Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor

CHAPTER ONE

“That one’s mine.”

Kestrel inclined her chin ever so slightly toward the richly attired stranger ambling through Phlan’s busy marketplace. Her practiced eye had taken only a minute to single him out of the throng. Was he a rich trader? A visiting nobleman? No matter. She’d never been fussy about her victims’ professions, just the size of their pocketbooks.

Ragnall studied Kestrel’s choice and nodded his approval. “Want any help?” The thrill of the hunt glinted in the rogue’s clear blue eyes.

“Nope.” She worked alone, and Ragnall knew it. The fewer people she trusted, the fewer she had to share the spoils with—and the fewer could betray her. Besides, the greenest apprentice could handle this job solo. The graybeard was an easy target. He’d been careless as he purchased a gold brooch, chuckling to the young female vendor about the weight of his money pouch when he’d accidentally dropped it. Kestrel was more than willing to relieve him of that burden. The brooch too, with any luck. “I’ll meet you later at the Bell.”

Ragnall’s gaze had already shifted to a middle-aged woman overburdened with parcels. “If you’re successful, the ale’s on you.”

“If?”

They parted. Kestrel dismissed Ragnall from her mind, concentrating on the task at hand. To Ragnall, several years her junior and born to a respectable family, thieving was a game. To her it was serious work.

She followed her target through the noisy bazaar, weaving past haggling merchants and ducking behind vegetable carts as she maintained her distance. When the man stopped to purchase a sweetmeat she paused several stalls away to admire an emerald-green silk scarf.

“It matches your eyes,” said the seller, a young woman about Kestrel’s age. She draped the scarf around Kestrel’s neck and held up a glass. “See?”

Kestrel made a show of studying her reflection, actually using the mirror to keep an eye on her mark. “It does indeed,” she said, combing her fingers through her wayward chestnut locks. She sighed. Someday when she’d made her pile and no longer had to work for a living, she’d grow her hair out of the boyish but practical cut she’d always worn. Though she doubted she’d ever wrap a fancy scarf around her neck—it felt too much like a noose.

In the mirror, the gentleman finished paying for his treat and moved on. Kestrel handed the looking glass and scarf back to their owner. “Perhaps another day.”

She considered “accidentally” bumping into her target as he savored the confection but elected for a less conspicuous method this afternoon. She’d been in Phlan several months, and already some of the Podol Plaza vendors recognized her. Too many obvious accidents like that and everyone would know her for a thief. She couldn’t afford that kind of attention. Though the local thieves’ guild operated openly, she had not joined it. The guild required its members to lop off their left ears as a sign of loyalty—a practice she considered barbaric. She planned to leave town before the guild pressured her into joining.

The nobleman stopped thrice more, admiring a jeweled eating knife, studying a plumed helm, testing the fit of a leather belt around his considerable girth. The latter he purchased. By all the gods, was he going to spend the entire pouch before she could get to it?

At last, an opportunity presented itself. The gentleman paused to watch a brightly garbed performer juggle seven flaming torches while singing a drinking ballad and balancing on a wagon wheel. Good old Sedric. She really ought to give the entertainer a commission for all the distractions he’d unknowingly provided.

She approached her target’s left side, eyeing the bulge just under his velvet cape. Casually, she bent down as if to secure her left boot and withdrew a dagger from inside. Sedric finished the ballad, caught the last torch in his teeth, and hopped off the wheel. The gentleman raised his hands, applauding heartily.

With a quick slice through straining purse strings, the moneybag was hers. By the time her victim noticed the missing weight from his hip, she was long gone.

Kestrel had learned—the hard way—that after lightening a gull’s pockets, it was best to get as far away as possible from the scene of the crime. She slipped down an alley, her leather boots padding noiselessly in the soft dirt, until she could no longer hear the din of the marketplace. A few strides more brought her to the grounds of Valjevo Castle. No one would bother her here as she counted and stashed her newly acquired coins.

The once-proud stronghold, like the city it had protected, was ruined by war and later corrupted by nefarious inhabitants. From what Kestrel had heard, a pond known as the Pool of Radiance had formed in a cavern beneath the castle. Thought to confer great wisdom and leadership on those who bathed in its waters, the pool instead turned out to be an instrument of evil, used by the power-hungry creature Tyranthraxus to advance his self-serving schemes. Though Tyranthraxus had been defeated and the pool had evaporated into a mundane hole in the ground, the castle remained empty and undisturbed despite improved prosperity in the city. Most residents yet feared to tread anywhere near the pool’s dry basin or its ominous environs, so few ventured this way intentionally.

Kestrel, however, came and went with perfect ease. The thief had grown up in the streets of a dozen cities, and it took more than a ruined castle to scare her. She’d never encountered trouble there and found the deserted cavern a convenient hideout. Though cutthroats and a few common creatures also enjoyed the isolation from time to time, generally the once-menacing cavern was safer than most city streets.

Safe enough, at least, that she had hollowed out a cavity beneath a pile of fallen rocks to use as a cache for the coins and other items she acquired. As she thought of the small hoard that waited for her within the castle, her fingers drifted to the nobleman’s money pouch at her side. Her stash of treasure was growing steadily—just yesterday she’d added a walnut-sized ruby to the hoard, courtesy of a quintet of sixes in a game of Traitors’ Heads. She wouldn’t use those dice anymore, however, until she left Phlan. She’d never live to roll them again if anyone discovered they were weighted.

It wouldn’t be too much longer before she could leave petty thievery behind, and the dangerous, seedy lifestyle that went with it. When she had enough coin she’d live and travel in style, supplementing her savings with an occasional high-profit, low-risk heist. No more dockside inns with flat ale and lumpy mattresses, no more tramping from city to city on foot, no more risking her neck for a few measly coppers, no more wearing the same clothes until she itched. She’d secretly ply her trade among a better class of people while enjoying the easy life. The one she and Quinn had always imagined.

She entered the castle bailey and negotiated its once-formidable hedge maze. When Tyranthraxus had been defeated, a wide swath had been cut through several rows of the sawlike leaves, black flowers, and poisonous six-inch thorns, but in the years since then the hedges had grown back enough to warrant caution. She ducked and sidled her way through, careful to avoid even the slightest brush with the menacing vegetation.

Once past the maze, she relaxed her guard. She approached the white marble tower, half-ruined and defaced with sinister-looking but now impotent runes, and circled to an ebony door marked with an intricate carving of a dragon. Standing in the spot she’d marked twenty-five yards from the door, she withdrew a dagger from one of her boots and gripped it in her left hand. Though she could throw a dagger accurately with either hand, her dominant left provided more force and deadly aim.

She hurled the blade at the entrance. The dagger stuck in the door with a solid thunk, landing dead center between the dragon’s eyes. Foul-smelling yellow mist issued from the dragon’s mouth—another lesson she’d learned the hard way. If not for the potion of neutralization she’d happened to carry on her first visit, she’d never have lived to return.

After waiting ten minutes for the poisonous cloud to disperse, she retrieved her dagger and opened the door onto a landing in the main room of the ruined tower, which lay open to the sky all the way down to the subterranean cavern. Birds, bugs, and spiders made their homes in the nooks and crevices of the interior tower walls. Despite the fact that rain could fall freely inside, the pool basin below had always remained dry.

She nimbly padded down the black iron stairway, alighting at the bottom and heading toward her secret cache. She stopped abruptly when she heard voices.

Bandits. She couldn’t quite make out what they were saying, but she could see them through the rubble, not fifty paces away. She quickly slipped into the shadow of a large unearthed boulder. How stupid she had been—approaching so carelessly, without even glancing down into the cavern! Fortunately, the intruders appeared not to have noticed her.

A tingling spread along her collarbone. It was a sensation she had experienced only a few times before, always a forewarning of serious danger. While others felt chills up their spines, hers apparently traveled up her spine and continued across her shoulders. Previously, however, the heightened perception had alerted her to perils more extraordinary than a handful of brigands. When her intuition kicked in, it usually meant something very, very bad lay in wait.

Her instincts must be working overtime today. Nevertheless, they’d saved her life before. She glanced back the way she’d come, assessing the possibility of a silent retreat.

Too risky. The iron grillwork stairway was far too exposed, and she’d been fortunate to escape notice the first time. Stifling a sigh, she turned her attention back to the bandits. If she couldn’t leave, she might as well see what these visitors were up to—and make sure they didn’t get too close to her cache.

There were three of them, young men with a week’s growth of stubble on their faces and a lifetime’s worth of maliciousness in their dark eyes. They hadn’t observed her because they were arguing among themselves over a sack the largest man gripped tightly in his fist. As their voices rose in anger, she caught snatches of their conversation.

“... said we’d split it evenly, Urdek!”

“That’s right. A quarter for each of you, a quarter for me, and—” the large man, Urdek, flashed a stiletto—“a quarter for my friend here.”

Kestrel silently shook her head. There truly was no honor among thieves. Urdek’s betrayal illustrated precisely why she worked alone.

The two smaller men produced daggers as well. One of them approached Urdek, muttering something Kestrel couldn’t make out. Urdek swiftly kicked the dagger out of his opponent’s grasp, sending the weapon flying to the ground with a wet splat.

The sound caught more of Kestrel’s attention than the ensuing fight. She shifted her position to get a better look at the ground where the dagger had landed. It lay in a puddle of muddy water. Tiny rivulets of brown liquid streamed into it from the direction of the dry pool.

Which was no longer dry.

She gasped. In one rainless night, the basin had filled with amber fluid. Its surface lay smooth as a mirror, not a single ripple marring the stillness. The water caught the late afternoon sunlight, seeming to infuse it with a golden glow. To someone unfamiliar with its history, the pond appeared almost serene.

Almost. Around its perimeter, nothing grew. The moss and weeds that had begun to spring up around the dry basin had withered and fallen to dust. Shriveled, skeletal husks lay dead where just yesterday thistles had flourished. The lifeless band of earth extended two feet from the rim of the pool, nearly reaching the scuffling bandits.

Kestrel turned her gaze back to them. Urdek had killed his weaponless comrade and disarmed the other. The smaller man tripped as he backed away, landing near the dead man’s dagger. He grabbed for it.

And screamed.

At first Kestrel thought the puddle’s liquid burned away the skin it had touched, but the stench that drifted toward her soon revealed otherwise.

The man’s flesh was rotting off his bones.

As she and Urdek watched in horrified fascination, the tissue and muscle of his hand turned green, then brown, then black in the space of seconds. Finally it disintegrated, exposing a skeletal claw.

The rot continued up his arm, to his torso and the rest of his body. Putrid hunks of flesh and decomposing organs fell into the dirt until finally the decay crept up his neck. White hair sprouted from his head; the skin on his face withered. His eyes dried up and shriveled until they became nothing more than two gaping sockets.

The once-human creature lurched to its feet still clutching the dagger. Its scream of pain now a murderous cry, it advanced on Urdek.

Kestrel turned and ran as fast as her nimble legs could carry her, not caring how much noise she made.

“Now can you tell me?”

Kestrel lowered the shotglass back to the table and shuddered—whether from the liquor or the memory of what she had witnessed earlier, she couldn’t say. She shook her head at Ragnall. “One more. At least.”

“You’ll regret this in the morning, you know. I’ve never known you to drink firewine before.” Nat’s firewine, the Bell’s house liquor, was said to be distilled from wine mulled in the inn’s washtub. It was also said to pack a nasty wallop. Despite his warning, Ragnall signaled to the barmaid for another shot.

Kestrel regarded her friend. At least, Ragnall was the closest thing she’d had to a friend in a long time—the fair-haired scoundrel had never betrayed her, which was more than she could say for most of her acquaintances.

The only person she’d ever really trusted in her life had been Quinn, the old rogue who had found her in a burned-out house when she’d been barely old enough to walk. Quinn had raised her as a daughter, at first trying to protect her from the shady side of his life but eventually teaching her everything he knew. At the age of seven she was winning bets from unsuspecting tavern patrons by throwing daggers with amazing accuracy. At nine, her mentor had deemed her old enough to dabble in minor illegal activities like picking pockets. By twelve she was learning more lucrative—but also more dangerous—skills.

Then Quinn had died.

That had been ten years ago, and she’d survived on her own ever since. All she had left of him was the knowledge he’d passed on to her and a custom-made club he’d commissioned. The compact steel baton was easy to conceal, but with the flick of a wrist it telescoped to thrice its size. She’d lost track of how many times the weapon—and Quinn’s training with it—had saved her life. While daggers were her weapon of choice, the club sometimes proved more practical.

Though there had been times when she’d wished for Quinn’s advice or guidance, years had passed since she wanted to talk to him as badly as she did tonight—not as a master thief, but as the only parental figure she’d ever known. The scene at the pool had shaken her more than she thought possible.

Quinn was gone, and she was an adult now. She pulled her thoughts back to the present conversation and Ragnall’s admonition about the firewine. “I’ll be fine,” she said. “You know I could drink you under this table if I wanted to.”

“I know,” he conceded. “I’ve witnessed it.”

Kestrel rarely drank to excess. In her profession, it was too risky not to be in full possession of one’s faculties. She didn’t intend to get drunk this evening, just dull the tingling in her collarbone. Though she’d fled Valjevo Castle hours ago, the sensation hadn’t ceased. If her adrenaline didn’t stop pumping at this rate, she’d be too exhausted to leave town in the morning.

Which is exactly what she planned to do. Phlan could keep its creepy Pool of Radiance and the undead creatures it spawned. She was moving on.

The serving wench returned with the liquor bottle. She refilled the shotglass, which Kestrel immediately emptied and slid forward for more.

“Slow down, Kes—you’ll make yourself ill.” Ragnall turned to the barmaid. “Bring us two tankards of ale instead.”

Kestrel made no objection. The firewine was burning a hole in her gut anyway. “And some bread and cheese,” she added.

She looked around, taking in the atmosphere of Nat Wyler’s Bell one last time. Though she’d called it home for several months, she wouldn’t miss this dingy little corner of Phlan. The common room had a hard-packed dirt floor and rushes that hadn’t been changed in years. The tables and walls were scratched and scarred. At its best, the fare was mediocre. Her corn-husk mattress upstairs was in desperate need of restuffing. The inn’s main appeal—its only appeal—was that Nat minded his own business and encouraged the serving girls and other patrons to do the same.

No, she wouldn’t miss the Bell, or Phlan as a whole. It was a place, just another place. By next week she’d be in a new one.

The food arrived. Kestrel tried to eat, but the doughy bread stuck in her throat. She washed it down with the ale, but it sat like a lump in her stomach.

“So tell me what happened.” Ragnall lifted his own tankard but set it down without drinking, his blue eyes narrowing. “He didn’t hurt you, did he?”

“Who?”

“The old goat in the market today.”

“No!” Kestrel snorted.

“What is it, then? I’ve never seen you quite like this.”

She stared at him a moment, debating. Would he think her crazy? On the other hand, what she’d witnessed today might make her crazy if she didn’t tell someone. She quaffed more ale and leaned forward.

“The Pool of Radiance has reappeared,” she said in a low voice.

Ragnall’s eyes widened. “You know this for a fact?”

“I saw it suck the life out of someone today—rotted his flesh right off his bones.”

He leaned back in his seat and let out a low whistle. “After we parted at the market, I heard a few rumors, but I didn’t put any stock in them.”

She frowned. “What kind of rumors?”

“Stories similar to yours. I guess several people—the number increases with each telling—have disappeared since last night, and others speak of undead creatures wandering the city. Like I said, I thought they were just bogeyman tales to keep children in line, but supposedly Elminster himself arrived tonight to investigate.”

“Elminster? How did he get here so fast? Or even hear about this?”

Ragnall shrugged. “How do wizards do anything?”

How indeed? Kestrel disliked spellcasters, considering them more treacherous than the sneakiest assassin. They were always muttering under their breaths, moving their hands in strange gestures, collecting odd substances. They gave her the creeps. Just when a body least expected it, they’d blow something up or send objects flying through the air. Or worse—set traps, like the one at the tower, that unleashed their sorcery long after the spellcaster had left the scene. She still bore a scar on her left wrist from trying to pick an ensorcelled lock three years ago.

“You going to report what you saw?” Ragnall asked.

“Yeah, right,” she said. “That’s what I need—to solicit a wizard’s notice. No thanks.”

“I hear there’s a reward.”

That got her attention. “What kind of reward?”

“One hundred gold pieces for a genuine firsthand account.” He broke a hunk of cheese off the wedge. “That’s what I heard anyway. Don’t know if it’s true.”

A hundred gold pieces. Kestrel had been debating the wisdom of trying to retrieve her treasure from its hiding spot near the pool. If she couldn’t get to it, the nobleman’s money pouch was all she had in the world, and any additional coins would make a big difference. Even if the rumors of reward proved false, perhaps she could convince Elminster that her tale was worth paying to hear.

She stood, immediately regretting the quick movement. A wave of dizziness rocked her. That firewine must have been more potent than she’d thought.

Ragnall extended a hand to steady her. “You all right?”

She nodded. The dizziness passed, but her head remained cloudy. “Fine. Where did you say Elminster was?”

“Meeting with the Council of Ten.” He snorted. “As if the blowhards who run this city could have anything useful to say. Why do you ask?”

She drained her tankard, tossed a few coins on the table, and fastened her cloak around her shoulders. “I’m off to see the wizard.”

Kestrel groaned and rolled over. She was going to kill whoever had stuffed her mouth with cotton. And glued her eyes shut. And now shone a lantern in her face.

Someone was sitting on her head.

Slowly, she forced one eye open. Then the other. Then both. Then squeezed them shut again.

She was back in her room at the Bell, lying facedown on her lumpy mattress. Sunlight poured in the window, sending darts of pain shooting through her eyes. Her head hurt so badly she feared her skull might explode.

Damn that firewine. And damn Ragnall—for being right about it.

By minuscule degrees, she pried herself off the mattress and into a sitting position. When the room stopped spinning, she glanced down. Relief flooded the tiny corners of her brain not occupied with processing pain signals. However intoxicated she’d been, she’d at least managed to pass out on top of the money pouch, preventing anyone from stealing it while she slept. Her thieves’ tools also remained undisturbed, as did the club secured to her belt. Her twin daggers, of course, remained untouched, one hidden in each boot.

No one else was in the room. Either Nat hadn’t rented out the other two beds last night, or the lodgers had risen and left. Either way, she was grateful for the solitude—she didn’t think she could bear the sound of even a whispering voice. The murmurs rising from the common room below were bad enough.

She crept over to the washstand, her body stiff from having slept in her leather armor. She splashed cold water on her cheeks and looked into the glass. Deep creases from her mattress webbed the skin on the left side of her face. She must not have budged all night.

What time had she returned to her room? She recalled drinking with Ragnall downstairs and his talk of Elminster. After that, she couldn’t remember anything specific. Had she really gone to see the old mage? Blurred images of a mysterious bearded man floated through her mind, but they could just as easily be remnants of a firewine-induced dream.

She pulled together her scattered thoughts and tried to clear the fog from her head. For someone who had planned to travel many miles from Phlan today, she was off to a poor start. From the strength of the sun, she judged the time to be close to noon. She needed to obtain provisions for her trip, collect her treasure from its hiding spot, and hit the road. Or the docks—she really ought to decide where she was going. Sembia, perhaps? Cormyr?

An hour later, her pack stocked with food and other supplies, Kestrel strode toward the castle. She’d considered leaving her stash behind and coming back for it later, but greed had gotten the better of her. Who knew when she’d return to the Moonsea? Her travels might never bring her here again. In the meantime, the thought of those riches just sitting beneath the rocks rankled her thief’s soul. The idea of starting over—of having to wait that much longer before living a life of ease—sank her heart.

Already her collarbone tingled. She ignored the sensation. She knew she headed toward danger, but she also trusted her ability to avoid it. Just get in, get the goods, and get out. That’s all she needed to do. Stay away from the water and be alert for any stray puddles.

As she entered the tower, she saw three figures near one end of the pool. She could tell from his uniform and standard-issue chain mail that one was a member of Phlan’s city patrol. The guard was a large man, at least six and a half feet tall, with a pair of the widest shoulders Kestrel had ever seen. Beside him stood a knight in full plate armor, the scales-and-warhammer symbol of Tyr emblazoned on his tabard. He wore a sword sheathed at his side and a war-hammer strapped to his back. A paladin, she assumed. He was about half a foot shorter than the guard and of a more average build. The third figure, a slender woman, wore brown leggings, leather knee-high boots, and a dark green cloak. She leaned on a wooden staff, listening to a conversation between the two men. The woman’s hood shadowed her visage and the fighters’ helmets obscured theirs, so Kestrel could not get a good look at any of their faces.

Silently, Kestrel berated herself. Of course, she should have guessed that in light of yesterday’s events the pool would draw investigators or gawkers today. She glanced around for evidence of the ill-fated brigands but saw no sign of them. Their bodies, if anything remained of them, must have been disposed of while she’d snored her way through the morning.

She assessed her surroundings. The cache lay on the other side of the strangers, but their focus seemed to be on the pool itself. If she moved very quietly and kept to the shadows as she circled around, she might manage to reach it without arousing the group’s notice. The exposed stairway was unavoidable, but if she didn’t take a chance she could grow old waiting for the trio to leave.

“Lord of Shadows preserve me,” she muttered. She crept to the stairway and slowly descended, hugging the wall to make as much use of the thin shadows as possible. When she reached the bottom, she started her cautious circle toward the rock pile. As she padded, she eavesdropped on the party’s conversation.

“So Elminster thinks this has something to do with goings-on in Myth Drannor?” the guard asked. “What does the ruined elven capital have to do with us?”

“From what he explained to me, he has suspected for weeks that someone has created a new Pool of Radiance there,” the woman said in a hushed tone. “Now with Phlan’s pool reawakened, he’s all but certain. Even as we guard this site, he’s trying to contact a party of adventurers he sent there to investigate. If they do find a new pool, they will destroy it—and whoever created it.”

“You sound sure about that,” the paladin said. “Those ruins have a reputation for eating adventurers alive.”

“These are not ordinary adventurers,” the woman replied. “Elminster hand-picked them, and they bear the Gauntlets of Moander—artifacts created specifically to destroy such pools. They will succeed where lesser parties would fail.”

Yeah, right, Kestrel thought. She’d heard her share of tales about thieves lured to the ancient elven city hoping to find untold riches in its ruins. She’d heard very few tales of thieves who’d actually returned. Elminster better have sent a score or more adventurers into that den of doom.

She made it about halfway to her goal before her foot slipped on some rubble. Damn! To Kestrel’s ears, the telltale scuffling sounded loud as a thunderclap.

“Who’s there?” the guard called out. All three of the figures now peered in her direction. “Show yourself!”

Kestrel paused, torn between trying to elude them and attempting to brazen it out. Before she could make up her mind, the hooded woman raised her hand, palm facing Kestrel’s direction, and murmured some words the thief couldn’t understand. A spellcaster! Kestrel turned to escape whatever sorcery was about to be hurled at her...

... And a moment later found herself unable to budge.

She tried to fight the magic, but her body refused to respond. Her feet, arms, even her mouth could not move. She was stuck in a half-twist, half-crouch, helpless to defend herself. Heart hammering, she watched the trio make its way toward her.

The paladin reached her first assessing her from head to heel. “A thief, by the look of her,” he said with obvious distaste. “Identify yourself!”

The sorceress approached. “She can’t speak until I release her from the spell.”

Gods, but Kestrel hated wizards! She’d not only lost control of the situation but of her own body. How long was the witch going to keep her like this? What did she plan in the meantime? Her vulnerability made Kestrel want to scream.

