Blackstaff

by Steven E. Schend

  Tsarra found herself unable to look away from the young man who locked eyes with her rather than submit to Khelben’s interrogation. While his loose-necked crimson shirt and black leather breeches still bore the marks and stains of a few recent battles, the man himself was clean and whole, his dark brown hair pulled back in a tight ponytail. His youngish face had a close-trimmed full beard. Tsarra was distracted by his eyes—slate gray with highlights of blue, like eclipsed marble—until he averted them to look at and offer a palm toward Nameless, who had been growling loudly.

  The tressym sniffed warily, his head bobbing to get a better range of scent about the man, and Tsarra felt her familiar’s reactions—an odd stream of emotions from surprise, hatred, curiosity, disgust, amusement, jealousy, contempt, and confusion. Nameless began meowing loudly, which Tsarra understood as “Stinks of longdeadnots and marsh and stone. Didn’t smell that before through sparksmell and fearstink. Like his scent, and he knows not to risk scratching my ears. He still goodforyou matefriend maybe? He huntercurious but also smellfury and wantflightfight like me.”

  Tsarra picked up her scimitar and said, “He says you smell of undead, and that makes me distrust you immediately. Despite your open approach toward him, my friend knows you’re furious at something and really want to be elsewhere.”

  “Undead, you say? Thank you, Nameless, for that information.” Khelben’s irritation was obvious in his snapped query. “Well, boy? Can you account for your actions? Tell us for whom you work.” His voice never wavered, but Tsarra could feel his strength waning, and his breathing grew labored.

  The man’s eyes widened, and he looked frantically at Tsarra, Khelben, and Sandrew, mouthing words mutely. He grimaced and seemed to scream, but no sound came from him other than the rustle and creak of clothing and the rush of air from his mouth.

  Sandrew’s hands glowed as he touched the man on the throat, but an attempt to speak after that only produced a rasp. Sandrew looked down and said, “I’m afraid we can learn precious little, Blackstaff. He has been rendered mute by the forces that turned him against his own church.”

  Tsarra asked, “So he’s a lay worshiper of Oghma?”

  “Aye, lass,” Sandrew said. “This is Raegar Stoneblade. He first came to us as a stonecutter during the Font’s construction, but he has since joined us as a devout worshiper as well.”

  Khelben asked, “Is that why he’s been spying on my tower and students?”

  Sandrew’s eyes widened, and he spun toward Raegar. “Not by my authority, Blackstaff. Betimes the Font will have seekers pry secrets and lore from those unwilling to share openly, but you and yours have always been friends to us. It appears I have not been as diligent as I might have been over loremasters who may have approved such mischief. Is that the case, Raegar?”

  Raegar nodded and gesticulated wildly, trying to pantomime his point, but Khelben began a violent coughing fit, and his shaking reopened his wound. Blood gushed over the floor, and Tsarra felt Khelben weaken, then go silent. His eyes fluttered and closed.

  “Khelben?” she asked, kneeling in the blood and putting her hand to his neck to find no heartbeat beneath her hand. Khelben!

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  29-30 Uktar, the Year of Lightning Storms

  (1374 DR)

  Tsarra’s heart leaped into her throat as she whispered once more, “Khelben? You can’t be—”

  Khelben’s eyes snapped open, and his body shook with a violent spasm of coughs. More blood poured onto the floor, but silver flames flickered to life and seared the wound shut once more, an acrid stream of smoke rising from Khelben’s shattered hip.

  Eltargrim’s Bones, this hurts. Khelben looked at Tsarra with eyes drained of energy, before he said, “Out of time. We need him and what he knows.” Khelben’s eyes closed for a moment, and Tsarra felt him scream angrily inside, though that emotion never made it to his face. “Tsarra, take him to the tower. Ask my wife to attend to the boy’s tongue. She should mindspider him if she has to, but I hope it won’t come to that.”

  Raegar clenched his jaw, and his knuckles whitened but he relaxed when Nameless growled at him and drew attention to him. He nodded to Khelben and Sandrew, but Tsarra noticed his face still blanched.

  “You’ll not punish him, Blackstaff? I sense he has been a pawn and deserves no reprimand beyond helping right what he has wronged,” Sandrew said. “I cannot openly acknowledge what he does for my church, but I can vow that his heart is a good one and his skills and actions do not overshadow that.”

