Uneasy Alliances

Chapter 5

"How can we get through the streets without being attacked by the fiends?"

Noph's question, directed to Garkim, echoed the unspoken sentiments of his companions. However, the chancellor appeared unfazed by it.

"I know a secret way. Come." He gestured to the paladins and pirates and walked quickly down one of the dark, crooked streets that led away from the base of the pyramid. The companions followed him, and the four palace guards brought up the rear.

Near the temple, the houses were large, some with enclosed courtyards in which Noph could see fountains playing and gardens with bright blooming flowers. However, as Garkim led them on, the way became more twisted and foul, the smells more pronounced, the dwellings smaller. Everywhere they found signs of the assault of the fiends: bodies lying across doorways where they had fallen defending their homes, shattered walls and windows, doors scored with claw marks and acid burns.

Garkim entered one of the courtyards, cautiously peering about. In the center of the atrium was an iron grille set into the paving stones. The chancellor gestured to two of the guards, who swiftly pried up the grille, revealing a gaping well beneath it. A few feet below the rim was a narrow ladder.

"The city drains," said Garkim in a low voice. "They reach into every part of Eldrinpar. The fiends may not yet have entered them."

"May not," began Kern, but stopped as the chancellor, gathering his robes about him, climbed down the ladder.

Entreri gave a swift glance at his companions, then followed. The others entered the well, gasping at the stench that rose from below. Noph, clinging to the slimy metal ladder, heard a clank above him as the last guard pulled the iron grille back in place.

Descending some fifteen feet, the party came to the bottom of the shaft and found themselves at the entrance to a brick-lined tunnel that snaked off into the darkness. Garkim hastily lit a torch and led the way, splashing through puddles and streams of water that gleamed in the torchlight. From time to time, the party passed other conjoining passages, but Garkim never hesitated in choosing which way to turn.

Noph caught up to Garkim and Entreri. "Lord Garkim, how do you know your way about here?"

Garkim's mouth was tight, but his eyes brimmed with tears. "My people sometimes use these tunnels."

"Your people?"

"The Mar. In Eldrinpar, it is the Ffolk who live near the temples and palaces, and the Mar who remain apart from power and faith. To escape the scrutiny of the Ffolk, the Mar long ago learned to use the drains. Like maggots, they burrow beneath the city, and the Ffolk are none the wiser." He sighed. "The gods have so decreed it, but it still seems hard to me."

"But you're a Mar."

"I was plucked from my home when I was a boy by the mage-king himself. It's true that I've risen to high station under his rule, but even so, there are-were-those in high councils who whispered against me when my back was turned because I was Mar." He shrugged and quickened his pace. "None of this will matter, though, if the followers of the Fallen Temple install the bloodforge."

"Why do they want it?" asked Entreri. His voice echoed strangely against the tunnel walls. "What do they want to accomplish?"

"They wish to summon Ysdar, a being of great power who comes from beyond this plane of existence. Some say he is no more than a name, a shadow to frighten children. But I believe he is real and is plotting to conquer all the Five Kingdoms."

"And he can do that if he gets a bloodforge?" Noph asked.

"According to most accounts of him, Ysdar already has a bloodforge. But a second would give him decisive power to command armies far greater than any that other kingdoms might bring against him. So we stand upon the sword's edge. The next few hours may decide whether my world stands or falls." Garkim fell silent and strode on.

At last the party entered a small room, into which a number of passages converged. To one side was another ladder leading upward. Garkim, the hem of his robes dripping with foul water, climbed up the ladder. The others followed and, in a few moments, emerged, blinking, into the light of day.

The sun was now high in the sky and blazed down upon the close quarters of the city. The air smelled of rot and decay, of soot and ashes from the burning city. And over everything was the acrid tang of fresh blood.

They were in a deserted street lined with empty houses. To Noph, it looked no different than the area where they had entered the drains. Yet something felt different, and after a moment he realized what it was. The fiendish clamor had died away, and high in the morning sky, he could hear the cry of gulls and smell a stiff salt breeze.

They were near the sea.

The group formed a narrow line, and Garkim led them along the street, gesturing to them to stay in the shadows cast by the overhanging houses. They saw no living thing.