The paladin nodded toward the guard’s short bow. “Train that on her.” When the guard complied, the knight of Tyr unsheathed his long sword, pressed the tip of it beneath Kestrel’s chin, and met her gaze. His eyes were as gray as his steel and just as cold. “Don’t try anything foolish.” He lowered the blade but kept it drawn.

She wouldn’t. If the paladin didn’t cut her down first, Phlan’s guards were known to be quick to release a bowstring. Accurate with their aim, too—though at this range, the fighter could be blind and still hit her. Kestrel’s agility and weapons couldn’t help her now; she would have to rely on her wits.

The wizard spoke a command word, and Kestrel’s body sagged. The rogue caught herself from falling and stood upright to face her captors.

“Who are you and what are you doing here?” the paladin demanded.

She considered lying but decided a modified version of the truth might ring more genuine in the holy warrior’s ears. “My name is Kestrel, and—”

“Kestrel!” The guard lowered his bow. “You’re late!”

“I—I am?” She glanced from one member of the trio to the next. The paladin still regarded her warily, but the mage appeared suddenly guilt-stricken. The guard actually looked as if he were greeting an old friend. Did she know him—all of them—from somewhere?

“Er... yes. I am late,” she stated boldly. “I apologize. Profusely. Didn’t mean to keep you waiting.”

“We weren’t so much waiting as concerned,” the guard said. “I thought maybe you arrived before us and something happened.” He removed his helm, revealing coarse blond locks, a square jaw, and a neck thickly corded with muscles. “My name’s Durwyn. Like you, I volunteered to stand watch here.”

Volunteered? When in her life had she volunteered for anything? A sense of dread swept her. “Just... um, when did you volunteer for this duty, Durwyn?”

“Last night. Elminster told my commander that you and two others would be here today.”

Damn and double-damn Nat’s firewine! She’d actually gone to see Elminster and now couldn’t remember what transpired. What in the world had she gotten herself into?

The paladin cleared his throat to draw her attention from Durwyn. “Tell me if you would, Kestrel, what you were doing skulking about if you indeed came to stand guard with us?”

A fair question, but his tone chafed nonetheless. The inflections of his voice suggested noble birth. Holy warrior or not, if he thought she’d tolerate arrogant condescension very long, he was sorely mistaken.

She lifted her chin. “Spying on you, of course. You don’t expect me to put my trust in people I know nothing about, do you? I was trying to judge what sort of folk I’m to work with.”

“Honest ones. Which, I imagine, is more than we can expect from you.”

She bit back the retort she would have liked to let fly. Paladins of Tyr, if indeed that’s what this knight was, were known for their self-righteous sense of honor and justice. Rogues avoided them like the gallows. “You mind tossing me your name between all the insults?”

“Corran D’Arcey, Defender of Tyr the Even-Handed, and third son of Baron Ethelred D’Arcey of Sarshel.”

So, she’d guessed correctly. A paladin of Tyr and a blue-blood. She held his gaze without blinking, determined to show him that his titles did not intimidate her. “I’ll just call you Corran for short.”

“And I’ll just—”

“Aren’t we supposed to be guarding a pool here, Corran?” she asked.

The rebuke silenced him for a beat. “Yes, we are,” he said tightly. He sheathed his sword and strode back to stand nearer the water.

In the awkward quiet that ensued, Durwyn shrugged and followed him.

Kestrel was disappointed to be left standing with the sorceress and not the guard. Durwyn seemed kind but not particularly bright—the perfect source to pump for more information about what she’d gotten herself into. The spellcaster, on the other hand, made her nervous.

The mage, who had not yet spoken to Kestrel, drew back her cowl. By her gold-flecked blue eyes and slightly pointed ears, Kestrel guessed her to be of partial elven descent. Moon elf, judging from the bluish tinge to her ears and chin. “I am Ghleanna Stormlake,” she said. “Had I known your identity, I would not have thrown that spell.”

Kestrel could not tell whether Ghleanna’s words held contrition or criticism. Was she supposed to have strutted into the tower declaiming her name?

“Apology accepted,” she said, whether one had been offered or not. Then, deciding Ghleanna could prove informative, she added, “I should have arrived on time.”

The mage’s lips formed a half-smile. “Elminster told me you might have a... headache... when you awoke.”

Kestrel felt her face grow warm. She’d not only been drunk but also obvious about it. No doubt the wizard had taken advantage of her compromised state to coerce her into this volunteer duty. She thought of the conversation she’d overhead as she arrived in the cavern earlier. “Elminster seems to tell you a lot of things.”

“I am one of his apprentices. When he left this morn to investigate tidings from Shadowdale, he asked me to keep an eye on events here in Phl—”

A crackle of energy suddenly rent the air. Not ten paces away, a floating, glowing ball of white light appeared. It expanded, forming a window in its center as sounds of ringing steel and battle cries filled the air.

“A gate!” Ghleanna exclaimed.

Corran and Durwyn rushed over. “To where?” Corran asked.

The window elongated to the size of a door, allowing brief glimpses of the combatants. A besieged fighter stumbled into view, overwhelmed by an unseen opponent. “By all that’s holy, help us!” he cried.

“That’s Athan—one of the adventurers Elminster sent to Myth Drannor.” Ghleanna cried. “They must be in trouble!”

The border of the gate flashed and hissed, like a flame being extinguished. The window winked. When their view returned, Athan could no longer be seen. The sounds of battle continued, mixed with cries of the dying. Just outside visual range, a terrible moaning commenced.

“We must aid them!” Corran started toward the gate.

“Are you out of your mind?” Kestrel asked. No way was she stepping into some sort of magical portal. If the sorcery didn’t swallow them up forever, they’d only be spit out into the middle of whatever was happening on the other end.

“We’re not supposed to leave our post.” Durwyn said.

“This is more important,” Ghleanna answered. “If Athan’s band fails, all Faerûn could be lost! Make up your own minds, but I am going.” She stepped into the gate. It flashed violet light, obscuring both the mage and the Myth Drannor scene from view.

“She’s crazy,” Kestrel declared.

“No—she’s honorable and committed to a greater good,” Corran retorted. “Something a rogue wouldn’t know anything about.”

She glared at Corran. “So follow her, then!”

The gate hissed and sputtered, its light turning pale blue, then a sickly green. The window began to shrink.

“I will—and so will you!” So quickly she couldn’t react, Corran grabbed her by the arm and dragged her into the gate.

She shouted her objection, but the sound was swallowed up by a vacuum. She found herself surrounded by black nothingness, the extradimensional space seeming to stretch to eternity. Corran still held her arm in an iron grip. Involuntarily, she grabbed his elbow just to have something solid to hold onto. They floated, propelled only by the momentum with which they’d entered. Far in the distance, she could see the battle scene in Myth Drannor taking place through a window.

A window that was closing.

They were going to be trapped in here! A frightful rumbling surrounded them as the window ahead wavered. Suddenly, the space didn’t seem so vast anymore. In fact, it felt close. Her chest tightened as she gasped for air. The rumbling repeated, accented by flashing golden light from either end of the portal.

Corran turned toward her, mouthing words she could not hear. She didn’t need to hear them—they were the same words running through her own mind.

The gate was collapsing.

CHAPTER TWO

Helpless, Kestrel and Corran bobbed along, unable to speed their progress toward the shrinking exit. They were near enough now that they could see the broken cobblestones of the street where Athan’s band fought, but at this rate they’d never reach it before the window closed.

Kestrel’s mind raced. They needed something, some fixed object, off which to push.

Or pull.

It was a long shot, but it just might work. She shrugged out of her backpack and brought it around so that she could dig through it with her free hand. In the wan light coming from the exit, she groped through the contents until her fingers brushed against a metal claw.

Corran saw her withdraw the grappling hook and nodded in understanding. He maneuvered her ahead of him to give her a clear shot at the window, then shifted his grip to her waist to free both her arms.

She’d never made such a long throw before, but they were running out of time. She cast the hook. Unencumbered by air resistance, it sailed through the exit and caught hold of an upturned cobblestone. Thank the gods!

She began to pull herself forward. Corran released her and also grabbed the rope. As the portal rumbled and flashed orange light, they desperately pulled themselves hand over hand, the rope trailing behind them as they reached the exit. They tumbled through. Kestrel rolled to an abrupt stop, striking a solid object.

A body.

She sat up, quickly assessing the scene. Three more bodies—all of them motionless—lay sprawled in the street. A band of five orcs scavenged two of the corpses.

They’d arrived too late.

“Get your filthy claws off them!” Ghleanna shouted from behind her. She turned in time to see the mage lift her hands and send three bursts of magical energy speeding toward the snouted humanoids.

The orcs dove to the ground, but the missiles corrected their course and hit three of the creatures. One orc, struck in the head, died instantly. The other two suffered chest wounds but managed to climb back to their feet, axes in hand. With a cry of retribution, all four remaining orcs now rushed Ghleanna.

Kestrel rolled out of their path, yanked a dagger from her boot and threw it. The weapon caught one of the orcs in the neck. Her victim sank to its knees, but with a series of inhuman grunts, it struggled to its feet. Tightly gripping its short sword, the beast staggered toward Kestrel. Its eyes held the expression of a mad animal.

Kestrel bent to reach her second dagger. A second hit would finish off the humanoid. Before she withdrew the blade, however, the orc collapsed.

She glanced around to see whether any of the remaining orcs approached. Corran, who’d landed several yards away when he tumbled out of the gate, had engaged two of the beasts. The skill with which he deflected the orcs’ blows bespoke the superior training of a nobleman. He fought with controlled, precise strokes that countered his opponents’ brute swings.

A thunderclap boomed so loud that it shook the street. Kestrel spun to discover the sound came from the gate, which now wavered violently and glowed flaming red. The rope attached to her grappling hook still trailed inside. What would happen to her tool if the portal shut with the rope still inside? The gods only knew when they might need it next.

A quick glance toward Ghleanna, who was releasing another volley of sorcerous missiles, indicated that the mage held her own for the moment. Kestrel grasped the rope and tugged.

It was stuck.

She pulled harder. The rope remained taut, but she could feel vibrations along it coming from within the gate. What was going on inside?

A moment later, a familiar figure tumbled through and landed at her feet. Kestrel yanked the rope out of the portal. Within seconds, the gate shuddered and imploded, disappearing from sight. At the same time, the sounds of combat ceased.

She offered Durwyn a hand. “I thought you weren’t going to leave your post?”

He grasped her arm and rose. “I got lonely.”

She looked toward Ghleanna and Corran, who had dispatched the last of the orcs. “I can think of many places I’d rather seek company than here,” Kestrel said, turning back to Durwyn. “We’re lucky we even made it.”

He nodded toward her grappling hook. “I saw you and Corran ahead of me and grabbed the rope as soon as I could. That was quick thinking on your part. I never would have made it out in time.”

“None of us would have.” She harbored a bellyful of resentment toward Corran. How dare he force her into that malfunctioning magical gate, nearly killing them both? She shuddered to think of her fate had she been trapped inside during the final implosion.

Durwyn joined Corran and Ghleanna, who were checking the fallen adventurers for signs of life. Kestrel hung back. As she coiled her rope, she thought about how much she wanted to wrap it around Corran’s neck. Instead she stowed it and the grappling hook in her pack. She retrieved her dagger, noting her surroundings as she cleaned it.

They’d arrived on a street lined with buildings in various states of destruction. Even in its ruined condition Kestrel could see that Myth Drannor had once been a city of incredible beauty. The wood, stone, and glass buildings of the former elven capital had been constructed as extensions of the very trees that sheltered them, wondrous feats of architecture that enhanced nature even as they altered it. Spires soared toward the sky, prompting Kestrel to raise her eyes. In doing so, she discovered a network of bridges that spanned the trees.

Now many of the bridges were destroyed, and the buildings below looked like an earthquake had violently shaken them. Broken spires lay in fragments on the ground, their jagged stumps rising no higher toward the stars than did human constructions. Collapsed walls exposed the rooms they had been meant to protect, inviting creatures mundane and malicious to make their homes within. Statues of exquisite elven maidens lacked limbs or heads and stood watch over dry fountains choked with moss and debris. Weeds and thorns overtook the gardens. Rubble littered the streets.

A feeling of sadness, unfamiliar but genuine, washed over Kestrel. Something more than a city had been lost here.

At last she approached the others.

“You certainly took your time coming over,” Corran said. He gestured toward the adventurers. “They’re all dead—if you care.”

“Good thing we almost killed ourselves getting here, then,” she responded. “You had no right to force me into that portal.”

“You would stand idly by while others suffered?”

“This isn’t my problem.”

“You did volunteer,” Durwyn piped up.

Was he ganging up on her too, now? She fixed him with a withering gaze that caused the burly man to step back a pace. “My commitment began and ended in Phlan,” she said.

Corran shook his head in disgust. “Don’t you have the least concern for anyone besides yourself?”

“I saved your arse in that damn gate, didn’t I?”

“Enough!” Ghleanna, her expression strained, stepped between them. “Corran, she’s right—you shouldn’t have forced her to come. Kestrel, now that we are here, can we at least search for clues to what happened?”

“Sure,” Kestrel responded, her gaze remaining locked on Corran. She’d settle this later.

The adventurers appeared to have been dead for hours. Ghleanna hypothesized that time had become distorted in the malfunctioning gate, suspending the travelers in limbo much longer than the few seconds usually required to journey through one. The party also looked to have suffered wounds the orcs could not have inflicted.

“I believe their opponents wielded magic,” Ghleanna said. “Look at those deep burns on Allyril, the party’s sorceress. Ordinary fire doesn’t burn skin quite that way—I suspect lightning bolts. The cleric over there seems to have had the life drained right out of him, as does Loren. Athan is missing. I—I fear he was disintegrated altogether.” She cleared her throat and looked away.

Corran uttered the opening words of a prayer for the ill-fated band’s souls. Kestrel, never one to take much interest in religious observances, rolled her eyes but remained silent during the invocation. As she waited, paying little attention to the words, she noticed a smooth rectangular bulge under the cloak of the man Ghleanna had called Loren. When the paladin finished his prayer, she bent over the body to investigate.

“Have you no respect?” Corran hissed.

“What? I thought you were done.”

“You would steal from the corpses of fallen comrades?”

She clenched her jaw, fresh ire rising within her. If Ghleanna or Durwyn had reached for that object, he wouldn’t have said a word. “I thought we were investigating what happened here.” Pointedly turning her back on him, she unclasped Loren’s cloak, slipped her hand into its inside pocket, and withdrew a slim book. She opened its leaves, quickly skimming the pages. “It’s a journal.”

Corran reached for it. “Let me see.”

Kestrel snatched the volume out of his grasp. “I can read.” She flipped to the end, hoping the last few entries would prove the most informative.

Elminster was right, the last page read. A new Pool of Radiance exists somewhere in Myth Drannor. The pool’s creators know our mission and already send agents to stop us, even though we have not yet learned who’s behind the plan. Fortunately, we still have the Gauntlets of Moander, and once we find the pool we shall use them to destroy it. Mystra—and Fate—willing.

Kestrel read the passage aloud. When she finished, Ghleanna turned to Corran.

“I saw no gauntlets when we examined the adventurers,” the mage said, a note of panic in her voice. “Did you?”

“No, but we weren’t looking for them, either,” he said. “Let’s check again.”

Their search yielded several vials of bluish liquid, a plain, battered silver ring sized for a woman’s hand, an assortment of weapons, and numerous other provisions—but no Gauntlets of Moander.

“Well, we will just have to tell Elminster what happened and let him worry about it,” Kestrel said. She turned to Ghleanna. “So go ahead and do your thing.”

The mage regarded her quizzically. “My thing?”

“You know,” she prompted. “Conjure up one of those gate things so we can get out of here.” As much as she hated the thought of trusting another magical portal, twilight approached, and she was even less enamored with the idea of spending the night in this haunted city overrun with the minions of some unknown foe.

Ghleanna was silent a moment. “I cannot do that, Kestrel,” she said finally. “I have not the power.”

“What do you mean?” A sick feeling spread through her insides. “We’re not stuck here, are we?”

“You’re welcome to try to find your way out of the city and walk home,” Corran said. “As for me, I choose to take up this party’s mission. The cause of good cannot afford the time it would take us to reach Elminster. We must instead pick up where these fallen worthies left off.”

Kestrel stared at him. The paladin really had an over-inflated sense of his own honor. Fallen worthies, indeed. Did anyone actually talk like that?

“Yes, we must!” Durwyn exclaimed.

She closed her eyes. Of course Durwyn would follow the knight. He was lost without a commander, and apparently he’d settled on Corran as his new one.

“I’m glad you both agree,” Ghleanna said. “I would have taken up this quest alone if I had to.”

Kestrel sighed. Was she alone possessed of sense? “Aren’t you all forgetting a few facts?” she asked. “Our foes already defeated the original party—we’re fewer in number and less prepared. Even if we do manage to find this new pool, what are we going to do when we get there? Skip stones across it? The bad guys have the gauntlets.”

“But we have the advantage of surprise,” Corran said. “They won’t be expecting a new party so soon. We can figure out the rest as we go along—we haven’t even read the whole journal yet.”

She bowed her head, rubbing her temples. They were insane. All of them. They would end up dead, and they wanted to take her with them.

Yet would she fare any better trying to make it out of the city, through the forest, and back to civilization alone?

“Kestrel, you were really smart back there in the portal,” Durwyn said. “We could sure use your help.”

As if she had a choice. Get killed here or get killed trying to leave here. Nonetheless, if she was stuck on this suicide mission, there was one thing she wouldn’t tolerate. She looked up at Corran. “No more insults from you.”

“Agreed.”

She glanced at Durwyn and Ghleanna. “All right then.”

Ghleanna responded by suddenly raising her palms and hurling a spell at her. Kestrel dived to the ground. “What the—”

A burst of light appeared about ten paces behind her, followed immediately by an inhuman cry. A hideous creature stumbled out of the shadows, clutching at its eyes. The thing appeared to have once been human but now was a disfigured shell of its former self. Sharp, elongated teeth protruded from its mouth like fangs; the nails on its withered hands had grown into talons. Its dried-out flesh, visible through tattered clothing, hung tight on its bones.

“A ghoul!” Corran drew his sword and attacked. His first blow severed one of its skeletal arms. Black liquid spewed from the stump. Sightless, thanks to Ghleanna’s spell, the ghoul could only blindly lash out with its remaining claw in defense.

Durwyn joined Corran’s side and swung his battle axe. He hit the creature in the side. The ghoul moaned and swiped its talons at the guard.

“Don’t let it touch you!” Corran warned. With a mighty swing to the ghoul’s neck, the paladin made quick work of the weakened creature. Its head fell to the ground and rolled several feet. Kestrel was glad it stopped at an angle that hid its hideous face.

“I take it you’ve faced ghouls before?” Ghleanna asked Corran as he and Durwyn cleaned the ghoul’s foul blood off their weapons.

The paladin nodded. “Several times. They’re nasty creatures—their touch can paralyze. If you’re killed by a ghoul, you’ll become one too, unless it eats all your flesh first. They feed on corpses.” He glanced at the dead adventurers and orcs. “It must have been attracted by the bodies. We should bury them before the sun fully sets, when the creatures will probably come out in droves. Where there’s one there are sure to be more.”

“Do we have time?” Ghleanna asked. “I’m almost out of spells, and we still need to find shelter for ourselves.”

“I hate to leave them here unprotected,” the paladin said. “These heroes died noble deaths—their remains deserve better than to become ghoul fodder.”

Kestrel gestured toward one of the ruined buildings she’d studied earlier. “If we move the adventurers in there and leave the orcs out in the street, perhaps the ghouls will be satisfied with the easy meal.” She expected Corran to dismiss the idea simply because she had suggested it. To her surprise, he agreed.

“We should also keep their equipment for our own use,” she added. “It can’t help them now.”

He opened his mouth to say something but seemed to change his mind. “I suppose.”

They distributed the goods amongst themselves. For the time being, Ghleanna carried the vials, planning to examine them later to see if she could identify their contents. Durwyn added several dozen arrows to his supply. Corran offered Kestrel an ordinary-looking dagger Loren had been carrying. “You seem to know how to use these.”

“Thanks.” She gestured toward the ring. “I’ll take that too, if no one minds. It won’t fit either of you.”

“And it can be sold for a fair price when we return, right?” Corran said dryly. He glanced at the others, then tossed it to her. “It’s yours.”

She slid the dagger into a sheath on her belt and slipped the ring on her right middle finger where it wouldn’t impede the dexterity of her dominant left hand.

They had just moved the last body into the makeshift crypt when a shout drifted out of another nearby building.

“Leave that alone! Hey—leave me alone! Scat! Scat, I tell ye! Git yer stinkin’ carcasses outta here! Hey—help!”

They hurried off in the direction of the cries, following them to a well-fortified building that looked as if it might once have been an armory. A foul stench issued forth, one that reminded Kestrel of the undead bandit she’d seen last night beside Phlan’s pool.

Within, they found a half dozen rotting, animated orc corpses in tattered clothing circling what appeared to be a peddler’s wagon. Atop it, fending off the creatures with anything he could lay his hands on, perched a very irritated halfling. His leather armor seemed to deflect most of the zombies’ claws, but a few scratch marks marred his arms and round, ruddy cheeks.

“Git back, I said!” He brained the nearest creature with a cast-iron frying pan, then tossed a basket over the head of another. “Whew! Ye need some perfume!” He unstopped a vial and flung its contents in the eyes of a third.

Durwyn moved to engage the undead beings, but Corran stayed him. The paladin stepped forward. “Foul creatures of darkness!” he called out in a commanding tone.

The zombies turned in the direction of his voice and staggered toward their new target, arms outstretched.

“Great,” Kestrel muttered. Now the creatures were coming to attack them. At least these things moved slowly. Just as she was about to draw the twin daggers from her boots, Corran held a silver symbol of Tyr aloft.

“Begone!” he cried. “Trouble this man no more!”

The creatures moaned and tried to shield their eyes as they backed away. They shuffled jerkily toward a rear exit and out into the night. Within minutes the armory was free of their presence, though their odor lingered.

The halfling scrambled down from his perch and over to Corran. “Thank ye, sir,” he said, removing his red knit cap and sweeping into a bow that revealed the start of a bald spot in the center of his thin brown curls. “Nottle’s the name. Purveyor of the finest equipment and goods in all Myth Drannor.” He straightened. “An’ who might ye be?”

“Corran D’Arcey, Defender of Tyr. These are my companions, Durwyn, Kestrel, and Ghleanna Stormlake.”

“Well met!” Nottle bowed again in greeting, then stooped to retrieve his merchandise. He hung the frying pan back on the wagon and picked up a quarterstaff from the floor. “Usually I can fend off the beasts m’self, but t’night they got m’staff away from me.”

“This happens all the time?” Kestrel asked. “Why do you stay?”

“Business is good here, m’dear,” he said. “Adventurers comin’ and goin’, all thinkin’ they’re gonna strike it rich, then discoverin’ they ain’t as prepared as they thought they were. That’s where I come in. Actually, the place has gotten a little less dangerous lately—them dreadful alhoon and phaerimm creatures have left this part of the city. The baatezu, too. ’Course, now we have the drow and undead to put up with, so it’s not exac’ly paradise. Say, are ye needin’ anythin? I’ll cut ye a deal, seeing as Corran here saved my wagon just now.”

“Drow?” Ghleanna asked.

“Indeed, m’dear. They mostly stay below, in the dungeons, but I’ve seen a few here on the surface. At night, a’course.”

Kestrel shuddered. She’d never encountered a drow before, but she’d heard tales of the ruthless subterranean elven race. They were said to have dark skin, shockingly white hair, and no mercy.

“An adventuring band was killed today not far from here,” Corran said. “Did you ever do business with them?”

