Gauntlgrym

A DROW AND HIS DWARF

WERE IT NOT FOR THE MORNINGSTARS SET DIAGONALLY ACROSS HIS back, their glassteel heads bobbing with every stride, Athrogate might have struck passersby as a diplomat rather than a warrior. His thick black hair was well kept, and his long beard was neatly tied into three thick braids set with shining onyx gems. He wore another onyx-a magical one-set into a circlet on his head, and his broad belt, dyed black, imbued him with great strength. Black boots showed the scuffs of a thousand mountains and a thousand trails. The rest of his clothing was of the finest cut and style: breeches of deep gray velvet, a shirt the color of the darkest of amethysts, and a black leather vest that served as a harness for the mighty weapons strapped to his back.

He was a common sight in Luskan, and his shadowy relationship with the dark elves was the worst kept secret in the City of Sails. But Athrogate walked the streets openly and often, in appearance, at least, alone. It was almost as if he was inviting some opportunist to take a try at killing him. And the dwarf liked nothing more than a good row, though that pleasure had been hard to find of late. His partner frowned upon it.

He walked to the corner of a building across the street from his favorite pub, Bite o’ the Shark-an apt name for anyone who had ever sampled the establishment’s private stock of Gutbuster. At the corner of an alley, Athrogate put his back against the wall and took out a huge and curvy pipe and began tapping down his pipeweed.

He was well into his smoke, blowing rings that drifted lazily over the street, when a striking elf woman exited Bite o’ the Shark and paused near a gathering of drunks, who began throwing suggestive, lewd comments her way.

“Ye see her, then?” the dwarf said out of the corner of his mouth, pipe still firmly in place.

“Hard to miss that one,” a voice answered from the shadows beside him. With the suggestive cut of her skirt, the high black boots on her shapely legs, the low cut of her blouse and a striking black and red braid, his words seemed a great understatement.

“Aye, and I’m bettin’, sure as the sun’s settin’, that one o’ them fools’ll go for her jewels. And oh, then they’ll know in the heartbeats to come, that her sticks’ll play skulls with the sound of a drum.”

The voice in the shadows sighed.

“Never gets old, does it?” Athrogate asked, quite pleased with himself.

“Never was young, dwarf,” came the reply, and Athrogate bellowed, “Bwahaha!”

“Someday, perhaps, I’ll come to understand how your thoughts flow, and on that day, I fear, I’ll have to kill myself.”

“What’s to know?” Athrogate asked. “One o’ them’ll go too far with her, and she’ll put the lot of ’em on the ground.” As he posited that very thing, one of the drunks stepped toward the elf and reached for her buttocks. She neatly dodged and smiled at him, wagging her finger and warding him away.

But he came on.

“Here it comes,” Athrogate predicted.

The man seemed to fall over her in a hug, from the vantage point of the dwarf and his companion, at least, but when the dwarf started congratulating himself on being right, the voice in the shadows pointed out that the drunk was up on his tiptoes. He started to turn slowly, the woman coming around to put her back to the open street. The elf had spun her walking stick and poked it up as he came at her, locking its tip under his chin and driving him up to his toes.

She was still smiling sweetly and whispering to the man in tones so low his companions apparently couldn’t hear, and she had angled the ruffian so they couldn’t see her walking stick, either. She released him and stepped away, and the man staggered and nearly tumbled then reached up and grabbed his chin, coughing to accompany his friends’ laughter.

“Bah, thought she’d deck ’em all,” Athrogate grumbled.

“She’s too smart for that,” said the voice in the darkness, “though if they pursue her now, she’d be more than justified in putting that weapon of hers to good use.”

There was no pursuit, however, and the elf made her way up the road, toward Athrogate.

“She’s seen you,” the voice commented.

The dwarf blew another smoke ring, and walked across the alley and continued on his way, his work done.

The elf moved up to where the dwarf had been standing, and with a quick and subtle glance both ways, slipped into the alley.

“Jarlaxle, I presume,” she said when she saw the drow standing before her, with his great, wide-brimmed, feathered hat and purple jodhpurs, his flamboyant white shirt opened low on his black-skinned chest, and his assortment of rings and other glittering accessories.

