The travelers seemed to have journeyed from the road in an attempt to cut time from their trip, but instead blundered into a gap in the land's surface. Their wagon had been overturned, their horses crushed beneath the weight of the cart. There were bodies lying on the flat, gray lands beside the wagon, and the sobs of a woman were carried by the wind to the ears of the adventurers. Adon was the first to badger Kelemvor as the fighter turned away from the sight.
"There is nothing we can do. The authorities in Tilverton can send someone." Kelemvor said.
"We can't just leave them," Midnight said, shocked at Kelemvor's attitude.
Kelemvor shook his head. "I can."
"That should surprise me," Midnight said. "Yet somehow it doesn't. Does everything have a price for you, Kel?"
Kelemvor glared at the dark-haired magic-user.
"We can't turn our backs on them," Adon said frantically. "Some may be injured and require the attentions of a cleric."
"What good can you do them?" Cyric said sharply. "You can't even heal."
Adon looked down. "I'm aware of that."
Midnight turned to Kelemvor. "What do you say, Kel?"
Kelemvor's eyes were cold. "There is nothing to say. If you wish to indulge in such foolishness, you'll do so without me!" He looked at Midnight. "Unless of course, you wish to order me to go."
Midnight looked away from the fighter and turned to Cyric, who shared her horse. The thief nodded and they galloped off in the direction of the fallen travelers.
Adon's pleas fell on deaf ears, until at last Kelemvor leaped from the mount and waved the cleric on.
"Go if you must," Kelemvor said. "I'll wait here."
Adon looked at the angry fighter, a mixture of pity and confusion in his eyes.
"Go, I said!" Kelemvor shouted and slapped the horse, sending it into a frantic race to catch up with Midnight and Cyric.
Midnight's horse covered the distance quickly, but the sobbing woman did not seem to take notice of the approaching riders. As Cyric and Midnight got close to her, they saw that the blood on her pale blue skirt had turned an ugly brown. The woman's bare legs were deeply tanned, and her hands, even as they moved across the body of a fallen man, seemed hard and calloused. Her hair was blond and thickly matted to her face. She cradled the man to her breast, rocking him gently.
"Are you hurt?" Midnight said as she climbed down from her mount and approached the woman. The magic-user realized that the woman before her was younger than she first believed. In fact, she seemed barely old enough to deserve the honor of the wedding ring that graced her hand.
The man had been dressed in tight leather trousers, and the soles of his boots were nearly worn out. He wore a pale blue ruffled shirt, which was covered with a brownish red stain. The magic-user saw no weapons near the dead man.
Even as Adon caught up with the others, Cyric realized there was no wedding ring on the hand of the dead man.
"Turn back!" the thief screamed, and six men suddenly burst from the gray sands surrounding the heroes. The dead man grinned, gave his "wife" a quick kiss, and reached for a broadsword that had been half-buried in the darkened sands beneath him. The woman withdrew a pair of daggers from under her legs. She gracefully leaped to her feet and settled into a slight crouch as she joined the others who moved about their prey in an ever-tightening circle.
Standing by the road, Kelemvor cursed as he saw the trap sprung. Midnight's conditions say I must defend them, the fighter realized, and he rushed toward the figures in the distance. Just as his sword was leaving its sheath, though, something rushed past the fighter's ear. There was a cold breeze, and the object passed with a hiss. Kelemvor saw a steel-tipped arrow sail by him and end its flight in the sands.
Behind him, Kelemvor heard the sound of men shouting. He focused past their angry voices and concentrated on the tiny sound of bowstrings being drawn tight, then released. The fighter turned and fell to his knees, his sword flashing as it cut through two of the three arrows that would have surely brought him down.
Kelemvor faced three archers who had risen from the filthy sands at the other side of the road. Already they were notching another round of arrows. The sound of steel striking steel rang out in the distance behind him, and Kelemvor knew that Midnight, Cyric, and Adon were fighting for their lives, too.
