The Spectral Blaze

SEVEN

23-24 E LEASIS, THE Y EAR OF THE A GELESS O NE

Praxasalandos oozed through a seam in the rock. It was a perfect way to stalk his prey. He could pace the Imaskari and dragonborn almost step for step, and they never even suspected he was near.

He found a spot where a crack connected his secret path to the open cavern. It wasn’t much of an opening, but it provided enough room for him to form an eye out of the liquid metal that was his body.

The intruders were still resting-in many cases, sleeping-and showed no signs of moving on in the immediate future. It made sense that they were tired. They’d marched a long way, sometimes taking the wrong tunnel and needing to double back despite the dwarf’s skill as a pathfinder. They’d also fought a pack of cave drakes that Praxasalandos had sent to hinder them.

The difference between the scene from before and what Praxasalandos looked at was that the dragonborn called Medrash was up and prowling around. Somewhat to his dismay, Praxasalandos had discovered that the explorers had a fair assortment of formidable individuals among them, but nonetheless, Medrash, his kinsman Balasar, and Khouryn, the dwarf, stood out from the rest. They were natural leaders in a way that transcended rank, although they possessed that too. Eliminate even one of them, and it would weaken the expedition significantly.

So that was what Praxasalandos intended to do.

He dissolved the eye before anyone noticed it then, guided by a kind of tactile instinct as reliable as sight, streamed back the way he’d come. He seeped out of the granite in a tunnel that connected to the area he’d just surveyed but beyond a dogleg, where none of his prey could see him.

There he compressed his mass as he solidified it and simultaneously sculpted it into an unaccustomed shape. The process was more difficult than assuming his natural form, but not much, not for a dragon possessed of his breed’s singular gifts.

When he was done, he peeked around the bend. There was an Imaskari sentry stationed there, but the human with his pale, mottled skin couldn’t see him hiding in the dark.

Praxasalandos kept peering out at intervals until finally Medrash was in view. Then he undertook the final and most difficult detail of his masquerade: putting a glowing lantern in his hand. Because obviously the real Balasar wouldn’t have wandered away from his comrades without a source of light.

It took a couple of heartbeats, long enough for Praxasalandos to feel a pang of doubt.

What was he doing? Why was he setting snares for folk who’d never done him any harm, especially when, judging from their standards and insignia, some of them worshiped Bahamut? Why was he serving Gestanius, a despicable creature that, by rights, any self-respecting metallic should oppose?

But of course, the answer was obvious: the game.

At certain moments, Praxasalandos regretted that he’d ever accepted the invitation to visit Brimstone on Dracowyr. But like most quicksilver dragons, he was curious; how could he pass up an opportunity to meet a creature who, though an undead horror, was also one of the saviors of their entire race?

And from the moment the vampire explained xorvintaal in all its intricate glory, there was no turning back. Praxasalandos had no interest in building a new Draconic Age, the alleged ultimate purpose for the contest. But the play itself was fascinating in its complexity, uniquely suited to divert a dragon’s deep and subtle mind not just for a month or a year, but down the long centuries of his near immortality. A wyrm could no more withstand its allure than he could resist the desire to amass precious objects into a hoard.

And once Praxasalandos opted in, he had to address the fact that, although powerful by ordinary standards, he lacked the resources to play in the same style as the most notorious wyrms of the East. If he wanted to fare well in the opening stages, his best chance was to ally himself with one of them. And Gestanius, who laired in the same mountains as he did, seemed a sensible albeit unsavory choice.

Medrash’s voice sounded down the tunnel. “Is there light shining around the corner?”

Praxasalandos decided that the lantern with its spot of phosphorescence had fully defined itself. He stepped around the turn, beckoned urgently for Medrash to come forward, then retreated out of sight.

“Balasar?” Medrash called.

Praxasalandos didn’t answer. He held his breath as he waited to see if the dragonborn would take the bait.

It was by no means a certainty. If Medrash doubted what his eyes had told him, he might retrace his own steps far enough to see that the real Balasar was still asleep. Or his voice might wake the real one, who would then presumably answer.

But when Praxasalandos heard the scuff of approaching footsteps and caught a whiff of Medrash’s scent, he knew the trick had worked.

He melted and poured himself back inside the rock. Then he flowed to the arch that linked the passage with the chamber the dragonborn and Imaskari currently occupied. There, by the pressure of thought alone, he started activating the runes that Gestanius had long ago concealed inside the granite.

Khouryn woke to a shiver in the stone beneath him. Or at least, he thought he had. No one else had woken up, and no one who’d already been awake looked alarmed. His surroundings were steady.

Steady but wrong. A dwarf could feel it in his bones, even if the Imaskari with their claims to knowledge of the subterranean world couldn’t.

He looked around again. There were three corridors leading out of the cavern, and the sentry stationed at one of them was looking down it intently, apparently because there was something to see.

Khouryn considered pulling on the mail the Daardendriens’ armorer had made for him and decided not to take the time. He grabbed his new axe and headed for the Imaskari warrior.

By the time he reached the soldier, he knew he’d been right to hurry. The granite beyond the arch looked solid. It wasn’t shaking in any visible or audible way. But if felt precarious, like a child’s blocks piled in such an unstable fashion that the arrangement fairly screamed of imminent collapse. A couple of minute particles of rock dust drifted down from the ceiling.

