The Dream Spheres (single books)

by Elaine Cunningham

  From the four corners of the wind they came, moving in with a perfectly coordinated attack. Their eagle mounts dove in with the instincts of raptors, their golden eyes fierce and their talons outstretched to snatch up their prey. It was a glorious, terrifying sight: a classic elven attack.

  It was also the worst possible strategy.

  Elaith's cry of protest was swallowed by the wind. He could not hear his own voice. Nor did he hear the whir and thump of the catapults, but he knew in his blood and bones that such weapons lay in wait. After all, these bandits knew the caravan's route, they had found this remote site. They would know what forces they would face and how they might best be defeated.

  Golden feathers flew back toward him like giant leaves torn away by a wintry blast. Among the feathers were deadlier missiles: bits of metal and stone hurled as grapeshot.

  Elaith instinctively ducked as the spray rose toward them, pulling back hard on the pegasus' reins. The winged horse threw back her head. Elaith caught a glimpse of the steed's wild, white-rimmed eyes-and the ugly metal shape that protruded from her neck.

  He leaned forward and eased it out. It was a caltrop, a ball covered with wicked, triangular spikes. Fortu shy;nately the thing had embedded itself more in the har shy;ness than the horse.

  The giant eagles had not been so fortunate. They had caught the full force of the deadly volley. Two of the wondrous birds lay on the ground like discarded rags. A third spun down, one shattered wing hanging limp. Elaith heard Garelith Leafbower's furious battle cry as the last of the Eagle Riders dove in for the attack.

  The first volley was quickly followed by a second, and a third. Elaith's pegasus strained upward, her wings curved almost to breaking to catch the rising winds. She leveled off and circled, whinnying with what sounded very much like concern. Elaith understood completely, though he did not know what kind of bonds pegasi shared. With senses heightened by battle, the elf felt the death of the young Eagle Riders as keenly as a wound to his own flesh. He urged the frantic beast to circle down so that he might assess the situation.

  Utter chaos filled the valley and the sky above it. The tethered pegasus teams frantically fought to be free of their traces. Sky chariots spun out of control, spilling contents and riders to the valley floor. Griffons reared, pawing at the air with their leonine paws as they at shy;tempted to fight their way through the lethal spray. The bandits swarmed the valley, cutting down the wounded and gathering up the spilled booty. Few survivors were in any condition to give resistance. Seeing the loss of his treasure, Elaith once again urged his steed into a dive.

  Stony, blood-soaked earth leaped up to meet them as the pegasus plunged. At the last moment she leveled out and swept into a wide circle, wings out wide. She hit the earth at a gallop. Elaith reined her to a halt and leaped to the ground. He drew his sword and headed toward the thickest part of battle.

  "Stand and fight!" roared a too-familiar dwarven voice overhead. "Lost your stones in that slingshot, did you?"

  Elaith ducked as Ebenezer's pegasus swept in low, her teeth bared in a fierce grimace. Her rider did not wait for the landing but launched himself into the air, his stubby arms outstretched. The dwarf flopped onto a trio of fleeing looters, bringing them down like stomped-on flowers.

  A slender, autumn-colored figure staggered out from the midst of a melee. Using a broken piece of harness as a lash, she beat the bandits away from a wounded elven groom as she looked frantically about for a better weapon.

  Elaith cut his way through to Bronwyn's side. Press shy;ing a dagger into her hand, he fell into place at her back.

  She lashed out at a short, black-eyed bandit. The thief ducked and darted out of reach, losing a hat in the process. The elf marked the sudden spill of long, black hair, the lavish curves revealed when the thief stooped to retrieve the fallen hat. A spray of blood dragged his attention fully back into battle. He pushed aside the man whose throat Bronwyn had just cut.

  "Thanks," she panted out, lifting the bloodied weapon.

  "Don't," the elf said coldly. "There is a price."

  For several moments there was no time for speech.

  Elaith stopped a high scimitar blow with his knife, then drove his sword up into the bandit's barrel chest. He kicked the man off his blade and lunged at the next attacker. With four quick, short strokes he left a bloody lightning bolt of a gash on the man's torso. The man fell to his hands and knees. Bronwyn took advantage of the moment to leap onto the man's back. Using the surprise-and the extra height-she easily cut down the bandit who came in on the heels of Elaith's victim.

