The Rose of Sarifal (forgotten realms:moonshae isles)

by Paulina Claiborne

  But at the same time that, full of despair, she asked herself this question, she remembered standing in the open glade below the tower while her sister and her nephew fought over her like dogs over a bone the exhilaration she had felt. On Moray Island the wolves and pigs had grown old and left her. And Lukas would grow old and leave her, in the blink of an eye. And even the elves and eladrin of Winterglen and Karador would grow old and frail and leave her. Only her family would be left, the ageless leShay, as permanent as the rocks and stones of Faer n, speaking a language of emotion no one else, perhaps, could understand. What had her sister said? She had sent Captain Lukas to Moray to bring back not her, not Amaranth, but something spherical, part of the whole. What could that be, if not some magic essence of herself, her own inviolable soul, caught as if in an alchemist s orb, as she had heard described by her professors when she was a child in the crystal city, in the lake? And perhaps her sister, tearing Amaranth s clothes away, only meant to remind her that the small moralities of men were not for her. And perhaps that was a hard lesson, unnatural, yet she must learn it if she truly hoped to find her path.

  Farther away down the tunnel, beneath an outcropping of quartz, Eleuthra lay in her wolf s shape at first, comfortable and warm. But as she dreamed, she regained her humanity, and her wolf s skin pulled away from her until she shivered and rubbed her naked arms. In her dream she saw the daemonfey above her, not stunted and maimed as when she had last seen him, but in his glory, his high-arched, sharp-spined leather wings curling above him, his fat tail hanging down between his legs, his skin shining and golden, his eyes black and red. Fire and blood in the black pool.

  Come to me, he said, his voice rich and commanding and seeming to come from somewhere inside her she was looking at his ridged black lips, and they didn t move.

  She woke with the image in her mind. But how could she go to him? He was dead. He had died saving the lives of his companions. Miserable, she let herself sink down again into her beast s body. Curling her spine into a circle, laying her face onto her thigh, she tried to discover a little warmth and comfort, and chase after a beast s furtive dreams, run them down like prey. But they eluded her, scattered away, and even the one she succeeded in cornering turned on her at the last, desperate, its eyes black and red.

  Lukas sat up, stretched his arms, rubbed the crick out of his neck, and buckled on his sword. We must go, he said. He had no doubt the leShay would chase them for Amaranth s sake, and if they could not use the drow, then they would use others to come after them, Ffolk slaves or else the fey.

  Show us the way, he said. Shivering, Amaka got to her feet. Little was left of the thoughtless, delighted girl who had roused them in the temple of Lolth the evening before. She scratched her arms and sniffed at the black air.

  Bring us south through Cambro to the surface, he said. Once out of Winterglen you can leave us and go back. Three days and you ll be home. Is there food along the way?

  There is food, she said, her eyes wide and nervous.

  The others had roused themselves. Lady Amaranth held up her lamp, and by its light they could see the walls of the cavern rise above them, the smooth, shaped blocks of stone, quarried by dwarves in the old days. Over time, some of the masonry had fallen, and rivulets of water had stained the limestone face and carved it into copper, bronze, and mud-colored stripes, tinged now in the blue glow.

  Lukas watched Gaspar-shen returning to the circle of light, the energy lines snaking over his chest and shoulders he had gone to relieve himself in a corner of the wall. The wolf arched her back and thrust out her forelegs. She curled her lips and growled softly as the genasi swaggered up. Yes, Captain?

  You ll take the leShay princess southeast to the far coast, to Kingsbay. From there to Snowdown across the straits, and then to Alaron. The druid will go with you. She is an emissary of the king.

  And you?

  I ll leave you at the sacred grove. I ll go find the gnome at Corwell, if I can.

  Gaspar-shen wrinkled his forehead. If he d had eyebrows, he would have drawn them together. From long exposure to human beings, he had begun to mimic their expressions. He was not happy, clearly.

  He said: On the island of Xxiphu, in the Sea of Fallen Stars, they make a pastry in the shape of a bug. The wings are spun sugar. But inside, if you split the mille-feuille thorax, there is nothing but a nauseating greenish goo.