That, however, was clearly not why the human was peering into the shadows and at the white light gleaming from around the bend. If he understood what was actually happening, he’d likely be yelling his head off, not that that was a good idea under the circumstances.

“What are you looking at?” Khouryn snapped. “What is that light?”

“I saw Balasar,” the human said haltingly. Mistrusted by most of their neighbors, the Imaskari were perforce a somewhat insular folk, and apparently the sentry wasn’t entirely fluent in the Common tongue that enabled Faerun’s many races and cultures to communicate one with the next.

Impatience ratcheted Khouryn’s nerves a notch tighter. “Balasar’s down there?” Could that be right? Hadn’t Khouryn just passed his friend on the way over?

“Medrash… followed,” the soldier said. “Light is from lantern and sword.”

“Herd everyone away from this passage,” Khouryn said, “quickly. But don’t shout. Understand me?”

The sentry’s eyes opened wide. “Yes!”

Khouryn trotted down the passage, and a perceptible tremor ran through the rock beneath his feet. More grit fell. With a tiny crunching sound, a hairline crack snaked through the wall on his left.

He rounded the bend. Peering about in seeming perplexity, Medrash was a few paces farther along. As the sentry had indicated, he’d set the blade of his broadsword aglow with silvery light to serve as a lamp.

“Get back here!” Khouryn said. “Now!”

Startled, Medrash jerked around. “Balasar-”

“Was never here,” Khouryn said. “This is a trap. Come on!”

Medrash ran toward him. Khouryn wheeled and sprinted but stopped when he turned the corner again.

The tunnel in front of him was vibrating. Enough grit was drifting down that not even a human could miss it. The granite rumbled softly but continuously.

Medrash rounded the dogleg and bumped into him from behind. “Keep going!” the dragonborn said.

“No,” Khouryn said. “We won’t make it. Back the other way!”

Medrash looked as if he wanted to argue, to protest that their comrades were just a few strides and a few moments away, but then he scowled and did as he’d been told.

The ceiling fell with a deafening crash and raised a blinding, choking cloud of dust. The jolt threw Khouryn off his feet. Coughing, eyes stinging, he looked around and could just make out the smudge of glow surrounding Medrash’s blade.

He drew himself to his feet and headed in that direction. Medrash met him halfway.

“Are you all right?” the dragonborn asked.

“Fine.” Noticing that the dust was settling, Khouryn turned, wiped his teary eyes, and inspected the mass of broken stone clogging the passage. For all their frantic haste, he and Medrash had just barely outdistanced the collapse, which meant the passage was blocked for twenty paces at least. “Well, we’re not going back that way.” A spasm of irritation twisted his guts. “Curse it, you’re not a dwarf. I don’t care what you think you see. Never walk down one of these tunnels by yourself.”

“I apologize,” Medrash said.

Khouryn sighed. “Forget it. Anyone can fall victim to a trick, especially a magical one.”

“And it seems that is what happened.” Medrash took another look at the rock fall. “Which reminds me that Biri and several of the Imaskari have magic of their own. If they work together, perhaps they can reach us.”

“Don’t count on it,” Khouryn said.

“Because the blockage is too big?”

“Partly. Also, remember that we don’t know how far the collapse extended, so we don’t actually even know that our comrades are all right. As they don’t know that we are.”

Medrash smiled grimly. “You’re saying we should plan on saving ourselves.”

“Pretty much.”

“Can we?”

“If this tunnel goes somewhere. I’m hoping it hooks back around and links up with the route our company is taking. It looks like it could, but there’s only one way to find out.”

“Then lead on,” Medrash said.

Khouryn did, meanwhile peering for signs of danger ahead. But he nearly missed, or at least disregarded, the line of silvery glimmer in the granite right beside him. Then, however, he realized what it was: the quicksilver dragon lurking behind another crack.

“Watch out!” Khouryn shouted. He stepped back and readied his axe. Two warriors against a dragon was rotten odds. But if he and Medrash both struck in the instant when the quicksilver wyrm became solid but before it could make an attack, they might have some kind of chance.

“I see it,” Medrash said. He raised his sword, cried the name of his god, and the glow of the blade burned so brightly that Khouryn flinched away. Then the paladin thrust at the fissure. It was a fast, hard action, but even though the crack was so narrow that Khouryn wasn’t sure the blade would even fit, it stabbed in cleanly, with nary a scrape of steel on stone.

Quicksilver churned and separated into separate droplets around the burning sword. Then it streamed away from the weapon and out of sight.

Medrash slid the sword back out much more slowly than he’d driven it in. Without the god’s power augmenting his skills, he was leery of dulling the blade. “I didn’t kill it,” he said.

“I figured,” Khouryn said. “But you ran it off, and I really didn’t want to fight it this very instant. So, well done.”

Medrash kept peering at the crack. “Up this close, I thought I sensed something.”

“What?”

“I’m not sure. A vileness.”

Khouryn snorted. “I didn’t have to be a paladin to pick up on that.”

As she entered the Green Hall, Jhesrhi looked around at the assembly and decided that a fair number of people had come to dread being summoned into the royal presence just about as much as she had.

Of course, not every face betrayed such feelings. Halonya was smirking like the half-demented thing she was. Lord Luthen and other peers who had thus far received only friendship and preferential treatment from the Red Dragon looked smug and self-satisfied. Zan-akar Zeraez kept his purple, silver-etched features composed into a mask of wise and sober courtesy.