One of the guardsmen in the rear screamed.

From a dark doorway, tentacles reached forth, their edges as sharp as razors. One whipped around the man's neck and tightened abruptly. His head fell and went spinning down the dusty street, eyes staring and mouth still open in a silent cry of death and despair. His body was yanked back into the doorway; there was a horrid crunching sound.

"Run!" cried Garkim.

Noph raced forward, then stopped, hearing a cry from Shar. She was clutching the hand of another guard, who had fallen in the street. A tentacle held him by the ankle, trying to draw him back to the same shadowy door where his companion had met death. The man was moaning, his face contorted in pain. Noph grasped the man's other hand and pulled. There was a dreadful moment of straining, and then suddenly resistance ceased, and Noph and Shar fell backward in the street. They saw the tentacle retreating, the guard's foot from the ankle down still clutched in its grasp. The guard looked down at his footless leg and promptly fainted.

"Come on!" Shar yelled to Noph. Between the two of them, they got the man up and half carried, half dragged him a hundred yards up the street. Trandon knelt by the guard, whose leg was spouting blood. He pressed his hands gently about the wound and murmured a few words. The flesh around the stump knit together, and the bleeding stopped.

"That's the best I can do," Trandon told Shar. "You'll have to help him along."

"No!" snapped Entreri. "He can't fight, and hell impede two others. He's useless to us now. Leave him."

Garkim drew himself up. "You will not leave one of my men behind, Master Entreri."

The assassin glared at him. "I give the orders."

"And I know the location of the bloodforge."

Entreri turned and with bad grace stalked along the way they were following. Garkim followed without another word. Shar put her arm around the guard, who had now recovered consciousness, and helped him limp along, while Noph rejoined Trandon and Kern.

The smell of the sea grew stronger in Noph's nostrils. He realized they must be drawing near the dock area. All at once, the party reached the end of the narrow street they had been traversing and beheld before them the Great Sea and, glimmering in the sun, a temple.

Before them was a broad plaza, along which were drawn several fishing boats. From the dock, a narrow causeway led across the water, perhaps fifty yards, to a building, constructed of black basalt, that sat amid the waves like a brooding spider.

Garkim gestured toward it. "The Temple of Umberlee."

Ingrar, standing beside him, nodded. "Yes. That's where they've taken the bloodforge."

The others crowded around them, standing in a shadow cast by one of the buildings that ringed the plaza. They could see various hooded figures moving along the docks and the causeway. Garkim gazed at them thoughtfully.

"Those are not the robes of the True Believers of Umberlee," he observed.

Kern snorted. "I didn't know the word 'true' could be mentioned in the same breath with the bitch goddess," he remarked to Trandon.

"Silence!" said Garkim sternly. "Umberlee is a deity widely worshiped in Doegan, as well as in other parts of the Five Kingdoms. It is not for outsiders such as yourself to denigrate her."

Kern shrugged. "All right, fine. The bloodforge is in the Temple of Umberlee. Let's go get it."

He was two steps onto the plaza before Trandon's hand on his arm yanked him back. "Wait," urged the fighter. "This isn't a situation for a frontal assault." He looked at Garkim. "You said those people"-he motioned toward the hooded figures-"don't look like Umberlee's worshipers. To me, they look like disciples of the Fallen Temple."

Garkim nodded grimly. "Precisely. The adherents of the Fallen Temple have evidently used the confusion to install themselves and the bloodforge in Umberlee's sanctuary."

Entreri had been carefully taking a visual survey of the plaza and dock area. Now he stepped back and tapped Trandon and Shar. "You two come with me. The rest of you wait here." Without another word, he was gone, stealing back along the way they'd come. Garkim looked after him, puzzled.

"What's he doing?" the chancellor asked Kern.

The paladin spread his hands in a gesture that indicated dissociation. "I've no idea, and I don't want to know. Right now, let's get out of sight." He examined the open door of a nearby house carefully, and beckoned the others inside. Noph helped the footless guard whom Sharessa had been aiding. Once inside, the man sank to the ground and rested against the wall.

"That woman… who is she?" the guard asked Kern.

