Dawn of Night

CHAPTER 11 RUNNING THE RIVER

Even by night, Starmantle's harbor bustled with activity. Laborers and ships' crews-some composed of humans, some not-unloaded crates of cargo by torchlight and glowball and stacked them high. Cale could imagine the illicit contents of many of the crates. Starmantle traded in vice as much as legitimate goods, the same as any other city of the Inner Sea.

The shouts of the sailors carried along the shore through the salt-tinged night air. Laughter, smoke, torchlight, and shouts carried from the open windows of the many dockside taverns. Pedestrians walked the wharves in small groups: revelers, sailors, whores, pimps, and worse.

Cale felt at home there in the night, surrounded by sin.

He stood with Jak, Riven, and Magadon on the rocky shore of an out-of-the-way inlet, down the shoreline and east of Starmantle's main harbor. Small wooden piers and docks, large enough only for small fishing craft, dotted the shoreline there. Jak led them to one such pier, a rickety wooden construct that extended a long dagger toss into the bay. There, tethered with thick hemp rope, several small rowboats floated in the gently lapping water.

The breeze off the sea smelled fresh and clean. As he had when he'd been aboard Foamrider, Cale felt the water pull at his spirit.

"That's it," Jak said and gestured at one of the row-boats near them, "on the left side of the dock."

Cale eyed the boat doubtfully. Even with his limited exposure to the sea, he could see it was a creaky tub, with rusty fittings, splintering oars, and no less than ten seasons of wear on its hull. Worn fishing nets lay piled aft. A coiled rope affixed to a rusty anchor lay fore. On the positive side, the boat was big enough that they could all fit in it. It also appeared to float. . . sort of.

"Did you pay for that, Fleet?" Riven asked.

"Of course I paid for it, Zhent. If Cale wanted it stolen, he'd have asked you to get it."

Riven gave a hard smile and replied, "No. He would have asked me to do it if he wanted the owner dead and the boat burned to ash. And after selling you that, the owner deserves no less."

"It floats," Jak grumbled. "Now let's just get in the damned thing."

"I'll row," Magadon said.

They all walked down the wood-planked pier. Jak lowered himself into the small boat and took a seat on the rear bench. Still sneering, Riven hopped into the boat and sat beside the halfling. Jak scooted away from him and looked in the opposite direction.

Before getting in, Cale asked Magadon, "Are you sure this is going to do? We're not going to be on the open sea, are we?"

"This will do," replied the guide. He nodded for Cale to get in. "And we won't be on the sea at all."

Cale nodded, climbed into the boat, and sat fore. Magadon, after unmooring the small craft from the pier, came last and sat on the middle bench, facing aft toward Jak and Riven.

The guide took the oars and over his back, Magadon said to Cale, "Allow me to get a feel for it before you . .. move us."

Cale replied, "You say when you're ready."

As Magadon rowed them out into the bay, Cale looked up into the clear night sky, alit with stars. The starlight reflected off the surface of the water, reminding him of the basin he had used to track Azriim to Skullport, of the starsphere that he still carried in his pack. The transformation of his soul had begun with the stars, he knew, had been foreordained thousands of years earlier when the makers of the starsphere had captured in magical crystal the periodic appearances in Faerun of the Fane of Shadows.

Somehow, he thought that everything would end with the stars too.

Two and two are four, he thought, and let his fingertips crease the water.

The oars thumped in their settings as Magadon rowed them out a bowshot and turned the boat sharply hither and yon, finally spinning it in a tight circle.

"Well enough," the guide said, seemingly comfortable with the boat. "This is the best we have, so we'll make do. Are you ready, Erevis?"

Cale pulled his gaze from the sky and nodded.

Magadon reached back and gripped Cale's forearm.

"Be at ease," he said, and Cale felt Magadon's mind reach for his. "This is where we need to go."

Motes of silver light formed before Magadon's eyes, flared, and floated over to surround Cale's head. In his mind's eye, Cale saw the image Magadon had transmitted, as clear a "memory" as if Cale had seen it himself: a wild river-the Wet River-racing northward from a long lake, coursing through a jagged canyon, and finally spilling over a high cliff to empty itself, in a torrent of foam and violence, into the Dragonmere.