Still, some courtiers, men who’d been stripped of property or offices merely on Tchazzar’s whim or been commanded to send their wives or daughters to his chambers, glowered and sulked. Daelric and some of the other high priests stood in a huddle, muttering together.

But only Shala kept scowling when the Red Dragon actually strode into the room, although some others couldn’t resist the impulse to wince or gasp.

That was because Tchazzar had blood spattered all over the front of him, from his long, handsome face all the way down to his pointed shoes, soaking his vermilion-and-black silk and velvet garments and dulling the glitter of his diamond buttons. Jhesrhi suspected that he’d been taking a personal hand in punishing supposed miscreants in the dungeons, although that was by no means a certainty. He’d proved himself capable of committing mayhem anywhere and anytime something angered him.

Everyone bowed or curtsied as, seemingly oblivious to his bizarre and disquieting dishevelment, Tchazzar mounted the dais and flopped down on the throne, immediately fouling the gold and sea green cushions with smears of blood. “Rise,” he said, and Jhesrhi noticed that he had significantly more gore on his mouth than the rest of his face. It even stained his teeth.

“Well,” Tchazzar continued, surveying them all, “here we are again, facing the same annoying paradox. With a god to rule it, Chessenta is blessed beyond all other realms. Yet no monarch could find himself more beset by malcontents. Why is that?”

After a moment, Jhesrhi decided it wasn’t just a rhetorical question. He was actually waiting for an answer. But no one knew what to say, or else those who did feared to draw the dragon’s attention to themselves.

Finally, looking like an overfed canary in his yellow vestments, Daelric cleared his throat and said, “Majesty, the brightest light casts the deepest shadows. When one studies the Keeper’s sacred texts-”

“Fire and blood!” Tchazzar screamed. “Did you think I was asking for platitudes? Not one word more! Or you can try studying the sacred texts without eyes and prattling about what you find there without a tongue!”

Daelric’s round, ruddy face turned a shade paler. He bowed and stepped back among his fellow clerics, who in some cases edged away from him as though Tchazzar’s displeasure were contagious.

Jhesrhi supposed that if anyone could calm the dragon, or at least encourage him to get to the point, it would be either Halonya or herself. And for once, the prophetess didn’t appear on the quivering verge of blurting something out. Although she did appear to be trying to maintain a grave expression to mask an underlying eagerness.

So Jhesrhi guessed it was up to her. “Majesty,” she said, “I ask you to remember that others don’t see as far or clearly as you.” As usual, she felt awkward and a little dirty concocting the kind of fulsome, roundabout speech such moments required. “But if you tell us what’s angered you, maybe we can help to find a remedy.”

Tchazzar shocked her by baring his pinkish teeth in a sneer. “Do you truly not know, my lady?”

Jhesrhi took a breath. She wanted to be sure her voice remained steady. “No, Majesty, I don’t.”

“Yet I’m sure you know how the storm damaged the supply cache.”

“Of course. But I don’t understand how that piece of bad luck connects to talk of treason.”

“Liar!” Halonya shrieked, reverting to form.

Flame rippled up Jhesrhi’s staff, and judging that it was better to look angry than scared, she let it burn as it would. “Majesty, I can’t tell you how sick I am of having this harpy fly at me with one false accusation after another.”

“I’m sure,” Tchazzar said. “I was tired of it myself because you convinced me she was mistaken. But you know how to command the spirits of the air, and it was a great wind that ruined the supplies.”

“Great winds have been known to blow of their own accord in the middle of great storms,” Jhesrhi said, doing her best to sound scornful. “Is that all there is to the charge against me? That, and Halonya’s spite?” If so, then maybe it wouldn’t be so bad.

But the Red Dragon said, “No, milady. Actually, there is a little more. You see, much as I resisted them, I’d already begun to have doubts about you. You’d… disappointed me in certain respects. And when I shared those doubts, the wyrmlady convinced me to set a spirit to spy on you. If it reported you were behaving as you ought, as I profoundly hoped you were, that would ease my mind. And if it reported something else, well…” He shrugged.

Inwardly Jhesrhi cursed herself for not fleeing as soon as she killed the spined devil. “And what has your spy reported?” she asked.

“Nothing,” Tchazzar said. “It didn’t keep its rendezvous with the wyrmkeeper who called it out of the Hells.”

“Then we’re back where we started,” Jhesrhi said. “There’s not a particle of evidence against me, just a jealous snake dribbling venom in your ear.”

“The fiend was invisible,” Halonya said. “It would take someone with knowledge of the wicked arts to detect and kill it.”

“Not if it simply slipped its leash and went home,” Jhesrhi said. “Those of us ‘with knowledge of the wicked arts’ understand that happens from time to time. Majesty, I’ll point out again that there isn’t a trace of proof to support these slanders, and then I’ll entrust myself to your sense of justice.”

“Actually,” Tchazzar said, “there might be a smidge of evidence. Hold up the item for everyone to see.”

One of the wyrmkeepers in Halonya’s entourage stepped forward, shook out a piece of gray cloth, and raised it high. Jhesrhi felt a jolt of alarm as she recognized the cloak she’d worn the night she destroyed the spinagon. Someone had evidently searched her quarters and found the garment where she’d tucked it away in the bottom of a trunk.

“It is yours, isn’t it?” Tchazzar asked. “I believe I saw you wear it shortly after we met.”

