Howling Delve

by Jaleigh Johnson

  The crowd blocked his path, but Kall could see the woman clearly. She knelt in the center of the stage, cradling a mass of what appeared to be mud and protruding roots that she’d hidden inside the lute. Her gaze was feverishly bright as she stared at the mass.

  A wave of trepidation swept over Kall. He was no wizard, but he knew the effects of mind magic all too well. He pushed through the crowd, shouting, “Everyone, stand back! Dantane!”

  Shocked gasps rang out as the woman began shoveling the strange mass into her mouth. She swallowed and immediately began to choke, the mass lodging grotesquely in her throat.

  Black veins speared out beneath her skin, spreading from her windpipe to her shoulders and up her face. Her tan skin bulged, turning purple-black as her head lolled to one side.

  A woman in the crowd screamed and fainted. People tripped and fell over her in their rush to get away. Kall found a gap and jumped onto the dais, his sword raised.

  “Laerin!” he shouted.

  The half-elf appeared below him, lifting the senseless guest over his shoulder. Morgan stood across the room, herding the crowd to the exit. “We’ll get ’em out,” Morgan assured Kall. “Cesira’s coming.”

  “Find Dantane!” Kall’s gaze remained fixed on the grim transformation unfolding on the dais.

  The lute player’s flesh rippled and shimmered like a heat mirage, her form lengthening and filling out into that of a young man with shoulder-length brown hair and finely tailored clothing. Kall could not tell his identity, for the black blemish remained on his face and continued to spread, exploding up from the flesh of his arms, legs, and torso as boils and bleeding wounds. He seemed to be filling up everywhere, and the strange, oozing black substance had nowhere to go but through his skin and vital organs.

  The thing that had been human lurched up to its legs and swiped with a too-long arm at Kall’s face. Kall raised his sword and felt the blade sink into the ooze. The creature howled and pulled back, leaving a trail of black gore that sizzled into the wooden platform.

  “Tarshz mephran!” came a shout from the balcony, and a spray of electricity yanked the hairs on Kall’s arms. Bolts of energy ripped into the creature, spraying black blood in all directions.

  Kall jumped back, cursing as drops hit his exposed arm and burned.

  Dantane climbed onto the balcony rail and floated to the ballroom floor, his robes flaring at the sleeves as his hands shaped another spell. He aimed the Art directly over Kall’s head at the creature. Kall dived behind a harpsichord, pulling its heavy bench over onto its side as a shield when the spell erupted.

  Bolts of ice burrowed from Dantane’s palms, then streaked across the room to impale the oozing mass. Gore sprayed the bench, burning black pockmarks into the wood.

  Kall rolled to his feet behind the creature. He hacked at it, the emerald sword finding flesh that was human and monster and sometimes a bizarre hybrid. The blade penetrated, and what was left of the lute player’s voice rang out in screeches of pure agony.

  A tentacled arm whipped out from where the woman’s stomach had been, catching Kall in the midsection. The blow threw Kall back; he smelled melted leather. He fumbled at his armor buckles, flinching when he felt hands come around him from behind. Fingers pressed flush against the acidic burning.

  “Get back!” roared Kall when he recognized Cesira’s chanting voice. Damn her, the last thing he wanted was for her to be acid-seared while protecting him.

  Steam rose in a cloud, hissing and stinging Kall’s eyes, but the burning sensation eased. The druid touched the base of his neck, and Kall felt a faint, humming tingle spread across his skin. It lingered in his ears like the last thrum of a fading song. Silently, Cesira drew away to stand beside him.

  You’ll have protection from the acid, she told him, for a time. She cocked her head, listening to Dantane’s chants, watching the measured release of power. Go now!

  Trusting her, Kall charged in under another rain of bolts, but they seemed targeted only to the creature and sailed harmlessly around him. Tentacles burst at random from the creature’s hips and groin—Kall hacked them off, forming a buffer for Dantane and Cesira.

  “Kall!” Dantane’s voice was thick with magic. “The root in its throat—carve it out. Destroy it! ”

  Kall risked a glance at the throng retreating from the ballroom. A few stragglers had stayed behind—Lord Rays among them—to watch the horrific spectacle.