Towering maples lined the river's winding course, ancient watchmen guarding the waterway and giving the river the appearance of a processional. There was no sign of human habitation. The area looked untouched and untraveled, pristine.

The silver motes winked out but the memory of the place remained fixed in Cale's mind.

How strange the mind works, Cale thought.

He caught an inkling of something that had happened back on the Plane of Shadow. But before he could recall it, it dissipated like a puff of smoke.

"Can you see it?" Magadon asked.

"I can," Cale replied. "How did you do it?"

Magadon said, "Simple really. I transferred a memory of something that I had seen to you, as though you had seen it. That can go both ways. I can use a modified mind-link to take something that you've seen, or even to see through your eyes."

"That's why no one likes you, Mags," Riven said.

Cale gave a half smile, feeling a strange sense of having done that all before.

"Didn't you already tell me that?" he asked Magadon.

The guide looked at him curiously, started to speak, stopped, then said, "I don't... I don't think so."

Cale shook his head, meanwhile storing what Magadon had told him in the back of his mind.

"Ready yourselves," he said to all of them.

With an exercise of will, Cale drew the shadows about the boat until darkness cloaked them like a shroud.

"I can't see," Jak said, and his voice was small in the darkness.

Cale pictured the location in his mind and transported them from the darkness of Starmantle's bay to the darkness of the Wet River canyon. He didn't feel any sensation of motion, though he heard Jak gasp.

When he let the shadows begin to dissipate, it was plain that they were elsewhere. Sound filled their ears: the slow croak of frogs, the chirps of crickets and cicadas, and the steady rush of the river. Maples loomed over them, blotting out the stars. Behind the maples rose the steep, boulder-strewn sides of a rocky canyon. The boat was moving, careening sideways in a moderate current.

"Help me get it to shore!" Magadon shouted. "The current gets fast very quickly."

While the guide skillfully plied the oars, Cale, Jak, and Riven used their hands to help paddle. Together, they pulled the craft out of the current and steered it into the shallows. There, Magadon hopped out and pulled the craft onto a stony beach.

Breathing hard, they all exited the boat and sank to the ground.

When he'd caught his breath, Magadon said to Cale, "We covered over twenty leagues in a heartbeat. Well done."

Cale caught Riven's frown, but chose to ignore it.

"We'll camp here," Magadon said, indicating a knoll under the leaves of a maple. "With the dawn, we start downriver for the Dragon's Jaws."

Jak and Riven stared at the guide.

"The falls are called the Dragon's Jaws," Magadon explained. He cocked his head. "If you listen with care, you can hear them even from here."

With his darkness-enhanced senses, Cale could hear them quite clearly. In the distance sounded the dull roar and boom of thundering water. In his mind's eye, he could see the falls: a raging river cutting a jagged gash in the wall of a high cliff. The gash looked vaguely like jaws snapping shut.

Magadon looked at Riven and Jak and said, "The falls at the Jaws descend two bowshots or more before crashing into the Dragonmere. The mist is as thick as an autumn fog; the roar as loud as the bellows of a hundred ogres. It's wondrous to see."

"Wondrous?" Jak said, while he stuffed his pipe. "Trickster's toes! Two bowshots is a long drop, Magadon."

Riven said nothing.

"The Jaws are the location of the Crossroad," the guide said. "More precisely, the Jaws are the Crossroad."

When Cale and Jak looked a question at him, Magadon said, "You'll see tomorrow. Save your questions until then. I need to prepare tonight."

Since Magadon seemed disinclined to speak further about it, Cale let it drop.

After they had pitched their tents and Magadon had gotten a campfire going, Cale volunteered to take the first watch. He would need to pray to the Shadowlord at midnight anyway.

"There is no need for that here," Magadon said, and nodded up at the maples. "This place is already being watched."

Cale followed Magadon's glance to the canopy above. He saw nothing there and heard only the wind through the leaves, the rush of the river, and the distant boom of the Dragon's Jaws. Still, he took the guide at his word, shrugged, and lay down to sleep.

He awakened at midnight, as always. Sitting up from his bedroll, he saw Magadon sitting near the river, keeping vigil and whispering to its waters. The guide's words were lost to the rush of the current and the song of the crickets.

