The Collected Stories, The Legend of Drizzt

Iruladoon

Forest of Iruladoon

Spring in the waning years of the Post-Spellplague

We’re not going to get there in time!” shouted a frantic Lathan Obridock.

He turned back from the prow to regard his fellow fishermen, his face wet from spray as Larson’s Boneyard bounced across the considerable swells on the always unpredictable Lac Dinneshere. His teeth chattered, both from fear and from the brutal cold of Icewind Dale waters, lakes that spent more than half the year covered in thick ice.

“Young Lathan, be at ease,” counseled Addadearber of the Lightning, a rather colorful and flamboyant resident of Caer-Dineval, the boat’s home port on the western bank of the great lake, one of three that defined this region about the singular mountain known as Kelvin’s Cairn. “I’d not have sailed with Ashelia Larson there if I thought she’d lead me to a watery grave!”

As he spoke, Addadearber waved his arms dramatically, but the effect was much less so than usual, since he had abandoned his red wizard robes for garments more practical to sailing. Nothing could pull a man to the bottom faster than water-soaked woolen robes, after all. Addadearber still wore his floppy black hat, though. Once conical and pointed, standing tall and straight, the hat was bent over halfway to its apex, its point leaning to Addadearber’s left-hand side, and its once-stiff brim sagging on both sides. It seemed a fitting reflection of the aging wizard, with his gray hair and bushy gray beard, crooked posture, and with his magic, too, rendered unreliable at best and often impotent by the fall of Mystra’s Weave, the great event known throughout the Realms as the Spellplague.

“You’re old and don’t care if you die, then!” accused the youngest member of Boneyard’s crew, Spragan Rubrik, at fifteen almost two years Lathan’s junior. His long curly brown hair dripped water from every lock, but it seemed obvious that his darker brown eyes would have been wet with moisture anyway, as he had been the first to discover the leak in the fish hold, the cold, dark water of Lac Dinneshere creeping in to claim her prize.

“I’d watch my wagging tongue, were I speaking to Addadearber of the Lightning,” advised Ashelia from the middeck tiller, her tone decidedly less dread-ridden than that of the two young fishermen. Nearing middle age and quite sturdy for her gender, the broad-shouldered Ashelia was still a quite handsome woman, with straight blond hair, sharply parted on the right, hanging to her shoulders, and light gray eyes shining. Her skin retained the texture and look of porcelain, unlike the other veteran fishermen, with just a hint of a tan showing so early after the end of a particularly deep winter.

“He’s hoping the old warlock will turn him into something that can swim, then,” quipped the fifth man from under the low-pulled hood of his forest green cloak.

“A toad is my preference,” Addadearber replied. “And ’tis true that toads can swim. How far is another matter, particularly given the size of the knuckleheads we’ve been pulling in for two days. I would take bets that the poor little laddie wouldn’t paddle ten good kicks before a ten-pounder got him. What’s your guess then, Roundie?”

The cloaked man just chuckled softly in reply, both from Addadearber’s teasing description and from the use of his nickname. He was known about Ten-Towns as Roundabout, because he always seemed to be exactly that. “Roundabout and never here,” was the phrase often spoken regarding the ranger, whose real name few knew, and which he never seemed willing to share. He was of medium height and muscular, but slender, with long, straight black hair and piercing eyes, one brown, one blue-a trick, it was rumored, of his mixed heritage. His ears were quite long, and poked through his hair. He didn’t try to hide the fact that his veins coursed with elf blood.

Spragan turned his alarmed expression to Lathan, but the older boy just shook his head and brushed the blond locks from in front of his blue eyes.

Addadearber began to whisper something then, something that resembled the incantation of a spell, and both young fishermen turned to regard him with great alarm, which of course turned the corners of the old wizard’s lips up in a satisfied grin.

“Enough o’ that,” Ashelia said to him. “Them boys’re scared enough.” She turned a severe look upon the two of them as she continued, “I’d have thought they’d been out on the waters enough now to know that a little leak isn’t sending Boneyard to the grave, especially me sister’s own Lathan there, sailor blood and all-not that ye’d know he’s got any blood in him in looking at his face just now!”

“We’ve never been this far-” Spragan started to protest, but Ashelia cut him short.