“I like your hat, Lady Dahlia,” Jarlaxle replied with a bow.

“Not as ostentatious as your own, perhaps,” Dahlia replied. “But it gets the attention of those I wish attentive.”

“Osten-“Jarlaxle stammered as if wounded. “Perhaps I use mine to distract the attention of those I wish to harm.”

“I have other ways of doing that,” Dahlia was quick to answer, and Jarlaxle found himself smiling.

“That is quite an unusual companion you keep,” Dahlia went on. “A drow and a dwarf, side by side.”

“We are anything but common,” Jarlaxle assured her. He grinned again, thinking of another pair he knew, drow and dwarf, who had forged an amazing friendship over many decades. “But yes, Athrogate is an unusual creature, to be sure. Perhaps that is why I find him interesting, even endearing.”

“His words do not match the cut of his clothing.”

“If one can call ‘bwahaha’ words” Jarlaxle replied. “Trust me when I tell you that I have civilized him beyond my wildest expectations. Less spit and more polish.”

“But have you tamed him?”

“Impossible,” Jarlaxle assured her. “That one could fight a titan.”

“We’ll need that.”

“So Athrogate has told me, as he told me that you’ve found a place of great dwarven treasures, an ancient homeland.”

“You sound skeptical.”

“Why would you come to me? Why would an elf seek the alliance of a drow?”

“Because I need allies in this endeavor. It’s a dangerous road, and underground at that. As I’ve considered the powers that be in Luskan, it seems that the dark elves are more reliable than the High Captains, or the pirates, and that leaves me with… you.”

Jarlaxle’s expression remained unconvinced.

“Because the place is thick with dwarf ghosts,” Dahlia admitted.

“Ah,” said the drow. “You need a dwarf most of all. One who can speak to his ancestors and keep the hordes at bay.”

The elf shrugged, not denying it.

“I’m offering you fifty percent of the take,” she said, “and I expect that take to be considerable.”

“Which fifty?”

It was Dahlia’s turn to wear a puzzled expression.

“You take the mithral and I get a mound of copper coins?” Jarlaxle explained. “I’ll take fifty, but my preferred fifty.”

“One to one,” Dahlia argued, meaning alternating picks on the booty.

“And I pick first.”

“And I, second and third.”

“Second and fourth.”

“Second and third!” Dahlia demanded.

“Have a fine journey,” Jarlaxle replied, and he tipped his hat and started away.

“Second and fourth, then,” the elf agreed before he’d gone three steps.

“Yes, I need you,” she admitted as the drow turned back to regard her. “I’ve spent months uncovering this place, and tendays more narrowing down my first choice as guide.”

“First choice?” Jarlaxle said.

“First choice,” Dahlia replied, and again the drow wore that doubting expression.

“Not Borlann the Crow?” Jarlaxle asked with a derisive snort. “Do you truly believe that one as striking as you can move about the city unseen?”

“Borlann served in the search, but was never the goal of it,” Dahlia replied. “I’d sooner take the drunks down the street with me.” She returned the drow’s sly grin. “He doesn’t think much of you, by the way, or of your many black-skinned comrades. He takes great pride in having driven you from the City of Sails.”

“Is that what you believe?”

The elf didn’t answer.

“That I am driven from the very city I now stand within?” Jarlaxle elaborated. “Or that my… associates would fear the wrath of Borlann the Crow, or any of the High Captains-or all of the High Captains should they band together against us? Which they would never do, of course. It would not take much of a bribe to turn two of them against the other three, or three of them against the other two, or four of them against Borlann, if that was the course we wished. Do you, who claim to have learned the secrets of power in Luskan, doubt that?”

Dahlia considered his claims for a moment then replied, “And yet, by all accounts, drow are more scarce in the city of late.”

“Because we’ve used it up. We’ve long ago emptied Luskan of all the treasures that interested us. We remain in the shadows, for the city remains a marginally useful source of information. Some ships still dock here, and from every port on the Sword Coast.”

“And so Borlann the Crow and the other High Captains are the true power after all.”

