Dawnbringer: A Forgotten Realms Novel

by Henderson, Samantha

“And I do,” said the vampire.

  “And you do.”

  There was another long, deceptively lazy pause.

  “What interest have I in your petty squabbles, merchantman? Let Jadaren Hold stand for all eternity, if the gods will let it. I have little interest in what lies within.”

  “Perhaps. But I have a sweeter bargain to offer you.”

  What he thought of as the voice within him welled up, silently, and became a presence, reaching out to the mind of the vampire before him.

  Listen. Listen to what he says. He saw her blink, then frown, and he knew she had heard.

  “How long has it been since the Sanctuary of Shadrun-of-the-Snows made it its duty to protect travelers? How long has it interfered with your affairs, right on your borders?”

  Her face tightened, and his heart leaped at the confirmation that he was right. The gamble paid off. The existence of the sanctuary was a sore spot for her.

  “That hovel in the mountains, with its chanting monks and caravans of stinking donkeys? I have no interest in it whatsoever.”

  “With all due respect, my lady Saestra,” said Sanwar, “you are lying.”

  Her entire body stilled, and he could feel the cold emanating from her very bones. The vampire trio behind her froze as well. Ponta did nothing whatsoever.

  “That’s enough lip from you,” snarled the human fighter to Saestra’s left. He shifted the mace and lashed out at Sanwar, a blow meant to drop him.

  Time seemed to slow to a torturous crawl. Sanwar watched with dispassionate interest as the weapon approached his face. He had no time to duck, and he knew he should be afraid, horrified—but he could summon no emotion.

  Like an afterimage, something flashed behind his eyes—a geometrical figure drawn in deep purple. In an instant it was gone, and he felt invisible hands seizing his shoulders and pulling him aside so that the mace missed him. The fighter, overbalanced, sprawled on the floor.

  Time snapped back into place, and Sanwar staggered, dizzy.

  The brute swore and attempted to get up, but the halfling Ponta slipped past Sanwar as neatly as a cat and kicked him deftly under the chin. He grunted and fell back down. The mace clattered from his hand and didn’t move again.

  Saestra turned her attention back to Sanwar as if nothing had happened.

  “Did I just hear you call me a liar, Master Beguine?” she said lightly.

  His back hurt with the effort of facing her. “Yes, my lady,” he said, schooling his face to look unafraid. “My regrets, but I did.”

  She laughed. “You are quite right. I did lie. I care very much about Shadrun-of-the-Snows and its place on my borders and its interference with my people.”

  He stifled the impulse to lick his lips. “I can give you the key to Shadrun-of-the-Snows, my lady. It lies within Jadaren Hold.”

  Sanwar couldn’t determine when he began to realize that the loci of the warding that must lie within the Hold had something to do with the Power that pulsed beneath the seemingly placid surface of the sanctuary. But his inner instinct told him he must bring one to the other and—

  Burst the bond of my prison.

  Before the cold eyes of Saestra he almost frowned, distracted. Where had that thought come from? How did he know one was related to the other? Whose prison?

  Something coiled within his mind touched his jumbled thoughts, and they quieted. His books and studies had told him along the way. One did not always know where one’s fragments of knowledge came from.

  Saestra tilted her head, considering him. “Interesting,” she remarked. “I wonder if you are lying in your turn.”

  “I might be,” he said. “It would be risky.”

  “It would indeed,” said Saestra. “But then, a promising investment is worth some risk, as we both know.”

  Saestra turned her head toward the shadows behind her. “Come,” she commanded.

  There was another pale glimmer in the darkness, and a tall figure drifted toward her. It was a woman, with the pale mien of a vampire and clothing that would not look out of place aboard a ship. She wore her hair braided tightly at the back of her neck and a terrible scar twisted her face out of true, a slash that started at the corner of her left eye and ended at her lip. On a human, the scar would have been a vivid pink. On her, it was white as a salamander’s underbelly.

  She turned her burning eyes on Sanwar, and now he knew true fear. He wanted to run even though every fiber of him knew he had no chance of escaping a predator like this.