Jhesrhi wouldn’t deny it, then, not in so many words. “It does look like mine, Majesty. But so what?”

“The creature sent to watch you was a spinagon. If it threw its quills at someone wearing this garment, they would have left holes with burned edges in the wool.” Tchazzar looked at the dragon priest. “Stick your fingers through so people can see where they are.”

Jhesrhi forced a smile. “If there’s one thing Your Majesty knows about me, it’s that I often conjure fire.”

“But I’ve never seen it burn your clothes.”

“I wasn’t always as good at my craft as I am now.”

“That makes some sense. It would make more if I’d noticed the holes before. Or if the cape hadn’t still been damp when Halonya’s man found it, like you’d recently worn it out in the rain.”

Jhesrhi’s heart was pounding so hard that she feared Tchazzar’s keen draconic ears would hear and that the sound would agitate him further. “Majesty, you’re shrewd enough to understand that the appearance of guilt can be manufactured.”

“That argument is starting to appear as threadbare as the cloak.”

“Majesty, I’m the one who-” She remembered that he didn’t want to be reminded, even obliquely, that he’d twice needed her to save him. “I mean… I know how I’ve ‘disappointed’ you. I’ve disappointed myself too. You can’t imagine how much I wish we were… further along. But still, you know I’ve given you more than I could ever give to any other. You know that if you’ll just be patient, our time will come.”

“Slut!” Halonya shrilled. “When her lying tongue fails, she dangles her body in front of you!”

“Yes,” Tchazzar said, “I’m afraid that is what she’s doing.” Tears started from his slanted, golden eyes and cut channels in the gore on his face. To Jhesrhi, the sudden display of unabashed misery was even more frightening than his naked anger or the smug way in which he’d toyed with her and watched her squirm.

“And how can you deceive and torture me,” Tchazzar continued, “when you know I love you? When I gave you everything! When you were one of the only two people I trusted! I should kill you!” He twisted to glare at Hasos. “And the false knight who vouched for you!” His gaze jumped to Nicos Corynian. “And the treacherous counselor who brought you to Chessenta in the first place.”

Tchazzar sprang up from the throne. “I should clean out this whole corrupt, ungrateful court and start fresh!” he shouted. “Finish the liberation of Chessenta by wiping out the cruel, greedy dastards who oppress it from within! The people will sing me hymns of praise! They’ll laugh and pelt you with stones and dung as you crawl naked and bleeding to the gallows! They’ll-”

“Oh, for the love of all the gods,” Shala said.

Tchazzar gaped at her, for the moment at least, seemingly less furious than dumbfounded that anyone had dared to interrupt.

“And lest there be any doubt,” the former war hero continued, “I was referring to the real gods. I’m willing to stick up for them even if these cowards won’t.” She indicated the high priests with a contemptuous flick of her hand.

“You’ve gone mad,” Tchazzar said.

Shala sneered. “Coming from you, that’s comical. No, Majesty, I’m not insane. I’m just bored with your tantrums. Will it bring this one to an early end if I confess that I killed the spina-whatever-it-was?”

“You couldn’t have!” Halonya said.

“Don’t be stupid,” Shala said. “I’ve killed far more dangerous creatures in my time. You were there for some of it. On this occasion, I was inspecting the battlements. I noticed the fiend wandering around, and it attacked me. So I disposed of it.”

“And then didn’t bother telling anyone?” asked Zan-akar Zeraez.

“To be honest, my lord,” Shala answered, “it didn’t occur to me that the brute was lurking there to watch Lady Jhesrhi’s apartments from above. I thought it was there to spy on me or maybe even kill me. I figured the wyrmkeepers had summoned it on His Majesty’s or Lady Halonya’s orders. So you can see why I didn’t think I could do myself any good by reporting what had happened.”

“But you’re not a sorcerer or a priest!” Halonya snarled. “You couldn’t have seen an invisible devil.”

Shala snorted. “I evidently know more about the supernatural than you do, prophetess, not that that comes as any great surprise. There are talismans that confer magical abilities even on thoroughly mundane people like me. Here, let me show you.”

Moving without any particular haste, Shala opened the pouch on her belt and brought out a ball the size of her fist. The object was so black that it scarcely looked solid or even three dimensional. It was more like a hole punched in the substance of the world. She tossed it into the air, and, floating, it started circling her body in a lazy sort of way. People exclaimed in surprise.

“The Crown Jewel of Chessenta,” she said.

“Then it’s mine,” Tchazzar said.

Shala shrugged. “I admit I was surprised that you never asked me to hand it over. For after all, you’re supposed to be a god. I figured that if that were true, you must know of it, even though it didn’t come into existence until after you disappeared. I assumed you meant for me to keep it as my family always has.”

“You were mistaken,” the dragon said.

Meanwhile, Jhesrhi watched the confrontation in an agony of guilt and indecision.

She understood why Shala was claiming that she’d killed the spined devil. The warrior had decided it was only a matter of time before Tchazzar turned on her in any case, so she was willing to endanger herself to protect the one person at court who could sometimes persuade the dragon to behave sanely and humanely and who was secretly working to forestall the coming war.

Jhesrhi couldn’t refute that bleak logic, but she was loath to let others risk themselves on her behalf. Hasos had gotten away with it, but he hadn’t spoken defiantly or disrespectfully. Shala had, to say the least.

