As he neared the outer gate, he saw the guards—both Ashmadai and ash zombie servants. Up high and in the distance, he spotted Sylora herself, standing at the tall tower’s balcony, which, now that he considered it more closely, looked much like the stub of a broken branch.
“Go on, go on!” Valindra said, coming up past him.
“Sylora,” Jestry said, pointing up to the distant sorceress.
“Go on, go on!” Valindra said again, then muttered something along the lines of “how beautiful, how beautiful,” though Jestry wasn’t sure if she was speaking of the complex, the tower, or Sylora herself. Nor did it matter, he realized, and he shook all thought of the lich’s foolish rambling away and hurried to follow her into the compound and to the tower.
The entrance to the tower lay inside the cave, where a short stone stairwell in the side wall went up just a few steps to a black stone door.
The door opened magically for Valindra and Jestry, who entered the ground floor of the tower to find it complete with a stocked hearth, obsidian chairs, and a small table covered in furs and set with utensils.
Jestry and Valindra continued up the sweeping stair along the far wall of the circular room, climbing up above the hearth to another black stone door. He pushed through the door to find another chamber, this one only partially furnished, but clearly intended as Sylora’s workshop. The stair continued to wind around the room, going between the outer and an inner wall. The stairs turned here, crossing high above the room, leading to an open trapdoor. The door fed into a low chamber not quite at the third level of the tower, a room that opened out onto the balcony.
Sylora nodded down at the pair through the trapdoor, and motioned for Valindra to go up and join her and for Jestry to follow the other stairwell to the third level, Sylora’s private quarters.
“Well done, Lady,” Valindra greeted, her tone wistful. “So much like the Hosttower, it seems!”
“That was not my intent,” Sylora assured her. She motioned to the scepter. “Did it lead you well?”
“Oh, well!” Valindra exclaimed. “By Greeth … Ark-lem! Ark-lem!”
“Do tell,” Sylora prompted, and she heaved a great sigh, understanding well the meandering direction Valindra’s story would surely take.
It took some time, but Valindra did at last recount Arunika’s words. Then, dismissed by Sylora, the lich wandered the ten feet out along the broken branch balcony to the railing. With a mischievous glance back at Sylora, Valindra lifted herself over the railing and leaped out, floating down to the courtyard below.
“And what did you think of our new friend, Arunika?” Sylora asked when Valindra had gone.
Jestry, crouched in a small hollow just above her, was not surprised at the confirmation that Sylora was aware of his presence. The top entrance of the hollow had been left open, after all, presumably so that he could eavesdrop on Sylora’s conversation with Valindra.
Jestry pushed aside a black cloth, which appeared as part of the balcony wall, and dropped down beside the sorceress.
“An interesting woman,” he said, trying hard to keep the true level of his fascination out of his voice.
Sylora’s grin told Jestry that she recognized his true feelings all too well.
“She is not beautiful,” Jestry blurted, and thought himself incredibly inane.
“Seduced by a smile and a word,” Sylora replied in a mocking tone that showed she was hardly upset. “Young men are such easy prey.”
“No, my lady, my love …”
“Hold your tongue, Jestry,” the sorceress interrupted. “Or I’ll tear it out and hold it for you.” Despite the threat, and the fact that Sylora certainly could carry through with it, the timbre of her voice once more conveyed that she was more amused, even pitying, than upset. She walked out to the balcony rail. “You’re fond of her, then?”
“No, I mean, I did not—”
“Afraid of her?”
“Surely not!” he protested.
“Good, because you might well be in Arunika’s company quite a bit in the coming days,” Sylora explained. “That’s suitable to you?”
“I do as Sylora asks,” the Ashmadai obediently replied. “I do not question Sylora Salm.”
“Good, because I tell you this now and do not disappoint me in it: When you’re with Arunika, you’re to do her bidding. If she tells you to kill yourself, do so.”
Jestry swallowed hard, but nodded. Such was his duty as an Ashmadai.
“And if she wishes to couple with you, do so,” Sylora added.
