Key of Stars

CHAPTER FIVE

The Year of the Secret (1396 DR)

Watch on Forever’s Edge, Feywild

The watchtower shuddered. Taal swayed with the quaking structure, unconsciously canceling out the motion of the rolling flagstones with well-honed reflexes. He’d become used to the relentless tremors during the centuries of his servitude.

Taal reached into a pocket of his shirt and carefully pulled out a tiny bird. It fluttered its wings, releasing a splendid rush of iridescent purple and green. The colors were too vivid for the watchtower. It was a creature of Faerie, and the watchtower lay beyond Faerie’s edge.

How it had found its way into the tower with one hurt wing, Taal couldn’t guess. But the innocent beating heart had brought him a bit of joy when he’d looked at its dazzling plumage. Taal had spent part of the last month tending to the wing and feeding the bird from his rations.

Taal judged the creature was fit to fly once more.

He lifted it in one hand. Its tiny feet clamped tight around his forefinger.

“You’ve got your strength back,” he said. “Now, fly away toward the light. Return to Faerie, and never again look into this dark corner.”

The bird cocked its head at him, but made no move to take wing.

He gave his finger a little shake. “Go!” he said. But the creature clung.

Then the tower quaked again, and with that unsettling jolt, the bird took to the air.

Taal walked to the tower’s edge and followed the creature’s progress as long as he could make it out. The bird winged above the darkling landscape. Boulders, bare rock, and the occasional stunted tree poked up below it. Light glowed along the far horizon, and the flash of color flittered toward that promise.

Even after he lost the bird in the glow, Taal continued to stare at the distant light. The illumination waxed and waned over a period of hours that were several shy of twenty-four, as if time moved slightly more quickly there.

Or, as was actually the case, slightly more slowly at the tower along the void.

The light was the Feywild border, and beyond that, the world, and all the other planes of existence too. All those landscapes, mundane and fantastic alike, were peopled with creatures of every description, creed, and philosophy.

Taal reflected that among those billions, perhaps only a handful were aware of the watchtowers erected thousands of years before by ancient eladrin nobles. Those ancients had determined that reality required defending against a madness that lay beyond all things.

He would miss the tiny bird. He buried the pang of regret beneath his oath, as he buried so many other feelings.

Finally, the bout of shaking subsided. Another would take its place, all too soon; the tower shivered more often than ever.

Taal turned away from the side of the tower that looked toward the light, and shuffled to the other side.

His gaze traced the watchtower’s silvery span, all the way down to the raw stone on which the sentinel tower was built. Beyond the structure’s imposing foundation, a cliff dropped away into a void of darkness. Dim specks of light glimmered out in that nothingness, like lonely stars.

They might have been stars in truth, but if so, they were weak, old, and nearly spent. They were nothing like what Taal recalled from his youth. He could sometimes still summon the memory of true stars when he meditated.

The cliff top stretched away to the north and the south. The pale stone ridge marked the border between substance and inchoate madness.

Beacon fires glittered from the tops of all the other eladrin watchtowers built along existence’s raw edge. A long time before, the forces of creation had made a terrible mistake. They had left an imperfection in reality, rendering a forgotten corner of the Feywild vulnerable to the emptiness that stretched away forever beyond it.

If only the void were truly mere nothingness.

The tower trembled again.

A mote of raw earth peeled away from the cliff face directly beneath the tower and sailed out into the void. Along the cliff, similar motes disengaged from the stone face and dispersed out into the dark, like seedlings blowing from tree branches in a slight breeze.

He’d seen the launch of countless such impromptu “armadas.”

The darkness engulfed each free-floating earthmote in turn. He waited patiently, until he saw distant flashes of green, red, and sky blue flower in the darkness. He presumed the light bursts heralded the moment a mote found a squirming monstrosity gliding inward from the discontinuity. When mote found horror, one annihilated the other. He fancied he could hear the detonations, though he knew the watchtowers were too far from the zone of engagement for sound to make the return trip.

The earthmotes were the natural world’s defense against the aberrations.

Taal peered into the abyss, past the flashes of light, into the eye-searing darkness. Despite never having seen it from the watchtower, Taal knew the name of the malign beachhead that existence defended itself from: the Citadel of the Outer Void.

A wild cat’s growl jerked him from his reverie.

The growl came from a tattoo on Taal’s upper right arm. The image, a tiger with a scorpion’s tail, was his personal totem, one he’d paid handsomely to have magically inked on his flesh.

He’d only enjoyed its power a few tendays before he was plucked from Faerun to swear his oath. But even in the stark realm where he served as castellan for one of the Twelve Towers, his totem warned him when potential enemies were drawing near.

He retreated from Forever’s Edge and cast his eyes back down to the darkling plain.

Two riders rode from the direction of the nearest neighbor tower, the Spire of Summer Mist.

Taal called on the spirit resident in his totem, asking for sharpness of eyesight. His vision instantly pierced the relentless twilight. He saw the riders were not mere couriers, as he’d hoped, but eladrin nobles.

