The Crimson Shadow

by R. A. Salvatore

  Another arrow, and then another, zipped in to strike the fiend, but Praehotec seemed to take no notice of them. Oliver darted in, and then back out, stabbing with his blade, but Praehotec didn’t care.

  Paragor had instructed the beast not to kill Luthien, but mighty Praehotec took no commands from puny humans.

  Luthien, believing that he was doomed, scrambled about, trying to find his dropped sword. He came up to his knees and balled his fists, determined to go out with sheer fury. Then he was blinded by a sudden brightness. Luthien fell back, thinking the demon had struck again with its magic.

  He was wrong.

  Brind’Amour followed his lightning bolt into the tent, and Praehotec, stung badly by the blast, and by the continuing stream of arrows from the other direction, knew that the game was at its end. The fiend leaped up and scooped the unconscious Katerin in one powerful arm.

  “Think well the consequences of marching on Princetown!” the beast roared.

  Brind’Amour stopped his next casting, for Katerin was in the way. Siobhan hit the fiend’s back again with an arrow, but Praehotec straightened, lifting its free arm up high and thrashing the frail tent aside. Huge leathery wings beat furiously and the demon lifted away, climbing into the night sky.

  “Katerin!” Luthien cried, trying to find his sword, trying to chase the beast down. He ran out unarmed and leaped high, catching one of Praehotec’s clawed feet.

  The other foot kicked him, sent him spinning away into unconsciousness.

  A glowing spear appeared in Brind’Amour’s hand and he hurled it up at the demon, scoring a sparking, explosive hit; two more arrows hummed from Siobhan’s great bow, sticking painfully into the demon’s legs.

  But Praehotec was too strong to be brought down by the missiles. Away the beast flew, bearing Katerin, to the helpless cries of protest from the companions and from many others in the encampment who came to learn of the commotion.

  Cries of protest and agony. Music to the fiend’s ears.

  CHAPTER 24

  BECAUSE HE MUST

  HE TOOK HER!” Luthien shouted, growing increasingly frustrated, even desperate, with the rambling conversation in Brind’Amour’s tent some time later. They—the wizard, Oliver, Siobhan, and Kayryn—were discussing the implications of the demon’s raid. Now the focus was on whether or not they should still march to Princetown, or if the abduction of Katerin signaled a desire for a truce.

  Estabrooke was in the tent, too, the knight sitting on a stool off to the side, thoroughly despondent.

  “It is important to remember that the demon did not kill her,” Brind’Amour replied to Luthien, the wizard trying to remain calm and comforting. “She is a prisoner, and will be more valuable to . . .”

  “To whom?” Oliver wanted to know.

  Brind’Amour wasn’t sure. Perhaps King Greensparrow had discovered their progress and had reached out to them from Gascony. More likely, though, the wizard believed that the fiendish emissary had come from much closer, from Paragor, duke of Princetown.

  “We cannot remain paralyzed on the field,” Siobhan put in, and Kayryn added her support, going over to stand beside the half-elf. “This is no paid army, but men and women who have farms to tend. If we sit here waiting, we will lose many allies.”

  “Duke Paragor of Princetown took her,” Brind’Amour decided. “He knows that we are coming, and knows that he cannot hold against us.”

  “We will have to alter some of the planning,” Siobhan replied. “Perhaps we could send in spies, or offer a truce to the duke when we are right before his walls.”

  The calculating conversation began to make Luthien’s blood boil. Paragor had stolen Katerin, but these friends spoke of larger plans and larger things. To Luthien Bedwyr, there was nothing more important in all the world, not even the freedom of Eriador, than Katerin’s safe return. Brind’Amour and Siobhan would plan accordingly, doing whatever they could to help ensure the safety of the captured woman, but their primary concern was not for Katerin but for the rebellion.

  As it should be, Luthien logically realized, but he could not follow such a course. Not now. He waved his arms in defeat, looked to the crestfallen Estabrooke, and stormed from the tent, leaving the others in a moment of blank and uncomfortable silence.

  “Exactly what Duke Paragor was hoping for,” Brind’Amour remarked. The wizard wasn’t judging Luthien, merely making an observation.

