by Paul S. Kemp
The arrow whistled past Resch's shoulder, but the big man didn't flinch. He dropped flat to his stomach behind the dead horse and yanked the priest down with him. In the distance, the arrow thudded into a dead ogre's neck.
"What in the Nine Hells is he doing!" hissed Gerond. "Have you gone completely mad?"
When there was no response, no break in the night air, Dev honestly wondered if he had gone insane. But he waited, his own eyesight as keen as Morla's in the dark, and where his arrow met gray ogre flesh, he saw a core of blood well up, over shy;flow like a fountain, and bubble down the monster's neck. The ogre had only been playing dead, but Dev had made it true.
Resch shouted a garbled warning. Automatically, Dev pivoted and fired a second shot, aiming at what might have been a drifting shadow. Arrow thudded again into flesh, and this time an animal cry broke out across the battlefield. It was the worst sound Dev had ever heard.
Gods keep us, he thought, we're already surrounded.
"Stay down!" he bellowed. Resch and Gerond scrambled to make room for him as Dev rolled over the dead horse's flank. Viciously, he twisted the animal's legs out of the way to make room for his quiver.
Two more creatures leaped up from their death poses. Dev laid his bow across the saddle and fired, clipping a kobold's haunch. To his right, Resch swung his barbed mace, caving in the skull of the second kobold as he crawled over the makeshift wall to get at them. When the creature stopped twitching, Resch hauled its body up next to the riders, but the cover still felt pitifully inadequate.
The priest chanted a low, monotone prayer, and touched Resch on the shoulder. Green light shone through his fingers, casting hollow, eldritch shadows on the vacant-eyed horse. Then the spell drained away, and Resch's flesh seemed darker, healthier, his movements more precise. The priest then turned to Dev, but Dev waved him off.
"Save it," he snapped. "Keep them back. If they get close enough, they'll rip us apart!"
Grimly, Dev thought that seemed precisely the monsters' plan. More bodies became animate from the field, until five stood between them and freedom.
Dev took bowshots at random, more to keep the monsters at bay than with any real aim. He planted a stack of arrows in the mud at his knees, determined to keep shooting until they were too close to pick off.
The priest raised his holy symbol. His eyes were closed, so Dev couldn't tell if he was frightened or merely concentrat shy;ing. The monotone chant sounded again. Dev thought he must be seeing things. He could actually see the spell cloud seeping from the priest's lips, a white fog that had no scent, and no more consistency than pipeweed smoke. The divine magic drifted past Dev's cheek, numbing him with cold. Dev recoiled, and his next shot went wild.
The monsters took the distraction and scurried closer, using the bodies of their own slain companions to absorb Dev's shots.
"Get that mace ready, sharp tongue!" Dev cried. "They're coming in for a visit!"
He grabbed the silent man by the shoulder, but Resch didn't move. He was doubled over, his forehead against the ground. He clutched his stomach, his mouth slack in sound shy;less pain. Dev couldn't see the wound, but the way Resch's body convulsed told him it was bad. It had happened so fast, the attack, and now they would be overrun. He hadn't even broken a sweat.
Furious, defeated, Dev fired blindly into the night. He didn't care if he ran out of arrows. He'd take some of the bastards down with him. Damn them and damn Morla for trusting a charlatan.
Resch had managed to maim one of the kobolds before he went down. The creature limped away, clutching a ruined leg. Dev took one more in the eye when it looked out from its hiding place. There were still three left, too many for himself and the worthless priest.
Dev hooked the bow on the slanted saddle horn. He'd never been skilled enough to wield a sword, but his fists would serve. He was about to vault over the horse when he felt the vibration.
He wasn't able to identify the source at first. But then the white mist came again, this time emanating from the dead horse's mouth.
Atrophied muscles contracted, and the beast's bent legs jerked weirdly back into their proper alignment. Dev fell back on his elbows, too frightened to put up a defense against the advancing monsters. His mouth hung open, horrified at the sight of the dead horse rising up before him, dragging her limp rider across her back.