  But then those disembodied hands touched his shoulders, very lightly, and he managed to face her without flinching back.

  “Helgre has little love for the Jadarens,” said Saestra. “And she possesses a certain familiarity with the woods around the Hold.” Her mouth quirked, as if she had remembered an old joke.

  Looking at those eyes, rimed with frozen flame, Sanwar thought perhaps Helgre had little love for the Beguines as well.

  The interview over, Saestra waited until her preternatural instincts told her the merchant was halfway back to his ship. The human fighter who had tried to discipline Sanwar still lay on his back, blinking stupidly at the rafters. Followed by her three ladies, who seemed to move without taking a step, Saestra drifted to him and looked down.

  “What is your name?” she said gently.

  He struggled to answer, and the halfling answered for him. “Holba, my lady.”

  Saestra nodded. “Well, Holba,” she said, “I don’t allow my men to attack my guests unless I order it. I would teach you this lesson myself, but I haven’t the time, so I’m afraid you will not be able to use this knowledge at a later date. Ladies, if you would oblige?”

  She made another elegant gesture and floated away, accompanied by Ponta and Helgre. Shrieks rang out behind her, heralding the short-lived education of Master Holba.

  Just short of the relative safety of the ship, Sanwar heard the screams and shuddered.

  JADAREN HOLD

  1600 DR—THE YEAR OF UNSEEN ENEMIES

  Lakini wondered if Lusk would pine after Shadrun-of-the-Snows, but he seemed to be as comfortable at Jadaren Hold as anywhere. She did notice he always seemed to be watching and waiting for something to happen—an impatient edginess she had never before associated with him.

  The mountain in which the Hold was rooted was covered in primal forests, and the devas returned to their old habit of patrolling together. Lakini reflected upon the sanctuary’s red-haired messenger and her determination to track Lakini down, and discovered that all in all she was content.

  Her peace was shattered the day a delegation from a halfling merchant family from Waterdeep arrived to negotiate an exclusive contract for the silk trade to High Imaskar.

  Lakini and Lusk were returning from patrol at dusk. They entered through the common passages at the base of the Hold that opened into enormous storage chambers, stables, and public gathering areas. The members of the newly arrived Waterdeep delegation were grouped together loosely, unpacking their animals and checking their goods. Lakini caught a glimpse of folds of deep, smoky blue silk, and greens shot with threads of gold—gifts to encourage the Jadarens’ permission to use long-established routes. There was a bustle of stable hands converging on the delegation to unbridle and tend their animals, and a braying of donkeys and shouting of orders. Through careful maneuvering, Lakini and Lusk made it through the crowd without incident.

  Toward the rear of the caverns, a halfling richly dressed in crimson silk was speaking to the stable master. As they approached, the halfling made an elaborate bow and hurried back to his delegation. As he passed them, nodding distractedly and politely, the close quarters made the hem of his silk robe lap over Lusk’s boot.

  Lusk snarled and spun around to face him, half drawing his dagger. Folk sometimes joked about Lusk’s facial markings looking like a jungle cat’s, just as they said Lakini’s looked like a mask, but at that moment he looked truly tigerish.

  The folk around them quieted and stared, and Lak
ini stared herself, too startled to react at first. The halfling looked puzzled, then, as it became clear the deva’s wrath was directed at him, alarmed. He muttered an apology and bowed low to the ground. Lusk looked at his defenseless back as if he’d like to smash the hapless halfling’s spine into the ground.

  Truly alarmed, Lakini reached for Lusk’s arm. He jerked under her touch and turned on her, his teeth bared. Still she pulled him away, toward the back passages and away from the harmless creature that had somehow offended him so deeply.

  With a snarl of disgust, he sheathed the dagger, shrugged her hand off, and walked away. She trotted after him as a murmur swelled to fill the silence of his wake. The halfling, no doubt thinking he’d had a narrow escape from retribution for some fancied offense, scurried off to rejoin his party.

  Halfway up the slope of the corridor, Lusk slowed his pace to let Lakini catch up. Still flushed with anger, he gave her a sheepish look.

