Depths of Madness

by Erik Scott De Bie

  Clutching himself tightly, Liet massaged his arms and winced at the sudden burning pain. Why did they hurt now?

  Then the hand was gone, snaking back into that shimmer, which winked out, leaving him in blackness—blackness that was complete except for the torchlight flickering from the new passage. He crept up to it, wary that the hand would reappear, and looked in. More sewers beckoned that they had never been in before.

  “’Light,” Liet said. He needed to tell her of this. “’Light!”

  In the darkness—less than a pace from where the useless one hid—Gestal took careful note of the hand from the wall. It did not please Lord Divergence, being this far into the lower domain. Certain forces would not welcome his presence.

  The eyes turned back down the passage whence the useless one had come. Yes.

  Gestal had an appointment to keep.

  He found her after only a few breaths—silent, still, in the middle of the corridor. Twilight’s head was bowed as though she were praying. Liet’s heart hammered in his throat. He opened his mouth but forgot whatever he had been about to say. As he tried to remember, his thought slipped away.

  Liet was about to speak when Twilight’s hand shot out and grasped his collar. Before he could say a word, she slammed him against the wall and put a thin, sharp knife to his throat. Liet squeaked, and she withdrew the blade and sighed.

  “Torm’s name!” he cried. “You can’t just say ‘well met’—like a sane lady?”

  “You can’t just approach from the light, spouting poetry, like a conventional suitor?” Twilight put the knife away.

  Heat shot into his face. “I, ah, I guess I’m sneakier than I thought.” His eyes widened. “I’m—I’m really not trying to sneak up on you!”

  The elf smiled halfway. “A lass can never be too cautious,” she said. “Strange men, creeping about dark corners, watching lasses from hiding, carrying sharp steel?”

  “I see your aim,” said Liet. “I’d have spoken, but I reasoned you’d hear …”

  “And you were correct,” said Twilight. “Just here to gawk as I take my rest, or do you have a purpose?” As she spoke, she slipped out of her breeches and blouse, shaking them out. Liet gulped, and though his mouth opened, he had no words, only shock.

  After a moment, Twilight raised an eyebrow, and his flush only deepened. He finally thought to whirl around just as she wrapped a dark cloak around her bare body.

  “Little point now,” she said. “So speak. I have little enough time for wandering lads who fancy watching lasses more than a century their senior strip bare.”

  Liet turned about, hesitantly. “Ah,” he said. “Well …”

  “Now there’s a deep thought,” the elf observed.

  “I need to tell you, ah …” Liet trailed off.

  “Are all men of the Dales this eloquent?” Twilight’s face contorted. “Out with it! Did you come to berate me for letting Asson die? Or question my methods with Davoren and Taslin?” She eyed him fiercely. “Or perhaps just a quick tumble on the stone here? It’s been a long day. I could certainly use some vigorous comforting, how about you?”

  “I’d settle for a vigorous handclasp,” murmured Liet, not thinking. Then he froze.

  Twilight blinked. “What?”

  In an instant, the angry gleam in her eyes took on a new tone.

  “Uh, ah, that is, I—”

  “What did you say?” she asked softly.

  “Ah,” Liet said. “I merely wanted to—make sure you’re well, after ah, today.”

  Twilight looked at him as if no one had ever said such a thing to her before. “Why?” she asked finally.

  It was Liet’s turn to be speechless. “I just, ah—just concerned, that’s all.” Hadn’t he wanted to tell her something? Something important?

  “You’re not breaking one of my rules, are you?” Twilight asked with a wry smile.

  “Most maids would call me chivalrous,” said Liet, “and not accuse me of—”

  “Do you know how to please an elf, manling?” Twilight’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “A kiss upon the tip of the ear or a lick on the palm of the hand is quite a thing.”

  “Uh, ’tisnt, ah, why I’m here,” Liet managed.

  “Really? You’re certain you’re”—she slid up to him and pressed herself against his chest, using her lithe curves to full effect—“not breaking”—Liet stiffened, but only from surprise, as she traced her fingers down many days’ stubble—“rule number”—she finished, pressing her nose against his, caressing his lips with her own—“four?”