Cale looked to the other side of the fire and saw that Riven was not in his tent. He sat up fully and scanned the campsite. His vision allowed him to see clearly in the darkness and he spotted Riven right away. The assassin sat in the deeper darkness against the bole of one of the maples. He had his legs partially drawn up and rested the back of his palms on his knees. His eyes were closed.

He was praying, Cale realized, and the understanding made him uncomfortable.

With effort, he put it out of his mind. So as not to disturb either Magadon or Riven, Cale quietly donned his mask and prayed to the Shadowlord. His patron answered; power filled his brain, the words to prayers that would unlock magic.

Afterward, he lay back down to sleep. By then, Riven was back in his bedroll, sleeping.

Magadon awakened him just as the false dawn began to lighten the sky above the canyon. Together, they roused Jak and Riven. Jak lit his pipe; Riven's coughs sounded loud off the canyon's rocks.

While they gathered their gear, Magadon explained the situation: "The guardian is a river fey, and will only appear if we brave the current near the Jaws while the sun is rising. I had hoped to win his favor last night. He did not answer, but we shall soon see if I succeeded."

"Near the Jaws," Jak muttered, and lost his pipe from between his teeth. "Dark," he said, retrieving it and dusting the dirt from the stem.

"You're right to be concerned," the guide said. "Once in that current, there is no getting out. We must convince the guardian to allow us passage, or we'll go over the falls."

Between his coughs, Riven managed a hard laugh. Cale and Jak shared a look.

"How do we do that?" Cale asked, his voice and mood serious.

Magadon shrugged, and as he finished loading his pack he said, "Fey are fickle. Some days, one thing will work, someday another. But something will work. We need only find what it is."

Cale wondered if he should reconsider his decision not to transport them all directly to Skullport.

Magadon must have sensed his hesitation.

"All we can do is try, Erevis."

"Try and die," Riven said, as he pulled on his pack.

"Maybe," Magadon acknowledged.

Jak pocketed his pipe and threw his pack in the boat.

"You've got nothing better, Zhent," the halfling said to Riven. "I trust Magadon's judgment."

Riven glared at Jak then turned back to the guide.

"How often have you made this passage, Mags?" he asked.

Magadon hesitated a moment then answered, "Once."

"Still trust his judgment, Fleet?" said Riven, laughing.

Jak looked concerned but said nothing.

"Can you do it, Magadon?" Cale asked, looking the guide in the eyes.

Magadon's brow furrowed and he said, "It will take all of us. But yes, I think so."

That was good enough for Cale.

"Then let's go," he said, and thumped Magadon on the shoulder.

They piled into the boat and Magadon pushed them off. After climbing in and taking his seat on the middle bench, he linked their minds.

This way, he projected, we can communicate unheard by the fey.

Just as the current seized them and sent them speeding down the river, Magadon looked meaningfully at Riven and Cale.

"Violence and threats cannot avail us with the guardian," said the guide, "so do not offer any. Provide it with what it asks, and it will grant us passage."

Cale and Riven acknowledged Magadon's words with a nod. As the sun's light began to peek over the canyon and brighten the sky, Cale resisted the urge to draw up his cloak hood. His skin stung, but he endured. His hand vanished and he drew the sleeve of his cloak over the stump. He would abide the light, though he knew that the sun would prevent him from using any of the abilities granted him by his transformation. If they went over the Dragon's Jaws, he would not be able to save them from drowning. But he would face death with his friends, in the sun, unhooded, and with open eyes.

Currents of nervousness and anticipation traveled along the telepathic lines that connected them. None were sure that it would work.

Nothing for it now, Cale thought, and held on.

The current accelerated rapidly and sent them hurtling down the river. Magadon used the oars not for propulsion but to help steer the boat, since it had no tiller. While he worked, he began to sing in a language that Cale had never before heard, but that somehow stirred him, calling to mind moonlit nights, forested glades, and quiet revelry. The guide's voice was a mellow baritone, and the song used the river's rush as a counterpoint to its melody.

Cale looked to the back of the boat, to Riven. The assassin clutched the side of the vessel with one hand and the bench he shared with Jak in the other. Dark circles painted the skin under his eyes.

In a mental voice only Riven could hear, Cale projected, Dreams?

