Shadowbane: Eye of Justice

by De Bie, Erik Scott

Shalis’s eyes softened, and it was clear life was fleeing her. She whispered a single word, letting it float on the air in that place of death.

  “Maerlyn.”

  “Maerlyn,” Myrin said in the alley. “But that’s not my name. I—”

  She only absorbed memories of herself. Shalis had lived a century ago, and Myrin knew that memory had been from before Ilira was spellscarred. She saw again the memory of herself being born—of Shalis, no less. Could Shalis’s daughter—Neveren’s daughter—could that be her? She knew in her heart that it was.

  She also knew, from that memory, that Ilira was not the danger of which Kalen had warned, but instead … “You’re here to protect me,” Myrin said. “You promised—”

  Then she realized, to her horror, that her hand was tingling with pain even through Kalen’s numbing spellscar. She looked, and through the blue flames, she saw her flesh unraveling against Ilira’s face. The elf’s spellscar was ripping Myrin’s hand and arm apart, raging at her with all the destructive fury of the spellplague.

  Ilira seemed as shocked as Myrin herself, unable to move in the rush of memory. Earlier, in the marketplace, she’d only managed to take a flash. Now, there was more.

  Myrin wanted it.

  Brace stared at them both, seemingly paralyzed with terror and revulsion.

  Finally, the elf’s gold eyes cleared and she could move. She shoved Myrin away, breaking the contact between hand and cheek, but caught her in her arms before she could fall. She supported the wizard’s slumping weight awkwardly.

  “Brace!” Ilira snapped. “Brace, godsdamn it, stop staring and help me!”

  The gnome shook himself and immediately crossed to them. He fumbled in an inner pocket of his weathercloak for a potion. His words fumbled around one another, but Myrin could hear the healing in them—healing she dearly needed.

  “No fear, Maerlyn,” Ilira whispered. That name told Myrin that Ilira had seen the memory, too, and thought the same thing she did. “I’ve got you. You’re safe.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.” Myrin pulled her ruined arm away. “It doesn’t hurt. It doesn’t—”

  Then agony struck her, she summoned breath for a scream, and the world faded.

  Leaning on Levia, Kalen made it to the door, behind which he could faintly sense Myrin. He reached for the handle, but Levia stepped past him and peered out first.

  “Gods,” she said. “Kalen, wait—”

  He shoved past her and watched as Myrin practically burned her hand off against Ilira’s face, then collapsed into the elf’s arms. If breath had been hard to draw before, it refused to come now. He clenched Vindicator’s hilt.

  “Stop her,” Kalen said. “We need—”

  “There’s nothing we can do—Kalen!”

  Kalen tried to push through Levia, but in his weakened state, he could hardly overpower her strong arms. Levia held him against the wall as he grasped feebly at her.

  “We need to save her, agreed,” Levia said. “But you’re in no state to attack now, and I can’t defeat both the elf and the gnome at once. We don’t attack until we can win.”

  “It doesn’t matter.” Kalen tried to wriggle free. “We have to—”

  “And what good does it do Lady Darkdance if you die trying to save her?” Levia shoved him back. “We have to wait until you recover. Until—”

  Blue flames spread across his hand on her arm, and she pulled away in surprise. Kalen felt his spellscar reassert itself, dulling the thousand shocks and pangs that had gripped him. Myrin must have used up the borrowed power, and the magic returned to curse him anew. This time, he welcomed it, as it meant he could move again.

  “I’m going.” He hefted Sithe’s axe in one hand, Vindicator in the other. “Try to stop me.”

  He pushed into the alley as Ilira gathered up Myrin in her arms. As before, the two shared a look equal parts challenge and promise. A reckoning would come between them, and neither would back down. Kalen stepped forward, and Ilira vanished into the shadows.

  “Gods damn all shadowdancers.” Kalen’s frustration ground the word to cracked glass.

  He heard movement deeper in the alley and saw a familiar gnome lurking among the refuse. Rather than rush at him, he reached out with the power of Vindicator and seized Brace even as he tried to flee. The gnome staggered forward, surrounded in the sword’s magic, but before Kalen could catch him, Brace wavered and faded from view.

