Windwalker

by Elaine Cunningham

  She turned back to the drow warriors. “You will wait here and engage in battle any drow soldiers, alive or dead, who come through that tunnel,” she said, pointing. “Leave none alive. Destroy the zombies.”

  The drow snapped a quick salute, and Liriel waved Petyar toward the tunnel. As soon as they were beyond the range of hearing, she seized the hem of the boy’s vest and pulled him to a stop. “Is there another way out? A way that doesn’t go through the cavern?”

  Petyar spat at her boots. “So you can escape now and abandon my comrades?”

  Fyodor backhanded the boy across the face. “Think before you speak, fool!” he said softly, his voice more angry than Liriel had ever heard it. “You will lead the others to the surface, and Liriel and I will draw the drow warriors and their zombies to fight this new force. That will give us some time and decimate their numbers.”

  “Exactly,” she agreed.

  The young man did not look convinced. “And if there was no second way?”

  “Then we would have to fight our way clear,” the drow told him. “It could be done, but I’d rather save the men for the battle to come. There will be a battle if even one of the drow remains standing. You’ve made sure of that. Now go!”

  The boy looked uncertainly to his cousin. “Fyodor?”

  “Do as she says, and hurry!”

  Petyar took off at a run. Liriel followed close behind. Her mind raced as she sped along behind him, planning strategy, listing spells.

  “These newcomers might join the other drow in battle,” Fyodor said.

  She shot a glance back at him. “It is possible, but they belong to House Baenre, and they are accustomed to following the orders of Baenre priestesses.”

  “Even if the battle is won, any surviving drow will have learned much about Rashemen’s defenses and magic.”

  Petyar came to an abrupt stop and whirled to face the others. “Now I understand what you meant,” he said in an appalled whisper. “I should not have said what I did about Rashemen’s magic. From my words they might conclude that Rashemen is worth pillaging, perhaps even conquering!”

  “We can’t let them return to Menzoberranzan,” Liriel acknowledged.

  The boy’s consternation turned to puzzlement. “You would lead them into battle, knowing that you must later slay them?”

  “They won’t take it personally,” she said. “They’re drow. They expect allies to turn on them.”

  Petyar turned helpless eyes to Fyodor. The warrior reached over Liriel’s shoulder and gave him a shove. “Remember the men held by these drow, and go!”

  The moon was high when Liriel and Fyodor climbed out of the tunnel. Petyar and the freed Rashemi warriors awaited them. All stared at her for a long moment before the fyrra ordered them to join the forces gathering in the clearing.

  Treviel fell into step with the pair. His gaze flicked from Liriel to Fyodor, and he shook his head.

  “She’ll turn, my son. No doubt the others already have. There are more drow down there than rats in the sewers of Immiltar.”

  “She will stand,” Fyodor said firmly.

  There was no more time for talk. The mountains were suddenly alive with dark forms. A silent army marched from the mouth of a nearby cave. Drow females, larger and stronger-looking than the males who had ambushed the scouting party, advanced in grim precision. Moonlight gleamed on their bald pates and ready swords but found no answering glimmer in their dead eyes.

  “Zombies,” Fyodor whispered. The memory of his last battle on Rashemaar soil flooded back in full.

  A sharp pain exploded in his thigh and jolted up his spine. He dived forward and rolled to one side, coming up with his black sword in hand.

  The drow female whose life he had spared regarded him with contempt. The point of her long, slender sword was wet with his blood. She snarled something at him and beckoned him to come closer.

  He glanced around for Liriel, but she had already been swept away by a fierce battle with two of the males.

  The drow female advanced on him quickly, Her sword slashed the air in a dazzling display of speed and grace, taunting him with her superior skill, flaunting the promise of death.

  Fyodor waited, hating what he must do. The beautiful drow lunged at him. He blocked the drow’s attack with a slow, clumsy parry, one that drove her sword down toward his thigh. Contempt flared in her red eyes, and she leaned into the stroke.