Riven looked up sharply, furrowed his brow, and shook his head.

No. I haven't dreamed since we came back from the Plane of Shadow.

Cale considered that as the boat scraped against a rock and began to pick up still more speed. Magadon continued to sing the song of summoning, even as his mental voice cursed the rocks and current.

Perhaps he's through with you? Cale said to Riven, but doubted it.

Riven knew whom Cale meant by "he." The assassin's eye narrowed and fixed on Cale.

I don't want him to be through with me, First of Five.

Cale heard the venom in Riven's mental voice and understood the feelings well. He had seen them in Riven before. When both Cale and Riven had served the Righteous Man in the Night Knives, Riven had been second to Cale. And in serving Mask, Riven was second again. Cale knew that a man in that position might do anything, might give anything. He recalled the assassin's prayers of the night before and wondered what Riven had asked of Mask, and what the Shadowlord had given and taken. For reasons he could not explain, Cale felt pity for Riven. The assassin was as caught up in the schemes of the Shadowlord as Cale, but he had no one to keep him grounded. Riven didn't have someone like Jak. Cale decided that he would try to give the assassin some ballast.

Listen to me, Riven, Cale said, in as brotherly a tone as he could muster. You give yourself over fully to Mask and you'll be stepping off a cliff bigger than anything we'll be seeing today. Keep yourself.

Riven answered with only a frown and a turned head.

Cale stared at him for a moment then shook his head. He had done what he could.

Magadon ceased his singing and Cale noticed for the first time that another voice had taken up the tune, a wondrous voice, an otherworldly, sing-song tenor. Cale scanned the churning river ahead and behind but could not see a source; it appeared to come from the rush of the waves itself. The words and the voice sent a charge of energy through Cale and he had to force himself to not stand in the boat. Where Magadon's version of the song had called to mind a majestic forest under the stars, the same words, sung in a different voice, had come to evoke an image of roaring waves, leaping fish, and the thrill of the hunt.

Remain still and non-threatening, Magadon projected to them, then he called aloud, "We hear your song, guardian, and beseech you to show yourself."

"White water," Jak shouted over the singing from his bench in the rear, pointing past Cale to the river ahead. Magadon cringed at the halfling's shout and the guardian's song faltered.

No shouting, the guide admonished.

Cale turned to see rapids around the next bend in the river. Rocks poked through the river's surface, causing swirls, little whirlpools, and foam. The water roared around them, roiling and splashing. A host of small cascades awaited them ahead, culminating in the distance in the torrent that spilled over the Dragon's Jaws. Cale dug his fingertips into the gunwales and tried to keep from spilling over the side as the boat began to lurch.

"We humbly request your presence, Guardian," Magadon said.

"I've been here all along, woodsman," said a voice from beside the boat, "at least for those with eyes to see. And please do not shout on my river, half-a-man."

Cale looked to the side of the boat and his breath caught. Rising halfway out of the roiling water to swim beside the boat was the guardian fey. Though roughly humanoid in stature-at least from the waist up-it looked to be composed of the river water itself. In its shimmering, liquid shape, Cale could make out the watery outline of long, unkept hair, laughing eyes, and a smiling mouth. Though Cale could see no means of propulsion-the creature appeared to have nobody below its manifested torso-the fey darted around the boat, gliding through the water with the ease and rapidity of a hummingbird in the air. The creature looked each of them over; an appraising glance. It lingered longest near the bow, eyeing Cale.

What's happening? Cale asked Magadon.

Do nothing; replied the woodsman, and grunted as he managed the boat through the increasingly powerful current. It is observing.

At last, the fey again took up station beside Magadon.

"You keep unusual company, woodsman," the fey said. "And sing out of tune. And confuse many of the lyrics. And befoul the Sylvan tongue. I am deeply offended."

The fey crossed his arms over his chest and looked away, still somehow keeping pace with the boat as it careened along in the current.

Keeping one eye on the rapids and one eye on the river fey, Magadon said, "I am but a simple guide, as you suggest. Forgive my mistreatment of your tongue."

He pulled the oars hard back as the boat tumbled down a small cascade. Cale's stomach raced up his throat.

"We've come to petition you for access to the Crossroads," Magadon said, struggling to keep his tone even. "We wish to journey to Skullport."

