"Deneir?" the imp asked in a coughing, raspy voice that Cadderly thought seemed both typical and fitting to its smoky natural environment. "You wear the clothing of a priest of Deneir."
The creature was staring at the red band on his hat, Cadderly knew, on which was set a porcelain-and-gold pendant depicting a candle burning above an eye, the symbol of Deneir.
Cadderly nodded.
"Ahck!" the imp said and spat upon the ground.
"Hoping for a wizard in search of a familiar?" Cadderly asked slyly.
"Hoping for anything other than you, priest of Deneir," the imp replied.
"Accept that which has been given to you," Cadderly said. "A glimpse of the material plane is better than none, after all, and a reprieve from your hellish existence."
"What do you want, priest of Deneir?"
"Information," Cadderly replied, but even as he said it, he realized that his questions would be difficult indeed, perhaps too much so for so minor a demon. "All that I require of you is that you give to me the name of a greater demonic source, that I might bring it forth."
The imp looked at him curiously, tilting its head as a dog might, and licking its thin lips with a pointed tongue.
"Nothing greater than a nalfeshnie," Cadderly quickly clarified, seeing the impish smile growing and wanting to limit the power of whatever being he next summoned. A nalfeshnie was no minor demon, but was certainly within Cadderly's power to control, at least long enough for him to get what he needed.
"Oh, I has a name for you, priest of Deneir…" the imp started to say, but it jerked spasmodically as Cadderly began to chant a spell of torment. The imp fell to the floor, writhing and spitting curses.
"The name?" Cadderly asked. "And I warn you, if you deceive me and try to trick me into summoning a greater creature, I will dismiss it promptly and find you again. This torment is nothing compared to that which I will exact upon you!"
He said the words with conviction and with strength, though in truth, it pained the gentle man to be doing even this level of torture, even upon a wretched imp. He reminded himself of the importance of his quest and bolstered his resolve.
"Mizferac!" the imp screamed out. "A glabrezu, and a stupid one!"
Cadderly released the imp from his spell of torment, and the creature gave a beat of its wings and righted itself, staring at him coldly. "I did your bidding, evil priest of Deneir. Let me go!"
"Be gone, then," said Cadderly, and even as the little beast began fading from view, offering a few obscene gestures, Cadderly had to toss in, "I will tell Mizferac what you said concerning its intelligence."
He did indeed enjoy that last expression of panic on the face of the little imp.
Cadderly brought Mizferac in later that same day and found the towering pincer-armed glabrezu to be the embodiment of all that he hated about demons. It was a nasty, vicious, conniving, and wretchedly self-serving creature that tried to get as much gain as it could out of every word. Cadderly kept their meeting short and to the point. The demon was to inquire of other extra-planar creatures about the whereabouts of a dark elf named Jarlaxle, who was likely on the surface of Faerun. Furthermore, Cadderly put a powerful geas on the demon, preventing it from actually walking the material world, but retreating only back to the Abyss and using sources to discern the information.
"That will take longer," Mizferac said.
"I will call on you daily," Cadderly replied, putting as much anger without adding any passion whatsoever as he could into his timbre. "Each passing day I will grow more impatient, and your torment will increase."
"You make a terrible enemy in Mizferac, Cadderly Bonaduce, Priest of Deneir," the glabrezu replied, obviously trying to shake him with its knowledge of his name.
Cadderly, who heard the mighty song of Deneir as clearly as if it was a chord within his own heart, merely smiled at the threat. "If ever you find yourself free of your bonds and able to walk the surface of Toril, do come and find me, Mizferac the fool. It will please me greatly to reduce your physical form to ash and banish your spirit from this world for a hundred years."
The demon growled, and Cadderly dismissed it, simply and with just a wave of his hand and an utterance of a single word. He had heard every threat a demon could give and many times. After the trials the young priest had known in his life, from facing a red dragon to doing battle with his own father, to warring against the chaos curse, to, most of all, offering his very life up as sacrifice to his god, there was little any creature, demonic or not, could say to him that would frighten him.