  “You know where he means to go?” Siobhan asked.

  “He is already on his way,” Oliver replied, understanding the young man too well. No one doubted the claim.

  Brind’Amour wasn’t sure how to respond. Should he try to dissuade Luthien? Or should he offer support, fall in with Luthien’s obvious thinking that Katerin’s safety should now be paramount? Brind’Amour was truly torn. He knew that he could not rush off in pursuit of the demon, for the sake of Katerin or anyone else. His responsibility was to no one person, but to Eriador as a whole.

  “He should go,” Siobhan said unexpectedly, drawing everyone’s attention. She looked at the tent flap as she spoke, as though she was watching Luthien riding off even then. “That is his place.”

  When she looked back to the others, she noticed Oliver most of all, the halfling eyeing her suspiciously.

  “More fuel for the legend of the Crimson Shadow,” Siobhan insisted.

  “Or does the woman scorned wish her lover dead?” Oliver asked bluntly.

  Brind’Amour winced—the last thing they needed now was to be fighting amongst themselves!

  “A fair question,” Siobhan replied calmly, diffusing the tension. “But I am no woman, no human,” she reminded the halfling. “Katerin is in peril, and so Luthien must go after her. If he does not, he will spend the rest of his days thinking himself a coward.”

  “True enough,” Brind’Amour offered.

  “We will not be led by a coward,” Kayryn of Eradoch said coldly.

  Oliver, as frustrated as Luthien had been, looked at them, one after the other. They spoke the truth, he knew; their reasoning was sound, but that did little to comfort the halfling. He had been beside Luthien from the beginning, before Brind’Amour had given the young Bedwyr the crimson cape, before whispers of the Crimson Shadow had ever passed down the back streets of Montfort. Now Luthien was doing as he must, was going after the woman he loved, and so Oliver, too, had to follow his heart and follow his friend.

  He gave a curt bow to the others and walked from the tent.

  Estabrooke, a noble man, a knight whose entire existence was founded on stringent principles, silently saluted the halfling and the brave man who had gone before Oliver.

  Luthien paced Riverdancer easily along the edge of shadow cast by Malpuissant’s Wall. The sun was low, breaking the horizon to the east, casting a slanted but narrow shadow into Eriador. Not as black as the shadow which had crossed the young Bedwyr’s heart. It seemed to Luthien as if all the world had stopped the night before—as if everything, the rebellion, the coming invasion, had simply ceased, caught in a paralysis, a numbing of the spirit that would remain until Luthien reclaimed Katerin from the clutches of the demon and its evil master.

  He wanted to hurry, to break Riverdancer into a powerful run, but he did not wish to attract too much attention, either from friends who might try to stop him, or from spying enemies who would warn the duke of Princetown.

  He and his horse were by then a common sight to the guards at the gatetower closest to Dun Caryth, and so they let him cross through the wall into Avon without incident.

  To Luthien’s surprise a foppish halfling on a yellow pony was on the other side of the wall, sitting quietly, waiting for him.

  “At least you waited until the morning,” Oliver huffed and sniffled, looking thoroughly miserable, his little nose bright red. He sneezed, a tremendous sneeze for one so small, then brought a bright yellow-and-red checkerboard handkerchief up to wipe his nose and goatee.

  “You have been out here all night?” Luthien asked.


  “Since you left the meeting,” Oliver replied. “I thought you would go straightaway.”

  Luthien didn’t manage a smile, though he was touched by the halfling’s loyalty. He didn’t want Oliver along this time, however. He didn’t want anyone along. “This is for me to do,” he said firmly, and when Oliver didn’t reply, Luthien made a ticking noise in Riverdancer’s ear and gave a slight prod and the great shining stallion trotted off to the south.

  Oliver and Threadbare paced him, the little pony scampering along to match Riverdancer’s longer strides.

  Luthien’s scowl had no effect, and when he kicked Riverdancer to a faster trot, Threadbare, too, picked up speed. Finally, Luthien pulled his mount up short and sat staring at the halfling. Oliver looked at him curiously and sneezed again, showering the young man.

  “This is for me to do” Luthien said again, more firmly.