The fey's gaze darkened. It looked at Cale doubtfully.

"You seek the Sargauth then," it said. "Dark waters, those."

More rocks, Mags, Cale projected. Big ones.

Ahead, the river accelerated. The water boiled around huge, jagged rocks.

I see them, the guide projected back. Hold on tight.

The fey watched with amusement as Magadon tried to steer the boat away from the rocks.

"Beware now," the fey said and giggled, the sound like rain tinkling on metal.

The creature's body slammed into a rock, exploding into a shower of drops and mist, then instantly reformed on the other side, still grinning.

After passing the rocks, the full force of rapids seized them. Cale felt as if a hand had taken hold of the keel of the boat and thrown it forward. Foam churned, water roiled, and the boat thumped again and again against more rocks hidden just below the surface. Cale's teeth rattled in his head and his cloak was sodden. Throughout, the fey somehow swam along beside them, just out of arm's reach, smiling benignly.

"The Sargauth," Magadon said, breathing hard and trying to keep the boat from breaking into pieces. "Yes. Will you grant us passage?"

The boat slammed so hard into a rock that Cale thought for certain they had staved a side. The craft spun off the stone and rotated ninety degrees. Magadon righted them with effort. A dip, another. Water swamped the bow. Cale was soaked. The boat hit another rock, tumbled down another cascade. From the rear, Jak shouted, bounced high in the air, and would have gone overboard but for Riven's reflexes. The assassin grabbed the halfling by the cloak and yanked him back into the boat.

"Hang on godsdamnit, Fleet!" the assassin said.

Over the roar of the river, the fey frowned, waggled a translucent finger at the assassin, and said, "No. I think I shall not grant you passage. You and your friends wield words as though they were weapons. I remain offended."

Ahead, Cale could hear the roar of the falls. It was growing louder. The river bed was dropping by steps; cascade after cascade. The maple trees and canyon walls around them were blurs. The boat bobbed through the water like a child's toy. Cale knew that the mad rush down the waterway ended in a fall that none of them could survive.

Be quick, Magadon, Cale projected to the guide.

He held on as the bow crashed down another cascade and nearly unseated him. They had a thirty count, no longer.

"Guardian," Magadon shouted, and Cale felt the guide's desperation travel along the telepathic channels. "Please, what can we do to gain passage?"

Ahead a spearcast, Cale saw the Dragon's Jaws. It looked just as it had in Magadon's mental image: the river's current had carved a great U-shaped channel through the cliff face. Foaming water roared through the channel and vanished from sight, falling into the thick mist formed from the water slamming into the Dragonmere far below. Jagged boulders jutted from the waters before the Jaws.

"The falls!" Jak shouted from behind.

The fey made a show of thinking.

"You've offended me with words, woodsman. Now you must amuse me with them. Or surprise me. Or astonish me." He waved a watery hand and said, "Begin."

The four comrades shared a look.

Try something! Riven projected.

Cale watched with dread as they neared the Jaws. The river surged, nearly capsizing the boat. They all four uttered a collective shout.

"Magadon!" the halfling called.

"I am born of a devil," the guide blurted.

The fey raised his eyebrows, laughed, and clapped his hands.

"Wonderful! Which one?"

The boat slammed into a rock, nearly sending Cale over the bow. They were taking on water.

"What?" Magadon shouted, doing everything he could to slow their approach to the falls.

"Which devil?" asked the fey. "Name your sire-or mother, as the case may be."

Cale saw Magadon's resistance, felt it in his mind. Cale didn't know if he wanted the woodsman to speak his father's name or keep it behind his teeth. He understood Magadon's struggle. Speaking the name of his demonic father-something Magadon was loathe to do-would have felt to the guide like surrender, like the way Cale had felt back on the Plane of Shadow when he'd drawn Weaveshear for the first time.

"Tell the thing what it wants to hear, Mags!" Riven said. His good eye was wide, eyeing the approaching falls. "It's just a name."

The fey's gaze fixed on Riven and hardened.

"The shadow of the shade speaks at last." It indicated Cale, looked back to Riven, and said, "You are merely his shadow, are you not?"