The animal got to its feet in time to block the final advance of an ogre and its kobold minions. The creatures hesitated, as stunned as Dev by the animated horse. The beast's black mane was pressed to its back by dried blood. A long sword slash cut across its neck, exposing musculature and white bone.
Shaking itself, the horse reared. It turned on the closest kobold, spewing white vapor and with its dead rider in tow. Rotting hooves came down, trampling the creature before it could run. Horse screams joined the dying kobold's pitiful wailing.
The remaining kobold and ogre fled. Dev could hear the priest casting another spell. He turned in time to see a cluster of black shadows hanging in midair. The lifeless forms shaped into the outline of some kind of mallet or hammer.
Dev watched it spin through the air, slamming into and through the back of the retreating ogre's skull. Shadows and blood exploded in the air, and a second hammer followed the first. Dev waited for it to find the skull of the fleeing, screaming kobold, wondering if the creature would feel the same numbing chill Dev had tasted when the priest's magic touched him.
Then the shadows were spinning toward him, blocking out the moon. Dev didn't realize the hammer was meant for his skull until it was almost too late. He ducked, but the spectral weapon clipped him on the side of the head.
Dev thought he felt his eardrum shatter. He fell sideways, one arm crushed under him, his body hitting the ground like a limp doll's-or a dead horse, he thought. He appreciated the irony for a breath until he lost consciousness.
I know what yer thinking, and it's absolutely right. He could have killed us at any time. He had something a little more painful in mind.
— From the memoirs of Devlen Torthil
"Don't worry," Gerond said, "your friend won't be in pain much longer. The poison will soon run its course."
For an interminable amount of time since he'd regained consciousness, Dev had been watching Resch squirm and convulse on the ground. Every muscle in his body stretched taut, it looked like the man would rip himself apart before it was over. Sweat poured down Resch's face, but he never made a sound. The silence was the worst part. Dev thought he could have handled it better if the dying man had been screaming obscenities.
"The spell is an interesting twist on traditional invigora shy;tion magic," Gerond explained, as if Dev was curious. "For a brief time, it strengthens the target immeasurably, but at the cost of disintegrating many of the vital functions of the body. That part of the process takes a bit more time."
"Cyric preach that one to all his followers, or just the fat ones?" Dev asked. His head throbbed, and his muscles were stiff where the priest had tied his arms. Taunts were the only weapons he had left.
"To think I almost killed you while you were sleep shy;ing," Gerond said. He knelt next to Dev and twisted his head around by the hair. "Lucky for you, I wanted one last conversation."
Pain flooded Dev's skull, and he whimpered involuntarily at the sight of the shadowy hammer floating in midair above the Cyricist's shoulder. He forced a laugh, though his jaw was locked with pain.
"No wonder your herbs reeked," he murmured. "And they call me the blasphemer."
Gerond smiled faintly. "You don't know what a relief it is not to have to play the charade any longer. Or do you? Do you ever grow tired of being the deceiver, Devlen?"
Dev would have shrugged, if the pain of it hadn't threatened to put him out again. "All I know," he said, his eyes straying to the dead kobolds lying nearby, "is you killed your companions."
"True, but like you, they're not very reliable." Gerond leaned forward, flipping Dev onto his stomach with a casual hand.
He'
s stronger than I thought, Dev realized sickly. His breath quickened, thinking the priest was going to cave in his skull after all, but instead he felt the priest clasp one of his bound hands.
"Why are you out here, fighting for Amn?" Gerond asked. "What is between you and the commander? I might be able to use it later, but either way, it will satisfy my curiosity."
Dev didn't answer. The pain was swirling in his head. He wondered if the sensation was blood, filling up his skull. If he were truly lucky, he would die before the bastard had a chance to be done with him.
"Suddenly you're not all mouth," the priest murmured. "But I hope you can still appreciate a good jest."
Dev heard the clink of steel as Gerond drew a knife from his belt. Still holding Dev's hands, the priest peeled one of his thumbs back. Dev felt the blade against his skin.
"What is between you and Morla?" Gerond repeated the question calmly. When Dev still didn't answer, he pressed the blade into Dev's thumb, neatly severing it below the nail.
