Darkvision

by Bruce R Cordell

  “Yes?” he inquired.

  “Iahn,” she breathed, “We might have a problem.”

  He waited, saying nothing, merely studying her with his pale, incurious eyes.

  “Some … I don’t know … magical probe found the three Celestial Nadir crystals I’ve been carrying. I felt the contact as it was made. I threw the stones overboard, but we may be marked, nevertheless. We’d best be ready.”

  The taker said, “I’m always ready, Ususi.”

  She sighed. Not everyone could be as thoroughly competent as vengeance takers were—or pretended to be. “My mistake. I didn’t mean to imply otherwise.”

  She mumbled a quick protective enchantment, a minor ward of stone. Her skin grew a mineral sheen that was unmistakable.

  “Do you mind walking with me along the deck?” the wizard asked Iahn. “I thought I saw something in the water, but it fell behind.”

  “We move swiftly through the water,” observed Iahn. “But let’s be sure we remain ahead of what you saw. Which was …?”

  “A glow.”

  “Hmm.”

  Ususi followed the vengeance taker down the deck toward the stern, stepping around coils of rope, barrels lashed to the railing, and other stowed supplies. At the stern, a short ladder led up to a rear-facing platform perfectly positioned for staring aft. Beyond the glimmer of the ship’s lanterns in the foaming water, all was dark. The shushing sound of the vessel’s passage through the sea wasn’t as reassuring as Ususi had found it earlier.

  “We’ll wait here a while,” counseled Iahn, peering into their wave-tossed wake.

  Ususi nodded.

  A noise like tearing fabric caught Ususi’s attention. She touched Iahn’s shoulder but saw his head was already cocked, listening.

  Ususi whispered, “Was that a sail?”

  Brilliant purple light flashed in the ship’s wake. She was answered.

  “Be ready,” mumbled Iahn. The vengeance taker held out his damos. A light touch from his other hand opened an orifice in the disk. Ususi shuddered as she glimpsed the oily, resinous liquid quivering within. Iahn smoothly removed three bolts from the bottom of his crossbow and dipped their points into the well.

  Ususi moved back a pace from the vengeance taker—she didn’t want to be nicked by accident. She rehearsed a few spells in her mind—Ususi was adept at producing blasts of fire and arcs of lightning, energies sufficient to deal with most threats. She preferred lightning …

  Something squirmed in the darkness behind the ship, coming closer.

  An awful shape oozed out of the night to stand before them on the edge of the platform. It was a creature formed half of bone and half of blackness so dense it possessed actual substance. In silhouette, it was a faceless, wingless demon. Its bony claws were long and tipped with the void. A needle-thin shard of Celestial Nadir crystal poked from a hollow in its forehead.

  “Shadow eft!” said Ususi in surprise.

  Iahn fired one of his poison-tipped bolts, which caught the creature squarely in the chest. It threw back its head, opened its mouth in a silent scream, and toppled off the back of the ship.

  “What is a shadow eft?” asked the vengeance taker, nonchalantly cocking his crossbow with the second poisoned bolt.

  After getting her breath back, she said, “Shadow efts were assassins for the ancient Imaskari. Efts were kept in suspended animation until some noble needed to eliminate a rival. Then an eft was programmed and decanted. An eft assassin, being part shadow, could find and kill most creatures before they even knew they were being stalked.”

  “I’ve never seen one before.”

  “Shadow efts haven’t been in the world since the Imaskari Empire failed,” said Ususi, a note of wonder in her voice.

  “What about that crystal in its head?”

  Ususi shook her head. “Nothing in my studies connects shadow efts with Celestial Nadir crystal—although now that I think of it,” she said, “maybe the old Imaskari stored shadow efts in the Celestial Nadir when they were in stasis. If …”

  Iahn’s shadow suddenly revealed itself as a monstrosity of bone and darkness. Night-dark claws plunged into the vengeance taker’s back, and he stiffened with pain and surprise.

  Iahn’s blood dribbled onto the deck as he struggled in the monster’s grip. The shadow eft rose straight into the night, its feet dangling, as if being reeled upward by an unseen rope. The retreating eft was taking Iahn with it.