  “I probably shouldn’t have done that, but the filthy thing touched me. I don’t like halflings overly much.”

  He said it as if it were natural to treat the race like toadfolk, defiling all they touched, and as if she’d understand and agree.

  She wondered if she would have been able to react in time to stop him if he had tried to kill the halfling. In that first red moment, that had certainly been his intent. If he’d been alone, she suspected, he probably would have done it.

  If he’d been alone …

  Pieces fell together like a puzzle: the halflings murdered in the woods near Shadrun, and Lusk’s indifference; the gutted body of a halfling thief outside an inn in Cormyr; a dozen, a hundred tiny things Lusk had said over the years, mildly disconcerting in themselves but taken together and considered impartially, deeply disturbing.

  “It was you.” Lakini’s voice caught in her throat like a physical thing. She halted in the dark corridor, and Lusk turned back to her. “The halflings in the forest outside Shadrun. The little thief butchered in the alley. It was you the whole time.”

  She wanted him to frown at her, to deny it, to call her ridiculous, deluded, even traitorous to make such an accusation. But instead he shifted, leaned against the wall, and folded his arms, smiling at her.

  She was horrified. “You’re a deva. We abjure evil and fight for the good. How could you do such things?” Her voice felt ragged, torn by the sharp lump in her throat.

  “What good do we fight for?” Lusk retorted. He pointed down the corridor, where the sound of commerce mumbled through the stone walls. “Down there they buy and sell the same goods and lands, back and forth, back and forth. All a hopeless, unrelenting cycle. It doesn’t mean anything. Such as you and I are born, over and again, into this world of petty bickering and squabbling after gold, land, and power. Nothing changes and nothing will. Where’s the good in that?”

  His raw anger seemed as deadly as his half-drawn dagger a few minutes before, ready to plunge into the hapless merchant.

  “You’re arguing against our nature,” she retorted. “And why hate the halfling? Enough to do what you did in the forest at Shadrun, so near a holy place …” Suddenly her knees felt like water. She felt as if she was going to be sick.

  “Halflings are filthy vermin,” said Lusk. “You don’t know, Lakini. You don’t know what they are. Not a one of them is worth saving. Listen, Cserhelm—”

  He took her arm and pulled her to him. She was helpless to do anything but listen. The world had changed, with the dreadful knowledge that Lusk had done these things—could even consider doing these things. She wasn’t ready to live in this new world yet.

  “Infection exists in this world,” he whispered roughly, his lips to her ear, his breath hot on her skin. “If a body is not to die, it might fight off its infections. Some you cannot reason away. Some you must cut from your flesh.”

  He released her arm, and she didn’t realize until the blood rushed back into it how tight his grip had been.

  “If you don’t realize our nature is to carve away evil like a cancer from the body, then learn it now. We destroyed the cancers in Wolfhelm. You should remember that lesson better.”

  The werewolves, more of them, five or six at least, had struck at the south gate this time. Lakini beheaded two and watched two boys and a very fierce and muscular girl, who usually was stationed behind the baker’s counter kneading the dough, deal with the rest. The Wolfshelm youth acquitted themselves well, but Lakini was uneasy. These werewolves were small and weak, little more than cubs, and she suspected the south gate assault might be more a distraction than an attack. Beckoning the sturdy baker girl to follow her, she told the rest to watch the gate and keep alert. Then she trotted around the village wall, weapons at the ready.

  She was right. The previous attack was a feint, and fierce, full-grown wolves were leaping the wall that had seemed so secure. She impaled one, and the girl clubbed another’s head to a pulp, but many slipped between them and into the streets of the town. Lakini ran down the main thoroughfare, beating on doors and bellowing a warning, the baker girl on her heels, and presently she heard the bell of Chauntea’s temple peal a warning, echoed by the shouts of the villagers in their houses steeling themselves to fight. All down the streets of Wolfshelm, firelight, torchlight, and witchlight glowed between the slats of the windows and through the chinks in the doors. The werewolves that prowled through the lanes and alleys, expecting easy prey, were met with a fierce and desperate resistance.

