by Ed Greenwood
"Ilgreth?"
He came to an abrupt, staring halt. He opened and closed his mouth several times, finding it did not work no matter what position he put it in.
Shayna Summerstar was leaning against the door frame, a thin silk nightgown clinging to her in several places. She was smiling at him in a way that Ilgreth had never dreamed he'd see from her-or any other beautiful lass of her age.
"The fire is well under control, they tell me," she said in a low, husky voice, unfolding herself from the door frame and gliding forward. Her gown fell open.
Involuntarily Ilgreth looked down, and then up, and gulped again. He kept his eyes firmly on her face, but knew his own face was blazing. Try as he might, nothing would come out of his mouth.
"So it provides me with the distraction I've been waiting for," she continued, drawing the door firmly closed and wedging a chair against it. "Think no more about flames, but about this instead: I have always loved you."
Then she was pressed against him, soft and warm. "For years," she told his throat, "I've looked for a chance for us to … be together."
In mute disbelief, Ilgreth stared at her.
Emerald eyes smiled up into his. "Take me to your bed," she whispered. "I've waited so long."
"Ah, uh-a-ho!" Ilgreth burst out intelligently, finding his voice at last. "Lady, are you sure you're-"
"Ilgreth," she said, pushing him back onto the bed and planting a knee on his chest. "I'm very sure. Humor me…."
"Ah, yes, of course, lady," Ilgreth said faintly, wondering when this dream would end, and where he'd find himself when he awakened….
The man with the tentacles and the face that was slowly changing sprawled at ease in Lady Shayna Summerstar's abandoned bed. A goblet of fine wine was in one hand and the decanter he'd filled it from in the other. He was smiling and nodding at something that was unfolding in another bedchamber.
He suddenly stiffened, spilling wine on the coverlet, and sat up. Newly gained memories of similar things had stirred within him-reminding him of a certain someone who knew far too much.
He tossed goblet and decanter carelessly away and snapped his fingers decisively before the items crashed to the floor. He was gone out the open door in a trice, striding hard along the passage outside, toward the source of the smoke.
"How are we-?" The guardcaptain was too breathless to say more, but the soot-blackened armsman nodded in understanding.
"Winning, sir-the two chambers beyond are as wet as duck ponds, and the fire's more smoke now than flame. As long as the roof-timbers don't catch …"
The weary, sweat-drenched officer nodded grimly. "Good. Hand me another bucket, and we'll go look at th-"
He reached back for the next bucket in the slopping line, but paused in astonishment. Beside him, old Narlargus slumped against the wall, and the bucket he held gently poured its contents out onto his boots and down the steps.
There was a smoldering, ashen stump where his head should have been.
Armsman and officer looked at each other and then back at the corpse sliding slowly down the wall, trailing a black smear of ash. They gabbled prayers and oaths, and fled in terror.
Storm Silverhand shortly came striding up the stair, cast a grim glance at the slain servant, and broke into a run. She was soon splashing along a passage whose walls were stained with soot, and whose floor stood an inch deep in water. Voices came from a room ahead, and Storm turned into it.
Weary Purple Dragons stood staring at a pile of ashes on the floor. "Is the fire out?" Storm asked.
"Aye, Lady," Ergluth Rowanmantle told her, "that's not what we're worried over, now."
Storm looked a silent question at him, and he raised grim eyes to meet hers. "This was the bedchamber of the Dowager Lady Pheirauze Summerstar," he explained, "and that was her bed."
Storm looked down at the pile of ashes. "And she was in it when the fire…"
"The flames started here, so far as we can tell by the marks," he said, "but that's not what-well, look here." He gestured with the tip of his boot at gold puddles on the floor among the ash. "This was an anklet, and, here, a row of rings. These-all of these-are what she called her 'gold glisters'; the jewelry she never removed."
"She died here," Storm agreed, nodding.
"Lady," the boldshield said wearily, "have you ever seen a fire that left puddled gold behind, but not a single bone? She's gone, completely-and yet she must have been in this; I've been told she couldn't get some of those rings off over her knuckles."