Worry drew down the corners of his mouth. Why, despite all his assurances sent via beacon fire signals, were the Master and Mistress of Summer Mist personally venturing across the plain separating the towers for a visit?

Taal hurried down the stairs that looped all the way down to the watchtower’s foundation. He passed many sealed doors. Behind these lay fell weapons, occult lore, collected omens, arcane ritual rooms, and other artifacts potentially useful in reality’s defense. Dust lay heavy on nearly every lintel.

He left the stairs at ground level. The spiraling steps continued their lonely descent into the bedrock, where many more lightless chambers lurked.

A larger keep surrounded the watchtower that stabbed the sky above it. Taal entered the keep’s great hall. He worked the wheel mechanism that unbarred the gate into the ward.

The visitors had already been admitted through the outer wall into the ward by tower guards. The ward and outer wall, unlike the watchtower and inner keep, bustled with eladrin warriors and servants pledged to the spire’s upkeep and defense.

Taal waited in the entranceway with folded arms as the two visitors approached.

The woman wore elaborately styled black leather armor. A rapier rode her hip, and an impious smile curled across her face when she saw Taal.

The man’s platinum blond hair was bound in a knot, and matched the colors of his impeccably cut clothes. A glimmering bow was strapped, unstrung, to his back.

“Welcome to the Spire of Winter’s Peace,” said Taal as they entered the great hall. “To what do we owe this unexpected visit?”

“Taal, always a pleasure to see you,” the man replied. “You don’t come around anymore, as you used to when you first took service. Have we become so tiresome?”

“My duties keep me busy, Lord Dramvar,” said Taal.

“No one works harder than you,” Dramvar assured him. “Nor are hardly any of our warriors a match for your unique, um, martial skills. Our warriors still speak fondly of the weaponless techniques you used to demonstrate. Who knew a human could achieve such proficiency? Oh. I mean …”

Dramvar’s pale skin colored slightly.

Taal bowed his head to acknowledge the compliment, and the backhanded insult. “In my youth, even among humans, I achieved some notoriety,” he replied. “In any event, as I’ve explained, I’m consumed in my tasks. If you’ve come to invite me to the next revelry, I-”

“Of course not,” said the woman. “Lord Dramvar is merely trying, in his inexpert fashion, to put you at your ease. But we have no time for pleasantries. We need to confer with your mistress immediately. Please inform Winter’s Peace that Summer Mist has important news that can’t wait.”

Taal nodded, his face drawn in thought. “Lady Eloar,” he finally said, “as I communicated via beaconfire on more than one occasion, the Lady of Winter’s Peace is temporarily unavailable.”

“Still?” said Lady Eloar. “Where did she go? The nearest kingdom of Faerie isn’t so far.”

“The lady’s research regarding the growing instabilities in the void required she travel into the world,” replied Taal.

“Without the approval of all the Towers?” Lord Dramvar exclaimed.

“She believed the threat was too great to wait on permission,” said Taal.

The woman narrowed her eyes. “She knows when a warden abandons the Watch too long, the power in the void senses it!” she said. “For what stupidity would she risk drawing attention from the Citadel?”

Taal chewed his lip. “If I could tell you the nature of the threat she perceived, I would,” he said. “But she did not provide me with any details. She left suddenly, with instructions that I stay on my guard and oversee the watchtower, its armory, and the company of warriors installed here as I always have.”

The man sighed. “Lady Eloar, it seems we have come all this way for nothing,” he said.

“Not for nothing, Dramvar,” Lady Eloar replied.

The woman fixed Taal with her sly smile and said, “I’m sorry it has to come to this, Taal, but the circumstances leave me no choice. I must invoke the Articles of the Compact. Please show us to your mistress’s study.”

Taal nodded again. The Articles of the Compact allowed any lord of the Watch on Forever’s Edge to examine another’s hold, lest corruption secretly take root. Those who stared overlong into the void were most vulnerable to its fell fingers of corruption.

“Of course. Please, this way?” said the castellan of Winter’s Peace.

Taal motioned to the stairs.

“Please do not take offense, Taal,” said Lord Dramvar. “After this, I hope you’ll still consider visiting us for the next revel. But even you must admit that Lady Malyanna’s eccentricities require some sort of censure.”

“Of course,” replied Taal. “All of us must answer to our oaths. After you?” Taal motioned for a second time.

The lord and lady preceded Taal across the great hall. The arch that opened onto the stairs was carved with stars and comets, swords and shields. As Lord Dramvar walked beneath the carvings, one finger absently touched one of the shields. It was a tradition, meant to invoke luck.

Lady Eloar passed through the arch without a glance.

Taal followed, and touched the same shield as Dramvar had. If superstition had even the least efficacy, it seemed prudent to cancel out any of Dramvar’s advantage.

