Sacrifice of the Widow

by Lisa Smedman

  Qilué realized what had just happened. The Selvetargtlin had temporarily halted time.

  The metal rod should have landed with a clatter behind Qilué, but she’d heard nothing. She whirled and saw a fifth Selvetargtlin—the missing judicator—standing next to the statue. The rod was in his right hand, which was still raised from catching it. His head was shaved except for a braid at the back of his head that whipped around as he whirled to smash the rod against the statue.

  “No!” Qilué cried.

  Silver fire flashed throughout the cavern, momentarily blinding even her. She heard a smash as the metal rod struck the statue then a pattering sound: chips of stone, flying away. As her vision cleared, she saw, to her relief, that the magic of the seal held. Though a gaping hole had been smashed in the middle of the statue, nearly cutting it in two, it refused to collapse. The void-black ball at the head of the mace had vanished, temporarily snuffed out by Qilué’s silver fire.

  The judicator snarled. The lines of glowing white that crisscrossed his skin in a web pattern flared as he cast the depleted rod to one side.

  Iljrene, meanwhile, sagged away from the cleric who had just stabbed her. The other two closed in, swords raised to deliver killing blows. Qilué turned away from the judicator to hurl silver fire at them. The roaring, swirling cone of silver-white caught all three clerics, sending them reeling with robes and hair smoking. One immediately collapsed, dead. The battle-mistress, too, was caught by the edge of the blast, but it simply spun her around like a wind-blown leaf, leaving her unharmed.

  Gasping her thanks, Iljrene slapped a hand over her wound and croaked out a prayer, healing herself.

  Dealing with the other three clerics had given the judicator time to close with Qilué. His enormous two-handed sword swept down, and she barely had time to raise her own weapon to parry it. The singing sword wailed in a minor key as the judicator’s weapon crashed against it, smashing it to one side. The judicator followed with a hilt-punch that sent Qilué staggering back. Her face burned where the spider-shaped guard of the judicator’s weapon had struck.

  She danced back, hurling herself out of range of his next blow. There was no time to cast a spell, no time to worry about Iljrene, who had plunged back into battle with the other two clerics, her sword singing furiously as she swung, parried, and swung. The judicator pressed Qilué with a flurry of blows, his eyes with their spider-shaped pupils glaring at her.

  “Tonight,” he announced in a funereal voice, “you all die, and Eilistraee with you.”

  Qilué fought back grimly, wondering if the Selvetargtlin were in league with Malvag. The fact that their attack had come on the night the Nightshadows planned to work their magic wasn’t lost on her. Selvetarm was, after all, Vhaeraun’s bastard child.

  The judicator’s sword whistled uncomfortably close to Qilué’s face, reminding her of more immediate concerns. She returned with a slash that glanced off the judicator’s breastplate, scoring a groove in the adamantine across the holy symbol that was embossed there. Her opponent paid the blow no heed. Unlike the other two clerics, who kept shouting their god’s name, the judicator fought in silence, and not only with that massive sword. As his blade met Qilué’s and they strained against each other, face to face, his mouth parted, revealing fangs. He bit her hand then whirled away, the blood-clotted end of his braid smacking her in the face for good measure.

  Qilué, thanks to Mystra, was immune to poison. At her whisper, the punctures in her hand healed. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Iljrene cut the legs out from under one of the Selvetargtlin she fought, then sweep her sword around, bloody and still singing, in an upward arc that caught the other just above the ear, slicing off the top of his head.

  Qilué whispered a prayer of thanks. The seal held, the six lesser Selvetargtlin were down—only the judicator remained. He was outnumbered two to one, but the rod, she saw, was no longer disrupted. Its round head had reformed, a black blot against the floor where it lay. Thankfully, it was at least half a dozen paces from the statue.

  She pressed home her attack, driving the judicator before her until his back was against the statue. Iljrene angled in from his left, her own sword singing a deadly counterpoint. Letting the battle-mistress take the initiative, Qilué stepped back, intending to cast a spell, but the judicator was unbelievably quick. His weapon flashed up, then down, catching Iljrene at the point where shoulder and neck met. It cleaved through her tiny body in an instant, cutting her torso in half from neck to hip. Blood rushed from the two halves as the pieces fell and sprayed into the judicator’s face, momentarily blinding him.

