Lord of Stormweather

by David Gross

  Tamlin squeezed the bloody fingers of his ruined right hand and prayed he could keep a fist with them. If he weren’t already wounded, he might have liked his chances against a single opponent. Considering his state, he said a prayer to the Lord of the Dead.

  “Dread Kelemvor,” he murmured. “If it’s not too much trouble, please take the other fellows first.”

  One guard stepped toward the cage, careful to remain out of range of the darkenbeast. Behind him, his fellow held the torch high.

  “Listen,” said Tamlin. “There’s no point in killing me. That will only ensure your own death.”

  Both guards ignored him, their gazes locked on the monster perched over his cage.

  “There’s a good boy,” the guard crooned to the darkenbeast, and he took a cautious step forward.

  “Think of the reward you will have for turning against those criminals out there,” Tamlin added. “I will personally see to it that—”

  Tamlin spied movement behind the guard with the torch. Something dark wriggled out of a narrow coal chute and poured itself into the shadows. When the figure rose up behind the torch-bearing guard, Tamlin saw it was a young, leather-clad woman.

  His sister, Tazi.

  In the months since Tamlin had last seen her, she’d changed somehow. Even beneath the mask of coal dust, her face seemed different somehow—stronger, more angular, even dangerous. With her cool expression and her dark hair tied back in a simple knot, she looked somehow austere.

  Not unlike our mother, he thought.

  Tazi broke the illusion with an unsmiling wink at Tamlin, then she put a finger to her lips.

  She clamped a hand over the torchbearer’s mouth, pulled his head to the side, and cut his throat with one clean jerk. She sheathed her dagger and still managed to catch the torch before it fell. With her eyes on the back of the second guard’s neck, she held the dead man’s body until his death spasms subsided, then let it sink gently to the floor.

  The effortless killing made Tamlin gasp. The joy at his sister’s timely arrival mingled with sudden fear that she’d changed far more than her lean face revealed.

  Oblivious to his companion’s fate, the other guard raised his long sword for a strike against the guardian beast. Tazi caught his wrist.

  As the man turned toward her, she smashed the burning brand into his face.

  The man screamed.

  Tazi dropped the torch, grabbed her dagger, and ended the man’s noise with a quick thrust to his throat. His body fell to the side, removing the only obstacle between Tazi and the darkenbeast.

  “Look out!” Tamlin called out—too late.

  With a trumpeting shriek, the monster leaped at Tazi.

  Tamlin lunged up to grasp the thing’s scaly legs. The creature easily pulled away from his weak right hand, and its talons ripped his left to the bone.

  Tazi raised her arms to defend her face, but the darkenbeast’s buffeting wings beat them down. Its jaws snapped at her face. She slashed with her bloody dagger, severing the tendons of the creature’s left wing.

  The beast screamed again, but rather than retreat it charged at Tazi, climbing up her body with the hooks of its remaining wing and both talons.

  The beast’s scrabbling attack sent her staggering back. She stepped on the burning torch, and as it rolled she fell hard on her back. The monster scrabbled to stay atop her, shrieking and tearing. Fragments of Tazi’s leather armor flew away like cinders from a bonfire.

  Tazi stabbed at its throat, but the beast’s jaws clamped shut on her arm and twisted, sending her weapon spinning to the floor.

  “Tal!” she yelled. “In here!”

  The only response was the screaming of men from the outer room and a deep, bestial roar that made the darkenbeast sound like a frightened mouse.

  Tamlin reached for Tazi’s dagger. Considering his recent run of bad luck, he expected it to lie a few inches beyond his reach. Much to his surprise, he grasped it easily. The problem was in gripping it in his ruined hands.

  Tazi and the darkenbeast rolled over and over on the floor. For every precise fist, elbow, or kick Tazi landed, the monster scratched away a pound of blood-stained leather.

  “Now would be a very good time!” Tazi yelled again to the outer room.

  “Over here!” called Tamlin. “Roll this way!”

  Tazi flung herself toward the cage. Her pernicious foe clung ever more tightly, raking and biting.