"There's a man on the stairs back there," Storm told him, "a servant, by his livery, who has his head-just his head-burnt away. He was carrying water buckets when it happened."
Their eyes met. Two mouths tightened into identical thin lines.
"Our murderer, it seems," Ergluth said softly, "has s-"
"My lords!" The breathless shout came down the passage from a servant who coughed out smoke. "Lord Boldshield?"
"In here," Ergluth said sharply, turning to the door.
A man in the livery of the house ducked in through the door, a torch in his hand. "Sir," he panted. His eyes went to Storm and then darted away again. "There's something you must see. Pray come quickly!"
Ergluth wasted no time on questions, but gestured for the man to lead them; the folk in the room emptied out into the passage after him. They had shouldered through a doorway and started down the stairs when the Purple Dragon commander asked his first question.
"Will we need our swords out?"
The man shook his head, and then turned on the landing below them to do it again. His face was grim. "Nay-too late for that."
He stopped at an open door where two Purple Dragons were standing guard, and gestured within. Storm and Ergluth looked at each other.
"The steward," the warrior told her. "Ilgreth Drimmer."
Something hard came into Storm's face, and she laid a hand on his arm. "I'd like to look at this alone for a breath or two, if you don't mind," she said quietly.
Ergluth shrugged. "It won't make any difference to him," he said wearily. "Go ahead." Then he laid a hand on her arm, and murmured in her ear, "Was he a Harper? Is that it?"
Storm whispered back, "No. I just. . have to say farewell to this one."
Ergluth waved his hand at her to go forth and do so, and muttered to the armsmen coming up behind him, "This is getting as bloody as a battle."
Storm took the torch from the servant who'd fetched them, and stepped cautiously inside. Nothing seemed disturbed in the room but a wicker laundry-basket, fallen by the foot of the bed that Ilgreth Drimmer lay upon. A door at the back of the room was ajar, opening onto a narrow passage where the dim blue light of false dawn was just beginning to show at the windows.
The steward lay sprawled on his back on the bed, a dagger in his breast. His face was slack in death, but nowhere could Storm see the burns left by the consuming powers of the shapeshifter. Had someone else slain the man to settle old scores, trusting to the tumult of the other deaths to quell all hue and cry?
Storm looked at the steward's hands, and took up a single strand of hair from under his nails. A long hair-too long for most men. She bent over Ilgreth's face and wiped at his lip with a finger. The tip of her finger came away red. Lip-rouge.
A woman, then-or a shapechanger posing as a woman, to gain entry here unopposed, and get close to the man. She frowned-and then gasped in astonishment.
Where the steward's red robes had been pulled away from his throat and pinned thus by the dagger, his neck was exposed-and there, glinting up at her, was a silver harp.
Storm reached for it. There was a sudden shout from the door. She looked up to see one of the guards staring past her at the other doorway. She whirled to look there-but saw only empty passage.
Vaulting the bed, the pin in her fist, she sprinted to the door and looked both ways, silver hair swirling. The dark, narrow hall was empty.
She turned back into the bedchamber. "What was it?" she demanded. "Who was ther
e?"
The armsman looked at Ergluth, who'd come into the room at the head of a crowd of Purple Dragons. The commander gave him a grim nod.
"A man in a cowled robe, Lady," he said, "with a staff in his hands and eyes like red flame."
"Anyone seen such a person hereabouts before?" Ergluth demanded. There was a general shaking of heads and negative mutterings. "Our shapechanger," he concluded.
Storm nodded. "Wearing the shape of a Zhent or Cult wizard, it seems."
Ergluth looked down at what she held. "So he was a Harper."
The Bard of Shadowdale shook her head. "I doubt it. Sympathetic to the Way of the Harp, perhaps, but I'd have known if he was in our ranks. And this was laid at his throat with no chain or pin to hold it there. No, this is another taunt to me-a double thrust."
Ergluth raised a brow. "A death and Harper blame for it?"
Storm shook her head again. "Two deaths; this one, and whatever Harper he slew to get this." She handed him the pin. "Put this in a place of stone, far from things that can burn or folk who can be affected by magic-a dungeon cell will do. I'm going hunting."
