by Ed Greenwood
Collecting Traelshun and Delloak with stares and a jerk of his head, he turned on his heel and started the long trudge back to his office, not bothering to look down again at what was left of Seneschal Avathnar.
This was one more headache he didn’t need, but there was something fitting, even satisfying, when the gods saw to it that vain, thickheaded men reaped the rewards of their own stupidity. Now, if the gods could just see to it that Cormyr held a few more Traelshuns and Delloaks, and a lot less of the likes of Avathnars …
Not that he expected them to. The gods had a long, long list of things to see to, and some of them had been waiting for centuries.
Sixteen left.
Elminster nodded; she was panting too hard to answer Symrustar aloud. This new body was as agile and deft as it was lovely, and she’d managed to find a small stretch of level, smooth rock underfoot, hard against of the tunnel walls, but sorely outnumbered was … sorely outnumbered.
It had grown to more than thirty against one when the fray had begun, and at least one of those outcast drow males was a wizard who’d been casting spellstop after spellstop at El, while taking care to keep well out of reach behind the rest as they’d closed in, stabbing and hacking.
The ironguard was all that had kept her alive in those first frantic moments. The profanely shouted desire of some of El’s attackers to “Leave enough of her to enjoy!” had helped her kill a few as they’d hesitated to be really brutal to her torso, though most of her armor had been so viciously and repeatedly hacked that it flapped and dangled, protecting her against nothing.
Just once, they’d gained sense enough to all rush her together, trying not to slay but rather to catch hold of her arms and legs and bear her down onto the rocks, to hold her helpless by sheer weight of numbers and cruel strength. So someone could stab her or slice open her throat, and make an end of her. At last they’d taken her down. Spread-eagled and struggling vainly, El had seared those holding her closest with the tiniest outrush of silver fire, a deadly momentary spitting she hoped no one would recognize for what it was.
In an instant, those who’d tasted it most deeply were far too dead to bear witness to anything. Giving off wisps of smoke and the hearty smell of cooked flesh, they sagged and fell away, leaving the less injured to hiss curses and scramble clear as fast as they knew how. Leaving their lone quarry to struggle to her feet and face them, breathless and bleeding freely from the bites of enspelled blades the ironguard could only lessen. El stood alone, the cooked dead slumped around her in a blackened and smoking ring, watching the surviving drow draw back to mutter together.
Their mage was hissing something at them, probably about how he could work a spell to see that most of their bolts got through whatever defenses a lone spider priestess could manage, if they held back and all fired their handbows at her at once. El didn’t wait for them to ready such a volley, but ran at the nearest drow, swinging her hooked sword in a vicious slash. The dark elf parried it easily, deflecting her blade aside with a triumphant sneer-whereupon she brought it swinging around to bite into the handbow hooked to his belt, ruining it, before she sprang back and ran on.
The next drow had seen what she’d done, and turned to shield his bow from her with his body. She took advantage of that to rush past and around him in a tight circle, until in his turning to keep facing her he overbalanced. She promptly made the same slashing attack, but this time the parry sent her blade up through his throat.
By then, all the drow were converging on El. She fled back to her open fighting ground with the blades of the fastest outcasts slicing at her backside. More of her leathers fell away as she sprang across a drift of tangled and blackened drow bodies, spun around, and ducked low in a lunge that spitted one pursuing dark elf who was too close and moving too fast to stop himself in time.
He went down noisily and messily, taking El’s sword with him, and she sprang back again to give herself space and time enough to snatch up some swords from the fallen before the sixteen surviving outcasts reached her.
She had a scepter that could blast down one drow at a time, if it behaved like all the other scepters of the same design she’d seen in the past, but she needed time enough to use it on one obliging target after another. The bite of just one sword would make it explode-and her ironguard would help this shapely body not at all against that.