  Tamlin tried to stab the thing in the spine, but the blow sent the knife straight through his feeble, blood-slicked grip. There was barely a scratch on the monster.

  “Dark and empty!” cursed Tazi.

  She slipped one hand up under the darkenbeast’s jaws and pushed its head away.

  “Sorry!” cried Tamlin.

  He recovered the dagger and, gripping it so tightly he was sure his torn fingers would break off, he thrust the blade deep into the beast’s neck.

  The arterial spray was hot and sticky, but the creature continued to struggle. Tamlin pulled the blade out of the beast and stabbed again—and again the bloody knife slipped in his grasp.

  Tamlin’s injured hands were beyond agony, even numbness. All he felt at the end of either arm was a weightless fire flickering in the shape of his half-forgotten palms and fingers. He knew he couldn’t hold onto the knife again if he tried.

  If he could distract the thing even for a moment, Tazi might have a chance to wriggle free and get the knife. He grabbed for the darkenbeast’s throat.

  “Die, damn you!”

  As Tamlin said the words, a jolt of energy thrilled his hands. A blue-white sheet of light coruscated over the monster’s body, and Tazi yelped and leaped back.

  Sparks shot from the creature’s eyes and mouth, leaving steaming black lumps of ruined flesh behind. The darkenbeast thrashed once more, then lay still.

  “What did you do?” said Tazi. Her hair had puffed up like the tail of an angry cat, and her face was red from the hot electrical flash.

  “It wasn’t me,” Tamlin protested.

  “It sure looked like it was you.”

  “Maybe it was the magic circle.”

  As he pointed at the arcane lines, he noticed a stream of blood running from his outstretched finger. He quickly tucked his ruined hands under his arms, squeezing them gently to staunch the bleeding.

  Tazi looked down at the floor and quickly stepped away from the edge of the chalk circle.

  “Don’t do it again,” she said. “I’m coming back over there.”

  Tazi knelt before the lock. She slipped a pair of picks from a pocket on her thigh and went to work on the lock.

  Tamlin looked down at the corpse of the darkenbeast. He felt giddy triumph mingling with horror and a peculiar sense of pity at the sight.

  “Sorry about that, old fellow. We had a few laughs, some good times, I know, but you left me with no—”

  “Let’s get out of here,” interrupted Tazi, opening the cage door.

  Tamlin stepped outside his prison, stood to full his height, and immediately wobbled. Tazi took him by the arm then put her own arm around his waist. Her muscles were as hard as packed sand.

  “You’ve been exercising,” said Tamlin. He felt increasingly dizzy.

  “And you’ve been losing far too much blood,” she said. “Don’t talk.”

  She led him through a short, dirty hall to his captors’ room. The corpses of two and a half of them were still there, along with the splintered remains of a stout wooden door. Tamlin’s vision was blurring. He smelled blood and dung and seawater.

  Soon they were in the slimy passages of the sewers, and Tamlin felt himself lifted in big, strong arms that carried him toward the daylight.

  “Vox,” Tamlin mumbled as he looked up into the dark, bearded face. “You’re not dead.”

  “No,” said Escevar, walking beside them, “but you might be if you don’t lie still.”

  Amid the stink of the sewer, Tamlin thought he smelled roses. Soft hands stroked his
arms, and pleasant warmth filled his limbs. Feeling returned to his hands in the form of a dull tingling, which he recognized as powerful healing magic. It surged through every fiber of his flesh, knitting torn sinews back together.

  “Hold him still,” said a familiar, gentle voice.

  It was one of the servants. He raised his head to look at her, but Escevar leaned over him, proffering a pewter flask.

  “A little anesthetic?” he offered.

  The open flask smelled of brandy, sweet and earthy rich. Tamlin felt a tickling at the back of his throat. His whole body craved a drink of the warm liquor.

  “Great gods, no,” he said with an effort. “That’s exactly what got me into this mess.”

  Behind them, another roar echoed through the sewers, followed quickly by a pair of terrified screams.

  “Somebody should go help him,” suggested Escevar.