“And enough from yerself!” she scolded. “Four generations o’ Rubriks been sailing Dinneshere, and ye’ve a grandda, an aunt, and two uncles who call the Lac their eternal resting place. I took ye on to train ye, for the wishes o’ yer ma-both of ye! Ye think they’d have trusted me with the lot o’ ye if I didn’t know the waters? And ye think I’d take ye out as full crew if I didn’t think ye ready for it? So don’t ye prove me wrong here. Lathan, ye stay up front and get yer sounding rope ready as we near the eastern shore, and yerself, Spragan, grab a pail and get to the hold.”

“There’s too much-”

“And don’t ye make me tell ye again, or I’m knowing a way to drop a hundred and fifty pounds from our weight real quick.”

With a last look to Lathan, Spragan scurried away. They heard him stumble down the aft ladder then splash about in the watery hold. A trapdoor near the taffrail popped open, and after more splashing, Spragan flung a bucketful of water up and out, to splash into Boneyard’s wake.

“Should I go and help the lad?” Roundabout asked.

Ashelia waved the notion away. “We’ve picked up the eastern current already and we’re not so far. Ye paid me too well for yer transport to the eastern shore for me to make ye work yer way across. Now regarding the old spell-thrower …”

“Bah, but you employ me to find fish, not throw water,” Addadearber replied. “I suffer your pittance of coin that I might glimpse your beauty, but there are limits to even your considerable charms.”

Ashelia’s forced grin and subdued chuckle revealed that the woman knew sarcasm when she heard it-yet another reason the old wizard was so fond of her.

Ashelia’s confidence in Boneyard was not misplaced. The seasoned sailor knew the condition of the boat from the feel of the tiller and the tug of the sails, and though she had to work hard to keep Boneyard moving along her desired course, they made the secret inlet and the quiet lagoon quite comfortably-and would have, even if Ashelia had not kept poor Spragan and Lathan bailing all the way.

Not many people knew about that place-just a few of Caer-Dineval’s fishermen, and Roundabout, of course, who knew the wilderness around the three lakes better than anyone in Ten-Towns. A solitary dock stuck out from the lagoon beach, with a single-roomed cottage behind it, and that in front of a small but thick forest. That alone was a remarkable thing, for most of Lac Dinneshere was bordered by rocky bluffs and barren tundra. But the bluffs both north and south were a bit higher than usual, shielding the wood. The forest, second in size in Icewind Dale only to Lonelywood on the banks of Maer Dualdon far to the west, like the dock and cabin, was a well-kept secret.

Larson’s Boneyard glided in easily under Ashelia’s skilled hand, with Lathan and Spragan stumbling around to secure the ropes.

“Water’s not deep,” Ashelia explained.

“I can see the bottom!” Spragan confirmed.

“Even if she fills, she’s not for sinking here, so we can patch her and bail her, and get back out in short order,” said Ashelia. “Tools, tar, and planks in the cabin.”

“A resourceful lot, you fisherfolk,” Addadearber congratulated her.

“Not all,” Ashelia replied. “But them that ain’t are dead, or soon to be. Lac Dinneshere’s not forgivin’ to fools.”

With Addadearber’s magical assistance heating some tar and blowing aside water in the hold so that Ashelia could set the patch plank in place, it didn’t take long to make the minor repair, but since the sun was low in the west, they decided to stay the rest of the day and that night ashore.

“Pick some good ones for our supper,” the captain told her young crewmembers. “Then bail her down below the patch so we can see if she’s holding and go out and get us firewood for the night.”

She left the two young men to their tasks and moved to the dock and the shore, to find the wizard and the ranger staring into the forest, perplexed.

“What do ye know, then?” she asked.

“It’s a good season,” Roundabout replied, indicating the forest. As she followed his gaze, Ashelia understood what he meant. The wood looked thicker and more vibrant than she remembered, and the air was full of the scent of flowering plants and the sounds of forest life.

Ashelia wore the most puzzled look of all. “Was here in the autumn,” she explained. “Something’s different. It’s bigger.”

“A trick of the Spellplague?” Addadearber posited. “Some magic gone awry, perhaps.”

“Everything is about magic with you, wizard,” Roundabout said, drawing an arc of one of Addadearber’s bushy eyebrows. “It was a good winter, full of snow, and the melt has been consistent,” the ranger added. “Even here in the dale, life finds a way to flourish.”

“Because we’re a resourceful lot,” Ashelia added and started for the cabin, the other two moving in her wake.