“Athan’s band? Sad thing, that—them gittin’ killed. I hope they weren’t friends of yers?” He lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Word is, the scarred mages got ’em.”

At the mention of scarred mages, a tingle raced along Kestrel’s collarbone.

“Who are the scarred mages?” Though she asked the question, she wasn’t sure she wanted to learn the answer. “No one knows fer certain. We jes’ started seein’ ’em one day. I think they got somethin’ to do with the goings-on at the castle. Dunno why they killed yer friends, but I might be able to find out.” He paused, a mercenary glint creeping into his dark eyes. “That kinda information... it don’t come cheap.”

“They weren’t our friends,” Kestrel said. Corran looked at her sharply, probably ready to accuse her of betraying the heroes’ memory or some nonsense like that, but she didn’t care. This little guy was a talker, and if the ill-fated party had disfigured wizards after them, she didn’t need word spread around town that friends of the dead adventurers had come to avenge them. “We just saw them lying in the street and wondered.”

“Curiosity ain’t generally healthy in Myth Drannor,” he said. “But I owe ye for scarin’ off those zombies, so if ye find yerselves needin’ information, come to me. If I don’t know the answer, I can usually find out.”

“Have you heard anything about a Pool of Radiance?” Durwyn blurted.

Gods! If he hadn’t been wearing armor, Kestrel would have kicked the big, dumb warrior for being so obvious.

Nottle scratched his head. “Can’t say as I have.” He pulled a canvas tarp over the wagon. “That some sort of landmark round here? You wanna to talk to the elves up at the shrine—coupl’a Mystra clerics, Beriand and Faeril. They can maybe tell ye more.” He lifted his staff and muttered a word Kestrel couldn’t discern, apparently securing his goods for the night.

The peddler turned back to the group. “The shrine’s hidden in a big tree stump. Head down the street—ye’ll see it.” He patted the many pockets of his oversized vest, then reached inside one to withdraw a scroll. “Ye’ll be needin’ this. Study the word on it afore ye git to the shrine. That should git ye in.”

Corran reached for the proffered scroll. “Thank you, Nottle.”

The halfling paused before handing it over. “We’re square now, right? Ye helped me, I’m helping ye, and that’s the end of it.”

The paladin appeared bemused, but Kestrel knew where Nottle was coming from. He didn’t want to be in their debt. “Yep, Nottle, we’re even,” she said.

He released the scroll to Corran’s grasp. “Best of luck to ye, then. An’ remember, if ye find yerselves needin’ any goods...”

They found the ruined shrine as Nottle described. An enormous tree trunk—easily as wide as any ordinary church Kestrel had seen in Faerûn’s human cities—stood at the end of the road. Mystra’s symbol, a circle of seven stars, had been carved into the bark, and a walkway had been hewn out of the wood about one story up. It wasn’t much, as far as temples went, but at least the building was intact. Kestrel could not, however, discern an entrance to the shrine or any stairs up to the walkway.

Though they had all studied the scroll, they’d agreed Ghleanna should speak the password. The sorceress possessed the most knowledge of things magical and had elven blood besides. In her distrust of the arcane arts, Kestrel was perfectly happy to leave the task to the half-elf.

As they approached the stump, a deep, booming masculine voice rent the air. “Tam-tamak!” They all jumped, startled, at the thunderous enunciation. The word resonated as if one of the gods themselves had uttered it.

Before their eyes, the tree stump transformed into an exquisite celebration of Mystra. Intricate renderings of the goddess and other decorative carvings emerged from the bark. A wide staircase leading up to the walkway also emerged. At its head appeared double doors marked with Mystra’s symbol. Ionic columns with flowing scrollwork flanked the opening.

They hastened up the stairs. When they reached the top, the doors slid open to reveal a small antechamber. The party had barely passed through when the wall sealed itself shut behind them, leaving them in darkness.

“Who enters Mystra’s house?” demanded a strong female voice. Kestrel searched the darkness but saw no sign of the speaker.

“Travelers who respect the Lady of Mysteries and seek aid from her faithful,” Corran replied.

A moment later, a ball of light appeared, illuminating the room and the woman who had spoken. She was an elf, with shoulder-length braided hair the color of pure gold and a round face dominated by the bluest eyes Kestrel had ever seen. Golden flecks within them caught the light, as did a medallion around her neck engraved with Mystra’s circle. The armor of a fighter protected her sinewy body, and she carried herself with strength and confidence. Had she been human, Kestrel would have guessed her to have seen thirty-five or more summers, but she had no idea how old that would make the woman in elf years.

“Then welcome, friends,” the elf said. “My name is Faeril. How came you to learn the password to this safe house?”

“From a scroll given us by Nottle the peddler.”

The corners of her mouth turned up in a half-smile. “Then Nottle must think well of you, though I am sure you paid him dearly. Here you will find shelter, food, and if you need it, healing. We merely ask that you share the password only with those of good heart.”

“A promise freely given,” Corran replied.

Faeril bade them follow her and led them through a short passage into a room with a makeshift altar, a cook-fire, and half a dozen cots that Kestrel guessed had been pews at one time. “This used to be the shrine’s sacristy, but now we use it for everything—worship, nursing, and daily living,” Faeril explained.

The chamber looked like a room hewn out of a tree trunk. Every surface was of wood—floor, walls, ceiling, furniture. The one exception was a pair of crystal cabinets etched with circles of stars. Though it appeared that the room had held windows at one time, the tree’s outer bark had overgrown the openings. As a result, the shrine was well-fortified, but dark.

The cook fire provided the chamber’s only light besides Faeril’s free-floating orb. A moment’s study revealed that it gave off no smoke. Kestrel suspected it was a magical flame, one that would heat food without burning down the shrine.

An older elf, perhaps the human equivalent of sixty-five, knelt before the altar but rose when the party entered. Unlike Faeril, he wore the simple garb of a cleric. A length of white cloth was wrapped around his waist and secured over one shoulder. His other shoulder and half his torso remained bare. He seemed to have begun losing muscle mass in his upper body, but his chest did not yet have the sunken appearance of an older man. The elf’s graying hair flowed to his shoulders, and around his neck, barely visible beneath a pointed beard, he wore a medallion that matched Faeril’s.

He took several steps toward them on bare feet. His eyes, dark as coal but warm as a summer rain, seemed to look not at the foursome but past them. After a moment, Kestrel realized why: The older cleric was blind.

“You are new in Myth Drannor, yes?” the holy man inquired. Though handicapped by blindness, he had a strong, self-assured voice. “I am Beriand, Mystra’s servant. Welcome to our sanctuary.”

The group answered the elves’ inquiry as to whether any of the party needed healing, and gratefully accepted an invitation to partake of an evening meal. Kestrel was so hungry she almost could have eaten the Bell’s five-day potluck soup. Almost. Fortunately, the clerics’ vegetable stew looked and smelled far more appealing.

Corran and Durwyn removed their armor before the meal. Eased of the burden of its weight, they relaxed visibly. Even their faces appeared less strained. Kestrel took the opportunity to study the paladin. Sweat dampened his short dark hair, which had been trapped beneath his helmet most of the day. Though he appeared less intimidating without his armor, Corran was still a formidable figure. His carriage revealed a man confident of his place in the world. He moved about as if he had a right to be there—wherever “there” was at the moment, be it the streets of Myth Drannor, the pool cavern of Valjevo castle, or this temple to a god not his own.

Durwyn, by contrast, appeared ill at ease in the shrine. He moved as if trying to confine his large body to the smallest space possible, a trait she hadn’t noticed when they were in battle or out of doors. Was it the temple, she wondered? Did he feel out of his element because this was a holy setting, or was he comfortable only in a combat environment?

The makeshift shelter had only three chairs, so the whole group sat in a half-circle on the floor as they ate. Beriand and Faeril sat in the center, with Ghleanna and Corran on one side of them. Kestrel and Durwyn sat on the other.

During the repast, the clerics explained how they came to be in Myth Drannor. “Few elves venture to this haunted city,” Beriand said. “Since the year our race finally abandoned Myth Drannor altogether, our leaders have discouraged return, and the evil creatures who overtook its streets and dwellings did their part to deter all but the most stalwart—or foolish.”

“Yet you came,” Kestrel said between hungry mouthfuls.

“We were called,” he responded.

“Beriand had visions that led us here,” Faeril explained. “He saw Mystra amid the ruins of Myth Drannor.”

“I believe it was a ‘genesis vision’—an image sent by Mystra to summon us here, back to where our sect began.” Though sightless, Beriand’s eyes shone with devotion to his goddess. “Our sect was founded in this city centuries ago by a priestess of Mystra named Anorrweyn Evensong.”

“Several months ago we journeyed here with six other clerics,” Faeril said. “But we never reached Anorrweyn’s temple. When we arrived at the city Heights, someone launched a huge fireball at our party. It killed all but the two of us.”

Corran gasped. “Unprovoked? Who would do such a thing to holy men and women?”

“We still do not know,” said Beriand. “We retreated into an undercity complex carved out long ago by dwarves, only to find the so-called ‘dwarven dungeons’ crawling with drow. Such an abomination would not be possible if the Mythal were functioning properly.”

Kestrel set aside her empty bowl. “The Mythal? What’s the Mythal?”

“The city’s ancient protective magic,” Faeril said. “Centuries ago, Myth Drannor’s most powerful wizards—including your human Elminster—came together to weave a protective spell that encompassed the entire city like a mantle. We suspect, however, that of late it has become corrupted.”

“I believe that is why Mystra summoned us here,” Beriand said. “As elves, we are naturally attuned to the Mythal. Though the magical Weave remains strong, many of its threads bear a foreign taint. The contamination has worsened in the time we have been here.”

Faeril offered more stew to the travelers. When Corran and Durwyn accepted, she rose to serve it. “It has been rough going since our arrival,” she said over her shoulder as she ladled the food. “We were forced to retreat to this shrine, and most days so much violence rocks the streets that we cannot leave. By day it is orcs, and by night, swarms of undead. But there are many here who need our ministry—we have saved many lives—and the Mythal must somehow be purified. So we stay.” She returned with two more steaming bowls.

Corran thanked her as she handed one to him. “In your time here, have you heard any talk of something called the Pool of Radiance?”

Faeril glanced at Beriand, whose face betrayed no hint of recognition. “Only from another band of travelers like yourselves,” she said. “They also seek it, but we had no information to help them.”

“Athan and his band were allies of ours,” said Corran, “but they were killed this day. Do you know what happened to them?”

Faeril gasped at the news. “These are ill tidings indeed. Athan was a fine warrior, one of the best men I have ever known.”

Beriand’s expression also saddened. “We had not heard—greatly we rue their passing. I know only that they had just come from the Room of Words, a chamber high up in the Onaglym, or House of Gems.”

Kestrel wondered if the tales she’d heard of Myth Drannor’s riches might prove true after all. A whole house full of gems? “What were they doing there?”

“They had recently found an item known as the Ring of Calling,” Beriand said. “They believed it would grant them access to the city’s acropolis—or the ‘Heights’—but first they needed to break the ring’s bond to its previous owner. They went to the Onaglym’s Room of Words in hopes of finding a command word that would free the ring from the skeletal arm on which they found it I do not know whether their research proved successful.”

At Beriand’s mention of a ring, Kestrel removed her newly acquired one and put it in the cleric’s hand. “We found this on one of the adventurers. Is it the Ring of Calling?”

He shook his head immediately. “Alas, no. The Ring of Calling is mysteriously bonded to the skeletal arm of its last wearer. No amount of physical force, nor any of the magic Athan’s band attempted, could remove it.” He gave Kestrel’s ring back to her. “Did you find any such ring?”

“No.”

He sighed. “Then I can only assume that whoever killed the party now has the ring, and searches for the enabling word themselves.”

“Back in the Room of Words?” Ghleanna asked.

“That is the most likely place to find it,” said Beriand. “The chamber is a repository of books containing words that power magical items. When Coronal Eltargrim Irithyl opened the elven capital city to other races, the dwarves came despite their distrust of magic. But later, when they built the House of Gems as their stronghold, they created the Room of Words to feel more empowered over the city’s many magical devices.” Beriand chuckled. “They thought if they could just collect all the enabling words in one place, they could somehow protect themselves.”

Kestrel didn’t think the dwarves’ idea sounded all that silly—at least it was some action against the mysteries of sorcery.

“Why did Athan’s band need the ring to reach the Heights?” Durwyn asked. “Couldn’t they just walk there?”

“The wars that brought down Myth Drannor left the city’s surface in such ruin that many sections are cut off from one another by huge piles of rubble from collapsed buildings and walls,” Faeril said. “We are now in a section called the Northern Ruins; the Heights holds the Speculum, Castle Cormanthor, and other important buildings. The only way to move between the districts is through the undercity created by the elves and dwarves over the centuries. The Ring of Calling can unseal a door inside the dwarven dungeons that leads to the Heights.”

“It sounds like our first step is visiting this Room of Words,” Corran said. “If we’re lucky, we’ll find the band’s killers there searching for the ring’s enabling word and we can get the ring back from them.”

No, if we’re lucky, they will be long gone and we’ll have to abandon this futile quest and go home, Kestrel wanted to say. Luck, however, didn’t seem to be on her side these past few days.

“How do we get to the House of Gems?” Ghleanna asked.

“Through the dwarven dungeons,” Beriand responded. “They connect to an isolated tower in the House of Gems. The tower is sealed from the outside, so the dungeons are the only way in. I must warn you, though—the undercity corridors are filled with orcs and undead. In fact, so many of the creatures were using the dungeons as a highway to this part of the city that I sealed the entrance. Rest here for the night to refresh your strength before challenging their numbers.”

“In the morning, we will direct you to the doors,” said Faeril. “Beriand sealed them with the Glyph of Mystra. Before you leave, study the book lying open on the altar. It contains the Word of Mystra, a command so powerful that it can be learned only through study, not by simply hearing it. Knowing the Word of Mystra will grant you entry through any portal marked with the goddess’s symbol. Doors marked with other glyphs, however, require different words of opening.”

Words of opening. The Mythal. Magical gates. The Ring of Calling. As Kestrel lay on her cot that night, her head swam with it all. This morning, her sole thought had been leaving Phlan. Well, she’d left it all right—and now only hoped to get back alive. How had everything spun out of her control so quickly?

Damn Nat’s firewine!

CHAPTER THREE

At sunrise, supplied with directions and rations from the clerics, the foursome left the elven shelter and hiked to the entrance of the dwarven undercity. Dawn proved a good time to travel the city’s surface—the sunlight chased away undead wanderers, while the hour was too early for much activity on the part of humanoids. The few orcs they did spot en route were easily avoided.

The daylight, however, did little to lift the pall that lay over the ruined city. An aura of tarnished greatness hung about Myth Drannor, its former dignity reduced to rubble along with its structures. Everywhere Kestrel looked, flawed beauty met her gaze: crumbling arches, cracked columns, decapitated statues, dead or dying trees. The tales she’d heard of the fallen elven capital had described treasure there for the taking by anyone brave enough to face its new denizens. However, even to her rogue’s sensibilities, looting this city seemed less like robbing from the rich than stealing from a cripple.

The party spotted the double doors inscribed with Mystra’s star symbol. They approached slowly, this time anticipating the thunderous Word of Opening rending the air.

“Aodhfionn!”

The command, as yesterday spoken by the mysterious otherworldly voice, roared like the surf pounding on the shore. Kestrel started at the force as vibrations echoed in the air. Hinges too long in need of oil protested strenuously. The doors to the undercity swung open to reveal a dark corridor.

Smooth, perfectly planed rock walls lined the ten-foot-wide opening. Within, narrower passages broke off in three directions. Lit torches punctuated the walls at fixed intervals, confirming that some sort of humanoid occupants passed through regularly. When she’d heard these dungeons were of dwarven construction, Kestrel had feared she and the others would have to stoop to move through them. Fortunately, the ceiling was at least six and a half feet high. Durwyn might have to duck in places to keep his helmet from scraping the roof, but otherwise it appeared that the foursome would find their movement generally unhindered.

Kestrel waited for someone else to enter first. She might have agreed to accompany these misguided do-gooders on their suicide mission, but she had no plans to stick her neck out an inch further than she had to. She’d do what she could to keep the party alive and intact—thus improving her own chances of survival—but her commitment ended there.

“Go ahead, Corran,” she prompted. The holy knight seemed to have appointed himself the leader of their little group anyway. “I’ll be right behind you.”

“I assume that’s supposed to reassure me,” he said, “but I can’t help wondering if I’ll feel a knife in my back.”

Don’t tempt me, she thought. Aloud she said, “Only if you keep us standing here much longer. The sooner we go in, the sooner we get this over with.”

“Let us enter, then.” Sword in hand, Corran strode forward into the flickering torchlight. “May Tyr guide our steps—and our hearts.”

“Whatever.”

The two women entered after the paladin, with Durwyn bringing up the rear. Corran chose the path that broke off to the right. Kestrel thought they should have paused at the fork and listened for clues to what lay ahead in each direction, but she didn’t care enough to speak up, and she didn’t feel like arguing with him this early in the morning. If he wanted to believe that his god guided his steps, that was fine with her—she just wished he and Durwyn would make less noise clanking around the stone corridor in their armor. They must have alerted the entire undercity population to their presence already.

When they reached the third fork, she couldn’t hold her tongue anymore. “Do you have any idea where you’re going?” she asked.

He stopped, turning to face her. “Do you?”

“No, but it might help to listen ahead instead of just parading through.” No sooner had she spoken than she thought she heard a voice murmuring in the passage to their right.

He opened his mouth to respond, but she covered it with her hand. “Hush!” She cocked her head, trying to make out the words.

“What do you hear?” Ghleanna whispered.

It was a low, guttural voice. An orc? Probably, but she wanted to find out for sure. “Wait here.” At the mage’s raised brows, she added, “I won’t go far.”

She crept down the right passageway, moving soundlessly and keeping to the shadows created by the flickering torchlight. After a few dozen yards, she still couldn’t see the speakers—she’d determined there were two of them—but she could hear them clearly, and the low rumble of many voices still further down the corridor.

“Ugly wizard need more guards. Blood Spear Tribe come today. Meet here later.”

“Broken Skull Tribe show who boss.”

“No! Ugly wizard say no fight each other.”

They were orcs, all right. Either that, or the stupidest-sounding humans she’d ever overheard. She padded back to the fork, then trod about thirty yards down the other passage. She held her breath and listened closely but heard nothing but the crackle of torches. She returned to the group.

“A couple tribes of orcs are gathering in the right passage,” she said, deliberately leaving out the mention of the “ugly wizard”—one of the scarred mages they’d heard about? Knowing Corran, he would want to confront the spellcaster immediately. “I vote we go to the left.”

The others concurred. They headed down the left corridor, passing several solidly built wooden doors inscribed with glyphs—all of them different, none of them recognizable to anyone in the party. Kestrel tried to pick the locks of the first two doors, but discovered them magically, not mechanically, sealed.

“They must require those other Words of Opening the clerics talked about,” Durwyn said.

“You think?” Kestrel retorted. Leave it to Durwyn to state the obvious.

Several hundred yards farther, they came upon a doorway that glittered in the torchlight as they approached, as if it held a door of glass. When they reached it, they discovered the surface thick with frost and crystals.

Ghleanna extended her hand to touch the surface. “It’s ice. A solid sheet of ice.”

“Strange,” Kestrel said. “I wonder what’s inside?”

Durwyn hefted his axe. “Let’s find out.” Before Kestrel could stop him, he swung the axe so hard it created an ear-splitting crash that echoed throughout the passageway. A huge web of cracks spread across the ice from the center of his strike. A second blow sent large chunks of ice flying into the room beyond.

Kestrel grabbed his arm before he could swing again. She fought to keep her voice muted. “What in the Abyss are you doing?” she hissed. “Every orc in this dungeon will hear you!”

Confusion spread across Durwyn’s features. “I thought you wanted to—”

“He might as well finish now,” Corran said. “One more blow, and we’ll be able to get through.”

Durwyn looked to Kestrel as if for permission. Corran was right—if breaking through was going to attract attention from the orcs, the alarm had already sounded. She supposed it was even possible that they were far enough away that the orcs wouldn’t be able to determine the origin of the noise. Besides, for all they knew, the path to the House of Gems might lie beyond this frozen doorway. She shrugged her reluctant assent.

The warrior struck a third time, shattering enough of the door to create a man-sized hole. They kicked aside hunks and shards of ice, then grabbed a torch from one of the wall sconces. Corran thrust it through the opening and peered in.

“It’s a small room,” he said. “Maybe ten or twelve feet square. Looks like there’s no one inside.” He crawled through, followed by the others.

Once inside, Kestrel shivered with cold. In the center of the room—taking up most of the room, in fact—was a large circular rune inscribed on the stone floor. Its intricate knot-work pattern was outlined in white frost. In the center, about waist-high, floated a golden sphere encrusted with icicles.

She crossed to the levitating sphere, withdrew one of her daggers, and prodded it. The sphere did not move. She tapped harder, but her effort yielded only the clank of steel against ice. Finally, she put the dagger away and pushed against the sphere with all her strength. It felt as icy as it looked, but it would not budge.

“Let me help,” Durwyn offered. The big warrior threw all of his weight against the floating object, but it remained just as firmly in place.

“I give up,” Kestrel said. She glanced at their other companions. Ghleanna knelt at the edge of the rune, closely examining it. Corran stood facing one of the walls, his back to the group.

“Ghleanna, what do you suppose this is?” the paladin asked.

The mage approached, as did Kestrel and Durwyn. The wall held an engraved formation of four diamond shapes arranged in a column, with a vertical line bisecting them. A ruby was embedded in the lowest point of the bottom diamond.

“I’ve never seen its like before,” Ghleanna said.

Corran traced the edge of the ruby with his index finger. “I tried removing the gem, but it’s wedged in there pretty tight.”

“Not exactly your area of expertise, I imagine,” said Kestrel. “Let me try.” She removed a pointed metal file from one of her belt pouches and tried to insert it between the gem and the wall to pry out the ruby. Despite her best efforts, the stone remained firmly in place—now surrounded by scratch marks.

“Apparently not your area of expertise either,” Corran remarked.

She shot him a dirty look. The failure of her thieving skills bothered her enough—she didn’t need Sir Self-Righteous rubbing it in. “It must be magically frozen in place, like everything else in this room,” she said stiffly. “Otherwise I would have had no problem removing it.”

Ghleanna offered to use sorcery in hopes of learning more about the room, but all agreed her spells were better saved for whatever lay ahead than to merely satisfy curiosity. “I’m sure this room isn’t the only mysterious thing we’ll encounter in Myth Drannor,” Corran said.

Kestrel hoped the others proved this benign.

After a while, the party entered an area of the dungeons that appeared less frequented by the orcs. Fewer torches lined these walls, and many of them had sputtered out or been extinguished. The light became dim enough that Corran removed one of the unlit torches from its sconce, lighted it off the next burning torch they came upon, and carried it with them. Soon, the passageway’s illumination grew so bad that the others followed suit.

As they neared a chamber with an open doorway, a sudden voice from within startled them. “Light? Oh—whoever you are, I beseech you! Please bring your light this way!”

They exchanged glances, knowing that their torches would reveal them to the speaker well before they could see him.

“A trap?” Kestrel mouthed.

“I don’t think so,” Corran responded softly. “If he means to ambush us, why alert us to his presence?” More loudly, he called out, “We’re on our way.”

Corran entered the chamber first. “Oh!”

“What?” Kestrel darted in after him. “Oh!” she echoed. “Well, I’ll be damned...”

In the corner of the room stood a man—or at least, half a man. He looked ordinary enough from the torso up, with a medium build, long brown hair, and penetrating dark eyes. From the waist down, the unfortunate fellow was embedded in an enormous boulder. His body appeared to simply end, consumed by the rock.