  Lukas turned his head. He watched Lady Amaranth push the red hair from her face. I don t want to hear it. You ll do as I say.

  They had miles to argue, and had best be started. He turned to the drow priestess. Bring us to the gap. To Cambrent Gap.

  She stared at him. All the light was gone from her face, except where the whites of her eyes were touched with pink. Yes, she said. Yes, come with me.

  As if dazed, she staggered to the south end of the cavern, where the ceiling slanted down. Where they had camped, it was too high to see. But now, cracked and fissured, it bulged down until its wet, rough, uneven surface was only a few feet above Lukas s head. By contrast, the floor was laid with hexagonal stone tiles, polished and discolored by the tramp of many feet.

  What about there? Lukas said. That looks more direct. He indicated another way, an arched tunnel at the cavern s southern end, higher and broader and straighter than the path Amaka had chosen. An army could have passed under the brick vault.

  Amaka shuddered. That s the fomorian road, now. Have you seen them? Giants grease-colored skins, and they make a stink. A hundred of them together could come through here. And their eyes

  What?

  They kill you with a look, if they come close.

  Her step was unsteady, her speech slurred and halting Lukas wondered if her own father had somehow poisoned her. But then she glanced at him and glanced away, and he thought that she was merely afraid, too afraid to function. What sense did that make? She was a drow. These corridors should have no power over her. The Underdark had been her home.

  If anything they were too shallow still. The way she led them, the tiles continued for a quarter mile or so then gave out. The path sloped down precipitously, a curling spiral of rough steps hacked out of the rock. No dwarf had shaped this stone. Lady Amaranth lit the way, but even without her the passage would not have been completely dark, because of the phosphorescent fungus on many of the rocks, where the drow had cultivated a pale glow to steer them up and down.

  It occurred to Lukas how foolish they were being, to trust in this uncertain guide. This goes too deep, he said.

  We ll take the other way. We ll take our chances with the fomorians. Anyway, I saw no one

  No, said Amaka, seizing him by the wrist. She was in front, leading the way down, but now she turned and grabbed hold of both his hands, as if in supplication. The leShay will catch you there. Already they will have sent their soldiers. But they ll never dare to follow you down here. And if they did, one man could hold the passage. It s so narrow.

  Lukas hesitated.

  They go to the same place! she said. Cambrent Gap, just as you wanted. I swear to you on the Shrine of Araushnee s Virginity, before she was abandoned long ago.

  What kind of oath was that? Lukas thought. The dark elves goddess was the biggest slut in the entire pantheon, and that was saying a great deal. This curving staircase reeked of them, a sweet yet poisonous scent that reminded him of night-blooming jasmine, which his stepmother had grown in her kitchen garden.

  And yet he still found himself climbing downward through the rocks. Why was that? Simple the girl begged him. Her beautiful dark face was streaked with tears, impossible to resist. She needed his help. It would have been cowardly to turn away, abandon her for something as ephemeral and uncertain as rational decisions or good sense. This was why, Lukas told himself, it was absurd for him to be or to ever have been captain of this crew. This was why the Sphinx was at the bottom of the sea. And yet it was why the others followed him without a murmur of dissent, why they clambered single file after him; first Amaranth, holding up her
lamp, then Gaspar-shen, and finally the druid, now in her human shape, barefoot, dressed in her wolf skin.

  Besides, he told himself. There was another reason he allowed the girl to pull him downward. All his life he had heard stories of the Underdark, the system of enormous caverns and limitless tunnels that founded the entire continent of Faer n, puncturing the rotten rock and causing sinkholes, cave-ins, and whirlpools on the surface a system part excavated and part natural, inhabited by hundreds of thousands of creatures who never saw the light, entire races and civilizations. Lower down, Lukas imagined, he might find dark cities and monstrous farms of bloated vegetables and pale livestock. He might find subterraneous rivers and even seas, where the fishermen lit torches to lure enormous purblind creatures from the deep.

