Midnight's mask

CHAPTER 16

Cale materialized in the shadows of the sanctum, an eerie void with the Weave Tap gone. What he saw near the doorway froze him.

Magadon, prone, bleeding, and laboring to breathe, cradled Jak in his lap. He had a hand on the little man's brow. Jak lay across the guide's legs, covered in blood, unmoving.

Unmoving.

Riven stood near them, watching, blades held slackly at his sides. His expression was impossible to decipher-it could have been controlled grief, contained rage, or indifference.

"Jak?"

The word came out of Cale's mouth before he could stop it. He tried to move but his body would not respond.

"Jak?" he said again, his voice louder.

He knew his friend would not answer.

A ragged gash opened Jak's throat. The little man's blades lay on the ground near him. He was not breathing.

Neither was Cale.

"I tried to save him…." Magadon choked as he looked up. Tears glistened in his colorless eyes.

Cale swallowed. His vision was blurry. His body went weak, numb. He managed a step forward, another. He could not take his eyes from the body of his friend, his best friend.

"I thought you were going to miss the festivities," said a voice, Azriim's voice. "I am glad to see you return."

For the first time, Cale noticed the slaadi. They stood on the other side of the sanctum's double doors, denied entry by a barrier of force. Magadon must have raised it. The barrier distorted the air like a lens of imperfect glass. The slaadi's forms looked twisted and distended through it, but Cale could still see Azriim's smirk. Both held their teleportation rods in their hands.

Cale ignored the creatures, sheathed his blade, and moved to Magadon's side. He knelt and pulled Jak's limp body from the guide. Jak felt so … light. The little man's eyes were open but unseeing. Cale could not quite believe how small his friend looked, how fragile. Had he always been that small?

Jak's shirt was twisted around his torso and for some absurd reason Cale found himself straightening it. He tried to ignore the sticky fluid that clung to his fingers. He noticed that the little man's left fist was clenched around something. Cale gently peeled back the fingers-he had never noticed how tiny were Jak's hands-to reveal the jeweled pendant that served as Jak's holy symbol. Jak must have taken it in hand before the end. Cale's eyes welled and he closed his friend's hand over the symbol.

He stood, cradling his friend, and carried him a few steps away from the doors. It seemed right to him that they be apart from everyone else.

"Look at him," Dolgan said from behind the barrier, and Cale heard the mockery in the slaad's tone. "I think he might weep."

Cale kept his back to the slaadi and looked down into the little man's green eyes. A thousand memories rushed through his mind. In all of them, Jak was smiling, laughing, smoking. Cale could not remember laughing except when he had been in Jak's company. What would he do without him?

The tears pooling in his eyes fell down his cheeks, welled in his eyes, splashed on the little man's face. He wiped them away. A sob wracked him.

His mind was empty. He wanted to say something, anything, but no words would come. Instead, an inarticulate animal sound emerged from his throat, a primal expression of the inexpressible.

They had been through so much. Survived so much. Only to end like this?

His mind kept repeating: How can this be? How can this be?

Jak's body was cooling in his hands. His best friend was growing cold. Cale was distantly conscious of his rage beginning to build. It welled up from the core of his soul, soaked him, caused his body to shake. Shadows swirled around him, little flames of darkness.

The rage gave him a focus, something to hold onto, a purpose.

His tears stopped. His sobs stopped. The world restarted.

He turned, met Riven's gaze, held it. Neither of them said anything. Cale saw something in the assassin's eye, something he had never seen. Riven's breath came fast; he bled from half a dozen small cuts. Magadon still lay on the floor, propped on his elbow, trying to staunch the gashes in his chest and abdomen. From the grotesque angle from which the guide's leg jutted from his hip, Cale could see it was broken or out of joint. The guide's face was nearly as white as his eyes. His eyes were glassy but focused.

Cale had healing spells at his command but he could not use them on Magadon, not then. At the moment, Cale's grief was the whetstone that sharpened his rage, that honed his hate. He had no healing in him. He had only anger. He could do only harm.

He knelt down on one knee and set Jak on the floor, against the wall. He brushed his hand over the little man's face and closed his eyes, gently. It was the last gentle thing he would do for a time.

"He is crying," Azriim said. Dolgan chuckled.

Cale thought back to the docks in Selgaunt when Jak had told him they should be heroes if they had the chance. He would honor his promise to the little man. But not yet. Before he could be a hero, he first had to be a killer.

He rose, looked over at Magadon, and said, "Which one?"

Magadon stared at him uncomprehending. He was going into wound shock.

"Which one did this?" Cale snapped. His tone was harsh; he had not meant it to be. Shadows boiled from his skin. His fists were clenched.

"The big one," Magadon stammered, his words slurred.

Cale nodded. He looked through the barrier at Dolgan-the big one. The distorted air magnified the slaad's claws. Blood coated those claws. Jak's blood.