And none of them were convinced by Roundabout’s argument that nothing unusual was going on, the ranger least of all. They could feel it, like a heartbeat in the ground beneath their feet. They could smell it and could hear it, a vibrancy in the air.

They did a bit of cleaning-the ranger scooped out the fire pit-and organized the cabin’s small table and chairs, and claimed a piece of the floor for their respective beds. Lathan and Spragan joined them shortly, arms laden with fish, knucklehead trout mostly, but with an assortment of blues and spotted bass for variety.

“Seems to be holding,” Lathan reported.

Roundabout tossed him an axe he had found leaning against one wall.

“Enough for cooking and for keeping us warm through the night,” Ashelia instructed, and the two young sailors set out.

“I should get me a couple of those,” Addadearber remarked as they left.

“They can be helpful,” Ashelia agreed.

“More trouble than they’re worth,” the ranger said, and when the other two gave him amused looks, he added, “And no, I am not letting them ruin my meal with their no doubt impressive cooking skills.” He scooped up the largest of the fish, pulled a knife from his belt, and went outside to clean the thing.

With a waggle of his fingers, Addadearber animated a second fish and danced it out the door behind the ranger.

“Ye’re holding faith in yer magic, then,” said Ashelia. “Not many others’re doing the same.”

“Minor dweomers,” the wizard explained. “We cannot simply cease with our spellcasting, else we’ll never retrieve our skills when the Weave repairs.”

“If,” Ashelia corrected.

Addadearber conceded the point with a shrug. “And if it does not, we must adapt to whatever magic remains, or evolves. I employ my spells every day, and often. As magic shifts, I will watch and I will learn, while my less courageous colleagues will find themselves far behind me.”

“And Addadearber will take over the world!” Ashelia said, grinning widely. “Or Icewind Dale, at the least. Are ye worthy o’ that kingdom, wizard?”

“What ill have I done to deserve it?” Addadearber replied.

“My fingers are freezing. I can barely hold the thing!” Lathan complained, swinging the axe at the end of one arm.

“I’ll take it,” Spragan was quick to reply, but all he received in answer was a scowl.

“I’m older. You just collect the kindli-” Lathan stopped short, confused when he glanced to his left to see that Spragan was no longer beside him on the trail, that the trail itself was no longer the same as he remembered. He stood beside a stand of birch, but didn’t remember passing it. “Spragan?”

No answer.

Lathan looked all around, and the ground behind seemed strangely unfamiliar, though he had just crossed. When he turned back to look ahead, he saw a copse of thick trees crowded in front of him, with no sign of the trail.

“Spragan!” he called more loudly. He moved off quickly in one direction for a short bit then back the other way, then back the way he had come.

“Spragan!”

“What?” his younger friend answered from right beside him, so suddenly Lathan nearly swung the axe at him.

“What’s the matter?” Spragan asked.

Lathan shook his head. “Let’s get done and get out of here.”

Spragan looked at him as though he had no idea what Lathan might be talking about, but he shrugged and indicated a nearby hillside where several older trees had shed their branches. “Kindling,” he announced, and started away.

Lathan took a deep breath and berated himself for showing such irrational cowardice in front of the younger boy. He took up the axe with grim determination, sighted a nearby young elm, and decided that a bit of exercise and axe-swinging might be just what he needed to settle his nerves.

He hoisted the axe in both his hands, wringing the cold out of them, as he strode purposefully toward his goal. As he neared, he glanced back to make sure that Spragan remained in sight.

He couldn’t see his friend. He couldn’t even seem to locate the hillside Spragan had indicated, though he hadn’t traveled more than a dozen steps.

Lathan gripped the axe more tightly.

Spragan suffered no such reservations or uneasy feelings. He danced through the thick underbrush and among the many wildflowers, gathering twigs and small branches. It had been a long day and he was hungry. He licked his lips repeatedly, almost tasting the trout in anticipation.

He bent down to a shrub and picked up an old, dry, long-dead branch, eyes widening as he thought his job might be done with but one catch. He propped the branch against a tree and kicked at its center, breaking it in half, then bent to retrieve one of the pieces so he could break it again.

He froze halfway down, seeing that he was not alone.