Gnaw-worms as long as a drow arm wriggled down the tunnel walls, drawn by the smell of spilled blood and cooked death. The wizard’s spellstops hung in the air around El like unpleasant smells, clinging to her. They would hamper rather than truly stop spells, but just one of them would slow magics too much to keep her alive in a sword fight-and the dung pile had cast six of them, hrast him.
The drow were wary of her now, and moving slowly to ring her, keeping their blades ready and their eyes on her.
“I don’t like fighting,” Elminster murmured aloud, to no one in particular. “I’d rather be left alone, to spend my days messing around with the Art. Trying new things, creating, feeling the flows …”
Inside his head, Symrustar nodded wordless agreement and approval, as together they recalled magic unleashed, beautiful glows rushing out into the night …
The drow were coming.
El backed to the wall before the sixteen could encircle her, yielding most of the flat stone floor so as to have solid rock at her back. All they had to do was come at her four at once, one to each side and two in front of her, and not let her draw one of them into another’s way … and she couldn’t hope to parry them all.
Of the spells she’d just burned into her mind, she was using the ironguard, and could see an immediate use for the guardian blades, the timetheft, and the-oh, but hey, now! If she … aye …
Yes, Symrustar agreed.
She mustn’t forewarn them. Cast the whirlblade storm in careful silence and then hold it in abeyance, waiting until they were all emboldened enough to draw near. Aye, go down fighting, and let them think they’d slain her. There, ’twas done …
And here they came.
CHAPTER EIGHT
ROUSING THE DRAGON
The drow advanced on El from all sides, their eyes baleful. They moved in slowly, readying their handbows.
Hrast. She crouched, the swords she’d snatched from their fallen fellows held ready, the blades turned sideways to serve as tiny shields. Yet she’d have to be falcon-fast, and have the very luck of all the gods, to deflect a fired dart before it struck her.
The silver fire could burn away poison, but oh, did it hurt. Her eyes and throat, she must protect above all else-
They all loosed at once, many darts singing in at her.
El flung herself aside, along the rock wall, slashing the air in front of her face with both blades in a wild crisscross flurry that sent three darts or more clanging aside.
A dart smote her forearm hard and stuck there, where her armor had been hacked away. Another ripped into her left breast, and a third hit hard high on the inside of her right thigh.
The drow charged, flinging their handbows down and running hard. Most of the darts had missed her, but a warm burning spreading swiftly through her told El the three that had struck her bore poison of some sort, probably spider venom. If it was handspider or stinglash, it would slow her and eat away at her, numbing and eventually paralyzing her. She had to end this swiftly.
El rushed to meet the closest drow, cut at his face, then ducked aside to slash at the next nearest. Then she spun and raced for the wall, trying to get back to the spot she’d chosen to make her stand. They came after her like wolves.
When she pretended to stumble, then fall, they pounced. Only to watch her roll, spin around on her shoulders, and kick up at them. She boosted one rushing drow over her and sent another staggering aside, then rolled after him and viciously sliced his ankles out from under him.
He toppled, shrieking, and El sprang up, slashed out his throat, and danced forward to meet the next wave of charging drow: four dark elves in motley ar
mor, one lurching along on a leg that had been wounded long ago. Beyond his bobbing shoulder she briefly caught sight of gnaw-worms wriggling among the rocks, seeking the dead, and the drow wizard spending a spell on another arrival: a roaming wild spider he might think she’d summoned. Eerie fire burst into being around the arachnid, making it convulse-and then El was too busy fighting four drow at once to see more.
Two used small knives to stab at her, wielding their swords only to fend her off. Those knives glowed, which meant they knew she was protected against unenchanted steel. The other two drow bore no glowing weapons, so El paid attention only to their arms and movements, to keep them from knocking her down, ignoring the blades that passed through her like smoke. That let her slip behind one, so a knife meant to gut her slammed hilt-deep into his belly instead.
El elbowed that groaningly wounded drow into the warrior behind him, and sprinted away from them all to fence for a moment with yet another outcast, who gave ground, his face tight in alarm as he defended himself, seeking only to parry.
