by Mel Odom
“There will be hundreds of rangers at this forgathering.” Shallowsoul reached out and meticulously straightened one of the books on a shelf where the corners did not quite overlap.
Krystarn took full opportunity to gaze at all the shelves of books. The room was even more vast than she had imagined. Twenty paces in now, and she still couldn’t see the other side of it. Only one wall was visible to her left. It soared up thirty feet before meeting the ceiling. A wheeled ladder hooked to the shelves ran all the way to the top, allowing a person to climb up to reach the highest volumes.
The two walls visible to her through the gaps in the intricate shelving looked like stone. The drow believed the vast library had been initially buried underground, not sunk there as the magic of the Army of Darkness had stricken the city and the protective mythal had come apart.
The room appeared to conform to no real shape as well, furthering her suspicions that the library had been deliberately designed to confuse any who entered it. Fragments in scrolls that she had found that spoke of the library had mentioned maps being necessary to find a way through.
Without those maps, even the parts of the library that Krystarn had seen would require years to merely catalog, even without getting into the content. Once in, if a searcher allowed himself or herself to be pulled in too far, there would be no return.
“I want you to find Baylee Arnvold and kill him,” Shallowsoul ordered.
“When?” Krystarn asked.
“Now.” The lich rounded another stack and the way widened, leading to a high desk in front of a tall stool. A large book occupied the center of the desk, the pages still wet with ink. A quill and an ink pot sat to one side.
Krystarn surveyed the writing, finding it like nothing she’d seen before in all her studies. Liches were undead, usually long removed from any vestiges of humanity. Once she’d discovered Shallowsoul’s true nature, she’d studied about liches. One of the key points of Su’vann’k’tr of the House Fla’nvm’s writings, was that liches often created brand new magic items and spells that no one had heard of before. Removed from the driving needs of the flesh, a lich instead obsessed on harnessing the mystical powers it could never achieve while remaining a living being. That it would create its own language was no surprise.
“You would have me kill this ranger in the midst of hundreds of his own?” Krystarn let her incredulity sound in her voice.
“It is true that I am a harsh taskmaster, Krystarn Fellhammer,” Shallowsoul said, “but it would be foolish for me to give such an assignment without giving you the means to see it through. Even while mortal, I was never a foolish man.”
Krystarn had some reservations whether the lich could remember back that far to make such a statement.
Shallowsoul sat at the desk. A single candle burned at the desk, but the drow knew it was more for conducting spells that needed heat or fire rather than any need for light. The lich saw as well as the drow in the absence of light, perhaps even better.
Krystarn surveyed the room as her mother had taught her. Her peripheral vision took in the short flights of stairs heading in three different directions less than a stone’s throw from the desk area. When she had time, she fully intended to map out the area in her book based on the parts of the library she had seen so far.
“Why not have Baylee killed away from the forgathering?” the drow asked.
“I want a message sent,” the lich said, digging in a drawer of the desk. “Fannt Golsway found the bitter dregs of a trail better left uncovered. I will not allow it to come anywhere close to this library. I want no one else to come after Baylee Arnvold or Fannt Golsway with prying eyes. The secret dies with them.”
“Are you sure that Baylee knows about the library?” Krystarn asked.
The lich regarded her with his fiery green pinpoint gaze from the hollowed eye sockets. “You ask so that you may add to your own small store of knowledge.”
“I ask because I have a vested interest at stake as well.” Krystarn forced herself to stare into the lich’s dead gaze. Her muscles trembled against the urge to turn and flee from the cold emanating from the foul creature. “You and I have an agreement. For every five years of my servitude to you, I am allowed to make a copy of a book from this library.”
The lich waved to the shelves. “A pittance against all that is actually here.”
“Yet a fortune to me,” Krystarn countered. “I would learn from you, as I have offered.”
“I have no need of an apprentice. I do not intend to forsake this unlife.”
“As you have made so clear.”