  “And what—what if I am?” Liet was almost breathless.

  With a little laugh, Twilight shoved him away.

  “I could make an attempt at poetry,” Liet said. “If that’s what y—”

  He instantly regretted it. In her face, in her stance, he saw that whatever fire had been lit had vanished. He felt like a child.

  “Go to your rest, boy,” she said. “I present far too wild a beast for you to tackle, this night or any night. You do not wish to try.”

  He sniffed. “Is that not my choice?”

  When Twilight raised an eyebrow, he cursed inwardly again. Why must she be so clever?

  “Ah, I mean, not whether I tackle you—uh, but whether I wish to, ah, try?”

  “Go to your rest,” she repeated. “And that’s the end.”

  Liet turned away, defeated. Then he caught himself on the wall and looked back. He was tired of being treated like a child, so he decided to say something not boyish. Of course, as soon as it came out of his mouth, it sounded quite juvenile. “I’m not afraid of you, Twilight.”

  Her reception, however, was not what he expected. She stared at him, her skin white, as though he’d said something quite mature. “You’re certain?”

  “Aye,” said the man Liet had suddenly become. “The question is, are you so certain you’re not?”

  She did not answer, but merely stared at him until—a little more confident—he went back to his blankets.

  Twilight awoke the following morning to screams. Cursing, she fumbled out of her cloak and grabbed Betrayal. She ran down the tunnel to her companions.

  Taslin sat in the middle of the room, screaming and moaning, rocking back and forth. There was something red on the floor in front of her. Gargan stood over Davoren, axe ready, and Slip huddled behind him. Liet had his short sword at the warlock’s throat.

  “Hold!” Twilight shouted. “What is this?”

  “He … he did something,” Liet stammered, “to Taslin.”

  “You saw him?” Twilight demanded. “What was it?”

  “N-no,” Liet said. “But he did something!”

  “Not I,” the warlock said. Liet put pressure on the sword and Davoren fell silent.

  Wary, Twilight walked to Taslin. A rag-wrapped bundle lay beside her, the size of a loaf of bread, perhaps. The rags were simple roughspun, and were soaked red. “Taslin?”

  The sun elf shook her head violently.

  Twilight prodded the bundle with Betrayal. No reaction. She knelt to examine it, moving the swaddling aside with her steel. Then she flinched back with a curse.

  A pair of red buttons stared out of a rag face. The doll wore rough, tattered robes dyed with what looked like blood. It was flattened, its stuffing leaking out from a hole in its chin. It looked like a scraggly beard.

  “Someone has done this,” Taslin said. “I will have blood.” Taslin glared at her. “Someone …” Then she trailed off, staring at Twilight’s face.

  Twilight looked around, moving only her eyes. All of them looked far too horrified. Trying her best not to tremble, Twilight lifted her fingers and felt sticky wetness on her cheek. She did not need a mirror to know what must be there—a mark of some kind, traced in blood. She turned and wiped it away.

  “From now on,” Twilight said, slowly and calmly, “no one wanders away from the others. We stay together. Understood?”

  Agreeing silence answered, but the eyes she felt o
n her back lost no suspicion.

  “Down!” Twilight hissed.

  Liet fell behind a pile of rubble, landing hard. Gargan ducked with them, hiding Taslin and Davoren around the corner.

  Liet rubbed his bottom. “What did—”

  Fingers fell on his lips, silencing him. Twilight gestured over the rubble with her eyes. Liet’s blood ran cold and he couldn’t bring himself to look.

  “Tsch,” Davoren said from the corner. “Simple primitives, hardly worth a moment.” He did not walk into the open, though.

  “Agreed,” hissed Taslin. She scared Liet—since that morning, her eyes had shone with troubling intensity. “Let us slay the rabble—they block our path.” She did not move.

  Twilight gestured to Liet to look. He peeked over the stone, as low as he could.

  A score of creatures covered in black and red scales ambled about the wide cavern, illuminated by the torches on the walls. Their faces were slack-jawed and they wore simple dark loincloths for clothing, but there, the resemblance to primitives ended.

