The mouth was breathing, exhaling a rank smell that was a combination of burned flesh and charred bone, overlaid by the stench of rot—worse, even, than Jeggred’s breath. Wincing, Pharaun pinched his nose shut and backed carefully away from it. He was glad that he’d had the good sense to have the demon open the hatch. He was certain that if he’d opened it himself, he would have been sucked into the mouth and consumed—utterly.
Too bad he hadn’t instructed Quenthel to open the hatch, instead. That would not only have produced an amusing result—but also a practical one. In order for the demon to sail the ship out of the storm, the mouth had to be fed something.
Pharaun paused. Or did it? For all he knew, a ship of chaos could sail for years on a single meal. Centuries, even. But could it sail from one plane to the next without feeding? That was something he’d have to find out. A bluff was in order.
He folded his arms against his chest and looked the demon in the eye.
“We’ve wasted enough time,” he told it. “Get the ship under way. Set sail for Plane of Shadow.”
The demon mirrored Pharaun’s action, crossing its own arms.
“Stupid mortal,” it said with a disdainful smirk. “You know nothing. We can not travel that far. Before the ship can enter the Shadow, it must feed. Permit me to gate in a worthless mane, and I will stoke its fires.”
Pharaun returned the smile. The demon had unwittingly told him what he needed to know. He wasn’t about to allow it to cast any spells—it wouldn’t be manes stepping through the gate, but another uridezu.
“The fires are stoked enough for the moment,” Pharaun told it. “We’ll sail out of this storm first and see about feeding the ship. Remember—the sooner you complete the task I’ve set for you and get us into the Abyss, the sooner you’ll be free.”
For a few heartbeats, the demon tried to stare Pharaun down. Then its whiskers twitched, and it looked away. It lifted its foot, indicating the thin length of chain that bound it to the deck.
“Someone must take the tiller,” it said.
“I’ll do it,” the Master of Sorcere said. “Just get the ship moving.” Then, noticing the sly look in the demon’s eye, he added, “And no tricks. I want smooth sailing—or at least, as smooth as possible in this storm.” He paused as spray from a breaking wave crashed over him, re-drenching his already sodden piwafwi. He pointed at his bare feet, still stuck firmly to the sloping deck, thanks to his spell. “As you can see, I don’t wash overboard easily.”
Pharaun turned and made his way against the wind and spray—one slow, sticky step at a time—to the stern of the ship. The tiller, he found, was, like the rest of the ship, made of bone. Not of powdered and compressed bone, like the boards that made up the deck, but of a single bone—an enormous radius, by the look of it, nearly ten paces long. It was slender and light enough that it must have been hollow, Pharaun decided, as he twisted it in its socket. It probably came from a dragon’s wing. Gripping the handle, Pharaun glanced down over the stern and saw that the rudder was an enormous sickle blade.
“Get us under way,” he shouted at the demon.
The uridezu snarled, then raised clawed hands above its head. As it swept its hands forward in the direction of the bow, the tattered skin sails above stopped luffing in the wind and belled out, straining at their lines. The ship began to move more rapidly in its circuit around the inside of the whirlpool. The demon continued to move its hands, plucking at the air with its claws, and with each motion the lines that controlled the sails either tightened or loosened, trimming the sails.
Experimentally, Pharaun moved the tiller to the left. A lurch sent him rocking backward as the ship turned in the opposite direction. He clung to the tiller as the bow swung around until it was pointing straight up at the cavern ceiling. Sails straining and boards creaking, the ship began climbing the inside wall of the whirlpool. After a few moments the bow came level with the surface of the lake and began climbing into the waterspout itself.
The ship teetered, then pitched violently forward. For a few terrible moments Pharaun fought to hang on to the tiller as the wall of water smashed into him, but then the ship was free of the waterspout and floating, level at last, on the surface of the lake. Shaking his head to free his face of the sodden hood of his piwafwi, Pharaun grinned at the demon, still fastened securely by its chain to the middle of the deck.
“Smooth sailing,” the wizard said, chuckling as the ship glided across the choppy surface of the lake, away from the storm.