He recalled the glabrezu every day for the next tenday, until finally the fiend brought him some news of the Crystal Shard and the drow, Jarlaxle, along with the surprising information that Jarlaxle no longer possessed the artifact, but traveled in the company of a human, Artemis Entreri, who did.
Cadderly knew that name well from the stories that Drizzt and Catti-brie had told him in their short stay at the Spirit Soaring. The man was an assassin, a brutal killer. According to the demon, Entreri, along with the Crystal Shard and the dark elf Jarlaxle, was on his way to the Snowflake Mountains.
Cadderly rubbed his chin as the glabrezu passed along the information-information that he knew to be true, for he had enacted a spell to make certain the demon had not lied to him.
"I have done as you demanded," the glabrezu growled, clicking its pincer-ended appendages anxiously. "I am released from your bonds, Cadderly Bonaduce."
"Then begone, that I do not have to look upon your ugly face any longer," the young priest replied.
The demon narrowed its huge eyes threateningly and clicked its pincers. "I will not forget this," it promised.
"I would be disappointed if you did," Cadderly replied casually.
"I was told that you have young children, fool," Mizferac remarked, fading from view.
"Mizferac, ehugu-winance!" Cadderly cried, catching the departing demon before it had dissipated back to the swirling smoke of the Abyss. Holding it in place by the sheer strength of his enchantment, Cadderly twisted the demon's physical form painfully by the might of his spell.
"Do I smell fear, human?" Mizferac asked defiantly.
Cadderly smiled wryly. "I doubt that, since a hundred years will pass before you are able to walk the material plane again." The threat, spoken openly, freed Mizferac of the summoning binding-and yet, the beast was not freed, for Cadderly had enacted another spell, one of exaction.
Mizferac created magical darkness to fill the room. Cadderly fell into his own chanting, his voice trembling with feigned terror.
"I can smell you, foolish mortal," Mizferac remarked, and Cadderly heard the voice from the side, though he guessed correctly that Mizferac was using ventriloquism to throw him off guard. The young priest was fully into the flow of Deneir's song now, hearing every beautiful note and accessing the magic quickly and completely. First he detected evil, easily locating the great negative force of the glabrezu- then another mighty negative force as the demon gated in a companion.
Cadderly held his nerve and continued casting.
"I will kill the children first, fool," Mizferac promised, and it began speaking to its new companion in the guttural tongue of the Abyss-one that Cadderly, through the use of another spell that he had enacted before he had ever brought Mizferac to him this day, understood perfectly. The glabrezu told its fellow demon to keep the foolish priest occupied while it went to hunt the children.
"I will bring them before you for sacrifice," Mizferac started to promise, but the end of the sentence came out as garbled screams as Cadderly's spell went off, creating a series of spinning, slicing blades all around the two demons. The priest then brought forth a globe of light to counter Mizferac's darkness. The spectacle of Mizferac and its companion, a lesser demon that looked like a giant gnat, getting sliced and chopped was revealed.
Mizferac roared and uttered a guttural word-one designed to teleport him away, Cadderly assumed. It failed. The young priest, so strong in the flo
w of Deneir's song, was the quicker. He brought forth a prayer that dispelled the demon's magic before Mizferac could get away.
A spell of binding followed immediately, locking Mizferac firmly in place, while the magical blades continued their spinning devastation.
"I will never forget this!" Mizferac roared, words edged with outrage and agony.
"Good, then you will know better than ever to return," Cadderly growled back.
He brought forth a second blade barrier. The two demons were torn apart, their material forms ripped into dozens of bloody pieces, thus banishing them from the material plane for a hundred years. Satisfied with that, Cadderly left his summoning chamber covered in demon blood. He'd have to find a suitable spell from Deneir to clean up his clothes.
As for the Crystal Shard, he had his answers-and it seemed to him a good thing that he had bothered to check, since a dangerous assassin, an equally dangerous dark elf, and the even more dangerous Crystal Shard were apparently on their way to see him.
He had to talk to Danica, to prepare all the Spirit Soaring and the order of Deneir, for the potential battle.
Chapter 17
A CALL FOR HELP
There is something enjoyable about these beasts, I must admit," Jarlaxle noted when he and Entreri pulled up beside a mountain pass.