  Adorning the creatures’ necks and wrists were necklaces and bracers of silver and gold. They hefted swords of like metal and spears of obsidian. Liet wondered if the lizards had plundered ancient crypts and treasure rooms to secure the precious items. Beneath the finery, some of the lizards’ eyes burned with unholy fire and their features twisted and curled wickedly. Small horns marred the crowns of their heads, and tiny limbs that might have been wings sprouted from shoulders.

  Liet looked to Twilight for clues as to their next move, but her face was ashen. He understood intuitively, somehow, what she was thinking. Though the creatures had not detected their presence, they stood right in the path. No other tunnel through the sewer led around this central chamber—not unless they backtracked as far as their campsite, quite a distance back, and took a different direction.

  Looking at Twilight’s nervous face, Liet had the sinking sensation that somehow, the enemy had known exactly where to wait.

  “Where’s Slip?” Twilight asked.

  “Here!” the halfling piped merrily at Liet’s side, startling him with such proximity. He shushed her before Twilight could do so, and the elf smiled weakly.

  Then one of the fiendish lizards gave a cry. Something big and invisible lifted it and smashed it against the ceiling. The rest scrambled to heft their weapons.

  A hulking creature of gray appeared in the middle of the chamber, holding the crushed remains of a lizardthing. It resembled a statue of iron plate armor, twice the height of a man. Without a sound, it dashed two lizards to the ground with one mighty fist. The other dozen beasts fell on their attacker, spears and obsidian swords shattering against its iron carapace.

  “What is that?” Liet asked. “What do we do?”

  “A golem,” Twilight breathed at his shoulder. “Right.” She looked to Slip. “You and Gargan keep the others hidden. I will be right back.” She moved.

  “What?” Liet lost track of her within a heartbeat, as if the shadows had swallowed her whole, devouring her before his eyes.

  The battle lasted less than twenty breaths. Methodical, brutal, and completely unemotional, the golem—as Twilight had labeled the iron monstrosity—smashed and trampled the lizards into the ground. They fought with indescribable wildness and inhuman ferocity, but they were as nothing against the golem. Its fists rose and fell with hideous speed and strength, powdering bones and sending webs of cracks through the stone. Every few swings, its helmet breathed out a cloud of vapor that melted skin and set the lizards flailing and gasping.

  Finally, when half the fiendish creatures were slain, including two that seemed more demon than lizard, they admitted defeat and fled. All who could move scrambled away and ran down the narrow tunnels.

  They went without pursuit. The golem, its work finished, gave the room a long gaze. Liet hunched behind the stone, praying that it wouldn’t see him. After the space of a long, agonized breath, it shimmered and vanished. But it didn’t seem to leave.

  A moment of silence followed. Terrified, Liet looked around, trying vainly to find Twilight. She seemed to have vanished. Was her body amid the dead? He couldn’t tell.

  Liet rose, shivering. Even if the thing was still there, hidden from view, he felt better revealing himself than not knowing.

  Then a hand caught his arm, and Twilight appeared out of the shadows at his side. “Going somewhere,” she asked, “without me? I’m crushed.”

  “’Light!” the swordsman exclaimed. He longed to throw his arms around her, but he stopped himself. She’d confused him before, and now wasn’t the time—not in front of Davoren, and especially not in front of Taslin, with Asson so lately slain.

  Then he noticed the body she was dragging.

  “Thalea,” Gargan mused. Liet reasoned it must be his word for “lizard.”

  “Uh, Twilight?” he asked. “What—what’s that?”

  “A present,” said Twilight.

  It was an unconscious lizardman with black scales and fiendish features. Its body was completely frozen, even its eyes. It wore a rough loincloth and a black sash, upon which was embroidered a sigil of a sickly gray tentacle enwrapping a scimitar.

  The only sign the creature lived was the madness in those reddish orbs. If anything, this imprisonment in its own body would drive the lizard even more insane.

  “What’s wrong with it?” asked Slip. “Is it—dead?”

