by Jak Koke
Here, too, killing Beaugrat was survival. The man had proven that he would keep coming back. His continued existence was a danger to Duvan. Well, not anymore.
Slanya stood, her reality fragmented. Queasy, her awareness floating out of her body, she collapsed next to her dead victim.
Duvan stood on a featureless plane-a flat gray landscape stretching as far as he could see. The sky overhead was a lighter shade of gray. Ahead, there were no trees or rocks or hills or vegetation of any kind. He could no longer taste the intense iron tang of blood in the back of his throat, and the thick smell of blood had disappeared.
There were no other people on this vast plane, none close enough to see at least. However, he could hear something. Whispers and hissing bass voices were the only sound, an undercurrent of indistinguishable vocal droning that seemed to come from all around. Those whispers permeated his spirit, seeming to snap at his soul like dogs.
Where am I? he wondered.
Duvan examined himself. He was whole, his body sound except for a dry cut under his ribcage. No blood there, but the scar remained open. It didn’t hurt. In fact he felt nothing-no pain, no joy. Nothing. Only emptiness.
He felt like an animated husk-a hollowed-out marionette.
Turning, Duvan caught sight of a small, gray bump on the horizon-a tiny blip on the flat landscape of gray. He started walking toward it, his progress marked only by the shape’s fractional increase in size. But whatever it was, that dull bump on the otherwise flat plane, Duvan felt drawn to it.
Deep gray and black shadows drifted like tatters of wind-driven fog all around him as he walked. He felt no fear and no fatigue as he walked and walked. For hours he walked, and the dark bump on the horizon grew little by little. Days and tendays and even months seemed to pass as he trudged forward. He had no sense of time in this place.
Fragments of memory flitted through his mind. He’d heard tell that souls passed to the Fugue Plane, Kelemvor’s home, to be judged. Perhaps that is where I am, he thought. But where is Kelemvor?
After more hours of walking, some of the whispered voices grew more distinct. One of them started talking to him, telling him that he didn’t have to go to the City of Judgment. Telling him that there were better options. The gods might not want him, but there were lords elsewhere who would accept him with open arms. He would start out at the bottom, but a soul like his could rise quickly. He would have power and eventual dominion over many others.
Duvan shook his head and marched on.
You should consider the offer, the whispers murmured. You are one of the Faithless. Your fate will otherwise be an eternity of boredom and monotony. The death god will entomb you in the walls of his city, forever.
Duvan walked on, considering. The Faithless-he had heard of that legend. No god to speak for him meant spending eternity as part of the City of Judgment. Duvan felt detached from himself, but even so he knew that he did not want to end up that way.
But the alternative? An eternity in the thrall of the demons of the Abyss. Endless boredom or endless pain.
As if on cue-although it could have been hours later since Duvan had completely lost track of time-another voice came to him. “Duvan?” It was not the low hiss of the demons’ voices. This was a voice he recognized. “Duvan?”
He turned to see a shimmering archway shining with blinding light, so bright he couldn’t see anyone through it. “I am here,” he said.
“I have come to guide you back, if you will come,” the voice said. “You must decide quickly, for the spell does not last long.”
Somewhere in the distant, hollow recesses of his mind, Duvan remembered his life-the struggles, the distrust, the pain.
There was also pleasure, he remembered. That had been part of his life. And contentment. Sadness, yes, but also humor and even joy, once or twice.
“I will come,” he told the voice-a voice he recognized as belonging to the High Priestess Kaylinn of Slanya’s monastery. Slanya had not betrayed him after all. His friend Slanya had come to save him.
His friend. Duvan liked the thought of that.
“Step through,” Kaylinn said. “Come back into the light.”
And so he did.
Commander Accordant Vraith strode purposefully through the throngs of revelers who had arrived for the Festival of Blue Fire. Pilgrims young and old had come to this broad, grassy field on the boundary between the mundane and the glorious. Entire families celebrated here along the border of the Plaguewrought Land.
