Oath of Vigilance tap-2

by James Wyatt

  As if in response, the two demons flew near each other and seemed to flow together, combining their substance into one larger form. As Albanon watched, the form twisted and changed, taking on the likeness of the demon they’d fought at Sherinna’s tower.

  “They chose something we both fear,” Kri said.

  “Less emotional impact, but probably more physical power,” Albanon said.

  “Good thinking. So we don’t let it get close enough to exert that power.”

  As one, Albanon and Kri unleashed a firestorm of devastation on the demonic figure. Lightning crackled over its limbs, fire erupted in the air around it, thunder crashed and battered it, and divine radiance tore at its substance. As spell after spell erupted around it, it took a few slow, pained steps closer to them, then toppled to the ground. Its hulking body melted into the two smaller shadows, then their shadowy forms dissolved, leaving only crimson liquid, like crystalline blood, that pooled on the ground and then seeped away.

  “And that,” Kri said, “is the power of the Order of Vigilance.”

  Albanon laughed, exhilarated from the sensation of all that power coursing through his body. “That is the doom that awaits all the creatures of this abyssal plague,” he said.

  Kri stared darkly at the blasted circle of earth where the demons had died. “All will perish,” he said.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Shara stared in terror at the apparition before her. It was Jarren-not as she remembered him in life but as she dreamed of him in her worst nightmares, his insides torn out by the claws of the dragon, his neck broken and his head lolling, his eyes fixed on her. “You fled the battle,” he said, his voice harsh and rasping. “You left us to die.”

  “I–I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.” Tears streaked her face and her sword clattered from her hand onto the road by her feet.

  He stepped closer, reaching a hand toward her hair. “I loved you, Shara,” he said. “I put my life in your hands.”

  “I know. I didn’t mean to flee. We-Uldane and I, we rolled away from the dragon’s breath, toward the river. We didn’t know-none of us knew the river was so far down!”

  “I trusted you, Shara. And now you’re giving your love to him?” Jarren’s bloody finger pointed behind her.

  For a moment, Shara didn’t know what he was talking about. Then she remembered that Quarhaun was behind her, and all at once she realized where she was and what she was doing. They’d been attacked-

  And the thing in front of her wasn’t Jarren’s ghost. It was a demon, preying on her fear, giving form to her worst nightmares and using them to weaken her.

  She roared in fury as she snatched her sword up from the ground and whirled it through the apparition of her lover. The ghost’s eyes widened in shock at this new betrayal, but Shara ignored its face, concentrating on the movement of her blade. She sliced and stabbed until no semblance of Jarren remained, just a gaunt creature of shadow with glowing veins of liquid crystal. Then even its shadowy substance dissipated and the red crystal turned to dust, scattered on the ground.

  Only then did she see Uldane, standing behind where the creature had been, daggers in his hands and a grin on his face.

  “I wondered when you were going to snap out of it,” the halfling said. “But now we’d better help Quarhaun.”

  She whirled around and saw the drow standing transfixed, staring at two smears of shadow in the air that reached dark claws toward his head. “Quarhaun!” she shouted. Her sword cut into both demonic shades, and Quarhaun seemed to come to his senses.

  Quarhaun’s sword burst into purple flame as his face twisted with fury and he lunged at the nearer of the two shadows that had held him entranced. Shara found herself wondering what he had seen, what terrible fear had paralyzed him, even as she helped him destroy the creature that had pillaged his nightmares. Two more shadowy figures appeared on the road, reaching their claws toward her, and she felt them in her head, trying to sift through her mind.

  A racket on the bluff above her jolted her back to full attention, and she looked up to see a dragonborn sliding down the bluff, bouncing and rattling down the steep slope with a sword in his hand and a roar in his throat.

  “Roghar!” she cried, delight at seeing her friend driving away the last tendrils of fear that had worked themselves into her mind.

  Quarhaun looked up as well, then gave her a quizzical glance. “A friend?”

  “Yes,” she said. Her joy gave strength to her sword, and the demons fell back from her assault. “A paladin of Bahamut and a strong ally. These demons are doomed.”

