The Siege

by Denning, Troy

  “Yes, you’ve done your part many times over,” Khelben agreed, plucking the darksword from Keya’s hand. He hissed at the cold and quickly returned the blade to Dexon, then raised his swarthy brow. “That didn’t freeze your hand?”

  “As a matter of fact, no.” She displayed her hands. Aside from the calluses she had earned in weapons practice, they remained as healthy as her eighty-year-old cheeks. “They didn’t even get cold.”

  Dexon’s jaw dropped, and Burlen and Kuhl fell to chuckling.

  Khelben frowned. “What are you two laughing about?”

  The battle din built to a roar as the Long Watch reached the Meadow Wall and began to assail the enemy at close range. Unable to use their own magic within the antimagic zones created by their beholder slaves, the phaerimm hung back.

  Khelben’s scowl only deepened. “This is important. If there’s a way for the Company of the Cold Hand to wield your comrades’ darkswords—”

  “The Cold Hand wouldn’t care for it much,” said Kuhl.

  “The Cold Hand will do what it must to defend Evereska,” Kiinyon growled. “They are elf warriors.”

  “It won’t work,” Kuhl said. “Most of the warriors in the Cold Hand are male—and I doubt even elven magic can get a Vaasan baby on a male warrior.”

  “B-baby?” Keya stammered. “What are you talking about?”

  Burlen grinned and nudged her arm. “Come on, Keya, you know how these things work,” he said. “You and Dexon are family now.”

  From the ruins of the Secret Gate, high in Evereska’s Upper Vale, Laeral had watched in horror as the first rank of elves poured over the Meadow Wall and disintegrated into swirling piles of ash. When the phaerimm launched their counterattack, using their magic to hurl half the stones in the Vine Vale through the breaches the beholders had opened in the mythal, she had gasped out loud. As the young warriors of the Long Watch somehow rallied themselves and came charging back to drive off the beholders, she felt tears sliding down her cheeks.

  “The stuff of legends, my friend,” Laeral said, looking across the window to Lord Imesfor. “If those are raw recruits in Evereska, I shudder to think what will become of the phaerimm when the time comes to unleash your seasoned warriors.”

  “I just wish I could be there with them,” Imesfor said. Though the magic of Waterdeep’s clerics had regrown his fingers, they were still too clumsy and stiff to cast spells, or even hold a sword in combat. “It is good to watch, to remind myself that the Tel’Quess never lose hope.”

  Forcing their mind-slaves to hold at the mythal’s edge, the phaerimm continued to hurl whole stretches of vineyard wall into the meadow. The Long Watch fell by the dozens and continued to attack, playing a deadly game of dodge as they tried to avoid breaches in the mythal while continuing to pour arrows into the beholders. One eye tyrant after another sprouted more spines than a hedgehog, then sank to the ground and disintegrated. Some, maddened by pain, finally broke free of their masters’ hold and turned to leave, only to be struck down by the phaerimm themselves. Though it would have been a simple matter to send the elite companies forward to support the Long Watch and finish off the beholders, Khelben and the elf commanders wisely resisted the temptation. One way or another, Evereska would need its most experienced fighters later, when victory or death hung in the balance.

  Laeral could see just see Khelben in the heart of one of the elite companies, a swarthy figure in black robes, his namesake black staff cradled in the croak of one arm as he discussed strategy with the elf lords clustered around him. How good it was to see her beloved again, even if he was little more than a black speck in a square of gleaming gray mithral.

  “Lord Blackstaff seems to have them quite distracted,” said Prince Clariburnus, peering out the watch-loop adjacent to Laeral and Lord Imesfor. “What say you, Lady Laeral?”

  “I would say we dare not wait—the mythal is growing weak,” Laeral said, noting that the rain of golden meteors had tapered to a drizzle. “You’ve seen their trap. We can’t dismount.”

  “That trap we will turn against them,” said Lamorak, who was watching opposite Clariburnus, “but let us be alert for more phaerimm trickery. You Chosen are not the only ones who know the value of guile in war.”

  Laeral met the prince’s orange eyes. “Always a good thing to remember,” she said, starting downstairs. “I will hold it in mind.”