Jhesrhi didn’t know how to intervene, but she meant to try. She took a breath and drew herself up straight. Apparently glimpsing the change in her posture from the corner of her eye, Shala shot her a quick but ferocious glare that froze the half-formed words inside her.

“Well, I think I deserve to keep it,” the warrior replied to Tchazzar. “You ousted me from the throne. You forced me to break Ishual Karanok’s sword. The jewel can be my recompense.”

“Give it to me now,” Tchazzar groweled.

“If you insist,” Shala said. And the black sphere hurtled straight at Tchazzar’s head.

Halonya screamed. Tchazzar leaped aside, and the jewel missed. As it started to turn, presumably to make a second pass at him, he leaped off the dais and charged Shala.

Retreating, she reached into her sleeve and snatched out the throwing knife she’d kept hidden there. Darkness rippled inside the steel, a telltale sign of the death magic that Jhesrhi also felt like a pang of headache. Shala lifted the flat, leaf-shaped blade for a cast.

Tchazzar spat fire. It was a puny flare compared to the mighty blasts he spewed in wyrm form, but it caught Shala in the face and she reeled. The dagger tumbled from her hand. The jewel slowed down, curved away from Tchazzar, and drifted back in her general direction.

The living god closed with Shala and backhanded her across her square, blistered face. Her knees buckled and he caught her by the forearms with red-scaled fingers. His claws pierced her clothing and the flesh beneath. He opened a mouth full of fangs and cocked his head to rip the side of her neck.

“Are you sure?” Jhesrhi called.

Tchazzar looked around. “What?” he snapped.

“I just thought, what you’re about to do would be very quick, wouldn’t it?”

The dragon took a breath. “You have a point.” He flung Shala to the floor, grabbed the black gem out of the air, and stared at it until it stopped trying to float back out of his grip. Then he glowered at the nearest guards. “You! You were apparently asleep when the bitch tried to kill me. Have you awakened sufficiently to take her to the dungeons?”

As the soldiers dragged Shala away, Jhesrhi couldn’t judge whether she’d done a good thing or a bad one. Maybe all she’d accomplished was to consign her rescuer to a long, excruciating death by torture, for surely Tchazzar had taken measures to ensure that no one would liberate a second prisoner from his cellars. Yet she couldn’t have stood idly by and watched an ally be slaughtered.

For the moment, she decided, all she could do was make sure that Shala’s act of self-sacrifice didn’t go in vain. And deliberate self-sacrifice it had surely been. The soldier couldn’t possibly have believed that the gem and the knife, potent weapons though they were, would prove capable of slaying the Red Dragon.

Tchazzar started pacing around the chamber, peering into one face after another. Looking for signs of disloyalty, no doubt. Fearful of the potential consequences of cringing, people met his gaze as best they could.

Jhesrhi put on a mournful expression. “Majesty,” she said.

Tchazzar turned. His teeth looked human again. His fingers showed only a hint of scales, and his nails were only a trifle long. Jhesrhi supposed that was something. “Yes?” he asked in a gentler tone than she’d previously heard from him that day.

“May I have your permission to depart?” she asked. “I can be gone by sunset. It goes without saying that I won’t carry away any of the gifts you gave me, so I won’t need long to pack.”

Tchazzar blinked. “What?”

“I assume Shala Karanok’s actions have exonerated me. Still, I have disappointed you, and you don’t trust me. So it would be wrong and selfish for me to stay. You need deputies you know to be dependable and true, especially on the eve of war.”

He looked back at her in silence for a moment. Her heart sank as she decided that her instincts had failed her. She shouldn’t have pushed and obliged him to make a choice that very instant.

But then he strode to her. Up close, he smelled of the blood that covered him, and of smoke and burning too. “No,” he said, “no, no, no. You don’t have my permission to depart. What you have is my heartfelt apology. Obviously Shala was our traitor all along, not you, never you.” He grinned. “Fortunately when a woman tries to assassinate you in open court, it pretty much answers any lingering questions concerning her true allegiance.”

“No!” Halonya wailed.

Tchazzar sighed and turned in her direction. “My dear, stubborn daughter-”

“Think about it!” Halonya jabbered, scurrying closer, her gaudy, voluminous vestments flapping and her amulets and necklaces swinging and clinking together. “The witch still had the wet cloak hidden in her quarters! It has to mean something!”

“Why?” Tchazzar asked.

Jhesrhi could have laid out that particular chain of reasoning for him. But although Halonya apparently had a sense of it, she seemed unable to articulate it. “Because!” she sputtered.

Stiff with reluctance, Jhesrhi lowered herself to her knees in front of Halonya. She bowed her head like a humble petitioner awaiting permission to kiss the bejeweled, curling toe of the other woman’s slipper.

“High Lady,” she said, “I beg your forgiveness. For whatever it was I did that first turned you against me, and for every unkind word I’ve spoken since. I know you’re wise and good, and that your person is sacred. I know our god wishes us to be friends. Yet it’s been hard for me to let go of my ill will. Maybe I’m the one who’s jealous.”

Halonya gaped down at her. Never in a dozen lifetimes would she have expected this, which was part of the point.

Tchazzar smiled at Halonya. “My lady?” he said.

Though still trembling with frustration, the priestess was prudent enough to give the living god what he manifestly wanted. She drew a hissing breath and, in a half-strangled voice, said, “Of course I forgive you, Jhesrhi. Sister. All I ever wanted was to be sure you were loyal to our master.”