Jestry swallowed harder, and tried not to nod too eagerly.
“Do you understand?”
“I do …” he started to say, but he couldn’t quite get past the words and wound up shaking his head and admitting, “No.”
Sylora laughed and reached up to gently stroke his face. “My poor, innocent warrior,” she said. “Do you fear that such an act with the likes of Arunika would make me jealous?”
Jestry thought he should say no, and thought he should say he feared to do exactly that, and thought he should blurt out that Arunika was nowhere near as beautiful as Sylora, of course, and that he could only truly love Sylora.
He thought a lot of things.
He said nothing.
She danced away from him then, to the edge of the balcony, where she leaped over, her magical cloak transforming her into the likeness of a giant crow, and she glided down to the courtyard on widespread wings.
Jestry found himself drawn to the railing, watching the woman alight, watching her transform again into the woman he had come to adore.
This was not going well. Evidently Barrabus had underestimated the scouting network of the Neverwinter enclave.
“I have friends in the region,” Barrabus said.
“Shadovar?” Jelvus Grinch asked.
Barrabus smiled innocently. He knew the question to be rhetorical. “My friends are enemies of the zealots who have infiltrated Neverwinter Wood. Is that not enough for you?”
Around him, the crowd stirred.
“We have reason to believe that these zealots, who facilitated the cataclysm that destroyed this fair city, are now building the most awful of necromantic facilities not far from your intended city. They’ve raised an army of the dead culled from the bodies of that cataclysm, and will send them to the”—he paused and glanced around at the rebuilding efforts—“inadequate walls you have constructed.”
“We’re not simple farmers,” one woman protested. “All here can raise a weapon and raise it well!”
That brought a cheer from all around, and Jelvus Grinch, widely considered the first citizen of Neverwinter, couldn’t help but puff out his chest a bit.
But if Barrabus was impressed, he didn’t show it.
“You will be overrun,” he stated flatly. “And even if some of you manage to escape, or somehow hold out, those who are killed will return as zombies to battle from the ranks of your enemies.”
That stole some of their bluster, to be sure.
“And you offer your services?” Jelvus Grinch said, and Barrabus nodded. “And those of the Shadovar, your kinfolk?”
“I’m no Shadovar.”
“But you’re allied—”
“For the time, perhaps. That’s none of your affair.”
“We have no love for the Empire of Netheril!”
“And they care not for you, or for your city,” Barrabus answered. “They have no designs here that concern you.”
“The Netherese were known prominently in Neverwinter before the cataclysm,” Jelvus argued. “Some have said that a Netherese noble dominated the Lord of Neverwinter in the waning days—”
“That was a long time ago.”
“And now they don’t care?” the woman in the crowd yelled.
“It’s only been ten years!” Jelvus Grinch added.
“Have you seen any Netherese within your walls?” asked Barrabus. “Have they made any advances against any of your citizens?”
&n
bsp; “Then why are you here?” asked Jelvus. “If your allies have no designs on Neverwinter, then why do they care at all?”
“My allies battle the zealots—you know this. If the zealots overrun Neverwinter”—he turned to speak to all of the gathering—“if you are all slain that you might join the zealots’ undead army, then the struggle of the Shadovar in Neverwinter Wood becomes all the more difficult.”
“Allies of necessity, then?” Jelvus Grinch reasoned when the murmurs had died away.
Barrabus shrugged noncommittally. “If allies at all,” he said, again with little conviction. “I am here to warn you of the possibility of an assault. I offer my services as scout, and my blades in the battle should it come, nothing more, nothing less.”
“Can ye fight, then?” one man called from behind.
Barrabus’s smile was anything but innocent. It was a look he had perfected as a child in Calimport, an expression of confidence unshakable and unnerving. There was no boast, no answer, because there needed to be none.
Jelvus Grinch surely knew the truth, simply in looking at Barrabus’s face.
“I cannot condone an alliance with the Shadovar,” he said.
“But you won’t discourage it,” Barrabus reasoned from his tone. “And I am not Shadovar.”
“Your help would be … appreciated.”
