Shadowstorm_ The Twilight War Part 12

The dead man nodded, once.

"What is Mask's interest in Endren Corrinthal?"

Skelan's jaw tightened. The tendons in his neck stood out as he tried to keep his mouth closed, but Elyril's magic was the stronger.

"The Shadowlord charted a path for us across Faerun to serve his Chosen, the Left and Right Hands of Shadow, the First and Second of Five. His purpose is their purpose. They wished Endren Corrinthal freed."

Elyril inhaled the stink of death, stared into Skelan's eyes, and said, "What are their names?"

Skelan hissed and shook his head.

"Their names, Skelan," Elyril purred.

"I will answer no more questions from you, Sharran. Release me."

Elyril snarled and pressed her invisible holy symbol into Skelan's forehead. He writhed. "Their names."

"No," he said through gritted teeth. "Nothing more."

"Speak," she said. "Speak!"

He said nothing. His body shuddered and his eyes closed, but she knew he was still there.

Angry, she put her mouth next to his ear and whispered, "Then sit in that rotting sh.e.l.l forever. The catacombs are cold."

She stood, spat on the corpse, and strode out of the room past the startled old man.

"Milady?" he called after her. "Milady?"

"Leave me!" Elyril said, and waved him away.

Irritated, she ignored the carriage and decided to walk the city by night. Her temporary residence was not far. Foul Selune had set and she paced under a blessedly moonless sky. As she walked, she pondered events.

What role had Mask to play in matters? And where was the ten-times d.a.m.ned book?

Lost in thought, she found herself on a dark side street. How had she ended up in an alley? The buildings, standing close together, blocked the sky from her view. She stumbled over a drunk and nearly lost her footing. He grunted with pain, slurred something incomprehensible. She cursed him and continued on. Ahead, she saw the glow of street lamps from a main thoroughfare.

"The Shadowstorm is not what you hope," the drunk murmured to her back.

The words froze her, sent a chill down her neck. She turned around and stalked back to the drunk, a hand on her invisible holy symbol.

He lay huddled against the wall, wrapped in rags and filth. His greasy dark hair was matted against his scalp. He squinted and held up a grubby hand for coin.

"Coin for a beggar, Milady?"

"What did you say to me?" she asked. "Just now. Speak it again. Are you a prophet?"

The man looked up at her and she saw cunning in his eyes. She liked it not at all.

"I am am a prophet, of sorts. I said that a storm would bring hope. The city needs rain to wash it clean. Coin, Milady?" a prophet, of sorts. I said that a storm would bring hope. The city needs rain to wash it clean. Coin, Milady?"

Elyril stared into his eyes and saw no lie there. She smiled at her misperception. Lack of sleep was clouding her senses. She chuckled and kicked the drunk in the stomach. He groaned and curled up.

"Milady is a dark soul," he said between gasps.

"Never address your betters unless you are addressed first."

The man tried to unfold and crawl away. "Yes, priestess."

Satisfied, Elyril turned and walked away.

Only after she had taken ten steps did she realize that the man had called her a priestess. She whirled around but he was gone, swallowed by the shadows.

Had she misheard him again? She decided that she must have.

She returned to the residence provided by the Nessarch to find Kefil sleeping and her doughy steward awaiting her.

"I have located the former Watchblade," the steward said. He must have seen the lack of recognition in Elyril's eyes. "Phraig, Milady. You asked me to find him. He awaits your pleasure in the side room."

"Ah, yes. This late?"

"You asked, Milady. This watchman has ... strange habits, it would seem."

"Have him wait a moment."

She retired to her room and snuffed a pinch of minddust before entering the study and ordering the steward to bring Phraig before her.

The young Watchblade entered the room and the lamplight dimmed for a moment. His movements appeared stilted, and Elyril wondered if he had been drinking. Or perhaps he was still recovering from wounds suffered during the raid. From his mussed hair and sunken eyes, Elyril deduced he had slept little. He wore no blade other than his eating knife, and he bore a large leather satchel over one shoulder.