"Shar? She's a pirate."

"She's the most beautiful pirate I ever saw." The guard managed a grin. "Something to make a man wish he'd chosen to follow the sea."

Noph settled himself beside the guard. "Don't expect too much from her. If there's one thing I've learned in my life, it's that you can't trust women. Love 'em and leave 'em, that's what I say."

The guard looked at Noph's hairless face and slender wrists. Along the youth's upper lip was a dark line of fuzzy down, where he'd been trying to grow a mustache. "Right. I'll remember that. Coming from a man of your experience." He sighed and stretched a hand down to scratch at his stump of a leg. "Damn thing itches."

The company was silent until Kern, who had been watching from the door, gave a low whistle. A moment later, Entreri, Shar, and Trandon entered, bearing a pile of shapeless rags.

"What are those?" asked Kern.

Shar held up a robe, identical to the ones they'd seen on the members of the Fallen Temple. "Here's one just your size, paladin."

The big knight drew back as if the garment were riddled with disease. "I can't wear that."

"Why not?"

"It's dishonorable to go into battle in disguise. And especially to disguise myself as a member of that disgusting bunch of-"

"Fine. Then you don't go," Entreri said briskly. "The rest of you get these on quickly. There's some sort of ceremony about to start, and we may be able to take advantage of it."

Garkim's dusky face paled. "Ceremony?"

"Yes. We heard chanting and drums, and there was a long line going to the temple."

Garkim hastily drew a robe over his head. "It must be the Rite of Investiture. We cannot allow this to happen!" He turned to the paladin. "Do you not see the terrible danger? Imagine those monsters of the Fallen Temple-the temple of your god Tyr-with the power of the bloodforge at their command! Do you think for a moment they would stop at the shores of the Five Kingdoms? This plague will spread across all realms. It will drive out all other gods. We must stop it!"

Kern stood, holding a robe loosely in one hand, indecision written upon his forehead. "It's… dishonorable to go into battle disguised in this way."

"Oh, come on, Kern," said Noph sharply. "Think about what he said." He struggled into a robe that was somewhat too long for him. "What does honor mean, if by your actions you endanger everybody and everything worth fighting for? It's a question of weighing profit and loss. Whatever loss there is to your honor, the profit we gain by saving Faerun is greater."

Kern looked at him in astonishment and then burst out laughing. "By Tyr himself, Freeman Kastonoph, you're a true son of Waterdeep. Always counting coins in the back of your mind. Your father's a lumber merchant, isn't he?"

Noph flushed a deep red. "That's not the point. I'm not like my father."

"Never mind, never mind." Still rumbling with suppressed laughter, the paladin slipped the robe over his head. The others were already attired, except for the wounded guardsman. Entreri turned to him. "Stay here, out of sight." He nodded to the others, and the party stepped into the street and crossed the plaza toward the temple.

Other hooded figures were still making their way to the ceremony. Considering what Garkim had told them of the conspiratorial nature of the Fallen Temple, Noph was astonished to see so many of them. There must be nearly a hundred worshipers, he thought. Crossing the causeway, over which waves splashed, spraying the devotees with spume, the company, taking care to stay close to one another, entered the temple.

"Here," murmured Garkim softly, drawing them into a small alcove in which they were partially shielded from the sight of the crowd within. Ingrar, whom Noph had guided across the causeway, now turned away from the youth and began to examine the walls of the temple, stroking the stone gently with his fingers. The others looked cautiously around the corner and into the main room.

The interior was a domed circle. In the center was an altar surrounded by candles. As in the underground room, a pedestal stood behind the altar. Several niches around the edges of the room had formerly held images of Umberlee, but these had been wrenched from their positions by the Fallen Temple priests and lay shattered on the floor. To one side were the bodies of two men who, from their clothing, Garkim recognized as a priest of Umberlee and his acolyte. They had been slashed and stabbed many times, their corpses kicked aside in blood-soaked clothes.

At present, the attention of everyone in the temple was focused on the altar. From an antechamber came a chanting and a whiff of incense. The crowd parted, and three robed priests bore into view the bloodforge. It was held by an iron tripod and carried on a wooden frame. It glowed and flickered with power.