  For a moment he had a crazy notion that he could raise up Lady Amaranth to rule here as a queen, in a black and shadow palace lit with crystal lanterns. What else? Did it really make sense to bring her penniless to Alaron? To do what work in a shop for a thousand years and more? Perhaps she and Suka could open a tattoo parlor in Llewellyn Harbor or Callidyrr: Feywild Dreaming, or maybe Madame leShay s Skin Boutique Body Shoppe, or maybe even The Rose of Sarifal whatever, as Suka herself might say. She wouldn t want to spend even remotely that much time with another female, in any case. Two weeks was about her limit, as Lukas had learned on board the Sphinx. Though of course Lukas himself would be long dead, a pleasant thought under those circumstances.

  The way broadened and the ceiling rose above them, beyond the princess s light. Every step they took, Amaka seemed more terrified. She had her hand on Lukas s wrist, and she pulled him onward, while at the same time she muttered words that seemed ridiculous to him for a drow priestess, a handmaid of the Queen of the Demonweb Pits, Ah, Goddess, never to see the sun again or walk under the stars, never to feel the wind on my face or the grass under my feet

  As they moved farther into this new cavern, Lukas would have welcomed a little less wind in his face. He didn t know what she was complaining about. They had climbed down into a new circle where the air was hot and humid and full of grit. Up ahead, fire burned at the entrance to another tunnel, a line of flickering red flame on the surface of the rock. Sulfurous gas escaped from a wide vent.

  Beside the entrance to this farther tunnel, the stone had been worked a statue, one collapsed and broken, one whole, on either side of the red entrance. Amaka pulled Lukas forward, but he resisted, and freed his hand with a twist. He looked back toward the narrow defile behind him, where Gaspar-shen stood with his scimitar drawn, and then to the other dark niches in the cavern s walls grottoes, or else the entrances to other tunnels in the porous rock. Flames flickered in some of them, or else a faintly glowing haze.

  Lukas smiled and shook his head. I m not going in there.

  The statue on one side was a knight in armor, his head bowed, his back against the living rock, his sword held like a cross in front of him, the blade between his hands. He was bareheaded, and his features were noble, though eroded, perhaps, by the same constant wind that filled Lukas s nose with powdery sand. On the other side only the base was left, a reptilian shape with powerful legs and claws, perhaps a dragon or a basilisk.

  Lukas put up his hands. I m not going in there, he said again. We ll go back up, take the fomorian road.

  He already knew he had been played. It wasn t the first time. But as he looked at Amaka s desperate face, he wondered if she d done this thing against her will. Please she faltered, as her red eyes darted wildly from one entrance to another. Lukas drew his sword. Lady Amaranth and Eleuthra stood behind him, the druid still in her human shape. The princess was holding her lamp high. Douse the light, he said, too late. They were surrounded by the drow swordsmen, who had stepped forward from the niches and wormholes in the rock.

  He held up his own sword, wishing for a moment that the Savage stood with him. Then they d have had a chance. He smiled, held out his hand toward Amaka, and made a little bow, while at the same time he looked past her toward the tunnel s mouth, where a dark figure stepped forward from between the statues, an unarmed woman, her white hair glistening pink in the red light. Give your father my thanks, she said to Amaka. I knew he would not disappoint us.

  Now she came out into the brighter glow, and he could see her face. She was smaller than many of her race. She was beautiful, like all the dark elves, but with a haunted, used, imperious expression she had none of Amaka s freshness even in despair. Her pink hair was streaked with black and gray and rust. Lukas imagined she held some kind of cold magic in her hands, as she moved her fingers in a practiced gesture. I am no, you don t need to know my name. I am the guardian of this sacred place. Then she threw back her head in a false, simpering laugh. Lady, she said to Amaranth, we are pleased we have been chosen to receive you. Almost we had given up hope.

  Another gesture with her long, painted fingernails, and seven of the drow stood away from the others.

  Chapter Seventeen — Knights of Llewyrr

  In the council chamber at Harrowfast, Suka said to Marabaldia,

  I think we should get away from here. Captain Rurik has already escaped with all his Ffolk. He rode away while you were talking because there is no point to these negotiations. And without Rurik, this is not your fight.

  This was measured speech, for her. Inside she felt a certain urgency.

  There was a circular open space at the bottom of the council chamber s sloping well, a raised stone dais, and on top of it a long stone table. Suka stood by Marabaldia s heavy chair, her head below the level of the table s surface. Doubtless it was strewn with important papers, which were out of sight to her.

