The Last Threshold tns-4

by R. A. Salvatore

  The monk stood in the main square of Neverwinter, staring at his hands as he turned them around before his eyes.

  “That a fightin’ practice?” Ambergris asked.

  “I’m looking for hints of shadowstuff,” Brother Afafrenfere replied curtly. “What have you done to me, dwarf?”

  “I telled ye,” said Ambergris. “Can’t have ye lookin’ the part of a shade if ye’re to walk the lands o’ Toril, now can I?”

  “This is not illusion,” Afafrenfere protested. “My skin is lightening.”

  “Is yer heart, then?” the female dwarf asked.

  Afafrenfere glared at her.

  “How long was ye a shade?”

  “I gave myself to the Shadowfell,” Afafrenfere protested.

  “Bah, but ye fell in love an’ nothin’ more,” the dwarf chided. “How long?”

  “You cannot-”

  “How long?”

  “Three years,” Afafrenfere admitted.

  “So ye spent the better part of a quarter-century here, and living where, I might be askin’, except that I’m already knowin’.”

  “Oh, are you?”

  “Aye, ye got yer training in the mountains aside Damara.”

  Afafrenfere stepped back as if she had just slugged him. “How could you-?”

  “Ye got a yellow rose painted inside yer forearm, ye dolt. Ye think I’m for missin’ a clue like that? And I telled ye true back there in Gauntlgrym. Meself’s from Citadel Adbar, and Adbar’s knowing o’ the Monastery o’ the Yellow Rose.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Afafrenfere insisted. “I gave myself willingly to Cavus Dun.”

  “To Parbid, ye mean.”

  “To Cavus Dun and the Shadowfell,” Afafrenfere growled at her. “And now you would take the shadowstuff from me.”

  “Ye ain’t no damned shade,” Ambergris insisted. “No more’n meself. Ye’re a human, as ye was afore ye ran to darkness. Ye’re actin’ like I’m stealin’ from ye, but know that I’m savin’ ye, from yerself, so it’d be seemin’. Ain’t nothin’ there in the darkness for ye, boy. Ye ain’t a born shade, and so ye ain’t to get yer desserts there among them grayskins.”

  “And you were just a spy,” Afafrenfere said. “A traitorous spy.”

  “Might be,” said Ambergris, though it was surely more complicated than that. She didn’t feel much like explaining herself to the young monk at this time, however. Amber Gristle O’Maul hadn’t chosen to go to the Shadowfell to serve as a spy for Citadel Adbar. The adjudicators of Citadel Adbar had sentenced her to that mission for serious indiscretions-it was that or a ball and chain, a mining pick, and twenty years of breaking stone in the lowest mines of the dwarven complex.

  “Be happy I was,” the dwarf said. “For if not, then be knowin’ that Drizzt Do’Urden’d’ve carved yerself into little monk bits.”

  “So now I’m supposed to forgive him?” Afafrenfere asked incredulously. “Forgive the fiend who killed Parbid? And I am supposed to forgive you, the traitor, the fake shade? You expect me to change my skin color and pretend that none of that happened?”

  “If ye’re smart, ye’ll be trying to forget the whole o’ that last three years,” Ambergris replied.

  Afafrenfere took a threatening step toward her, but the powerful dwarf didn’t back away an inch, and didn’t blink.

  “Look, boy,” she said, waggling a thick finger in Afafrenfere’s scowling face, “and while ye’re looking, look into yer heart. Ye was never of that dark bunch, not as kin or kind. And ye’re knowin’ it. Ye might not be no paladin-monk, like them others o’ Yellow Rose, but nor are ye any gray-skinned assassin, killin’ yer own at the demands o’ them Netheril dogs.”

  “He killed Parbid!” Afafrenfere yelled, and Ambergris was glad to hear that argument alone, for it confirmed her suspicions nicely.

  “Parbid attacked him and got what most attackin’ that particular drow are sure to be gettin’,” Ambergris snarled right back, and now she went up on her toes and put her fat nose right against Afafrenfere’s as she spoke. “Are ye holdin’ a blood feud against one who did no more than defend himself from yer own attack?”

  Afafrenfere straightened a bit, moving his face away, but Ambergris pursued stubbornly.