Behind her, Kestrel heard Durwyn and Ghleanna enter. The warrior gasped. “What happened to you?”

“If you can believe it, a lovers’ quarrel,” the man responded. “I was exploring these dungeons with my fiancée, a fellow sorcerer, when we fell into an argument. The subject was so trivial that I can’t even remember what the fight was about, but in the heat of the moment I renounced my love for Ozama. She flew into a rage and cast a spell that sealed me in this boulder until I solved a riddle:

Kestrel nearly snorted. “That old thing? Your sweetheart changed the ending, but the first half of it must have circulated through half the taverns between here and Waterdeep last year.”

“And all the courts the year before,” Corran added.

The man’s face lit up, his eyes darting from one party member to the next. “Do you really know the answer?”

“A ring,” Durwyn said.

Kestrel crossed the room and tapped her silver ring against the rock. A mighty crack! rent the air as the boulder broke into pieces. The long-trapped wizard immediately fell to his knees, his legs unused to supporting his weight.

“A ring,” he murmured, rubbing the atrophied muscles of his calves through the fabric of his purple robes. “So much lost time over such a simple answer.” He remained absorbed in his own thoughts, an expression of regret settling onto his angular face. His musings, however, lasted but a few moments before he left the mournful thoughts behind and addressed the foursome. “My name is Jarial. Words aren’t enough to thank you for releasing me.”

Corran introduced the party, then asked how long Jarial had been trapped in the boulder.

“Since the Year of the Arch—1353 by the Dale calendar,” he said. “What year is it now? There’s no way to tell time in here.”

“The Year of the Gauntlet. 1369.” Kestrel soberly studied him. Even though Jarial was a sorcerer, she felt sorry for him wasting so much of his life trapped alone in the darkness. He appeared only twenty or so, but he had to be much older. And the riddle that had imprisoned him had become so common while he endured endless isolation—even Durwyn had known the answer! “You mean this Ozama woman just left you down here for sixteen years and never came back?”

“I believe she meant to return,” Jarial said. “Something must have happened to her. She was angry but not vindictive enough to leave me here forever. We came here in the first place seeking a magical item called the Wizard’s Torc, said to lie in the lair of a dark naga somewhere in these dungeons. I fear she continued looking for it alone and met with misfortune.”

“Or found it and left you here to rot while she kept it for herself,” Kestrel said. “How did you survive, anyway? I mean, excuse me for asking, but why didn’t you starve to death, or get killed by the creatures dwelling down here?” She noted that his jaw was not even roughened by stubble, nor his clothes frayed by sixteen years of constant wear.

“Ozama’s spell kept me safe from the ravages of time and enemies,” Jarial said. “Though I did begin to fear I would go mad. At first, of course, I pondered the riddle every waking moment. When no solution came to me, I shouted myself hoarse calling for help. That attracted the attention of some of the undercity’s more unpleasant residents, who offered no aid but found it entertaining to come in here and torment me.”

Jarial’s little-used voice sounded scratchy. The poor man was probably parched. Corran offered him some water, which the mage accepted gratefully.

“You’re a sorcerer,” Kestrel prodded. “Couldn’t you use magic to free yourself?”

“Believe me, I tried! After going through all the spells I knew, I started devising new ones.” Jarial smiled ruefully. “Though I had the satisfaction of using some of my mocking antagonists for target practice, I still couldn’t gain my freedom.” He continued kneading the muscles of his legs, trying to rub life back into them.

“After giving up on using sorcery to free myself, I spent probably another year just saying aloud every word I could possibly think of, hoping to accidentally stumble on the answer. Obviously, that strategy proved ineffective as well. Eventually, I stopped bothering to even use magic to light this room. I’d just consigned myself to spending eternity here, alone in the darkness with only my own thoughts for company.” The lonely sorcerer tried again to rise, but his legs remained too weak to support him.

“Here, drink this.” Ghleanna offered him a small vial of bluish liquid, one of the potions they had found on Athan’s band. Faeril had identified it as a healing potion made of blueglow moss, a local plant renowned for its curative properties but now in short supply. “You’ll never manage to massage away years of disuse.”

Jarial swallowed the dose and within minutes was able to walk around the chamber. When his stride had steadied, he held the foursome in his gaze. “I can’t thank you enough,” he said. “What quest brings you to these dungeons? You must let me aid you.”

Kestrel laughed humorlessly. He was welcome to take her place.

The band, now five in number, continued through the maze of passages. Jarial thought he remembered the location of a stairway that led up into the hill of the acropolis, so at his suggestion the party backtracked to a previous fork and headed down a different corridor.

A few yards down, light spilled out of a doorway. Within, they heard sounds of shuffling and sporadic muttering as if someone were talking to himself. Kestrel snuck ahead and peered inside.

Nottle the peddler bent over an open trunk, rummaging through its contents. “An’ what’s this? Ah, yes! Dwarven weapons always fetch a good price.”

Kestrel blinked. The peddler was foraging through the dungeons as casually as if he were shopping in Phlan’s marketplace. Was the little guy trying to get himself killed? She motioned to the others to join her, then entered the chamber. Engrossed in his scavenging, the halfling didn’t even notice her.

“Nottle, what are you doing here?”

“Yiaah!” The peddler jumped about a foot. The short sword he’d been holding clattered back into the chest. “Jeepers! Ye scared me!”

“Worse things than us could stroll into this room,” Kestrel said as her companions entered. “How did you get in here?”

“I saw ye folks unseal the door, and I follow’d ye in. Them elven clerics mean well an’ all, but thanks t’ them I ain’t been able to git in here fer weeks—all the good stuff’s nearly gone.”

The paladin shook his head in disbelief. “You’re telling us this whole dungeon complex has been plundered in a matter of weeks?” Corran asked. “By whom?”

“Everyone!” Nottle retrieved the short sword he’d dropped and added it to the collection of booty he evidently intended to abscond with. “Since them horrible phaerimm and alhoon have been run outta this part o’the city, all sortsa creatures come here to loot their old hoards. Why do ye think there’s so many orcs about? It’s a great time to be a scavenger!”

“Aren’t you afraid for your safety?” Ghleanna asked.

“No more’n usual.” The peddler struggled into his overstuffed pack and picked up his lantern. “A bit o’danger comes with the trade. If I wanted to play it completely safe, I’d open a borin’ little shop in Waterdeep. ’Sides, the orcs’re some o’my best customers, so they pretty much leave me alone.”

“Orcs aren’t the only things haunting these passageways,” Jarial said. “I’ve seen zombies and—”

“Oh, I can handle a few zombies.” Nottle headed for the door. “Nice chattin’ with ye folks again. Let me know if ye need anythin’!” With that, he was gone.

All five of them stared after the peddler. “He’s going to get himself killed,” Durwyn said.

Kestrel shrugged. “Better him than us.” In a way, she envied the halfling. Were the need for stealth not so great on this misguided mission of theirs, she would have enjoyed looting these ruins right along with Nottle. But she could ill afford the noise of carrying too much plunder.

As they filed out of the room, Kestrel heard Durwyn whisper to Jarial, “What’s an alhoon?” She’d wondered the same thing herself at Nottle’s first mention of them but hadn’t wanted to admit ignorance.

“An undead mind flayer,” the mage said. “Horrible creatures with heads that look like an octopus. Between their psionic powers and wizard spells they’re deadly opponents.”

“And the phaerimm?”

“Extremely powerful magic-using creatures, nearly all teeth, claws, and tail. I saw plenty of them—and alhoon—in the time I was trapped down here, but as the peddler said, they just up and disappeared one day. It must have taken something awfully strong to drive them away.”

Kestrel didn’t want to dwell on what that “something” might be. If it was the same creature—or creatures—responsible for creating the new Pool of Radiance, their mission was even more futile than she’d thought.

They headed farther down the passage, ducking into rooms as they continued their search for a way up and out of the dungeons. Many of the rooms stood empty or littered with broken furniture, while others—probably the former lairs of the alhoon and phaerimm—held ransacked chests or similar signs of already having been visited by scavengers such as Nottle. As in the region where Jarial had been trapped, the torches along the wall of this new area became sparser, until they reached a zone where there were none at all. Though each of the explorers held a torch, the flames did little to illuminate their surroundings. A pall of preternatural darkness cloaked this sector of the dungeons.

They came upon a room that seemed to serve as an antechamber to a larger complex. Several doors in the back and side walls stood open, and the party entered one to find themselves engulfed in nearly total darkness. The flames of their torches cast little more light than candles.

“I don’t recognize this area at all,” Jarial said. “We must have made a wrong t—”

“Hush!” Kestrel interrupted him. She held her breath, concentrating on a sound she heard echoing from the stillness. Rattle. Scrape. Rattle. The noise seemed to come from a room off to their right.

Rattle rattle. Scrape scrape. Rattle rattle.

“I hear it, too,” Ghleanna whispered.

Clack. Clack. Clack clack.

Corran’s hand drifted to his sword hilt, but suddenly stopped. He sucked in his breath. “It almost sounds like—”

A white shape shuffled into view, its grinning head and gangly limbs a stark contrast to the blackness beyond. Clattering erupted as a sea of others appeared behind it.

“Skeletons!” Durwyn leapt forward, swinging his battle-axe in a wide arc that shattered the skull of the nearest foe.

“At least a dozen of them,” Corran called out as two creatures armed with swords closed in on him. He left his own sword in its sheath, reaching for the warhammer on his back instead. In a single movement, he brought it around and smashed the sternum of the first skeleton. It crumpled into a pile on the ground.

The creatures were closing in fast. There had to be more than a dozen, but in the poor light Kestrel couldn’t determine where they were coming from. She grabbed her club from her belt and snapped her wrist to extend the weapon to its full length. Her daggers would do no good against a mass of walking bones with no flesh to pierce.

A sudden flare issued from Jarial’s fingertips, sending a sheet of flames shooting toward a group of skeletons. Within seconds, the blaze consumed three of them and caused two more to fall back. Distracted by the spell, Kestrel almost didn’t hear the rattling bones approaching behind her. She spun around, automatically swinging her club. The baton struck the lone skeleton hard enough to knock it off balance. She seized the advantage and struck again, knocking its weapon out of its grasp. Her third strike bashed in its skull.

She glanced back at the others. Corran had dispatched several skeletons, but for every one that fell two more surged in. Both warriors were heavily engaged now, shielding the more physically vulnerable sorcerers. As she watched, Durwyn swung his axe in a powerful arc that sent the skulls of two creatures flying at once. Their headless remains clattered into a pile at his feet. He kicked the bones aside and pressed forward to attack another foe.

A flash of steel caught her eye, alerting her just in time to an advancing opponent. Was it the flickering torchlight, or had this collection of bones yellowed with age or decay? Its sinister grin held no teeth, and cracks appeared along its clavicle and pelvis. The creature swung its sword in a jerky motion that Kestrel easily parried. She then struck the frail hipbone with all the strength she could muster. The brittle pelvis shattered.

The skeleton, now in two halves, collapsed. The fall alone sent several ribs skidding across the floor. Its legs fell still, but the creature propped its torso up on one bony hand and swung its sword with the other, trying to cut Kestrel’s legs out from under her. She jumped to avoid the sweeping weapon and landed on the weakened collarbone. It snapped under her weight. A final blow from her club kept the creature from rising again.

She had just finished off this latest foe when she saw Corran cast aside his torch. A moment later, a flash of metal in his left hand caught her attention. His holy symbol. Did he hope to repel the skeletons as he had the zombies last night? The creatures were coming at him too fast to give him a chance.

A crazy, desperate idea entered her thoughts, and she acted before she could talk herself out of it. She dove to the ground and rolled into the skeletons. The creature nearest Corran crashed to the floor. Before it could recover its feet, she swung her club and caught another skeleton in the knees. It fell on top of the first and caused a third to trip over their sprawled bones. Kestrel scrambled out of the pile. They were down but not defeated, providing Corran with only a small window of opportunity.

It was all he needed. “By all that is holy, begone!” he cried, holding Tyr’s symbol aloft.

At the paladin’s shout the skeletons nearest him retreated. At the same time, light burst from the head of Ghleanna’s staff, at last fully illuminating the room.

Nine skeletons—those Corran had repelled—circled the room’s perimeter, keeping as much distance as possible between themselves and the paladin as they attempted to reach the exits. Two more yet advanced, while the three Kestrel had felled clumsily tried to disengage themselves from each other.

The sudden brightness startled the skeletons enough to give the explorers the initiative. Kestrel easily finished off the three fallen creatures, methodically bashing each skull. Ghleanna smashed her quarterstaff through the spinal column of one of those advancing, while Durwyn arced his axe to crush another. He and the paladin then set about picking off the retreating skeletons.

A low moan behind her caused Kestrel to spin around again—and add a groan of her own to the chant as an all-too-familiar smell greeted her nostrils. “Zombies!” she called out. Five of the creatures shuffled into the chamber from the door through which the explorers had entered. She tossed her twin daggers at the first walking corpse, then reached for the blade she’d retrieved from Loren’s body. As she threw the unfamiliar weapon, it glinted in the magical light of Ghleanna’s spell. The blade struck the creature’s heart causing it to crumple to the ground. She was out of daggers—she’d have to fight off the rest of the zombies with the club.

To her amazement however, the nondescript dagger pulled itself free of the monster and flew back into her left hand. A magical dagger! She both thrilled and cringed at the discovery. A returning dagger could prove valuable, but magical weapons had been known to hold curses.

As the sounds of the skeleton battle died behind her, Corran’s voice echoed off the chamber walls again. “Trouble us no longer!” The remaining zombies ceased their advance and attempted to escape. Kestrel threw Loren’s blade at the creatures she’d already injured. No way were they shuffling off with her twin daggers stuck in them. Thanks to the weapon’s boomerang power, she felled both foes. Corran and Durwyn took care of the last two zombies.

In the aftermath, Corran removed his helm and pushed sweat-dampened hair away from his eyes. He nodded toward the dagger that had once again found its way back to Kestrel’s hand. “A magical blade. What will you call it?”

“Call it?” She wasn’t even sure she would keep it—she would certainly use it conservatively until she knew she could trust its sorcery.

“Enchanted weapons deserve their own names.”

Kestrel shrugged. “I’ve thought of it as Loren’s blade up to now. I guess I’ll continue to do so.”

“Loren’s Blade,” Corran repeated. “A good name.”

Kestrel studied the paladin as he cleaned and secured his own weapon. He might be an arrogant know-it-all, but the man knew how to fight. That little routine he did with the holy symbol was proving useful, too.

She’d sooner eat roasted zombie flesh than tell him so.

“Do you suppose we stumbled into their lair?” Ghleanna asked the group at large.

“Either that, or they may have been guarding something,” Corran answered. “An exit, perhaps? Let’s take a look around.”

They poked through the room from which the skeletons had emerged, finding little more than rubble, and continued to explore the rest of the complex. Ultimately, they came to what appeared to be the main chamber. Bones lay strewn about, some human, some not. Unlike the animated skeletons they encountered earlier, these seemed to lie where their owners had died, earthly possessions still surrounding them. One of the skeletons yet wore a gray woolen cloak and a pair of snakeskin boots.

At the sight, Jarial caught his breath. “Ozama.”

Kestrel turned away, allowing the mage a few moments of privacy in which to grieve his former lover’s loss, or curse her for entrapping him, or whatever he wanted to do upon discovering her remains. She glanced around the room, noticing that the door opposite bore an unfamiliar glyph—two swirling circles drawn with a single line. The symbol was burned into the wood. A small barred window in the door looked into the next chamber, but from her vantage point she could see only darkness within.

She approached the door. Finding it sealed, she peered through the window but still couldn’t see anything inside. She beckoned Ghleanna. “Can you cast the light from your staff into there?”

“Certainly.” The mage came forward and lifted her staff toward the opening, but the darkness beyond completely swallowed up the light. Ghleanna frowned. “How strange... .”

“I’m afraid I’m a little shy,” said a rasping voice from the blackness.

Despite its refined tone, the voice sent a shudder down Kestrel’s spine, like the sound of fingernails on glass. “Who are you?” she asked.

“I might ask you that question,” the mysterious speaker responded. The voice sounded male, but she couldn’t be sure. “It is you, after all, who have intruded into my home.”

Kestrel squinted, trying to make out a shape in the darkness, but could not discern even the dimmest outline. She did, however, detect a faint rustling, as of something sliding across a floor, followed by the clinking of metal.

Corran strode past Kestrel to stand before the window. “Please forgive the rudeness of my companion,” he said, casting a scolding look toward Kestrel. “She’s a little... uncultured.”

Kestrel bristled, regretting that she had thought anything nice about the insufferable Lord D’Arcey a few minutes earlier.

The paladin then peered through the window himself. “We apologize for disturbing you—we seek only an exit from these dungeons to the Heights above.”

“‘Tis not a disturbance,” the sibilant voice said. “Indeed, I welcome the diversion of visitors. This can be a rather solitary place.”

The last hiss on the word “place” caused goosebumps to form on Kestrel’s arms. She glanced at the dusty bones strewn about the floor. Had these visitors also provided a diversion? She ambled away from the door to give the dried-out bodies a closer look. At first she’d assumed the skeletons and zombies had defeated them, but now she wondered otherwise. An exchange of glances with Ghleanna revealed that the mage held similar suspicions.

“I imagine one could grow bored in such isolation,” Corran said.

“Indeed, no,” the voice said. “Lonely perhaps, but not bored. I have a hobby—a passion really—for collecting things.”

“What kind of things?” Kestrel called out, looking at the unfortunate adventurers who had preceded them to this place. Lives? Souls?

“Oh, necklaces, amulets, torcs, chokers, neck rings, pendants, collars—just about anything that goes around one’s neck.”

Jarial’s head, which until now had been bowed over Ozama’s remains, snapped up. “Preybelish,” he whispered.

Kestrel quietly moved to his side. “You know him?”

“I believe we’ve found the dark naga Ozama and I sought all those years ago,” he said, his voice barely audible even to Kestrel. “The one said to possess the Wizard’s Torc.” His fingers stroked Ozama’s cloak. “She must have died trying to get it from him.”

“Yes, she did,” the voice—Preybelish—hissed.

Kestrel’s gaze darted to the door, then back to Jarial. “How could he possibly have heard you?”

Jarial drew his brows together. “I—”

“He doesn’t know,” Preybelish said. “But he does want to avenge his lady. Don’t you... Jarial? As much as the little bird beside you wants to settle a score with a certain holy knight.”

“What do you mean by that?” Corran asked.

Kestrel froze, not even releasing her breath. Could the naga read their thoughts? She dared not ponder the idea for fear of giving something away to the creature. Instead, she concentrated on the image of a topaz necklace she’d once seen in—and liberated from—a shop window in Waterdeep. It had fetched a handsome price, but she envisioned herself holding the piece of jewelry as if she still possessed it.

“Forget these temporary companions, little thief. You don’t believe in their cause anyway,” Preybelish said. “We could form a lucrative partnership. I’ll give you fair recompense for that necklace or any other any neckwear you wish to sell me.”

“What nec—” Durwyn began. Ghleanna hushed him.

“I might be persuaded to part with it,” Kestrel replied.

“Good, very good. I shall unseal the door for you. Come in—alone—and we will bargain.”

Kestrel looked to Jarial for guidance, all the while forcing her surface thoughts to remain on the necklace. The mage nodded, but gestured for her to stall. “All right,” she said to Preybelish. “But I prefer to see who I’m doing business with.”

As she spoke, Jarial slipped the snakeskin boots off Ozama’s skeleton and held them toward her. “Magic,” he mouthed. She shook her head in refusal. Her daggers were hidden in her own boots, and she trusted the blades more than any enchantment. After one more pleading look, the mage slipped the boots on his own feet.

“I’ll dispel the darkness once you’re inside,” Preybelish said. The heavy wooden door creaked open.

She glanced at the others. Corran’s hand rested on his sword hilt ready to unsheathe the weapon at any time. Ghleanna’s mouth moved in an unheard spell, her left hand drifting in a slow arc. Durwyn looked just plain confused, but he held his battle-axe ready.

“Let us bargain, then.” Kestrel walked toward the door.

Just as she reached it, Ghleanna uttered a single word aloud. The darkness that had engulfed Preybelish’s chamber immediately dissipated, revealing a large purplish-black snake with a humanlike face. Around his neck, supported by his inflatable hood, dangled necklaces, chokers, and other neckwear of varying lengths and ostentation. The naga’s thick coils disappeared beneath a sea of coins and jewelry, but Kestrel guessed his body must extend at least ten feet. His eyes shuttered to thin slits in the sudden light.

Preybelish hissed, baring his long fangs. “You’ll regret that, you foolish half-breed!” His tail, barbed and sharp as a razor, emerged from the treasure hoard and flicked violently, showering gold around the room and sending Kestrel diving for cover behind the decapitated marble head—and neck—of what had once been an enormous statue. Preybelish’s attention, however, was focused outside his chamber. On Ghleanna.

A moment later, a jet of flame shot forth from the naga’s tail straight at the female mage. Ghleanna howled as the entire left side of her body caught fire. She dropped to the floor to extinguish her clothing, rolling out of Kestrel’s sight.

Corran, who had been standing a little too close to the doorway when the attack shot past, sucked in his breath as his armor—heated by the flames—seared his skin. Despite the obvious pain, he advanced on Preybelish, Durwyn close behind.

“I have to agree with the little bird,” the dark naga said. His eyes were wide open now, sinister glowing yellow orbs. “I do so hate the company of paladins. So holier-than-thou.”

Corran brought his sword down with enough force to cleave the snakelike creature in half. The attack, however, glanced off some invisible barrier, not even nicking a scale. “Vile serpent!” the paladin shouted in frustration.

Durwyn swung his axe. The blade found its mark, sinking into the naga’s muscular body. Preybelish hissed and swung his tail, catching Durwyn in the chest and knocking him off his feet. Blood started seeping from a gash in the warrior’s neck.

Kestrel looked through the doorway to see what Jarial was doing, but the wizard had disappeared from view. Was he attending Ghleanna? “Not now, Jarial,” she muttered. “This can’t be left up to me.”

From her vantage point she had a clear shot at the creature’s back—or whatever one called the part of a snake’s coils opposite the underbelly. Preybelish seemed to be focusing his attention and his mind-reading abilities on Corran at the moment. She withdrew her daggers from her boots but paused before throwing them. Once she hurled the weapons, then what? She’d accomplish nothing but angering the creature and drawing his attention back to herself. While Loren’s Blade would return to her hand, she did not trust its magic.

The holy knight attempted another attack. This swing managed to bite into the monster’s flesh, though it visibly slowed before impact. Preybelish uttered a string of foul epithets and thrashed his tail at the paladin. It hit Corran with enough force to knock a lesser man to his knees, but Corran caught his balance, his armor apparently shielding him from the tail’s sting.

Durwyn lay slumped on the floor, unconscious. Though the gash in his neck bled, the flow was not profuse enough for such a large man to have passed out already. Kestrel looked back at the wicked barbs on the end of Preybelish’s tail. Two of them dripped black fluid.

Poison.

The creature muttered arcane words under its breath—another spell. Where in the Abyss was Jarial? She let the daggers fly before the naga could finish his incantation.

The evil serpent howled in rage as the weapons drove into his flesh less than a foot from his head. Thick brown blood welled from the wounds. He twisted around to glare at her, fangs bared, yellow eyes blazing with pain and fury. “Don’t you know that snakes eat little birds?” he hissed.

“Not this one.” Kestrel managed to sound more confident than she felt.