"I am Phraig, Milady," said the former Watchblade with a bow. His deep voice, coming from so small a man, surprised Elyril. And the tone struck her as vaguely mocking. His eyes shone in their sockets-the white was entirely too p.r.o.nounced-and the intensity of his gaze made Elyril uncomfortable.

"Sit. I have questions for you about the recent raid on the Hole."

Phraig sat.

Elyril felt warm, as if the boy radiated heat. She cleared her throat and said, "You were forced to lead the raiders into the Hole. Tell me everything. Omit not even the smallest detail."

Phraig did, staring at her throughout. Elyril learned that one of the leaders was missing an eye and another was bald and unusually tall. Both served Mask, which was consistent with what Elyril had learned from Skelan's corpse. She a.s.sumed them to be Mask's Chosen, his Left and Right Hands. Phraig named them: Erevis Cale and Drasek Riven.

"They spoke their names to you?"

Phraig looked sly. "I heard their names, Milady."

Elyril accepted that.

Despite the new information, Elyril still could not connect events. Was Mask's priesthood allied with the Selgauntans and Saerbians? Had Mask taken an active hand in attempting to thwart Shar's plans to cause the Shadowstorm?

Her frustration manifested in curt questioning of Phraig, who held an infuriatingly self-satisfied smile throughout the interview. After a time, Kefil padded into the study. He stopped just inside the doorway and sniffed the air suspiciously.

"My mastiff," Elyril said, expecting Phraig to show the same discomfort everyone did around Kefil.

Phraig turned in his chair, smiling. "What a fine animal." He held out a hand. Elyril saw that his fingernails were long and black-no doubt, he was afflicted with some illness.

Kefil's hackles rose. He bared his teeth and growled.

"Here, pup," said Phraig.

Kefil abruptly tucked his tail between his legs, whined, and fled the room. Phraig clucked his tongue and turned to regard Elyril with a smile. "Somewhat pa.s.sive, isn't he?"

"That is all, boy," Elyril said, wis.h.i.+ng for another snuff of dust before retiring. "You may go."

Phraig did not stand.

"Did you hear me? I said we are done."

"I did hear you, Milady. But ..." He trailed off and looked away.

Elyril's irritation turned to curiosity. He was holding something back.

"Is there something more? If you hold back from me, I will see that you are punished. Make no mistake-"

He looked up at her from hooded eyes and whispered, "I have a secret."

The words elicited goose pimples on Elyril's skin. Her hand went to her invisible holy symbol. She felt on the verge of an epiphany. She leaned forward and said softly, "Speak it, Watchblade."

Phraig's eyes were sly. "I took something from the dead shadowman." He made a gesture that could have indicated anything. "She told me to."

Elyril's heart accelerated. Her body tingled. She licked her lips. "Whom do you mean by 'she'?"

Phraig looked away. "You know. You must. The night itself spoke to me with the voice of a woman. It told me to take it, told me to keep it for you."

Elyril was holding her breath. "Keep ... what?"

"This." Phraig rummaged in his satchel and pulled out a large book. Black scaled leather covered gilded vellum pages. Elyril's breath caught when she saw it.

"The book," she breathed. She held out a hand as if to touch it, but stopped just short, struck with the unreality of events. "How can this be?" she asked.

"She said to give it to you. Take it." He offered it to her. "I have never opened it. Perhaps it can answer your questions."

Elyril stared at it for a moment, finally took it in trembling hands. It was uncomfortably warm where Phraig had held it, as if the man were on fire, but she did not care. She ran her fingertips over the rough cover, the way she might a lover.

"She told me it was unfinished," Phraig said. "The middle is gone, she said."

"The book to be made whole," Elyril said, hushed, awed.

"This is yours, then, Milady?"

Elyril nodded, rapt. She was reminded of the first time she had ever partaken of minddust, the feeling of well-being, of transcendence.