  His tone made it plain that he was not volunteering for the job. To emphasize the point, he quickened his pace and led the way up to the street.

  “It’s probably better not to approach Tal in his present state,” said the servant.

  Tamlin looked up past the hands upon his arms and saw Larajin, one of the family’s chambermaids—at least until recently.

  It had been months since Larajin left Stormweather Towers, and she no longer wore the gold vest and white dress of the household maids. Instead, she had donned a plain, homespun smock and a dun-colored cloak. Russet hair spilled out from her hood, framing a fair face with hazel eyes so light they appeared almost yellow.

  Those pretty features had been the object of much gossip from other servants who complained that Lord Thamalon favored Larajin more than was proper. There was even talk that Larajin was Thamalon’s mistress, and some of it had reached Shamur. Perhaps the Old Owl had finally bowed to his wife’s jealousy and married the girl off to some shopkeeper. That would explain why Tamlin hadn’t seen her for months.

  “It would be good to have one alive for questioning,” said Tazi.

  “No need,” said Larajin, arching her delicate eyebrows. “I can question the corpses later.”

  “Larajin!”

  “Look what they’ve done to him,” said Larajin. “Look what they’ve done to your brother!”

  Her hands moved from his arms to his forehead. They felt cool and soft, and Tamlin realized he was burning with fever.

  “I know, I know,” said Tazi. “It’s just that I never expected to hear something like that from you.”

  “You have been away for a while,” Larajin said as she continued her ministrations.

  The pain was leaking away from Tamlin’s body. Even so, he felt as weak as a kitten, and he was grateful when Vox lifted him up through the torn sewer grating and up to the streets. There was an Uskevren carriage, surrounded by men in blue livery, the gold horse-at-anchor ensign on their breasts.

  “He should be all right, now,” said Larajin. “I’ll go back for Tal.”

  “Be careful,” said Tazi, closing the carriage door. She called up to the driver, “Go!”

  Tamlin squinted and smiled in a fashion he hoped looked brave rather than delirious. Tazi and Escevar smiled back at him from the opposite seat, but their expressions were tarnished with worry. Tamlin remembered then that he wasn’t the only one in peril.

  “They told me mother and father were—”

  “Missing,” said Tazi firmly. “Now that you’re back, we’ll search for them together.”

  Tamlin felt relief wash through his chest. He hadn’t before realized how tense his muscles had remained those past, uncounted days.

  Tamlin thought about what he’d heard during his rescue and said, “And in addition to his talent for imitating father’s voice, Talbot has become some sort of monster.”

  “Well,” she said. “In a manner of speaking, yes.”

  “And you’ve just returned from training as a master assassin?”

  “That is not how I’d describe myself.”

  “Cat burglar, then. Just like mother.”

  “Well, yes. If you must be rude about it.”

  “And even the chambermaid has divine powers?”

  “That’s right,” said Tazi. She glanced at Vox and Escevar as if considering whether to speak in front of them. Eventually she shrugged and said, “That, and she’s actually our sister.”

  “Our sister …” Tamlin felt another wave of dizziness coming. He was saved by the absurdity of the revelations. “It appears that everyone I know has become some sort of storybook hero—” he sighed—“and all I can boast is ‘most often kidnapped.’ ”

  “Now would be a bad time to tell you about Larajin’s twin brother?” Tazi asked. She raised a solemn eyebrow, but the quirk upon her lips was all mischief.

  “Now you’re making things up.”

  She kept smiling, but she shook her head.

  “Next you’ll tell me he’s an elf.”

  Tamlin strove not to take offense at her wild laughter, even though it continued long after they turned off the streets of Selgaunt and rumbled through the gate to Stormweather Towers.

  CHAPTER 10

  THE SORCERER

  On the morning after their emergence from the wood, the wagons waited at a rendezvous point. Within hours, Thamalon watched as eleven more small groups of wagons joined them. Some were similar to those Baeron commanded, while others appeared to be the more traditional sort of flat-bed conveyances piled high with crates and bundles. All were heavily guarded.