As Taal’s finger slid off the smoothed edge of the carving, his other arm shot forward. His palm slid along the side of Eloar’s neck as he captured her head in the crook of his arm. His forearm sawed across her trachea a moment before his elbow settled below her chin. He squeezed.

She tried to scream a warning to Dramvar. The other eladrin continued blithely up the stairs, his back to the struggle. She clawed at Taal’s arms, raking her nails down his skin. His ambush had caught her so off guard she was panicking. Another heartbeat, and-

His arms collapsed on nothing. Lady Eloar appeared several steps above Dramvar on the curving staircase, gasping and rubbing at her throat with one hand. With the other, she pointed past Dramvar. “Betrayal!” she rasped. She drew her rapier.

Lord Dramvar spun in place, the easy lines of his face hardening. He pulled his silver bow from his back. The moment his hands touched the wood, a chatoyant line flared into light between the endpoints. His hands retrieved an arrow from his quiver with the swiftness of an eagle snatching a fish from a lake. The bow was drawn back, an arrow nocked.

But for all the eladrin’s amazing speed, Taal was faster. He was already inside the man’s guard. As Dramvar tried to shift a pace up the stairs and release his arrow, Taal slapped the beautiful weapon from the archer’s hands. Disbelief pinched the eladrin’s expression.

Taal stepped in closer, sweeping his other arm around. He caught Dramvar’s head on his bicep and continued twisting. As the man overbalanced, Taal braced himself on one leg and raised the other, pulling Dramvar over it. Taal threw the man up the stairs, and the eladrin flipped end over end, right onto Lady Eloar’s naked rapier.

The man’s flailing bulk bowled into Lady Eloar. They both went down hard on the stairs. Dramvar splattered blood on the marble and on his ally.

Taal took three quick steps to where they lay. He reached down to snap Dramvar’s neck. Calling on reserves of fortitude, the eladrin archer pulled another arrow from his quiver. He lunged as Taal’s fingers brushed his neck, and stabbed the sharp head into the meat of Taal’s calf.

Taal gritted his teeth at the unexpected sting, but his hands found their way to either side of Dramvar’s head-the eladrin had left himself open with his wild attack.

The castellan of Winter’s Peace sat back into gravity’s pull, and rolled over his left shoulder. As he did so, he held Dramvar’s head close like a starvling might hold a loaf of fresh bread to his breast. He rolled, and Dramvar came with him, but the eladrin’s neck snapped.

Taal released the suddenly flopping body as he rolled. The arrow still protruding from his leg snagged on a stair. Moreover, rolling backwards down stairs is hard, no matter how skilled one is. Even though he knew his aim was compromised, Taal was surprised when his head struck the arch at the base of the stairs.

He lost several heartbeats to the white flash that seared across his vision. He struggled to rise as if through a buffeting gale, and face the remaining eladrin on the stair.

During the moments he had blinked at the pain, Eloar had vanished.

Dramvar remained sprawled limply and at an awkward angle across five steps. The eladrin’s head was bent so far from true that it alone told the tale of the archer’s demise.

“What mischief are you up to?” Taal said.

Had she escaped upward, around the tower’s curve? Or had she flashed by him and out of the watchtower altogether?

He doubted she’d fled. Eloar was equal to Malyanna in power, or at least had been before the Lady of Winter’s Peace had made her alliance with the things in the void. For all his overwhelming skill, Taal knew that his best advantage against Eloar had been surprise.

Now she was ready for him. He wondered if he’d unconsciously allowed her to escape his ambush.

Taal took two strides to Dramvar’s body. He bent and checked to be sure. No pulse. He steeled himself against the wave of regret that slipped out from beneath his oath.

He rose and ascended, wary for the least hint of movement or sound.

His totem issued a low, hunting snarl. Taal whirled, not quite fast enough to avoid Eloar’s rapier. She’d been standing on the stairs the whole time, cloaked in a shroud of fey invisibility.

The rapier opened a line of blood on his right forearm. A spark of yellowish light jumped from the blade and dazzled Taal’s eyes. He retreated a step, sideways on the broad stair.

“Taal, surrender,” came Eloar’s sad voice. “You have foresworn your oath. You are a servant of the void, the very influence you swore to guard against.”

The eladrin was visible again, but the magic of the woman’s strike raced through his blood, confusing his vision and his senses. Everything blurred, and the room seemed to cant to one side. His stomach lurched in protest.

Taal raised his hands in a defensive posture and closed his eyes. The inked orbs of his tiger totem blinked.

He saw Eloar plainly, if without color. The eladrin advanced on him, her rapier ready to skewer his stomach. Her playful smile was gone, replaced by a frown of concern.

“You’re wrong,” said Taal, sorrow trembling in his voice. “I have not foresworn my oath.”

“No?” Eloar paused, watching him with skeptical eyes.

“My oath was to Malyanna, the Lady of Winter’s Peace,” he said as he darted forward.

The eladrin, apparently believing Taal overcome by her influence, was unprepared when he knocked her blade out of line and jabbed a finger as stiff as an iron nail into her throat.