“If it serves us for them to believe so, then let it be so.”

That reply had Dahlia shifting uncomfortably for the first time, Jarlaxle noted, though she did well to hide it. He would have to play his hand carefully with her. She had ulterior motives, and he didn’t want to scare her off by making her fear that she would be getting herself in too far over her head with him. Still, the elf intrigued him, and the mere fact that she had so beautifully and thoughtfully engaged Athrogate to get to him showed him that she was not ill-prepared-in anything she did, he presumed.

“My associates’ interests in Luskan are minor in these times,” Jarlaxle clarified. “Their network is vast, and this but a minor endeavor.”

“Their network?”

“Our network, when it serves me,” Jarlaxle replied.

“And my proposition?”

The drow pulled off his great hat and swept a low bow before her. “Jarlaxle, at your service, dear lady,” he said.

“Jarlaxle and Athrogate,” Dahlia corrected. “I need him more than I need you.”

Jarlaxle straightened and met her stern gaze with a wicked little grin. “I doubt that.”

“Don’t,” she said, and she walked out of the alley.

Carefully scrutinizing her every alluring movement as she walked away, Jarlaxle’s grin only widened.

“The power in the west mounts,” Sylora said to Szass Tam. “The tremors grow stronger. There is great danger and great potential to be found there.”

“You have spoken with our agent?”

Sylora propped the mirror she carried up before her and closed her eyes, bringing forth its scrying magic once more. The shiny glass dulled, as if with a mist within and only a small circle in the middle of the looking glass cleared. It no longer showed the reflection of the Dread Ring, but a clear image of a single object, a skull-shaped crystal.

“There is much more to the skull gem than to serve as a phylactery for a lich,” Sylora explained. “It serves me as conduit to our agent, and when the time comes, as a guide on my journey.”

“You wish to leave at once.”

“It would have been better had I gone instead of Dahlia,” the Thayan sorceress replied.

“You question me?”

“Neverwinter is thick with Netherese.”

“A cult of the upstart Asmodeus is there, at my bidding, to… trouble them.”

“But not to defeat them. There is a Dread Ring to be created, to be forged from the secrets that Dahlia seeks to uncover, a power of uncontrollable catastrophe, and exquisite beauty.”

“More credit to Dahlia, then,” Szass Tam reminded. “It was she who identified the signs of approaching peril, and sought to exploit them.”

“They are beyond her,” Sylora insisted. She could hardly see Szass Tam through the haze of ash in the Dread Ring-and that was a good thing, given the archlich’s horrid features-but it seemed to her as though his posture showed indiflerence to her excitement.

“Dahlia is not alone,” Szass Tam assured her. “She thinks she is, and that is to our benefit. It is my hope that she will need us not at all to accomplish what she has set out to do. But you will watch her, and you will know, and we will… support her as we deem necessary.”

“Am I to travel to Neverwinter Wood, as we discussed?” Sylora asked, not willing to push any further. She knew when Szass Tam had heard enough, and knew, too, that arguing with him was a sure way to be invited into his dark realm-as a slave.

“Not yet,” Szass Tam instructed. “The cult-the Ashmadai-will keep our Netherese friends occupied. The greater prize will come from Dahlia’s work, so I would have you learn as much as you can, both through your work here in our libraries and through your regular contact with our agent. This is of utmost importance. Should we succeed, we will have another Dread Ring, and better, it will come in no small part through the suffering of those ancient relics, the Netherese.”

“This is my charge?”

“It is.”

“And my credit?” the wizard pressed.

“In your rivalry with Dahlia?” Szass Tam responded with a sly cackle, one that ended abruptly as he continued, his tone much more severe. “Dahlia suspected the link between the rising catastrophe and the fall of the Hosttower of the Arcane, not you. She has performed wonderfully, though it pains you to admit that. My suggestion to you is that you perform equally as wonderfully, for our greater purpose and for your own well-being. I have granted you this opening for redemption and excellence because of your history with Dahlia-if anyone in Faer?n will watch over that one’s every movement, it is you.