Preybelish uttered a string of incomprehensible syllables, weaving another spell. Corran swung his sword again, this time striking the creature with full force. The naga, however, would not allow his concentration to be broken. He stared unblinking at Kestrel as his voice rose in pitch.

Her heart hammered in her chest as she tensed in anticipation of the inevitable sorcery. Would flames consume her, as they had Ghleanna?

Suddenly, an arrow materialized behind Preybelish and raced through the air to embed itself in the back of the creature’s head. The acrid odor of burning flesh filled the room as acid ate through the naga’s skin. Just feet away, Jarial appeared.

The naga screamed in rage, swinging his tail wildly. The barbed point caught Jarial’s legs, knocking him down. Kestrel swore under her breath. Not Jarial too? Now two of their party were poisoned and a third badly burned.

Preybelish turned on Corran. “Don’t even think about it,” the creature said before the paladin so much as lifted his arm for the intended strike. The naga swung his tail once again, knocking Corran’s sword out of his grasp.

Kestrel’s mind raced. If they could only control that tail.

“Catch a naga by the tail?” Preybelish mocked, twisting around to fix her with his evil gaze. “What would you do once you got your hands on it?”

Behind the naga, to Kestrel’s surprise, Jarial got back to his feet. The mage appeared winded but hardly scratched. She forced her thoughts away from the wizard, so as not to betray him to Preybelish’s mind-reading powers.

“This!” Jarial said. He darted out his hand and touched creature’s tail just below the barbed tip. The contact lasted only a split second, but it was long enough. Preybelish screeched inhumanly as the last quarter of his body went rigid and fell immobile to the ground.

The naga bared his fangs and spun his upper body to advance on Jarial, still possessing enough unparalyzed coils to reach the unarmored mage. Corran went for his warhammer but Kestrel was faster.

She leaped onto Preybelish’s back, grabbed one of the many chains hanging from his neck, and twisted. When the chain closed around the creature’s airway, she pulled hard. “Did you say you collect neckwear, Preybelish?”

Despite her effort, the naga managed to get enough air to begin hissing out the words of a final spell.

She braced her feet against the naga’s spine and tugged with all her might “Chokers, right?” Preybelish thrashed about so wildly that she had trouble retaining her grip. Corran hurried over to lend his strength. With the paladin’s added power, the evil creature’s eyes grew wide, his words of incantation becoming desperate gurgles as he fought to breathe. Kestrel threw her whole body into one final tug.

“Choke on this.”

CHAPTER FOUR

Fortunately, the naga’s poison did not prove lethal. Durwyn awoke from his drugged sleep just as Preybelish entered his final one. Within a quarter hour the warrior seemed none the worse for the battle, save the easily bandaged wound on his neck.

Ghleanna, however, was another story. She lay unconscious and badly burned on one side of her body.

Kestrel paled just looking at the injured mage. “How many of those blueglow moss potions do we have left?”

“Let me tend to her first,” Corran said. He knelt at her side, removing his helm and gauntlets. Gently, he touched his hands to Ghleanna’s damaged skin, closed his eyes, and bowed his head in prayer. Ever so slowly, as the paladin murmured words of supplication to Tyr, the half-elf’s charred tissue healed.

Kestrel turned away. When Corran had repelled the zombies, she’d felt that his showy theatrics were meant to draw attention. Now, watching him lay on hands, she grew uncomfortable. His features and manner softened—the arrogance, the bossiness, the presumption were all set aside as he ministered to their injured companion. The sight deeply unsettled her. It revealed a side of Corran D’Arcey she did not wish to acknowledge.

Jarial approached, carrying Ozama’s cloak. “I thought Ghleanna could use this,” he said.

“I’m sure she’ll appreciate it.” Kestrel glanced at the woman rendered so vulnerable by the same magic she herself wielded. Corran still had a lot of healing to do. She turned back to Jarial and gestured toward Preybelish’s treasure. “Let’s leave them in peace and find that Wizard’s Torc.”

He regarded the naga’s hoard reluctantly. “It doesn’t seem important anymore. Certainly not worth the lives it cost—and almost cost.” His lips formed a rueful smile. “Sixteen years trapped in a boulder has a tendency to alter one’s perspective.”

Kestrel could scarcely believe her ears. After all he’d been through, how could he not want the prize? “You’re right—your lady did sacrifice her life in pursuit of the torc. Don’t you think you owe it to her to retrieve it now that you have the opportunity?” Besides, it sounded valuable—if he didn’t take it, she would.

A spark of interest returned to his eyes. “I suppose we should at least see if it’s here.”

By the time they emerged from the naga’s lair with the magical necklace in hand, Ghleanna was up and around. Corran had done as much healing as was in his power, and one of the remaining blueglow moss potions had done the rest. Both she and the paladin appeared drained, however. The group elected to sleep a while in the relative safety of Preybelish’s den, gnawing hungrily on dried provisions and taking turns keeping watch.

Their strength restored, they left the complex and returned to the maze of corridors. Eventually, they came upon a stairway leading up.

“Finally,” Kestrel muttered. “I was beginning to think we’d never get out of this place.”

“Don’t start looking for the sun yet,” Jarial said. “There are two dungeon levels built into the hill, so we have another stairway to locate after this one.”

At least they were moving in the right direction. Kestrel nearly sprinted up the steps in her eagerness to make more progress exiting these tomblike corridors. She slowed, however, at the top of the stairs.

Light spilled out of a room about thirty yards down the passage. A grid of shadows on the floor revealed it was a prison cell with a door of wrought-iron bars. From within, a harsh male voice bellowed questions at someone whose replies Kestrel couldn’t hear.

“Just give up the damn word, you cretin! We’ll learn it eventually anyway!” The smack of someone being struck echoed off the stone walls. “Tell me what you know or I’ll feed you to my master for supper.”

The explorers exchanged glances. “Someone should sneak ahead and see what’s going on,” Corran said. Kestrel sighed. Given everyone else’s skills at stealth, no doubt “someone” meant her.

She left the group hidden from sight in the stairwell and crept along the passage, keeping to the shadows as she neared the barred doorway. Though she moved silently, the interrogator spoke loudly enough that even Durwyn could have approached unheard.

Inside, a warrior sat on the floor. He was a sturdy young man, no older than twenty, dressed in brown leather armor. His wrists and ankles were bound to one wall with chains. Six skeletons, armed with short swords as those downstairs had been, stood at attention on one side of the cell. It was the room’s other occupant who made Kestrel suck in her breath.

A masked figure circled the prisoner. Though a red leather hood covered the interrogator’s head and shoulders, holes revealed his eyes, mouth, and jaw. The hard cast of these features matched his voice. What Kestrel could see of his face was so devoid of kindness or any other humane emotion that it might as well have been carved from stone. He wore little other clothing: a loincloth, boots, and one bracer—all made of red leather that matched the hood—a wide studded steel belt, and a circular medallion on a neckchain. His athletic body, particularly his upper legs, bore menacing green tattoos in a weblike design.

The figure’s most striking feature of all was his right hand—or lack thereof. In place of a normal human hand, the man bore a five-fingered reptilian claw. As the mutant human continued to hurl questions at the bound warrior, he scratched and poked the prisoner with his claw to underscore his displeasure.

“Perhaps a little sorcery will loosen your tongue. Shall I turn you into a rodent?”

Kestrel felt the blood drain from her face. This malevolent being was a sorcerer?

He struck the prisoner in the back of the head with his claw. The skeleton nearest them mimicked the movement, hitting the captive with the flat of its blade. The mage grabbed the fighter’s hair and jerked his head up to look him in the face. “Who sent you here? What were your orders?”

“No one sent us.”

“Liar!” He slapped him with his open hand. “You saw what we did to your companions. I’ll give you one more day to come to your senses. If you put any value on your pathetic little life, you better start singing.” He hit him once more.

Kestrel slowly backed down the corridor. It sounded as if the sorcerer were about to leave, and she didn’t care to encounter him in the passageway. After the fight with the naga, she could happily live out the rest of her life without battling another spellcaster, and she intended to try.

She returned to the others. “There’s one prisoner, a warrior. He’s in chains. Used to be part of a larger group—it sounds like he’s the only one left.”

Ghleanna gasped. “One of Athan’s band?” The half-elf’s face brightened.

“Possibly. He refused to tell who he works for or what he’s doing here. But the—”

“We’ve got to free him!” Ghleanna said. “Is it Athan? What does he look like?”

“Who cares what he looks like? You should see the interrogator! He’s some sort of sorcerer, a big guy with lots of tattoos. One of his hands is a claw!”

Corran looked at her as if she’d gone daft. “What do you mean, a claw? Is his hand shriveled?”

“No, I mean the end of his right forearm looks like it belongs on some other creature, like a bird—or a dragon.”

Corran raised his brows. “Oh.” He digested this bit of information, then inquired about other guards.

“Six skeletons. The sorcerer sounds like he’s leaving soon. I figure if—”

“Once he leaves, I’ll take care of the skeletons. Durwyn, you try to break the prisoner’s chains.” Corran looked to the mages. “Unless one of you can get them open?”

Kestrel clamped her mouth shut. She’d been about to suggest a plan of her own, but apparently Corran thought he was the only person capable of devising one.

“I’ll have to look at how heavy they are, but I’m sure I can break them,” Durwyn said.

“Good. Kestrel, you keep watch.”

Keep watch? She ground her teeth, biting back a retort. The lowliest apprentice rogue could spring the locks on those irons. She’d mastered the skill as a child, when Quinn hadn’t been quite fast enough to outrun some of the city patrols they’d encountered. Corran’s arrogance made her want to spit. She hoped the high-handed paladin was the first to die when Durwyn’s blows alerted the sorcerer to their activities.

The clang of iron signaled the sorcerer’s departure. Kestrel watched as the threatening mage locked the door behind him and walked down the hall—thankful he went in the direction opposite from that where the party waited. Four skeletons stood sentinel outside the cell; the other two presumably remained inside with the captive.

When the sorcerer’s light faded from view and they deemed him out of earshot, Corran led the group toward the cell. He held his holy symbol before him. “Leave us be!” he commanded the skeletons.

The creatures backed down the passageway about ten feet afraid of Corran but apparently unable to abandon their post. The two inside the cell greeted the party at the door, thrusting their blades through the bars, until Corran repelled them, too. They retreated to the far corner of the cell.

“Who’s there?” the captive called out.

Ghleanna’s face fell. Apparently, the prisoner’s voice wasn’t the one she’d hoped to hear. “Friends.” Despite her obvious disappointment the half-elf injected a note of cheer into her tone.

Durwyn raised his axe to smash the padlock. Though Kestrel had planned to let him bang on it til doomsday, she changed her mind: Her own survival depended on the party’s. She extended her hand to stay the warrior’s arm. “There’s a quieter way.”

“But Corran said—”

“Yeah, I heard him.” Though Durwyn looked to the paladin for guidance, Kestrel didn’t waste a second glance on either man. She was the best person for this job and she didn’t care what His Holiness had to say about it. She withdrew her lock picks from their beltpouch and went to work on the padlock, which opened easily in her expert hands. Then she defiantly went inside the cell with Corran and the mages. Let Durwyn keep watch.

The captive looked up expectantly as they entered, hope flitting across his broad face. “Are you here to free me?”

“Yes.” Kestrel knelt beside him and examined his irons. The shackles, too small for his meaty wrists, chafed the skin but had not yet broken it “You’re not magically bound, are you?”

“No—at least, I don’t think so.”

“Then I’ll have you out of these in no time.”

Ghleanna came forward and also knelt at the prisoner’s side while Kestrel worked on the lock. “How long have you been held here?” The half-elf smoothed matted brown hair away from a nasty-looking cut on his forehead. “Are you hurt?”

“I’m fine. That sorcerer makes plenty of threats, but so far he’s only smacked me around.” Kestrel sprung open the wrist irons. He shook his arms to return the blood to his hands. “I believe I’ve been here two days or so. They knocked me out when they captured me, so I’m not certain.”

“They?” Corran prompted from across the cell. He poked his head out the door to signal their success to Durwyn.

“The scarred mages. I’m not exactly sure who they are. Some sort of cult. You can’t miss them—they all have one mutated hand. My companions and I never learned what they were all about but I think we got too close to finding out.”

Kestrel shuddered involuntarily as she worked to release the leg irons. There were more of the tattooed, clawed figures?

“Your companions—” Ghleanna began hesitantly. “Was a man named Athan among them?” Though the half-elf used a casual tone, Kestrel noted her grave expression.

The fighter had been watching Kestrel’s progress on his chains, but now turned to Ghleanna with upraised brows. “You know Athan?”

Relief washed over her features at his indirect confirmation. She leaned forward excitedly. “I knew several in your band—Allyril and Loren as well.”

“We came here to aid your party but arrived too late,” Corran added. He offered the prisoner a hand as Kestrel sprung the lock on his leg irons.

Enlightenment spread across the prisoner’s features. “You’re the guards we tried to contact in Phlan! Thank the gods—there’s still hope.” He took Corran’s hand and pulled himself upright. “My name is Emmeric. We doubted that magical gate would open, but desperation made us try. Did any of my companions survive?”

Corran shook his head. “We found four bodies.”

“I didn’t recognize any of them as Athan,” Ghleanna added.

Kestrel studied the female wizard. The half-elf mentioned this Athan person repeatedly. Even now, her brows were drawn together in concern. Did Elminster’s apprentice share more than a passing acquaintance with the missing adventurer? Was he a paramour? Of course—why hadn’t Kestrel noticed before? Such a connection would explain the mage’s eagerness to jump through that unstable gate and take up the fallen party’s mission.

“There were six of us,” Emmeric said. “I don’t know what happened to Athan. The cultist who’s been interrogating me hasn’t mentioned another prisoner. I suppose he could have escaped alive, but the way those scarred mages were throwing spells at us, and other cultists—fighters—attacking...” He shook his head in resignation. “Even Athan couldn’t have held them off forever. I hate to say so, but it’s quite possible that there wasn’t enough left of him to be found.”

A stricken look crossed Ghleanna’s features before she turned her face away. Oblivious to the half-elf’s distress, the men continued their discussion. Kestrel decided to keep her suspicions to herself for now. The mage’s relationship with Athan was her own business.

Emmeric confirmed that the cultists who attacked his party stole the Ring of Calling. While one of the sorcerers interrogated him to learn the ring’s command word, a contingent was sent to the Room of Words to do its own research. “Our greatest failure,” he said, his shoulders sagging, ”was also losing the Gauntlets of Moander to the cult. From what I overheard before being isolated here, the cult’s leader—an archmage named Kya Mordrayn—now possesses the gauntlets.”

“Is she aware of their power?” Corran asked.

“Most certainly. Whoever these cultists are, they’re the force behind the new Pool of Radiance. Knowing that the gauntlets can destroy the pool, Mordrayn keeps them with her at all times, or so I understand.”

One of the skeletons in the cell clawed the wall, returning the group’s attention to their surroundings. “We shouldn’t tarry here,” Corran said.

“Where are you headed?” Emmeric asked.

“The Room of Words. We hope to get that Ring of Calling back,” Corran said. “Feel up to joining us?”

“I’ll lead the way.”

The party found the topmost level of the dungeon crawling with lizard men and orogs. Though Emmeric had warned them en route about the presence of the humanoids, even he was surprised by their numbers. The creatures of both races seemed focused on a single task: systematically looting every abandoned lair in sight.

“Tyr’s toenails,” Kestrel swore as they observed an orog band from a hidden alcove. The blasphemy earned her a withering look from Corran. Good. She’d meant to goad him. “I’ve never seen so many humanoids in one place.” The orogs looked like bigger, meaner—and unfortunately, more intelligent—orcs.

“I’m surprised the two races are operating as allies,” Jarial said.

Emmeric shook his head. “I don’t think they are. The orogs, I know, work as mercenaries for the cultists—a couple of them roughed me up to persuade me to talk, but I believe the lizard men were pillaging these caverns long before the cult showed up. They might resent the interlopers.”

“I don’t think they like each other at all,” Durwyn announced. “Look at the way the orogs keep glancing at that group of lizard men over there. And the lizards watch them right back. Then each side whispers among themselves. They’re like schoolchildren.”

The guard’s apt analogy surprised Kestrel. She hadn’t credited the big man with such perceptiveness.

“Perhaps we can use their enmity to our advantage,” Corran said. “They won’t notice us if they’re too busy fighting each other.”

A smile broke across Emmeric’s features. “I like the way you think. What do you have in mind?”

Corran turned to Jarial. “Was that an invisibility spell you used back there against the naga?” At the mage’s nod, he continued. “Can you cast that on any of us, or just yourself?”

“Any creature close enough for me to touch.”

“Excellent.” The paladin addressed the group. “Here’s my plan. Jarial can use his invisibility spell on me. I’ll move among the orogs and lizard men, getting close enough that if I speak they will hear me, but staying far enough away to make them think my voice is coming from a rival band. Then I’ll utter a few insults to make the two groups turn on each other.”

It sounded like a good scheme to Kestrel—it involved no risk on her part, and if it failed, she could spend the rest of this mission reminding Corran that it had been his idea. In moments, an invisible Corran was sneaking toward the nearest group of lizard men to put his plan into action.

“Look, Ugdag! Look at lizard slime.” Though Kestrel easily recognized the voice as Corran’s, he’d dropped it an octave lower than his natural timbre and covered his blue-blood accent with a guttural rumble. The disguise proved convincing enough to fool the lizard men. Several of the scaly green beasts snapped their heads toward the orogs, webbed hands gripping the hafts of their spears more tightly. Unable to hear Corran’s slurs, the orogs continued about their business.

“Lizards weak,” Corran went on. “Hai! Too weak to fight orogs. Too weak to serve orogs!”

The reptilian leader of one band hissed. Hatred rimmed his red eyes. “Orogs full of swamp gas!” he cried, drawing himself up to his seven-foot height. His insult drew the attention of every orog in the vicinity. He shook his spear at them. “Orog clods! Shashiki!” The rest of the lizard men raised their spears as well. “Shashiki!”

“Lizard heads water-logged!” one of the orogs shouted in response. He strode forward, clawed toenails clacking on the stone floor, until he stood mere feet away from the lizard leader. Breath issued from his snout in angry bursts. The orog forces lifted their weapons. “Gagh-hai!” he cried, “Grabesh!”

“Graaabesh!” echoed the orogs.

“Shashiki! Kripp-kripp!”

The two races rushed toward one another, each determined to exterminate the other. In the confusion of battle, no one noticed the five visible—and one invisible—adventurers passing through.

With Emmeric to guide them, they moved swiftly toward the entrance to the House of Gems. They slowed, however, as they passed an ice-covered doorway.

“Hey, that’s just like the room we saw below.” Durwyn ran his hand over the frosty surface. “With the frozen floating ball inside.”

“There’s a similar sphere in this room,” Emmeric said. “We examined three such rooms—one on each level we explored. We never did figure out their significance.”

They wound their way through the corridors until Emmeric stopped before a huge seal inscribed on the stone floor. Two small concentric circles lay within a larger one, with two arcs connecting the inner circles to the circumference. “From the description given us by the elven clerics at the tree shelter, we believed this is the Circle of Mythanthor,” Emmeric said. “If so, the glyph protects a hidden door to the city surface.”

“The one the Ring of Calling will enable us to access?” Corran’s disembodied voice made Kestrel jump. Though she knew he was among them and her sensitive ears could hear his sounds of movement as they traveled, the paladin’s continued invisibility unnerved her. She preferred to keep her antagonists, and her allies for that matter, where she could see them. Unfortunately, Jarial said the spell would remain in place for twenty-four hours, unless Corran attacked someone first.

“Yes, that door, but we never found the ring’s enabling word,” Emmeric said. “I don’t know how it might be learned.”

“What do you mean?” Ghleanna asked. “It wasn’t in the Room of Words?”

Emmeric shook his head. “We searched thoroughly, but without success. When the cultists attacked us, we were on our way to visit the elven clerics to see if they could suggest another place we might look. Of course, during my captivity I never revealed that the command couldn’t be found in the Room of Words—I wanted the cult sorcerers to waste as much time as possible conducting their own futile search.”

Kestrel rolled her eyes. Could this quest become any more hopeless? “So let me get this straight—the cultists have both the Gauntlets of Moander and the Ring of Calling. Even if we can get the ring back we don’t have the password. And if by some miracle we do somehow get to the city surface, we still don’t know where the new Pool of Radiance is, or what this cult plans to do with it. Does that about sum it up?”

Ghleanna and Durwyn exchanged glances but did not speak. Emmeric appeared bewildered, but then he didn’t know she’d never wanted to join this fool’s errand in the first place.

The silence only provoked Kestrel further. “When are you people going to face reality? We can’t beat these odds. If we keep this up, we’re going to die trying.”

Corran’s voice penetrated the stillness. “I’d sooner die an honorable death than a cowardly one.” She was glad the paladin remained invisible so she couldn’t see the holier-than-thou look on his face. Self-righteousness dripped heavily enough from his voice.

“I’d rather not die at all, thank you.”

“You have always been free to leave us, Kestrel.”

Free to die alone trying to get back to civilization, he meant. It was not a true choice, and the paladin knew it. She glanced from one companion to the next, seeking a glimmer in just one pair of eyes that would reveal a like mind, a dawning of sense in one of these naive do-gooders. None appeared. Obviously, nothing she said would convince any of them to give up their doomed mission.

“Are you quite finished?” Corran asked.

Oh, how she wished she could see the paladin’s face—so she could smack off the smug expression she knew it bore.

Emmeric, still in the lead, rounded a bend and quickly retreated, nearly bumping into Kestrel. “The entrance to the House of Gems is right around this corner,” he said. “The cultists have posted guards, though.”

“How many?” came Corran’s disembodied voice.

“A cult sorcerer and maybe a half-dozen orogs.”

Kestrel sucked in her breath. She’d rather face twice as many orogs than the cult sorcerer. Just the thought of that clawed hand—let alone the spells it could hurl—made her cringe.

“We can handle them,” Corran declared. “We should focus most of our effort on the mage—he’s the most unpredictable, and if the orogs are mercenaries they might flee once their employer is defeated. Durwyn, you and Emmeric fend off the orogs. Ghleanna, Jarial, and I—and Kestrel, if she cares to participate—will concentrate on the cult sorcerer.”

Kestrel was sorely tempted to respond to Corran’s barb by “declining to participate,” but she let it pass for now. Later, when she had leisure for retaliation, she’d put the condescending paladin in his place.

Everyone readied weapons and spells. As one, they charged around the corner.

The cult sorcerer and his minions paused in momentary shock but soon recovered themselves. “Who are you?” the cultist demanded. “Depart from the House of Gems!”

“I’m afraid we can’t do that,” Ghleanna said as she released a spell. Three bursts of magical energy raced toward the evil wizard, all striking him in the chest. Before the injured spellcaster could utter more than a foul expletive, Jarial sent one of his magical acid-tipped arrows singing through the air. The missile struck its target squarely between the eyes.

“By the hand of Tyr!” Corran’s voice rang out in warning. The paladin materialized as his sword impaled the mage. The cultist sunk to the floor, staring sightlessly through his red leather hood.

Kestrel, unused daggers still in hand, looked at the dead sorcerer in amazement. “Damn, that was fast.”

The orogs, who hadn’t even had time to close in, froze at a command from their leader. “Hey, you gubuk,” he said to Emmeric and Durwyn.

“Gubuk?” Durwyn repeated.

“You soft-skin people. I parley with you. Stand. Stand and talk!”

The fighters turned for guidance to Corran, who nodded. “All right. Let us speak.”

The two sides lowered their weapons and approached each other warily. “Orogs swore to protect ugly mage,” the orog leader said. “If ugly mage dead, orog honor say, nothing to protect. No need to kill you gubuks. We go now. No hard feelings.”