  Qilué screamed and hurled spellfire at him, hoping to kill him before he blinked the blood clear, but though the silver-white blaze made the judicator reel back, he remained on his feet. As the two halves of Iljrene’s body crumbled in on themselves, reduced in an instant to a boiling mass of black spiders, he touched the point of his sword to it. The mass bulged upward, questing for the blade, then sizzled, dissolving into it. He held it there, his spider-pupiled eyes stared at Qilué. A challenge.

  Furious, she hurled herself at him, knocking his sword away from the heap of tiny spiders. The sight of Iljrene, her steadfast companion and battle-mistress, reduced to a profane mass of spiders, rattled her badly. She swung wildly at the judicator, fury boiling out of her in waves of silver fire.

  It was her undoing. The judicator’s sword swept down, slicing off her right arm at the elbow. Qilué reeled back, nearly fainting from the pain. Her singing sword clattered to the floor with a wail, then fell mute. Qilué stumbled over a loose chunk of stone and nearly fell. Her left hand tightly clasped the stump of her right arm, and blood sprayed through clenched fingers.

  “Eilistraee!” she gasped. “Heal me.”

  She felt flesh knit together under her fingertips, saw the spray of blood stop as the arm began to regenerate.

  The judicator, however, gave her no quarter. He rushed Qilué, his terrible sword raised for a killing blow, and Qilué had nothing to parry it with. She could escape with just a word, but that would mean abandoning the Pit and its seal, and the rod was once again fully active.

  “Mystra!” Qilué cried, desperately calling forth spellfire.

  The judicator’s sword swept down, even as moon-white fire blazed through the cavern.

  Selvetarm loomed above Cavatina. Another dollop of acid dripped from his mace and landed with a bubbling hiss on the stone next to her, splattering and burning her skin. The god’s mouth was enormous—wide as a doorway. Hot, foul-smelling breath washed over her as his fangs clamped hold of her torso. She gasped as she was lifted from the ground, the spiderwebs that had accumulated on her body hanging from her like limp hair. Dangling upside down from Selvetarm’s fangs—which had yet to puncture her breastplate and deliver a final, poisoned bite—she saw the blur that was the traitor Halisstra sway through her field of view.

  Halisstra waved one of her twisted, elongated arms. Behind her, a black dot that was the iron fortress of Lolth thundered toward them on its eight metal legs, its feet clashing like gongs against the ground.

  Halisstra shouted something. Garbled words, to Cavatina’s ears, which still rang from the unholy word Selvetarm had used to fell her. Cavatina could see more clearly. That flash of silver was the Crescent Blade, being waved overhead by a triumphant Halisstra, a creature that had only pretended to be seeking redemption, a demonic thing of Lolth.

  Halisstra shouted something. It sounded like the word “slay.”

  Cavatina nearly laughed. Selvetarm needed no urging. In another moment his fangs would clamp down on her, and poison would be driven into her paralyzed body.

  Selvetarm’s fangs continued to squeeze Cavatina’s chest, preventing her from drawing breath. Strangely, they had yet to pierce her armor. A miracle, that—but not exactly the one she’d pleaded with her goddess for. Even magically enhanced armor would only hold back the fangs of a demigod for so long.

  Halisstra waved the sword ove
r her head, still shouting—but at the same time looking nervously over her shoulder at the approaching fortress.

  “Slay it!”

  Selvetarm shifted his grip, still trying to bear down on Cavatina with his fangs. He’d yet to raise his head fully;

  Cavatina swung back and forth, just over Halisstra’s head.

  Cavatina realized what Halisstra was shouting. Not “slay,” but “take.” She held the sword by its point, blood dripping from her hand where she gripped the blade, offering the hilt to Cavatina.

  Realizing that, Cavatina nearly cried. With an effort that took every bit of her will, she forced a numb arm to move. Leaden fingers spread. As she swung past Halisstra, she seized the hilt of the sword.

  Selvetarm straightened, and Cavatina nearly dropped the sword. Slowly, with intense concentration, she forced her other hand to also close around the hilt. She closed her eyes, whispering a prayer with numbed lips …

  And she could move again.