  “Feywild magic—it’s made him invisible.” Levia spoke a word of power, and silvery radiance filled her eyes. With her blessed vision, she scanned the alley. “He’s escaped. I hate fey creatures. Do you think they’ve been in league this whole time—the elf and the gnome?”

  “Perhaps.” Kalen lowered Vindicator, whose gray flames licked the cobblestones at their feet. “Either way, they’ve won this night.”

  “Torm burn their eyes,” Levia said.

  Kalen considered. The other Shadowbane was still at large in the city, but that consideration paled next to Myrin’s safety. Much as he wanted to rush off after her kidnappers that instant, Levia had been right before. They needed to be patient.

  “You’re sure of your information,” Kalen said. “That we can act on it?”

  “Absolutely sure,” Levia said. “That murderess must be brought to justice.”

  “Agreed.” Kalen nodded. “Is Hessar good in a fight?”

  “I’ve seen him take down a cadre of Shou warriors without breaking a sweat,” Levia said. “As a monk, he’s skilled enough, but he knows magic, too. He holds his own.”

  “And you’ve kept up your spellcasting these last years?”

  Levia gave him a look as if the question was ridiculous.

  “Three, then—not enough,” Kalen said. “Set Hessar to follow them, but don’t have him attack. You return to Castle Thalavar and prepare a strike plan to neutralize Lady Nathalan. Recruit men from the Eye—men you trust absolutely. Those men with the tattoos, perhaps.”

  “You could command them yourself, you know.”

  “Just go.” Kalen looked up into the night. He had another task to undertake, before they could strike. “Be prepared. We have a shadow to slay.”

  Levia took her leave, and Kalen looked up at the darkening sky. He had one more task to undertake before the assault, and it was such a small thing. Why then did he feel like he was marching to his own grave?

  MIDNIGHT, MIDSUMMER

  AS THE MOON ROSE HIGH, KALEN STOOD ON THE ROOFTOP of one of the buildings on the south bank of the River Thunn. A cold night wind whipped up off the Sea of Fallen Stars, ripping his clothing and biting his exposed flesh. The banners of the Shou district strained at their ties, and the waterfall thundered not far away.

  He fell into communion with Vindicator, and the sword appeared in his upraised hand in a swell of gray flames. He held it aloft a moment, like a star in his hand, and turned in a circle to face all of Westgate. Then he set the sword reverently on the roof and sat cross-legged just outside its reach. He waited.

  In the silence, he meditated on the stars above—Selûne’s tears—and on the struggles below. Kalen wanted to aid Myrin’s quest to recover her memories, but that was for another time. He needed to thwart Ilira’s seeming dominance of Myrin—break his friend from the elf’s thrall. Levia wanted him to intercede with the Eye of Justice. And, of course, there was Rhett to consider: where he might be found, whether he still lived or not.

  All of these tasks, though, paled in comparison to what he would do this night.

  Kalen heard the man approach from behind, although whoever he was, he could certainly move quietly. Kalen focused on his breathing, letting the night wind stir his hair.

  Finally, gray flames spread silently around Vindicator, and it vanished from where it lay before Kalen. Summoned by another.

  “Hail, Shadowbane,” Kalen said over his shoulder.

  That gave the man pause.

  Kalen had chosen this meeting place on purpose—the spot where he’d chased the false
Shadowbane after their first meeting in the Timeless Blade. The way the man had lingered at the edge and looked back at him had suggested he would listen to Kalen if approached peaceably. Now the imposter stood on the roof half a dozen paces from him, in a defensive posture, waiting just as he had then. Kalen might just accomplish the task that drew him there that night.

  Kalen appraised the imposter’s attire. The man was dressed much as Kalen himself had always dressed in Waterdeep: thick black leathers studded with plates of steel, a dark gray cloak (less tattered than Kalen’s had become over the years), and a helm that hid his face. The differences were subtle: the way he carried himself, the way he moved. He lacked Kalen’s fluid grace, but Kalen knew not to underestimate his skill or speed.

  He certainly looked like Shadowbane. Was he the one Kalen sought?