Shallowsoul regarded her, and a cold smile curved his tattered lips baring his teeth even more. The drow thought she even heard the flesh crack and split. “I want you to kill the ranger, Baylee Arnvold.”
“How?” Krystarn challenged.
The lich brought a bag onto the desk. Four gold bands big enough to go around Krystarn’s head encircled the bag. Even as the bag lay on the desk, the cloth jumped and moved. “Do you know what these are?” He tossed one to her.
At her knowing touch, Krystarn could feel the magic within the band. “No.”
“You’ve seen skeleton warriors, I presume?” Shallowsoul asked.
“Yes.” Krystarn’s stomach tightened at the thought, and the announcement confirmed the suspicion she had about the gold bands.
“These are control bands for the four skeleton warriors in this bag.” Shallowsoul tossed the bag across. “Do you know how to use them?”
Krystarn caught the bag of holding. “I’ve been told once you’re wearing a band, you have control over the skeleton warrior.”
“Their souls were captured and placed within those bands,” Shallowsoul agreed. “Those particular four were once enemies. I killed them, stripped their souls from their dying bodies, and enchanted them within those bands. They’ve been there for hundreds of years.”
The bag shifted in the drow’s grip. The gold bands felt chill against her skin.
“Choose three of your men and take them with you.” Shallowsoul crossed the room to a stack and took down a weathered wooden staff. “This staff has already been charged with enough magic to take yourself and the three you’ve chosen to the forgathering. There are two charges. One to open a dimensional door to take you there, and the other to bring you back again.”
Krystarn caught the staff, folding it readily into her grip.
“Go now,” the lich ordered, “and do not fail me.”
Questions filled the drow’s mind, but she uttered none of them. She had learned never to question Shallowsoul. The lich brooked no such thing. She inclined her head again, taking one last glance around the room to memorize it, then turned and walked away. She deliberately chose another path, hoping the lich thought she’d merely gotten turned around.
Two steps forward, her eyes hungrily devouring the texts around her, searching for a clue as to what the pages might contain, the air in front of her suddenly rippled. Shallowsoul’s grating bone laughter flared to harsh life around her. Then the dimensional door pulled her through.
In one cold, falling eye blink, she stood back in the tunnel. A wave of dizziness overcame her as the last of the lich’s laughter faded away.
One of the males reached out to aid her.
Regaining her balance, Krystarn drew one of the short daggers secreted in her corset and raked a cruel line of blood across the male’s cheek. Even as he reacted, trying to step away from the blade, Krystarn stepped forward and shoved the dagger up under his nose, hooking the tip into one nostril to freeze the male into place. A trickle of blood ran down his upper lip.
“Do not forget your station,” she warned. “I’ve killed drow women for less, much less a member of an imperfect gender.”
“Forgive me, Malla. I only forgot—”
“There is no forgetting around me,” Krystarn said.
“Yes, Malla.”
“Step back.” When the drow warrior moved back, Krystarn flipped the dagg
er slightly, cutting through the male’s nostril and creating a slit almost a half-inch long.
To his credit, the warrior said nothing, though his ebony face grayed in pain.
Krystarn put her dagger away, secreting it once more. “Do not ever let me think you see me in a moment of weakness,” she told all of the men. “I shall not be weak because that would only encourage the craftiest among you to try to slip a blade between my ribs. And I do not intend to lose any more of you than I have to.” So far, only two of her warriors had died in the tunnels surrounding the library’s hiding place.
The wounded man stepped back into the military formation, ignoring the blood that streamed down his chin and dripped to his tunic.
“Captain V’nk’itn, we are traveling again. Get your men into a bag of holding.”
The captain waved his arm and one of the men produced a large bag of holding from a backpack. He held it open while the man next to him climbed inside and disappeared without a sound.
“Also,” Krystarn told her captain, “I want yourself and two other men whose nerve will not fail to stay with me.” She grasped the staff Shallowsoul had given her and waited for her orders to be carried out.