Barrabus nodded and Jelvus broke up the gathering with a call for all to get to work shoring up the meager walls surrounding their rebuilding efforts.
“You really think the undead will come?” Jelvus Grinch quietly asked Barrabus as the pair walked off alone.
“Likely. The zealots attempted a second cataclysm.”
Jelvus Grinch stopped walking and sucked in his breath.
“It was foiled and the volcano put back in its place, by all accounts,” Barrabus assured him. “I doubt you have to fear another eruption.”
Jelvus Grinch looked at him skeptically.
“If I thought differently, would I be here?” Barrabus said, and when that didn’t seem to relax Jelvus, Barrabus the Gray added, “I was here for the first explosion, you know.”
“When Neverwinter was destroyed?” Jelvus Grinch balked. “There were no survivors.”
“There were a few,” Barrabus replied. “The lucky, the quick, and the clever—or, more likely, those who were all three.”
“You were here? When the ash fell and the lava—”
“When the gray flow rampaged through Neverwinter and to the sea, taking almost everything with it. I was there.” He pointed to the Winged Wyvern Bridge. “I watched the river run with molten stone and ash, and bodies. So many bodies.”
“I shouldn’t believe you,” Jelvus Grinch said. “But I find I do.”
“I have better things to do than lie to the likes of you over such an unimportant piece of trivia.”
Jelvus nodded and bowed.
“There’s one more thing,” Barrabus said. “There’s an elf about, a drow of some renown. His name is Drizzt—”
“Do’Urden,” Jelvus finished.
“You know of him,” said Barrabus. “You know him personally?”
“He escorted a caravan here some months ago,” Jelvus answered. “He and a dwarf—Bonnego Battleaxe of the Adbar Battleaxes. Would that he had stayed in these dark times! And we asked, do not doubt. To have the likes of Drizzt Do’Urden beside us now would serve us greatly should the attack you expect come to pass.”
Barrabus nodded and sighed more deeply than he should have. So, the vision he had seen in Sylora’s scrying pool had been accurate, and Drizzt Do’Urden was alive and well and in the North.
“What is it?” Jelvus Grinch asked, drawing him from his thoughts. “Do you know of Drizzt?”
“I do. A long time ago …” His voice trailed off. “I would ask you, as a favor, as a sign of our budding alliance, that you would inform me if Drizzt is seen anywhere near Neverwinter.”
Now Jelvus Grinch looked at him suspiciously, so Barrabus added, “I do loathe most drow elves, and would hate to kill him by mistake.”
That seemed to satisfy the man. Barrabus gave a quick salute and went out from Neverwinter’s gate to see what he could learn.
THAT GUARD RECOGNIZED ME,” DAHLIA WHISPERED TO DRIZZT as they moved into Luskan, past the guards at the gate, all of whom continued to stare at the departing elf. One in particular wore an expression that indeed seemed more than simple lust.
“Did he? Or are you not simply a remarkable sight?” Drizzt replied. “Perhaps he recognized me.”
“If he had recognized you, it would have been of no consequence, I’m sure,” Dahlia said. “I’ve warned you I’m not welcome in Luskan.”
“Yet you did not disguise yourself.”
“My troubles here are ten years old.”
“Yet you fear being recognized.”
“Fear it? Or welcome it?”
“Perhaps you would someday deign to tell me why you expect trouble here in Luskan,” Drizzt said. “I’m curious why you’re so unwelcome here.”
“I killed a high captain,” Dahlia admitted, almost flippantly. “Borlann the Crow. Ten years ago, right before I set out with Jarlaxle and Athrogate for the mines of Gauntlgrym, I killed him.”
Drizzt couldn’t help but smile.
“Would you like to know why I killed him?” she asked.
“Does it matter?”
“Does it matter to you?”
Drizzt shook his head, and though he was a bit taken aback by the level of his disinterest over the reasons and by his instinctive sense of callousness toward anyone who would have taken the mantle of Ship Rethnor, he found he could only smile wider. “If I had my way nearly a century ago, Borlann’s father would never have been conceived, and neither he.”