  “Well, are ye? Are ye really that stupid? Are ye really that ready and eager to die?”

  “Oh, fie!” Afafrenfere wailed, throwing his forearm across his eyes as he turned away.

  “And don’t ye give me none o’ them Afafrenfere dramatics!” the dwarf scolded. “I got no time for ’em!”

  Afafrenfere turned on her, scowling more than ever.

  “Good enough then!” the dwarf roared, and she stomped her booted foot on the cobblestones. “Ye wantin’ a gate to the Shadowfell and I’ll make ye one, and good enough for ye, and on yer word alone that ye won’t be rattin’ me out to Cavus Dun or any others.”

  That had Afafrenfere off-balance, obviously. “Send me back?” he asked rather sheepishly.

  “Not soundin’ like music to ye, is it?” the dwarf pressed. “Now that yer Parbid’s dead, what grayskin’s to stand beside ye, human?”

  Afafrenfere swallowed hard.

  “Ye ne’er was o’ that place,” Ambergris said quietly. “Quit lying to yerself the way ye’re lyin’ to me. Harder to do that, ye know. Ye never wanted to go to the Shadowfell. Ye never was one o’ them, and ye’re likin’ yer skin lighter than darker.”

  “You presume much.”

  “Be glad that I do, for if I didn’t, I’d’ve tossed ye into the primordial’s mouth behind Glorfathel,” Ambergris replied, and now she was grinning widely, for she knew that she had won, that her presumptions had been correct. For all her threats and bluster, Ambergris truly liked this overly-dramatic, high-prancing young monk. Wherever love, or passion, or confusion, or whatever it was, had led him, Afafrenfere was not a bad sort. He could do a dirty deed if he had to, but it wasn’t the course of first choice for him, as it would have to be were he to survive among the hoodlums and murderers of Cavus Dun.

  “I wish you had,” a third voice replied, and the two turned to see the approach of Artemis Entreri.

  “You were listening to our private conversation?” Afafrenfere accused.

  “Oh, shut up,” the assassin replied. “Half the damned city was listening, no doubt, and I would be quite grateful if you held such conversations truly in private. I have little desire to remind the folk of Neverwinter of my own origins.”

  “How grateful?” the dwarf asked, rolling her fingers eagerly.

  “Grateful enough to let you both live,” Entreri replied.

  Maybe it was a joke.

  Maybe.

  “Where is Drizzt?” Entreri asked.

  “Went out this morning with Dahlia,” Amber replied.

  “Bound for?”

  The dwarf shrugged. “Said he’d be back for dinner.”

  Entreri glanced up at the sky, the sun already nearing its zenith. Then he swiveled about to regard the port, several tall ships bobbing out in the harbor beyond where the river spilled into the Sword Coast.

  “Ye’re leaving us, then?” the dwarf asked.

  “Do have a fine journey,” Afafrenfere added, his tone both sarcastic and hopeful.

  Entreri stared at him for a moment, locking the monk’s gaze with the intimidating expression that had sent so many potential enemies scurrying for dark holes.

  But Brother Afafrenfere did not shy from that look, and met it with one equally resolute.

  That brought a wicked smile to the face of Artemis Entreri.

  “Ah, but ain’t we got enough enemies to fight already?” Amber asked, but the two continued to stare at each other, and both continued to smile.

  “Tell Drizzt to find me if he can when he returns,” Entreri instructed. “Perhaps I will still be within the city, perhaps not.”

  “And where might ye be if not in Neverwinter?” Amber asked.

  “Were that any of your concern, you would already know,�
� Entreri said, and he turned and walked away.

  Drizzt allowed himself some space from Dahlia as they wove their way through the forest, his emotions still reeling from their troubling conversation. Dahlia pressed ahead, eager for some tangible enemy, some way to free her anger. She didn’t waste a look back a Drizzt, he noted, and he understood that she did not wish to peel the scab from her emotional wound. He had hit her hard with his discussion of Effron, the twisted tiefling. He had pried her tale from her, but perhaps, he now realized, she had not been ready to divulge it.

  Or worse, perhaps Dahlia needed something from him that he didn’t know how to give.