"We have nothing!" Kelemvor shouted as the archers loosed their volley, and he rolled to avoid the missiles. The sight of a single arrow passing just over his face revealed the hopelessness of the situation to the fighter. No matter where he turned, one of the three archers would eventually anticipate his movements. His armor offered little protection against the archers' longbows, and the added vulnerability of his unprotected head presented a target the highly skilled bowmen already sought.
The archers scrambled forward, crossing the road. They dug in at new, closer positions. Then they tried a new tactic: rotating their assault. In moments Kelemvor faced a constant volley of arrows as the third archer released his arrow even as the first took aim.
Across the field of stone and sand, by the overturned wagon, the fighting had become desperate. Midnight caught a glimpse of a crossbow trained on Cyric's back. Her first thought was to throw a spell to save the thief, but there was no time to cast and there was no way of knowing if her spell would fail or succeed. She dropped to a crouch, sending one of her daggers into the throat of the assailant. The steel bolt went wild as it was loosed and flew harmlessly over Cyric's head.
Unaware of the attempt made against him by the man with the crossbow, Cyric fought on against the leader of the brigands. His hand axe had proven to be an awkward defense against his opponent's broadsword, so the thief feinted to the left to draw the man in close, hoping to disarm him. But the swordsman wasn't taken in by the ruse, and his blade came within inches of Cyric's throat. The thief rolled and drew first blood as his axe bit deeply into the brigand's ankle, nearly severing his foot. The swordsman fell, his blade thrust out to gut Cyric, but the dark, lean man rolled out of the way of the blade and brought his axe up with all his strength. The brigand made no sound as the axe was buried in his throat.
Cyric removed his bloodied axe from the swordsman, and a sharp, biting pain flushed through his system as one of the blades of the brigand's "wife" hit home.
At the periphery of the circle formed around Midnight and Cyric, Adon was dragged from Kelemvor's mount. His war hammer broke free of the bonds that held it at his side and fell to the ground as Adon fell beside it. He snatched up the weapon as a filthy boot moved to cover his hand. Adon grasped the boot and pulled hard. A moment later the owner of the boot fell to the ground, and Adon clubbed him with the hammer. Then Adon sprang forward, barely avoiding a knife thrust that would have relieved him of a portion of his beautiful, well-combed hair, as well as his scalp. Adon clubbed that attacker, too.
Adon heard movement behind him. He turned and saw a filthy man running toward him with a short sword aimed at his heart. Before the cleric even had time to react, the body of another of the brigands crashed into the man with the short sword, knocking him to the ground. Adon looked up and saw Midnight engaged in a hand-to-hand duel with a burly fighter. The man brought his knee up into Midnight's stomach and clasped his steel-gloved hands together as he brought them high over his head, preparing to crack open the skull of the magic-user with his mighty fists.
Adon remembered his long hours of study, got a running start, and delivered a blow to the small of the man's back that shattered his spine instantly. The brigand fell back, eyes wide, and Adon stepped out of the way. He helped Midnight to her feet, and she stared at him in disbelief.
"A follower of Sune must be trained to protect the gifts his goddess gave so freely!" Adon said and smiled.
Midnight almost laughed, then shoved the cleric out of the way as she released a spell that caused a new assailant to stop dead in his tracks, dropping his weapons. He shook as if something horrible were growing within him, then his eyes rolled back in his head
as his flesh darkened and became stone. A single tear ran from his eye.
Midnight froze. It was a child she had struck down, no more than fifteen summers in age. She had only meant to erect a shield to ward off the blow he was about to deliver. How could she have turned him to stone?
The statue exploded, sending bits of dark stone in every direction.
Close enough to hear the explosion, Cyric fell away from the wild-eyed girl as she thrust at him again and again. He felt a warm flow of blood dripping down to his legs from the wound at his side, and the pain became worse as he moved. He fell over the corpse of the swordsman, the soft blue ruffled shirt now stained a bright crimson. The girl's slashes moved closer to his chest, so Cyric took his chance and grabbed the girl's wrist with one hand, her throat with the other.