The assassin quickly dismounted and ran to the ledge to view the trail below-and to view the band of orcs he suspected were still stubbornly in pursuit. The pair had left the desert behind, at long last, entering a region of broken hills and rocky trails.
"Though if I had one of my lizards from Menzoberran-zan, I could simply run away to the top of the hill and over the other side," the drow went on. He took off his great plumed hat and rubbed a hand over his bald head. The sun was strong this day, but the dark elf seemed to be handling it quite well-certainly better than Entreri would have expected of any drow under this blistering sun. Again the assassin had to wonder if Jarlaxle might have a bit of magic about him to protect his sensitive eyes. "Useful beasts, the lizards of Menzoberranzan," Jarlaxle remarked. "I should have brought some to the surface with me."
Entreri gave him a smirk and a shake of his head. "It will be hard enough getting into half the towns with a drow beside me," he remarked. "How much more welcoming might they be if I rode in on a lizard?"
He looked back down the mountainside, and sure enough, the orc band was still pacing them, though the wretched creatures were obviously exhausted. Still, they followed as if compelled beyond their control.
It wasn't hard for Artemis Entreri to figure out exactly what might be so compelling them.
"Why can you not just take out your magical tent, that we can melt away from them?" Jarlaxle asked for the third time.
"The magic is limited," Entreri answered yet again. He glanced back at Jarlaxle as he replied, surprised that the cunning drow would keep asking the same question. Was Jarlaxle, perhaps, trying to garner some information about the tent? Or even worse, was the Crystal Shard reaching out to the drow, subtly asking him to goad Entreri in that direction? If they did take out the tent and disappear, after all, they would have to reappear in the same place. That being true, had the Crystal Shard figured out how to send its telepathic call across the planes of existence? Perhaps the next time Entreri and Jarlaxle used the plane- shifting tent, they would return to the material plane to find an orc army, inspired by Crenshinibon, waiting for them. "The horses grow weary," Jarlaxle noted. "They can outrun orcs," Entreri replied. "If we let them run free, perhaps." "They're just orcs," Entreri muttered, though he could hardly believe how persistent this group remained.
He turned back to Jarlaxle, no longer doubting the drow's claim. The horses were indeed tired-they had been riding a long day before even realizing the orcs were following their trail. They had ridden the beasts practically into the desert sands in an effort to get out of that barren, wide-open region as quickly as possible. Perhaps it was time to stop running. "There are only about a score of them," Entreri remarked, watching their movements as they crawled over the lower slopes.
"Twenty against two," Jarlaxle reminded. "Let us go and hide in your tent, that the horses can rest, and come out and begin the chase anew."
"We can defeat them and drive them away," Entreri insisted, "if we choose and prepare the battlefield."
It surprised the assassin that Jarlaxle didn't look very eager about that possibility. "They're only orcs," Entreri said again.
"Are they?" Jarlaxle asked.
Entreri started to respond but paused long enough to consider the meaning behind the dark elf's words. Was this pursuit a chance encounter? Or was there something more to this seemingly nondescript band of monsters?
"You believe that Kimmuriel and Rai-guy are secretly guiding this band," Entreri stated more than asked.
Jarlaxle shrugged. "Those two have always favored using monsters as fodder," he explained. "They let the orcs-or kobolds, or whatever other creature is available- rush in to weary their opponents while they prepare the killing blow. It is nothing new in their tactics. They used such a ruse to take House Basadoni, forcing the kobolds to lead the charge and take the bulk of the casualties."
"It could be," Entreri agreed with a nod. "Or it could be a conspiracy of another sort, one with its roots in our midst."
It took Jarlaxle a few moments to sort that out. "Do you believe that I have urged the orcs on?" he asked.
In response, Entreri patted the pouch that held the Crystal Shard. "Perhaps Crenshinibon has come to believe that it needs to be rescued from our clutches," he said.
"The shard would prefer an orcish wielder to either you or me?" Jarlaxle asked doubtfully.
"I am not its wielder, nor will I ever be," Entreri answered sharply. "Nor will you, else you would have taken it from me our first night on the road from Dallabad, when I was too weak with my wounds to resist. I know this truth, so do you, and so does Crenshinibon. It understands that we are beyond its reach now, and it fears us, or fears me, at least, because it recognizes what is in my heart."