  Drizzt felt very alone at that moment, more so than at any point since Bruenor’s death. Dahlia was more distant, quite possibly forevermore, and Drizzt couldn’t even call upon that one companion he had known and counted on since the day he’d left Menzoberranzan.

  With that troubling thought in mind, the drow dropped his hand into his belt pouch and brought forth the magical figurine. He lifted it up before his eyes and stared into the miniature face of Guenhwyvar-loyal Guenhwyvar, who would not come to his call any longer.

  Without even really thinking about it, he called softly to the cat, “Guenhwyvar, come to me.”

  He stared helplessly at the figurine, feeling the loss profoundly yet again, and so entranced was he that he didn’t even notice the gray mist gathering nearby for many heartbeats, so many indeed, that Guenhwyvar was nearly fully formed beside him before he even noted her presence!

  And she was there beside him then, fully so. Drizzt fell to his knees and wrapped her in a great hug, calling her name repeatedly. The panther nuzzled back against him, replying in kind as only she could.

  “Where have you been?” Drizzt asked. “Guen, how I’ve needed you! How I need you now!”

  It took him a long while to calm down enough to yell out, “Dahlia!” He feared that she’d gone beyond earshot.

  His fears proved unfounded, though, for Dahlia came rushing back through the underbrush to his call, her weapon at the ready. She relaxed immediately when she came through the last line, to see Drizzt and the panther together once more.

  “How?” she asked.

  Drizzt just looked at her and shrugged. “I called to her and she came to me. Whatever magic was hindering her must have dissipated, or perhaps a tear in the fabric between the planes has repaired itself?”

  Dahlia bent low, stroking Guen’s muscular flank. “It’s good to have her back.”

  Drizzt answered with a smile, and the warmth of that expression only grew as he considered Dahlia stroking the cat’s soft fur. There was serenity on her too-often troubled face, a genuine warmth and kindness. This was the Dahlia that Drizzt wished for as a companion. This was the Dahlia he could care for-perhaps even love.

  For some reason, he thought of Catti-brie, then, and in his mind’s eye, he interposed his memory of his dead wife with the image of Dahlia before him.

  “So we do not need to find the seer,” Dahlia reasoned.

  “So it would seem,” Drizzt agreed and he continued to brush and hug Guenhwyvar.

  “Well, send the cat off on the hunt, then,” Dahlia proposed, her voice and her expression going chilly. “I’m tired of this walking already. Let’s find the goblin killer and be done with this adventure.”

  The suggestion, reasonable as it seemed, rang out like a broken bell in Drizzt’s heart. He wasn’t about to separate from Guenhwyvar if he could help it. And more than that, Dahlia’s tone struck him badly. She didn’t think of this hunt in the forest south of Neverwinter as any grand or important adventure. She was up for a fight-when was she not? — but that was purely for selfish reasons: the need to let free her rage, or more goblin ears for coin. For personal gain of one sort or another.

  Like their lovemaking, he mused. Earlier he had pondered that he was using Dahlia, but was that insincerity not mutual?

  The safety of the road, the betterment of those around her … these emotions did not resonate within Dahlia’s scarred heart. Not to any great degree, at least, and certainly not enough for Drizzt to see her in the same light in which he had once viewed his beloved Catti-brie.

  He looked up at the sky.

  “Night draws near,” he said. “If we hunt a vampire as you suspect, we’re better off meeting it in daylight.” He looked back at Guen and scratched her neck. “We’ll return here tomorrow morning.”

  Dahlia looked at him skeptically for just a moment and seemed ready to argue their course. But then she replied, as if in epiphany, “You fear that you will have to dismiss the cat to her home and will again have trouble recalling her.”

  Drizzt didn’t argue the point. “Can you give me this much at least?” he pleaded.

  His question seemed to hit the elf woman hard. She held out her hand to him, and when he took it, Dahlia pulled him to his feet and crushed him in a hug, whispering, “Of course,” into his ear over and over again.

  And there was desperation in her tone, Drizzt knew, and he knew, too, that he really didn’t know how to react.

  She was, yet again, not the person he had just decided she was.