Only a child, the thief thought, and her free hand raked across his unprotected face, her nails biting into his flesh. Cyric twisted the hand with the dagger until he heard the sound of bones snapping, and pushed the girl away, forcing her against the hard ground. Her skull made a high, cracking sound, and her eyes suddenly glazed over as the fight went out of them. A tiny trickle of blood swam from her mouth, cascading down the length of her neck until it touched the top of her breast.
She was dead.
Something dark and horrible within Cyric rejoiced at the knowledge, but a brighter part of his soul pushed the thoughts away.
Cyric heard a noise beside him and turned. The pain from his wound suddenly flared, and the thief tumbled to the ground, falling upon the corpse of the girl. Although he could not move, he saw Midnight and Adon as they challenged the remaining two members of the band of brigands.
There were less than forty summers in age between the two remaining attackers, so it wasn't surprising when they turned and ran to the other side of the overturned wagon. They barked out commands for their supposedly injured mounts to rise as they pulled the gently laid debris from the flanks of the beasts.
Cyric watched as Midnight scanned the area, her gaze suddenly locking on him. He reached out as Midnight and Adon rushed to his side. A moment later he was staring up at Midnight's face. His head was in her lap, and her hand was gently caressing his chest. The thief's head fell back in relief, and Midnight's hand caressed his brow. Then her expression changed.
"Kel," she said softly, and Cyric realized she was staring toward the road. He turned his head in the direction of the road and watched as Kelemvor was besieged by a small band of archers. Midnight called to Adon, and the cleric took Cyric as the magic-user stood and started to run toward the road.
"Midnight, wait!" Adon shouted. "You'll only get yourself killed!"
Midnight hesitated. She knew Adon was right. Kelemvor was too far away. Even if she had been by his side, her daggers would be useless against arrows. The only way she could save the fighter was with her magic. She thought of the child she had inadvertently slain, images of the exploding stone body etched in her mind.
When Mystra's gifts had crumbled into dust, Midnight had taken a small pouch of diamonds that had been reduced to powder. Reciting the spell to create a wall of force, Midnight reached into the bag and took a pinch of the diamond dust between her fingers. She released the dust at the correct moment, and there was a blinding flash of blue-white light. Midnight was thrown from her feet as a complex pattern of light formed in the air where she had stood. Feeling as if a part of her soul had been wrenched from her, Midnight looked to the road as the pattern of light vanished.
The wall had not appeared.
Midnight threw her head back in frustration. She was just about to loose a scream of rage when something appeared in the sky.
It was a huge rift in the air, a swirling mass, with lights of every color of the spectrum visible within it. The rift appeared in the form of a coin set on its end and thrust at the sky, and as the rift grew, it began to block out the sun.
By the road, Kelemvor stood his ground as the archers closed in. There was a roar in his ears, but he assumed it was an effect of the wounds he had sustained. Two arrows had already gotten past his defenses, but Kelemvor turned a blind eye to the pain that surged up from his right calf and his left arm.
The archers were advancing, ready to finish the fighter off, when suddenly they stopped.
Kelemvor wondered if the brigands had finally run out of shafts as they backed away, pointing at the sky. Two of the archers dropped their weapons just as Kelemvor noticed that his shadow seemed to be deepening. Then a vast, dark veil fell upon the earth, and the archers screamed in a language Kelemvor did not understand and ran in the direction of Arabel.
Kelemvor looked up. The archers, all else, was instantly forgotten. The rift was growing larger now, and Kelemvor stumbled back as something that appeared to be an incredibly huge eye looked out of the vast hole in the sky, then vanished.
Kelemvor turned and looked across the battlefield for Midnight, Cyric, and Adon. Their shapes were hard to distinguish because of the darkness that fell over the entire area, but the fighter could see that two figures were still on their feet. They seemed to be carrying someone.
Adon, Kelemvor thought. The thieves murdered poor, defenseless Adon!
Despite the blood he had lost and the pain he had suffered, Kelemvor ran to the figures in the distance.