He flicked wet hair back out of his eyes, glanced up at the ledge where they’d first entered the cavern—some distance away—and turned the ship in that direction. He’d collect Danifae and Valas first and retrieve Quenthel and Jeggred from the eye of the storm later.
Then the fun of deciding what—or who—to feed to the ship would begin.
Halisstra clung grimly to the reins as the horse galloped across the open plain. She could see little through the thickly falling snow, and prayed the animal would neither slip nor plunge its foot into a hole. It was apparent just looking at the beast how fragile the swift mounts of the World Above were compared to the riding lizards of the drow. Surely but one little twist could snap a leg, sending a rider tumbling to the ground.
Should that happen, at least Ryld would be protected from injury by his levitation spell. He clung to the hem of her piwafwi, trailing behind her like a cloak as she rode.
Above them, the sky was getting lighter by the moment. Dawn had come and gone and the sun was rising steadily in the sky—a faint glow behind the sullen, flat gray clouds. It had grown light enough for her to see for some distance—at least in the rare moments when the snow lessened and anything could be seen at all. Which was hardly a welcome thing. The fully risen sun marked the time that the spell Halisstra had cast on Ryld would end. Any moment the poison might rush back upon him full force, like a tide overcoming an already drowning man.
Halisstra stiffened. Was that dark line up ahead the forest? If so, they had reached the edge of the Cold Field at last.
Twisting in the saddle, she gave Ryld a reassuring grin—only to have that grin falter as she saw the look on his face. It was set in a grim mask of concentration, deep lines at the corners of eyes and mouth the only hints of the effort he must be making to push away his pain. Even so, he managed a grim smile in return.
“I can’t—” he started to say, then he shuddered.
For a moment his body sagged in the air, but then with a visible effort he regained control and continued levitating. Alarmed, Halisstra fumbled with the reins of the horse with near-frozen hands, trying desperately to slow it.
Ryld groaned aloud, then gasped, “Halisstra . . . I . . .”
He released his grip on her cloak and fell to the ground. In that same instant, the horse turned back into swirling mist, becoming non-corporeal once more, and Halisstra found herself flying through the air. Snow-covered branches whipped at her face as she struck the trees ahead. She landed heavily, knocking the air from her lungs, and lay for a moment, too stunned to do anything but gasp. Then she realized they’d done it—they’d reached the forest.
Scrambling to her feet, she staggered out of the trees. She could no longer feel her feet—they were like lumps of ice, somewhere at the bottom of her legs—but somehow she managed to walk. She was relieved to see Ryld sitting up, apparently unharmed by the fall. She knelt beside him and draped one of his arms across her shoulder.
“Can you walk?” she asked.
He shook his head.
Looking more closely at him, Halisstra was alarmed by the grayish tinge of his skin. She hurriedly dropped his arm.
“Wait, then,” she told him. “I’ll pray.”
“Pray . . . quickly,” he gasped, then his eyes closed and he sank back into the snow.
Halisstra gasped in alarm. Was he dead?
No, Ryld’s chest still rose and fell. Leaning forward, she placed a hand upon his chest, forcing her frozen fingers into the shape
of a crescent moon.
Eilistraee, she prayed silently, unable to speak the words aloud because of the trembling of her lips. I beg of you. Help me. Send me the magic I need to drive the poison from his body. I could not sing your praises this morning as the sun rose, but I beg of you—let me do that now. Bestow your bounty upon your servant, and give me the blessings I need so that I can save the life of this male who serves . . . She paused then, and sobbed, then corrected herself. This man that I love.
That done, she began humming the morning prayer. Singing the words was impossible—she was shivering violently again, and her lips didn’t seem to be working properly.
She paused. Was that the crackle of a breaking twig in the woods?
It didn’t matter.
Continue the song, she told herself.
Teeth chattering, she resumed her humming, but it was difficult to concentrate. The fiery tingling had left her hands, leaving a comforting numbness. All she wanted to do was lie down in the snow beside Ryld and sleep . . .
Was that someone calling her name? No, she must have been hallucinating.
