by Kate Novak
Joel drew his sword and murmured a prayer to Finder. His blade flared like a torch. It wasn’t as bright as the light boy’s wand had been, but it was enough to see what was going on.
They were being attacked by five men. Four were common street thugs, undoubtedly hired just for the purpose of abducting Jas, but the fifth one wore the white and green robes of a priest of the evil god Iyachtu Xvim. Xvim’s priests were determined to recapture Jas and enslave her as their dark-stalker slave. One of the thugs, an especially large man, weighted with chains, had grabbed Jas about the middle, making it impossible for her to take to the air. The three remaining thugs, scrawnier than their companion, were dragging forward a large weighted net to throw over the winged woman.
Jas began screaming at the top of her lungs. Wise to the ways of the city, she wasn’t crying for help but screaming, “Fire!” over and over again.
If the priest were brought down, Joel realized, the others might abandon the attack. With his sword raised, the bard moved toward the servant of Xvim.
The priest held his hands out as if to ward off a blow. A dark shadow seeped from the priest’s palms; then two whirling black blades of mystic force shot out from his hands. The blades spun toward Joel.
The bard was able to ward off one of the blades with his sword. It sparked against the naked steel and then spun off into the darkness. The second spinning blade sliced Joel’s chest and left shoulder, then it, too, spun away. A horrible searing pain gripped Joel’s whole left side, but he didn’t let it deter him from his attack.
The evil priest raised his hands again, and Joel’s sword smashed into the bracer protecting the priest’s left wrist.
Joel dropped the tip of his blade and lunged. His sword sliced through the fabric of the priest’s robe and stabbed into the priest’s inner thigh. Blood gushed from the priest’s leg, and he screamed in pain. Before the bard could press his attack, two blades buried themselves in his flesh, one in his back, the other in his right arm, causing the bard to drop his sword.
Joel looked down at the weapon that had struck his arm. It was the same ebony blade that had whirled off into the night. As he watched wide-eyed, it dissolved like the mist. Blood seeped from Joel’s arm, staining his sleeve red. At least, Joel thought thankfully, there’s no sign of the other blade.
The priest of Xvim unslung a mace from his belt and whirled it over his head, charging toward Joel.
The bard leapt to one side and rolled away.
The priest of Xvim spun about. Keeping his back to a garden wall, his eyes searched for his foe.
Crouching in the shadow of a wall buttress across the street, Joel cast a hasty healing spell to stanch the bleeding from the wounds he’d received from the magical blades. Then he eyed his sword with irritation. It lay in the middle of the street, glowing from the spell he’d cast on its blade. Should he try to retrieve it, the weapon would only serve as a beacon, and he was by no means certain that he would be able to use it to any effect with the injury to his arm. Suddenly he was aware that Jas had stopped screaming. Joel scanned the street for any sign of his friend, but in the darkness, he could spot neither Jas nor her attackers. They’d disappeared into the mist. Emilo was nowhere to be seen. In fact, Joel couldn’t remember seeing Emilo at any time during the attack. Was the kender involved in the ambush? he wondered uneasily.
The question was moot at the moment. The priest of Xvim was still a problem. Joel considered casting a spell to heat the metal the priest carried, but he wasn’t certain if the foe wore any armor beyond the bracers about his wrists, and the handle of the priest’s mace was wooden. Then Joel’s eyes fell on the answer.
A thick clump of razorvine climbed up the wall behind the priest of Xvim; its tiny dark leaves glittered in the light cast by Joel’s sword. Not only could the bard use it to immobilize his enemy, but also if his enemy fought against it, its razor-sharp stems would do grave injury to any flesh they touched. Joel began whispering a prayer, motioning toward the vine with his fingers.
The vines twisted and writhed, then fell forward, wrapping themselves about the evil priest’s throat, his raised mace and arm, and his waist. The priest cried out in surprise and tried to pull away from the wall. Then he began to scream in pain from the lacerations inflicted by the vine’s stems.