Across the field, Cyric, too, had seen the eye. His head had lolled back as Midnight and Adon carried him to the relative safety of the overturned wagon, then set him down.
The earth shuddered.
"Don't leave me," Cyric said.
Midnight looked down at him, confused. She caressed the side of his face. "No," she said simply.
Then, just before he lost consciousness, he saw a figure approaching from the road through the blinding whirlwinds of sand and dust.
Midnight ran toward the fighter as he struggled across the sand, and with her help, Kelemvor reached the overturned wagon. Just then, a huge part of it was sheared off by the wind. The oak planks creaked horribly, then snapped and sailed off into the air. "We've got to get out of here!" the fighter screamed, but he was barely able to hear his own voice of the whine of the wind.
"Cyric's been wounded. We can't leave him," Midnight cried.
"Cyric!" Kelemvor yelled in surprise, and a wall of dust rushed toward him. The fighter turned his face away from the winds. "Can he be moved?"
"No!" Midnight shouted. "Adon is tending to his wounds as best he can!"
There was a slight hiss as the ground beside the couple turned into vapor. The air beside them crackled with a rim of tiny white stars, and a hole the size of a man tore through the air just as Midnight raised her hands and prepared to release another spell.
An old man exited from the portal, a large staff in his left hand. His face, although lined with wrinkles, held a sharpness that spoke volumes on his barely contained annoyance. Beneath his frown, the man's pure white beard reached down to play against his chest. The man wore a large hat and a simple gray cloak. He looked to Midnight.
"Why have ye summoned me?" he said.
Midnight's eyes widened. "I didn't summon you!"
The old man looked up at the growing rift in the sky. Strange lights had begun to play across the opening. Eyes narrowing, he pointed to the rift. "Are ye responsible for this?"
"I didn't mean to — "
Raising his hand to indicate silence, the old man shook his head and turned from Midnight. "There are far easier ways of getting my attention, ye should know. Ye could have come to Shadowdale, for example."
"Elminster!" Midnight cried, and suddenly the winds cut her off from the old sage. The dust cleared, and she caught a glimpse of movement from Elminster's direction. The gray mist parted and revealed the seemingly frantic movement of hands, coupled with the sage's unmistakable voice rising to levels that cut through the winds. Then the mist engulfed Elminster once more. A moment later a section of the mist faded and the sage stood before her.
"Do ye know what that is!?" Elminster said, his impa
tience all too evident as he gestured at the growing rift in the sky. He did not wait for a reply. "That is the direct effect of Geryon's Death Spell. Spells of this sort are directly forbidden, although it is difficult to punish transgressors as they are usually dead before the spell reaches this stage!" Elminster let out a deep breath. "Besides that, Geryon himself died over fifty summers ago."
The roar from above became worse.
"Can you stop it?" Kelemvor shouted.
"Of course I can stop it!" the old sage shouted. "I'm Elminster, aren't I?" Elminster looked back to Midnight. "Is this spell written some place?"
"No," Midnight said.
"Can ye recall it again, through any other means?"
Midnight shook her head. "No," she said. "I summoned it by accident."
"Very well," Elminster said. "Consider thyself warned. A spell of this type is very dangerous."
The rift seemed to be lowering. Elminster looked up and stood away from Midnight and Kelemvor, concentrating his attentions on the hole in the sky.
The fighter and the magic-user found themselves staring at the old man, speechless.
The aged hands of the great mage moved with surprising speed, and he chanted in a deep, resonant voice. A field of sparkling energies surrounded him, a flood of stars that pierced the heavy veil of grayish winds. Sweat was beginning to form on Elminster's brow as he worked his spell, then a web of tiny, glowing eyes began to form in the space between his fingers. Just before it reached completion, the web collapsed inward and a silver, spinning disc hung in the air.
Elminster issued a command, and the spinning disc shot up into the air, growing in size. It shattered in a blinding display, and the rift in the sky slowly tilted down. The hole descended like a kite with its strings cut, floating to the ground at a leisurely pace, moving back and forth on the winds erratically.
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