  “I do not argue,” Oliver lisped.

  “Me, alone,” Luthien clarified.

  “You could be wrong.”

  Luthien sighed and looked all about, as if trying to find some way out of this. He knew how stubborn Oliver could be, and he knew how fast that deceptive little beast Threadbare could run.

  “Do you know anyone else so small enough to fit under the hem of your hiding cape?” Oliver asked logically.

  Luthien stared at his friend for a long moment, then threw his hands up in defeat. In truth, the concession came as a huge relief to the young Bedwyr. He was determined to go after Katerin, and it frightened him to take another on the perilous, probably suicidal, journey, yet he realized that Oliver’s place was indeed beside him, as his place would have been beside Oliver if the halfling’s love had been whisked away in the night. So now he would have company for the long ride and the adventures to follow, a trusted friend who had gotten him out of many predicaments.

  Before the pair began to move once more, they heard the sound of hooves behind them. They looked back toward the wall to see two riders, one large and wearing a horned highlander helm and the other small of frame.

  “Siobhan,” Oliver reasoned, and as the pair approached, Luthien saw that the halfling had guessed right. Now the young Bedwyr grew frustrated. He could rationalize having Oliver along, but this was getting out of hand!

  Siobhan and the rider pulled up beside the companions.

  “You are not going,” Luthien offered, a preemptive strike against any argument to the contrary.

  Siobhan looked at him curiously, as though she didn’t understand. “Of course I am not,” she said matter-of-factly. “My duty is to Eriador, and not to Luthien, or to Katerin.”

  For some reason that Luthien couldn’t quite figure out, that statement hurt more than a little.

  “But I condone your course,” the half-elf went on. “And I wish you all speed and all victory. I expect to see you, and you,” she said, looking at Oliver, “and Katerin, waiting for us when we breach Princetown’s gate.”

  Luthien felt better.

  “I have brought this,” Siobhan went on, extending her hand to reveal an amber-colored stone the size of a chicken egg. “From Brind’Amour,” she explained as Luthien took the stone. “When your task is complete, or when you are most in need, the wizard bids you to hurl it against a wall and speak his name three times.”

  Luthien felt the stone for some time, marveling at how light it was. He wasn’t sure what the stone was all about, but he had seen enough of Brind’Amour’s magic to understand that this was no small gift. “What of him?” the young Bedwyr asked, looking at the highlander.

  “Do you mean to ride into Princetown?” the half-elf asked.

  Luthien was beginning to catch on.

  “Malamus will ride with you as far as the eastern end of Glen Durritch, almost in sight of Princetown,” Siobhan continued. “And there he will wait with your mounts.” Unexpectedly, the half-elf then slid down from her saddle, handing the reins to Malamus. “For Katerin,” she said to Luthien. “My walk to the wall is not so far.”

  She nodded to Luthien, then to Oliver, and patted the rump of her horse as she started back for Malpuissant’s Wall, back to the duties that would not allow her to accompany them.

  Luthien watched her with sincere admiration. Siobhan wanted to go, he realized. Though she and Katerin were rivals in some respects, they also shared a deep regard for each other.

  The young Bedwyr looked from Siobhan’s back, to her gifts, to Brind’Amour’s gift, and then to Oliver, sitting patiently, waiting for Luthien to lead on.

  The night had been dark, but the day was dawning brighter.

  Back atop the gatehouse at Malpuissant’s Wall, Estabrooke, the First of the Sixth Cavalier, watched the small forms on the southern field, the Eriadorans in Avon, invading the proud knight’s homeland. The image of the demon, of evil Praehotec, was still sharp in the old knight’s mind. For twenty years Estabrooke had lived in the shadow of Greensparrow, hearing the tales of atrocities, of allegiances with demonkind. Some said that the horrible plague which had broken Eriador’s will for war twenty years before had been brought on by the Avon king, but Estabrooke had dismissed such rumors as peasants’ folly.

  Some said that Greensparrow was a sorcerer of the darkest arts, a demon friend, a fiend himself.

  But Estabrooke had dismissed such rumors, all the rumors.