The pilgrims had brought their wagons full of supplies and had built huge bonfires whose flames licked the sky. Here and there, pilgrims danced to music and singing. They feasted on roasted food and drank wine and ale without restraint. Many children joined in the festivities, and Vraith noticed more than a few coming-of-age rituals under way.
They smelled of joy and intoxication. Chaos and abandonment.
Vraith felt the stirrings of her spellscar beneath her sternum, eager to pull the threads of their souls and weave them together. If her ritual worked, some part of each of these lucky volunteers would end up locked inside the new border.
Vraith’s deputy-Renfod, himself a Loremaster Accordant-came up next to her, joining a handful of others here to carry out her instructions. The chaotic crowd would have to be at least minimally structured, which she knew might prove more difficult than performing the actual ritual. It was one thing to arrange five or ten people, and quite another to organize a thousand or so.
The evening sky reddened overhead as she neared the border veil. Like a sheen of oil on water, the barrier reflected an undulating rainbow, stretching like a semi-translucent curtain as far as she could see in all directions. Most of the pilgrims gave the barrier a wide berth.
“Has anyone seen Brother Gregor?” Vraith asked nobody in particular. “He’d better have brought his elixir.”
Renfod nodded, then said, “He’s here, Commander. At the edge of the festivities.”
Vraith smiled. “Excellent. We’ll start with him. Lead on.”
Renfod’s dark form angled away from the border veil and through the crowds of drinking and dancing pilgrims. Vraith appreciated the man’s efficiency, his obedience, and willingness to serve.
Still, there was no need to get sentimental. He was just one filament in the tapestry of her rise to authority and power. A willing filament to be sure, but nothing more. Her ascendancy would culminate, ultimately, in her rapture-her melding with the sharn. She would become one with the transcendent collective minds of the sharn; she would live in the Blue Fire and across many universes simultaneously.
Unfortunately, while Renfod bent over backward to help her further her cause, the same could not be said for Brother Gregor.
She hated that she needed him. But there was nobody else who could work the alchemical magic that he could. The man had a gift. She’d had to resort to non-magical forms of manipulation-persuasion and cunning. That was all right with Vraith, however; she was good at those talents too.
Renfod and his entourage cleared a path to the periphery of the festival throng. They passed a wedding ceremony underway. The tall bride was all smiles in her lace finery, while her portly groom looked nervous behind his well-clipped beard.
“There he is,” Renfod said as they circumnavigated the wedding, pointing a little ways ahead at Gregor.
The monk’s shock of white hair was a beacon tinged with red in the light of the waning sun. He stood with several other monks and clerics from the monastery, all surrounding a large metal cauldron. Vraith could see as she approached that the cauldron was full of dull green liquid.
“May the Blue Fire burn inside you,” Vraith said.
“Pray Oghma grants you wisdom,” Gregor replied, his tone icy.
Vraith pretended to ignore Gregor’s cold attitude; she gestured at the cauldron with her hand. “I trust the elixir is ready?”
“It is,” he said. “Now I just need to get people to drink it.”
“I can help,” she said. Then, tur
ning to Renfod, “Let’s get our militia to arrange everyone in a long line. Tell them that I will come by and bless them each individually with a small cut on their palms and a drink from the cauldron. The ritual can begin only when this is completed.”
Renfod nodded and then strode away, barking orders.
“This thing you do,” Gregor said. “I have your word that it will be used to tame and capture the spellplague in all its forms across Faerun?”
Vraith stared hard into Gregor’s gray eyes. “Don’t start having second thoughts now, monk. You’re in too deep to swim to the surface on your own.”
Gregor refused to back down. “You didn’t answer the question.”
So he was going to need her to lie. That was fine with her; lies came easily to her. “Someone’s word,” she said, “is as fickle as the next famine or plague or war. I give you my word, for whatever that is worth to you.”
Gregor’s brow knitted in puzzlement.
“But,” Vraith said, “nobody’s word is worth what you think it is. The only thing that you have of value is your own internal compass, your own faith. Gregor, you either trust me to do what you believe needs to be done, or you do not. My word cannot change that.