Kestrel had to smile at the creatures’ simple logic. And pragmatic loyalties.

“A few questions first,” Corran said. “What can you tell us about your employers?” Kestrel almost wished he hadn’t asked—the rank smell of the orog leader’s matted, hairy hide made her queasy. Or was that his breath?

The orog shrugged and tossed his head. His stringy, greasy hair didn’t move. “Ugly mages full of lies. Make deal with orogs. Orogs walk dungeons, yes, find magic items. Mages promise lots of gold. But ugly mages no pay.” He blew air through his snout. The noise seemed meant to signal disgust. “Today ugly mages say get small gubuk, put in box, they give big treasure. We take gubuk, put in box. Ugly mages not pay.”

Ghleanna frowned. “Who was he—the small gubuk?”

“Garbage man. Lives in wagon—”

“Nottle.” Kestrel groaned, shaking her head. Stupid scamp. Hadn’t they warned him?

“Nottle, yes. That what ugly mages call gubuk. Oho, garbage man not like box! He talk and talk.”

“Where is this box?” Corran asked.

“In old dwarf treasure room,” the orog said. “Down in dungeon. Way, way down.”

CHAPTER FIVE

“You have got to be kidding!”

Kestrel couldn’t believe her ears. Corran and the others wanted to drop everything to go rescue that hare-brained peddler. “We’re here! At the House of Gems. We’re right—” she gestured wildly at the door—“here!”

“Nottle’s in trouble,” Corran stated calmly, as one would address a stubborn child. “We must aid him.”

“He’s an idiot!” she sputtered. “We warned him about the danger. He ignored us. He deserves whatever he gets.”

“Then I guess all of us better hope we never need your help.”

Her fingers twitched. She wanted nothing more than to sink one of her daggers between the paladin’s shoulder blades. How had he managed to make her the villain of the group? All she’d ever tried to do was inject a dose of reality into their starry-eyed plans to save the world all by themselves.

Emmeric cleared his throat. “Actually, I agree with Kestrel.” Corran appeared surprised at the dissent, but the fighter continued. “We can’t afford to waste time, not with the Ring of Calling so close.”

“Thank you,” she said. At least someone else in the party was showing some sense.

“But it isn’t close,” Corran said. “We’re just hoping the cult sorcerers will be in the Room of Words when we get there. They might not be there yet. They might have been there and gone already. We don’t know. We do know where Nottle is and that he’s in danger. As men and women of good conscience—” he shot a pointed look at Kestrel—“we must aid the weak.”

“And risk weakening ourselves and the success of our mission in the process?” Emmeric pressed.

“Tyr will look with favor upon us.”

Kestrel rolled her eyes. “Tyr can kiss my—”

“Enough.” Ghleanna released a heavy sigh. “In the time we have spent debating this, we could have traveled halfway to Nottle’s prison. Let us make haste to release him and return here without further delay.”

The group headed off. Kestrel, however, tarried. They had not searched the cult sorcerer’s body for clues to the cult’s activities—or valuables, for that matter—and she, for one, intended to get all she could of both.

Around his neck she found a bronze medallion on a leather strap. Etched into it was a symbol: a ball of flame with sinister eyes hovering above a four-pointed reptilian claw. She removed the medallion and stuffed it in one of her belt pouches, then assessed the rest of his body. The minimal clothing left few places to carry items, but she did find a thin key hanging from a chain on his belt. The end of the key had the image of a circle within an arch engraved on it.

“When I noticed you missing, I knew I’d find you here.” Corran’s voice did not surprise her. Though she could tell he’d tried to move silently, she’d heard him approach. “Are you nearly finished robbing the dead? The others are waiting.”

She did not bother to look up from her task. Her back still to him, she slipped the key into a hidden sheath in her right sleeve. “I happen to be searching for clues to what this cult is all about—something you seem to have forgotten in your haste to save a half-witted halfling from himself.”

“Uh-huh.”

His tone of sarcastic disbelief pushed her over the edge. She whirled to face him. “What in the Abyss is your problem?”

He regarded her stoically. “My problem?”

She glared at him, her face hot with anger she could no longer hold in check. “You have done nothing but judge and insult me from the moment we met.”

“You represent everything I abhor.”

“How can I? You don’t even know me.”

“Are you not a thief? I have yet to encounter one who wasn’t a selfish opportunist. Your behavior thus far has done little to change my mind.”

Her behavior? She had been selfish to try talking the party out of a quest that amounted to a suicide pact? She had been opportunistic in helping them defeat Preybelish? Sir Sanctimonious would do better to examine his own conduct.

“I have yet to meet a paladin who wasn’t judgmental and self-righteous,” she snapped. “Seeing only my actions and hearing only my words, you presume to know my motives. Well, you don’t know as much as you think you do, Corran D’Arcey.”

He raised his brows patronizingly. “No?”

“No. You’re a weak leader, a spiritual hypocrite, and a lousy human being.” Expecting him to dismiss her reproof as he usually dismissed her, she tried to push her way past him.

He grabbed her arm, forcing her to stay. “It reflects poor breeding, Kestrel, to walk away in the middle of a conversation. On what do you base those criticisms?”

Why did his insults still hold the power to rankle? Their frequency should have rendered her immune by now. “You’ve appointed yourself the leader of this mission, yet you allow your prejudice to cloud your decisions, ignoring or underusing my skills to the detriment of the party.” Despite her ire, her voice held steady. “For someone who professes humility in the service of his god, you have demonstrated precious little of it among your fellow mortals. And for someone who seeks to better understand the ways of the divine, you know very little about the human condition. I doubt very much that the third son of Baron Whoever-the-hell has ever wanted for anything or can comprehend what desperation can drive a person to do.”

There—she’d said it all, and her heart hammered in her chest with the rush of having finally confronted him. To her delight he looked as if he’d been slapped. She shook her arm loose, turned her back on him, and went to join the others.

With minimal travel time, the party descended to the dungeon’s lowest level and found the old dwarven treasury. The stone door stood ajar, its engraved glyph—a circle within an arch—desecrated. Through the graffiti, however, Kestrel noted that the original symbol matched that on the key she’d taken from the dead cult sorcerer.

A muffled voice, unmistakably Nottle’s, came from within, promising riches in exchange for release. “Gems... I got a nice collection o’gems. Or if it’s weapons ye want—”

“Oh, stuff a sock in it,” responded another voice, this one gruff and just inside the door. A few low chuckles indicated that several men stood guard.

Durwyn nocked an arrow. After the surprisingly easy defeat of the mage upstairs, they’d decided to launch more conventional missiles during their initial volley and hold Jarial and Ghleanna’s magic in reserve until they saw how many opponents they faced. Emmeric, armed with Corran’s sword, fingered the hilt impatiently, eager to strike back at the cult for slaying his companions.

The paladin gripped his warhammer. He had not spoken to Kestrel since their confrontation. When she’d suggested that she sneak into the room after combat began—in an attempt to disguise their number and attack one of the guards from behind—a shrug had been the only indication that he’d heard her.

At Corran’s nod, Durwyn stepped into the doorway and fired, a second shot quickly chasing the first. “One down—five more!” He jumped out of the way to let Corran and Emmeric charge past, then grabbed his axe and followed them into battle. Next, Ghleanna and Jarial entered.

Kestrel withdrew her twin daggers from her boots and waited in the corridor as sounds of combat erupted. She counted to sixty, then slipped inside.

It was a huge room, at least one hundred feet on each side, filled with chests, crates, and emptied sacks. Had Kestrel the time, her thief’s mind would have loved to calculate the riches the chamber had held during Myth Drannor’s peak. Now a more serious task occupied her attention.

The three warriors had engaged five guards in combat. A sixth guard lay on the floor, one of Durwyn’s arrows through his heart. At first Kestrel thought their opponents were cult sorcerers, for they all had claws for right hands and wore red leather boots, loincloths, and bracers. These adversaries, however, had no hoods to hide their heads and shoulders, and she gasped at the sight of their deformed features. Their skin, though still flesh-colored, resembled a scaly reptilian hide from the tops of their heads to their upper chests, and their eyes burned red with battlelust. Where the scarred mages had tattoos to broadcast their cult affiliation, the fighters had three razor-sharp blades piercing each thigh. The guards wielded wicked-looking double-bladed halberds with spikes at their heads and hooks at their bases.

Durwyn battled two of the cultists. His second arrow protruded through the shoulder of one. He landed a blow on the arm of his injured foe, then managed to parry the other’s strike. Corran also fought two opponents. His warhammer easily deflected the attacks that came his way, but he appeared unable to gain the offensive. Emmeric, though fighting with an unfamiliar weapon, seemed to be holding his own.

Ghleanna gazed balefully at one of Corran’s adversaries, her fingers tracing ancient runes in the air. A moment later the sorceress uttered a single command word. The cult fighter shrieked, but Kestrel could discern no physical damage. His blows, however, lost their precision. When Corran’s other foe caused the paladin to shift his position, the spellbound cult fighter swung wildly, apparently trying to hit anything within reach of his weapon.

He’s blind, Kestrel realized. With one of Corran’s opponents thus disabled, she darted around the room’s perimeter to aid Durwyn. As she moved, she kept one eye on the unfolding combat.

Emmeric, gaining familiarity with the weight and balance of Corran’s sword, backed his opponent against an open trunk. The cult fighter’s calves bumped into the chest, knocking him off balance. As he struggled to regain his equilibrium, Emmeric seized the moment and scored a hit. The thrust opened a deep gash in the cultist’s shoulder. Undeterred by the blood oozing down his arm, the fighter lunged forward to return the blow. Emmeric anticipated the strike but not the handful of diamond dust the fighter grabbed from the open trunk with his free hand and threw in his face. The distraction lasted only a moment, but that was long enough for the cultist to open a wound in Emmeric’s sword arm.

A glance at Durwyn indicated that the large warrior still managed to fend off both of his opponents, so Kestrel elected to aid the injured Emmeric. She maneuvered behind the cult fighter, planning to stab him in the back. Just before moving in for her strike, she glanced toward Jarial and Ghleanna in the doorway to make sure they saw her and didn’t inadvertently direct any magical attacks her way.

Her heart stopped.

Behind the door stood a hooded figure with the green tattoos of the cult sorcerers. The wizard’s sinister gaze focused on Emmeric, his hands gesturing rapidly as his mouth formed unheard words.

“Cult sorcerer!” she shouted.

Her warning came too late. A crackle of electricity rent the air as a lightning bolt blasted from the wizard’s fingertips to strike Emmeric. The bolt struck the fighter with so much force that he flew through the air and into the wall a good eighty feet away, the smell of burning flesh following in his wake. His scorched body dropped to the floor.

Kestrel took the dagger she’d meant to plunge between the fighter’s shoulder blades and instead hurled it at the cult sorcerer. It buried itself in his stomach. The evil sorcerer looked up, surprised—but not stopped. As blood welled around the weapon and ran down his legs to pool on the floor, the cultist muttered the words of a new incantation. His gaze never left Kestrel.

Movement to her left, however, wrested her attention to a closer opponent. Emmeric’s foe, alerted to her presence by the dagger that had sailed past his ear, now turned his attacks on her. She parried his blows with her other dagger, staggering under the force of his strikes. When a shout from one of the other cultists distracted him momentarily, she seized the opportunity to grab her club.

Even with Quinn’s familiar baton, the cultist’s hits came too quickly for her to manage any offensive blows. He laughed mockingly when she tried to strike back twice—and both times nearly lost her right arm to the cult fighter’s superior weaponmastery. Meanwhile, she braced herself for the sorcerer’s spell. When would it come? She dared not avert her gaze from the hideous visage of the cult fighter, even for a second.

Suddenly, a flash of orange light silhouetted her adversary. Beyond the fighter, a sheet of flames fanned the cult sorcerer. One of Jarial’s spells. The evil spellcaster cried out in agony just as three bursts of magical energy materialized and sped toward her.

Searing pain tore through her right thigh. The wound burned, its sting worse than any inflicted by a mundane weapon. Kestrel sucked in her breath, waiting for two more.

Jarial’s magic, however, had distracted the cult sorcerer at the moment he took aim. The other two conjured missiles hit her opponent, who yelped as both projectiles caught him in the back. She seized the momentary advantage and slashed his throat.

As the cultist sank to the ground, she quickly took stock of the situation around her. Durwyn had just felled one of his opponents. The other gasped for breath and swung his halberd with undisciplined desperation. The blinded fighter lay in a puddle of his own blood. Corran’s remaining foe was backed against a wall. The three mages appeared locked in a sorcerer’s contest, racing to see who could cast the next spell.

Kestrel hurled her second dagger at the cult sorcerer. The next spell would not be his.

The dagger caught the evil wizard in the calf. Kestrel muttered an oath under her breath. She was injured and tired. Her aim had been poor. The strike provided enough distraction, however, that the cult sorcerer lost his concentration, and Ghleanna completed her spell first. Bursts of magical energy hissed toward the injured spellcaster, at last finishing him off. Durwyn and Corran defeated their foes at about the same time, the paladin landing a blow on the head of his opponent and the warrior removing the head of his.

In the ensuing silence, they all took a moment to catch their breaths. Kestrel glanced around the chamber warily, half-expecting another cult sorcerer to leap out from the shadows. She couldn’t even look at Emmeric’s incinerated, broken body lying in a heap across the room. Gods, but she hated wizards.

Her leg burned where the cult sorcerer’s missile had hit it. She bent over to examine the injury, anticipating a bloody open wound. Fortunately, her armor had slowed down the missile and thus prevented it from entering too deep. The magical energy appeared to have cauterized the area. Her thigh hurt like hell, but it would heal.

A single voice broke the stillness. “Uh... anyone still out there?” Nottle’s muffled words came from a nearby cluster of strongboxes and crates.

“Yes, Nottle,” Corran replied.

“Thanks be to Yondalla! I’m gittin’ cramped in here. Lemme out!”

Kestrel left to the others the task of releasing the foolish halfling, instead making her way around ransacked coffers and trunks to Emmeric. Nottle had cost them a valuable comrade-in-arms and her a potential ally against Corran’s tyranny. Only Emmeric had agreed that they could not afford this detour, a point he’d lost his life proving. Would the others listen to reason now, or would she eventually end up as dead as the fighter?

She tried to walk normally but found herself hobbling. Each step made the wound throb. Damn that sorcerer to the Abyss! Damn Nottle! Damn Corran, too—she blamed the paladin for the fact that they were down here at all.

Until she reached Emmeric’s remains, she harbored a tiny, unrealistic hope that the warrior somehow clung to life. That hope evaporated as soon as she got a close look at him. His body was burned so badly that it scarcely looked human, little flesh yet clung to his charred frame. She swallowed the bile that rose in her throat.

Movement behind her indicated that someone had followed her. Two someones, judging from the familiar sound of their footsteps. Corran and Ghleanna.

“Poor Emmeric,” the half-elf whispered as she got a look the fighter. “I’d thought maybe...”

“Yeah, me too,” Kestrel said.

The two women fell silent as Corran knelt over their fallen companion. The paladin gently untangled Emmeric’s skeletal limbs and repositioned his body so that it appeared to rest more comfortably. Then he rummaged through a few open chests until he found a velvet cloth to drape over the fighter. Corran never spoke as he tended to Emmeric’s remains. Did he feel guilty for dragging them down here, to the warrior’s demise? Kestrel hoped so.

From the conversation drifting toward her, it sounded as if Jarial and Durwyn were having difficulty releasing Nottle from the strongbox in which the cultists had secured him. She sighed and limped toward them, her fingers already reaching for her lockpicking tools. Could any of these people survive without her?

“I’ll smash it open with my axe,” Durwyn said as she approached.

Nottle squawked. “An’ smash my head, too?”

“That won’t be necessary.” Kestrel pulled the appropriate pick from her pouch. She tried to squat in front of the chest, but her injured leg screamed in protest. She wound up simply plunking her bottom down onto the floor. Before touching the lock, she looked up at Jarial. “I assume you’ve checked this for magical traps?”

“I didn’t find any.” The mage eyed her askance. “Are you injured?”

“I’m fine.” Kestrel examined the lock for signs of mundane surprises. It appeared to be a simple padlock. The only unusual feature was a glyph engraved into the body of the lock. “Damn,” she muttered. She’d seen a padlock like this once before—Quinn had nearly lost a finger to the blade that had sprung out of it. Different icon, but she’d bet it worked on the same principle.

Jarial leaned over her shoulder. “What?” Durwyn also bent down to get a closer look.

“I’m guessing this symbol’s here for a reason. Use anything but the proper key to open it and something very bad happens.” She glanced to Durwyn. “You did check the dead cultists for keys, didn’t you?”

A sheepish expression crossed his face. “Uh...”

She rubbed her temples. “Why don’t you do that before we go any further?” Durwyn immediately started rifling the corpses. Not much of a thinker, the warrior was great at following orders.

Nottle rapped on the lid of the strongbox. “What’s takin’ so long?”

“We’re trying to make sure no one else gets killed saving your foolish hide,” she said. The halfling sure had an irritating little voice. “You getting enough air through those airholes?”

“Yeah.”

“Shut up or that will change.”

Nottle fell silent. As Durwyn and Jarial searched the cultist’s bodies, Kestrel studied the engraving on the padlock. She’d seen that circle and arch image before. It matched the glyph on the treasury door—and on the key she’d taken from the cult sorcerer upstairs.

“Never mind, boys. I think I’ve found it.” She withdrew the key from her sleeve, and discovered that it slipped easily into the lock. The clasp sprung open. A moment later, the peddler was free.

“Finally! I thought I’d never git outta there.” The halfling stretched his short limbs to their fullest extent.

“We told you this place was dangerous, Nottle,” Corran said as he and Ghleanna rejoined the group.

“Yeah, I know. I couldn’t resist. Scavenging’s in my blood.” He leaned toward Kestrel. “Surely you, m’dear, understand the lure of an old dwarven treasury? I suspect we’re kindred spirits.”

She didn’t deny the allure but preferred to think she had more sense. She nodded toward the dead cultists. “I see this is a great place for making new friends.”

He wrinkled his nose in distaste. “Nah, they weren’t friendly at all. ’Specially when I wouldn’t join their club.”

Corran’s brow rose. “They invited you to join their organization?”

“Well, not exactly—said I could make a ‘great contribution,’ but I kinda got the feelin’ they were all in on some joke I didn’t understan’. Not that I’d want t’belong to somethin’ called the Cult of the Dragon. I don’t like dragons. Though they have got nice treasure. Dragons, that is—I dunno about these folks.”

Kestrel and the others exchanged glances, but no one seemed familiar with the cult’s name.

“Did they tell you anything about their activities?” Corran asked.

“Nah. But I did overhear a thing or two. Once they shut me up in the box, they sometimes forgot about me and talked a little too freely. Since ye rescued me and all, I’ll tell ye what they said without chargin’ my usual price for information.”

Kestrel smiled thinly. “How generous of you.”

Nottle appeared not to notice her sarcasm. “These cult folks, they’re the ones who killed yer friends the other day. They’re also the ones who drove the alhoon and phaerimm outta this part o’the city.”

“Their sorcerers are that powerful?”

“Their leader is—he’s a dracolich!”

A shudder raced up Kestrel’s spine. If an undead dragon was behind all these events, their quest was even more doomed than she’d previously imagined.

Durwyn scratched his head. “I thought Emmeric said the cult leader was an archmage. Some woman—Kya something.”

“Perhaps they’re working cooperatively,” Corran suggested. “Nottle, did you overhear anything else?”

“Somethin’ ’bout using some kinda pool t’make the dracolich stronger than he already is.”

Everyone but Nottle exchanged apprehensive glances. “Does the pool have a name?” Ghleanna asked.

Nottle shrugged. “Don’t know. They jus’ kept calling it ‘the pool.’ It was a little hard t’hear from where I was sittin’, ye know.”

Jarial cleared his throat. “Can we talk about this en route? Now that Nottle is free, we shouldn’t tarry.”

Corran nodded. “Jarial’s right. This news only increases the urgency of our mission.”

“Emmeric?” Durwyn asked.

“At rest.” Corran replied. “Let us finish what he and his companions started.”

Following a shortcut Nottle knew, they passed yet another ice-covered doorway on their way back to the Room of Words. “I sure wish we knew what those frozen rooms were about.” Durwyn said.

“Perhaps they’re related to the Rohnglyn,” Nottle said.

“The what?”

The peddler shrugged. “Accordin’ to rumor, some kinda magic transportation use t’connect all four levels of the dwarven dungeons. Rohnglyn, the elves called it. Years back, when the alhoon was still layin’ claim t’these halls, they all got in some big feud an’one o’the beasts put an ice charm on the Rohnglyn. Froze the thing right in place, or so I hear.”

“This device,” Corran asked, “it would enable us to move between levels more quickly?”

“Instantly. So they say, anyway.”

Corran pulled out his warhammer. “Care to help me make a few ice cubes, Durwyn?”

The two warriors smashed their way through the ice, revealing a room identical to the one they’d seen before—with one notable exception. The rune on the floor lay covered with ice stalagmites infused with colored lights. Elaborate icicles, many thick as tree trunks, hung from the ceiling, some of them fused to the lower ice formations in great columns of ice. As in the other room, a frozen golden sphere floated at about waist level in the center of the circular pattern.

Ghleanna tapped one of the ice formations with her staff. “Solid.”

“Can you free it from the alhoon’s spell?” Corran asked.

“We can try.” She raised a brow at Jarial. “What do you think? Should we attempt to dispel the magic or counter it?”

“The alhoon are powerful spellcasters. I don’t know if either of us has the experience to dispel such strong sorcery.” Jarial circled the rune, running his hands along some of the icicles. “It looks like the sphere could withstand a fireball, which would probably melt some of the ice...”

Ghleanna nodded pensively. “Perhaps if we all stood outside the chamber, a lightning bolt could break through the thicker ice formations.”

As the two discussed additional possibilities, Kestrel noticed Durwyn shifting impatiently. The warrior concentrated on the icicle nearest him, his fingers absently stroking the haft of his axe.

Corran joined in the mages’ discussion. “If you weaken the ice with your spells, I’m sure Durwyn and I could then—”

“Enough talk. We waste time!” Durwyn raised his battle-axe and swung at the closest icicle. The force of the blow sent a huge crack running along the ice from top to bottom. As it weakened, its center seemed to take on a bluish hue. Durwyn struck again, this time breaking through the formation. Embedded in the jagged layers of ice rested a thin blue shard that twinkled in the torchlight.

They all moved closer for a better look. “Well, I’ll be pickled,” Nottle said. “What do ye suppose that is?”

Jarial furrowed his brow in concentration. “It looks like...” He extended a hand, running his fingers along the crystal’s edge. “It is. This is an ice knife, identical to one Ozama often conjured through spellcasting. Only hers wasn’t blue.”

“Borea’s Blood,” Nottle whispered.

“You’ve heard of it?”

The halfling’s eyes glowed as he regarded the ice sliver almost reverently. “It’s said that Borea’s Blood—” He stopped suddenly, as if remembering himself. His eyes regained their usual mercenary glint, and he shrugged casually. “Jest a blue knife, that’s all. Nothin’ you folks would wanna lug around with ye.” He reached toward it “Here, I’ll jes—”

“I don’t think so.” Kestrel batted away his arm. Obviously the knife had some value if the peddler took interest. “I’m sure lugging this around won’t prove a burden to us at all.” She grabbed the crystal and tugged, expecting it to remain frozen in place. To her surprise, the blue knife slid from the icicle as smoothly as a sword from its scabbard.