She smiled at him as only a young girl could, bright and beaming, and with a shake of her head that sent her long auburn hair dancing over her girlish shoulders. Her dress, too, caught his attention, for it seemed so out of place, inadequate against the chill winds of Icewind Dale. White and full of ruffles, it seemed more a gown fitting for a grand ball in Bryn Shander than something one would wear into the forest. Even the black cloak tied around her shoulders appeared more fashionable than warm.

“What are you doing out … Who are you?” Spragan sputtered.

The girl smiled and stared at him.

“Do you live here?”

She giggled and dashed behind a tree.

Spragan dropped the branch and rushed to follow her, but when he went around the tree, she was nowhere to be seen.

She was behind him! He sensed it without turning. Spragan jumped forward a step and whirled around.

It was her, but it wasn’t her, the girl before him was his age, at least.

And she took his breath away. She had to be the older sister of the child he’d just seen, with her bright smile, flowing reddish-brown hair, and blue eyes-so blue he seemed to sink right into them as he stared at her. But it wasn’t her older sister, Spragan sensed. It was the same girl, only older, and dressed the same. Confused, the poor young man reached for her arm.

His hand went right through her as she vanished, just faded to nothingness.

A young girl’s giggle had him spinning back around, and there she was, right there, and no older than eight.

And she was gone again. A woman’s laughter turned him once more, and she was as old as his mother, though still incredibly beautiful.

A young girl again. A teenager, like him. A child once more. A woman, no more a girl. An old crone … One after another they appeared to him, all around him, laughing-laughing at him! — and turning him this way and that. Poor Spragan jumped around, then tried to sprint away, stumbling down the hillside.

Singing filled the air around him, sweet and melancholy, and peppering him with a range of emotions. He tried to pick up speed, but stumbled again then caught himself fast against one tree and skidded to an abrupt halt as he used it to turn around.

And she was there, right in front of him, a woman again, perhaps twenty-five years of age. She wasn’t singing anymore, and wasn’t smiling, her face tight, her eyes intense. Spragan shrank back from her, but his legs wouldn’t heed his command to run.

The woman breathed deeply, her arms lifting to her sides, her form blurring suddenly as the air around her shimmered with some unknown energy. Her hair blew back and fluttered wildly, though there was no wind, and her layered gown did likewise as she rose up tall before him-no, not tall, he realized to his horror! She floated in the air! And purple flames erupted all around her, and her eyes rolled up into her head, showing only white.

Spragan gave a cry of horror and hot winds buffeted him and flung him to the ground.

“Who are you?” he cried, scrambling to his knees.

The wind came on more furiously, carrying twigs that nicked at him as they flew past, and sand that stung his eyes and reddened his face. He rose against the blow and turned.

She was still there, floating in the air, flames dancing around her, hair flying wildly.

Then she was a little girl again, but no less ominous-indeed more threatening as her eyes rolled back to show blue, and her mouth opened wide in a sinister hiss.

Spragan ran past her, and he was half-running and half-flying as the wind gripped him and rushed him along. He cried out and tried to duck, but too late. Even though he managed to lift an arm, it served as little defense as he smashed into a low branch and was thrown onto his back.

The ground below him reverberated with music, like a heartbeat, and the air hummed with the woman’s song.

Words flitted through poor Spragan’s mind: “ghost” … “banshee” … But whatever it was, whatever she was, he knew beyond doubt that he was doomed. Though dazed, his nose broken, he tried to run on, blood filling his mouth, tears dulling his vision.

But she was there at every turn, young or old, and terribly beautiful.

So terribly beautiful.

Lathan set the axe between his feet, spat in both his hands, and gripped the handle tightly. He gave a growl as he lifted the axe back over his right shoulder, lining up his first strike on the young elm tree, but he had to pause when the axe brushed the branch of a nearby pine.

Lathan looked at it curiously, wondering how he hadn’t noticed it was so close. With a shrug, he shifted a step to the side and hoisted the axe once more.

A gust of wind hit him just as he began his swing, and the pine beside him swayed in the sudden breeze, and again his axe clipped through needled branches as it came forth, and before it could gain any momentum, it got hooked on one of those branches and held fast.

“What the-?” Lathan asked aloud as he turned to regard the tree.

Then the wind began to blow more furiously, and the pine danced as wildly as Lathan’s blond hair. Stubbornly he tugged at the axe, but the tree held it fast.

“No, you don’t!” he growled in defiance, and with a great tug, he tore the axe free. Before the wind could interfere again, he turned and swung at the elm.