Cale's hands opened and closed, opened and closed. The pounding of his heart filled his ears. With effort, he took control of his anger, channeled it.

"I think you've made him angry, Dolgan," Azriim jibed.

Dolgan fixed Cale with a hard glare and bared his fangs. "Good," the slaad said.

Moving with deliberateness, Cale took out his black mask and donned it. Behind its opaque curtain, he let the killer in him take hold. Jak was dead. For the moment, so was Cale's conscience. He was going to make the slaad suffer.

Never taking his gaze from the big slaad, he whispered a series of prayers, casting spells that gave him added strength, speed. The darkness in the sanctum deepened, mirroring his mood.

"Oh, he is definitely angry," Azriim said.

The slaadi paced along the edge of the psionic barrier, their movements predatory. Azriim removed first one wand, then another from his thigh sheath, touching himself and Dolgan in turn, no doubt augmenting their own abilities.

Cale watched the slaadi work and called upon Mask again, invoking a spell that infused him with a shard of the divine. A small part of Mask's power rushed into him, filled him, focused his rage, increased his spite. His body grew half again as large as normal. His strength increased still more. He stood as tall as Dolgan. His strength matched a giant's.

He was ready.

He turned from the slaadi to look back at Magadon.

The guide looked … drained. Cale could not help him, not until he had killed something.

"Hang on," Cale said to him, and his voice was deeper than usual, more commanding. "This will be over soon."

Magadon nodded, gritting his teeth against the pain.

"Lower the barrier, Mags," Cale told him, and turned back to face the slaadi. "Raise it behind us after we're through."

The slaadi stopped pacing.

"Don't trouble yourself," Azriim said, and held up his teleportation rod. "We'll come to you."

Cale stared holes into the slaadi.

Azriim lowered the rod.

"Have it your way, then," he said.

The slaadi backed off and spread to opposite sides of the wide corridor.

"Erevis…." Magadon began.

"The big one is mine," Cale said to Riven.

The assassin nodded, stood at Cale's left shoulder. He spun his blades and pointed their tips at Azriim's chest.

"That's unfortunate. I have wanted to kill the stupid one for a long while. But I'll settle for the chatty one."

Azriim smiled, and the smile gave way to a hiss. Dolgan drew his axe from the sheath on his back, held it in his hands, and roared. Veins and sinew rose from the muscles of his arms, chest, and neck.

Cale put his hand to Weaveshear, started to draw it, but stopped.

Riven looked at him sidelong. "What are you doing?"

"Close work," Cale said, the words a threat and promise for Dolgan. He could not control the shadows pouring from his flesh.

Riven absorbed that. "I think I'll go with my steel, just the same."

"Lower it, Mags," Cale commanded again.

Dolgan dropped his axe and waited, claws flexing. He and Cale would fight hand to claw.

"Remember that they are stronger," Riven said to Cale.

"No, they're not."

Riven stared, nodded, bounced on the balls of his feet. "Do it, Mags," he said.

The psionic barrier flared once and disappeared.

The moment it disappeared, Azriim spoke a word and discharged a bolt of black energy from his outstretched hand. Cale and Riven threw themselves against opposite walls and the black ray streaked past them.

Riven bounded forward at Azriim, blades whirling.

Cale charged Dolgan.

Memories of a past life-or was it only a dream? — slipped away from Jak, gossamer wraiths of recollection floating away into oblivion. He knew he remembered things, he just could not quite remember what things. The loss pained him distantly, but even that soon faded.

It did not matter. He was happy where he was.

He stood barefoot on a rolling moor. Swells of plush green grass stretched around him for as far as he could see. The grass felt soft under his feet, between his bare toes. Golden sunshine showered down to warm him. Stately, solitary elms dotted the moor, their canopies casting great swaths of grass in shadow.

Shadow.

A memory bubbled up from somewhere. He almost got his mind around it but it drifted away before he could pin it down. Still, whatever it was made him smile.

A soft breeze stirred the grass, caused the leaves of the elms to whisper among themselves. It also carried from somewhere in the distance the smell of food cooking-a heavy, stomach-warming smell. The aroma was familiar to Jak but he did not know why.

"Oh well," he said, unperturbed.

Following his nose, he started walking. A cerulean sky roofed the land, dotted with puffs of white. He had to have a smoke. It was too nice a day not to have a smoke. He reached for his pipe and discovered that it was not in his belt pouch.

Strange, he thought, but his disappointment faded quickly.

He whistled a tune and walked on. After only a short while, another smell attracted his attention and caused him temporarily to forget about the cooking aroma-the unmistakably wonderful stink of pipeweed. And good quality.

Someone else had decided that the day required a smoke. Surely they would share a spare pipe with a fellow traveler.

"Hello there," Jak called. "Who's there? Who's smoking?"

"Here," returned a voice from the other side of a nearby hill.