The moment Borea’s Blood cleared its icy sheath, every shard of ice in the room immediately disappeared. The large ice formations vanished, while the broken chunks on the floor melted into small puddles. Only the blue crystal remained unchanged, resting coolly in the palm of Kestrel’s hand. Above the rune, the colored lights danced like faeries on Midsummer Night.

“You did it—you unfroze the Rohnglyn,” Durwyn said.

She regarded the fighter. Had he not taken matters into his own hands, they might have wasted an hour debating strategy. She was developing new respect for the quiet but dedicated warrior. “No, it was your no-nonsense approach that found the crystal in the first place.”

At the compliment, the corners of Durwyn’s mouth twisted in a self-conscious half-smile. He appeared unused to praise. “Now that it’s thawed, how do you suppose it works?”

As in the room they’d entered earlier, the far wall of this chamber held a carving of four diamonds stacked right on top of each other, with a small gem—an opal—in the bottom-most point. Kestrel, Ghleanna, and Corran studied the pattern, while Jarial, Durwyn, and Nottle examined the floating golden sphere and the lights.

“Four diamonds, four dungeon levels,” Ghleanna said finally. “I’m guessing the gem in that pattern indicates the current position of the Rohnglyn. The bottom diamond is the bottom level of the dungeon, and so on. Perhaps it’s simply a matter of moving the gem to the level we want to reach.”

“That tells it where we want to travel,” Corran said, “but how do we activate the device?”

“I think that’s what this sphere is for,” Jarial said, poking at the globe. “Maybe once the opal is repositioned, we push or rotate the sphere.”

“We’ll never figure it out just standing here. Let’s give it a try.” Kestrel pulled the gem out of the wall and moved it up to the next vertex. “If Ghleanna’s theory is correct, we should wind up one level above, in the room we entered before.”

They all entered the dancing lights and moved to the center of the rune. Jarial reached toward the globe. “Ready?”

The moment he touched the golden sphere, the lights spun wildly about the perimeter of the rune, circling a half dozen times before returning to their usual state. The party waited expectantly, but nothing more happened.

“Maybe it’s not as easy as we thought,” Durwyn said.

Kestrel went back to study the diamond pattern again. She frowned in concentration. “Perhaps we need to do more than merely reposition the ruby.”

“Ruby?” Ghleanna said. “It was an opal, was it not?”

Kestrel glanced at the sorceress in surprise. “You’re right—the ruby was in the first room.” She turned back to the pattern, now noticing the tiny scratch marks at the bottom of the pattern. “Here are the marks I made trying to pry it out.”

Corran walked to the doorway and peered into the corridor. “Sure enough. We’re back on the third level.”

“Ha! That’s a pretty good trick,” Nottle said. “Gettin’ around the dungeons will be a piece o’cake now.” The halfling fairly skipped toward the door. “I’m gonna check on my wagon. See you folks later.” He nearly exited before turning around once more. “Oh—if ye ever git tired o’ toting around Borea’s Blood, ye know where t’find me.”

They watched him depart. “Let’s get back to the House of Gems,” Corran said.

Kestrel plucked the ruby out of the wall and inserted it in the topmost vertex. She reentered the dancing lights and nodded at Jarial. “Go ahead.”

The wizard touched the golden sphere. This time the lights raced so quickly and flashed so brightly that Kestrel squeezed her eyes shut. She opened them a moment later, expecting to find herself in another identical room.

Not in the belly of a dragon.

CHAPTER SIX

The unpredictable Rohnglyn had landed them in an enormous oval-shaped hall. Elaborate murals and mosaics of dragons covered the walls, some studded with precious stones to depict gem dragons. Small round windows served as the dragons’ eyes, allowing the first sunlight they’d seen in days to spill into the room. The hall’s beams and columns were intricately carved in the same motif. Blue, red, green, and black dragon tails spiraled white pillars, while silver dragon claws cradled glowing orbs at fixed intervals along the walls. On the ceiling, two great wyrms—one red, one gold—were locked in eternal combat.

Corran fixed Kestrel with an annoyed glare. “This isn’t the entrance to the House of Gems. What in blazes did you do?”

“Nothing! I just moved the gem to the top—I’m hardly an expert on this Rohnglyn thing, you know,” she retorted.

“Obviously.”

Durwyn turned in a slow circle, taking in their surprising new surroundings. “Where are we?”

Good question, Kestrel thought. Woven among all the dragon images were mysterious-looking runes and intricate knotwork patterns. The gilded railing along a second-floor balcony featured the most elaborate of these patterns. Similar designs were also set into the floor. Two rows of statues flanked the main walkway. These depicted sorcerers—some human, some elven, some of other races—all of whom appeared powerful, wise, and formidable.

“Wherever we are, this is a place of great magic,” Ghleanna murmured. “Can you feel it surround us?”

After witnessing Emmeric’s brutal death, magic was the last thing Kestrel wished to be surrounded by.

“Clearly, we’ve left the dungeons and are now above ground,” Jarial said. “I wonder if we have stumbled into the Speculum—the old wizards’ guildhall. When Ozama and I first came to Myth Drannor we saw the building perched near the castle in the city’s Heights. It is shaped like a giant dragon curled around an egg. The hall we now stand in is large enough to constitute most of the dragon’s body.”

“It’s so—still,” Kestrel said quietly. Something about the room inhibited speech, making her reluctant to use any but muted tones.

“I imagine the protective magics cast in and around this hall long ago have kept it safe from the desecration overtaking other parts of the city,” Jarial responded.

Durwyn stepped off the Rohnglyn rune. “As long as we’re here, let’s look around. Maybe the wizards left something behind that can help us.”

Kestrel let the others advance well into the room before she left the security of the Rohnglyn, not needing to look at the familiar scar on her wrist to recall the nasty surprises sorcerers could leave lying in wait. The injury in her thigh served as ample reminder of magical treachery, though the pain had subsided enough that she no longer favored the leg.

Once she started exploring the hall, however, she became caught up in the striking architecture and detailed renderings of dragon and sorcerer alike. Each depicted wizard appeared frozen in the process of casting a spell. An image crossed her mind of all the statues suddenly coming to life and the sorcery that would be unleashed. She shuddered. Thank the Lord of Shadows, they were all just sculptures.

At the end of the hall stood an empty pedestal, apparently still waiting patiently for the statue it would never receive. It stood about three feet high and had a wider base than the others, with recesses curling around its side that looked almost like steps. Curious about the view the elevated height would afford, she used the footholds to climb up.

The moment her foot touched the top of the pedestal, a series of chimes sounded. The musical notes so startled her that she nearly toppled off, but she caught her balance just as a wavering image appeared before her. The image solidified into a large two-dimensional floating oval mirror. Kestrel wrinkled her brow as her reflection came into focus. She looked like someone who’d spent the past several days traipsing through dusty old dungeons and fighting for survival. What she wouldn’t give for a bath!

Corran, Durwyn, Jarial, and Ghleanna all hastened to the pedestal. “How did you do that?” Durwyn asked.

Kestrel glanced down at the warrior. “I don’t know—I just climbed up on the pedestal and this mirror appeared.”

When she looked back at the mirror, she found her reflection fading until the surface became completely black. “Hey, what—”

A new image appeared, this one an unfamiliar face. It was a woman’s visage: piercing ice-blue eyes set under perfectly sculpted brows, angular cheekbones, and blood-red lips. Her honey-colored tresses were wound into a towering coil studded with gems. Her neck and shoulders were bare.

Durwyn let out a low whistle. “Wow. Who is that?”

Even Kestrel had to concede the magnetism of the woman’s beauty. It captured one’s attention and would not let go, seducing male and female viewers alike. Yet Kestrel sensed something predatory about the unknown woman’s charm, as if the stranger were a spider inviting her into its web. The thief’s collarbone tingled, a sensation that surprised her—in all the danger she’d faced since coming to Myth Drannor, she’d not felt the intuitive warning signal until she gazed at this woman’s face.

As they watched, more of the stranger’s body became visible. The woman reclined against some kind of dark red, leathery, curved bolster or throne, her limbs carelessly draped over its sides. She wore a red leather bodysuit slit to the navel—and little else. Body piercings on her thighs marred the otherwise smooth lines of her long legs, which ended in a pair of high-heeled red leather boots. The piercings resembled those Kestrel had seen on the cult fighters. Was this woman involved in the Cult of the Dragon?

Soft wavering light emanated from a source Kestrel couldn’t see, casting a warm but eerie glow on the white skin of the woman’s face and arms. The mysterious figure pensively gazed at the source of the glow.

Pelendralaar, said a husky female voice, barely audible above a gurgling hiss-babble in the background. Though the enchantress’s mouth had not formed the word, Kestrel was sure it had come from her.

“Child,” boomed a deep masculine voice. A bright flash of orange light bathed the woman’s face, then diminished.

The Pool has reached the port at Hillsfar. She closed her eyes and tossed her head back, exposing the curve of her throat. Her lips formed a slow, wicked smile. Can you hear the screams?

Her unseen companion offered only a deep rumble in response. More flashes of orange lit her face. The woman’s eyes opened. She turned her head and sat forward, gazing up and off to the side. Something troubles you. Speak.

“They are not fools,” said the thunderous voice. “They will send their heroes.”

The seductress nestled into her seat once more as she turned her gaze back to the source of the wavering glow. The view broadened, revealing a body of amber fluid lapping the ground nearby. They will meet the Mythal. Our Mythal. Another smile, this one more sinister than the last, spread across her features. She lifted her right arm and regarded her hand—not visible in the mirror—as if inspecting her manicure. And then they will meet you.

At the word “you,” the view expanded. Kestrel gasped, a sick feeling spreading through her stomach. The woman had no right hand but an enormous reptilian claw, far larger and sharper than any they had seen on the cultists. She stroked her razorlike talons along the curve of her throne, eliciting a deep, low groan from the mysterious masculine voice. A moment later, Kestrel saw that the sorceress sat not against an object of mortal construction but a great red dragon. The beast, however, looked horribly withered and disfigured. Its skin was dried and tight against its too-visible bones.

It was not a dragon, Kestrel realized, but the animated corpse of a dragon. The creature issued a final rumble, flames darting from its mouth.

The scene shrank, growing smaller and smaller until it appeared to be contained in a glass sphere the size of a child’s ball. The sphere rested on a wooden stand atop a circular table. The glare of the dragon’s flames illuminated several figures gathered around the crystal ball. Of them, Kestrel recognized only Elminster.

“Our heroes have already done well, taking up the fallen party’s mission as their own. If only we could send additional help...” the great mage said with a weary voice. “But the corrupted Mythal prevents us. They must seize the power of the Mythal for themselves. Otherwise, Moonsea is lost, and the Dragon Coast, and with them all our hopes.”

The other figures nodded in assent as the mirror faded to darkness, then disappeared altogether. Kestrel remained, unmoving, on the pedestal. A long minute passed before anyone spoke.

“I believe we’ve just had our first glimpse of Mordrayn,” Corran asked.

“And her pet dracolich. What did she call him—Pelendralaar?” Ghleanna said. “It seems Emmeric and Nottle were both correct about the cult’s leadership. The two are working together.”

Kestrel hopped off the pedestal so she could converse more easily with her companions. “Mordrayn said the pool has reached Mulmaster. Do you think she means another Pool of Radiance has appeared, like the one in Phlan?”

“Elminster suspected the Phlan pool was an offshoot of a larger, main pool here—not separate bodies of water, but somehow linked.” Ghleanna leaned against a statue of the notorious wizard himself, captured in bronze unleashing one of his human spells in the elven hall. “When he left Phlan, he was on his way to Shadowdale to investigate tales of another offshoot there. If the pool has indeed reached Mulmaster, there is no telling how many other cities it might threaten. We must stop its spread, or we might not have homes to return to.”

The mage’s words chilled Kestrel. Until this point, she’d believed the Pool of Radiance was a menace confined to Myth Drannor and Phlan. She’d wanted to walk away and let those cities solve their own problems, figuring she’d just start over in a new town far from the Moonsea. But if the pool could replicate itself anywhere, was there a safe place in all Faerûn?

Durwyn shook his head as if to clear it of confusion. “I don’t understand—how can the Pool of Radiance in Myth Drannor send tendrils of itself to cities tens of leagues away from here?”

“Maybe it has something to do with the Mythal,” Corran said. “Beriand and Faeril told us it has been corrupted, and Mordrayn and Pelendralaar spoke of it as being theirs.” He turned to Ghleanna and Jarial. “Suppose the cult gained control of it somehow. Could it enable the Pool of Radiance to expand in such a manner?”

“The two sorcerers exchanged grim glances. The Mythal is woven of ancient magic,” Ghleanna responded. “Such powerful sorcery holds possibilities we cannot even conceive.”

Kestrel glanced around the hall. They stood in a place of powerful sorcery, after all—perhaps the answer could be found right here. The runes on the walls were indecipherable to her, but maybe Ghleanna or Jarial could read them. Too, they had not yet explored the second floor. She peered up at the balcony. Several rows of bookcases, extending back as far as she could see, rested about two yards away from the railing. Scrolls and tomes neatly lined their shelves. A library? She pointed toward the balcony.

“The second floor seems to have a lot of scrolls and books. There might be a history of the Mythal or something.”

They climbed the stairway. The moment they reached the top, however, a cold breeze blew over them. Out of nowhere, a figure materialized.

Rather, almost materialized. A solid wooden throne appeared, but the man seated on it remained translucent, the back of the chair showing through his form. Kestrel sucked in her breath. A ghost. Her heartbeat accelerated, adding to the sick feeling that still lingered in the pit of her stomach.

Weren’t ghosts supposed to appear the way they did in life? If so, this man—an old elven sorcerer, from the look of his ornate robes and headdress—must have been ancient when he died. The spirit’s gaunt face, sunken eyes, and bony limbs lent him a skeletal mien. He rested on a cobweb-covered oak throne as gnarled as he and seemed so deeply settled into it that Kestrel wondered if he had risen from it in centuries. On his lap he held a gold bowl filled with water, and his right hand rested on a grinning skull with glowing red eyes.

The spirit did not seem to notice the party. “Now foul water freezes the guardians,” he muttered as he stared into the bowl. His voice had a tired, forlorn quality to it, as of one who has lived too long and seen too much, for whom immortality is more a curse than a blessing.

Kestrel and the others exchanged glances. She was in favor of backing right down the staircase without a word, but Ghleanna stepped forward. Before the half-elf could speak, however, the skull’s eyes flashed.

“Do not disturb the Master.”

Kestrel jumped. The skull had spoken!

“Here is the wise counsel you seek.” The skull’s feminine voice carried an eerie resonance, sending further chills down Kestrel’s spine.

“How do you know that we—” Ghleanna began.

“Your coming has been foreseen.”

Kestrel looked from the skull back to its “master.” The ghostly wizard was a diviner, then—a seer. She had known her share of charlatans who earned their living telling fortunes for the gullible, but she’d never encountered anyone with the genuine power to foresee the future.

“Master Caalenfaire instructs you to seek out the spirit of the dwarf lord Harldain Ironbar,” the skull said. “You will find him beyond the Circle of Mythan—but hold! You do not have the Ring of Calling!”

“No, we yet seek it,” Ghleanna said. Kestrel didn’t know how the sorceress had the nerve to address the skull, or even to stand so close to Caalenfaire.

“Master! Despair and woe! Your prediction has gone awry.”

The ancient diviner stirred, but still appeared entranced. He never lifted his gaze from the scrying bowl on his lap. “What? Volun, what is this you say? Where are they? I cannot see them. I cannot hear them. The fools!”

“They are talibund, Master. They have left the Path.”

Kestrel glanced at her companions to see whether they understood this conversation any better than she. The spellcasters appeared pensive, as did Corran. Durwyn looked absolutely bewildered.

“Volun, what is this ‘Path’ of which you speak?” Ghleanna asked. Kestrel noted that she gripped her staff tightly. Perhaps the sorceress wasn’t as comfortable talking with the disembodied skull as she wanted the pair to believe.

“Master Caalenfaire had worked out a destiny for you—a path you should walk. For the eventual good of Myth Drannor, if not your own.” Volun’s eyes flashed rapidly. “Instead you have become talibund. Now you walk your own path, which none can see. May Tymora help us! This is an unsettling turn.”

Kestrel edged closer to Jarial. “What’s this word the skull keeps using—‘talibund’?”

“I don’t know,” he whispered back.

“Talibund. The Veiled Ones,” Volun said. “What soothsayers call those whose destinies cannot be foretold.”

Ghleanna gripped her staff tighter and took a tentative step closer to the skull. “Is the warrior Athan talibund? Can your master say whether he still walks the path of the living?”

“Athan’s path became veiled before even yours,” Volun replied. “Master does not know his fate.”

Disappointment flickered across the half-elf’s face. With each dead end in her inquiries about the warrior, Ghleanna seemed to lose a little more of her spirit.

“Look, Volun,” Caalenfaire said. “I have captured them in my bowl once more. Or at least, their shadows—the Veiled Ones will be writ into the Song of Faerûn.”

“Now what is he talking about?” Kestrel muttered. Her nerves were too frayed to withstand much more of this mysterious speech.

“The Song of Faerûn is the great tale of the world, sung by the Bard of Kara-Tur at the close of the millennium. Master, tell us more about the Song!”

“Listen, Volun, and be amazed.”

From the scrying bowl drifted the notes of a lute, soon joined by a feminine voice of such sweet perfection that Kestrel momentarily forgot her fear.

The bard continued the song, but her voice faded from hearing. Kestrel felt her anxiety returning.

“This is not what we had foreseen, Master! It gives me hope.”

Durwyn stepped forward excitedly. “What happens next? How does the song end?”

Caalenfaire, apparently back in his scrying trance, did not answer. Durwyn looked at the skull hopefully. “Volun?”

“I will not tell you,” Volun replied. “No mortals should glimpse their future. It is never happy enough, or long enough. Look at my master. Would you become like him? Do not seek out the future—it will find you soon enough.”

“How do we return to the Path?” Corran asked.

“Return? You cannot. Do not even try.” The flickering in Volun’s eyes dimmed. “We will peer ahead as far as we can and give you such help as we are able, but if Master Caalenfaire could see you, perhaps others could also. People of power. Maybe it is better for you to walk alone in the dark—”

“Not quite alone,” Caalenfaire murmured. “There is a hand over them, Volun. Whose hand, I cannot determine.”

“Can you at least tell us something of the cult?” Ghleanna asked. “How can we succeed if we don’t know who we’re up against?”

The skull was silent, its eyes dark, empty sockets.

“Tell them, Volun,” Caalenfaire said finally.

“The Cult of the Dragon is a secret society, four and more centuries old,” Volun said, its eyes flashing red light once more. “Its founder was the madman Sammaster, a sorcerer who believed it is Toril’s destiny to be ruled by dead dragons.”

Kestrel had remained quiet until this point, not wanting to draw the attention of either the skull or its unsettling master. Now she felt compelled to question the outrageous statement. “Dead dragons? You said he was mad, but where in the Abyss did he come up with that idea?”

“From a passage in the oracle Maglas’s book of prophecies, Chronicle of Years to Come.”

Caalenfaire passed a hand over his scrying bowl. A distant, ancient voice echoed from within. “Nought will be left save shattered thrones, with no rulers but the dead. Dragons shall rule the world entire.”

“Sammaster mistranslated the passage,” Volun said. “He thought it said ‘The dead dragons shall rule the world.’ He founded the Cult of the Dragon to bring that prophecy to fruition.”

“How do the cultists operate?” Kestrel asked.

The diviner stirred. He leaned back in his chair, but his gaze never left the scrying bowl. “Let the little bird come closer, that she may see.”

Kestrel’s heart slammed in her chest so hard that her pulse roared in her ears. Come closer? To an undead sorcerer? She’d never experienced a stronger impulse to turn tail and run. Somehow, she forced her feet to remain rooted to the floor as she glanced at her companions. Corran gave her a sharp look and jerked his chin toward the throne. She shook her head. No way.

Then she realized that the others waited for her to move forward. She would look the coward if she refused. Swallowing hard, she approached. Caalenfaire slid his left hand down the side of the scrying bowl so she could see into it, but otherwise he remained still. She peered into the water.

“The cult finds evil dragons willing to undergo the transformation into dracoliches—undead dragons,” Volun said. As the skull spoke, an image appeared in the scrying bowl. A dozen cult sorcerers gathered around a blue dragon. The cultists performed some arcane ceremony involving the dragon and a large diamond. One of the cult sorcerers poured a potion into the dragon’s mouth. Within moments, a glow appeared in the center of the diamond. As the glow strengthened, the dragon’s skin shriveled and dried, its body becoming a corpse.

“In exchange for their mortal lives,” Volun continued, “the dragons gain additional powers in their new undead state. They also win the cult’s promise to help elevate them to world domination.” The scene showed the archmage touching the diamond, uttering a few words, then touching the dragon’s skeletal remains. The glow disappeared from the diamond as the dragon corpse jerked violently and rose, red flames flickering in its empty eye sockets.

Kestrel shuddered as the image faded away. She’d known the cult sorcerers were evil, but this kind of diabolical magic went beyond her comprehension. It made Caalenfaire and his familiar look downright approachable.

Well, not quite. As soon as she could politely do so, she backed away from the diviner’s throne. “So this Kya Mordrayn person—she runs the whole cult?”

“The cult operates in cells,” Volun said, “pockets of followers scattered throughout the continent of Faerûn. While each cell has its own leadership, the cult as a whole has no central power structure. The individual cells are too fractious to get along with each other. Such an organization necessarily attracts the unbalanced and power-hungry. Mordrayn is the archmage of a single, but strong, cell.”

“And she’s helping Pelendralaar amass enough power to take over the world?” Corran asked. “That’s rather ambitious, isn’t it? Even for a fanatic.”

“She has unraveled the great Weave.” Caalenfaire’s voice held a disturbing note of resignation.

“Mordrayn and Pelendralaar use the powerful magic of the Mythal to advance their goals,” Volun said. “With such strong sorcery to aid them, Master fears they may actually succeed.”

The diviner passed a hand over his scrying bowl, frowning. “Poison has reached the heart.”

“Master Caalenfaire senses great evil deep within Castle Cormanthor. We believe this evil, whatever it is, helped contaminate the Mythal. Cleanse the Mythal and defeat the cult, and you might have a chance at destroying the evil that has overtaken the castle.”

Kestrel stifled a groan. Cleanse the Mythal and defeat a bunch of insane cultists—as if doing so were as easy as picking a fat nobleman’s pocket.

“Something troubles the little bird,” Caalenfaire said.

Kestrel wished he would stop calling her that, but she wasn’t about to tell him so. “This whole mission troubles me. ‘Cleanse the Mythal.’ ‘Seize the power of the Mythal.’ How are we supposed to take control of something we can’t see or touch?”

Caalenfaire consulted his bowl once more. “The Path dims now. It twists.” His voice seemed to span a great distance, not just the boundary of death but the march of time. “Still, the signs are clear. You must get up from under. Beyond the Circle, find Harldain Ironbar. You can enter his tower in the House of Gems only from the surface. Harldain is your ally. Heed well his counsel.”

Volun’s voice also seemed to be fading from the present. “To reach the Heights, you must unseal the Circle of Mythanthor. You have seen it—a great golden circle in the floor, in the uppermost part of the dungeons. You need the Ring of Calling to unseal the Circle. Master, look into your bowl. Can it tell you where the Ring of Calling lies?”

“I am looking. It is unclear. They are Veiled Ones now, and their shadow darkens anything they might touch or any place they might go. There are many possibilities. The Tulun Wall... the Corridor of Salg... but first they should try the Room of Words in the Onaglym. Yes! But look—Resheshannen!”

“Master has spoken the Word of Oblivion. When you find the ring, use this word to release it from its once-proud bones. Wear the ring while standing in the Circle.”

