Annihilation wotsq-5

by Филип Этанс

  The assassin raised an eyebrow, and Dyrr—if he had any blood he would have felt it boil.

  "Surely," the lichdrow said to Yasraena, "you don't mean to imply that I might not achieve the necessary victory on my own. Surely you don't. . worry over my safety."

  He locked his gaze on the young matron mother's eyes and held her there until she went gray, blinked, and turned away.

  "You know that all of House Agrach Dyrr has the utmost confidence in you," she said, her voice low, stretched thin. She turned to look Nimor up and down. "But this is no time for personal vendettas. We have aligned ourselves with this. . whatever he is. Why not use him?"

  Nimor smiled, and Dyrr was reminded of the carnivorous lizards that inhabited the wilds of the Underdark.

  "You wouldn't know where to begin to use me," the assassin said.

  Dyrr simply shrugged off the meaningless exchange. He began to cast a series of protective spells on himself, ignoring a few more tiresome minutes of Yasraena and Nimor's verbal scuffling. Dyrr blinked after having cast on himself a spell that would make unseen things visible to him. Nimor looked different but in ways that seemed incongruous, even impossible. The drow assassin was no drow, as Dyrr had known for some time, but for the first time Dyrr could see something that might have been wings.

  The lichdrow let that matter fall to the side in favor of a series of carefully crafted contingencies. After all, Dyrr himself wasn't exactly a drow anymore either. If Nimor was something else than a drow, so be it—as long as the dark assassin remained useful.

  Something that Yasraena said made Dyrr stop in the middle of an incantation.

  "Will House Agrach Dyrr be evacuated from Menzoberranzan," she asked Nimor, "should things not go the lichdrow's way?"

  Dyrr struck her. The slap echoed in the Spartan sitting room, and Yasraena fell in an undignified heap onto the worg-carpeted floor. The lich took some of her life-force with the slap—only a taste, but enough to turn her gray and leave her gasping for breath. She looked up at him from the floor with wide, terrified eyes.

  Matron mother indeed, Dyrr thought.

  Nimor made no move and barely even seemed to take notice. Finally, he looked down at Yasraena as she began to struggle to her feet.

  "If the lichdrow gives his leave," said the assassin, "I would like to answer that question."

  The cold gleam in Nimor's eyes was enough to convince Dyrr that the assassin would give the right answer. The lichdrow nodded.

  "House Agrach Dyrr," Nimor said to Yasraena, who had managed to get to her feet though her knees shook, "lives or dies in Menzoberranzan."

  Yasraena nodded, rubbing her face with trembling hands, and Dyrr caught Nimor's attention.

  "Precisely, my friend," the lichdrow said, "as do you."

  Nimor stepped toward him, squaring his shoulders. It could never have crossed the lichdrow's mind for a second to back down, and he didn't.

  "If I believe you are soon to fall," Nimor said to Dyrr, "I will rescue you."

  Dyrr wanted in that moment to kill Nimor Imphraezl, but he didn't. Instead, he laughed. He was still laughing as he teleported away.

  The Clawrift, a natural rent in the bedrock, cut into the northern sections of Menzoberranzan east of Tier Breche. Gromph stood at the very edge of it, looking down into the blackness. Even his newly acquired, much younger eyes were incapable of seeing the bottom. Sorcere was behind him. In front of him, across the wide chasm, was the City of Spiders. The stalagmites and stalactites that had been carved into homes and places of business for the drow were aglow with faerie fire. He could see House Baenre all the way on the other side of the cavern and the odd flash of light that marked the continuing siege of House Agrach Dyrr.

  The lichdrow appeared in midair over the mile-deep chasm and hung there, a dozen yards away or more. He appeared facing Gromph as if he knew exactly where the archmage would be.

  "Ah, my young friend," the lichdrow called, his voice floating over the space between them and echoing into the Clawrift itself, "there you are."

  "As promised," Gromph replied, bringing a string of spells to mind.

  "So it has come to this, then?" Dyrr asked.

  "The two of us," replied Gromph, "fighting to the death?"

  The lich laughed, and Gromph knew the sound would have sent lesser drow running.

  "Why, Dyrr?" the archmage asked, not really expecting an answer.

  The lichdrow turned his palms up and lifted his arms to his sides, looking around, gesturing toward the city.

  "What better reason," asked Dyrr, "than the City of Spiders herself? From here, the Underdark, and from there, the World Above."

  It was Gromph's turn to laugh.

  "That's it then?" the archmage asked. "Mastery of all the world? Isn't that a bit of a cliche, lich? Even for you?"

  The lichdrow shrugged and replied, "My existence knows no bounds, Gromph, so why should my ambition?"

  "A simple enough answer, I suppose," Gromph said, "to a simple question."

  "Shall we get on with it, then?"

  "Yes," Gromph replied, "I suppose we had better."

  They began slowly, both feeling each other out with minor divinations. Gromph could feel himself being explored even as he explored the lich. Nauzhror's voice, and Grendan and Prath's, whispered in his mind. Defenses were noted, items and clothing assessed for enchantment, notes compared. Gromph had brought a staff with him and was surprised to see that Dyrr had one too. He hadn't expected Dyrr to bring a staff.