  “No!” yelled Ususi.

  The wizard uttered the triggering syllables for a difficult spell. Then she commanded, in the language of Imaskar, “You are dismissed; desist and return to your plane of birth!” Magic unfurled from her mind and fingers, discharged through the air, and connected with the rising shadow eft.

  The eft melted into the darkness. Ususi sucked in a breath. Gone? Or merely unseen? Then Iahn dropped hard onto the deck. The impact knocked the crossbow from the vengeance taker’s grip. With a single clatter and bounce, it bounded over the railing and was swallowed by the water with nary a splash.

  “Effective,” coughed Iahn, a hint of strain in his voice. He stood, slightly unsteady.

  “I’m sorry about your crossbow, Iahn.”

  He shook his head and raised a hand.

  “And I’m sorry I dropped you, too.”

  The vengeance taker nodded. Blood seeped down his right arm, but he was already reaching into his kit. He pulled out a tiny vial. Ususi recognized the vial’s design—before she’d left Deep Imaskar, she’d purchased elixirs in similar containers. Its fluid was charged with a spell of minor healing.

  Iahn unstoppered the vial and tossed down the contents. A flush passed across his features and his posture straightened, though the rents in his clothing remained. The vengeance taker dropped the empty vial back into his kit.

  “Do you think we’ve seen the last of them, Iahn?”

  He shrugged. “Can’t say. I doubt it. You tossed three crystals overboard? We’d best assume one more eft, at least.”

  Ususi looked around, trying to see into every hollow and shadow, squinting hard. A bad strategy—her imagination tried to convince her that each pool of darkness hid a lurking eft. Could she banish the shadows as she had the last eft? Well, she could do better than that, now that she thought about it.

  “I’ve got something that might work,” she murmured, and fumbled with the various scrolls at her belt. She had six leather tubes affixed, and in each were three or more fine parchments on which were penned active spells encoded in magical glyphs. While she kept many spells mentally prepared, the scrolls served her for emergencies, bearing effects she might want on rare occasions. She also had a few spells of unique potency given to her by powerful friends, or looted from ancient tombs.

  “This one, I think,” Ususi said, and pulled out a brownish, crumbling parchment on which yellow symbols glimmered with their own internal glow. “Ready yourself for an early sunrise, Iahn,” she warned the vengeance taker, and she began reading.

  The words were merely the keystones of the magical structure already imbued in the fabric of the ink and parchment. As she spoke each word, the fiery yellow writing faded, and a brilliant charge grew on the edge of her consciousness.

  With the last word uttered, light as bright and unforgiving as the sun blossomed overhead. She’d grown accustomed to the daystar over Faerûn in the years since she’d left Deep Imaskar, but the transition from night to day sent a jolt through her eyes, dazing her for a moment. She saw one of Iahn’s hands jerk up to shade his eyes, and simultaneously heard a terrible screech from behind the closest mast.

  The spectacular burst blossomed across the wave-tossed water and illuminated half the deck in bright sunlight. A shadow eft tumbled out from behind the mast, scrabbling for a hold with clawed fingers. Its form grew ragged and pocked as daylight ate at the shadows that served as the eft’s flesh.

  Despite the creature’s agony, the faux sunlight wasn’t enough to kill it, or even stop it from charging straight for
Ususi. The wizard unconsciously backpedaled, but the thing was on her in a moment. She raised an arm, ready to unleash another spell. Ususi saw a sweeping claw waver in the air, becoming paper-thin, as if shedding the dimension of width, enhancing its sharpness to a supernatural degree. She shrieked and threw herself back, but the shadow claw caught her across her face, left arm, and side.

  Searing pain shattered her thoughts, and the strength seemed to pour out of her legs. The wizard sprawled onto the deck, her head lolling.

  Iahn, exquisitely illuminated in the fading sunburst, crossed into Ususi’s dwindling field of vision. With a quick step, the vengeance taker pivoted his upper body and lunged, punching with a right cross. His hand, instead of being balled into a fist, was open, and the damos strapped to his palm gaped.

  As if stopping himself from a fall, Iahn’s hand lashed out and caught the shadow eft on its broad back, connecting the open mouth of the damos to the shadow eft’s body with incredible force.