She spun away from him and ran, heading again for the spot she’d chosen for her stand, the smooth rock that was lower than its surroundings. This time she made it.
Spinning around again to face her foes and gulping in deep breaths, fighting to get her wind back, she watched them come for her again.
In a tight pack this time, angry and wary at how many of their fellows had fallen, the wizard crouching low behind them.
“That won’t save him,” El murmured aloud, slow anger beginning to stir in her. She had her breath back now; let them come …
Sound the warhorns, Symrustar murmured in her head, sounding amused. The real bloodletting begins.
There were fourteen coming for her now. The fifteenth was down among the rocks behind them, rocking and groaning as he clutched his deeply stabbed belly. The boldest gnaw-worms were already converging on him.
Time for a little goading. El gave the advancing drow a sneer, waved the three darts still hanging from her where she’d left them-to let her blood spill more slowly than if she’d plucked them out-like a grand hostess showing off treasures, then struck a hand-on-hip pose and beckoned her foes mockingly.
One drow promptly shouted a war cry. He and four others rushed El, the rest following more slowly.
Good. Now for the ruse. She met them with both blades, seeking to slay rather than defend herself, feigning agony when two drow swords slashed through her. One blade left behind the fresh fire of more spider venom, but neither did her any other harm-as she spitted one warrior hilt-deep on her sword ere letting go of it, and slashed open the face of another.
They all went down together in a heap, one drow dying and another blinded by his spurting blood and oblivious to everything except the agony of holding his face together with both hands. El cut his throat in the same slash that drove her blade into the neck of the drow beside him, who was busily scrabbling to pick up the blade he’d dropped in his fall.
That left two drow alive and unharmed. One was already stabbing her repeatedly, his unenchanted blade doing no harm but his weight and the knuckles of his stabbing hand driving the wind out of her repeatedly and bruisingly. The other was crouching behind the enthusiastic stabber and reaching around to grab at her scepters, trying to snatch them and hurl them away before daring to get closer. El sliced some of his fingers off, then drove her sword up through herself-she felt nothing but a momentary shivering chill-to meet the pumping sword hand of the drow trying to stab her.
He shrieked and fell aside, clutching at his sliced-open hand-and El rolled and reached in an awkward crawling lunge across sharp rocks that slid her sword into the throat of the scepter-grabber. As he convulsed, she rolled back again to deal with the stabber.
The rest of the dark elves advanced slowly, still about seven or so strides away. Good. El threw back her head as she hewed down the stabbing drow and screamed in false agony, her voice loud, raw, and shrill.
Then she slumped, down in her hollow with drow bodies all around, lying as if dead-save for the stealthy hand beneath her that slid a scepter from her belt and awakened it. She lay still, waiting, her mouth slack and open. Smarting from half a dozen wounds and the numbing fire of the venom, El watched through slitted eyes as the drow gathered cautiously above her.
Would they come closer to gloat? Or stab down at her face and breast and throat, to make sure?
They did both-and as the first dark sword tips thrust down, El let loose the whirlblade storm.
It was a vicious magic, not all that different from the blade barriers war priests of old were wont to wield, and as its shards of steel started to flash and whirl above her, and drow blood started to spray, El called up swift silver fire to spin a momentary shield over herself. As it closed over her, she flung the awakened scepter up into the storm of conjured steel, an instant before cowering under her silver fire.
A moment later, the world just above exploded with a roar.
The blast was impressive, shaking her like dice in a gambling cup despite the shielding fire. She heard and smelled drow bodies spattering wetly over rocks all around … and when her shield faded and she rolled cautiously over to look up, drow gore dripped down into her face from the tunnel ceiling high above.
She rolled into a crouch, to peer around cautiously. Not a foe remained. Wizard and all, the outcast drow band was no more.
Dead, every last one of them. And all because they hated and feared magic. Or those who misused it against them, like their own priestesses. No one should hate or fear magic.