But the tree was faster, bending low and to the side, sweeping past him with a great whoosh, and as Lathan tried to continue his swing, he found his legs pulled out from under him, throwing him facedown to the ground, the axe bouncing from his grasp. And still the tree wound back, pulling the caught Lathan with it, though he clawed desperately at the ground to stop his slide.

Finally he did stop, and he rolled, trying to free his foot.

The wind stopped as abruptly as it had come up, and that seemed a good thing to Lathan only as long as it took him to realize that he was caught in the branch of a rather tall pine tree that was bent low.

He managed to gasp before the rush of the tree’s return swing snatched him up and took his breath away, lifting him high and fast into the air, only to let him go at exactly the right moment.

Screaming, spinning, flailing wildly and helplessly, Lathan flew through the forest. Every instant, he cringed, thinking he was about to splatter against a tree or branch, but each time he somehow missed, as if the forest was getting out of his way.

On he flew, out of the forest, and below him, Roundabout looked up, mouth agape. Over the boat and the dock he went, out to the waters of Lac Dinneshere, where he landed with a great splash.

“Ashelia! Wizard!” Roundabout cried, sprinting to the boat to grab a rope or something to throw to the lad, who flailed in the water some thirty feet out from the dock.

The two came out of the cabin just as a second missile soared overhead, much higher and farther than Lathan. Easily a hundred feet out from the dock, the woodsman’s axe splashed into the waters of Lac Dinneshere.

Roundabout’s very first throw of the rope proved perfect, but still it took them some time to pull the shivering, terrified Lathan from the frigid water.

“Get him inside afore his toes fall off!” Ashelia instructed.

“Spragan! Where is Spragan?” Addadearber yelled at the wailing young man.

They hustled him off the dock, and before they even reached the cabin, Addadearber had his answer. Rushing out of the forest, crying and screaming, waving his arms as if a hive of bees was right behind him, came poor Spragan, his face all cut and bloody, his jacket shredded, one shoe missing. He fell to the ground, obviously not for the first time, and Roundabout ran to him.

Spragan screamed and tried to flee.

The ranger called out his name in comforting tones and tried to reach for him in an unthreatening manner, but Spragan howled all the louder, and thrashed as if fighting for his very life against a horde of demons. He tried to run away, but got his feet all tangled and fell down again.

Roundabout was on him in an instant, expertly tying him up in a paralyzing hold, one that put the ranger’s mouth near to Spragan’s ear, where he whispered reassurances.

But if the boy heard him, he didn’t show it, and just began wailing, “She’s going to eat me! She’s going to eat me!” over and over again.

Roundabout glanced at the dark forest, then set his feet under him and hauled himself and the boy up, keeping the lad’s arms fully locked all the way. With superior strength, he lifted Spragan right from the ground so that he couldn’t dig in his heels and get any leverage to tug free.

But by then, the boy had fallen limp anyway, sobbing quietly and whispering every so often that he didn’t want to die.

A short while later, Addadearber and Roundabout stood beside the cabin, staring into the forest. Behind them, the sun reached in long rays across Lac Dinneshere.

“I see more intrigue than trepidation on your face, wizard,” Roundabout remarked after a long silence.

“Magic,” the wizard answered. “Lots of it.”

“Felt it when we first got here,” the ranger agreed. “Do you know the name of this place?”

“Didn’t know it had a name.”

“Only the barbarian tribes know it,” Roundabout explained. “They named it Iruladoon long, long ago, before Ten-Towns, when the elves were thick in Icewind Dale.”

“I’ve not heard that word before.”

“Old Elvish word,” Roundabout explained. “It translates to ‘a place without time.’ I expect the barbarians thought it appropriate because the long-lived elves didn’t seem to age.”

“Spragan talked about a girl, a woman, in various stages of age all at once. Might it be that there’s more to the naming of Iruladoon than simpleton barbarians being confused by long-lived elves?”

“You want to find out, of course,” Roundabout remarked.

“I’ve devoted my whole life to the Art,” Addadearber replied. “It is my religion, my hope that there is something more beyond this pitiful, short existence we’re offered. And now I, like so many of my colleagues, have watched the collapse of all that we hold dear. I stand before a place of magic-that much is assured. Does it hold some answers? Some hope? I know not, but know that I am bound by my faith to find out.”