  Now the knight of the throne, the noble cavalier, had seen with his own eyes. The rumors had come true for poor, torn Estabrooke. They had materialized into a demonic, evil shape that the noble warrior could not shake.

  He watched Luthien and Oliver ride off. Secretly, and though it were against everything the man had devoted his life to defending, Estabrooke hoped that they would succeed, would bring Katerin back safely and leave Duke Paragor, the same duke who had sent the cavalier to Eriador, dead in a pool of blood.

  CHAPTER 25

  GHOSTS

  THE HIGHLANDER, Malamus, spoke not a word on the two days of riding it took the companions to get into Glen Durritch, the wide and shallow vale just southeast of Princetown. Here, there were no more trees for cover and only a single road, a brown snake winding through the thick green turf.

  Luthien, playing the role of general again, studied the land, imagined a battle that could be fought and won here. The ground sloped up to the left and to the right, into rolling, tree-covered hills. Perfect cover and high ground. Elven archers could hit this road from those trees, he realized, and down here, there was no cover, no place to hide from the stinging, deadly bolts.

  So intent was the young Bedwyr that he was caught fully by surprise when Oliver’s rapier tapped him on the shoulder. Luthien pulled up on Riverdancer’s reins and looked back to see the halfling dismounting.

  “The western end of Glen Durritch,” Malamus explained. Oliver motioned with his chin to the west and Luthien squinted against the low-riding sun. Mountains loomed dark and cold, not so far away, and before them . . .

  What? Luthien wondered. A sparkle of white and pink.

  Oliver walked by him. “Five miles,” the halfling said. “And I do not like to walk in the dark!”

  Luthien slipped down from Riverdancer and gave the reins over to Malamus. The highlander matched Luthien’s gaze for a long moment. “The blessing of Sol-Yunda go with you, Crimson Shadow,” he said suddenly and turned about, pulling hard with his massive, muscled arm to swing all three riderless mounts with him. “I await your return.”

  Luthien just grunted, having no reply in light of his surprise. Sol-Yunda was the god of the highlanders, a private god whom they said watched over their kin and held no regard for anyone else, friend or foe. The highlanders hoarded Sol-Yunda as a dragon hoarded gold, and for Malamus to make that statement, to utter those seven simple words, was perhaps the most heartening thing Luthien Bedwyr had ever heard.

  He stood and watched Malamus for a few moments, then turned and sprinted to catch up with Oliver as the halfling plodded along, toward the spec of white and pink below the line of dark mountai
ns.

  Less than an hour later, the sun low in the sky but still visible above the Iron Cross, the friends came close enough to witness the true splendor of Princetown and to understand why the place had earned the nickname as the Jewel of Avon.

  It was about the same size as Caer MacDonald, but where Caer MacDonald had been built for defense, nestled in between towering walls of dark stone, Princetown had been built as a showcase. It sat on a gently rolling plain, just beyond the foothills, and was widespread and airy, not huddled like Caer MacDonald. A low wall, no more than eight feet high, of light-colored granite encompassed the whole of the place, with no discernable gatehouses or towers of any kind. Most of the houses within were quite large; those of wood had been white-washed, and the greater houses, those of the noblemen and the merchants, were of white marble tinged with soft lines of pink.

  The largest and dominant structure was not the cathedral, as in most of the great cities of Avonsea. That building was impressive, probably as much as Caer MacDonald’s Ministry, but even it paled beside the fabulous palace. It sat in the west of Princetown, on the highest ground closest to the mountains, four stories of shining marble and gold leaf, with decorated columns presented all along its front and with great wings northeast and southeast, like huge arms reaching out to embrace the city. A golden dome, shining so brightly that it stung Luthien’s eyes to look upon it, stood in the center of the structure.

  “This duke, he will be in there?” Oliver asked and Luthien didn’t have to follow the halfling’s gaze to know which building Oliver was talking about. “We should have kept our horses,” the halfling remarked, “just to get from one end to the other.”

  Luthien snickered, but wasn’t sure if Oliver was kidding or not. The young Bedwyr couldn’t begin to guess how many rooms might be in that palace. A hundred? Three hundred? If he kicked Riverdancer into a full gallop, it should take him half an hour to circle the place but once!