Dev howled, curling automatically into a fetal position. The priest held onto his hands, slick now with blood. He thrashed and screamed over and over, the cries turning finally to frenzied laughter. He couldn't seem to stop, even when the Cyricist's dark prayers sealed over his wound, leaving an empty stump that was cleaner than any magician's trick.
The watching gods are going to slay me with irony. Dev beat his head against the hard-packed earth until his vision swam. Darkness cheerfully claimed him, but he knew that when he awoke he would still be maimed, and he would have to tell the priest everything.
When you're a soldier, there's nothing more valuable than the trust of the man-or woman-fighting next to you. If that trust is broken, the whole army suffers. To be a good soldier, or a good commander, you have to understand this. Even if it ruins a life.
— From the memoirs of Devlen Torthil
"I was in the militia, Esmeltaran," Dev said. "This was years before your friends came to drive us out."
Dev was dimly aware of the priest, standing somewhere behind him, probably watching for more patrols. He could hear Resch farther away, in the last throes of the poison. If sound was any indication, the man was throwing up blood and gods knew what else.
The animated horse trudged the field in slow circles, a spell-locked trance from which it couldn't escape. Dev remembered a time in his home village, when he'd seen a lame foal shuffling around its paddock, just before a farmer put a knife across its throat.
"Step and drag… step and drag you here to me… hush you little pony… hush you goodnight," the farmer sang.
"Go on," the priest said. "Did you know Morla then?"
"We were on the wall together," Dev said. "Morla and I had the best eyes. Esmeltaran's militia is small. We all knew each other."
"You were friends," Gerond said, surprised. "I hear it in your voice. What happened?"
"One night, I saw something from the wall, something Morla didn't see." Dev stopped speaking, but he knew it wouldn't be enough to satisfy the priest.
"What did you see?" Gerond asked.
"Nothing, as it turned out," Dev said, "a trick of my eyes, a shadow. If I could have bitten my tongue, my life might have turned out a little differently than it has."
"I don't understand," the priest said. Dev could hear the impatience in his voice. He shifted, and managed to roll onto his back so he could look the priest in the eyes.
"I was scared, see? I was young, and I didn't trust my instincts-that what was out there wasn't a threat to me or Morla. My heart was thumping like to leap out of my chest, and then my whole body started to shake. It had to be sure. It needed to see that there was nothing out there. They say that's what happens with sorcery, and those that can juggle it. The need overwhelms any common sense. Suddenly, a person can do things, things that no soldier of Amn has a right to do. Like send a shaft of light-bright as sunshine-across a city wall to pierce shadows that hold… nothing."
Dev's head had started up a pounding again. He closed his eyes until the pain became bearable.
"So you touched the Weave, completely unaware, and the city-Morla-expelled you from the militia," Gerond said. He almost sounded sympathetic. It made Dev's skin crawl. "Was it then you became the charlatan?" the priest wanted to know. "Or have you always been the deceiver, Torthil, and just didn't know it?"
"You've had enough of my stories," Dev snapped. His eyes offered a challenge. "Time for sleep."
"As you wish," Gerond said. "No more deceptions, no more decoys."
He moved forward, and Dev braced himself. Thank the gods the story of my life is a short tale, Dev thought, or poor Resch might have died in the middle.
"The problem is distraction, see?" Dev said, and gasping, sobbing, the dying warrior that had once been Resch the Silent, heaved his body up from the ground, using muscles, bones, and bowels that had ceased to obey him. But some shy;how, he got to his feet and slammed his body into the priest's back.
They hit the dirt hard, but Resch was already dead. His weight pinned the priest long enough for Dev to lunge onto his back.
Wrapping his bound hands around the priest's neck, Dev thrust back, clumsily, using his heels. The rope bit into fleshy folds and lodged somewhere beneath Gerond's chin. There it would stay, or Dev knew he would be as dead as Resch.
"No prayers, no thoughts." Dev pushed down, grinding the priest's hands into the ground when he would have reached for his holy symbol. "Hush, little pony, hush."