“You’ve had dealings with the House of Rethnor as well, I see.”
“Kensidan, Borlann’s grandfather, murdered a dear friend of mine when Ship Rethnor and the other high captains seized power in Luskan and condemned the city to the sorry state we see today. I had no choice but to flee, though I dearly wanted to pay Kensidan back for his efforts.”
“Then perhaps I’ve settled your debt to the family of this Kensidan.”
“Only if one believes in generational responsibility, and I don’t. I know nothing of Borlann.”
“He was a high captain,” Dahlia answered. “What more is there to know? He dealt death and misery on a daily basis, and often to those undeserving.”
“I need no justification from you. Do you need it from me?”
Dahlia spat on the ground.
Drizzt stared after her as she walked to the side of the road, entering an alleyway. She pulled a small coffer from her backpack and flipped open the lid. Drizzt eased just a bit closer, and glanced both ways along the street to make sure no one paid them too much heed. From this angle, he could see the coffer was comprised of multiple compartments, one of which Dahlia had opened. She pinched the powdery ingredients within and snapped her fingers in front of her face, sending the puff of brown powder all around her.
Then she reached into a different section of the coffer and came back with a silvery hair pick. She pulled off her hat and turned her back to Drizzt, bending low and away from him and flipping her black and red braid forward.
When she came back up and turned around, Drizzt sucked in his breath. Dahlia’s woad was gone, with not a blemish marring her perfect skin. And her hair, still that remarkable black and red, was fashioned in a completely different cut, short and stylish with a sharp part, hair angling down in front to almost cover her left eye.
She closed the coffer and tucked it into her pack, put her leather hat back on her head, and walked over to Drizzt.
“Do you like it?” she asked, and the attempt at vanity from Dahlia was as jarring to the drow as the abrupt change in her looks. Her entire appearance seemed softer, less aggressive and threatening.
He considered her question, and realized that he had no easy answer. The Dahlia he had k
nown was not unattractive. Her fighting prowess, the danger of her, her ability to convey her hatred of the high captains by spitting on the road—he couldn’t help but be intrigued. But this other side—even her posture seemed somehow more feminine to him—reminded him of the warmth he’d once known—more conventional, perhaps, but no less attractive. Perhaps the greatest tease of all was the hint that Dahlia could be tamed.
Or could she?
Would Drizzt even want to?
“I accept your silence as compliment enough,” she teased, starting away.
“If you could so easily disguise yourself then why didn’t you do it before we entered Luskan?” Drizzt asked.
Dahlia replied with a wicked grin.
“It’s not as much fun if it isn’t as dangerous,” Drizzt answered for her.
“When there’s conviction behind your complaining, perhaps then I’ll listen more attentively, Drizzt Do’Urden,” Dahlia replied. “For now, just accept that I understand the truth of your sentiments and will welcome your blades when trouble finds us.”
“You’re walking with purpose,” Drizzt said, thinking it wise to change the subject. “Pray tell where you’re leading me.”
“Pray tell me why you brought me here. My course would’ve been south, to Neverwinter Wood, remember?”
“There are questions I need to answer first.”
“To see if Jarlaxle survived,” Dahlia replied, catching Drizzt by such surprise that he stopped walking, and had to scramble to catch up.
“It’s obvious,” she said when he neared. “Your affection for him, I mean.”
“He is helpful,” was all Drizzt would admit.
“He is dead,” Dahlia said. “We both saw him fall, and witnessed the explosive fury of the primordial right behind.”
Drizzt wasn’t sure of that, of course, since he’d known Jarlaxle as the ultimate survivor of many seemingly impossible escapes, but he could only shrug against Dahlia’s assertion.
“I would know, too, of the power of Bregan D’aerthe in Luskan,” he said.
“Diminished,” Dahlia replied without hesitation. “It had weakened considerably those ten years ago, and it’s unlikely the drow have expanded once more in the City of Sails. What’s left here for them?”
Neverwinter: Neverwinter Saga, Book II Page 7