  They fought well together. Bronwyn did not exhibit Elaith's training or skill, but neither was she hampered by his rage. Whenever the elf began to be carried along on the icy tide of battle, she stepped in and finished the matter with grim practicality. Elaith soon found himself responding in kind, protecting her by fending off attacks that she alone could not have parried.

  To his surprise, the heat of battle burned away his desire to take vengeance on this cunning wench. It was nearly impossible to desire the death of someone after working so long and so hard to keep her body and soul on speaking terms with each other. The Mhaorkiira he must have, but if he could find a way to let Bronwyn live, he would take it.

  Finally Elaith and Bronwyn stood alone, in a silence broken only by a few scattered, tired clashes and by the groans of the wounded. She regarded him steadily with eyes that seemed to understand, and thus affirm, his change of plan. Before words could be spoken, Ebenezer sauntered up, one eye swollen shut and his tunic dark with blood.

  Bronwyn regarded him with dismay. "Any of that yours?"

  "Might be you could say that. I earned it, leastwise." The dwarf touched his puffy eye and grinned proudly.

  This was neither the moment nor the company Elaith would have chosen for this discussion, but he could not afford to wait. "The ruby. I want it back."

  A faintly smug expression touched the woman's chocolate-colored eyes. "I wasn't aware it was yours when I bought it. At any rate, I don't have it."

  Seeing his doubt, she nodded toward a small leather bag, lying empty on the ground. The strings had been cut, and the bag lay flat and slack. She strode over and scooped it up. Her face suddenly went very still, and she jerked open the bag and thrust one hand in.

  "Stones!" she spat out.

  The dwarf pricked up his ears. "Troubles?"

  Bronwyn drew out a small, round crystal and showed it to him.

  "Trouble," the dwarf agreed.

  "What is this?" Elaith demanded.

  Bronwyn shook the offending sack. "This is a bag of sending. Everything I put in it should be in a safe place in Waterdeep. The magic isn't working!"

  A possible explanation for this occurred to Elaith, one so fraught with dire possibilities that it blunted the loss of the kiira. He put out his hand. "That crystal."

  Ever the merchant, she countered, "In exchange for a truce. We've both lost what we sought. Call it even."

  Since this fit in with Elaith's inclinations, he re shy;sponded with a curt nod. She dropped the globe into his hand. The small, iridescent crystal nestled into his palm like a living thing. His elven senses picked up the cap shy;tured magic. He quickly dropped it into a bag, under shy;standing at last the enormity of the risk-and the opportunity.

  All magic came from somewhere. The dream spheres gave a dream and took one, but the magic power that fueled this exchange was drawn from nearby magic. Apparently the dream spheres stole magical power, drained it off and reformed it in much the same fashion as the legendary magic of spellfire.

  Elaith's initial purpose for the Mhaorkiira remained, but here was a new and enormous potential. Not only could hidden knowledge be his, but also he could pos shy;sess the potential to confuse defensive spells and con shy;found mages. All that he lacked was the kiira gem.

  He would have it and would not count any amount of blood too high a price.

  * * * * *

  In a cavern hidden behind th
e waterfall, deep within the mountains that surrounded the blood-soaked valley, the surviving bandits threw off their masks and hoods and began to paw through their loot.

  Isabeau Thione strode through the crowd, looking like a pirate queen in her dark breeches and crimson shirt. She was in rare high spirits, joking with her hired band and dispensing portions of the loot with a lavish hand.

  Appalled by it all, Lilly hugged the shadows on the far side of the cavern. Although she had not taken part in the battle, she had witnessed it all from the shadows of the trees. Never had she seen anything like it.

  No, actually that was not entirely true. A former cook at The Pickled Fisherman once bought a small flock of chickens for stew. For sport, he penned them in the back alley and hacked them apart with a machete. The cook had long ago drifted off. Rumor reported that he'd ended up in Mystra's Arms, one of the houses that cared for Waterdeep's insane. Such places catered mostly to those driven mad by magic gone awry, but they also tended the occasional soul who found his way to lunacy by a more convoluted path. At the moment Lilly felt per shy;ilously close to madness herself.