It would be good to get back to the business of taking lives. Lloth would be pleased. The ranger was as good as dead.
11
“What would the Waterdhavian Watch want with you, Baylee?”
The ranger shook his head at Serellia’s question as he lounged in the shadows by a tree overlooking the table where Cordyan Tsald sat with one of her companions. The female watch lieutenant’s name was already being passed rapidly throughout the forgathering after the axe throwing event.
“The only tie I have there is Golsway,” Baylee answered. He watched a brief fluttering of leathery wings take to the air from a branch near Cordyan’s head. Xuxa, what have you learned?
A lot of silly intrigues that are currently in vogue in Waterdeep, the azmyth bat answered. But nothing regarding you.
Baylee watched the woman, eating as unconcernedly as if she had a right to be there. He smiled. In a way, he found her behavior curious. And she had chosen the right way to set all the tongues wagging at the forgathering. As well liked as he was by most rangers who knew him, Baylee also knew he had people who disliked him, if they didn’t count him as a definite enemy.
Aymric held up an arm. Xuxa landed neatly on it, hanging upside down. “A reward, dear Xuxa, for your daring efforts.” He offered her a small piece of apple nut crunch.
Gossip collecting, you mean. Still Xuxa took the offered treat.
“They are deliberately not talking about you,” Serellia stated.
“Well,” Karg rumbled, standing beside them, “after the display I’m told she put on at the axe throwing contest, everyone else is talking about you.”
“They came at you straight-away, my friend,” Aymric pointed out. “If they had a fell purpose in mind, they would have waited for you outside the forgathering.”
“Even then, that would not have been a wise move,” Karg said. “Our sentries spotted them a full two hours before they arrived and had word sent back to Myndhl. He’s in charge of security this year, you know.”
Baylee did know. Myndhl was a forest runner like Vaggit, and several areas in the Dalelands named Myndhl as an outlaw. His largesse didn’t necessarily stem from the coffers of Zhentil Keep as Vaggit’s did. Many times over the years, Myndhl’s victims had included the wealthier houses around the Dalelands whose only crime was success. As such a wanted person, Myndhl’s security systems were elaborate.
“Then I suppose there’s nothing to be done for it,” Baylee said.
“What do you mean?” Aymric asked, peering through the branches.
“I’ll go down there and kill the man sitting with the lieutenant,” Baylee replied. “Then she’ll talk.”
“You’re kidding,” Karg rumbled.
“Yes.” Baylee started out from the tree, aiming straight for the table where Cordyan and her companion sat. Heads turned as he passed by, and he knew that most of the rangers at the forgathering knew what was going on.
“Then what are you going to do?” Serellia demanded, rushing up to walk with him.
“I’m going to introduce myself and ask her what she wants.”
“And what if she grabs you and teleports you out of here?” Aymric demanded, coming up on the other side of Baylee.
“That’s why I’m here,” a voice spoke out of thin air.
“Carceus?” Aymric asked. “Is that you, you old god-seller?”
“And whom else would it be?”
Looking in the direction of the voice, Baylee thought he saw a shadow ripple through the darkness at his side. Carceus Ravnei was a traveling cleric in the service of Gond Wonderbringer. He enjoyed friendships with a number of rangers due to his wandering travels trying to increase the number of followers of Gond in the Dalelands. His invisibility was due to some enchanted item that no one had quite nailed down over the years. The cleric had his secrets.
“Thank you for coming,” Baylee said.
“After Xuxa’s impassioned plea but a moment or two ago, how could I not come?”
Baylee watched as Cordyan’s head came up. Her eyes held the color of newly worked copper still drawing some of the red of a fire into them. He stopped at the head of the table.
Cordyan stood up, her left hand drifting down to her sword hilt.
Baylee spread his hands, showing he was unarmed. “You were looking for me.”
