Scream of Stone

by Philip Athans

  Phyrea drew in a deep breath and steadied her shaking arms.

  “I’m not sure …” she started to whisper, but stopped herself.

  It’s yours, the old woman said. It’s ours, said the little girl.

  You can’t let him have it, the sad woman nearly sobbed. Hasn’t he taken enough?

  Phyrea didn’t want to listen to them, but not because she was afraid of their lies—she wasn’t, not any more—but because she knew they were right. The flambergé was hers, and she should never have given it to the Thayan. Phyrea knew she couldn’t undo everything—right all the wrongs she was responsible for—but she could get the sword back and return it to Berrywilde where it belonged.

  She flexed her arms and curled her abdomen. Muscles that had only recently been knitted back together by the prayers of the priestesses of Chauntea resisted at first, but quickly enough surrendered to the force of her will. She drew herself up to a handstand, then bent at the waist so her legs stuck out at a right angle, pointing away from the window. She paused like that for a moment, a part of her reveling in the feeling of once again being in complete control of a body that she’d honed, in secret and for all the wrong reasons, into the most insidious weapon in Innarlith.

  Then she jumped.

  Tucking tight, she flung herself backward through the window, careful that no part of her touched the frame or the glass. She hit the floor with barely a whisper of leather on wood, sliding her feet out to temper the force of her landing. Phyrea smiled to herself as she stood, facing the window, and she waited.

  It’s all right, the little boy assured her. She hadn’t triggered the trap that had been set on the window. So far, so good.

  Don’t step on the rug, the man with the scar told her, or sit on the bed.

  There must be something really, really interesting in that chest of drawers, said the boy.

  Especially the bottom drawer, the girl added.

  Phyrea, the magic of her ring continuing to reveal the dweomers that peppered the room, made her way in absolute silence to the wall upon which the sword was hung.

  Stop, the little boy said. Don’t make a sound.

  Phyrea did as she was told, her head tilted to one side, listening. She didn’t hear anything for the longest time and was starting to let the ghosts know of her impatience when the first voice echoed into the limits of her hearing. Muffled by walls and distance, she couldn’t make out any words, but the volume increased as the voice—no, voices—neared.

  “… khazark wants you to know,” one of the voices said—and it sounded as though they were right outside the room, “he’ll tell you. Otherwise, remember your place.”

  The man spoke Mulhorandi, a language Phyrea’s father had insisted she be tutored in. She’d never thought she’d have a chance to use it. The common tongue and Chondathan were all she’d really ever needed, but at that moment she silently thanked her father, wherever he was.

  “My apologies, Master,” said the other voice—younger, a boy. “Shall I await the khazark here?”

  Phyrea wondered who or what a “khazark” was, but wished the boy wouldn’t wait for him—or it—anywhere near the room she was in. She’d promised herself she’d get the flambergé back without killing anyone.

  “No,” the man said, and Phyrea fought back the urge to sigh in relief. “The khazark may be very late in retiring tonight. There is much to prepare for.”

  Phyrea didn’t like the sound of that, but she did like the sound of their footsteps receding.

  Step carefully, the man with the scar advised.

  You can take the sword, said the old woman.

  Phyrea shook her head slowly. Surely Marek had cast some spell to fasten the weapon to the wall so that no one could remove it without magic equal to or greater than his, or he’d at least trapped it, like he’d done the window and the chest of drawers.

  He didn’t think anyone would get in here, the little boy said.

  Arrogant, said the old woman. I like that in a man.

  Phyrea shivered and reached up for the sword. It lifted easily off its hooks, and the weight of it in her hands was familiar—at once comforting and disquieting. Nothing exploded or leaped out at her.

  Go out the way you came, the man with the scar said.

  “Thank you,” Phyrea whispered into the darkness.

  The man with the scar on his face materialized just long enough to smile at her. Phyrea had to stand there for a moment to calm her shaking—a spasm that made her whole body quiver—then she went back out the window.