Riven's eye narrowed. His mouth set into a hard line. Despite the upset of the boat, one of his hands went for a blade. His anger was palpable through the mindlink, overriding the group's collective trepidation at the on-rushing Jaws.

"Mephistopheles!" Magadon shouted, and the word made Cale's stomach churn worse than the river. "Mephistopheles is my blood sire."

The fey seemed unperturbed by the foul name.

"Excellent!" the creature said to Magadon. "A base word but well said!"

"You want to hear words of power, you little pissdrip?" Riven growled from the back of the boat. "Then hear this."

Do not! Cale ordered, but it was too late.

Riven spat a stream of corruption in the tongue he sometimes used as a weapon. Cale, Jak, and Magadon doubled over in pain upon hearing the words, but the fey only squinted as though he was facing the wind in a rainstorm. After Riven had spewed the sentence, he looked surprised to see that the fey had not disintegrated.

The fey, seeing Riven was done, clapped his hands lightly.

"Foully told, but well said." It turned to Jak and said, "Now you, little bedraggled half-man. The pissdrip has yet to hear from you."

Jak, his eyes still watering from the obscenity mouthed by Riven, could not take his gaze from the river.

Say something, Fleet, Riven projected.

You keep your mouth closed, Zhent! Jak shot back with heat, and glared at Riven.

Little man. . . . Cale prompted.

"Come now," said the fey. "Confess."

At that Jak gave the creature a sharp look, then looked to Cale. Cale gave him a reassuring nod and the halfling nodded back and turned to the fey.

Barely audible over the roar of the approaching falls, Jak said, "I'm afraid of what is happening."

The fey grinned.

"Well done, half-a-man! Well done indeed! I'd ask what in particular frightens you, but I know it is everything." The creature spun around to face Cale, and pointing past him to the onrushing falls said, "Time is short, shade. What do you have to say to me?"

The roar of the water was loud in Cale's ears. He struggled to find something to say, something the fey would not have heard before. Nothing. He could not think above the roar of the Jaws.

Hurry, Cale, Riven prompted.

" 'Ware," the fey blithely cautioned.

They all saw it too late. The boat crashed into a jagged rock jutting a handbreadth above the waterline. It split the side of the little craft and sent Cale tumbling into the river. He heard the shouts of his comrades for only an instant before he went under. His single good hand clutched for something, anything, but managed to take hold of only a broken bit of the boat's hull. Not enough to keep him afloat.

He felt as if a giant's hand pressed him to the riverbed and held him submerged. The water was not deep. His back scraped against the rocky bottom and he could still see sunlight cascading through the rough water. But he couldn't gain purchase to push himself to the top. The current rolled him, twisted him, twirled him like a dry leaf in a gale.

And above it all, even underwater, he could hear the dull, foreboding rush of the Dragon's Jaws.

In his head, he heard the fey say, Speak, shade, or all is lost. Already your friends are drowning, though the woodsman swims strong and even now tries to save them.

Cale's breath was failing. He didn't even have the sense to feel much surprise at the fact that the fey could communicate telepathically. He reached for the surface and felt his hand broach the water, feeling the sun's sting on his flesh for only a moment before the current pushed him back down. The falls were near. His breath was gone. A flurry of incoherent images flashed through his mind: Riven leading a religious service, the Fane of Shadows, a twin spire built on an island and reaching for a starry sky, a laughing mask stepping from Shar's shadow to stab at Cyric, the Plane of Shadow, the ruins of Elgrin Fau.

The ruins of Elgrin Fau.. . .

He hoped the fey was still listening.

Over six thousand years ago, he projected to the fey, on a world now forgotten, Kesson Rel the Dark, first Chosen of the Shadowlord, angry at his forced exile from Elgrin Fau, banished the whole of the city into the Plane of Shadow. The inhabitants thought he had stolen the sun, but he had stolen only them. He lingers still in the darkest places of the Shadow Deep, feeding his malice. One day, I will find him and avenge his betrayal.

For a heartbeat, everything fell silent. Cale blew out the last of his breath in a stream of bubbles. A sudden roar filled his ears, impossibly loud. He felt himself falling, going through the Dragon's Jaws and down into oblivion.

Your travels will lead down dark paths, said the fey in his head. Journey well, shade.