Ah, El, that would require the Realms to be free of all who use magic to be tyrants over others.
El sighed aloud. Symrustar was right. And how often had he been one of those tyrants, those misusers?
Memories she was not proud of rose in a swift, dark procession …
Wisely, Symrustar kept silent. Rather grimly, El tugged the darts out of herself, then healed her wounds and purged the venom in an agonizing burst of silver fire.
When her helpless gasping and staggering faded, she stumbled on down the tunnel. She was little better than naked now, her leather armor in tattered ruin, and still alone.
Now, now! You do have me, Symrustar reminded her. Nicely done, by the way.
El nodded wearily. She’d made far too much noise and loosed too much magic to tarry; all that tumult would soon bring more formidable Underdark prowlers-or a strong drow patrol, ready for spell-hurling trouble. By then, it would be only prudent to be far away. Up in the sun-drenched Realms Above, for instance.
Limping a little, and rubbing at aches here and bruises there, El trudged along.
This beautiful new dark elf body of yours, Symrustar chided her, you’re not taking very good care of it.
Elminster’s reply was calm, lengthy, and very colorful. It might have made some Moonsea sailors blush, if any of them had been down in the Underdark Shallows to hear it.
Alorglauvenemaus slept more soundly and more often, these days, than in its younger years. It was well and truly ancient now, and knew from its studies and from wyrms it had met-and in some such moots, slain-that these deepening slumbers were the norm for older dragons.
Not that it experienced many interruptions. No visitors reached this cavern beneath a volcano-like hollow hill, in the heart of a fetid swamp filling a narrow cleft between the stony shoulders of adjacent mountains in the Thunder Peaks. No intruder had ever reached its lair, though orcs had splashed into the swamp once, very briefly. Not good eating, but there’d been a lot of them …
It curled its long tongue, trying to remember that taste.
Yes, it so happened that Alorglauvenemaus was awake now-so it was awake a moment later, when an explosive unleashing of magic shuddered through the solid rock beneath its hoard. A blast had befallen several levels beneath its lair.
The ancient black dragon lifted its head in alarm. That had been more than a spell. There was a certain smell …
Alorglauvenemaus thrust its dark h
orned head down the great cleft at one end of its cavern, the opening to the descending chain of caverns that served it as a toilet, a spittoon, and betimes a vomitorium-for armor causes gut ructions, no matter how steaming-strong one’s digestive acids-and sniffed, loud and long.
Aye. It was. The scent was faint, yet unmistakable, and Alorglauvenemaus had smelled it before. Silver fire, the raw stuff of the Weave, had been unleashed down there.
Which was puzzling, even alarming, given that the Weave had fallen, and its bright goddess with it, some sleeps ago.
The ancient black dragon frowned, shook its head slowly, and let out a deep, cavern-shaking growl that announced to the reverberating cavern walls that it was not pleased to encounter that particular scent. That smell meant trouble.
Yet Alorglauvenemaus knew how to deal with trouble. It drew back its head and spat, letting out a great hissing breath of sickly green acid, a burst that struck foam from the rocks it touched as it bounced and boiled down the long chute of caverns.
As it went, that green, swiftly graying flow hissed and spat and spewed forth many momentary little whirl devils of glowing spume, stuff of the rocks it was eating into; rocks that were already pitted and worn smooth by previous acid spewings.
Three caverns down, the last fading tongue of the acid flowed around a heap of rocks, washing away some of the shoulder of stone they stood on. Almost wearily the heap slumped over the edge, starting to roll and tumble. And awakening a gathering roar as it went on down. In the end, much lower down, it had faded into a small rockslide, but it spilled out of a side cleft in the tunnel almost to Elminster’s feet.
El stopped to let the last stones of the rattling little avalanche roll to their various stops right in front of her boots, rock back and forth, then settle. The faint breeze came down into the Underdark by the same route the rocks had taken.