Joel dashed out from his hiding place and scooped up his sword. In the next moment, he stood before his attacker with his sword pointed at the priest’s chest, ordering him, “Don’t move, or the vine will cut through your flesh to your bone. It’s called razorvine. You must be new to Sigil, or you would have known not to get anywhere near it. The citizens here grow it to keep thieves out.”
The priest of Xvim glared at Joel. “You are too late, priest of Finder,” he gloated. “We have captured the winged woman. My master’s servant will come to claim her, and she will be our dark stalker again.”
“Jas!” Joel shouted down the street in the direction he suspected the thugs had dragged his friend. “Emilo!” His voice echoed back in the fog, but there was no reply from the winged woman or the kender. “You’re going to tell me where they’re taking her,” Joel insisted, pressing the point of his sword ever so slightly against the priest’s belly.
“Never,” the priest replied.
“What’s going on here?” a voice bellowed.
Joel lowered his sword and turned around slowly. Five Hardheads, the city watch, stood behind him. One carried a wand enchanted with a light as bright as the sunshine.
“Officers, this man attacked me,” Joel declared, indicating the blood and scars from the freshly healed wounds on his arm and shoulder. “His henchmen have just abducted my friend, a woman named Jas. It’s imperative that I find her before they smuggle her out of the city, but he refuses to tell me where they have taken her.”
The highest-ranking Hardhead stepped forward. “Is that right?” he asked the priest of Iyachtu Xvim.
“The woman indentured herself as our servant,” the priest said. “We are only reclaiming our own.”
“That’s a lie. She’s a free woman,” Joel snapped. “You have no claim on her.”
“We’ll have to sort this out back at headquarters,” the Hardhead leader said. “Tell us where the woman is,” he ordered the priest, “so we can determine the truth of your stories.”
“I have no idea,” the priest said.
“He’s lying,” Joel growled.
“Mitchel, convince the witness to cooperate,” the Hardhead leader barked.
One of the other Hardheads stepped forward. The priest of Xvim glared disdainfully at the man. The Hardhead began a chant.
The Hardheads, Joel recalled, had special magical ways to make witnesses talk.
“You will never force me to speak!” the priest shouted. “I will die first!” With the fanaticism of the mad, he lunged forward until the razorvine about his neck sliced through his throat. Blood gushed down his robes, and he collapsed to his knees. He hung against the wall, still trapped by the razorvine.
Joel blanched in horror. Even the Hardheads looked shaken. The one casting the spell stuttered and grew silent. One of the younger Hardheads whispered an oath.
“You’ll have to come in with us, sir, and file a statement,” the Hardhead leader said.
“Please,” Joel asked, “couldn’t I search for my friend while the trail’s still fresh? I don’t think they could have taken her far. They have her wrapped in a net, so they’d have to go to ground nearby or risk being spotted by your patrols.”
The Hardhead leader considered Joel’s words briefly, then gave a sharp nod. “We’ll help you. Describe your friend and the men who abducted her,” he ordered.
“She’s got short, dark hair, brown eyes, and she stands about this high.” Joel held a hand up to his chin.
“Human, sir?” the Hardhead leader asked.
“Yes,” Joel said, “but she’s been cursed by the priests of this man’s god,” he explained, pointing to the priest of Xvim. “She has wings
, and her skin is covered with feathers.” The bard didn’t bother to mention that Jas had the wings long before the priests of Xvim had transformed her into a dark stalker. There was no sense in confusing the authorities. “The men were common street thugs in dirty clothes. Three were pretty scrawny, but the fourth was a big, muscular man with chains around his body. They must have taken her in that direction.” Joel pointed back up the street.
“You three go with this gentleman,” the Hardhead leader ordered three of his men. “Stop anyone coming in your direction. Ask if they’ve seen her. Mitchel and I will knock on doors.”
Joel hurried down the street with the three Hardheads. His heart was heavy with the fear that he might never find Jas. Anger gnawed at his gut as well, anger born of the suspicion that he and Jas had been set up for the ambush, anger now directed toward a certain suspicious kender by the name of Emilo.