He spoke the words with perfect calm and perfect coldness, and it wasn't hard for Jarlaxle to figure out what he might be talking about. "You mean to destroy it," the drow remarked, and his tone made the sentence seem like an accusation.
"And I know how to do it," Entreri bluntly admitted. "Or at least, I know someone who knows how to do it."
The expressions that crossed Jarlaxle's handsome face ranged from incredulity to sheer anger to something less obvious, something buried deep. The assassin knew that he had taken a chance in proclaiming his intent so openly with the drow who had been fully duped by the Crystal Shard and who was still not completely convinced, despite Entreri's many reminders, that giving up the artifact had been a good thing to do. Was Jarlaxle's unreadable expression a signal to him that the Crystal Shard had indeed gotten to the drow leader once again and was even then working through, and with, Jarlaxle to find a way to get rid of Entreri's bothersome interference?
"You will never find the strength of heart to destroy it," Jarlaxle remarked.
Now it was Entreri's turn to wear a confused expression. "Even if you discover a method, and I doubt that there is one, when the moment comes, Artemis Entreri will never find the heart to be rid of so powerful and potentially gainful an item as Crenshinibon," Jarlaxle proclaimed slyly. A grin widened across the dark elf's face. "I know you, Artemis Entreri," he said, grinning still, "and I know that you'll not throw away such power and promise, such beauty as Crenshinibon!"
Entreri looked at him hard. "Without the slightest hesitation," he said coldly. "And so would you, had you not fallen under its spell. I see that enchantment for what it is, a trap of temporary gain through reckless action that can only lead to complete and utter ruin. You disappoint me, Jarlaxle. I had thought you smarter than this."
Jarlaxle's expression, too, turned cold. A flash of anger lit his dark eyes. For just a moment, Entreri thought his first fight of the day was upon him, thought
the dark elf would attack him. Jarlaxle closed his eyes, his body swaying as he focused his thoughts and his concentration.
"Fight the urge," the assassin found himself whispering under his breath. Entreri the consummate loner, the man who, for all his life, had counted on no one but himself, was surely surprised to hear himself now.
"Do we continue to run, or do we fight them?" Jarlaxle asked a moment later. "If these creatures are being guided by Rai-guy and Kimmuriel, we will learn of it soon enough- likely when we are fully engaged in battle. The odds of ten- to-one, of even twenty-to-one, against orcs on a mountain battlefield of our choosing does not frighten me in the least, but in truth, I do not wish to face my former lieutenants, even two-against-two. With his combination of wizardly and clerical powers, Rai-guy has variables enough to strike fear into the heart of Gromph Baenre, and there is nothing predictable, or even understandable, about many of Kimmuriel Oblo-dra's tactics. In all the years he has served me, I have not begun to sort the riddle that is Kimmuriel. I know only that he is extremely effective."
"Keep talking," Entreri muttered, looking back down at the orcs, who were much closer now, and at all the potential battlefield areas. "You are making me wish that I had left you and the Crystal Shard behind."
He caught a slight shift in Jarlaxle's expression as he said that, a subtle hint that perhaps the mercenary leader had been wondering all along why Entreri had bothered with both the theft and the rescue. If Entreri meant to destroy the Crystal Shard anyway, after all, why not just run away and leave it and the feud between Jarlaxle and his dangerous lieutenants behind?
"We will discuss that," Jarlaxle replied.
"Another time," Entreri said, trotting along the ledge to the right. "We have much to do, and our orc friends are in a hurry."
"Headlong into doom," Jarlaxle remarked quietly. He slid off of his horse and moved to follow Entreri.
Soon after, the pair had set up in a location on the northeastern side of the range, the steepest ascent. Jarlaxle worried that perhaps some of the orcs would come up from the other paths, the same ones they had taken, stealing from them the advantage of the higher ground, but Entreri was convinced that the artifact was calling out to the creatures insistently, and that they would alter their course to follow the most direct line to Crenshinibon. That line would take them up several high bluffs on this side of the hills, and along narrow and easily defensible trails.
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