“And,” Vraith continued, “as I just said; you are in too deep to be having doubts now.”
Gregor shook his head slowly. “I have many options,” he said.
Vraith forced herself to bite back an angry retort. She smiled. “Well, you do what you need to do. But I assure you that you have nothing to worry about. The truly great have to make hard choices, and oftentimes lesser folks get caught in the way. It is the price of vision.
“We will change the world, you and I,” she told Gregor. And she believed it.
Duvan came to life with a shock. His back arching in spasm, he gulped air. Again, shocks shot through his body, and his chest seemed to be filled with broken glass. A violent exhalation seized him, as though a giant invisible hand clamped down on his chest. He rolled on his side and coughed up blood and phlegm. Then the pain hit. His back burned where Beaugrat’s blade had pierced him. His head felt like it had been wrenched off and then jammed back into place.
Darkness and silence surrounded him. He could see nothing, hear nothing. The iron tang of blood that filled his nostrils stank so powerfully that it blocked out all other smells.
Then, filtered through the black cotton in his head, he heard a voice he recognized. “He’s alive,” Kaylinn said. “Welcome back, Duvan.”
Liquid against the back of his throat blazed a trail down to his chest, somewhat dulling the ache that pervaded his muscles and joints. His eyes were open, but he could not see any light. Only tiny pinpricks of light showed in the vast dark gray in front of him.
“Thank you so much, Kaylinn.” That was Slanya’s voice, and he heard tears in the utterance. His heart opened with the sound. Slanya had not betrayed or abandoned him. On the contrary, she had come to save him.
“Thank Kelemvor,” Kaylinn said. “For he allowed Duvan back among the living.”
“His time is not over,” Slanya said, and her voice was not the stoic and rigid Slanya he remembered-the combat cleric who challenged him, who stood by him and fought. No, there was a deep vulnerability in that voice, a touching quality that melted Duvan.
“Where am I?” he asked, but no one seemed to hear him. He couldn’t even hear himself. His mouth wasn’t working right.
“He’s trying to talk,” Kaylinn said. “It will take a few hours for him to completely recover all his senses. But he can hear you now.”
Slanya’s voice was in his ear. “You rest now, Duvan,” she said, and her breath smelled of almonds. “You have no cares in the world.”
If the voice said rest, then that’s what he would do.
Some time later, though he had no way of knowing how much, he awoke. His vision came back slowly and in patches. And he could sense that he was lying flat on his back, but the pallet that held him was soft, and the sheets under and over him were elegant and clean. He was naked, he realized then, and had been scrubbed free of dirt.
“How do you feel, Slanya?” came Kaylinn’s voice.
Duvan’s eyes fluttered open to see the High Priestess standing in the open doorway of the small chamber.
“I feel a little more myself,” Slanya said. She sat on the foot of his cot, wearing a clean cloth robe. “After I used my spellscar power, everything fragmented. It was as though reality was crumbling around me. I couldn’t trust what I saw. Your healing has helped some.”
“Your spellscar has left you fragile,” Kaylinn said. “And I have reached the limit of my healing abilities.”
Slanya was injured, Duvan realized.
“You must be exceedingly careful to use your power in moderation,” Kaylinn said.
“I understand. Thank you, High Priestess. I will be careful.”
“Well, if you’re stable now,” Kaylinn said. “I am going to go get some rest.” Duvan heard fatigue in Kaylinn’s voice for the first time. “I’m exhausted.”
Light came through a window, red and orange. The setting sun, Duvan guessed, from the tenor of the light. At the foot of his bed, Slanya’s silhouette was limned in red, like a crimson halo. Duvan blinked; the richness of color was overwhelming after the monochromatic gray of the plane of death.
Duvan heard a door slide closed as Kaylinn left to get some rest. Late-summer birds chirped as treble accompaniment to the deep droning of chanting monks in the background. The smells were overwhelming as well. The odor of lilac soap drifted up around him, and he grew increasingly aware of the spicy scent of healing balm permeating the room.