  “Punishment is far from my mind, Sandrew,” Khelben gasped, “save to let him help us visit it upon the one who wronged all of us. Now, time is short for us all. We must away.”

  “Are you certain you don’t want healing?”

  “Too many gods’ magic affects me already to accept one more right now, Lorekeeper. I have my own remedies, thank you. There’s no need to carry me, either of you.” Khelben glared at both Tsarra and Raegar who had moved to either side of him. He sent to Tsarra, Back away, as both of us can’t use this magic and I need you to be my hands for a while. Look to your intuition for guidance, in case I don’t respond for a while.

  Khelben’s blue eyes lit up with silver and gold as he whispered a spell. Gold shimmered in the necklace he wore, a tiny tapered bottle. As he finished, his form dissolved into a golden mist, shrank, and seeped into the bottle. A necklace alone rested on the bloodstained marble floor. Tsarra and more than a few onlookers gasped with his disappearance.

  Sandrew the Wise smiled and said, “An Anyllan’s bottle. I read about these ancient elven devices, but I never thought I’d see one that still worked. Khelben should be safe to heal slowly inside there.”

  Tsarra stooped to pick up the necklace off the floor and place it around her own neck. She sent out tentatively, Khelben?

  Khelben’s mental voice wavered. Need sleep to save my energy. Go to the tower, and both of you talk to Syndra. She knows what’s to be done, and Raegar knows who is to blame. Be respectful, but hurry. Know I am sorry for this burden forced upon you. I can no longer carry it alone.

  Tsarra flinched despite herself, but with the visions and what she’d learned in the past day, she knew why they had to face the undead. Stop worrying. You’ve trained me well enough. Sleep and I’ll do what I can in the meantime.

  “You three and Khelben brought much trouble to my temple.” Sandrew the Wise looked sternly at all of them. “I trust that when we meet again that I may have a suitable explanation for this disruption—” he glanced upward toward Oghma’s empty fist, deprived of its scroll—“and desecration.”

  On that last word, Raegar’s shoulders slumped, and he knelt by the priest, bowing his head for forgiveness. Sandrew’s hand hesitated but settled on the man’s head in benediction.

  Tsarra, Raegar, and Sandrew realized the circle of angry people had pressed close around them, just outside the glowing hemisphere set by the priest.

  “Khelben insists on utmost speed, but I’m afraid your priests don’t look all to willing to let us go quickly.”

  “What else would you expect, girl?” Sandrew said. “There are many here who wish the guards would clap you both in irons. Run now and get you away so I may cool tempers, but vow before Oghma that you will return and explain all this.”

  “What little I know, Lorekeeper, I’ll share with you. I promise that everything you saw today leads to the betterment of the Realms.”

  Tsarra turned to Raegar, and said, “You are going ahead of me, and we’re running at best pace to Blackstaff Tower. Try to lose me, and my familiar will be the first to correct you, followed by my spells or arrows.” Tsarra jerked her thumb up at Nameless, who bared his teeth.

  Raegar rolled his eyes and nodded. The three of them darted through the glowing energy. Their movement startled most from their path, and they flew or ran through the temple doors and into the streets.

  Behind them, Sandrew cleared his throat and snapped his fingers both to dispel the sound-
blocking hemisphere and to draw the attention of the crowd. “Oghma wills their secrets remain their own for now, brethren. Return to your lore and lives, and the Binder may or may not reveal what enigmas he sees fit.” He whispered to himself, “And may what magic you work be as good as you claim.…”

  “That should do it. What say you now, handsome rogue?” Laeral’s merry eyes looked into Raegar’s from beneath a heavy silver helm, its forehead adorned with three stripes of sapphires.

  Raegar knew whatever that lich had done bound him no longer. He inhaled, and “Thank you” sounded in both his head and throat. He smiled broadly and stretched his arms and shoulders.

  “I don’t know what you did.” Raegar took the heavy helm from his brow and set it on the sidetable next to him. “I don’t feel anything crawling around inside my head any more. Thank you, ladies, for that.”

  “Enough. Under whose control were you? Answer me, Stoneblade!” Tsarra had been pacing the room and snapped her head around. Raegar watched the arc of auburn curls more than the angry look on her face.

