Realms of the Underdark

Chapter Six: Recurring Nightmares

Tresk Mulander squinted through his glowing shield toward the shimmering image of his young drow opponent. So far, all had gone as anticipated. The girl was good, just as Mistress Shobalar had claimed. She even had a few unanticipated skills, such as her deadly aim with a tossed knife.

Well enough. Mulander had a few surprises of his own.

It was true that Xandra Shobalar had raped his mind, plundered his vast mental store of necromantic spells. There was one spell, however, that the drow wizard could not touch: it was stored not in his mind, but in his flesh.

Mulander was a Researcher, always seeking new magic where lesser men saw only death. Moldering corpses, even the offal of the slaughterhouse, could be used to create wondrous and fearsome creatures utterly under his control. But his strangest and most secret creation was waiting to be unleased.

In a bit of unliving flesh-a tiny dark mole that clung to his body by the thinnest tendril of skin, he had stored a creature of great power. To bring it into existence, he had only to make that final separation from his living body.

The wizard worked his thumb and forefinger beneath the golden collar.

Ironically, the enspelled mole was hidden beneath the magical fetter!

Mulander twisted off the bit of flesh, reveling in the sharp stab of pain-for such was a miniature death, and death was the ultimate source of his power. He tossed the tiny mole to the cavern floor and watched with sharp anticipation as the contained monster took shape.

Many of the Red Wizards could create darkenbeasts: fearsome flying creatures made by twisting the bodies of living animals into magical atrocities. Mulander had gone one better. The creature that rose up before him had been fashioned from his own flesh and his own nightmares.

Mulander had begun with the most dreadful thing he knew-a replica of his long-dead wizard mother-and added to it enormous size and the deadliest features of every predator that ever had haunted his dreams. The tattered, batlike wings of an abyssal denizen sprouted from the creature's shoulders, and a raptor's talons curved from its human hands. The thing had vampiric fangs, the haunches and hind legs of a dire wolf, and a wyvern's poisoned tail. Plates of dragonlike armor-in Red Wizard crimson, of course-covered its feminine torso. Only the eyes, the same hard green as his own, had been left untouched. Those eyes settled upon the drow girl-the hunter who had suddenly become prey-and they filled with a brand of malice that was only too familiar to Mulander. An involuntary shiver ran through the powerful wizard who had summoned the monster, a response engraved upon his soul by his own wretched, long-gone childhood.

The monster crouched. Its wolflike feet tamped down, and the muscles of its powerful haunch bunched in preparation for the spring. Mulander did not bother to dispel the magical shield. The monster retained enough of a resemblance to his mother for him to enjoy its roar of pain as the force field shattered upon impact.

Enjoyable, too, was the wide-eyed shock on the face of the young drow. She regained her composure with admirable speed and sent a pair of knives spinning into the monster's face. Mulander knew a moment's supreme elation when the blades sank into those too-familiar green eyes.

The monster shrieked with rage and anguish, raking its face with owl-like talons in an effort to dislodge the knives. Long bloody furrows crisscrossed its face before the drow's knives finally clattered to the cave's floor. Blinded and enraged, the creature advanced toward the dark-elven girl, its dripping hands wildly groping the air.

The drow snatched a bola from her belt, whirled it briefly and let fly. The weapon spun toward the blinded creature, wrapped tightly around its neck. Gurgling, the monster tore at the leather thongs. A sharp snap resounded through the cavern, quickly followed by a grating roar. Sniffing audibly as it sought its prey, Mulander's monster dived with outstretched talons toward the drow girl.

But the drow rose into the air, swift and graceful as a dark hummingbird, and the monster fell facedown upon the cavern floor. It quickly rolled onto its back and leapt up onto its feet. A thunderous thumping rush filled the cavern as its batlike wings began to beat. It rose slowly, awkwardly, and began to pursue the drow.

The young wizard tossed a giant web at the monster, the creature tore through it with ease. She bombarded it with a barrage of death darts, but the weapons bounced harmlessly off the creature's plated body.

The drow summoned a bolt of glistening black lightning and hurled it like a javelin. To Mulander's dismay, the bolt slashed downward through one leathery wing.

Shrieking with rage, the monster traced a tight spiral to the cavern floor and landed with a stone-shaking crash.

No matter: the magical battle had taken its toll on the young elfmaid. She sank slowly toward the cavern floor, and toward the jaws of the wounded but waiting monster.

Her golden eyes grew frantic and darted toward Mulander's gloating face.

"Enough!" she shrieked. "I know what you need-dispel the creature, and I will give you what you want without further battle. This I swear, by all that is dark and holy!"

A smile of malevolent satisfaction crossed the Red Wizard's face. He trusted no oath from any drow, but he knew that this one's battle spells were nearly exhausted. Nor was he was surprised that she had lost heart for the battle. The girl was pathetically young- she looked to be about twelve or thirteen by the measure of humankind. Despite her fell heritage and magical prowess, she was still a callow lass and thus no match for such as he!

"Toss the key to me," he told her.

"The monster," she pleaded.

Mulander hesitated, then shrugged. Even without the magical construct, he was more than the equal of this elven child. With a flick of one hand, he sent the monster back into whatever nightmares had spawned it. But with the other, he summoned a fireball large enough to hurl the drow against the far wall of the cavern and leave nothing of her but a grease spot. He saw by the fear in her eyes that she understood her position.

"Here-it's in here," the girl said frantically, reaching into a pouch at her waist and fumbling about. Her efforts were hampered by her own fear: her breath came in exhausted little gasps and sobs, her thin shoulders shook with terrified weeping.

Finally she took out a tiny silken bag and held it high. "The key is in here. Take it, please, and let me go!"

The Red Wizard deftly caught the bag she tossed him, then shook a small glistening sphere into his palm. It was a protective bubble-a bit of magic easily cast and easily dispelled-which contained a delicate vial of translucent green glass. And within that was the tiny golden key that promised freedom and power.

Had he glanced at the drow child, Mulander might have wondered why her eyes were dry despite her weeping, why she no longer seemed to have any difficulty maintaining her ability to levitate. Had he taken his gaze from that longed-for key, he might have recognized the look of cold triumph in her golden eyes. He had seen that expression once before, briefly, on the face of his own apprentice.

But pride had blinded him to treachery once before, and had lured him into a mistake that had condemned him to a sentence of death, a sentence that had been commuted into lifelong slavery.

When the understanding of this finally came, Mulander knew that this mistake would truly be his last.