"How does one hunt a shapeshifter?" Ergluth asked grimly. "He could be anyone in the kingdom!"
Storm turned to look at him. "Not quite. I've raised a barrier he cannot pass-at least, not without my knowing it. He can be anyone only in Firefall Keep."
"You've shut him in here with us " one of the Purple Dragons gasped.
Storm's eyes met his. "That's right," she said softly. "I'm very much afraid some of us will soon learn what the phrase 'died for the good of the realm' really means."
Not far away, Shayna Summerstar trembled in the darkness against a wall, staring again and again at the blood on her fingertips.
WELL DONE. WASH IT AWAY AND BE AT PEACE. SEE HOW EASY IT IS TO SLAY?
I hate it. I hated tricking that old man.
IT WAS NECESSARY.
Why?
I WANTED YOU TO-THAT'S WHY.
Shayna shivered again, but said nothing.
NOW COME TO ME. YOU'LL FIND ME MUCH BETTER COMPANY THAN AN OLD, OVERWEIGHT STEWARD.
Shayna bit her lip, felt a protest well up within her-and then found herself pushing away from the wall and walking toward him. There was a deliberate strut to her stride as she went, swaying her hips like a tavern-dancer.
She could not even scream in protest. When she came around a corner two hallways later and looked into the eyes of a startled guard, she winked, smiled, and then strutted provocatively past him. He did not see the blood on her hand. She took the stairs beyond two steps at a time, hurrying to be with her waiting, smiling master.
Her Dark Master.
TEN
To Dream Of A Dragon
Storm yawned once more and stumbled, bruising her shoulder against the passage wall. "Careful, lady," the guard just behind her said, reaching out a hand.
"Aye. You should get some sleep," said Ergluth, at her elbow. Storm shook her head. "I don't need … can't need …"
Then it struck her. Of course she'd need sleep, now, like any other mortal, with Mystra's silver fire flowing out of her endlessly to fuel the barrier. That was why she was so exhausted, her legs rubbery and blundering. For the first time in centuries, she desperately needed sleep. "You're right," she said abruptly, and handed her torch to the nearest guard. "It's. ." She lifted her head, trying to remember where her bed was.
"We're heading there now," the boldshield told her. When she gave him a hard look, he shrugged and added, "It's along our way."
Wearily, Storm nodded. It seemed only a moment later that she was dropping the bar into place across the inside of her closed door, yawning once more, and turning to make sure the room was empty of lurking shapeshifters.
It was, or seemed to be. Storm shucked her gloves, unlaced and kicked off her boots, undid her sword belt and let it fall, and hauled the tunic off over her head. The rest could wait.
The bed felt so soft…With an effort, Storm sat up, blinked sleep from her eyes for just a few moments longer, and carefully cast two of the precious spells she had left. Wards flickered into glowing life around the bed, shimmering where the silver fire streamed out through them. No spell, and no body-however it changed its shape-should be able to reach her now.
Storm sighed, shook her head at the thought that she couldn't cower in a bed for very long.. and then she was swimming in warm white mists.
Dark things loomed out of them as she moved forward, flying now. The black fingers of giants, frozen into vainly reaching stone things. . then a fire-darkened skull so large that she passed through one of its eye sockets … and a red, scaled head rising up through the mists to fix her with an old and very wise eye … a dragon? What was a dragon doing in her dreams?
She fell down an endless well, tumbling. Bodies with eyes and mouths aflame rose past her. Grinning things changed shape around her, and the dragon's great eye looked endlessly down on her from the top of the shaft. Why a dragon?
Suddenly Storm stood in the Summerstar family crypt, lit by flames that floated without torches to feed them. All around her, the bodies of the long-dead fallen were thrusting aside their coffin lids and rising stiffly out of their shrouds. Ignoring her, they walked to the walls and punched through them, every blow of skeletal fists making the room tremble and boom as if thunder had rumbled.