Convulsions wracked the priest's body, but Dev kept his grip. He waited until the bloated body flopped once then lay still on the field. Only then did Dev roll away.
A dull thud sounded nearby. Dev snapped around, tense at the thought of more enemies, but it was only the horse. Freed from the Cyricist's hold, the beast crumpled in a heap of ungainly legs next to Resch's body.
Dev closed the scarred man's eyes, then went to find the priest's knife for his bonds. He tried to ignore the blood staining the blade.
Not quite the hero's grand tale. Me on my belly with an insane priest lopping off all my precious appendages. I was too damn scared to do anything, and all the while there's Resch, thrashing and bleeding out poison, trying to hold onto what was left of his body long enough to help me. I wouldn't have blamed him for rolling over and calling it done, but I didn't understand. I didn't realize how long he'd been waiting to get back at someone for the way he'd been violated. Death wasn't going to take precedence over revenge, not for Resch. Never underestimate the power of trauma to bring on clarity.
— From the memoirs of Devlen Torthil
"I read your account of what happened. You did well. More than well."
Morla stood at the opening of the tent. She'd sent her guard away. They were alone. When she turned, finally, to look at Dev, her face was the color of brittle bone.
"By Lady Selыne, I swear I didn't know about Gerond." Morla looked sick. "How could I have known?"
"How could you?" Dev echoed. He thought she seemed small, somehow, without her guard and armor. An old warrior woman. Tired. "You know I forgive you, Morla my light." The words came out hollow, with none of the usual bluster.
"Do you?" Morla was watching him, with her keen vision that missed nothing. "Do you know why I acted as I did?"
"You always do what you think is best for your people."
"For Amn. Your home."
Dev inclined his head. "Your people, as I said."
"Without stability, without trust, Devlen, everything falls apart. Amn will not-"
"Amn doesn't need to think of me as being more than a charlatan, Morla," Dev interrupted. "I see that now. Comes to it, I'd rather be the decoy."
"You have the potential to be so much more."
He looked at her through narrowed eyes. "That was a long time ago. What do you want from me now, Morla? Absolution? I gave it. Your army? I carried out your mission. I'm finished now."
"You can still serve Amn. You wanted to die a hero," Morla said. "I want you to live as
one. My penance, if you want it that way." Her hand shook minutely, though she still clutched her blade. "Please consider it."
A hero. That's the best bait to dangle, and Morla knew I'd wanted it bad. When I walked off Chieva's Sorrow that dawn, I had to leave Resch's body behind. Resch was a hero, but he'd had to die in agony for it, and the only thing folk would ever truly remember about him was that he'd lost a tongue in battle. At least he'd repaid one of the bastards in kind. So I walked off that field to become a war hero-better than dying, but somehow it didn't have the fire I expected. I was still a charlatan; that's what folk would always remember about me. A charlatan with a cap off his thumb. But I still played the best game in Amn. I was the trickster who could fool the monsters. Maybe they'll remember that too. Or maybe all of this is a load of piss, and I never did anything heroic. Maybe I just wrote that I did. That's the point, see? You never know when someone's playin' yer fiddle. You just never know.
— From the memoirs of Devlen Torthil
BONES AND STONES
R.A. Salvatore
The Year of the Tankard (1370 DR)
An uneasiness accompanied Thibbledorf Pwent out of Mithral Hall that late afternoon. With the hordes of King Obould pressing so closely on the west and north, Bruenor had declared that none could venture out to those reaches. Pragmatism and simple wisdom surely seemed to side with Bruenor.
It wasn't often that the battlerager, an officer of Bruenor's court, went against the edicts of his beloved King Bruenor. But this was an extraordinary circumstance, Pwent had told himself-though in language less filled with multisyllable words: "Needs gettin' done."
Still, there remained the weight of going against his beloved king, and the cognitive dissonance of that pressed on him. As if reflecting his pall, the gray sky hung low, thick, and ominous, promising rain.
Rain that would fall upon Gendray Hardhatter, and so every drop would ping painfully against Thibbledorf Pwent's heart.