Tchazzar released the gem, and it started to float and circle him as it had Shala. Then, either forgetting or not caring that Jhesrhi found it difficult to be touched, he took hold of her with his bloody hand and lifted her to her feet.

Then he wrapped one arm around her, the other around Halonya, and drew them both against him. “At last!” he said. “At last.”

Jhesrhi’s stomach churned. She felt as if she had to shove him away or puke, and strained to keep from doing either.

Meanwhile, Halonya gave her a glare that promised their feud wasn’t over.

Jhesrhi had already been sure of that, just as she knew there were a dozen other ways the conspiracy could unravel. And it almost certainly would if it had to continue much longer.

Gaedynn, she thought, Aoth, Khouryn, where are you?

Balasar watched Nellis set up a wooden tripod. The telescoping legs had runes carved into them and, at the point where they met, supported a leather bowl.

Slowly, with a sort of exaggerated, ceremonial care, the Imaskari ambassador set his crystal orb in the socket. Then he paced around the tripod widdershins, shifting his hands into a new position then freezing and crooning one line of an incantation with every step.

Nearby, Jemleh used his cane to draw a curve of silvery glimmer in the air. He sketched an oval, and once it was complete, more shimmer flowed inward from the edges, until it looked like a hanging mirror.

Biri opened her waterskin and spilled a dash of water on the cavern floor. Whispering, she swept her wand of congealed cloudstuff through vertical strokes that made it appear she was encouraging the liquid to rise up. Eventually it turned to mist and did precisely that. Vague shapes formed and dissolved within the swirls of vapor.

When their preparations were complete, each wizard peered and muttered at his or her own preferred mode of scrying until Balasar felt like he was going to explode with impatience. Finally Jemleh turned and said, “I’m sorry, dragonborn. Divination still isn’t working. I’m almost certain Gestanius laid down enchantments to block it.”

Nellis lifted the orb from its bowl. “I agree.”

“Me too,” Biri said. Her miniature cloud drifted apart and disappeared.

Balasar scowled. “All right. We can’t see them, but that doesn’t mean we can’t reach them. We know more or less where they were when the ceiling fell.”

“Unfortunately,” said Jemleh, “ ‘more or less’ isn’t good enough when a wizard is shifting himself through space. Either the magic won’t work at all or it’s likely to stick whoever attempts it inside solid rock.”

“Then we’ll have to tunnel,” Balasar said. “I assume you have spells that can move a lot of stone quickly.”

“To an extent,” Jemleh said. “Again, it would be helpful if we knew exactly in which direction to dig. We would also need to proceed carefully enough to prevent another collapse. But that’s what we’ll do if you so direct. This is ultimately your expedition. The empress ordered me and my people to assist Sir Medrash, Sir Khouryn, and you.”

Balasar grunted. “Medrash is the leader. That’s why we need to get him back.”

“Can we talk alone for a moment?” Biri asked.

“If you want to,” Balasar said.

They moved off several paces, in the general direction of Jemleh’s floating mirror until the gleaming oval crumpled in on itself and flickered out of existence.

“I know you refuse to believe Medrash and Khouryn are dead,” Biri murmured, “and I’m with you. I refuse to believe it too.”

“Good.”

“But we’re running a race,” she continued. “We’re trying to kill Gestanius in time to prevent a war Tymanther can’t win. You should ask yourself what Medrash would want us to do.”

“Curse it, he’s my clan brother and my best friend! I can’t just abandon him… or Khouryn either.”

“We just have to hope that the branching passage goes somewhere. If it does, Khouryn will find a way out.”

“You’re assuming he and Medrash can fend off the quicksilver dragon and its servant creatures all by themselves.”

“If any two warriors can do it, they can.”

“You’re also assuming that the rest of us can keep to the right path without a dwarf to guide us.”

“You said yourself that there’s some reason to think these Imaskari know their way around underground. And I’ve seen signs of it myself. They’re not Khouryn but they’re not useless either.”

Balasar closed his eyes and took a long breath. Then he turned back toward Jemleh and Nellis. “Change of plans,” he said.

Peering from behind a gnarled little pine tree, Gaedynn watched the shadowy figure sitting atop a granite outcropping. He saw better at night than most humans-or else practice had made him better at spotting and interpreting what could be seen-but still, it wasn’t the first time he’d wished for eyes that defied the dark like Khouryn’s or, better yet, Aoth’s. Or on further consideration, maybe not. That weird, blue glow would mar his good looks.

He covered a yawn. Staying awake for his own watches and somebody else’s too was starting to wear on him. But it had to be done, especially since he hadn’t yet taken Aoth into his confidence. He wasn’t sure why, except that the particular problem just felt like his conundrum to solve.

The shadow rose and disappeared down the other side of her perch.

A surge of excitement washed Gaedynn’s sleepiness away. He rounded the pine and scrambled up the outcropping. There was no path on that side of the rock, and under duress, he might have admitted that he wasn’t quite as expert at creeping around in the mountains as he was at sneaking through a forest. Still, he fancied that he made it to the top of the stone with a minimum of noise.

He moved more quietly still when he set his feet on the path Son-liin had taken. He figured he needed to. He drew an arrow from his quiver and laid it on his bow.

The person awaiting Son-liin was doing so at a spot where the narrow, twisting trail widened out into a relatively broad and level place. The mountain walled in the site on three sides and dropped away in a sheer cliff on the other.