  “I never got a name,” Raegar said, and Tsarra growled in anger, pacing around the chairs in which he and Laeral sat. Raegar watched her a moment then looked back at Laeral when he said, “By the gods. How anyone can get anything accomplished around so much distracting beauty is beyond me.”

  Raegar smiled, winking at Laeral in the opposite chair but watching Tsarra for her reactions. He had never been so close to anyone of Blackstaff Tower in either his recent missions nor in all his years in the City of Splendors. Still, he knew enough about them to expect what would happen next. For his part, he bent over in the chair to touch his toes and stretch out his torso and back.

  As he anticipated, he rose from the chair to find the point of a glimmering scimitar near his throat. As he smiled and felt a rush of excitement go through him, Raegar heard a complicated growl come from the tressym, who lay nestled among a pile of books on a high shelf over the door frame. Tsarra’s gaze snapped to him and she uttered a similar tangle of purrs and growls. The conversation between the woman and her familiar continued for a few moments until Raegar cleared his throat, earning a glare from Tsarra. He raised his hands slowly, smiling his most sincere smile, and tried to push the point of the blade away from his neck by his fingertips.

  “Ahem. If I’m to duel, I’ll need to borrow a blade, milady.” Raegar wasn’t sure how she would react to his teasing, but he hoped Laeral might aid him.

  Laeral smirked as she set down her helm and stood. “Tsarra, please. You’ll hardly get the lad to answer any questions that way. Besides, Nameless tends to be right about a great many things, whether you want to acknowledge that or not.” Laeral’s fingers danced and a small silverfish appeared to swim upwards through the air and into the black tom’s claws.

  “This is not the time for jokes, Laeral!” Tsarra snapped back at the taller woman, the point of her scimitar not moving an iota. “Khelben urged me—”

  “Yes, yes, girl, but allow a moment to revel in irony aplenty.” Laeral moved closer to Tsarra, easing her sword arm down and whispering to her as the two women moved away from Raegar. He wasn’t sure if Laeral meant him to overhear, but his heart leaped as he caught her whispered comment. “After all, holding him at bladepoint was the first thing I did to my beloved when we first met.”

  Tsarra’s reaction was a frustrated growl followed by what Raegar guessed might be a chuckle from the tressym. The auburn-haired half-elf glared at the tressym, Laeral Silverhand, and Raegar as she sheathed her scimitar. After a moment, Raegar saw her catch herself, close her eyes, take three deep breaths, and her shoulders dropped as she relaxed. When she opened her eyes again, Tsarra looked directly into Raegar’s eyes, but he couldn’t read anything in hers other than impatience.

  “Well, stonecarver, chisel us some knowledge from that grinning stone face of yours. Who or what was behind your attack on the Font of Knowledge?” Tsarra’s tone was brusque and clipped. Raegar had seen her do that with others in the street—cloak off her emotions and keep things strictly on the matter at hand, despite how she felt at the moment. He admired her a little for that.

  Raegar dropped his smile, and said, “I don’t know his name, but he’s obviously a lich who killed my friend. I want to see him dead and buried far more than you, woman.”

  “I doubt that. What does it look like?”

  Laeral said, “Even without their original gender characteristics after death, Tsarra, liches are never ‘its.’ ”

  “To me, they’ll never be more than things that desperately need to be put back into the ground.” Tsarra replied. “Well, Raegar?”

  Raegar said, “Tsarra, I hate to disagree with you, but the lich was—er, is, er … Blast it! Is it ‘is’ or ‘was?’ ”

  Laeral snickered and said, “Keep to the present, Raegar. Liches still obey the identity they bore in life, so give them the benefit of present tense. You are sharper than some give you credit, lad.”

  Raegar smiled at the compliment and continued, “The lich is most definitely a man, Tsarra—sorry to disagree. You can tell by his stance and how he moves, not to mention his swaggering. He wears olive green robes embroidered with gold runes, keeping the hood up. I think that’s less for show and more to hide the fact that he’s only got a little skin left on his face. Just enough to hold his jaw on and a little around one eye socket.”

  “He could be any one of five liches from that description, three of whom are in the North,” Tsarra said. “Did he wear any distinct jewelry?”