Ghleanna bowed. “We thank you, Master Caalenfaire and Volun. You have lent our quest new direction.”

“The sword, Volun, the sword,” Caalenfaire murmured. “Now that their path lies in shadow, they need it more than ever.”

“Oh, yes—Master has a gift for you. Examine the scrying pedestal in the main hall. An arrow will guide you. And Master says the little bird should fear not Loren’s Blade. It carries no curse.”

Kestrel started at the unexpected announcement about the magical weapon she’d acquired from Athan’s band. How had the diviner known she harbored doubts? The returning dagger had not even come up in conversation.

Caalenfaire seemed to have lapsed back into a trance, and Volun’s eyes had gone dark. One at a time, the adventurers retreated down the stairs. Anxious as Kestrel was to depart, she hesitated to turn her back on the ghost and thus found herself the last one standing on the balcony. As she finally turned to go, the diviner’s tremulous voice broke the stillness once more.

“The bird of prey feels under attack.”

Kestrel froze. Why, oh why, had he singled her out? Slowly, she faced him. “I thought I was ‘talibund.’ What do you know of me?”

“You do not share the others’ idealism. You speak uncomfortable truths... .I know something of that.”

She grew warm, her hands trembling with nervous energy as if she’d been caught red-handed at some shady activity. Could the old ghost see straight into her soul?

“There is one in particular with whom you clash.”

Corran. As if on cue, the paladin’s voice floated up to them. “Kestrel?”

“Coming!” she called, not taking her gaze off the spectral wizard.

“Be of two minds but one heart,” Caalenfaire said, his image fading from view and his voice seeming to echo from some far-off place. “Do not let conflict between you threaten your mission. It is too important.” With that, the ghostly diviner and his familiar faded away altogether.

Kestrel paused to catch her breath before heading down the stairs. The apparition’s words had left her feeling exposed, as if all her thoughts and emotions were on display for anyone to see. She shook her shoulders in an attempt to shrug off the sensation.

By the time Kestrel rejoined the others, they had already begun to examine the base of the scrying pedestal and had located a rune shaped like an arrowhead. Jarial had followed its point until he found a crack in the marble, which he’d traced to outline a secret panel. Kestrel tried to pry it off but ultimately had to give up and let Ghleanna cast an opening spell upon it.

Corran reached in and withdrew a gleaming silver long sword. He held the blade reverently, testing its weight and balance. The weapon seemed almost an extension of the paladin’s own hand, so smoothly did it arc and thrust under his command. As Kestrel watched him swing the sword from side to side, Caalenfaire’s final words echoed in her mind.

“‘Tis a magnificent weapon—light but sturdy—the finest I’ve ever held.” Corran swept the blade through the air one more time, then offered its jeweled hilt to Durwyn. “Care to test it?”

The guard hefted his axe. “Nay, this is my weapon. I’d hardly know what to do with a long sword.”

Corran shrugged and offered the blade to Kestrel. Though she could defend herself with a sword in a pinch—hell, she could defend herself with a frying pan if she had to—her swordsmanship wasn’t nearly worthy of such a weapon. “Keep it, Corran,” she said. “You wield it much better than I ever could.”

He gazed at the blade a moment more. “I shall call this sword ‘Pathfinder,’ that it may help us find our own way to defeat Mordrayn and the Pool.”

They did not tarry longer. The diviner’s cryptic hints and warnings had created a sense of urgency in them all. As the party headed back to the Rohnglyn, Kestrel fell into step beside Durwyn. “Little bird,” he said absently.

“What?”

“Caalenfaire called you a little bird. So did Preybelish. I just realized why—they were referring to your name.” He stopped and regarded her quizzically. “Why did your parents name you after a falcon?”

Kestrel stared at him. They’d just learned from a spooky diviner that a dracolich and some mad cultists were trying to take over Faerûn, and he was asking about her name? “They didn’t.”

“But a kestrel is a—”

“I know what a kestrel is,” she snapped. “My parents didn’t give me my name. I got it from the man who found me as a baby after they were killed.” Her tone softened as she thought of Quinn. He’d been passing by the burned-out house and heard her hungry cries coming from the root cellar where her parents must have hidden her before brigands put arrows in their chests and set the cottage ablaze. “He said when he first saw me I reminded him of a falcon because he’d never seen such fierce eyes in so little a person.”

She flushed, self-conscious at having revealed the personal story to a group of people she barely considered allies, let alone friends. Durwyn had caught her off-guard. No one had ever asked about her name before. As she looked away from Durwyn, she caught Corran regarding her pensively. Yes, she was a ragamuffin raised by a rogue stranger—she’d probably just confirmed every low opinion he held of her.

She noted Ghleanna’s gaze on her also. The sorceress, however, regarded her not with condescension but with understanding. Her expression surprised Kestrel—the half-elf had seemed reserved until now, except on the subject of Athan. Perhaps her missing lover made her empathetic to the losses of others.

They reached the dancing lights of the Rohnglyn. Just before Jarial touched the golden sphere to take them back into the dwarven dungeons, Kestrel glanced up at the balcony once more.

Caalenfaire and Volun reappeared. For the first time, the diviner gazed at the party instead of into his scrying bowl, his face careworn but hopeful.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Outside the entrance to the House of Gems tower, the body of the cult sorcerer Kestrel and her companions had defeated lay undisturbed. Either the cultists had not passed through the door to the Room of Words since the party was last here or they had stepped over their comrade’s body as if it were no more than a piece of litter.

To the group’s surprise, they found the tower door unlocked. It opened into a single round room about thirty feet in diameter, a curved stone staircase spiraling up the far wall. The chamber was empty of furnishings or occupants.

“At last a lucky break,” Durwyn said as he strode forward.

“Wait!” Kestrel grabbed his arm. The cultists were no fools—and neither were dwarven engineers. She studied the circular room, noting a line of what appeared to be pockmarks rimming the stone wall at a height of about five feet She knelt to retrieve one of the daggers from her boots but changed her mind and withdrew Loren’s Blade instead. The magical dagger would better serve her purpose.

With a snap of her wrist, she sent the weapon hurling through the air at eye level. Dozens of darts came flying from the wall in rapid succession, shooting out of the holes on one side and into the holes opposite. The others gasped in surprise. Durwyn let out a low whistle.

Kestrel herself was so startled by the profusion of missiles that she almost forgot to catch Loren’s Blade as it returned to her. “The darts flew too fast for me to see, but I’ll wager they’re spiked on both ends,” she said. To prove her point, she threw the dagger again, with the same results.

“A perpetual trap,” she explained. “There’s no need to reset it once it’s sprung. The darts can cross the room over and over until doomsday.” Though Kestrel forced herself to adopt a nonchalant all-in-a-day’s-work demeanor, inwardly she cursed every person under four feet tall who’d ever lived in this city. She admired the dwarves’ engineering prowess—not one dart had missed its chamber—but damn, they made her life more difficult.

Durwyn rubbed the stubble on his chin. “So how do we get past the trap?”

On a hunch, Kestrel flung Loren’s Blade across the room once more, this time four feet off the ground. Nothing happened, except that her weapon clanked against the wall and boomeranged back to her hand.

That was the secret, then. “The trap’s designed to strike nondwarves—people taller than them.” She addressed Durwyn primarily but extended her gaze to include the others. “As long as we stay close to the ground, we should be all right.”

The party crawled single file through the booby-trapped chamber and made it to the other side safely. Corran started to speak, but Kestrel hushed him as she examined the steps for more unpleasant dwarven surprises. Though he bristled under the rebuke, the paladin held his tongue. She cast a discerning gaze at each tread and riser, running her fingers along the cold, smooth stone. Though she found no evidence of additional traps, her sensitive ears detected a faint shuffling sound above.

“Wait here,” she advised the others. She silently crept up the stairs, stopping before she reached the top. From this vantage point, she could peer over the second-story floor and see most of the room while remaining hidden in the stairwell.

This level of the tower comprised a single room with shelves full of scrolls. Wooden cases similar to wine racks lined the wall, with each diamond-shaped opening holding its own roll of paper. The documents merited only a cursory glance, however—it was the dozen or so orogs in the chamber that arrested her attention. They occupied the center of the room, effectively blocking the stairs to the third story. The humanoids stood in perfect formation, their eyes blankly staring straight ahead. She studied the unit for a leader but didn’t discern one.

A fly buzzed past Kestrel’s ear, landing on her forearm. She brushed it off, but the pesky thing buzzed around her face again. “Shoo!” she whispered, batting it aside. The fly finally got the message and sped off to bother someone else.

She observed the orogs for a few minutes longer. The guards stood so still they didn’t seem to breathe. They merely gripped their short swords, ready for combat. As she watched, the fly that had irritated her flew into the midst of the orogs and landed on one humanoid’s snout, where it proceeded to dance around the creature’s nostrils. Just watching the insect made Kestrel’s own nose itch, but the orog didn’t so much as flinch. He continued to stare straight ahead.

Kestrel returned to the group. In a hushed voice, she reported what she’d seen.

“Maybe we can parley with them as we did with those other orogs guarding the cult sorcerer.” Jarial glanced up the stairs. “Do you think they would be willing to talk?”

“I’m not even sure they’re alive,” Kestrel responded. “I mean, the whole thing with the fly—”

“They might be under the influence of a charm,” Ghleanna said. “Or in a state of suspended animation.”

Corran rubbed his chin thoughtfully, his fingers stroking the rough stubble of the past three days. “If that’s the case, can we figure out a way around them? We need to reserve as much of our strength and resources as possible for the cultists in the Room of Words.”

“You all think too much.” Durwyn grabbed his bow and nocked an arrow. “We waste time. We can handle a dozen orogs.” He mounted the stairs.

Kestrel stared after him, surprised by his assertiveness. “Wait for me!”

The others followed close behind. As soon as Durwyn rose high enough in the stairwell to sight the orogs, he stopped and let the arrow fly. Another shaft quickly followed. Both arrows found their targets, felling a pair of humanoids.

The rest of the orogs started forward. Kestrel maneuvered around Durwyn and hurled her twin daggers at two of the creatures. Behind her, she heard Ghleanna utter the words of a spell.

Kestrel’s first dagger struck an orog in the throat. He sank to his knees, then slumped over. Her second dagger, thrown with her right hand, hit its victim in the side. Though the blade had buried itself in his flesh, the creature’s face didn’t register the slightest discomfort. He continued his advance as if nothing had happened.

Ghleanna’s incantation also had no effect. “These are no ordinary orogs,” the sorceress said. “That spell should have put two of them to sleep.”

The orogs closed in. Their movements lacked fluidity. Though they moved quickly, they jerked and lurched, as if they were marionettes on strings and someone else controlled their steps.

Kestrel hurled Loren’s Blade at her wounded opponent. The magical dagger struck him in the chest. As the weapon returned to her hand, the orog kept coming. He was so close now that she could see the yellow stains on his long, canine teeth, smell the stench of the matted, coarse hair covering his unwashed body. Though the creature had been injured twice, his pale eyes retained their vacant stare.

She hadn’t enough distance to throw Loren’s Blade at him again. She reached for her club and hastened to one side so as not to be forced backward into the stairwell. A snap of her wrist extended the baton to its full length, but a simultaneous blow by the orog knocked the club out of her hand. It scudded across the floor among the clawed feet of the other orogs.

She gripped Loren’s Blade tighter as her foe raised his sword for another strike. She’d have to parry with the dagger until she found another melee weapon.

Jarial released a spell. A fan of flames shot out from his hands, seriously burning the four creatures closest to him and singeing the hides of several others. Kestrel had hoped the fire would distract her opponent long enough for her to sink her dagger into him again, but he didn’t so much as blink. None of the creatures did.

“Tyr preserve us,” Corran muttered. Pathfinder in hand, he battled two orogs at once. The first lunged at the paladin with its blade. Corran’s gleaming weapon easily disarmed the humanoid, sending the orog’s short sword flying. It landed a few feet from Kestrel.

She retrieved the weapon and assumed a defensive posture just as her foe struck again. Sword fighting was not her forte, but the orogs didn’t have to know that. She parried the humanoid’s blows, giving herself a chance to become accustomed to the weapon before shifting to an offensive stance. Her opponent was strong and towered over her by at least a foot. When the opportunity arose, she would have to press her only advantage—superior agility.

Meanwhile, Durwyn’s swinging axe caught her peripheral vision. The warrior had already defeated one opponent and now fought two more. Make that one more—another orog succumbed to his powerful strokes. The unfortunate mercenary, already burned by Jarial’s spell, lost an arm to Durwyn’s axe. He dropped to the floor without a sound.

So had all the fallen orogs, Kestrel realized suddenly. Except for her own companions’ grunts of exertion and the clang of metal on metal, this was the most quiet battle she’d ever experienced. The humanoids fought and died without so much as a groan—a far cry from their usual whoops and calls of war.

More comfortable with her newly acquired weapon, Kestrel darted to one side. The movement forced her opponent to twist his body awkwardly to continue countering her strikes. The creature fought hard but mechanically, its swings and parries more the product of rote than battle fervor.

That blank stare was really starting to give her the creeps. There was definitely something wrong with these creatures.

Ghleanna swung her staff and hit Kestrel’s opponent in the head, providing the opportunity the rogue had been looking for. Kestrel thrust her blade at an upward angle, catching the humanoid in the throat. The orog sank silently to the ground, its face never losing the blank stare.

When Kestrel glanced around, she saw that Durwyn had just dispatched the last of his trio of foes. Corran also had defeated three orogs with his new magical blade. As she watched, he lunged to catch another one—who had turned on Jarial—in the back. The creature remained standing, still as death, for a full minute, as if it hadn’t realized it had been killed. Then it dropped as its comrades had.

As everyone caught their breaths, Kestrel retrieved her weapons. She studied the bodies of the orogs she had slain, then swept her gaze across all the orog corpses.

Not one of the creatures had bled.

“Uh, guys? Have you noticed—”

“No blood,” Corran said as the realization hit him as well. He bent down to examine one of the orogs more closely. “The cult somehow drained the blood and life out of these creatures, leaving them animated corpses. Soulless.”

Kestrel shuddered involuntarily. The more she learned about the Cult of the Dragon, the more she wished she could just walk away from this whole quest. Only the vision of all humanity wandering around in the orogs’ soulless state kept her from making the suggestion. Instead, she turned her gaze to the stairs the bloodless humanoids had been guarding. At the top, the Room of Words waited. The Ring of Calling was only feet away—along with the cult sorcerers who would fight to the death to keep it.

The party burst into the Room of Words so suddenly that the sorcerer holding the Ring of Calling dropped the skeletal arm in surprise. He recovered quickly, his fingers and lips immediately moving to form an incantation.

Kestrel’s dagger prevented him from ever finishing it.

Once she saw the light of life leave his eyes, the thief didn’t spare the dying cultist another glance. One down, five to go, and good riddance to the chump on the floor. She gripped her second blade and scanned the room for her next target.

Beside her, Durwyn released an arrow. The shaft whistled past her ear to embed itself in the heart of another cultist. The evil sorcerer’s eyes widened beneath his leather hood. He gripped the shaft with his clawed hand and tried to yank the arrow from his chest, but his clumsy struggle only caused more blood to ooze from the wound. As the cultist gurgled something unintelligible, his gaze met Durwyn’s—then took on the glassy stare of death.

Meanwhile, both Jarial and Ghleanna managed to unleash spells before the cultists could prepare any sorcery of their own. The half-elf’s magic rendered one hooded sorcerer blind, while Jarial’s sank an acid-laced arrow in the stomach of another. The wounded sorcerer screamed in agony as the smell of burning cloth and flesh filled the air. Tendrils of greenish smoke wisped from the hole in his gut. He stared at Jarial, his features forming a mask of hatred. His lips curled to spit out a foul-sounding, arcane curse. Then he began weaving a spell of his own.

Kestrel’s heart pounded as the scarred sorcerer spun his retaliatory enchantment. The element of surprise had enabled the companions to kill or handicap four of the six cultists in the chamber. Though their odds had improved, victory still wasn’t assured. Now they would have to rely on their wits and the strategy Corran had devised just before they entered the chamber. According to plan, the paladin would identify the band’s most powerful sorcerer and—cloaked by Jarial’s invisibility spell—disable him.

There was no sign of Corran yet, and the two unharmed cultists had overcome their surprise. One, the youngest-looking cult sorcerer she had yet seen, nervously stumbled over the words of an evocation that sent a burst of dark energy flying at Durwyn. The black flames struck the warrior in his bow arm. He dropped his bow and clutched his arm. “To the Abyss with your hellfire!” he cried. Pain flashed across his face, but for only a moment. His axe arm was still good, and with the discipline of a trained fighter he concealed his suffering and reached for his favored weapon. Axe in hand, he strode toward the wizard who had injured him. The scrawny young man backed up as the massive warrior neared.

When Kestrel’s gaze landed on the other uninjured cultist, she caught him sneering at her. Judging from his more elaborate tattoos and the size of his claw, she guessed him to be the highest-ranking sorcerer of the group. The leader unleashed four black-flamed missiles. All at Kestrel.

She tumbled to the floor, but the sorcerous darts followed her. Pain ripped through her stomach, then her already-injured leg, with intensity that brought tears to her eyes. She curled into a ball in a half-coherent attempt to shield her chest and gut from the remaining missiles. The strikes seared her right arm, nearly forcing her to drop the dagger she still gripped in that hand.

“Bastard!” she spat as pain rocked her body. Her arm burned as if flames consumed it. She could barely control her hand.

The hooded cultist waved mockingly with his own mutated right hand. “Having a little trouble?”

Through an act of sheer will, Kestrel rolled to prop herself on her injured right arm. The smug sorcerer thought he had disabled her throwing hand. Arrogant troll—she’d show him. She blocked out the agony coursing through her limbs and transferred the weapon to her dominant hand. Then she met his baleful gaze. “Not as much as you.” She hurled the dagger.

The blade should have struck his foul heart. Despite her injuries, her aim had been true. To Kestrel’s despair the weapon fell short of its mark, instead sinking into his left calf. The wizard acknowledged the hit with no more than a hissed curse, then moved his hands in the sinister gestures of another spell.

She tore her gaze away from the evil sorcerer long enough to glance wildly about the chamber. Where in the Abyss was Corran? She saw no hint of the invisible paladin. Apparently he’d left Kestrel to battle the chief sorcerer by herself. “Damn you, Corran D’Arcey,” she muttered.

An eerie babble of voices filled the air as all the spell-casters in the room uttered arcane words of individual incantations. Even the sightless mage was in the process of casting a spell—Mystra only knew where that magic would land. Durwyn, who had killed the hapless apprentice, appeared to have chosen the blind wizard as his next target. She only hoped the warrior’s axe struck before the sorcerer’s spell.

Jarial was locked in a spellcasters’ duel with the acid-burned sorcerer. In the few seconds that Kestrel watched, the injured cultist released a retributive gout of flames at Jarial. Ghleanna and Jarial had agreed to avoid fire-based attacks out of concern for the many ancient books, scrolls, and maps in the chamber, but apparently the cultists had no such qualms.

Kestrel heard Jarial’s cry as the flames licked his skin but had to return her attention to her own adversary. Corran had abandoned her. She would have to face the sorcerous leader alone. She still had one more dagger, Loren’s Blade. She reached for its hilt at her waist.

And blinked. Was pain making her head swim? The sorcerer suddenly appeared blurry. Kestrel squinted and stared, but could not discern a steady outline—the cultist seemed to waver before her eyes. She gripped the magical dagger, eager to hurl it at the wizard but unable to fix a target.

The smell of burning paper met her nostrils as smoke drifted toward her. In trying to injure Jarial, the foolish cultist had set an enormous old tome ablaze. Its wrought-iron stand probably would keep the flames from spreading, but the book and the knowledge it contained were now lost forever.

The smoke obscured the cult leader’s image even further. His shifting form seemed to be preparing yet another spell to aim at her. Kestrel groaned, her body already aching beyond anything she’d ever experienced. Despite the poor visibility, she couldn’t just stand here offering the wizard target practice. She peered through the dense air and grasped her weapon, preparing to throw. She would have to trust her instincts.

Just as she was about to toss the blade, a familiar voice penetrated the haze. “By the hand of Tyr!” The wizard yelped and doubled over. Corran materialized, his new blade wet with fresh blood.

“About damn time!” she shouted.

With a cry of rage, the evil sorcerer released the spell he’d prepared for Kestrel onto Corran instead. His image still blurred, he appeared to touch Corran’s arm for only a split second. Corran immediately staggered backward two paces, his face ashen and somehow drained of vitality.

With an evil grin the wizard straightened, now scarcely bothered by the wound Corran had opened in his gut.

A cold chill passed through Kestrel. The sorcerer had stolen some of Corran’s life force! What other evil could this necromancer wreak?

They could not afford to find out. She flung the dagger. It soared through the air and struck him squarely in the chest. Corran followed the strike with one of his own as Loren’s Blade flew back to Kestrel’s hand. The sorcerer’s eyes widened in pain and hatred, but he still did not die. Instead he began to utter the words of another incantation.

Kestrel prepared to hurl the magical blade again. Though the cultist’s wavering image became increasingly hard to discern through the smoke, she thought she saw him glance at the floor off to one side. She followed the direction of his gaze. There, forgotten in the fray, lay the skeletal arm bearing the Ring of Calling. The chief sorcerer seemed to be moving toward it as he avoided another of Corran’s blows.

Kestrel glanced at her companions. Jarial unleashed an incantation on his rival, sending another acidic arrow through the air to silence the sorcerer for good. Ghleanna also appeared in the process of casting a spell, this one at the leader. She squinted through the smoke, trying to fix her sight on him. Durwyn had just finished off the blinded mage and stood not far from the skeletal arm.

“Durwyn—the ring!” Kestrel cried. “Pick up the ring!”

Durwyn scanned the floor, spotted the arm, and rushed toward it. The cult leader’s voice increased in volume, sounding as if he were nearing the end of the spell he wove. As Ghleanna spoke the final word of her own spell, his shifting image solidified. The cultist stood only feet from the ring. He uttered the final thunderous syllable of his spell and reached for the skeletal arm.

Durwyn snatched it first. The sorcerer shrieked in anger.

And disappeared.

Knowing the cult sorcerer could return any moment with reinforcements, the party did not tarry in the Room of Words. Kestrel, Corran, and Jarial quickly downed blueglow moss potions for their injuries, and the band headed back through the tower to the dungeons.

They reached the Circle of Mythanthor—their gateway out of the dwarven undercity and up to the surface of Myth Drannor. Kestrel could feel the adrenaline pumping through her as they all gathered beside the golden circle on the floor. As much as she’d resisted joining this mission, she was swept up with the others in the excitement of at last completing the first stage of their quest. Finally, they could leave the dark dungeons behind them.

Durwyn handed Ghleanna the skeletal arm. She traced her fingertips around the Ring of Calling, lingering on the starstone gem. Then she tilted her chin up, closed her eyes, and spoke the Word of Oblivion in a steady, clear voice.

“Resheshannen!”

The bones crumbled to dust, leaving only the ring in the sorceress’s hand. The white starstone sparkled in the torchlight as Ghleanna slipped it on her finger. “Come,” she said. “Let us leave the darkness.”

One at a time, they entered the circle. Ghleanna crossed the boundary last. The moment she stepped inside, a sphere of light appeared and hovered before them. It widened until it reached the size and shape of a doorway. Sunlight shone through from the other side, where Kestrel could make out the towering spires and elaborate architecture of the ruined but still impressive Heights of Myth Drannor. In the distance, the parapets of Castle Cormanthor rose toward the sky as if seeking release from the evil that gripped the fortress.

The city surface—and with it, Mordrayn and Pelendralaar—awaited.