Behind the Scenes
Somewhere in the outer planes a fire flared in an empty brazier. As brightly as it shone, it could not illuminate the edges of the dark hall where it burned.
In a high-pitched voice, a small creature cried out, “The summons! The summons!”
From the shadowy recesses, a deep, spiteful voice announced, “Finally the summons is issued.” Then the speaker commanded, “Fetch the makers and their infernal machine while I prepare for our journey.”
There was a scurry of activity in the great hall as servants hurried to carry out the order.
In a more brooding tone, the speaker murmured, “My scheme has taken root. How appropriate that it should happen at this very moment. Tymora has just lost one of her favorites, and soon she will lose far more. Tymora’s luck will be mine.”
Act One
Scene 2
Emilo had heard the priest of Iyachtu Xvim mutter the words that would extinguish the magic of the light boy’s wand. There was menace in those words, of that the kender had been sure. The moment the light went out, Emilo dodged to the side and crouched behind a wall buttress. Once Joel used his own magic to light the blade of his sword, the kender was able to observe the attack completely unnoticed. The attackers didn’t bother to search for him. They must have thought he’d run off, or else they didn’t really care if he was present, thinking he posed no threat to their activity.
Joel seemed to be holding his own in his fight with the robed attacker, but Jas was completely inundated by the four men intent on bringing her down with a net. She screamed, “Fire!” at the top of her lungs until the men unstoppered some sort of vial under her nose. Then she collapsed, unconscious. The men dragged her off in the net. There was no time to wait for Joel to finish his battle with the fifth man. Emilo took off after the four men abducting Jas.
The kender had no trouble trailing behind the men despite the dark and the fog. The man who had first grabbed Jas was wearing chains which weighted him down and made it impossible for Jas to fly off. The chains jangled as he walked, and he and his companions all complained about having to drag the weight of the small winged woman. Emilo simply followed the noise they made.
They turned into a small alley. Near the back of the alley, a short set of steps led down to a door in the rear of a building. One of the men unlocked the door with a key and opened it. The men dragged their prize into the building and closed the door behind them. Emilo slipped quietly down the steps and put his eye to the door’s keyhole.
A lantern lit the basement room beyond the door. The men hung the net holding Jas from a hook in the low ceiling. Then they sat in rickety chairs surrounding a rickety table and began playing cards. Emilo put his ear to the door.
“Perr’s going to be mad about losing his light,” one of the men commented. “Going to expect a bigger cut for leading the gullies our way.”
“Not our fault. Priest were the one what fizzed it out,” another man said. “Let him ask the priest.”
“That’s cold. And him just a boy. Still paying for the wand, he was,” the first man said.
“Think we should tell the priest to light it up for him again,” a third man said.
“Right,” the first man agreed.
“You ask him, Sladdy. I’m not asking that snake for anything more than the money he owes us. Got venom in his looks, he does.”
“What’s taking him, I wonder? Don’t suppose that berk with the sword did him in, do you?”
“Not a chance. Probably just got lost. No matter. His boss will be here soon. He’s the one with the purse anyway.”
“The priest’s boss is the one that gives me the shakes. There ain’t no man under that cloak. It’s a creature from the Lower Planes, if you ask me.”
“No one asked you.”
Emilo pulled away from the door. Even if Joel did defeat the priest, Jas wouldn’t be safe. Someone else would be coming for her, someone undoubtedly very nasty, unless Emilo could rescue her somehow. Hastily the kender concocted a plan.
He pounded hard on the door with the back of his dagger. “Sladdy, it’s Perr!” he called out in a fair imitation of the light boy’s voice. Then he ran back up the stairs and hid in the shadows.
A few moments later the door opened and one of the men poked his head out.
“Perr? Where are you, boy?”
“Hiding,” Emilo whispered in the darkness. “Hardheads caught the priest. Priest turned stag on ya; told ’em where to find you and the girl. Hardheads are coming this way. Better run while you can,” he called out. Then, keeping to the shadows, the kender ran back down to the end of the alley and ducked behind the corner.