  When the phaerimm had made no attempt to stop them from entering the Sharaedim, it had been Laeral who realized the thornbacks would attempt to breach the mythal and take refuge inside Evereska—and who had developed the strategy to take advantage of their plan. After emerging from the shadowshell and using her silver fire to open a gate in the weakened deadwall, she had sent the relief army to attack the enemy rear guard, then summoned Lord Imesfor from Waterdeep to serve as a guide. He had led the Shadovar army through the shadow fringe into the Secret Gate and safely past hundreds of elven traps—a gauntlet so devious and powerful that it had claimed several of the phaerimm before they finally gave up on clearing the passage and simply sealed the entrances—at least those they could find.

  Laeral reached the exit vestibule at the bottom of the stairs, where a company of Shadovar cavalry stood beside its mounts in a long line stretching back across a marble bridge into the murky recesses of the Passing. With little more than lances, darkswords, and black helms, the veserab riders were lightly armed and thinly armored. Behind the cavalry, Laeral knew, ran an even longer line of infantry equipped just as sparingly. Against the magic of the phaerimm, massive blades and heavy armor counted for less than the swiftness of the strike and the agility with which one dodged.

  Lamorak came and gave his orders, then turned to Laeral and said, “This is your plan. Would you care to launch the attack?”

  “By all means—thank you.” As Laeral waited for the riders to mount their veserabs, she turned to Lord Imesfor. “I know you’d like nothing better than to see the outcome of the battle, but the Shadovar infantry will need someone to lead them back to the relief army.”

  Imesfor raised his hand, displaying a set of stubby white digits that did not yet look quite like fingers. “Say no more. It will be my pleasure to guide them through the Passing.”

  “Once the outcome is apparent, of course,” Lamorak clarified.

  Imesfor nodded. “Of course.”

  Since the infantry would not be able to step foot into the valley below without being disintegrated by phaerimm magic, the prince’s plan called for them to return to the holding action in the mountains and catch the enemy from behind. Given the tremendous advantages of holding the high terrain, the tactic was certain to save a lot of lives in the relief army.

  The cavalry commander reported his readiness, and the two Shadovar princes mounted their own veserabs. Laeral cast a flying spell on herself, then raised her arm and led the way out of the Secret Gate down a hanging gorge that opened into the High Vale itself. The life-draining magic of the phaerimm had reduced the slopes to barren pitches of rock and dirt, lacking even a rotted stump to hint at the forest of old growth spruce that had once covered the valley.

  As soon as Laeral cleared the shelter of the hanging vale, she turned and streaked for the Vine Vale as fast as she could fly. The cavalry came behind her, fanning out across the slopes in a great blanket of flapping black wings. Mistaking the Shadovar and their mounts for a legion of some new, hell-spawned horrors come to aid the phaerimm, the elite companies of Evereska raised their voices and weapons and started to press forward.

  Khelben raised his arms and staff and called out something in a thunderous voice that brought the Evereskan companies up short, but the damage was done. First one, then a dozen, then half the phaerimm at the Meadow Wall drifted away from the mythal and swung their toothy jaws toward the descending Shadovar. Laeral reached the highest terrace of the Vine Vale.

  A scintillating wall of colors rose in front of her. Foolish phaerimm—still didn’t know who they were dealing with. Laeral d
ispelled it with a gesture, then did the same to the curtain of flame that appeared next. By then, the Shadovar were sweeping past to both sides, spraying dark bolts into the enemy. The valley ahead became a storm of shadow magic and black flapping wings. Laeral saw a dozen thornbacks drop out from beneath the tempest and disintegrate into long mounds of ash. An instant later, she was in among them, flashing past scaly, wormlike bodies and deflecting barbed tails with her quarterstaff.

  Climb! Lamorak’s voice came to Laeral as a bare, faint whisper inside her head. Cast the shadow zone!

  Laeral and the Shadovar ascended high into the sky. The phaerimm started after them, but their floating magic was no match for the swift-climbing wings of the veserabs. Even Laeral had to extend a hand and allow herself to be drawn along by a passing shadow lord. Blasts of silver lightning and golden magic chased the riders skyward, filling the air with black blossoms of blood, wing, and shadow armor.