  Let the knights of Llewyrr retake Karador. Let them put their lost princess on the throne. They will not welcome you there when it is done, or thank you for your help.

  The fomorian princess and Lord Ughoth had been speaking privately, their heads together across the table, their whispering voices inaudible. Suka felt like a child at her friend s knee, or perhaps a little dog jumping up and down. She heard her bark turn frantic. We ve got to leave, she said.

  Eladrin soldiers had come into the hall. They were nosing around the entrance. Suka saw Marabaldia s hand come down the princess, lately, had gotten into the habit of touching her, stroking her hair, which was soft and fine in comparison to her own. I swear to the gods I ll bite her thumb, Suka thought. Then she ducked under the stone tabletop and crossed to where Lord Mindarion was sitting unacknowledged by the others, slumped back in his chair. His eyes were closed, and a yellow-haired eladrin woman sat with him, fussing over him, rubbing some kind of cream into his beardless cheek. Her name was Altaira, and she was his daughter, or granddaughter, or great-granddaughter.

  My lord, said Suka in her least impudent and most servile tone, but the woman clothed all in white and yet with embroidered patterns on her collar in rainbow-colored thread (gnomes work, Suka suggested to herself, gnome slaves work, because these people were too lazy and spoiled to lift a gods-damned finger) interrupted.

  Hush, she said, in a tone both fragile and superior, don t disturb him. He is far away.

  I would so like to join him, Suka thought, flicking her dog bone stud against her front teeth, while at the same time glancing behind her at the soldiers talking together along the upper circle of the hall. The shadow walker hurt him, said Altaira, her hand fluttering over Mindarion s fine, high, effeminate cheeks, which were (it was true) ashen and gray, even in the light of the oil lanterns and the candles flickering behind their alabaster screens. He has turned inward. He will linger like this for many years. He will not talk to us again, if I know anything.

  Well, then, we re done, said Suka, this time to Marabaldia and Ughoth who had gotten up from their stone chairs to stand over her, expressions of indulgence on their enormous faces. Princess, she said, please let us leave this place. We can go north on our own, to Cambrent Gap and then beyond, below Citadel Umbra that s the way, isn t it, to your own kingdom?

  Kingdom
said Marabaldia, smiling at her prince. I suppose you could call it that. But

  Please, interrupted Suka. I don t think there s time. She glanced behind her, where Lord Askepel and a few of the others were talking with the soldiers, their faces grave and severe, and as easy to read as children s primers. We must go, she said. Please, come with me.

  Again she imagined Marabaldia might bring her hand down and run her fingers through her hair. Something had happened between the fomorian princess and her boyfriend. Something had changed in the last day, as a result of which Marabaldia had become less able to focus on the task at hand, and tended to treat Suka as if she were a child or a pet, scratching at her head, admiring the rosiness of her complexion and the delicacy of her porcelain skin, et cetera screw that. If the fomorian was feeling so maternal now, maybe it had to do with her own change of circumstances. Her distorted, bloodshot, golden eye beamed down like a searchlight, or like a fumbling, gathering hand that was trying to comfort the little gnome and calm her down. But Suka would not be consoled, because, objectively, they were completely reamed she twisted under the descending palm and took off across the translucent tiles of the central dais, lit from below now that it was night. She ran up through the tiers of cushioned stone banquettes and statues of griffons and other beasts even more exotic and extinct, trying to reach the door before Lord Askepel forbade it.

  Too late. Below them in the guardhouses under Harrowfast, a company of fomorian soldiers were doubtless drinking and playing knucklebones, bored to tears, together with an honor guard of cyclopses, which Lord Ughoth had brought up from the Underdark. Here in the council chamber no weapons were permitted. Six fomorian knights sat dozing among the seats, but now they roused themselves as a dozen or so armed eladrin came down the graded steps toward the stone table. Askepel was with them. Immediately Suka turned and, hands in pockets, sauntered down toward Marabaldia again, whistling the refrain of Oh, Father Dear as a kind of distress signal that she hoped the princess would recognize.