  It occurred to him then that he didn’t know how long this other Shadowbane had been operating in Westgate, nor how long he had been wielding Vindicator. Before that first day in Westgate, when he’d used the amulet to sneak Vindicator into the city, Kalen had kept the sword hidden in Myrin’s deep-pockets belt pouch. It was entirely possible the imposter had summoned it from within, every day since Luskan. Possibly even before.

  The imposter raised one hand, but Kalen cut him off. “Don’t speak—just listen.”

  The imposter nodded ever so slightly, but he said nothing. Kalen had expected as much.

  “I may die in what comes next, and there is much left undone. I need someone to carry on, to wield Vindicator in pursuit of the same goal.” He looked up. “I need you, Shadowbane.”

  The man staggered back—surprised, perhaps. Kalen could not tell with his closed helm.

  Kalen climbed unsteadily to his feet. This far from Myrin, his spellscar was temperamental. “I have tried to pass on my task, as it was passed to me,” he said. “I had an apprentice once—Vaelis. I tried to train him, as my own teacher trained me. There was no friendship between us—I was his master, and I was hard on him. I never listened, and I never stood by him. Perhaps I trained him poorly, or perhaps …” He shook his head. “Regardless, he is dead, and his blood is on my hands.”

  The false Shadowbane stared at him, as silent as before. He held Vindicator in a two-handed high guard, such that Kalen would spit himself upon the steel if he charged. The false Shadowbane’s hands trembled ever so slightly.

  “I tried again with a man called Rhett—although I did not see the truth until it was too late.” Kalen drew closer, standing just two paces from Vindicator’s point. “The sword chose him, and Rhett sought at every turn to become my apprentice, but I refused. He was—is, if he lives still—a good man. He …” Kalen closed his eyes. “He was my friend. I was hard on him, but I loved him even so.”

  As though the words rang especially true, the false Shadowbane lowered Vindicator a touch, then shook himself and drew it back up into a defensive position.

  “That is why I attacked you,” Kalen said. “I sent Rhett to Westgate, but I find you instead. I’ve accepted you are not he, although you used his name in the Timeless Blade. But whoever you might be and whatever you want—of me, of this city, of that sword—none of that concerns me. The sword is all that matters now.”

  He nodded toward Vindicator, which hung in front of his face.

  “All I know is that the sword has chosen you, as it once chose me—and that makes you as worthy a wielder as I. More, perhaps.” Kalen looked up at the man’s helm gleaming in the moonlight. “If the sword answers your call, then you are Shadowbane. You must rise to the challenge and carry on the quest that lies before us. Are you willing?”

  The imposter’s arms trembled, although whether it was from the exertion of holding a high guard for so long or from the weight of the question, Kalen could not say.

  Finally, Shadowbane lowered the sword and set its point against the rooftop. The wind howled around them. The false Shadowbane’s shoulders slumped a touch, as though he were struggling with a powerful emotion he could not quite express.

  Kalen nodded. “We serve the same master—the Threefold God, who wielded that sword: Helm of the Everwatch, God of Guardians; Tyr the Evenhanded, God of Justice; and Torm the True, God of Valor.”

  He lifted his hand, and his ring—the one Gedrin had given him so many years ago—gleamed in the moonlight. It bore the symbol of long-dead Helm: a gauntlet with an eye in the palm, which had always matched the hilt of Vindicator. In his hands, at least. As the other Shadowbane held the sword, Kalen saw the image on the hilt wavering, undecided.

  “A woman I respected once told me that we were not saviors but rather destroyers,” he said. “She was wrong. I am Helm’s Sword, the defender of this world. What of you?”

  Shadowbane shook his head, uncertain. He looked away toward the eastern horizon.

  “You hold the sword, so I know one of them speaks in your heart. Which is it?”

  Shadowbane was breathing heavily, his fingers tight on the sword. Gray flames swirled around the steel, leaking down to coat his gauntleted hand. They resolved themselves into a symbol below his knuckles: a set of scales, as one might use to weigh gold—or a heart.

  Tyr. The long-dead God of Justice, the second of the three, who had taken the mantle from Helm. He’d worn it only a short while, then bequeathed it to Torm shortly before he left to face creatures of darkness in the heavens beyond the mortal world. How fitting.

  “You are sworn to the scales, as I am to the helm. Do you accept this burden?”