"Mine," she said. "Yes."

"Then I will take my leave," Phraig said. He stood, brus.h.i.+ng her hand with fingers not hot, but cold as snow. "I feared I was going mad, hearing voices, seeing things. After all, if I were mad, how would I know?"

The words struck her and she looked up into his eyes. The light caught them strangely and she saw only whites.

"How would I know?" she echoed.

He smiled a mouthful of fangs, turned, and exited the room.

Elyril sank back into her chair, cradling the book against her breast as if it were a newborn babe. She bathed in its warmth, thanked Shar, opened it, and began to read from back to front.

It told of Shar's creation from darkness, of her battles with her sister, Selune, of her secret creation of the Shadow Weave in mockery of Mystra's Weave. It told of Shar's end, which was the end of all things. It hinted at more, at a moment of necessary weakness but ultimate triumph for the Lady of Loss, a time when she would devour the shadow.

Elyril pored over every word, every page, inhaling more and more minddust, and in so doing she learned the book's secret. It lay between the words, in the empty s.p.a.ces on the page. She laughed aloud at its import.

The emptiness spoke in its silence of a ritual-the ritual that would free Volumvax and summon the Shadowstorm. Elyril felt flush at the prospect.

But she could not learn all she needed to know. Some details of the ritual were missing. The book had been divided and the middle pages were gone.

It wanted a mate. It wanted to be made whole.

Elyril had to find the rest.

The late afternoon sun shone down from a cloudless sky. Abelar and Regg, accompanied by Beld and his two companions, rode beside a drought-dried stream bed across the gra.s.sy plains, toward the small village Abelar had commandeered to quarter his forces for a few days while he traveled to the Abbey of Dawn.

They rode through high gra.s.s, past autumn-stripped stands of birch and maple. They fell silent when they pa.s.sed the melted remains of a small village. The village's cottages had been reduced to shapeless, discolored lumps. The blackened skeletons of dead trees stood in fields of blasted gra.s.s and bore silent witness to the carnage wrought by an enraged dragon.

"The dragon rage," Regg said. "A black, probably."

Abelar nodded. He had seen a black up close, ten leagues west and south of Saerb. He thanked Lathander that the rage was over.

They left the destruction behind and traveled onward. Presently they reached the fallow fields around the village. The poor harvest had made food scarce. Winter would be unforgiving to the villagers.

At Abelar's orders, his company took only shelter from the villagers, never food, not even for the horses. The force counted six priests among their number. All were untested and inexperienced, but all were competent to perform the minor miracle of conjuring food and fresh water. They kept the men fed and distributed any excess to the hungry villagers, starting with the children. More often than not, Abelar's company left the villages better off than when they arrived. The overmistress's forces would be larger, and would not be as kind. Civil war would leave thousands of innocents dead.

"Sembia is not in a state to survive a war," Abelar said to Regg.

Regg nodded agreement. "What realm is? Cormyr is still reeling from hers. Here, the wounds of the rage are fresh and the drought lingers. War is always ugly, my friend. And the weak always suffer most."

"But not on our watch," Abelar said softly.

"Truth," Regg affirmed. "Not on our watch."

Ahead, the chimneys of the log cottages and farms of the village sent thin plumes of smoke into the clear sky. The rhythmic ring of a smith's hammer carried over the plains. The breeze carried the smell of a cooking fire.

The riders crested a brush-covered rise and saw the village below-a collection of simple homes and animal pens built around a large commons. A woman and her undernourished adolescent daughter drew water from the community well. A few scrawny dogs padded through the lanes.

The canvas tents of Abelar's company covered a tree-dotted field on the far edge of the village. A boar roasted on a spit over a fire; one of the men must have taken it on a hunt. Two men tended it while the rest went about their business-cleaning armor, training, eating, talking. The company's horses grazed in the dry gra.s.s away from the tents. All were saddled, as if the company were ready to ride.