  Fyodor was no longer there. He spun away from the contrived blunder and swung his sword in a circle—a move many times faster and more fluid that his first. He smacked the drow hard with the flat of his sword and sent her sprawling.

  An arrow sang past him and buried itself in the base of the fallen drow’s neck. She twitched once and went still.

  Thorn ran past him, nocking another arrow. This she aimed at one of the drow males who fought Liriel, backing her away from battle and toward the caves. Liriel dodged his falling body and tore the arrow free. This she plunged into the throat of her second opponent. With a quick nod of thanks, she raced off toward the hillside where the witches stood.

  Another male stepped into her path. Liriel kept running, casting a simple heat-metal spell as she went. The drow dropped his sword and reached for his dagger. Consternation flooded his face when he realized it was not there.

  “Looking for this?”

  An elf woman with red-gold hair stood several paces behind him, a smirk on her face and a drow dagger in her hands. Sharlarra gave the dagger a mocking little shake and tossed it to Liriel.

  In one smooth movement Liriel snatched it from the air and sent it spinning back toward the male. It slammed into his throat. His mouth moved around a drow curse, but only blood emerged. As the light faded from his eyes, he lifted one hand and in silent drow cant jerked out the curse he could not speak:

  Lolth take you.

  A shiver went through Liriel. She tossed her head, shaking it off, and looked for the elf, but Sharlarra was already off. She ran like a deer, weaving among the roiling throng with a small, hooked knife in one hand and a sword in the other. Wherever she went, hamstrung zombies toppled and fell.

  Over the sound of battle came a terrible sound, a keening wail that would have given pause to a banshee. The cry grew in power, taking on the harsh, irregular rhythm of a drow chant. It was like no song Liriel had ever heard, but she recognized the power of a deathsinger’s magic.

  Dozens of zombies that had been reduced to a crawl by Sharlarra’s knife stood up and resumed their advance. Those that had been cut apart by Rashemi swords retrieved their limbs—or someone else’s—and pressed them back into place. They came on, moving inexorably toward the place where the witches stood.

  Geysers of steam burst from the soil in the midst of that orderly advance. The rock itself stirred, flowing upward into a roughly human form—or at least the top half. A crudely hewn head, massive chest, and long, thick arms rose from the stone. A rocky fist hurled forward and shattered a zombie skull. Other, similar constructs took shape, and soon a score of stone warriors battered the advancing army.

  A shout of triumph rose from the Rashemi warriors, greeting the appearance of the rock elementals.

  Liriel could still hear the deathsinger’s chant. So, apparently, could the zombies. They rose, and healed, and came on. Deathsingers did not just celebrate death: they commanded it!

  Liriel looked around for the source of the song. On a nearby ledge stood a male drow, flanked by two fighters. His many braids swung this way and that as he swayed in time to his own chant. A large ruby gleamed in his forehead like a third eye.

  On impulse, Liriel reached for the Windwalker and called forth the powerful spell stored there—a spell that required as its material component a large and valuable gem.

  The deathsinger’s wail rose to a shriek of mortal agony. He clawed at his head, raking furrows in his own flesh. Suddenly he went rigid, and his form began to expand like that of a berserker entering frenzy.

  The drow exploded in a spr
ay of gore, shattering from within. A large ruby statue stood in his place. The golem backhanded one of the guardian drow and seized the sword hand of the second. It casually threw the dark elf from the ledge and made its descent with a crashing leap. The golem waded into the zombie throng, pushing them back toward the land-bound rock elementals.

  Fyodor saw this from where he stood and fought, and a faint smile touched his face. It was well that Liriel had not promised to refrain from raising golems.

  He caught her eye and raised his sword in a quick salute. She gave him a brilliant, fierce smile and continued fighting her way toward the witches.

  From the vantage of a nearby cave, Gorlist watched the course of the battle. Jerking himself back from the sight, he paced and snarled like a caged cat. He slammed a hand into the stone wall, ignoring the blood that flowed from his torn knuckles.

  “Damn her!” he snarled. “Damn her to the deepest depths of the Abyss!” Foam flecked his pale lips, and Shakti, watching him closely, realized that his mind had slipped the last leashes of sanity.