Jak legged his way up the hill. When he crested the rise he saw a well-dressed halfling with wavy, sandy hair seated under an elm, his back to the trunk, a wooden pipe stuck between his teeth. A broad-brimmed green hat with a purple feather lay on the ground beside him. The halfling smiled around the stem of his pipe. Jak found the smile infectious.

"Well met!"

Jak returned the smile and said, "Well met."

He was certain he had seen the halfling before, maybe in some dark place underground. He searched his memory but found nothing.

The halfling climbed to his feet, dusted off his red trousers, and said, "You sure took your time. Seems like I've been waiting for you a long while." He banged his feathered hat against his thigh and replanted it atop his head.

"You have?" Jak asked, confused.

"I have," responded the halfling with a wink. "Now come on."

Green cloak swooshing, the halfling walked up to Jak, placed a tindertwig and pipe-already tamped, no less-into his palm.

"You'll be wanting this, I assume. Now, follow me. I know where you're going."

"You do?" Jak asked, and followed along, taking a whiff of the unlit pipeweed. "How? I don't even know where we're going. Do we know each other?"

The halfling looked at him out of the corner of his eye, green eyes glinting.

"We know each other very well, Jak Fleet."

Jak flushed with embarrassment. It was quite rude not to remember an acquaintance.

"Uh … I'm afraid I don't remember your name."

"No?" the halfling asked with raised eyebrows. "Well, I imagine you will in time. Are you going to smoke that or keep holding it hostage under your nose?"

"Huh? Oh." Jak grinned, struck the tindertwig on the rough leather of his belt pouch, and lit. He took a deep draw. Exquisite.

"Very good," he said. "Where's the leaf from?"

"Around here," the halfling said.

Jak resolved to get some more as soon as possible. Meanwhile, he blew a series of smoke rings as he walked along. His comrade did the same and for a time they held an unspoken competition over who could produce the biggest ring.

Jak lost, but barely. He found that he liked the halfling; he could not help it. Something about the rascal seemed so familiar and yet Jak could not remember his name. He was sure he would in time, just as the halfling had said.

What a strange way to think, he thought.

"Nice around here, isn't it?" his friend asked.

Jak nodded. "Where are we, anyway? I don't know this moor."

"We're right where we are," the halfling answered.

"I know that," Jak replied. He was beginning to think that his comrade was a bit. . simple. "I mean, what is this place called?"

The halfling smiled. "It's called 'my place'."

Jak was incredulous and could not keep it from his tone. "All of it? Seems like a lot for one halfling."

His comrade grinned. "Oh, it's not for just one."

"No?"

"No. Look." The halfling took his pipe from his mouth as they topped a rise. With it, he pointed down into the valley.

Jak followed his comrade's gesture and saw….

A small cottage. A smoking chimney rose out of a mud-and-thatch roof. The clank of plates and the wonderful, familiar smell that had drawn Jak across the moor floated through the open shutters. So too did laughter. The voices sounded familiar to Jak.

His comrade took a deep breath. "Smells good, doesn't it? Homey, like."

"It does," Jak answered. He inhaled, drank in the smell, and it triggered a sharp memory from his childhood.

"That's my mother's potato soup!" he said.

The halfling grinned wide. He tapped the stem of his pipe on his temple.

"It is, Jak. She's waiting for you. She and your father. Your grandmother too. Even your younger brother Cob. Do you remember him?"

"Remember him? Of course!" Jak could hardly believe his ears. He had not seen any of those people for years, not since they all had..

Not since they all had died.

But that didn't seem right. How could that be right? And his mother shouldn't be there either, should she?

As though reading his mind, the halfling said, "A lot happened after you left Mistledale, Jak. Go on. The soup's going to get cold. This will all make sense soon."

Jak turned, stopped. "Wait. I feel like I'm leaving something behind, something. . undone."

His friend shook his head and smiled gently. "No. You've done all you can. Memories haunt even better than ghosts. Go on, now."

Jak could not make sense of the halfling's words but that did not keep him from smiling. "Come with me. My mother loves guests. And the soup is wonderful."

The halfling in the green hat shook his head gently and replanted the pipe in his mouth.

"I can't, Jak. Not right now, at least. You go. Go and rest. I'll come back when I can and we'll talk then. Well enough?"

"Well enough," Jak said, and he could not contain a grin. His family! "This is a great place."

"I am glad you think so," replied his companion.

Smiling, Jak turned and sprinted down the rise toward the cottage.

From behind, he heard his companion exclaim, "Oh, drat!"

Jak stopped, turned, and looked back up the rise to see the halfling looking forlornly at his pipe. He held it up for Jak to see.

"It's gone out," he said, and frowned. "Trickster's hairy toes!"

For some reason, that oath made Jak smile.

"You like that?" the halfling called down to him.

Jak nodded.

The halfling tucked the pipe into his cloak. "I always liked it too. See you soon, Jak."

Jak gave his friend one more wave, turned, and hurried to the cottage.