  70

  10 Kythorn, the Year of Lightning Storms (1374 DR)

  THE CHAMBER OF LAW AND CIVILITY, INNARLITH

  Wenefir knew precisely where he stood. It had all been explained to him by Marek Rymüt. Should Pristoleph acquiesce to the senate’s demands and peacefully step down, the Temple of the Delicate Chaos would be allowed to come up from underground. Wenefir would not just be allowed, but would be assisted, in spreading the word of the Mad God to the people of Innarlith. Worship of Cyric would finally come out into the open, and Wenefir was confident that, given that chance, Cyric’s word would take hold of the city and never release it. Ransar? What would that be compared to the spiritual leader of thousands of souls enslaved to the whims of the Prince of Lies?

  He walked into the senate chamber alongside Pristoleph. Wenefir could feel the heat radiating from his old friend. Though his face was impassive, impossibly calm in the face of a senate that had come to hate him so deeply they were willing to plunge their own city into civil war, the heat revealed his simmering anger, a rage that literally boiled just below his placid exterior.

  Those senators who had had the courage or ambition to attend the session seemed to feel it, too, though none of them came close enough to Pristoleph to feel the heat. Only a very few of them even tried to look Pristoleph in the eye, and most of those who tried failed to hold the ransar’s powerful gaze.

  Pristoleph didn’t even spare a glance in the direction of the black firedrakes. The creatures that used to be his most trusted bodyguards lined the walls of the chamber, hands on long spears and other weapons, and dark passion in their eyes. Wenefir recognized a few of them, “men” who had held posts in Pristal Towers, but their murderous eyes betrayed no shred of the loyalty that had once been so resolute.

  Wenefir didn’t let the presence of the black firedrakes rattle him—he was rattled enough as it was, merely from the dense, hot air of the room. Black firedrakes aside, all he had to do was play his role and wait, and Innarlith would be Cyric’s, and by default, his, soon enough.

  “Welcome, Pristoleph,” Meykhati said from the dais, his omission of the title ransar was neither unexpected nor unnoticed. “You will have the ear of the senate, and you will not be harmed.”

  Meykhati didn’t have to say that. It had all been decided, negotiated, decided again, then renegotiated and settled in the last two days. Pristoleph didn’t appear to have heard the senator. Instead, he walked to the dais, stood next to him, and cleared his throat.

  The senators in attendance took their seats, all eyes fixed on Pristoleph. They waited to hear a message they had been given in writing in advance, a message penned in part by Marek Rymüt, in part by Meykhati, and in part by Pristoleph. Wenefir knew that if Pristoleph merely spoke those words and walked away, everything would go back to normal, the streets would calm, the wemics would go back to the Shar, and Cyric’s Black Sun would rise in Innarlith. Sweat beaded on Wenefir’s forehead.

  “I come before this assembly for the last time,” Pristoleph began—the words taken verbatim from the prepared statement. Wenefir took a deep breath. “I will speak my piece, then I will step down as your ransar.”

  There was a general murmur in the chamber that made Wenefir cringe. The senators had the nerve to feign surprise.

  “But before I go,” Pristoleph went on, “there is something that I must say.”

  Wenefir’s head spun. That wasn’t part of the statement. Prist
oleph was supposed to have begun thanking people who helped him get where he was. Wenefir scanned the huge chamber for Marek but didn’t see him. How could the Thayan not be here? Wenefir thought. His own internal voice had gone shrill with panic. Cold sweat began to soak through his robes and the scar between his legs began to itch.

  “Perhaps you wish to reconsider,” Meykhati warned Pristoleph. “The senate’s patience is voluminous but has its limits. For the sake of peace—”

  “To the Abyss with peace,” Pristoleph shot back, and Meykhati shrunk away before clearing his throat and puffing out his chest, his eyes darting around the chamber for fear that his colleagues had seen him flinch. “I will speak, and you will listen.”

  The assembled lawmakers fidgeted and murmured to each other. One of them stood—Aikiko—and turned to march out of the chamber. Pristoleph watched her go, his yellow-hot gaze boring into her back. She stumbled on the steps at the end of the aisle and turned. Wenefir saw the fear in her eyes and thought, She looks like I feel.