  Gorlist drew his sword, preparing to leap into the combat. Shakti started forward.

  “No! Wait! Wait for—”

  Her words were cut off as something hard slammed into the back of her head. Her red eyes glazed and rolled up.

  Thorn stepped from the shadows and shoved the stunned priestess aside. Shakti hit the wall hard and slid down to the damp stone floor.

  “Now,” snapped the elf fighter, “let’s continue the discussion we were having earlier.”

  Liriel raced toward one of the elementals. The stone guardian began to shiver, vibrating faster and faster. The drow took refuge behind a rock just as the creatures shattered. Shards of rock soared over the battlefield as if they had been shot from a trebuchet, arching toward the witches. The women met them with a single soprano shout. Stone clattered against an invisible wall and slid down to form a rough stone wall around their position.

  Liriel scrambled to her feet, staring in disbelief at the place where the elemental had stood. She knew that spell! She had studied it as a girl with the Shobolar wizards. A relatively simple spell, it was the sort of thing that one of Triel’s warriors might know.

  She glanced toward the eastern sky. The crimson rim of the sun edged over the mountains, turning the snowy peaks into a silent tribute to the night-spilled blood. Day had come, and yet the drow fought on undeterred, and their magic still held.

  Drow magic on the surface. This wasn’t possible!

  Oh, but it is, my little Windwalker.

  The drow stopped dead. Her hand went to the Windwalker amulet, the magical trinket that allowed her to bring her magic to the surface.

  A terrible possibility began to burn into Liriel’s mind. “No,” she whispered.

  Oh, yes. The amulet is more powerful than you dreamed. It can hold the power of this land, and the spirits who act in league with these witches. The spirits are scattered, sundered. Yield to me, as you did before, and we will command them with a single voice!

  Even as Liriel shook her head in vehement denial, she knew what must be done. Once before she had called a wandering spirit into the Windwalker and sent it safely home. In doing so, she had healed Fyodor of his uncontrolled rages. If the amulet was truly that powerful, could she do this on a greater scale?

  And more important, could she keep such power from Lolth’s hands?

  She ran toward the witches and vaulted over the tumbled stone wall. Two groups of six stood in linked spellcasting, commanding airborne whips that lashed at Triel’s forces. Zofia stood between the two groups, directing their efforts.

  Liriel hurried to the old witch, holding out the Windwalker. “What one witch knows is known to all. You said that I would bind and break, heal and destroy. Help me!”

  The witch took Liriel’s small black hand without hesitation. “One circle,” she said, reached her free hand out toward her friend Wanja.

  The hathran gripped the old woman’s hand in her own. One after another, the witches joined hands. The circle went around and stopped with Anya. The young witch hesitated only a moment before she reached her hand out to the drow.

  The moment their fingers touched a surge of power went through Liriel, a magic as great as any she had known under Lolth’s sway. She opened her mind to the Windwalker and the drow magic stored within.

  A frigid wind buffeted her, whipping her hair around her and chilling her until she felt certain her skin must be a gray as a bheur’s. None of the witches was touched by the storm. All its fury was focused on Liriel as the goddess tried to claim her and take for herself this power.

  This land.

  But Liriel was not alone. The will and power of the witches lent their strength to hers. Their collective will thrust the goddess aside, as a circle of lamplight pushes back the darkness.

  Liriel shook off the debilitating chill and formed in her mind an image of Yggdrasil’s Child, the mythic tree whose roots ran deep, whose branches were broad enough to encompass all life.

  There was magic deep in the bones and marrow of this world, magic she knew well. She reached down to it, strengthening the ties she had inadvertently created when she carved her own destiny on the Ruathym oak.

  Next Liriel reached for the heart of Fyodor’s homeland. The song of Rashemen began as a whisper, swelling to a mighty chorus that filled her mind with its powerful cadences. She saw the recognition on the faces of the witches, and the wonder. For the first time these women heard the song of the land they served.