“The wood’s not wanting visitors,” Roundabout reminded him.

Addadearber nodded. “I have a spell that will allow me passage. I fear to use it, but I shall. And you, of course, believe that you can enter Iruladoon.”

Roundabout nodded, and with a grin to his companion, the ranger pulled up his hood.

“Should we wait until morning?” the wizard asked.

“I prefer the dark,” Roundabout replied with a wink of his blue eye.

The ranger moved to the trees at a careful pace. He paused for just a moment when he reached the tree line, then nodded and disappeared into the forest.

Addadearber cast a minor spell upon himself and squinted into the shadows, ensuring that his spell had worked to enhance his lowlight vision. Then he paused and prepared himself for the more potent, and thus, far more dangerous, dweomer. Not long ago, the enchantment had been a routine thing to powerful Addadearber, but since the advent of the Spellplague, he hadn’t dared attempt it. Reports from all over Faerun spoke of wizards permanently trapped inside one of their own spells, and Addadearber didn’t find that prospect particularly appealing.

But the forest beckoned him, the promise of revelation. He gave a short puff, blowing out all of his doubts, and immediately launched into casting. Arms waving, he chanted furiously, throwing all of his power into the dweomer, reminding himself of the potential consequences of failure.

He turned black head to toe. Not a darker hue, but absolute black, seeming almost dimensionless in his monotone color. Then he flattened, parchment thin, as the wraithform took full hold.

Addadearber didn’t breathe in his undead form, but if he did, he would be breathing easier, to be sure. Roundabout had gone into Iruladoon cautiously, but the wizard needed no such care. Not in that form, where he could slip silently and unnoticed from deepening shadow to deepening shadow.

As if carried on a stiff breeze, a parchment blowing in the wind, Addadearber soared up and between the lines of trees.

He sensed Roundabout as he glided past the creeping man, who stiffened and sniffed and glanced all around, but never caught on to Addadearber’s passing. With great speed, he managed the entire perimeter of Iruladoon before the onset of twilight, coming back to the same area where he had first entered the wood. Then he went in deeper, following no path but his own instincts, weaving silently and invisibly in the darkening night.

His eyes flashed as he crested one hill, for there, in the distance, he saw a campfire. As he neared it, he noted that it was on the edge of a small pond. Behind it and to the side, a circular door had been set against the face of an earthen mound-the type of house he had seen in halfling communities. And so he was not surprised when exactly that, a halfling with curly brown hair and a disarming, easy stride walked out from behind the house, a fishing pole over one shoulder and his other thumb hooked under one of the red suspenders that held up his breeches, which in turn held up his rather ample belly.

Addadearber held back and let the little one set the pole upon a forked stick he had set in the bank, though he didn’t bother to cast his line just then. He went back to his fire and assembled a tripod, upon which he hung a sizable pot. Then he went to the pond with a bucket. Apparently soup or stew was on the menu for that night.

Satisfied that there was nothing amiss about the place, and likely no one else about, the wizard closed his eyes and released his dweomer. He felt only a few short instances of tingling pain as his body expanded to its three-dimensional proportions.

He allowed himself a deep sigh of relief.

“You call this place home?” the wizard asked, startling the halfling.

The little one turned to regard the man with curiosity. “You shouldn’t be here,” he said, obvious alarm in his voice. “This is not your place.”

“But I am here, and I am not pleased.”

The halfling cocked his head, and if he was concerned by the wizard’s tone, he did not show it.

“Do you know who I am?”

The halfling shook his head.

“I am Addadearber of the Lightning!”

The halfling shrugged.

“I am the chief mage of Caer-Dineval, the mightiest wizard of Icewind Dale,” Addadearber declared.

That seemed to pique the little one’s interest, as his mouth formed the words “Icewind Dale” incredulously.

“The mightiest!” the impatient wizard reiterated.

The halfling wore a wry smile and glanced around. “I doubt that.”

“And that is why I am here. A couple of my friends were ill-treated by the forest you call home-or by some wizard within. They were expelled, brutally, and by magic.”

“They did not belong here.”

“You say that a lot.”

“For your own, and for their own, benefit,” the halfling explained. “This is not a place for visitors. You should leave.”

“Little one, do not anger me. You will not enjoy the spectacle of an angry Addadearber. I will leave when I decide …”

Before he could properly finish the thought, a large fish broke the water near the bank beside him and slapped its tail at just an angle to send a spray of water over him.