The canting worshipers placed it carefully on the altar. Now, from the opposite corner of the room, came a loud wailing scream. The crowd again drew back, this time to allow passage of three burly men, stripped to the waist, their faces concealed by hoods. Between them, they dragged a portly man, totally naked, his chins wobbling in fear. His stomach swayed obscenely from side to side. The chanting picked up rhythm, and the crowd began to sway in time to it.

"What are they doing?" whispered Noph to Shar, who stood next to him. She hushed him with a gesture.

The servants placed the man on the altar, face to the ceiling. Two held his arms, the other his legs, even as he struggled and screamed.

A figure stepped forward, red-robed, a silver circlet round his neck. From it dangled a medallion inscribed with designs that Noph could not clearly make out. The priest lifted his hands and face in appeal.

" О Mighty Ysdar, hear this day our prayer. Feel the power of our sacrifice. Join with us as we feast."

In a circle of motion, he whirled, drawing a long, curved, cruel knife from beneath his robes. He slashed in one quick motion, lengthwise down the body of the victim, who gave a ringing scream of agony. The worshipers closest to the altar rushed forward, their bodies hiding the victim, whose screams grew fainter and finally died away.

In a few moments, the crowd at the altar had cleared. The victim's body was no more than a shredded mass of flesh and bone. Some in the crowd were still wiping their mouths.

Noph swayed on his feet. In his travels thus far, he'd never seen anything this horrible. Next to him, he sensed rather than heard Kern reaching beneath his robe for his sword.

"Wait!" Trandon put a hand out to stay the paladin.

Kern shook his head angrily. "I cannot watch this any longer, Trandon. It must be stopped." He looked around at the rest of the party. "Are you ready?"

Artemis stepped back a pace. "Not yet. Not while there are ten times as many of them as there are of us."

"Coward!" Kern hissed at him. "I always knew you were a coward!"

Shar joined Entreri. "He's right, Kern. There's no point in just going out there and getting slaughtered."

Kern ignored her words. "Noph?"

Noph stood for a moment. Then, with a sigh, he stepped forward. "You're right. This can't go on. We have to do something. We have to fight for something right, even if we're going to get killed trying.'' He looked at Kern. "Maybe I was wrong. Maybe ifs not just profit and loss."

Kern clapped his shoulder. "Lord Garkim? What say you and your men?"

Garkim smiled tightly. "As I told you earlier, Sir Knight, I recognize the danger to my homeland. And I can see what will happen to all the kingdoms of the world if these people are not stopped. I do not choose to fight. I must fight."

From the back of the alcove, a quiet voice said, "Yes. We must fight." Ingrar came forward. His face was glowing, and, astonishingly, he was smiling, as if he had become privy to an enormous secret and was bursting to tell it.

"Ingrar! What is it?" cried Noph.

"Go now and fight! Don't ask more! You must go now!" The young pirate's urgency infected even Artemis and Shar.

Kern lifted his sword. "Ready?"

"No." Trandon again lifted a hand. "Kern, you, I, Sharessa, and the guards must create as much of a circle around us as possible. Lord Garkim, Entreri, and Noph, move with us, and when we come near the altar, seize the bloodforge."

"What then?" asked Noph.

Trandon looked at him, a corner of his mouth quirking cynically. "Then we try to get to the door. Ingrar, stay here, and when you sense the forge is near, start for the outside. I don't think you'll need anyone to guide you; you seem to feel the forge in some other way." He lifted his hands. "First let's see if we can get their attention."

He spoke an arcane word, and from his fingertips a blazing ball of light leapt forward and streaked across the crowd, exploding against the far wall. Shrieks came from worshipers, who became sudden torches, their robes igniting in a fiery display of arcane power.

"Now!" yelled Kern. The company surged forward. Kern's hammer glowed in the light of the bloodforge as the heavy blunt weapon rose and fell, driving the devotees of the Fallen Temple before him. Trandon had time for a blast of lightning that reduced two worshipers to smoking cinders; then he caught up his staff to defend himself against an onslaught of squealing Doeganers. Sharessa's sword flashed in and out, parrying and thrusting as she tried by the sheer skill of her swordplay to keep the howling mob at bay. By her side, one, then another of Lord Garkim's guards was overborne and dragged away.