  Chapter 2

  PETTY PERSONAL STRUGGLES

  The young tiefling crept through Draygo Quick’s residence. He knew that the Netherese lord was out at a gathering of his peers, but having lived in the residence for all of these years, Effron also understood that Draygo didn’t have to be here to keep the place well-guarded, both with magical wards and with capable and dangerous underlings.

  He fell against a wall and held his breath, hearing the conversation of a pair of warlocks. He recognized the voices and knew these two as his peers in age, though surely not in ability. If it came down to a fight, Effron was confident that he could defeat both with little trouble.

  But where would that leave him with Draygo Quick?

  Panicked by that thought, the young warlock glanced around for some hiding place or avenue of escape. But he was in a long and bending corridor with few side rooms, all private chambers, and thus all likely locked or warded. Fleeing back the way he had come would cost him too much time.

  His indecision made the choice for him, as he came to realize that trying to scamper away now wouldn’t get him far enough ahead to remain out of sight. The warlocks were too close.

  So he stepped out and openly approached them, as if nothing were amiss.

  They both nodded and continued their conversation, one pausing in his discussion to remark to Effron, “Lord Draygo is not in residence.”

  “Ah,” Effron replied “Do you know when he will return?”

  The two looked to each other and shrugged in unison.

  “I will leave him a note,” Effron said. “If you see him, pray tell him that I wish to speak with him.”

  They nodded and continued on their way, and Effron breathed a sigh of relief. Obviously, Draygo Quick had not informed the residents of the falling out, or of Draygo’s dismissal of Effron from his tutelage.

  His relief was short-lived, though, for his instructions to the young apprentices would of course reveal to Draygo Quick that he had been in the residence. He could likely talk his way out of that indiscretion if Draygo Quick confronted him, but he had come here to steal something, after all, and now that plan seemed perfectly suicidal.

  He pressed on anyway, trying to sort it out as he went, rushing through the main room of the keep, a vast foyer with a checkerboard black-and-white tiled floor. He crossed from there into the main library, a room of potions and an alchemical workbench and a distillery, and from there to the wide curving stairs encircling the castle’s main tower.

  Many steps later, Effron paused at Draygo Quick’s private door. He knew the password to get safely beyond the magical wards, but knew, too, that if Draygo Quick had bothered to change that password, the glyphs would almost surely burn through all of the magical defenses Effron had erected upon himself. How meager his counter-measures would be against the bared power of Draygo
Quick!

  He almost threw up his hands in defeat then, but just growled out the expected password and stubbornly pushed through the door.

  He didn’t melt.

  Surprised, relieved, shocked even, Effron collected his thoughts and closed the door behind him, then rushed into the adjoining room, Draygo Quick’s vaunted menagerie.

  The cage was in place upon the pedestal, under the silken cloth, as he had expected, but the bars were not glowing with power and the cage was empty.

  Effron bent low and peered around the bars, unable to comprehend the sight before him. Had the panther escaped? How could that be?

  And who might have released the magical bindings of the cage?

  Effron held his breath and stood up fast, spinning, his broken arm flying around him like a scarf in a gale. He expected to see a six-hundred-pound, angry black panther standing right behind him.

  It took him many minutes of scanning the room, his gaze piercing the shadows, before he was able to relax in the confidence that he was indeed alone. He moved to one of the grand cabinets along the wall and gingerly opened it, brushing aside the mist and examining the many bottles on the shelves within. Each contained a tiny representation of some powerful monster, which were, in fact, the bodies of those actual creatures in miniaturized stasis. Effron himself had sorted these items and kept them cleaned, as per his duties for Draygo Quick, and so he recognized immediately that nothing was amiss and no new additions had been made.

  He closed the cabinet and turned back to the empty cage, soberly now, and tried to wrap his thoughts around this unexpected turn. Where had the cat gone? A myriad of possibilities rushed through Effron’s mind, but only two seemed plausible: Either the panther had been handed back to Drizzt Do’Urden in some bargain concocted by Draygo Quick, or the cat had been slain, or had died of its own accord, perhaps due to the severance of the connection to the Astral Plane.

  It took him many heartbeats to steel himself against the implications of both of those possibilities. Either way, he had likely forever lost a valuable tool in his quest to confront and kill his mother.