  “Paralyzed,” Davoren said softly.

  “How do you know?” the halfling asked.

  The warlock scowled.

  The fiendish lizard’s eyes blinked, both sets of lids slicking over soft surfaces. The paralysis was fading, Liet realized. Then the beast recovered the use of its tongue, and it wasted no time using it. The words the creature spat were deep and violent, their texture broken and jagged. And though none but Taslin seemed to understand its words, the tone was clear enough.

  “What tongue’s that?” Slip asked.

  “Infernal, wormling,” said Davoren. “So garbled I cannot understand a word.”

  “That’s because it’s Abyssal,” corrected Twilight.

  As Davoren glared, bested, Slip brightened. “How many tongues do you speak?” she asked the elf.

  “Irrelevant,” the warlock snapped. “What’s he saying?”

  Twilight looked to Slip first. “Many enough,” she said. Then she turned to Davoren. “And it’s a she.”

  The warlock started to retort, but shut his mouth. Liet understood and agreed—he really didn’t care to know how Twilight could tell.

  “The same words over and over: Takt der shar,” Twilight pronounced, her silky voice curling perversely around the fiendish tongue. “The Mad Sharn.” Taslin shrugged.

  Hearing the words, the fiendish lizard spat at Twilight and said something dark and unfathomably vile. Liet saw his companions fall to the ground, writhing and moaning. Gargan and Twilight sank to one knee. Taslin fell as though dead. Slip blinked, then clasped her hands to her ears and sank to her knees. Only the warlock remained standing, staring hard at Liet, to whom the word was mere profanity.

  Why did it not harm him? Was this some inner power, as with the wight?

  The fiendish lizard didn’t finish the phrase, though, choking off in the middle. It was as though the very words stopped its heart. The creature died with a dry rattle.

  “I suppose that solves that problem,” was all Davoren said.

  Liet ran to Twilight and helped her up. The elf looked at him, uncertain of something. Then her eyes widened. “A sharn,” she said. Liet could feel her shiver in his arms.

  “Its master, I expect,” Davoren said. Leave it to the warlock to know some of the darkest secrets of the Realms. “The madness of demons fits a creature born of chaos.”

  “Chaos?” Liet asked. “What—?”

  “There are certain forces in this world you should not know about,” Twilight said. “That no sane mortal would want to know about.”

  “But you do,”
Liet argued.

  She conceded that with a nod. “A race that was old when the elves were young,” said Twilight. “Mighty spellweavers before Corellon’s tears conceived the first elves—children of the primal chaos that came before the gods themselves.”

  Her voice took on a mystical quality, as though she recounted the memories of a pleasant childhood or a beautiful, half-forgotten summer. Liet could almost fall asleep into dark dreams, listening to that lovely, haunting voice.

  “Sharn is simply what men call them, though in truth that is only a fantasy. They are an ancient, mighty race, but not one that most would deal with lightly—not even gods.” Her eyes darkened, and Liet heard a second meaning. “Which would be wise. A creature born of such disorder cannot be trusted.”

  Liet Sagrin shivered, and not just with fear.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Why do you follow me?” Twilight asked later as she clicked open a lock. “I told you to stay with the others. You have a habit of disobedience.”

  “Why do we camp at a crossroads?” Liet asked. The heavy door sighed when Twilight pressed on it. She gestured, and Liet helped her push it open. The door growled in protest but opened. The plain chamber within was empty but for refuse—shattered wood chips, broken ceramics, worn statuettes—and ancient dust. Footprints, distinctly those of a lizard’s feet, traced a path through the chamber to an open portal across the room, but the prints were old. She wished she were a tracker, and might have known how old.

  She pulled a torch from her pack. Liet grinned until she shoved it at him. No reason she had to carry it—she had darksight.

  “I asked you first,” she said.

  “I’m sure ’tis the same answer.”

  “Guaranteed escape route?” Twilight asked simply.

  “I thought you only, ah, appreciated the concept,” he said sheepishly. “Of a crossroads, I mean. That’s not—you know—the same answer, or anything.”