  “If he doesn’t kill himself on the way down,” Quarhaun muttered.

  Shara laughed. Then Roghar was beside her, hewing into the demons as divine light flared around him. The demons seemed particularly perturbed by that radiance, which tore at their shadowy substance and even seemed to make Shara’s sword bite more easily into them. Two demons at once reached their claws toward Roghar’s head, and he paused for a terrible moment as Shara watched the fear creep into his eyes. Then he shook his head and renewed his attack, undaunted by whatever vision of terror they had presented to him.

  A moment later, a bolt of eldritch fire streaked down from the road above them, and Shara glanced up to see Tempest looking down at her. The fire slammed into one of the demons and consumed it, sending the last shreds of its substance hurtling down over the bluff. Quarhaun glanced up as well and cocked an eyebrow when he saw Tempest’s curling horns.

  “A tiefling warlock and a paladin of Bahamut?” he said. “An unusual pair.”

  Roghar and Shara maneuvered into a position that kept their friends sheltered from the demons’ attacks, coordinating their movements with quick, simple signals. Shara smiled to herself at how good it felt to fight alongside someone skilled and reliable.

  Sorry, Uldane, she thought. It’s not the same.

  Shara and Roghar kept the demons at bay, their blades hacking and slicing into their shadowy forms. Uldane darted around past them to cut at the demons, then back behind the protection they offered, shouting encouragement to everyone as he went. Quarhaun and Tempest riddled the demons with blasts of fire and bolts of dark lightning. In moments, the last demon dissipated into wisps of shadow and a scattering of red crystal droplets.

  Laughing with the sheer pleasure of it, Shara threw her arms around Roghar. “The paladin rushes in to save the day!” she said. “Your timing was perfect.”

  “Well, I was in the neighborhood,” Roghar said.

  “And thought you’d drop in?” Uldane said with a grin.

  Roghar dropped to one knee to embrace the halfling as well. “That was pretty terrible.”

  “I thought it was funny,” the halfling said.

  Tempest made her way down from the overhanging bluff and embraced Shara. “It’s good to see familiar faces,” the tiefling said. “Trouble seems to be afoot in Fallcrest.”

  “Do you know what’s going on?” Shara asked her.

  “Not yet. We just arrived and found the Nentir Inn in flames. We were circling around to investigate when we heard sounds of a fight.”

  “I heard the sounds,” Roghar said, thumping his mailed fist on his armored chest with a clang. “And rushed to the rescue.”

  “And a good thing you did,” Shara said. “We were outnumbered, and Quarhaun is still recovering from our last fight against these demons.”

  “So you would be Quarhaun,” Roghar said, extending a hand to the drow.

  Quarhaun looked down at the dragonborn’s extended hand for a moment too long before he clasped it. “I am,” he said.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” Shara said. “Quarhaun, this is Roghar, and this is Tempest. We were thrown together on a past adventure.”

  “And now it appears that all our various adventures are connected,” Roghar said with a scowl. He squatted down and poked at a tiny pool of red crystalline liquid left behind by one of the demons.

  “Don’t touch it!” Shara and Tempest exclaimed together.r />
  “It’s inert,” Roghar said. “I think it’s … dead, I guess.”

  “More of Vestapalk’s spawn,” Shara said. “Transformed by the Voidharrow.”

  “Vestapalk?” Roghar said. “The dragon? I thought you killed it.” Roghar had been at her side that day, in the ruins of Andok Sur, when her blade had opened the dragon’s belly and sent it hurtling down into a chasm opening beneath it.

  “I killed it,” Shara said. “Or at least I dealt it a mortal wound. But I also provided the means for its resurrection.”

  “What?” Tempest said.

  “When I cut the dragon, it had the death knight in its claws. I cut open the death knight’s belt pouch as I swung at the dragon, and a vial full of glittering red liquid came out. It was absurd, really, a coincidence that only an evil god’s tricks could have orchestrated. The liquid spilled out of the vial and flowed into the dragon’s wound. The Voidharrow, Kri called it.”

  “Kri?” Roghar asked.