  She had not anticipated any of this. A letter, stolen from the large, bearded man she and Isabeau had robbed together the night they'd met, gave the route of this car shy;avan. A simple theft, Isabeau had argued, only the pigeon was a caravan rather than a single nobleman. Lilly had fallen far short when she'd taken the woman's measure, and her lack made her as guilty of bloodshed as any of the hired killers.

  She could not stay in partnership with Isabeau. The woman was as rapacious as a troll. Who knew what she might do next? No, Lilly could not stay-not with Isa shy;beau, and perhaps not even in Waterdeep. She needed a place to hide, to start anew, a place to come to terms with what she had done, to find a way to make amends.

  A bright, ringing clatter tore her from her guilty thoughts. Two mercenaries stood toe to toe, staring stu shy;pidly at the half sack each of them held. For a moment they watched the spilled coins roll away, then they began to pummel at each other. Isabeau shouted for the others to break up the fight. Most merely joined in.

  All was chaos. Lilly knew what to do in such moments-she had done some of her best pickings during tavern brawls.

  She eased her way into the melee and faked a stumble. With a quick swipe she gathered up some coins and gems and dropped them into her pocket. When she stood up, a blow caught her in earnest.

  Her jaw exploded with pain, her head snapped back, and the ground slammed up to meet her.

  Lilly awoke to the sound of dripping water, which kept an eerie rhythm with the pounding in her temples. Cautiously she opened one eye. Isabeau was stretched out beside her, a smug little smile on her face and a pile of treasure beside her.

  A heap of gleaming white globes dominated the hoard. Longing swept through Lilly like a healing tide. She sat up and reached for one, clenching her hand around the comforting magic.

  "You know those?" asked Isabeau.

  Lilly tried to move her aching jaw, and decided that a nod would do the job.

  Isabeau smiled. "Perhaps you would like to take your share in these? Say, seven?"

  It was a ridiculously low payment, even at the cost of dream spheres, but Lilly considered it a fair enough way out.

  "That will do," she mumbled.

  Her words seemed to ring in the empty cavern. The silence struck her, numbed her. Like a dreamwalker, she rose and stumbled in growing horror through the too-quiet cave.

  Everywhere the mercenaries lay in twisted, tortured positions. Blackened tongues protruded through mouths stretched open with silent screams. Their pockets had been turned, their gear bags sliced open and looted.

  Lilly's hand flew to her mouth. She whirled back toward Isabeau, hardly believing what her eyes told her.

  "You're wondering how we will move the cargo," the woman said, misreading her partner's dismay. "The porters I've arranged know the tunnels well. They can have the goods moved to Waterdeep's undercity faster than an overland caravan could cover the same ground."

  One of the shadows moved and broke away into the torchlight. Lilly backed away, shaking her head in ter shy;rified disbelief at the monstrous sight.

  Isabeau did not seem concerned by the sudden ap shy;pearance of an enormous, bipedal lizard. She strode for shy;ward and handed the creature a fine short sword that held the sheen of a newly made weapon.

  "An Amcathra blade," she said. "There will be four more when you get to Skullport."

  Enormous claws closed around the hilt, and the crea shy;ture grunted in apparent satisfaction. Isabeau looked to Lilly and seemed amused by the woman's reaction.

  "Meet the tren," she said casually. "You might as well get used to them. We will be doing a considerable amount of business with them from this point forth."

  She cocked her head and regarded her horror-struck partner. Her eyes narrowed in speculation, and she turned back to the monster. "Lilly does not appear to approve. Show her what happens to those who speak of matters best left in shadows."

  The curved, fang-lined jaws parted in a reptilian smile. With a grunt, the creature hunkered down beside one of the dead mercenaries. The enormous, clawed hand closed around the man's protruding black tongue. One yank, and the tongue came free with a wet, tearing sound. The tren grinned again, then tossed the tidbit into its fanged mouth.

  Through the whirling haze that gripped her, Lilly heard the grunting echoing throughout the cavern. More tren emerged from the shadows, and they crouched down to feed.