  “He had a ring of cold iron, really rough workmanship except for the silver part placed on top. Its sigil was a sword with a moon for a hilt among a rack of antlers. I thought it seemed familiar but I couldn’t place it.”

  Laeral snapped her fingers, drawing both their attentions. “Did it look like this?” she asked, and her hands wove an illusion in mid-air of a dusty shield hanging on a wall. The seal on it was a sword with a crescent moon hilt painted atop a dark stag’s head on a midnight blue field. Beneath the shield was a pillow holding a dark iron ring with the silver emblem, just as Raegar had seen earlier.

  “Yes, exactly. The rings seem identical. What are we looking at, milady?”

  Laeral sighed and said, “If my husband could copy these items, someone else could too. How is a question for another time, though. This is Raurlor’s Ring, which sits under heavy magical protections in Castle Waterdeep. Only a lord of the city can approach within five paces of it, and yet somehow it lies in another’s hands. That’s equally fascinating and worrisome. Khelben, our plan isn’t as secure as hoped.”

  Raegar saw Tsarra’s eyes flash with anger, and her jaw tightened, but she looked at nothing in particular. He asked, “Lady Laeral, Lord Arunsun’s in that necklace. Why are you talking as if he can hear us?”

  “Oh, my love could hear me if he stood in far Kozakura and I here, Raegar. Trust me. He’s just having a silent chat with our lovely apprentice here.” Laeral nodded toward Tsarra as she rose from her chair. “Try and tear your doting eyes off of her, young man, and follow me. We’ve much to do, and you don’t want to find out what the tower likes to do to those without a proper escort.” Laeral’s fingers trailed across Tsarra’s throat and shoulder as she walked by, her index finger touching the glowing necklace.

  Raegar looked at Tsarra, who hardly seemed to notice what Laeral’s touch meant. Her shoulders were tense, and Raegar wondered what went on inside the young half-elf’s head. He noticed the emerald gem on her forehead glinting and glowing. He watched her grimace, tensing all the muscles in her jaw, neck, shoulders, and even her clenched hands were white-knuckled. Her posture changed, and she shifted her weight as he and Laeral moved past her. Tsarra fought something deep inside herself.

  If I didn’t know better, Raegar thought as he pursued Laeral, she’s either fighting herself or she’s possessed. She changes how she stands as if she’s not sure who she is.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  30 Uktar,
the Year of Lightning Storms

  (1374 DR)

  When Laeral addressed Khelben, Tsarra felt a stirring in her mind. She paused a moment as waves of emotions and thoughts hit her simultaneously. For a moment, she felt dizzy and tasted and smelled something sour.

  “Sweet Lurue,” Tsarra prayed under her breath, “don’t let the vision take me. Don’t let me be swept away by these thoughts and emotions not my own. May your horn cleave this wave and leave me with my senses.”

  She concentrated and gently pushed away other thoughts and feelings, letting them flow around her rather than flood over her.

  Tsarra felt more timid and her shoulders bunched up when the sending came to her. A red flare of anger came with Khelben’s waking thought.

  Blast it!

  Don’t shout, Tsarra sent to Khelben, idly fingering the necklace that held his reduced form. It makes my ears ring, even if I’m not using them.

  Tsarra felt more than heard Khelben’s mental sigh. Tell Laeral not to check on the ring. An agent can retrieve it for later inspections.

  Khelben, when you’re conscious, it’s very hard to …

  Hard to what, Tsarra?

  While you were dormant, all my doubts went away. I was thinking more clearly than I have since this all began. What are you doing to me?

  I’m not doing anything, apprentice. Now tell Laeral—

  Gods take you, wizard, you are doing something to me! I’ve lived here for nearly two decades, but I’ve not been this apprehensive around you since my first year! My temper’s not been this bad in at least ten years. What’s going on?

  We don’t have time—

  Well make time, Khelben. I’m not sure of my own self, and if you need my sorcery to be ready to fight a lich, I have to be able to focus. Right now, I’m fighting a war inside myself and I’m losing. What is happening here?

  Tsarra felt Khelben’s surprise, followed by a pregnant pause. Finally, Khelben sent his thoughts to her: I stand corrected. We were affecting you without knowing we did so. Luckily, the explanation will take a fraction of real time outside the kiira. Close your eyes and think of the design of your tattoo.