  Shadowbane nodded. The sigil flowed from his hand onto Vindicator’s hilt where it turned white, rather than gray.

  “One thing more to this ritual—so that you remember it.”

  Kalen launched a fist at the false Shadowbane’s head, but the man knocked it aside with his left arm. He moved casually, as though he had known the blow was coming. Perhaps … but Kalen shook that suspicion away.

  Again, the man nodded silently.

  Kalen gazed west toward Darkdance Manor, which stood dark. Myrin and the others had not gone there, but he would find them. He would find them, and he would save her.

  “I need the sword for one more task. I will summon it again when I have need of it, but after that, if I am dead, it is yours. If not …” Kalen focused, and gray flames rose from his skin, resolving into Helm’s armor around his limbs. “I will have no more need of Vindicator. You will carry it until you die, or until the task is done, and shadow and darkness are gone from Faerûn.”

  And with that, Kalen turned to go.

  “Shadow and darkness must be pursued,” a rough voice murmured behind him.

  Those words caught Kalen’s ear. He’d heard them before of course, many times, but the way the imposter said them …

  “Shadow and darkness must be pursued,” the man said in a voice like gravel, “through every street, down every path, no matter how dark, until it is wiped from the world.”

  He knew those words. Gedrin Shadowbane had spoken them, upon waking from his dream of the death of Helm a century ago. Kalen had first heard Gedrin speak them as he stood surrounded by foes in a light-seared warehouse in Luskan. He had spoken his heart’s vow in the moments before darkness swallowed him. He had never surrendered.

  The words persisted as the vow taken by all initiates of the Eye of Justice.

  Kalen stepped forward and put his hand on the man’s shoulder. “I am proud of you, Shadowbane.”

  Then Kalen turned and walked away.

  “What is this game?” his Shadowbane asked.

  Lounging behind the desk, Lilten realized he’d been carried away by daydreams of a long ago, more peaceable time. Before that, he’d been pondering the next move on his lanceboard. The black reaver and white sorceress were cloistered close at one corner, also engaged by the white jester. At the other side stood the white knight, along with the white priestess and the black sorcerer, poised as though to launch an attack against them.

  Lilten held two pieces in his hand—the black knight and the whi
te bladesinger—considering where best to place them. Never the master of paying attention, though, he’d found himself considering the black reaver, and his mind had naturally wandered to warm memories: sweat-streaked and sweet.

  Thus, when the boy stormed into his chamber and pointed Vindicator at his face, Lilten was momentarily dazed and sat blinking in the face of his vehemence.

  “You lied to me. You told me he’d lost his mind—that he was coming to kill me. You—”

  He cut Vindicator through the air in his frustration, the sharp steel and gray flames endangering the bookshelves. Abruptly, he realized what he was doing and caught the blade with his gauntleted hand. He stared at the hilt and trembled.

  “Well, accept my apologies that I proved so convincing. I take it you’ve been busy.” Lilten looked to Vindicator’s hilt. “Tyr. How droll.”

  “That’s not the point.” Shadowbane put Vindicator to Lilten’s chest. “I became their prisoner, as you asked. I learned what they were about, as you asked. Then I escaped and went to Kalen, as you asked. And what happens? Not only do I not have to fight him, but he gives up the sword to me. Was this your plan all along?”

  The old fire surged in Lilten, and he felt his limbs growing warm. “Threaten me at your own peril, boy,” he said, moderating his voice. “I am not always so affable.”

  That had an effect on the youth, and he withdrew the sword. “Why did you lie to me? He and I—what I had with him was real. But this—” He shook his head. “Why did you lie to me?”

  “Why does anyone do anything? For gain, of course.” He placed the lady knight on the lanceboard, next to the lady sorceress. “You, my dear boy, have many strengths, but the power of your mind is not one of them. It makes you quite easy to manipulate.”

  “Master, I don’t understand. Why would you do this? What gain can be had?”

  He smiled. “No.”

  “No?” Shadowbane looked stricken. “As in, no, you won’t tell me?”

  “Indeed not,” Lilten said. “Why would I even try, when your small mind cannot process the scope of that which I offer? It would simply be a waste of the time it takes to explain it.”