The place was far enough from camp that no one there would see or hear the pair. Gaedynn was glad they wouldn’t feel a need to whisper. He wouldn’t have to sneak so close to eavesdrop.

The scrawny genasi slouching in the shadows had round, slumping shoulders. The pale blue glimmer playing along the lines on his face and hands indicated that he was a windsoul. Gaedynn was fairly sure the fellow was Yemere but wasn’t certain until he heard his voice.

“Well,” the noble said, “thanks to that wretched medusa and his map, we got here faster and with fewer losses than I wanted.”

Son-liin didn’t answer. Gaedynn wasn’t surprised. He was no sorcerer, but since the day his father handed him over to the elves, he’d seen more than enough magic to guess the young stormsoul might be sleepwalking or in some comparable state.

“But everything can still work out,” Yemere continued. “I’m going to warn Vairshekellabex that we’re coming. You’re going to do your best to convince everyone to approach his lair via the north trail, and when the ambush begins, you’ll start shooting firestormers. I won’t score as many points as I would have if I’d destroyed the expedition all by myself, but I’ll still do all right.”

Inwardly Gaedynn spit the foulest obscenity in his considerable repertoire because Yemere was obviously talking about playing xorvintaal. That meant he was a dragon wearing human form, like Tchazzar, and a challenging foe for Gaedynn to tackle alone, to say the least.

But he had to. If he slipped away to get help, Yemere might be gone by the time he came back.

He switched his arrow for one of the few remaining enchanted ones, stepped into the open, aimed, and loosed.

Evidently glimpsing his attacker from the corner of his eye, Yemere started to pivot. Then the shaft plunged into his chest. Gaedynn wasn’t sure he’d hit the heart, but if not, he’d at least pierced a lung.

Yemere fell back against the curved stone wall. At the same instant, black spikes that looked like thorns stabbed up through his skin. The effect started around the arrow and moved outward, down the wyrm’s limbs and up into his head. It was as if brambles were growing and snaking their way through his flesh.

He thrashed for a moment, then sprawled motionless. Gaedynn stayed put and shot several more arrows into what he hoped was a corpse. Son-liin simply stood and looked down at Yemere as though awaiting further instructions.

Then Yemere began to grow.

In fact, it was a flailing explosion of growth, as hammering wings and a lashing tail burst into being and everything else thickened and lengthened. Gaedynn reached for another enchanted arrow, then registered how Son-liin was still standing motionless right next to the transformation. Yemere’s convulsions were likely to smash her flat or swat her off the cliff without the wyrm’s even intending it.

Gaedynn ran to the stormsoul, grabbed her, and dragged her backward. “Wake up!” he shouted. He didn’t really expect it to do any good, and it didn’t seem to.

As he hauled her to safety, Yemere completed his metamorphosis. In his natural form, the dragon had phosphorescent blue eyes and gray scales that glinted in the moonlight. The spines that grew under the lower jaw and behind the head somewhat resembled a beard and hair. Gaedynn was relieved to see that at least the creature hadn’t shed his wounds by altering his shape. The arrows still hung from his body, and the thorns still jabbed out of his skin, although they looked considerably smaller since Yemere was so much bigger.

“Kill him,” the dragon snarled.

Son-liin wrenched herself out of Gaedynn’s grip, snatched her knife from its sheath, and stabbed at his belly. Caught by surprise, he still managed to twist. He didn’t avoid the thrust entirely, but since it didn’t catch him squarely, the blade skated along the reinforced leather of his brigandine.

He drove a punch into Son-liin’s jaw. As she staggered and fell, Yemere opened his jaws.

Gaedynn leaped aside. The dragon’s breath weapon pounded the spot his target had just vacated like a huge, invisible club, denting the hard-packed earth.

Then Yemere seemed to surge forward. Gaedynn knew-or a part of him did-that the wyrm hadn’t actually changed position. But suddenly his long face-specifically, the slanted, glowing eyes-appeared so close that they were all he could really see, or at least, all that he could focus on. The world seemed to tilt and turn as vertigo assailed him.

“Corellon!” he gasped.

He was no mystic, and no downpour of divine power answered his call. But perhaps the name of the Great Protector helped him focus his will. In any case, the ground settled beneath his feet, and he wrenched his eyes away from the dragon’s stare.

Yemere roared and rushed forward. He came fast but hobbled nonetheless, his wounds clearly paining him. And scurrying backward, Gaedynn managed to keep ahead of him.

Perhaps deciding that, in his current condition, he was no quicker or more agile than his foe, Yemere stopped where Son-liin still lay stunned. He poised a clawed forefoot over her body. “Surrender,” he said, “or I’ll crush her.”

Gaedynn laughed. “I was game to try to help her. I’m not going to commit suicide for her.” With a flourish, drawing attention to the motion, he reached to pull another enchanted arrow from his quiver.

Possibly fearing what that shaft might do, Yemere didn’t bother following through on his threat. He simply charged again, and if he trampled Son-liin in the process-Gaedynn couldn’t tell-it wasn’t deliberate.

Gaedynn saw that he wouldn’t have time to nock, draw, and loose. As the dragon struck at him like a serpent, he sidestepped and thrust the arrow like a dagger at the side of his adversary’s head. But his arm couldn’t match the lethal power of a bow, and the shaft snapped on the reptile’s scales. The magic inside discharged itself in a crackling flash that stung his fingers.