Then the sheets around him rustled, and the smell of woman washed away everything else. Slanya nestled in next to him, her body warm against his. She wrapped her arms around him in an intimate hug.
“I thought you were gone, Duvan,” she said. Her hands combed through his hair, and the feel of her caress brought tears to his eyes. Whether he was too tired or overwhelmed to fight it, he didn’t know, but he realized that he cared for Slanya.
She cradled him in her arms and petted his brow. “Everything’s all right now,” she whispered.
He curled up in Slanya’s embrace. He surrendered to the overwhelming urge to trust in her. He could be vulnerable with her, and everything would be all right. That was a gift beyond anything he’d imagined possible ever again.
“I’ve got you, Duvan,” Slanya said. “I will take care of you.”
Since Papa had died, nobody had said that. Nobody had ever rescued him. Even Rhiazzshar’s pleasures had been manipulative and full of expectant reciprocity. Slayna’s offer was pure generosity and selflessness. He had always been on his own, and it felt so good to let someone take care of him. Tears welled in Duvan’s eyes, and his voice caught in his throat.
“Thank you,” he mouthed to her through the sobs. “Thank you.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Gregor stood in the cool air washing across the grassy fields. He shivered, chilly despite the body warmth of the masses of pilgrims gathered for the Festival of Blue Fire. His silk robe let the wind through, sending waves of goosebumps across his skin.
He clenched his teeth and hoped the events of this night went well. He hated that Order of Blue Fire bitch. Hated that he had fallen into this deal. Hated that she was right when she said he had come too far to stop.
Taking a deep breath, Gregor calmed himself. Anger would not serve him well. He needed focus. Fortitude.
The prismatic glow of the towering border veil cast an eldritch pall over the crowds and the trampled grass field. The sun had set hours earlier, and bonfires had sprung up sporadically through the field. Many revelers danced in groups around the fires, although most responded to the instructions by Vraith’s small army of Peacekeepers. They had fallen quite literally into line.
Gregor was impressed with the efficiency and organization of Vraith’s workforce. After only a short time, a long line of pilgrims arced ou
t from a spot on the westernmost edge of the wide field, circumnavigated the bulk of tents and wagons, and came to a head near the eastern edge.
Vraith and a small entourage of her trusted advisors travelled along the line, while Gregor and his helpers trailed behind. “Join us in embracing the Blue Fire together,” Vraith said over and over again as she moved along the line.
Gregor noticed that while most pilgrims had joined the line, quite a few had ignored the call to join in. Quite a few of those were children. He knew that once the ritual was complete, the entire field would be inside the Plaguewrought Land. All those children would be swallowed up by the advancing changelands.
“Here, I need to cut your palm,” Vraith said further down the line. “It hurts but a little and will ensure that you are one with the others when we are all baptized in the light of the Blue Fire.” She sliced their palms and told them not to stop the bleeding until the ritual was complete. They would know when.
Gregor and his monks followed behind her and gave each pilgrim a ladle from the cauldron. “A single swallow will protect you from overexposure to the wild magic,” he told them. And mostly, he believed it. As with most things, the truth was far more complicated and could not be explained in a single sentence.
Using a hollow needle and indigo pigment, Brother Velri marked each pilgrim who received a dose of the elixir. It was important to give everyone enough and there was a limited supply; he didn’t want people taking more than one drink.
Ahead of them, Vraith paused a second. “Congratulations on the wondrous occasion of your wedding,” she said, speaking to a tall, dark-haired woman dressed in fine lace. “I am extremely honored you have chosen the Festival of Blue Fire to celebrate your personal union.”
The woman beamed a toothy smile at Vraith, and the shorter, portly man beside her gave a respectful bow. His dark eyes showed concern as Vraith cut his new wife’s palms with the ceremonial knife. The woman, for her part, demonstrated no reluctance and showed no evidence of pain.
Gregor and his crew followed, doling out doses. He too congratulated the couple, although he couldn’t help but wonder as he passed them whether their wedding night would be marred by the horrific massacre of scores of children.