  Kall yelled to Cesira. “Don’t let them see!” The last thing he wanted was for the merchants to witness him butchering the girl, even if she no longer resembled anything human. He waded into the mass of tentacles as the druid backed down the dais’s steps, chanting a familiar spell and arching her arms above her head.

  The air immediately grew thick and moist. Dense fog billowed from the portal of Cesira’s arms, curling around the dais in a concealing bubble that hid Kall, Dantane, and the creature from view.

  Behind the vapor wall, Kall wedged his sword in the harpsichord bench and grabbed blindly at the creature with his gloved hands, trusting Cesira’s protective spell to hold long enough for him to finish his grim task. He punched into the thing’s mouth and felt teeth and tongue give way with a wet crunch.

  Kall fought down a rush of bile. Whatever shape it took now, the thing still had a woman’s head, and Kall had just rendered it a ruin. Steeling himself, he bore down, ignoring the choking and mewling sounds coming from the monster. When his hand met an obstruction, Kall didn’t allow himself to think. He yanked the mass of mud and root straight up.

  The creature’s head disintegrated around his arm. Kall lurched backward, hurling the root ball across the dais. It landed, writhing, at Dantane’s boots.

  “Kill it,” Kall growled.

  Dantane wavered. His eyes followed the movements of the dozens of tendrils branching off the mass, each quivering with something arcane.

  “Dantane!” Kall shouted.

  The wizard flinched, stirred from his trance. He pointed to the mass and muttered something. Flames erupted from the root ball, consuming it in a flash of blue light and searing heat. Dantane raised his sleeve against the glare and stink. “Done,” he said.

  Kall strode to the bench, yanked his sword free, and kept moving until the point threatened to slice Dantane’s nose in half. “If not for Cesira, I’d be smoking on the floor next to that thing. Mind telling me why you tried to get me killed?”

  Breathing heavily, Dantane matched the furious lord’s stare. “I was fighting to prevent the creature from tearing your guests apart. If you’ve a problem with my methods—”

  Kall interrupted, “You’ve as well as told the whole of Keczulla I’m hiding a wizard under my skirts!”

  Dantane hesitated. Something that might have been chagrin came and went across his sweat-soaked face. “I’m not accustomed to fighting under these circumstances,” he stammered. “As to the rest”—his white lips thinned—“had I intended you harm, Lord Morel, rest assured, your head would now be in as many pieces as that unfortunate creature.”

  Kall’s grip on his sword tightened, but Dantane didn’t back down. “Perhaps you would like me to discern the woman’s—or man’s—identity?” The wizard’s voice sounded smug. “It might prove useful, even vital, to have such information at hand when the Gem Guard come calling about this incident.”

  From somewhere outside the fog, Morgan’s voice rumbled, “Two red inks say he skewers him.”

  “No bet, I can’t see his face,” was Laerin’s reply.

  Kall lingered over the raised steel a moment longer. Abruptly, he sheathed his sword, his eyes still spearing Dantane with hostility. He kicked at the harpsichord bench and jumped off the dais.

  The stragglers had gone. Aazen had gone. Kall hadn’t seen him leave with the crowd. “Close off the estate,” he ordered the servants who’d dared remain within earshot. “Let no one back in except the guard, whenever they turn up.” He had no doubt they would. Dantane was right, damn the man again. He had t
o find out who the lute player was and why she—or he—had turned up at the party with deadly magic.

  Could it have been one of the families, attempting to strike at him? It seemed ludicrous, considering their aversion to magic and the rumors flying all evening about his generous-bordering-on-desperate attempts to make restitution among the merchants.

  Attempts that might come to nothing after tonight, Kall thought. Fury spiked through him. Amn’s retribution for magic use, especially magic that murdered, was second only to the collection of debts among the merchant families. He was about to be buried deep in trouble of both sorts.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  The Howling Delve

  4 Marpenoth, the Year of Lightning Storms (1374 DR)

  This was a great idea,” Talal said sarcastically as he held the torch around Meisha’s body.

  The Harper turned, flames catching in her eyes. Talal flinched. “Are you really going to walk at my heel with that thing, or can I carry it? ”

  “My torch, Lady,” Talal said, holding it out of reach.