  “A priest of Ioun,” Uldane said. “He showed up at Moorin’s tower looking for that vial of the Voidharrow, which the death knight stole from the tower.”

  “The demon that … that took me,” Tempest said. “It was looking for the Voidharrow, too. And it was made of the same substance.”

  “That demon is serving Vestapalk now,” Shara said. “And helping the dragon spread what they called an abyssal plague. We’ve only seen them once-and actually, that’s where we met Quarhaun. The dragon’s minions had captured both Quarhaun and Albanon, and the dragon tried to transform them both with the Voidharrow.”

  “And since then,” Uldane said, “we’ve encountered all kinds of demon creatures that have that same crystal stuff.”

  “We’ve fought them all over the Nentir Vale,” Shara said.

  Roghar scratched his chin. “It appears that this threat isn’t confined to the Nentir Vale,” he said. “We discovered a droplet of this Voidharrow in Nera.”

  “Then Vestapalk’s reach has grown wide indeed,” Shara said.

  “Not necessarily,” Tempest said. “The substance was in the keeping of a little cult of the Chained God. There was no other evidence of a connection to Vestapalk. It could have come from the same source as the vial the death knight carried.”

  “Kri did say that the Voidharrow was separated,” Shara said. “Some of it was carried east, I think he said, while the rest was passed down until it came to Moorin. So maybe what you found came from that eastern portion.”

  “So what is it?” Roghar asked. “Where did it come from?”

  Shara looked around and saw a circle of scowling faces. “More immediate questions first,” she said. “What’s happened to Fallcrest? And is there any safe place in the town where we can rest, or do we need to make camp at a safe distance outside?”

  “Let’s try the bridge,” Roghar said. “I have a feeling the Nentir Inn was set ablaze as a lure.”

  “Trying to draw people out from their fortifications,” Shara said, nodding. “And into a trap.”

  “We’d better make sure we don’t get drawn into the trap,” Quarhaun said.

  “Right,” Shara said. “At the top of the bluff, we cut through the woods and around the orchards behind the inn to the bridge.”

  “Sounds like a plan,” Roghar said.

  “At least the beginning of one,” Quarhaun added.

  The top of the bluff offered a fine view of the land Shara, Uldane, and Quarhaun had just passed through. Shara explained what they’d seen at Aerin’s Crossing and the outlying farms, and nodded as Tempest described the eerie silence of the forest along the King’s Road. Shara led the group on a path through another small wood, just as quiet, around to the riverside.

  As soon as they emerged from the trees, Shara breathed a heavy sigh of relief. Across the river, Fallcrest’s Hightown was bright with torchlight illuminating the bridge and the opposite shore against the approaching dark.

  “So Fallcrest is not yet lost,” she said.

  “Just under siege,” Roghar said.

  Their path to the bridge along the riverside brought them past the fields of one more farm, and then into the fire apple orchards belonging to the Nentir Inn. Apples hung ripe on the trees, bright red and swollen with juice.

  “Pick me an apple?” Uldane asked Shara.

  “I suppose thieves in the orchard are the least of Erandil’s worries tonight,” she said. She plucked an apple from a low branch and tossed it to Uldane, who caught it and took a hungry bite, making little grunts of delight as he chewed.

  Suddenly hungry, she picked an apple for herself as well and polished it on her cloak. Fire apples were named for their brilliant red color. She lifted it to her mouth, but paused with her mouth half open. Some insect or worm had gnawed at the fruit, tearing the skin and leaving a jagged wound. The blemish in the scarlet skin conjured images in her mind of rough crystal growths and crimson liquid.

  The color of the Voidharrow.

  She didn’t feel hungry any more. Uldane didn’t seem the least bit put out by the color, though, so she handed him her apple. “Here’s one for later,” she said.

  “They’re delicious,” Uldane said, sliding the apple into a pouch at his belt.

  “I’m glad.”

  As Roghar hurried into the northern wood to retrieve the horses, the rest of the group drew steadily closer to both the Five-Arch Bridge and the burning wreckage of the Nentir Inn. Shara kept alert, looking for ambushers hidden near the inn, but no demons leaped out from the trees to attack. Once she thought she saw something moving in the blackened husk of the inn itself-something besides the leaping flames, that is-but no threat materialized.