  After all wagons reported to their commander, Baeron returned and ordered his men to resume their journey. Thamalon was glad to hear that his presence was still permitted, and gladder still that he remained with Baeron’s team.

  On his occasional business with dwarves, Thamalon found them blunt and predictable during negotiations. Only after a deal was struck did they relax and speak freely—and only after a few mugs of ale had loosened their tongues. At those times they could be the most ribald of colleagues, treating their business partners like decades-old friends if only for a few raucous hours.

  In the three days Thamalon rode beside Baeron, he found the dwarf talkative even without benefit of ale. Once they were clear of the elven woods, Baeron became downright friendly, perhaps in gratitude for Thamalon’s assistance during the ambush.

  The dwarves had been traveling for over ten days, a period Thamalon knew as a “ride,” the average length of a caravan journey. They came from their stronghold in the eastern mountains, avoiding elven territory as much as possible. As the Sorcerer’s legions drove them farther and farther from Castle Stormweather, the elves retreated deeper into the forest, and the dwarf scouts were hard pressed to keep track of their shifting territory and avoid confrontations.

  Curiosity about this other Stormweather rustled constantly in Thamalon’s imagination. Had he come across the name in a history or heard that some lord in Waterdeep had named his mansion similarly, he might have smiled and forgotten it. To discover a fortress with the same name as his own holding after falling through an enchanted painting … that was a matter that deserved consideration.

  Thamalon didn’t much believe in coincidence.

  Trying to keep his inquiries casual, Thamalon continued to press for more information on this Sorcerer and his Stormweather.

  The dwarves made the perilous journey for trade with the Sorcerer’s subjects, especially to buy their most precious commodity: throbe vapors. The armored wagons were actually huge tanks of the gas. They would return fully laden, each with enough of the vapors to fire one of their forges for months to come.

  “Why did the elves attack you?”

  “They object to the harvesting of throbe,” Baeron explained, “and we bring weapons to trade with the Sorcerer.”

  “What is wrong with harvesting throbe?”

  “The elves revere the skwalos,” said Baeron. “They believe that the spirits of their ancestors reside in the animals.”

  “Skwalos?”

  Baeron raised h
is bushy eyebrows, pointed upward, and asked, “What is your word for them?”

  Thamalon looked up and saw a gray sky pregnant with rain.

  “The clouds?”

  “Ho ho!” Baeron punched his shoulder.

  Thamalon realized it was a gregarious gesture, but it hurt. He rubbed his arm and wondered how many bruises this adventure would cost him before it was done.

  “You do not jest?” the dwarf asked. “Look again.”

  Thamalon did so, scanning the clouds for a clue. After long seconds, he discerned vast, dark shapes cruising through the mists.

  “The floating whale creatures?” said Thamalon.

  “If ‘whale’ is your word for forest, then yes.”

  “Perhaps the comparison is not apt,” admitted Thamalon. “How’re they like a forest?”

  “Is that a riddle?” asked Baeron, brightening.

  “No.”

  “Oh,” said Baeron, making no attempt to mask his disappointment. “Well, over time, the skwalos develop patches of fungus and moss. Some of the ancients eventually catch seeds on the wind and sprout flowers and even trees. My grandmother once told me of elf wizards who cultivated food upon the backs of the greatest skwalos, living in the sky with them to harvest their familiars.”

  “Harvest?”

  “How do the wizards in your land do it?”

  “Well, I know little about wizards, but I imagine they summon them with a spell.”

  “Things are very different here from your land?”

  “Indeed. Almost everything here is somewhat strange. Except for you,” he quickly amended. “You’re very like the dwarves I have met. And the elves are not much different.”

  Baeron laughed as though Thamalon had made a great joke.

  “How long have you been at war with the elves?” Thamalon asked.

  “Us? We have had no war with the elves for centuries. Their foe is the Sorcerer. The elves attack only our throbe caravans, and we make an effort not to burn down their entire forest while fending them off. The elves protest and send their emissaries to pull at the king’s ears, but they still buy our throbe-forged steel. Even the elves have their merchants.”