  Selvetarm’s eyes widened.

  Now! the sword howled.

  Twisting in Selvetarm’s grip, she bent the upper half of her body forward, toward the god’s head. At the same time, she swung the Crescent Blade.

  “Eilistraee!” she screamed. “Do not fail me!”

  The Crescent Blade flashed toward Selvetarm’s neck, glinting red in the eerie light of the eight stars clustered above.

  Selvetarm’s eyes widened.

  The breeze that blew incessantly across the Demonweb Pits stilled.

  Spiders halted in mid-scurry as the blade bit into flesh—and cut clean through it, in a spray of dark blood.

  The neck was severed.

  The head fell, at last releasing Cavatina.

  “Eilistraee be praised!” Cavatina cried, exultant. “Selvetarm is dead!”

  She twisted in mid-air, halting her fall with her magical boots. The demigod’s head slammed into the ground and shattered into bloody pieces, his body belatedly crumpling to a heap beside it. Cavatina threw back her head and laughed, tears streaming from her eyes. She’d done it! Slain Selvetarm.

  Killed a demigod.

  It felt incredible—a greater thrill than any she’d ever experienced. She raised the Crescent Blade above her head, triumph surging through her. For just an instant, her body flared with the moon-bright white of Eilistraee’s holy moonfire. On the ground below, spiders scurried away in terror, seeking shadows.

  This, Cavatina exulted wildly, must be what Qilué feels each time she calls on Mystra’s silver fire.

  It was incredible. Indescribable. Glorious.

  Yes, the sword whispered. This is what it feels like to be a god.

  The words startled Cavatina, brought her back to the here and now, reminding her that she was in the Demonweb Pits. Lolth’s domain. She saw the Spider Queen’s fortress hurtling toward her at an impossible speed, hastened to fury by the flare of moonlight that was Eilistraee’s sign.

  Cavatina gripped the Crescent Blade firmly then decided against testing her luck a second time. Killing one deity had taken a miracle. Trying to kill a second would be demanding too much, especially if that god was Lolth, fully cognizant of what had just happened and protected within her fortress of iron.

  Cavatina looked around. Halisstra was nowhere to be seen. Had she already escaped through the portal? Cavatina hoped so. She realized now that she’d been wrong about Halisstra. Even someone twisted into an evil caricature of her former self could, it seemed, be redeemed.

  “Halisstra!” Cavatina shouted. The wind was rising, and spiderwebs snagged at the edges of her open mouth.

  There was no reply.

  Lolth’s fortress drew nearer. Halisstra or no, Cavatina had to leave.

  Shaking her head at the sheer wonder of what she’d just done, she sprinted for the portal and leaped into it.

  Dhairn cried out in triumph as he brought his blade down in a killing blow. The light pouring from the priestess was blinding him, but he would cleave her in two, even with his eyes closed.

  “Selvetarm!” he shouted.

  Victory was his! The Promenade was his!

  The blade struck the priestess’s forehead—and crumbled in his hands. Instead of solid steel, Dhairn held nothing but a blade-thin line of spiders. The creatures scattered as though they’d burst from an egg sac when they met the priestess’s forehead and showered like black soot onto her shoulders. Dhairn gaped at them then flexed a right hand that was empty for the first time in more than a century. He raised it, staring at it in disbelief. His sword? Gone?

  “Selvetarm?” he whispered.

  He felt nothing. Only … emptiness.

  The priestess bent, scooping up her weapon with her off hand. Dhairn ducked instinctively as silver flashed within a hair’s breadth of his face. He danced backward, weaving to avoid her sword. Something had happened to his weapon, something inexplicable, but he still had his spells. He raised a hand to cast one—and blinked in surprise at his skin, which had turned a clear, solid black.

  The white lines—Selvetarm’s holy web—were gone.

  The priestess’s sword flashed down. Too late, he jerked his hand back. The blade bit into it midway between the fingers, splitting the hand lengthwise. He howled in anguish—then turned the howl into a shout. “Selvetarm!” he cried, trying to summon up the battle fury that would carry him past the pain, but the cry rang hollow in his ears.