“But you serve me, Sylora,” Szass Tam reminded. “You serve my ends and not your own, or your own will come quickly, I assure you. My desire is that Dahlia succeeds, and you will work toward that end. Our enemies are the Shadovar.”

His tone left no room for debate.

“Yes, Your Omnipotence,” Sylora replied, dipping her head in a scant bow.

Sylora’s only comfort then was her deep-rooted belief that Dahlia was far too young and inexperienced, and far too dedicated, to succeed in the facilitation of the needed catastrophe. The wizard horded the very real possibility, indeed the probability, that she would have to rescue Szass Tam’s victory in the west. Then, she hoped, the archlich would come to see the true limitations of that wretched elf.

“Borboy, really?” Athrogate asked with a snicker for the tenth time since he and Jarlaxle had watched Dahlia enter High Captain Borlann’s keep. The slim stone tower, known as Crow’s Nest, had been only recently erected on Luskan’s Closeguard Island where the River Mirar spilled out into the Trackless Sea.

Jarlaxle continued his amusement at the dwarf’s use of the derogatory nickname so many in Luskan had tagged on High Captain Borlann. He possessed his father’s title, and the magical Cloak of the Raven, handed down to him from his grandfather Kensidan. But there, at least according to the old seadogs haunting Luskan’s allies, the resemblance ended.

“Skinny little runt,” Athrogate remarked.

“As was Kensidan,” Jarlaxle replied. “But possessed of a presence that could fill a room.”

“Yeah, I’m remembering that one. Tough old bird. Bwahaha! Bird, eh?”

“I understood you.”

“Then why ain’t ye laughing?”

“Figure it out.”

The dwarf shook his head and muttered something about finding a companion with a sense of humor.

“Ye think she’s layin’ down for him?” Athrogate asked after a while.

“Dahlia uses every weapon to her advantage, of that I am certain.”

“But for that one? Borboy?”

“Surely you’re not jealous over an elf,” Jarlaxle remarked with eyebrows raised.

“Bah!” the dwarf snorted. “Ain’t nothing like that, ye fool.” He paused and put his hands on his hips as he looked at a candlelit window high up the moss-covered walls of Crow’s Nest. Athrogate gave a little sigh. “Though I’d have to be a dead dwarf not to see the fight’n’fun in that one.”

Jarlaxle gave a wry little grin but let it go at that. Like the dwarf, he stood staring at the keep. Nothing seemed amiss for a long while, but then from the window came a shriek that sounded like the excited screech of a giant crow. Both dwarf and drow came forward a step, peering more intently at that lone window-and the candlelight was snuffed all at once. Men began rushing around the compound, and another pair of shrieks sounded along with a blue-white flicker from behind the window, like the sudden flash of a lightning bolt.

Then came a still louder screech, a brighter flash, and a report of thunder that shook the ground beneath their feet. The window exploded outward, glass shattering and flying, and along with it… black feathers.

Athrogate emitted a strange, gulping sound then blew it out with a “Bwahaha!” Across the way, a giant black bird dived out the window, opened wide its wings, and floated across the compound, over the water, and dived to the ground right in front of Jarlaxle and Athrogate.

Before either dwarf or drow could say a word, the crow disguise flipped back into a fine, glossy cloak, to reveal its new owner.

“Let us be quick,” Dahlia said to the pair, walking past and fiddling with one of the two earrings in her right ear as she did. “Borlann was a minor nuisance, but the murderous arms of his House are long.”

“Be quick for… where?” Athrogate asked, but Dahlia didn’t slow.

“Illusk,” Jarlaxle answered before she could, and with one glance back at the compound, the drow started away, sweeping the dwarf along beside him. “And the undercity.”

The stunned Athrogate mumbled and muttered, chortled and giggled, before finally remarking, “Bet Borboy wishes ye’d left last night!”

Korvin Dor’crae paced about Valindra Shadowmantle’s decorated chamber. He stopped and stared into a large mirror and imagined the reflection he once saw in such a glass, trying to use those memories of his past life as a distraction.

It didn’t work.