The space beyond the walls was a room she knew: the great hall of Firefall Keep. Storm stepped out through a hole made by a tall, broken-skulled skeleton. She found herself standing in the open area between the wings of the long table, during a feast. All the places at table were occupied by sneering Summerstars and disapproving war wizards. The staggering corpses disappeared like smoke, leaving her alone with the laughter of the diners, who pointed at her and howled with mirth.
Looking down, she saw that she wore only black tentacles. . tentacles that rose up, twining around her limbs, until they reached her throat and began to squeeze. She choked, fought in vain against the glistening constriction, and then everything she saw was rimmed with green and gold, wavering until the watery world went away, and all she could stare at was the dragon's lone, watching eye.
"Why a dragon?" she snarled in bewilderment and awoke. She sat bolt upright, drenched with sweat.
Ergluth and four Purple Dragons were calling anxiously to her from around the bed, the drawn swords in their hands flashing and spitting back sparks from her wards.
"What-what befalls?" she asked in weary puzzlement.
The eaglelike eyes of the boldshield peered into hers. His face was graven with lines of concern. "This barrier-is it yours?"
"Yes, of course," Storm snapped. "Why did you wake me by thrusting steel into it?"
"We heard you call something about dragons," he replied. "Several times, you cried out-once at full bellow. When we came in, someone was standing by the bed, holding a dagger. He was shrouded in spell-mists, with laughing skulls flying all around him like birds. We couldn't see who it was, but he was trying to get past your wards. When he saw us, he sent mists, skulls, and all at us. Things've only just cleared, now. . there must be a hidden way into and out of this room."
"I've found several," Storm said, yawning, "but I thank you for trying to guard me, just the same." She fell back onto the pillows, waves of weariness rolling over her, and managed to say, "I was too sleepy to think of this before … Ilgreth was the first to die and not be burned. Keep him safe, and the dagger that slew him, too, until both can be examined with spells to tell us who might have killed him."
"I thought of that," Ergluth Rowanmantle said grimly, "and left him in the care of two of my most trusted guards while I sent for Broglan. When he got to the steward's room, one of the guards was dead on the floor-burned to a husk-and Drimmer, dagger and all, was gone. It seems one of my trusted guards was … someone else."
"We've got to stop him," Storm murmured, falling back into welcoming drowsiness, "before he slaughters half your command."
"Lady," Erg
luth told her grimly, "I've lost eleven men since sunset, all slain at their posts … to say nothing of the two who'll be months coughing the smoke out of their lungs from fighting the fire. You'll get no argument from me…."
He fell silent then, and shook his head. A gentle snore told him she was no longer hearing his words. Well, let her sleep. Without her, Firefall Keep would be a house of ghosts right now, every last one of them naught but ashes. He looked from armsman to armsman, all four of them veterans. "Protect her," he said gruffly. "Sword anyone who comes into this room and tries to get at her-even if you think it's Broglan, or me-who fails to give you the password. I'll be back before highsun."
The four guards nodded, looked at each other, and went to the door to drop the bar behind him. Then they went slowly and carefully around the room. They checked under the bed and above its canopy, one searching while the others watched. They found nothing. Casting a look at the silver-haired woman on the bed, they leaned on their swords and tried to think how they might walk out of Firefall Keep alive.
Not many scenarios came to mind.
Master, I failed.
Shayna Summerstar let her master feel her bitter disappointment as she put the dagger high up on the ledge above her wardrobe, where no prying eyes would find it.
NAY. YOU DID WELL. YOU STOOD AGAINST THE WARDS AND TESTED THEM-FUTILE, BUT FEARLESS. I LIKE THAT.
Shayna felt a glow of pleasure at the praise, but tried not to show him just how much she needed his approval.
I could have had her! She was asleep-I could have found some way past the wards, if there'd been time! But the guards came …
I SENT THEM.
You sent them?
I MADE THEM THINK THEY'D HEARD SOMETHING ODD IN THE HARPER'S ROOM. THEY DID THE REST. THEN I SENT THE MISTS THAT HID YOU, AND LED YOU TO THE HIDDEN WAY OUT.
But why? I thought you wanted her dead!