Xuxa fluttered through the night overhead, then settled onto a branch over the table. Her thoughts are closed to me, the azmyth bat announced. She has a very disciplined mind, though. And her intentions are definite.
Whatever they are? Baylee asked sarcastically.
Xuxa chirped in disapproval, almost drawing the lieutenant’s gaze.
The man sitting at the table remained on the bench, looking up with no expression. He ate neatly from a small clay plate.
He is a watch wizard, Xuxa announced, though more than that I cannot fathom.
“Baylee Arnvold?” Cordyan asked.
“And you are Lieutenant Cordyan Tsald, though I don’t know why you would be looking for me.” Baylee watched the way the woman moved, noting the symmetry of power and grace. Though young in years, she carried experience wrapped around her. And for one so young, she had gone far in a very challenging arena to make lieutenant.
“First I must inform you I am here in an official capacity.”
Baylee inclined his head. “Of course. I hope you’ve enjoyed the festivities despite that capacity. I hear you’re quite good with an axe.”
The woman let the compliment roll past her without acknowledgment. “I need to know when the last time was that you spoke with Fannt Golsway.”
“I would have to refer to my journal to give you the exact date,” Baylee said. Without warning, a leaden feeling filled his stomach.
“An approximation at this point would be adequate.”
“Months,” Baylee replied.
“What was the nature of that discussion?”
“I’m sure it had something to do with an antiquity or a point of history,” Baylee assured the watch lieutenant. “Golsway has little time to talk to anyone about anything other than that.”
“Would that be in your journal as well?”
“If it was something I was interested in.”
The woman shifted, taking a step closer to Baylee. “I’ve been told you and your mentor weren’t on the best of speaking terms the last time you saw him.”
“We had a disagreement,” Baylee agreed. “One which I fully intend to redress when I see him at the end of the second tenday from now.”
“You have intentions of traveling to Waterdeep?”
Baylee glanced around at the forgathering. The questioning had drawn more than a few spectators. “Yes.”
“Why?” Cordyan asked.
“You ask a number of questions without giving me an e
xplanation,” Baylee said.
“I’m afraid that is the nature of my business.” Cordyan’s face remained unreadable even to Baylee’s trained eye.
“I’m returning to Waterdeep to see Fannt Golsway,” Baylee answered.
Cordyan regarded him silently for a moment. Then she said, “I’m afraid I have some bad news for you. Fannt Golsway is dead.”
“Malla, we are ready.”
Turning her attention from the staff she held, Krystarn looked over the three men standing in the hallway with her. Only minutes had passed as the men readied themselves for the coming battle. “That is satisfactory, Captain V’nk’itn.” She handed him one of the golden bands Shallowsoul had given her. “You understand my instructions on how to use this?”
“Yes, Malla.”
Krystarn gave the two remaining bands to the other drow males. “To flinch or lose your focus will get you killed more surely than a blade in the back.”
All three males nodded. None of them appeared happy about being in possession of the bands.
“Those of you who fail to use the bands will die by my hand,” she promised. Then she took up the staff the lich had given her. She spoke the activation phrase and tapped the staff against the floor.
A ruby beam spat out from the tip of the staff and splashed against the empty space between the walls of the hallway. The beam formed a thin crescent at first, finally flaring out into a full circle that rapidly expanded and filled with swirling rainbows. In heartbeats, it filled the hallway.
Once the dimensional door was secure, the beam faded away.
“Kill the ranger, Baylee Arnvold,” she said. “And kill any who are with him.” The drow warrior leaped into the dimensional door in front of her. The familiar chill wrapped around her, then took her away.
“When did Golsway die?”
Cordyan Tsald stared into the jade gaze of Baylee Arnvold. “A tenday and two days ago.” Her heart went out to the ranger, and she wasn’t used to it doing that so easily. In her trade, she worked with thieves and liars on a continual basis. And men motivated by a need for power or wealth. There were few whom she respected.