  “If any more of you would like to go,” Pristoleph said. “You know where the doors are.”

  That stopped Aikiko in her tracks and she turned, standing at the end of the aisle. She fidgeted, not sure what to do with her hands, and Pristoleph stared at her for a moment that seemed as endless as it was heavy.

  “In the long history of Faerûn,” Pristoleph said, his eyes finally leaving Aikiko to bounce around the senate chamber, “change has come in many forms, both good and bad. Empires have risen and fallen, whole races have emerged only to be washed from the face of Toril, and even the gods have tread the land upon which we stand this very day—and even they died like the mortals that bow before them. All of these moments, all of those beginnings and endings, have come at the hands of a man. It wasn’t Mystra who brought low the Empire of Netheril, but a single archwizard who gave himself the power of a god. And in that spirit, Ivar Devorast came here from Cormyr to change the face of Faerûn for all time, to leave a mark upon the very rock and soil, to dig a river where none existed before, to redraw our maps and change everything in the process. Some of you supported that goal. Others of you opposed it. Some of you watched from afar, content to get on with your lives either way. But not one of you—not one of you useless, pointless bureaucrats—recognized the truth of the canal, or of Ivar Devorast, or of me.”

  Some of the senators looked angry, some appeared cowed, but all of them remained silent. Meykhati’s face went red, but he too didn’t speak.

  “What Ivar Devorast created, and what he subsequently destroyed,” Pristoleph went on, “was a work that could only be imagined by one man. He destroyed it because you proved yourselves unworthy of it. You proved Innarlith unworthy of it. You are servants. You are slaves.”

  “That’s an outrage!” Meykhati shouted. “An outrage!”

  Wenefir’s knees quivered, and his breath came in shallow gasps. The huge chamber seemed to press in on him from all sides, stifling, suffocating. The priest turned and almost fell. His head spun and his mouth went dry.

  “Be silent, fool,” Pristoleph said. “You’ll get what you want. You’ll be ransar. And you’ll stay ransar only long enough for the Thayan—a man we should have killed the moment he stepped on Innarlan soil—to choose your successor. Be the lead sheep, if you like. The herd will be happy with you until they’re told not to be.”

  “Get out!” Meykhati shrieked. “Get out of here before I have you arrested. Get out of here before I kill you myself!”

  Wenefir glanced back to see Pristoleph and Meykhati seem to teeter for the blink of an eye, then move toward each other as one. Candles flared into great plumes of white-hot flame and one of the chandeliers that hung from the high ceiling began to quiver. The senators stood, and someone shouted, but Wenefir ignored it all, brushing aside a page who was fleeing the room.

  Wenefir burst into the outer chamber and ran. His legs burned and he breathed in gasps. He would be blamed. He would be blamed for all of it. Pristoleph had destroyed himself when he defied the order, the arrangement, and he’d taken Wenefir with him.

  The priest burst through the doors, startling the pair of black firedrakes that stood guard. They almost stopped him, but stepped aside when they recognized the priest. Outside, there was a short colonnade. Rain fell and mixed with the sweat that had soaked into his robe. He stepped aside to avoid someone who was just as startled as he, and he slipped. Mud splattered, he stood and started to run again, losing his way and ending up in the gardens that surrounded the imposing edifice of the Chamber of Law and Civility.

  “Wenefir,” a voice boomed amid the patter of rain. The sound of it stopped the priest cold.

  “Marek—” Wenefir gasped. “Pristoleph—”

  “Come here, Wenefir,” Marek Rymüt said, beckoning him to a narrow path that led into a copse of trees. “It will be all right. Pristoleph’s fate is sealed.”

  Wenefir followed the wizard because he wasn’t sure what else to do.

  “He lied,” Wenefir mumbled. “It’s degenerated into a brawl.”

  “I know,” said the Thayan.

  “What do we do?”

  “We?” the Red Wizard asked.

  “Yes, I—”

  Wenefir might have finished that thought had a bolt of lightning not crashed down from the roiling gray clouds to hold him for an agonizing moment in its death grip.