The wizard glared at the water, then at the halfling. “You did that!” he accused.

He got splashed again, then again.

“No,” the giggling halfling said. “They don’t answer to me. If they did, I wouldn’t need my pole.”

“You try my patience!” Addadearber said when he was splashed yet again. He took a deep breath and tried to calm himself. There were things here he wanted to learn about, and certainly not in an adversarial way.

“Who are you?” he asked, calm.

The halfling shrugged.

“How long have you lived in Iruladoon?”

“Iruladoon?”

“This place. How long?”

Again, the halfling shrugged. “Time has little meaning here. Months? Years? I don’t know.”

“And what do you do?”

“I fish. I sculpt-have you an interest in scrimshaw?” He turned and indicated the round door of his home.

The wizard got splashed again.

“And you instruct your forest to treat visitors in an ill manner,” Addadearber said. The halfling laughed at that, and as another wave of water sprayed Addadearber, the wizard pointed accusingly and stepped forward to warn, “Do not ever mock me!”

To his surprise, the little one didn’t shrink back in the least, but just stood there looking at him, curious, shaking his head. Normally when Addadearber voiced such a proclamation, mothers took their children off the streets and great warriors quivered, and that injustice, that little halfling looking at him with something akin to pity, was more than he could take.

“You insignificant ant! I could reduce you to ash with a mere thought!”

The halfling glanced to the side, to the waters of the lake, and sighed, and returned his gaze to Addadearber with a finger held up over pursed lips and a warning of, “Shh.”

“What?” Addadearber replied, then he, too, looked at the lake, and his eyes widened. There, just off shore, the water churned in a wide circle, silent at first but then growing strong enough so that waves cupped over and splashed around the growing whirlpool.

“You really should leave,” the halfling said.

“I came here to learn,” the wizard replied, trying hard to keep the rising fear out of his voice. “The world is troubled-magic is ill. My goddess has gone silent.”

“I know more about that than you ever will, I fear,” the halfling interrupted.

“Then you must tell me everything.”

“Go away. For your own sake, wizard, leave this place and do not return.”

“No!” Addadearber yelled above the rising tumult of the churning water. “Enough of your games and tricks! I will have my answers!”

He got one, then and there, as a sudden and unseen wind slammed him in the side, throwing his hat far and wide, and throwing him behind it, arms and legs flapping. He splashed hard against the side of the whirlpool and was swept up in its mighty current. Around and around he went, splashing futilely to try to get out of the vortex.

He called out to the halfling, who just stood there on the bank, thumbs hooked under his suspenders, a resigned and pitying look on his face.

Down went Addadearber, lower and lower against the unrelenting press of the water. Dizzy and disoriented, the strength leaving his arms, he could not resist, and was plunged under. He came up only once, sputtering a garbled curse at the halfling, then he disappeared.

The halfling sighed as the water flattened to a nearly dead calm once more, the placid trout pond looking as if nothing had happened.

Except for the hat. Out in the middle of the pond, the wizard’s floppy, conical hat bobbed on the few remaining ripples.

The halfling grabbed his fishing pole. He always prided himself on his ability to cast a line.

Roundabout crept through the trees, his appreciation for the strange forest growing with every step. He hadn’t been through Iruladoon for more than a year, and since then it had changed entirely. A year past it had been a cold pine forest trying to find root in the harsh environs of Icewind Dale, with sparse, seasonal underbrush and a short flowering season. But the forest had indeed changed. He could sense it. The vibrancy of life there could not be ignored; the colors, smells, and sounds filled the air with a sort of heartbeat, a sensation, a vibration or sound, under his feet, a cadence for the rhythms of nature. There was a uniquely divine energy to it, tingling all around him.

The sun disappeared in the west and the forest grew dark, but the half-elf didn’t fear the place. His hands did not slip near the hilts of his sheathed sword and dirk.

The heartbeat-music, in a sense-grew. Roundabout felt the power as if its source was approaching him.

“Where are you, wizard?” he whispered to the empty air.

The forest went preternaturally silent, and Roundabout held his breath.

And then he saw her, through the trees not far away, a woman in a white gown and with a black cloak, dancing carefree through the trees. Compelled, he followed, and he wound up lying on a mossy embankment beneath a stand of pines, staring out at a small meadow where the barefoot witch danced in starlight.