  The shadow eft arched its back and spasmed. Already made partly of darkness, the eft’s body darkened further, beginning at the point where Iahn’s hand clamped down on the creature’s back, then spreading across the entire figure. The eft tried to scream but remained mute unto its last breath, which Ususi witnessed—the creature was utterly consumed by its own shadow, the virulence of its form suddenly undone by the poison of the vengeance taker’s damos.

  Or was her vision dimming? A warm stream of blood tickled her neck as she lay, unmoving, on her left side. Her blood pooled on the deck beneath her, ominous for the speed at which the diameter expanded.

  Yet Ususi was strangely incurious. It wasn’t as if her strength were deserting her—her will to care about her situation was simply leaking into the floorboards. Even breathing was a chore. It’d be so much easier to simply quit worrying about it all.

  Hands rolled her over onto her back. Iahn’s face hovered above her. It wore an expression she’d never seen before. Worry?

  “Ususi, hold on. I’ve run through my healing drafts,” he said. “Where do you keep yours?” Iahn quickly searched the many pouches on her belt. She could feel the tug and pull as he opened each pocket and pulled out the contents. But she didn’t really care. It seemed sort of funny. Too much effort to laugh, though.

  Where were her healing elixirs? Her expeditioner’s pack had a little rectangular case filled with ten or so curative drafts, she recalled. It was a struggle to focus enough to speak, but Iahn looked so touchingly concerned.

  “My cabin … in my pack,” Ususi finally breathed.

  “Wait,” the vengeance taker commanded, and raced away, leaving Ususi bleeding on the deck.

  Alone. Just as she preferred. She looked straight up through the invisible glass of night and saw that the clouds had pulled back. The tiny sparks of a million stars twinkled, calling her. Their still, calm majesty stole down upon her, overwhelming her. Ususi wondered if she could will herself forward and upward, into final, beautiful oblivion. The sound of the waves breaking along the side of the ship, with their timeless certitude and obstinacy, urged her on.

  And why not? She had so many questions she knew would never be answered. What was she accomplishing in the day-to-day existence she endured—what greater good was being served? Her dream of rediscovering ancient Imaskaran sites seemed childish, and its appeal faded as she turned over that desire in her graying thoughts. She mentally reached back toward her youth, trying to find the spark of excitement that usually accompanied thoughts of her search, and failed to find any. Was that dream just a convenient fiction she told herself? Was she actually laboring through each day to “get by, get through?”

  If she survived this night, all that lay ahead of her was day after plodding day of more of the same, a hollow husk of what her hopes had promised.

  The magnificence of the sparkling stars called to her more insistently.

  Tears formed in the corners of her eyes. It was a blunt, harsh, banal life she lived. Now was her chance to end the strife, the uncertainty, the little defeats and pains that so plagued and disillusioned her. And she was suddenly so cold.

  “Drink this,” a voice urged. Liquid poured into her mouth. Ususi coughed, turned her head, and spit it up. She wasn’t going to give in to salvation that easily. The liquid tasted like tangerine, light, clean, and fresh. It was a pleasant taste, but she fought the urge to enjoy it. She wanted the lonely stars back.

  A strong hand held her chin, and another infusion of liquid trickled down her throat. This time, when she tried to spit it up, a hand massaged her neck and she involuntarily swallowed the potion.

  The call of oblivion faded slightly. Strength grew in her arms, legs, and core. The cool splendor of the night transformed into a cloudy, rainy evening on the rough planking of a sea-tossed ship. Where were the tiny points of light that offered her their cosmic embrace?

  Sorrow clutched her, and tears began streaming down the wizard’s cheeks.

  “Don’t cry,” said the vengeance taker, misunderstanding her tears. “You’ll be all right.”

  She nodded. Her raveled will began to reassemble as the mortality of her grievous wound receded. Her emotional transcendence had been a physical response to death’s nearness—her body had foreseen finality, and attempted to ready her for the end. So she supposed …

  Life had been poured rudely back into her, but her memory of death’s acceptance lurked. The knowledge that she did not fear death stood in the shadows of her consciousness, like a lover she would miss, but whom she was certain to meet again one day. Until then, though …

  Ususi grabbed one of her rescuer’s hands, squeezed, and said, “Thank you, Iahn. You’ve saved me.” She wondered if her words were true.