  Lakini heard the scream of a donkey and ran through the maze of streets to the smithy. An amber witchlight shone at the apex of the building, and by its glow she saw Rosebud flailing with a wicked determination at two werewolves that were circling her. She spun about, lashing at one, then at the other, as they tried to sneak in under her guard. One almost managed to grab her leg, but she evaded it and landed a hoof square in its gut. Yipping in pain, the lycanthrope was bowled head over heels. But, recovering quickly, it sprang to its feet and returned to the attack, growling fiercely.

  It saw Lakini too late, and a quick slash of her blade liberated its head from its shoulders.

  She looked back to the donkey and saw what she hadn’t before: a figure lying on the ground, limp as a bundle of rags. The remaining werewolf made a lunge for it, and Rosebud let out a fearsome bray and circled the body, kicking madly. She was tiring rapidly, however, her reactions slower and slower. Lakini knew it was only a matter of time before the beast would overcome Rosebud and rend her limb from limb.

  Lakini stooped and grabbed a handful of dirt, the thick, gravelly clay that defined Wolfshelm’s streets. Waiting until the donkey was clear, she hurled the dirt at the werewolf. The big clot landed hard on the side of its face.

  The thing snarled and turned on her, its great yellow eyes full of hate. Standing upright, it might have come as high as her chin, but it crouched, its long, muscular arms outstretched and tipped with wicked claws. A charnel smell rolled off it, befouling the air.

  It rubbed at its face and then looked at its hand, rubbing grains of dirt between its foreclaws. It charged her, arms reaching for her like the mandibles of a spider. Rosebud aimed a final kick at the thing, but she was tired and the blow was weak, missing its mark.

  Lakini let the creature charge. At the last moment, when she could smell its carrion-befouled breath, she lifted her sword, still streaked with the other werewolf’s blood, braced herself, and let it impale itself on her weapon.

  A mouthful of teeth snarled at her, and its spittle flicked her face. It lashed at her, and one of the claws hooked into her tunic, tearing the fabric. She forced the blade in deeper. The beast shuddered and jerked away from her with a force that almost tore the sword from her fingers, but it was the werewolf’s dying spasm, and it slid to the ground.

  The supine figure stirred, moaning, and Lakini kneeled next to it. It was the smith, who still clutched the hammer he’d seized to defend himself. With a dreadful feeling of foreboding, Lakini squeezed her hand shut and opened it again, causing a
small ball of light to appear on her palm. By its pallid light the man looked as pale as the undead.

  “You’ve been hurt,” she said. It wasn’t a question but a statement. “Show me.”

  Shaking, the smith held out his forearm. It was already swollen, and a dreadful purple color. The tattered flesh around the punctures had turned black.

  “I wasn’t so lucky this time,” said Jonhan Smith, and tried to smile.

  Lakini stared up into Lusk’s eyes a long moment. Then she pushed him, sudden and hard, both hands on his shoulders. Startled, he stumbled back into the wall.

  “Stay away from me,” she said, shaking with anger. “You are an abomination.”

  Without turning to see what he did, she ran down the corridor, through the crowded common rooms, past the startled guards, and up the wild paths of the mountains where the clean air could scour and cleanse her.

  In the woods outside Jadaren Hold, a human captain of the guard stood beside a vampire with a disfiguring scar. The captain wondered how his employer had ever, ever thought this might be a good idea.

  Still, the creature made no threatening gesture toward him and his men, and she kept the disorganized-appearing mob she’d brought with her in order.

  She stirred against his shoulder, and he tensed. She pointed at the monolith that loomed in the darkening sky before them, orange flickers of campfires springing into life at its base. A little more than halfway up its side, a tongue of green flame shot forth and faded.

  “Soon,” whispered Helgre in her beautiful voice that had never sung. “Very soon now.”

  NONTHAL, TURMISH

  1600 DR—THE YEAR OF UNSEEN ENEMIES

  Sanwar sat cross-legged in the middle of his private study. The room was close and hot, and he was stripped to the waist. Sweat trickled down his back and spotted the floor, but he made no move.