  Clariburnus, Lamorak, and several powerful Shadovar spread out over the Vine Vale, then released the reins of their mounts and began to drop wads of shadowsilk. They spread their hands palm downward and called out something in ancient Netherese she could not quite catch. The wads flattened into translucent disks of darkness and fell to the valley floor, forcing the phaerimm and beholders down beneath them. As the first creatures touched ground, they wailed in pain and crumbled to ash.

  Perhaps two dozen thornbacks and twice that many beholders perished before the disintegration spell was nullified. The survivors writhed about under the disks for a moment, then finally broke the surface of the shadow like fish rising from a pond. The Shadovar were already diving on them, peppering them with shadow bolts as they emerged from the darkness, their mounts spraying them with streams of noxious black mist. Laeral released her escort to join the assault and curved back toward the Meadow Wall, concentrating her own attacks on the beholders. Unlike the Shadow Weave spells of her allies, the phaerimm were less likely to be injured by anything she hurled at them than they were to absorb it and heal themselves. Of course, a blast of her silver fire was sure to slay even the mightiest phaerimm, but she could use that only once an hour, and so it seemed wisest to hold that particular attack in reserve.

  A flash of silver light lit the vale behind Laeral. Her entire body erupted into fiery nettling as a bolt of lightning caught her in the flank and sent her tumbling through the air head over heels. She bounced off the mythal and quickly brought herself back under control, then turned to find a pair of cinder clouds settling to ground where the attack had blasted through two Shadovar warriors before exhausting itself on her.

  About twenty yards away floated the phaerimm that had hurled the lightning, its toothy mouth turned in her direction and hanging agape. The bolt had been a powerful one. By all rights, it should have torn through her and continued on to another five or six targets, but Laeral was one of the Chosen. She could use the Weave to protect herself from many forms of magical attack, and this was one of the most obvious ones.

  Laeral raised her hands and was about to blast her attacker with silver fire when a pair of Shadovar warriors swooped down on it from behind, their veserabs engulfing it in a cloud of noxious black fume that made Laeral’s eyes sting even at a distance.

  Guiding their mounts with their knees, they poured shadow bolts into it with one hand and raised their black swords with the other, hacking it into three pieces as they flashed past. Laeral waved her thanks and praying that Waterdeep’s hippogriff riders never found themselves taking the sky against such a deadly air cavalry, she turned back to the mission she had assigned herself.

  Not far ahead, a pair of beholders were using their antimagic beams to cover each other as they retreated from the Meadow Wall and laced the sky above with disintegration rays. Laeral cast a quick invisibility spell on herself and dropped to a few inches above the ground, then came up beneath the creatures, pouring golden streams of magic into them. Both beholders erupted into crimson starbursts, coating her head to toe in foul-smelling gore.

  Laeral only hoped that Pluefan Trueshot still allowed humans into the Hall of the High Hunt. She had not seen Khelben in nearly four months, and she could see that she would need a long dip in the Singing Spring before their reunion could be a proper one.

  Khelben’s first glimpse of Laeral in the battle came when she emerged from the starburst of viscera and entrails that, until a few moments earlier, had been two beholders holding Keya Nihmedu’s company of the Long Watch at bay. Even smeared in crimson, she was a sight for weary eyes—and not only because she had broken the siege of Evereska. Never had he spent four months as long as the last four, when he had not known when he would see his beloved Laeral—or even whether he would survive to do so. The Chosen did die, and—as he had so nearly learned at the Rocnest—the job of killing them required far fewer than two hundred phaerimm.

  Khelben watched Laeral vanish back into the magic storm, then stood staring into the flashing bolts and scintillating sprays for a few minutes longer. Though the sheets of fire and swirling clouds of veserab breath made it impossible to catch more than glimpses of the action, the battle roar was as ferocious as ever, and the number of Shadovar wheeling up into sight was steadily diminishing. The phaerimm were standing their ground, no doubt because they understood what was at stake in this battle as well as Khelben did.

  “Lord Duirsar, the time has come to commit Evereska’s army,” he said, speaking to the Hill Elders as much as he was to Duirsar. “We must break the siege now, while the phaerimm are still reeling.”