  “Then would you care to lead?” She pointed down the dark, unfamiliar passage.

  “I’d care to go back to the warrens!” he complained, handing her the brand. “I showed you the wizard. Haroun says that’s enough, and she doesn’t even know he tried to kill you.”

  “You told me your people explore these caves constantly, looking for ways to escape.”

  “I told you we draw lots for the pleasure,” Talal argued. “Stain one stone with berry juice, put the rest in a sack, and choose. Tymora’s lucky whipping boy gets a torch, a weapon, and a trip down the tunnel to have his wits smashed all over the place. That’s what happened to Gadi.”

  “He was killed?” Meisha shone the torch down a side passage and listened. She heard nothing but the distant, constant drip of water. When she’d lived here, Varan had always made his apprentices safe, no matter how dangerous the Delve could be. Now the apprentices were dead, and Varan …

  Meisha suppressed a shudder. Varan had become one of the threats in the dark.

  “Smashed, I said. By whatever roams the tunnels outside your wizard’s shields,” said Talal.

  “Varan warned us not to venture outside the wards. Even I don’t know what lies at the end of many of these tunnels,” Meisha admitted. “You say you’ve sent someone out already?”

  “Braedrin,” Talal said, nodding. “Hasn’t come back yet. Smash,” he murmured under his breath.

  “What are these marks?” Meisha pointed to the walls.

  “Tells us where people have been,” Talal explained. “Means no traps, either.”

  “Traps,” Meisha echoed. A mask of blood and a dead apprentice’s face flashed before her eyes.

  “Don’t know who strung ’em, but they’re all over the place. We lost two that way when we first started going out. Pressure spears. Hit you square, one’ll take your head clean off. More of Lady Luck’s favor, the well-meaning bitch.”

  Meisha raised an eyebrow. “You’ve a ready insult for all the gods. Which one do you actually like?”

  The boy shrugged, dislodging a scuttling beetle from his clothing. “None of them—easier that way.”

  “You don’t believe in the gods?”

  “Believe, yes. But I leave them be, and I wish they’d return the favor.” He flicked away the beetle. “Not so much to ask.”

  “What about after this life? Don’t you worry for your soul?”

  “Hells, no. I’m aiming to live forever. See how I avoid prancing down dark tunnels with death-seeking sorcerers? I get along fine, Lady; it’s the rest of Faerûn that wants to muck me up.”

  “How many of you are there in the warrens?” Meisha asked, shifting the topic.

  The boy spent a moment figuring. “Thirty-eight. We took count of everyone, after the first death, so we’d know names. Forty-nine came into the caves, not counting that bastard Balram and his son.”

  Meisha stopped short. “The man who trapped you here was Balram?”

  “Him and his son, Aazen—not so twitchy as his father, but quiet, scary quiet,” Talal said. “Never said more than a few words to any of us.”

  Aazen. She remembered the name from the cave. The leader who’d stabbed her was Balram’s son. Meisha tried to take it all in. She pressed her hand against the crystal hidden in her jerkin. She’d almost forgotten it, but now its presence in the hands of Balram’s man made perfect, terrible sense.

  “I never knew there was a son,” Meisha said. “I only knew Kortrun.”

  Talal’s eyes widened. “You knew ’em?”

  “I’ve been searching for Balram Kortrun on behalf of a friend.” Meisha resumed walking, and after a moment Talal ran to catch up. “They were refugees with you?” Meisha asked.

  “We fled Esmeltaran together,” said Talal. “When we took up here, Balram—like I said, he was always twitchy—didn’t like the Delve or the crazy wizard. We couldn’t figure out why he kept going back to the wizard’s room, though, if he was so afraid. He’d come out some nights, looking almost sick with whatever he’d seen. Finally, he took his son, said he’d go for help to Keczulla. We all thought he was crazy, but we let him go. No one said so, but we hoped they might make it. We were too damn scared to go with them.” Talal stared off into the darkness, thinking. “I guess we’re paying for that, too. If we hadn’t been cowards, we wouldn’t still be here. If we’d’ve woken up and seen how it wasn’t the wizard but the wizard’s toys he was interested in …”

  “But they did make it to Keczulla,” Meisha prompted.