He thought of Dahlia again soon enough, waiting for her to return with Jarlaxle and the dwarf. She had gone to see Borlann the Crow-her newest diamond, her newest lover. Surely Dor’crae wasn’t jealous of that. He cared not at all for such petty issues as sex, but there remained implications for him in the elf’s promiscuity.

The vampire ran his hand through his black hair, and could clearly picture the movement in the mirror, though of course the glass showed no image. Borlann was Dahlia’s tenth lover-ten he knew about, anyway-and all ten were accounted for, two on her right ear, Borlann and Dor’crae, and eight on her left. Among the Thayans, Dahlia had been given many nicknames, most alluding to a certain species of spider known for mating then eating the males, though not all of those diamonds on Dahlia’s left ear represented males.

Dahlia didn’t murder her lovers, however. No, she challenged them to a fair fight then utterly destroyed them. When Dor’crae had entered his tryst with the elf, he’d known that, and was confident in his power to defeat her, should it come to that. In fact, he’d entertained the notion of not only defeating her, but had fantasized about converting her into a servile vampire.

But he had come to know better. Dor’crae had mentally played a fight with Dahlia in his mind a thousand times. He had seen her training with Kozah’s Needle, and had witnessed two of the fights with her former lovers. And more than that, he had come to appreciate the elf warrior’s cunning.

He couldn’t beat her, and he knew it. When Dahlia had had her fill of him, when she decided to move along, for expediency, to make a point to Szass Tam, or for simple boredom or whim, he would face oblivion.

“Your friend is here again,” Valindra said, drawing Dor’crae from his thoughts.

He turned and looked at the doorway, expecting the lich referred to Dahlia. But seeing nothing there, he glanced back at Valindra, who redirected his attention to the empty skull gem, her own phylactery, which had come to serve Dor’crae in an entirely different manner.

The eyes of the gem flared red.

Nervous, Dor’crae glanced back at the door, and if he had any breath, he would have held it.

“She comes,” he whispered to the spirit in the skull gem, “with our allies for the journey to the source of power.”

The skull gem’s eyes flared. “Szass Tam watches,” a woman’s voice replied, and it sounded tinny and thin through the magical conduit. “He would not have this opportunity pass us by.”

“I understand,” Dor’crae assured her.

“He will blame one, I will blame the other,” the voice of Sylora assured him.

“I understand,” Dor’crae dutifully replied, and the flaming eyes went quiet.

Dahlia entered the chamber, and as soon as Dor’crae saw her, he noted the new ratio of her earrings, nine to one.

Valindra, too, noted the entrance of Dahlia, but more because of the drow and dwarf that followed not far behind her. The lich gave a little hiss as Athrogate showed himself, but managed enough of her composure to wish Jarlaxle well.

“It has been too long, Jarlaxle,” she said. “I am lonely.”

“Too long indeed, dear lady, but my business has kept me away from your fair city.”

“Always it is business.”

“Just lie down and die, ye rotten thing,” Athrogate muttered, the dwarf obviously having little regard for Valindra.

“Is this a problem?” Dahlia asked Jarlaxle. “You knew that Valindra would be accompanying us.”

“My little friend has a particular distaste for the walking dead,” Jarlaxle replied.

“It ain’t right,” muttered the dwarf.

Jarlaxle looked to Dor’crae and asked Dahlia, “This is your associate?”

“Korvin Dor’crae,” she replied.

Jarlaxle studied the vampire for just a moment before grinning in understanding. “And this is my associate, Athrogate,” he said to Dor’crae. “I expect you two will get along wonderfully.”

“Yeah, well met and all,” Athrogate added with a slight nod, though he glanced again Valindra’s way, his expression sour, revealing that he was, in all likelihood, oblivious to Dor’crae’s true nature.

“Let us be on our way,” Dahlia instructed. She moved to usher Valindra toward the other exit, waving for Jarlaxle and Athrogate to lead the way.

As soon as the four had moved out the door, the vampire began to follow, taking a roundabout course to pass the skull gem. He quietly dropped it into his pocket. The eyes flared as he did, showing that his unseen ally was still there, in the extra-dimensional pocket of the phylactery, and the vampire could have sworn the inanimate gem smiled at him as it disappeared into the folds of his clothing.