  A small whispery soprano took up the melody. Liriel’s gaze went to the singer and linked to Anya’s awestuck eyes. The young witch squeezed her hand, and her heart—as open to Liriel’s gaze as her own—welcomed her one sister to another.

  Other witches joined in the song. Still in a handclasped circle, they began to dance, and the ancient spellcasting they had learned as maidens kept perfect time to the song.

  The waning moon had not yet set despite the coming of day. Using the magic that Qilué had taught her, Liriel reached out into the moonlight, listening for the song that was unique to each place.

  A silvery glow surrounded her as she reached out with the moonmagic of the Dark Maiden. She heard the song that was Ysolde, daughter of Qilué, and the priestesses with her. To her surprise, they were very close. Liriel reached out into the forests and sent out a silent summons.

  The winding of a hunting horn rang out from the wooded slope and bounded from mountain to mountain. The remnants of Gorlist’s band fought with renewed ferocity.

  Silver arrows streaked down from nearby trees, and a ringing chorus of female voices rang above the sounds of battle. Ysolde ran down the slopes with her sword held high. Behind her raced several of her maidens, all lofting bright swords and emitted the eerie, ululating cry. Their hair shone silver-bright in the dawning day.

  “More of the demons coming!” roared Treviel, pointing with bloodied sword toward Ysolde’s band.

  Fyodor seized the fyrra’s shoulders and spun him about. The older man went rigid with shock at the sight before him.

  A drow danced among the circle of spellcasting witches.

  “That dance is a summons to the guardians of the land. This—this!—is what Mother Rashemen sends?” Treviel murmured.

  “Tell the men not to attack any of the silver-haired drow women. Tell them!”

  The fyrra hesitated. This advice went against everything he knew as truth or even sanity. Yet he could not deny what his eyes told him.

  “This drow is truly wychlaran?” he asked.

  “That and more,” Fyodor said softly.

  He looked toward his dearest friend, her small hands entwined with the pale fingers of Rashemaar witches, her eyes fixed upon things he could not see, and a vision of his own came to him. Through the Sight that was his heritage he glimpsed a golden-eyed raven—the spirit form of the girl his destiny and heart had chosen.

  The raven-spirit sent forth a call, a mighty summons as familiar to Fyod
or as the sound of his sister’s voice. He felt the power of that summons, for once his own wandering spirit had followed it to the Windwalker. He was not at all surprised when the ghosts that haunted the edge of his vision stirred and moved toward the raven’s call. He did not marvel when spirits rose from the trees and rocks and waters to join in the powerful spell of binding.

  “She is wychlaran and more,” he repeated firmly. “She is the Windwalker.”

  “You’re Zofia’s kinsman,” Treviel said, accepting Fyodor’s vision. He lifted his voice and began to roar out the song that sped the berserker transformation. Here and there the warriors took up the ritual.

  The entranced drow heard the familiar song and drew it into the dancing circle. Fyodor’s quest had been tied to the Windwalker, and echoes of his own spirit journey lingered in the mighty artifact.

  The witches took up the song that was begun on Ruathym, when Fyodor unleashed the hamfarrig magic within, and the sea-going fighters of Ruathym became once again the legendary wolves of the waves.

  Power flowed from the witches into the singing berserkers. The rage came over them swiftly. Fyodor was the first to throw down his sword and rear up on two strong, black-furred legs. A blue-eyed bear roared into the thick of battle, tossing aside zombies and living drow alike with swipes of his massive paws. Petyar changed, and a long-limbed brown bear galloped toward a beleaguered Rashemi. The clatter of Rashemaar swords against stone echoed through the clearing as one after another the men dropped their weapons and took on their true berserker forms. Before long every man of the Black Bear lodge fought with the form and fury of his totem animal.

  In some corner of her mind, Liriel was aware of Sharlarra darting through the battlefield, collecting the discarded weapons. These she took to the edge of the battlefield where grim-faced women took up swords their husbands and brothers had dropped, and children stood waiting to leave childhood behind forever. The elf handed out the weapons, and all Rashemi who could hold a blade went to fight beside their berserkers.