  He fell to the ground afire, smelling his own flesh burning, choking on the smoke and heat that blistered his lungs.

  “We shall do nothing, priest,” Marek said, his voice almost lost to Wenefir amid the crackling of flames.

  Marek Rymüt laughed while Wenefir burned to death.

  71

  10 Kythorn, the Year of Lightning Storms (1374 DR)

  THE CANAL SITE

  There was just enough left of Willem Korvan’s mind to make his undead body quiver at the sight of Ivar Devorast.

  The man that had been his friend, became his enemy, then ended as his prey, stood straight and tall against the driving rain. A piercing blast of lightning split the sky and illuminated the devastated remains of the canal. Devorast stood in silhouette against the jumble of broken stone and shattered wood. Willem opened his mouth, ignoring the rain that pelted his face. He shivered, but not because the rain was cold. His body moved in response to fell magic—a curse, really—that had saturated his desiccated form with the semblance of life. Sometimes that magic tipped out of balance and he shook. Sometimes his mouth fell open. Sometimes he gurgled. Sometimes he lost control of his eyes. And sometimes he screamed.

  The loud rumble of thunder masked the scream at first, but when the thunder echoed away, the hoarse cry remained.

  Devorast spun, blinking his wet hair from his eyes, and Willem leaped.

  He’d crawled up on Devorast from behind and was poised on all fours on a tilted block of stone that seemed to have been tossed up by the hand of some enormous giant from where it had once served as part of the canal’s wall. The stone was at once rough and slick. Willem ignored—didn’t even register, really—the pain of scraping several layers of skin from his knee, hip, and palms when he leaped. The skin, all of it, was dead anyway.

  Devorast grunted, not in panic or fear, but from simple exertion, as he jumped to the side to avoid Willem. The undead creature didn’t try to turn in the air. He didn’t have that degree of control over his own body, and in the primal part of his mind that Marek Rymüt had made most dominant, Willem knew he didn’t have to.

  They were alone. No living soul within miles would hear Devorast’s last words—if Willem allowed him any. No one was there to help. No one would stand in Willem’s way at the last moment. And any ability to change his mind, to decide for himself simply not to kill the man who once shared his roof and his dreams, had been drained from Willem Korvan once and for all.

  “Who are you?” Devorast shouted into the pounding rain.

  Willem fetched up on the muddy ground in a crouch and grimaced at his prey. Another
of his teeth fell out to clatter against his tongue, which sat in his lower jaw like a stone. Devorast’s eyes narrowed and he stepped back.

  “What are—?” he started, but then shook his head.

  “Willem?”

  Willem lunged, his hands out in front of him. He meant to grab Devorast by his filthy red hair and drag him down to the mud. He meant to rip the man’s head off. He wanted to taste Devorast’s blood, to gouge out his eyes, to rip his spleen from his still-warm guts.

  But something stopped him in mid-air with the force of a battering ram. He’d only barely registered a glow in the air like some sort of phosphorescent mist.

  If he’d had any air in his lungs it would have been driven from him by the impact of his chest, but instead he simply flew backward through the air, whirling in the driving rain. He hit the ground in a rolling confusion of limbs and scattered stones, but was quickly back on his feet.

  He screeched a hollow, atonal battle-cry across the dark distance between him and Devorast, but the human didn’t stand and fight. Instead, he turned and jumped. It was a jump no human should have been capable of—both too high and too far. He landed with uncertain footing on a tall pile of broken stone blocks, and turned to look back at Willem.

  Willem began to close the distance between them in whatever rough approximation of running he was capable of. His feet slipped in the mud and he staggered and grunted. Devorast stood high on the mound, watching him.

  “Willem, is that you?” the human shouted over the rumble of thunder and the drumming of the rain. “Willem? What’s happened to you? What have you become?”

  “What do you care?” Willem coughed out, then repeated it in a feral, shrieking wail. He hadn’t willed himself to speak, and when he tried again his brain wouldn’t send words to his mouth. He lumbered toward Devorast, toward the man he was created to kill.

  “Willem,” Devorast called. “Do you understand me?”