Emilo had to wait only about a minute before all four men came tearing out of the alley and ran off down the street. He hurried back into the alley. It was a simple matter to pick the lock on the door and slip inside. The lantern was still lit.
Jas still hung inside the net on the hook. She was just regaining consciousness, stirring in the net and muttering some foul oaths.
“Jas, it’s me. Emilo. You’ve got to hold still so I can cut you out,” the kender hissed.
“Where are we?” the winged woman demanded as Emilo sliced at the rope net with his dagger.
“Somewhere we want to get far away from quickly,” Emilo answered.
“Why?” Jas asked.
“The priest’s boss is coming here. Someone from the Lower Planes, they said. Is that a bad place?”
Jas swore again. She grabbed Emilo’s dagger and began slicing at the net in frenzied fear. Emilo worked more methodically with his sword. In a few moments, Jas tumbled to the floor, landing on her tailbone. As Emilo helped her to her feet, she grimaced in pain. “There?” she asked, pointing to the door to the alley.
Emilo nodded. They rushed out the door and hurried up the steps. Once in the alley, Emilo froze. From the end of the alley, he heard a noise, a croaking, gulping sound. There was a whiff of sulfur in the air.
The kender dragged Jas farther down the alley and pulled her down to crouch beside him in the dark shadows.
They’d left the door to the kidnappers’ hideout open, so a faint beam of light streamed out into the alley. A giant creature stepped out of the mist into the beam of light. It resembled a frog, though it was several feet taller than a man. It made its way down the alley, walking on its hind legs. It seemed to be looking straight at them. Emilo felt a momentary sense of hopelessness steal over his heart.
Then the kender felt Jas stiffen and sway. Her eyes seemed to glow in the dark. She reached her hand out toward the frog creature. Fortunately the frog creature, standing in the light, could not see into the dark shadows where they were hiding. Nonetheless, its gaze seemed to exert some evil power over Jas. The kender slid his hands over the winged woman’s eyes.
Jas’s body shook, then relaxed.
The frog creature shimmered and shrank, then transformed itself into the shape of a man in a great cloak. In human form, it made its way down the steps, ducked through the door, and disappeared into the thugs’ hideout.
Emilo grabbed Jas’s hand and tugged
her to her feet. They ran past the door, down the alley, turned, and dashed down the street, around another corner, and down another street. They didn’t stop running until they bumped into a Hardhead with a light wand who ordered them to halt.
“I haven’t done anything,” Jas insisted. “I’m running from a creature who tried to abduct me.”
“I know, miss,” the Hardhead said. He blew a shrill whistle. A few moments later, Joel and two more Hardheads appeared out of the mist. Joel’s tunic was torn and stained with blood, and his flesh beneath was scarred but not bleeding. He looked sick with worry.
“Jas!” Joel cried out. “Thank goodness you’re all right.”
“Thank Emilo,” Jas corrected. “He helped me escape. If it hadn’t been for him, I’d be a prisoner in Gehenna right now.”
Joel looked surprised, but he was relieved to learn his suspicions about the kender had been incorrect. He broke into a smile and clapped a hand on the kender’s shoulder. “Thank you,” he said heartily.
“Show us where you left the thugs that captured you,” one of the Hardheads ordered.
“I don’t want to go back there!” Jas declared, her voice rising in pitch. “There’s a monster back there who wants to take me to Iyachtu Xvim.”
“Iyachtu Xvim?” the Hardhead asked, puzzled. The other two Hardheads rejoined the group in the street.
“Xvim’s an evil god of one of the Prime worlds,” Joel explained.
“The monster was an evil creature from the Lower Planes,” Emilo added with obvious relish. “It was a giant green and yellow frog, ten feet tall. It shape-changed into a man in a cloak.”
Joel bit his lower lip, wishing the kender were less extravagant with his description. No one is going to believe such an exaggeration, he thought.
But the Hardheads seemed to take the description in stride. “Hydroloth,” one said.
“Undoubtedly,” the leader replied.
“It’s in a basement room in the alley beside the alchemist’s guildhall,” Emilo offered helpfully.