Keep humming, she told herself. Keep praying. Ryld’s life depends on it.
But what song had she been humming? Her teeth had at last stopped chattering, but with the shivering gone, Halisstra found herself unable to remember the melody. Instead she sat, staring, at Ryld. Was he even alive?
None of it mattered. Not any more.
Her prayer unfinished, Halisstra sighed, then crumpled to the ground. Strangely the snow was warm, not cold, like a comforting blanket. She lay in it, watching the flakes drift down from the wide gray sky. Funny, she’d never dreamed she’d die with so much space above her . . .
There. That dark patch. That was the ceiling of a cavern . . . wasn’t it? Then why was it moving? Why was it bending down and taking her hand?
As if in a dream, Uluyara’s face swam down toward hers. Fragments of a sentence drifted down into her ears, like falling snow.
“We . . . scrying . . . found you.”
Halisstra felt hands lifting her and for a moment thought that Uluyara was shifting her body so she could remove the Crescent Blade and songsword from her backpack. Then she heard the melody of a prayer—that was Feliane’s voice; she must have been here, too—and she felt a tingle of warmth. Halisstra realized that her pack was being removed so Feliane could hold her, warm her with her body . . . and her magic. At first she was shocked—then she realized she was still thinking like a drow of the Underdark. Knowing that she was saved, she cried in relief, then she realized she was being selfish.
“Ryld . . .” she whispered.
“Don’t worry,” Feliane said, her voice growing more intelligible as magic flowed into Halisstra, warming her and driving away the icy hand of death. “He’s alive. Uluyara is driving the poison from his body even now.”
Sighing, Halisstra allowed herself to relax, to drink in the warmth of Feliane’s spell. She’d done it—she’d gotten Ryld to safety. And herself. She’d even managed to recover the Crescent Blade.
Now all she had to do was kill a goddess with it.
chapter
thirty six
Gromph waited in the great chamber of House Baenre’s temple, watching through Kyorli’s eyes as members of the House guard dragged in prisoners, bound at the ankle and wrist, for execution. A company of soldiers from House Agrach Dyrr had attempted to break out of their compound after House Baenre pulled its troops away to fight the tanarukks, but fortunately soldiers of House Xorlarrin had been able to capture them. House Baenre had claimed its share of the resulting prisoners, who were being “sacrificed” in the temple—for all the good it would do. With the goddess silent, did it really matter?
As yet another captive from House Agrach Dyrr was hustled into the temple—one, unlike the others, not too badly damaged—Gromph stepped into the path of the House guard who was dragging him in and held up a hand. The guard came to an immediate and obedient halt.
“Yes, Archmage?”
Gromph squatted, bringing Kyorli down to the level of the prisoner. Using the rat’s eyesight, he stared into the eyes of the captive, who glared defiantly back at him.
Yes. They might just do.
“This captive is not to be exec—sacrificed,” he told the guard. “Take him to Sorcere, instead, and deliver him to Master Nauzhror. Tell the master that I require the battle-captive . . . for my own purposes.”
From deeper in the temple—behind the adamantine doors that led to Lolth’s inner temple—came a high, sharp scream, followed by a drow voice pleading. Slaves, meanwhile, carried the body of the last soldier to have been executed past the spot where Gromph stood and flung it outside at the feet of a riding lizard. A moment later Gromph heard a crunching, gulping noise—the sound of the lizard enjoying its victory feast.
The prisoner looked back and forth between the body being consumed by the lizard and Gromph, as if trying to decide which was the lesser evil.
“Thank you, Archmage,” the Dyrr cousin said. “I’ll serve you well.”
Gromph smiled and said, “Perhaps you will. Part of you, anyway.” Then, standing, he addressed the guard. “Take him away.”
As he waited for the “sacrifices” to end, Gromph craned his head back and squinted up at the temple ceiling. Using Kyorli’s eyesight, he could see movement—the quick scurrying of the spiders whose webs filled the great dome above—but no detail. The webs were a white haze, their lines indistinct. Kyorli could see only a limited distance. Rats relied more upon smell and whisker touch than they did on eyesight.