  And they reached the bridge. About halfway across its fifty-yard span, a dozen bright torches marked the position of the soldiers posted to hold the bridge against the demons.

  “Safety and a warm bed,” Shara said with a sigh.

  “Maybe for you,” Quarhaun said.

  She turned to look at the drow, who was eyeing the bridge uncertainly. “What do you mean?”

  “I think the chances of those soldiers welcoming me to Fallcrest are slim. Is there another way into town?”

  “Why wouldn’t they welcome you?” Shara said.

  “Because he’s a drow,” Uldane said. “It wouldn’t be too much of a problem in normal circumstances. We’d vouch for you, they’d give you a warning not to act up, and that would be the end of it.

  Quarhaun nodded. “But with the town under attack?” he said. “Not a chance.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Shara said.

  “You think so?” Quarhaun asked. “You don’t know your people very well.”

  “My people? I’m from Winterhaven.”

  “We can disguise you,” Uldane said. “Or just cover you up enough that they can’t really see you.”

  “I don’t think that’s necessary,” Roghar said, rejoining the group with the horses in tow. “If Shara and Uldane trust you, that’s good enough for me, and I’ll vouch for you to the guards. They’ll heed the word of a paladin of Bahamut.”

  Quarhaun laughed, though there was no joy in it. “You two have seen what’s happening here, right? Everything Shara and Tempest were saying? You saw the demons we fought? As far as those guards are concerned, I’m part of the town’s troubles. I might as well be a demon myself.”

  “We’ll wrap you up,” Uldane said. “Like a mummy!”

  “He’s right, Roghar,” Tempest said. “Even you have encountered your fair share of mistrust, especially in more remote villages where they don’t see many dragonborn.”

  “And that mistrust vanishes when they see my shield and witness Bahamut’s presence in me.”

  “Well,” Quarhaun said, “if people mistrust dragonborn and fear tieflings, they loathe the drow. It’s not that they haven’t seen many drow-it’s that they’ve seen them and learned to hate and fear them. And I don’t have a divine dragon head on a shield to make people like me. What do I have? A warlock’s
eldritch blade, carved with symbols of the infernal power I wield. I’m sure that will help my cause.”

  “Then it seems you are reaping the benefits of the life you have chosen, warlock,” Roghar said.

  “Roghar,” Shara began.

  “The benefits of a life lived without divine meddling?” Quarhaun said. “I’ll take them with all their drawbacks, if it means I’m not the pawn or plaything of some supreme machinator with nothing better to do than wreck people’s lives.”

  Roghar drew himself up to his full height, nearly seven feet of scaled fury. “I am not Bahamut’s pawn or plaything,” he said. “I am his champion, his agent in the world.”

  “I fail to see the difference. I’ve seen many champions sacrifice themselves in the gambits of the meddling gods.”

  “Champions of what god? The Spider Queen? Certainly she is a schemer with no loyalty to her agents, but Bahamut-”

  “You know him well? Speak with him personally? You’re so sure he’s better than Lolth?”

  “Of course I am!”

  “That’s enough, you two,” Shara said, planting herself, greatsword in hand, between them. “Theological questions are beyond the scope of the matter at hand.”

  Quarhaun opened his mouth to say something, but bit it back with a visible effort. Roghar slowly relaxed his aggressive stance.

  “Maybe not like a mummy,” Uldane said.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  The Tower of Waiting stood dark and silent against the slowly brightening sky. The ancient doorway stood out as a slightly darker shadow in its side, gaping open and empty, the door long since broken down or rotted away. Albanon led the way into the tower, holding his glowing staff high and scanning the shadows at the edge of its light for more demons.

  The interior of the tower was as different from the Whitethorn Spire as Albanon could imagine. Instead of a spacious, graceful entry chamber that stretched the entire height of the tower, he found a small, dark antechamber that was barely high enough for him to stand. Three more doorways led out of the chamber, each one cluttered with rubble from the tower’s slow collapse.