  “And came back with the Shadow Thieves. What a rescue,” said Talal sourly. “They made us take the wizard’s toys from his room while he slept, then they sealed the entrance to the Delve, trapped us inside. Told us if we took care of the old man, let him be to make his magic toys, they’d come back to collect them. When they came, they’d bring food—meat to butcher, chickens for eggs—clothing, maybe some weapons, if we didn’t try to escape—everything we’d need to live.”

  “So you care for Varan, keep him fed and strong enough to make magic items, and in exchange they give you this existence.” Meisha marveled at the complexity of the system, but in reality, the risks and costs to the Shadow Thieves were minimal. What was feeding forty people when compared to the worth of magic weapons, amulets, rings … whatever Varan could conceive of in his current state? “You’re certain it’s the Shadow Thieves?”

  “They didn’t bother hiding it,” Talal said. “We didn’t know how they even got in at first, until Gadi tracked them to the doorways. We tried to work them. Gadi said they used some type of key that wasn’t a key—he got close enough to see that much.”

  “Gadi was very brave,” Meisha observed.

  “My brother.” Pride swelled in Talal’s eyes, and Meisha’s heart twisted. “Runs in the family: brave, stupid—pick one.”

  They entered a large chamber. Meisha shone the torch high, but the light refused to penetrate to the ceiling.

  “I’m going to cast a spell,” Meisha said. When Talal didn’t answer, she looked at him questioningly. “Is that a problem?”

  “No, just … not used to being asked, is all.” Talal barked a laugh, but Meisha could sense the unease behind his bravado.

  “I’ll try to be gentle.” Meisha lowered the torch, fisting her hands into the flames. “Mephhisden,” she hissed.

  Fire wound languidly around her fingers and upward into a narrow, twisting column, a length of hemp weaving itself from the air currents. Near the ceiling, it tapered off to a needle point of fire that illuminated the cavern’s ceiling and the corpse impaled upon one of the stalactites. Its arms and legs dangled in a spiderlike pose above their heads.

  “Braedrin,” Talal murmured, recognizing the man’s vacant stare. “Pinned, not smashed,” he corrected himself.

  Meisha wedged the torch between two close stones. The column of fire sparked and twisted, illuminating a pair of overlarge shadows with long, triangular ta
ils hovering around the body. “Dragazhars,” Meisha said, watching them scatter from the light. “Watch your head.”

  Talal immediately dropped into a crab crouch, his eyes on the leathery cloaks of the deep bats—night hunters, Meisha noted—which billowed out like dark sails a full seven feet across the cavern’s ceiling.

  Talal shuddered. “They wasn’t what stuck him on that spear.”

  “No,” Meisha agreed. “I’d have to see the body up close to know what killed him.”

  Unexpectedly, Talal said. “I can get it down.”

  “The walls are sheer,” Meisha pointed out. “Unless you have rope hidden somewhere under that mainsail of a garment …”

  In answer, Talal pulled a balled up object from under his shirt. Meisha recognized the waterskin the halfling had used and discarded when the Shadow Thieves escaped through the portal. Talal had twisted and flattened the bladder until a small bulge of the magical substance had collected around the mouth. “I’ve been waiting to try this,” Talal said.

  Meisha blinked at him. “What about the bats? A moment ago you were terrified of them.”

  “You’ll kill them if they come near me.” Talal glanced up from smearing his dirty toes. He appeared hopeful. “Won’t you?”

  Meisha eyed the floating bats, calculating. “If you insist,” she said finally.

  Talal stood, balancing on his heels. He trotted clumsily to the cavern wall and placed his bare palms on the stone. He shifted his weight, drawing himself up to his toes and holding the position until he was satisfied the substance would support his weight. Grunting, he hauled himself up the sheer stone wall, moving much faster than the halfling and his comrades had dared.

  Meisha kept her eyes on the night hunters as Talal scuttled across the ceiling to the body. He stopped and freed his arms to dangle upside down, using his swinging momentum to carry him to the stalactite. He grabbed the stone tip protruding through the unfortunate Braedrin’s chest and hung on with one hand. The other he positioned at the man’s back and pushed, grimacing as the corpse slid off the stone into the crook of his arm.