Roundabout lost his heart at that moment, for never had he seen any woman quite so beautiful and graceful. He couldn’t even blink, fearing to lose the image before him even momentarily. He wouldn’t let it go. He couldn’t let it go.

She danced and she twirled and she sang, and her voice was the song of Iruladoon.

She was the wizard who had enchanted the wood, Roundabout was certain.

Or the goddess … and that thought had the ranger holding his breath once more, had his hands trembling and sweating, and no one who knew Roundabout had ever seen him in such a state.

She stopped her dance and her song, and brushed her thick auburn hair back from in front of her face, revealing eyes so blue that even the night could not dull their inviting luster.

Roundabout shifted uncomfortably. He knew logically that she could not see him, and yet there was no doubt in his mind that she looked at him directly. He thought he should stand and introduce himself, and explain himself.

But he couldn’t move. His legs would not answer his call to stand. His mouth refused to form the words to call out to her.

She smiled and shook her head then spun into her dance again, twirling around and around, faster and faster, until she was but a blur of flowing robes. And from that she leaped, as if upon the starlight itself.

And she was gone.

Gone from the meadow, but not from the mind of Roundabout. He saw her still, he clutched the image. He never wanted to let it go. He never wanted to look at anything else ever again. Just her, forever her. In that dancing creature, that witch, or ghost, or goddess, Roundabout had witnessed the perfection of nature itself.

He managed to mouth the name “Mielikki,” and recognized, albeit briefly, that he wasn’t lying down any longer, but had regained his feet.

Then he saw her again, in his mind or in front of him-it mattered not-dancing under the stars.

Addadearber came up with a gasp and a wild splash, sucking in air. His lungs ached and he desperately gulped more air. It took him a long time to even hear Ashelia calling to him from the bank near the dock, only a few feet from him.

He managed to get there and crawl out of the lake, trembling with fear and shivering with cold.

“How in the Nine Hells …?” the woman asked.

Addadearber shook his head, considering the whirlpool and the tunnel of water that had flushed him from Iruladoon, right back into the small lagoon. It made no sense, even to a man who had flown in the empty air, who had turned enemies into frogs, and who created lightning and fire out of thin air.

“Well, what do ye know?” Ashelia asked, helping him from the water.

But Addadearber could only wag his head and sputter.

Almost at the same moment, Roundabout walked out of the forest, his step light, his eyes glassy, and he seemed not even to recognize them or notice any of his surroundings.

“Roundabout!” Ashelia called, and she let go of the wizard and ran to the ranger.

He looked at her as though unable to understand her alarm. Then he looked all around, at the cabin and the lake, at the dock and Larson’s Boneyard tied up against it. His face screwed up with puzzlement, and he shrugged.

“They attacked me!” Addadearber insisted, storming up to the pair. “I will burn that forest to the ground!

“If you raise a torch or a spell against it, I will kill you,” Roundabout replied, and both Ashelia and Addadearber gasped.

“Ranger!” the fisherwoman scolded.

“We have to leave this place,” Roundabout said, retracting not a bit of his threat.

“We’re sailing in the morning.”

“We’re sailing now,” the ranger corrected.

“We? I thought you were to remain on this bank,” Addadearber said with a sharp tone, obviously unhappy with the threat. “With your friends who haunt the forest, perhaps?”

“Shut up, wizard.” Roundabout turned to Ashelia. “To Lac Dinneshere, all of us, and now.”

“Spragan’s still stupid, and Lathan’s still hurting,” Ashelia argued.

“I will row or tack, then, and so will Addadearber.”

“You have grown quite bold,” the wizard warned.

But Roundabout only smiled, and glanced back at Iruladoon. He had seen her. The witch, the ghost, the goddess-with that celestial image still fresh in his mind, there was little the blustering Addadearber could say that could bother him.

Unless the wizard did indeed try to turn his anger, magic or mundane, at the forest.

Roundabout smiled, hardly believing his own heart, for he knew that in that instance, he truly would kill the man.

They put out from the dock soon after, all glad to be gone from the haunted forest.

All, except for Roundabout, who knew that he wasn’t really leaving, that he took a piece of Iruladoon with him, and would hold it forevermore.

For he would never allow himself to forget the dance of the goddess, and her ladder of starlight.