Noph, his dagger out, defended himself as best he could against the clutching, bloodstained fingers of the crowd. They fought their way to the altar and surrounded it. Noph, Entreri, and Garkim grabbed the tripod holding the bloodforge and lifted-and stopped in frustration.

"It's too heavy," Noph yelled to Kern above the din. "We can't lift it." The forge glowed malevolently, and Noph realized something with a shock. "It doesn't want us to lift it. It knows what it wants."

He looked around him. In Sharessa's face and in that of the remaining palace guards, he saw only despair. Kern was fighting like a madman, his face streaked with blood, his eyes shining with something very like happiness. Trandon's face reflected only cold, calculating concentration as he batted away flashing blades with his staff. Garkim and Entreri had drawn their swords and were helping to hold back the crowd so intent on tearing them apart. The Doeganers fought without skill, but their sheer numbers told in their favor. The fight couldn't last long now.

From the side of the temple came a thunderclap. With a loud crack, a portion of the dome fell, crushing screaming worshipers beneath it. A light shone through from the sky, a more than natural light that bathed the interior of the hellish temple in ethereal radiance. Noph could see the bones in his hand shining red through the skin.

From the side of the temple, Ingrar advanced from the alcove. The light shone directly on him, almost lifted him, so that he seemed to glide rather than to walk. His blind eyes, deep and dark, were opened wide and seemed to be filled with an inner fire.

Around him, as he advanced through the ranks of the cultists, silence fell, and the struggling mass around the altar parted to let Him through. Noph seemed to hear from far off a kind of chanting in a language at once unknown and yet hauntingly familiar.

Ingrar stood beside the bloodforge, its surface now flaring with sparks and flashes of magical energy. He lifted his hands toward the gaping ceiling and to the light that fell upon him The rays increased until they were blinding in intensity, yet even if the viewers shut their eyes, they could still see Ingrar standing in an attitude of total supplication.

The chanting rose in volume until it filled the temple. Now Noph could see that Ingrar was no longer alone. Next to him-impossibly, within him-stood another figure, that of a tall warrior, a flowing beard touching his chest. In one hand he held a great warhammer; his other arm ended in a stump where the hand should have been. From his mouth and from Ingrar's lips came thunderous words that seemed to shake all the temple and the city beyond.

"I am come," cried Ingrar. "I am come to purge the land of those who blaspheme in my name. Let all ye who pretend to speak in the name of Tyr beware, for my wrath is righteous and my judgment is harsh."

Kern was on his knees, shielding his eyes with one hand, the other stretched out in prayer. Ingrar-or was he now the embodiment of mighty Tyr himself? — looked at him, and it seemed to Noph that a smile touched the bearded lips of the man-god.

"Rise, Kern, paladin of Phlan. You have been a hammer in the cause of right. But you — his gaze swept over the worshipers of the Fallen Temple- you have dragged down my name and made it a curse in this land. For you, I have no mercy."

The figure and Ingrar lifted their hands together. They blazed forth fire that seemed to burn without heat. It swept across the temple; dimly, above its roar, Noph heard screams and saw the adherents of the Fallen Temple claw at their bodies. Some pulled their robes off, and Noph saw that beneath their robes their flesh was melting away from their bones.

Those nearest the door struggled to get out of the building, but many were trampled by their companions. Some few saved themselves, and their laments could be heard slowly dying away along the causeway as they struggled back to the docks.

Before the altar, the god stepped away from Ingrar and faced the blind youth. His hand rested on the young man's forehead.

"You were chosen by me to be the vessel of my avenging might. You, who see so clearly, must now be the renewer of my strength. You must once more make my name beloved in this land. This is the task I lay upon you."

The god's eyes blackened and became empty eye sockets that seemed to fill his entire face. The figure faded away, and the light that had illuminated the temple went out. Ingrar, blind once more, stood silently facing his companions. Beside him, the bloodforge's surface was dull and silent. But Kern, Trandon, and Noph could see that around Ingrar's face, there still lingered some of the radiance of one touched by the gods.