  Warian couldn’t sleep. His mind kept returning to Uncle Zel revealing himself as a stowaway. His uncle’s words buzzed and rattled around his brain, enhancing his anxiety the longer he considered them. His uncle’s terrific snores weren’t helping. Only Warian knew Zel rode Stormsailer, so of course, his uncle stayed hidden in his cabin.

  The snores had been light and breathy at first, soundless enough that Warian could almost ignore them. Before long, the snores began to thunder. On more than one occasion, Warian rose from his bed to glare down at his uncle who lay on his back, mouth ajar. When he pushed Zel onto his side, the snoring eased. But the relief was temporary. A short time later, a snorting cough woke Warian from a drowse. Zel had rolled back to his preferred position. It was no wonder the man had never taken a wife.

  Eventually, Warian constructed a tent of three pillows across his head. With two standing on edge on either side of his head, and one lying across the pair, the down stuffing helped deaden the noise of Zel’s obstructed breathing. By the time he found himself staring up into the underside of a pillow, sleep’s promise had wholly deserted him.

  What if Shaddon was contaminated with the same strange presence Zel noticed plaguing Xaemar? Warian couldn’t laugh off the possibility—he’d noted something strange at the family meeting, that was sure. And the change in his own arm must be somehow connected. What if Shaddon was the actual source of the contamination? It seemed a reasonable guess. Shaddon was a Datharathi, and that meant finding opportunities for business and advancement whenever possible.

  And his arm—would he, too, fall under the influence of the contamination? Would he find that his wishes were being suborned by a will not his own? And most disturbingly—would he even know it? His relatives gave no sign of being aware that their personalities were under assault. Either they didn’t know, didn’t care, or didn’t remember. Or Zel was wrong.

  Either way, Warian cared. Maybe he was stupid for not immediately taking the drastic step that would safeguard him from potential influence. Maybe he should chop off the arm and be done with it.

  The trauma he’d experienced upon first losing his natural arm came and sat on his chest. Or, the influence that potentially controlled him tugged on those memories—what was free will? Bugger.

 
Warian turned onto his side, but his movement upset the balance of his pillow dolmen, and two pillows toppled to the floor.

  “Damn it all!”

  Warian sat up and looked to the porthole. Orange and pink hues highlighted the dark line of the horizon below. Dawn wasn’t far off.

  Warian rose from his bed and stood directly before the porthole. At least the view he had so admired last night had returned. Sometime toward morning, the ship had broken through the storm and ominous cloud cover. Now the skyship pressed ahead, just below fantastic masses of white and gray. Looking out the window, Warian felt like a minnow swimming in an unbounded ocean among leviathans of mist. A fluke thrash of any of these mythical swimmers could smash Stormsailer and send the debris flittering down into the sea.

  Another sawing snore pierced through Warian’s imagery. He reminded himself once again that Zel, as an apparent ally, probably shouldn’t be choked awake.

  The skyship reached Adama’s Tooth right after dawn.

  Warian watched from the upper deck as the flying craft made its approach. Zel remained in the cabin. With luck, no one would find the stowaway until after Warian and Sevaera disembarked. But Zel had other plans—he began preparing a disguise. Warian left him to his task.

  Adama’s Tooth was a nearly vertical natural monolith with deeply cleft, striated sides. Warian knew it rose at least two thousand feet above the meandering coastline of the Golden Water. Many stories circulated about Adama’s Tooth—according to some accounts, the spire was not natural at all, but artificially raised by the effort of a great wizard, long dead, though Warian couldn’t recall the supposed wizard’s name.

  The less civilized Durpari tribes of the region called the spire Dragon Lodge. In fact, it had been a sacred site of worship for many locals before the Datharathis had bought the rights to open a mine in the tower’s side. Those same locals had launched a number of raids against the mine over the years. The first few times, the mining equipment, brought in at great expense, had been destroyed.

  Datharathi Minerals learned its lesson, and radically increased security.