Gromph would have to be careful. Triel had learned from And-zrel about what had happened to Gromph. But for the time being she had been fooled by Gromph’s assurance that the potions had fully restored his vision. Like the other nobles of House Baenre, she took no notice of Kyorli—the familiar often rode on Gromph’s shoulder—but if she learned that the Archmage of Menzoberranzan was blind, she could deem him weak. And the weak—in House Baenre, as in all the noble Houses of Menzoberranzan—were swiftly dispensed with.
Keeping that in mind, Gromph turned as he heard footsteps approaching from behind the adamantine doors. Looking through Kyorli’s eyes, he picked Triel out from among the priestesses who fanned out into the great chamber.
“Matron Mother,” he said, bowing deeply. “I have news. Good news.”
Triel strode over to where he stood. Whiskers tickled Gromph’s cheek as Kyorli strained forward, sniffing eagerly. Gromph saw lines of red crisscrossing the matron mother’s face and hair, sprays of blood from the flayings she’d recently inflicted. The serpents in her whip swayed gently, tongues dabbing at the bright blood that had stained a weblike pattern across the front of her white tunic.
“You’ve heard from Quenthel?” Triel asked.
Gromph nodded and said, “I have.”
Ever aware of the political web and his place in it, Gromph omitted any mention of Pharaun. Gromph’s underling would be spoken of only if specifically asked about.
“Quenthel and the others have discovered the whereabouts of a ship of chaos and plan to sail it to the Abyss,” he told Triel. “There they will find out what has become of Lolth. Our troubles will soon be at an end. Assuming, that is, that our sister proves worthy of the task you have set her.”
Just as Pharaun hoped she would, Triel smiled at the barb Gromph had tossed.
“Our sister is less brilliant than some, but she is loyal . . . when it suits her,” Triel conceded. “Especially in matters concerning Lolth.”
Gromph swore silently as Kyorli’s attention wandered to one of the spiders that had descended, suddenly, just in front of them. Triel’s face was a blur, and he couldn’t read it—but causing Kyorli to whip her head around suddenly could reveal his weakness.
The archmage nodded thoughtfully and said, “I see.”
“Do you indeed?” Triel asked, and her tone was slightly mocking.
Thankfully, the spider Kyorli was watching sw
ung behind Triel, bringing her into the rat’s field of view. Staring out through Kyorli’s eyes, Gromph saw Triel’s fingers moving.
Then you know that Quenthel has been to the Abyss more than once, she signed.
“Of course I do,” Gromph answered smoothly. “You covered up her death quite carefully, but I have my methods of learning our House’s darkest secrets. Where else would Quenthel’s soul have gone, during those four years that elapsed between her death and eventual resurrection, but to serve her goddess in the Abyss? I can see why you chose her. I only wonder . . .”
“What?” Triel snapped.
“Why the goddess sent her back,” Gromph continued. “Quenthel certainly was a loyal servant. Wouldn’t Lolth have wanted to keep her close to hand?”
“Perhaps she had other plans for Quenthel,” Triel answered. “Assuming the leadership of Arach-Tinilith, for example, which is precisely what happened.”
“Or carrying out her current mission,” Gromph added. “It’s certainly within the powers of the goddess to have seen this crisis coming and have prepared years ago to meet it.”
“Indeed,” Triel answered. “Who better than someone who knows the terrain to lead an expedition to the Abyss?” She paused. “Is that all you have to report?”
Gromph bowed and said, “For the moment, Matron Mother. I’ll let you know as soon as I receive another report.”
Dismissing him, Triel strode away.
Sighing his relief, Gromph shook his head. If Triel knew he was still blind, she was letting it pass. If Lolth had been granting her spells, Triel herself and any number of other priestesses could have restored his eyesight in a heartbeat. The fact that none of them could do it was just another reminder of the powers they no longer commanded. Leaving him his pretense of sight would only help Triel maintain her own pretense of power.
R. A. Salvatore's War of the Spider Queen: Extinction, Annihilation, Resurrection Page 33