  “What remains to us is hardly an army,” Kiinyon objected, “and even less so, after we followed your advice the last time.”

  “The attack cost more than I had anticipated, but it was also a crucial diversion.” Khelben pointed at the Shadovar swirling above the vale, then started toward the Meadow Wall. “Now, with the Shadovar and the rest of the North’s forces operating inside the Sharaedim, this is the phaerimm’s last chance to breach the mythal. If we can make them withdraw now, we can break the siege and hunt them down at our will.”

  Unconvinced, Kiinyon grabbed Khelben’s arm and tried to hold him back. “If we fail—”

  “If we fail, we lose everything,” Lord Duirsar interrupted. “We have been failing for the last four months, it’s time to take a chance.” He nodded to Khelben. “Call the charge.”

  Khelben used a spell to carry his voice to every corner of the vale. “Ready the charge! Long Watch, stand down!”

  At the Meadow Wall, the young elves of the Long Watch began to disengage and fall back, clustering around trees, granite monoliths, and deep ravines where they would not hinder the charge. The process took several long minutes, for they were as inexperienced as they were exhausted, with casualties that would have reduced even the most stalwart company of veterans to a disorganized horde. At Khelben’s side, however, Keya Nihmedu was cinching her chin strap and checking her armor. He turned a disapproving eye on her and was rewarded with a glare that could have cracked stone.

  “If you say one word about my condition—”

  Khelben raised his hands. “Wouldn’t dream of it,” he lied.

  In contrast to Dexon, who was hanging at her heels with a dazed look in his eyes, she seemed to be taking the news of her condition in stride. Khelben removed the magic bracers on his wrists and tossed them to her.

  “I want you to wear these for me—and stay close,” Khelben said. “I may need them.”

  “Of course.” Keya’s expression changed to dutiful, and she slipped the bracers onto her biceps. “What are they?”

  “When the time comes,” Khelben said. He raised his staff and waved it toward the Vine Vale. “To battle!”

  Unlike every human charge he had ever led, this one started in near silence and seemed to grow quieter. There was no yelling, no banging of arms or clanging of armor, only the soft patter of thousands of graceful feet—and the much louder sound of the Vaasan boots pounding along behind.

  They came t
o the Meadow Wall, and Khelben cast a spell of flying. He sprang into the air on the run, sweeping his black staff across a line of beholders floating out of the haze, their writhing eyestalks spraying all manner of rays and beams at the first rank of charging elves. Khelben held his staff across his body and caught half a dozen rays directed at him, then spread the fingers of his free hand and sent a stream of golden bolts pouring back at his attackers. Three of the eye tyrants sank to the ground with clusters of smoking holes drilled clear through their spherical bodies, but one of the creatures managed to sweep its antimagic beam up in time to block Khelben’s counterattack.

  A tumbling darksword split this one down the center, then the Company of the Cold Hand was streaming past into the Vine Vale, leaping the bodies of deflated beholders, wounded veserabs, and groaning Shadovar … even a few hacked and mutilated phaerimm.

  Khelben sensed his bracers drifting off to the left and turned to see Keya Nihmedu leading Dexon and the other two Vaasans through the remains of the vineyard gate. Cursing her impetuousness, he circled around to meet her from the other direction—and found himself somersaulting backward through the air as a flurry of golden magic bolts caught him in the chest.

  Sting though they might, the attacks harmed him no more than had the lightning bolt that had sent Laeral tumbling. He righted himself and returned more cautiously, weaving and bobbing, coming in fast and low, staff at the ready and silver fire crackling on his fingertips. He found Keya and the Vaasans battling a pair of phaerimm, the elf dodging and somersaulting as black death rays and tongues of fire erupted all around her. Dexon barely stood on a withered, smoking leg, Burlen had one arm hanging limp at his side, and Kuhl was still attempting to sneak up behind the nearest creature for a killing blow.

  Khelben loosed a bolt of silver fire into the nearest phaerimm. That was all it took. As the first crumbled to cinders, the second creature attempted to teleport away—attempted, because Kuhl was already leaping on it from behind, driving his sword down into its mouth. The Vaasan landed face first on the ground, his sword coated in foul-smelling gore.