Recognizing that he had no hope of regaining the distance that archery required, he dropped his bow and snatched out his short swords. They didn’t do him a lot of good. Yemere pressed him so relentlessly that it was all he could manage just to dodge and duck the creature’s gnashing fangs, snatching talons, battering wings, and whipping tail. Striking back was rarely possible, and when he could, his blades didn’t bite deep enough for it to matter.

And though the space, like a small arena with one wall missing, had appeared roomy enough when he arrived, it now seemed completely full of dragon. He repeatedly found himself nearly pinned against the stone or about to be shoved off the drop. Then it took an even riskier, more desperate evasion to stave off death for another heartbeat or two.

He struggled to think of a stratagem that could save him. Nothing sprang to mind.

But then two beams of dazzling light stabbed down from the sky. They burned into Yemere’s back, and he roared and convulsed. The roar cut off abruptly when Eider dived out of the dark, thumped down on the dragon’s neck just behind the head, and ripped out a big chunk of flesh with her beak. She spit it out immediately, possibly because it had thorns in it.

Yemere collapsed, and Eider sprang clear before the huge, spasmodic body hit the ground. Jet swooped down with Aoth and Cera on his back.

Gaedynn watched Yemere for another moment, satisfying himself that, jerks and twitches notwithstanding, the wyrm really was finished. Then he hurried over to Son-liin.

Somewhat miraculously, considering all of Yemere’s lunging and whirling around, she remained uncrushed. In fact, she shakily sat up as he approached, animation and bewilderment in her face. “What happened?” she groaned.

Gaedynn started to answer, realized he was so winded he was probably going to wheeze, and took a moment to catch his breath. “That’s Yemere,” he said, nodding in the direction of the carcass. “As you may notice, he was actually a dragon and using his talents to control you and make you do things to endanger the rest of us. But you’ll be all right now.”

Eider padded over to Gaedynn with a griffon’s uneven gait. He ruffled the feathers on her neck. “Good girl,” he said, “good girl.”

“That she is,” said Aoth, dismounting. “And you’re lucky. Taking on a dragon all by yourself was cocky even by your standards.”

Gaedynn grinned. “Actually that aspect of the situation caught me by surprise. It would have been helpful if the fellow with the spellscarred eyes had noticed what the whoreson really was.”

Aoth shrugged. “They don’t ordinarily catch shapeshifters because shapeshifting’s not an illusion. Be glad we heard Yemere roar.”

“Oh, I am,” Gaedynn said, “although if necessary, I would have finished him off somehow.”

“I’m sure,” said Cera dryly.

Aoth took another look at Yemere’s body, whose final shudders were subsiding. “The hide looks just the same as the hide of the dragonspawn that attacked us in the Eagle’s Idyll.”

Cera murmured a word that set the head of her golden mace glowing, so she, too, could see the body clearly. “In other words, it gleams like steel,” she said in a somber tone.

“That makes sense,” said Aoth. “From what I’ve heard, steel dragons are one of the kinds that like to go around disguised as men or elves.”

“But they’re metallics,” Cera said. “I wouldn’t expect them to take any part in Tiamat’s filthy game.”

Gaedynn grinned. “Sunlady, forgive me if this is contrary to the dogma of your faith. But good is never as good as it’s supposed to be. Although evil is often every bit as bad.”

“If we can return to practical matters,” said Aoth, “the important thing is that if it was Yemere who tried to kill us in Airspur, then there’s reason for hope that Vairshekellabex doesn’t know we’re coming.”

“Yemere didn’t think he did,” Gaedynn replied. He left off scratching Eider, and the griffon twisted her head and gave him a reproachful look. He snorted and resumed petting her. “He was going to fly off tonight and tell him all about it. If I hadn’t stopped him.”

“Yes,” said Aoth, “you’re a hero. Understood. Remind me to buy you a mug of ale someday. Meanwhile, shall we head back to camp?”

“Let me fetch my bow,” Gaedynn said. He retrieved it and was glad to discover that Yemere hadn’t stepped on it either. He grinned at Son-liin. “How about if Eider and I give you a ride back? She doesn’t have her saddle, but I can keep you from falling off.”

Son-liin smiled. “I’d like that.”

He held one of their bows in either hand and guided Eider with his voice and knees alone, not that the griffon really needed guiding for the short flight back to camp. Getting the weapons out of the way made it easier for Son-liin to sit behind him and wrap her arms around him.

“Ever flown before?” he asked.

“No,” she said.

“There’s nothing like it. You’ll probably come away from this little jaunt craving a winged steed of your own.”

After that, she was quiet for several heartbeats. Taking in the view, he assumed, or as much of the vague, black masses of the mountains and valleys as a person could make out in the dark. Then she said, “What made you think I was under a spell?”

“I grew up wandering and hunting in the wild too. Not exactly this kind of wild, but still. I figured you must have learned to handle yourself better than you have been lately. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have survived. I also overheard when you told Cera you’d mysteriously forgotten your father’s warning about traveling the gorge with the blue mist at this time of year.”

Son-liin grunted. “But you were so… scornful. I thought you blamed me for everything. That you hated me.”

“I assumed that whoever was tampering with your mind, he was taking steps to make sure no one found out. I wanted him to believe that one person he didn’t need to watch out for was me.”

“Well, you’re a good pretender.”

Gaedynn grinned. “You should learn too. There’s not a more useful skill in all the world.”