  He would not faint from the pain. He could not. Forcing his body into a spin, he whirled, whipping the priestess’s face with his braid. At the same time he furiously whispered a prayer. He thrust his wounded hand out, reaching for Selvetarm, but no healing came.

  Worried, he tried another spell—one that would cover his body in venomous blades, turning it into a living weapon. Ducking and weaving all the while to avoid the priestess’s furious but not quite coordinated slashes, he cried his deity’s name.

  “Selvetarm!” he shouted. “Make me your weapon!”

  Nothing happened. The demigod refused to answer.

  Nervous sweat prickled Dhairn’s skin. Something had happened. Something terrible. Had Selvetarm turned his back on Dhairn and his followers—abandoned those who sought to worship Selvetarm as a deity unto himself? Had Lolth ordered her Champion to do it?

  What … was … wrong?

  Utterly unnerved by the sudden absence of his deity, Dhairn backed away from the high priestess, who pursued him with fury in her eyes. Behind him, he heard another of Eilistraee’s priestesses hurrying down the stairs, shouting something about the Selvetargtlin being defeated. He only realized how close to the exit he was when her blade skewered his back. He stared, uncomprehending, at the sword point that had mysteriously emerged from his chest. As the cavern began to vanish into a gray mist, he croaked out one final plea.

  “Selvetarm,” he gasped through lips suddenly gone ice-cold. “I commend … my soul … to …”

  But the demigod was no longer there to claim it.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Malvag reeled as the gate closed with a thunderclap that rattled the crystals in the cavern. It was several moments before the ringing in his ears subsided. When it did, he turned to Valdar and Q’arlynd, his body quivering with excitement. “Vhaeraun be praised! We did it!”

  The slender Valdar wove back and forth where he stood, exhausted. Q’arlynd looked equally drained, his face an ashen gray. Both males nodded weakly.

  The wizard turned and lifted his bound hands. “If you wouldn’t mind….”

  Malvag hesitated—but only for a heartbeat. Old habits. In the moment of communion their spellcasting had provided, he’d glimpsed Q’arlynd’s soul. The wizard wasn’t going to turn on him.

  Malvag stepped forward and untwisted the wire, releasing the wizard’s hands. Then, for good measure, he slipped the slave ring off Q’arlynd’s finger and took the master ring off his own. He tucked both rings into a pocket of the wizard’s piwafwi.

  Q’arlynd’s fingers were gray and puffy, with deep indenta
tions from the wires. He rubbed them stiffly together, wincing.

  “I can’t feel them,” he said. He extended his hands slightly. “Could you—”

  “Of course.”

  Malvag took the wizard’s hands in his own and whispered a prayer. He felt the rush of power that was the Masked Lord’s reply course through him as the fingers healed. When he released Q’arlynd’s hands, silver-white motes danced upon the wizard’s dark skin.

  Malvag jerked his hands away. What was that?

  Valdar stared at the wizard’s hands. “Moonfire,” he gasped.

  The wizard, sensing the knife-edge in Valdar’s tone, held his hands perfectly still as the sparkles slowly faded.

  “If this is moonfire, it’s not my doing,” he said. “I’m a wizard, not a cleric.”

  Valdar stood just to Malvag’s left, tense as a cocked wristbow. He glanced sidelong at Malvag. One hand was behind his back, where the wizard wouldn’t see it.

  Has he turned back to Eilistraee? Should we kill him?

  Malvag took a deep breath. By Vhaeraun’s holy mask, was it really going to unravel so quickly? “No,” he said aloud. He turned. “You touched his mind, Valdar, and you know he’s no traitor. He’s one of us, now.”

  “There’s a simple explanation for what just happened, Valdar,” the wizard added. “We just opened a gate to Eilistraee’s domain. There’s certain to be lingering effects from that.”

  Valdar relaxed. Slightly.

  The wizard smiled and spread his hands. “What’s more, I could easily have teleported away just now—which would be the logical thing for me to do, if I was a traitor—but I’m still here with you.” He shook his head, an exasperated expression on his face. “We just cast high magic. Drow, casting high magic, perhaps for the first time. Do you honestly think I’d turn my back on that kind of power?”