  Lilly began to scream. Dimly she was aware of Isabeau scolding her, slapping her, but she could not stop. She sank to the stone floor, hands fisted against her ears to block the sound of the horrid feast, and she screamed and screamed until the merciful blackness closed in again.

  Nine

  The scent of autumn was strong in the wind that whipped along the city streets, whirling the bright fallen leaves in small eddies and tugging at the skirts of passing women.

  Danilo clapped one hand to his head to keep his hat at the angle dictated by current fashion. "You picked an unfortunate time to develop a love of the shops," he told his companion.

  Arilyn impatiently brushed a dark curl off her face. "What if street rumor is right? What if the per shy;fume merchant sells more than scents and oint shy;ments?"

  "It is hard to credit. Diloontier has a fine reputa shy;tion. Many of the merchant families do business with him. His scents hold true, and the few potions he sells are harmless and reliable. Believe me, the wizards' guild keeps a wary eye on his affairs, as they do anyone who traffics in minor magic."

  "What of the tunnels?" Arilyn persisted.

  "My dear, this city is built over a veritable anthill. Creatures of all sorts have been digging tunnels under Waterdeep Mountain since dragons ruled the land. It does not signify."

  Arilyn shrugged and pushed open the door to the shop. She stopped so abruptly that Danilo bumped solidly into her.

  Cassandra Thann regarded both of them over the exquisite bottle in her hands. After a moment's hesita shy;tion, she handed it back to Diloontier.

  "The blend is not quite right. Too much spice. I have no wish to go about smelling like a winterfest pudding."

  "I will see to it at once," the merchant said. He made a quick bow to her, then turned aside and snapped his fingers at one of his apprentices. "You, Harmon. See to this gentleman while I repair this perfume."

  He bustled off, leaving the two women eyeing each other like swordsmen in need of their weapons.

  "I'm fond of winterfest puddings," Arilyn commented. "Since that perfume didn't suit you, perhaps I should buy it."

  Cassandra looked nonplussed for a moment. She quickly covered her reaction with a cool smile. "My dear, that scent is far too. . formal for you. Surely there is something in this shop that would suit you better."

  The subtle insult held an opportunity. The noble shy;woman was aware of Arilyn's dark reputation. The half-elf decided to play upon that knowledge. She folde
d her arms and let her gaze go flat, cold, and deadly-the stare of a hunting hawk or a hired killer.

  "So I hear. I have no immediate use for such things, but I would be very interested to know who might."

  They regarded each other for a long, measuring moment. Cassandra glanced back at her son. She took a small vial from the shelf and handed it to him. "Take this as a gift for your … lady, and go. You would do well to heed my advice."

  Cassandra pulled on her gloves and sailed out to her waiting carriage.

  Danilo waved away the perfumer's assistant. He led the way out into the street, then turned an apologetic gaze upon his friend. "I suppose you realize she was not referring to perfume," he murmured.

  "The thought occurred to me," Arilyn said with a touch of sarcasm. "Does Cassandra have a general aver shy;sion to half-elven assassins, or did she have some other, more specific advice in mind?"

  "I'm not entirely certain," he admitted. "She was most insistent that I not involve myself with Oth's death, but I put that down to her abhorrence for scandal. She is concerned about my choice of companion, probably for much the same reason. As you have observed, some of the nobility look askance at alliances between their peers and other races."

  This was the first time Danilo had openly admitted that a problem might exist. Arilyn decided it was time to put her cards on the table. "I spoke with Arlos Dez shy;lentyr yesterday."

  Danilo looked at her sharply. "He told you about his first wife?"

  "So you have heard that story," Arilyn said. "I'd won shy;dered. Yes, her death made quite a stir among the elves. Many were indignant when no real attempt was made to find her killer."

  "If, indeed, she was murdered."

  "Sibylanthra was a young elf in apparent good health and happy with her work, her husband, and her young children. What else could it be?"

  When Danilo offered no argument, she continued. "You admit that your peers are unhappy to see you with a half-elf. Someone was unhappy that Arlos Dezlentyr married an elf woman. Tren tunnels link the Dezlentyr estate with Diloontier's shop. Shall we find out why, or would you rather spend the rest of your life checking shadows for a tren ambush?"