  Fire,Nauzhror told him after a tense few minutes of study. The most effective weapon against the undead wizard from the traitor House will be fire.

  That's it, Gromph thought. Dyrr had made his one mistake.

  "You're going to surprise me today," the lich called to Gromph, "aren't you, my dear archmage?"

  "The only two things I'm completely sure of, Dyrr," Gromph replied, "is that we will surprise each other today and I will destroy you."

  They started casting at the same time. Gromph was an experienced enough diviner to know that like himself, the lichdrow had cast his last defensive incantation.

  The spells burst into being from the Weave at the same instant. A freezing wind blew from the lichdrow, carrying with it thousands of razor-sharp splinters of ice. That shredding storm met Gromph's fireball over the black depths of the Clawrift. The fire blew out even as it melted the ice. The two effects ate each other before either came close to touching their intended targets.

  Well, Gromph told himself with a sigh, this is going to take a while.

  Chapter Twelve

  Things were quiet but tense on the ship of chaos. Pharaun tried not to look at Quenthel. He couldn't help but notice that she seemed unable to take Reverie. Her shoulders were stiff, and her viper-headed scourge never left her hand. The snakes writhed constantly, sliding the sides of their arrowlike heads against the priestess's warm black skin. The uridezu was surreptitiously eyeing her.

  Pharaun found that curious. He was the one who had bound the demon, yet Raashub was more concerned with Quenthel. True, the Baenre priestess was still nominally "in charge" of the expedition, but her leadership had always been more ceremonial—at least in Pharaun's mind.

  The Master of Sorcere couldn't quite organize his thoughts on the matter—not just then anyway—but the demon was looking at her oddly.

  He sighed and stared out across the black water of the Lake of Shadows again. He placed his hand on the rail then removed it when he felt the warm pulse of blood running through it. The ship barely moved in the dead calm of the black lake, but still Pharaun felt as if he needed to hold onto something. His hand found the twisted gray-yellow rigging—looking for all the world like a length of intestine—but he couldn't hold that much longer either.

  The demonic ship didn't quite figure into Pharaun's esthetic. The wizard brushed the hair from his eyes and tried not to think about what he must look like. He hadn't bathed in far too long—hygiene had become secondary for them all, and
they were rapidly beginning to stink. Jeggred was the worst of them all on a good day, but the wizard found himself avoiding Quenthel as well. Still, the thought of bathing in the cold, dark waters of the Lake of Shadows held no appeal. Pharaun could well imagine what might be living in that lake's depths, and he didn't want to offer himself up like a worm on a hook.

  The ship creaked and groaned but not too much. Only rarely did there come the echo of a splash or drip or other small disturbance from the water. Pharaun was beginning to think it was the silence itself that he found so unnerving.

  Something hit him in the back of the head hard enough to drive him facefirst into the bonework deck.

  Surprised as much by the fact that he'd been taken by surprise, Pharaun lay blinking for a few seconds—enough time for whatever had hit him to grab him by the ankle. His foot instantly went numb, then whatever it was lifted him bodily off the deck. Still not quite having regained his wits—Pharaun hadn't realized at first that he'd been hit that hard—the Master of Sorcere found himself being spun in the air by the ankle. As he was whirled through the air, he caught glimpses of what was happening.

  A party of uridezu were boarding the ship, crawling over the rail dripping with lake water and maggots. Their gray skin glistening and their pink tails twitching, the rat demons attacked in force, though Pharaun couldn't get an accurate count of them while being spun around by the ankle by another uridezu.

  The wizard knew that he'd been right, that the first uridezu Raashub had gated in was meant to test them.

  The demon let go, and Pharaun was sent pinwheeling through the air. He watched the rail pass beneath him, and when he was over open water he cast a spell while still in midair. By the time he hit the surface in a sprawling, stinging splash, Pharaun could breathe water.

  The wizard didn't waste any time. Swimming and using the levitating powers of his brooch to help pull him downward, Pharaun dived deeper and deeper into the pitch-black water. The lake was cold enough to make him tense and stiff, but he still swam as fast as he could. All around him were the shadows of living things. There were fish, he hoped, and snakes, he feared, and other things—things crawling on the bottom.

  The lakebed was covered in a fine silt that felt oddly alluring to the touch. Pharaun let himself sink into it up to his neck and closed his eyes to mere slits so that all anyone might be able to see would be his black face against the uniformly black silt.

  Something brushed past his leg, but Pharaun didn't move.

  The deep water and the stirred-up silt taxed Pharaun's darkvision to its limits, but he saw two uridezu dive into the water above him. Secure in his hiding place, ignoring another. . something. . slipping past his side, Pharaun watched the rat-demons swim with surprising agility, their heads waving back and forth as they searched the lake bed for the drow wizard. Pharaun waited for them to draw closer. . closer. . close enough. He threw an aura of faerie fire around them both.

  The demons reacted to the magic with twitching confusion. The purple light not only outlined their silhouettes in the dark water, making them painfully obvious, it also picked out details of the folds of their skin, their whiskers, and the knitting of their worried brows.

  Pharaun kicked once and rose slowly from the silt, already casting a spell. The uridezu looked over at him and swished their tails in the water. They swam quickly away from each other, smart enough not to both be caught in the same spell. Pharaun picked one at random and froze the water around it.

  The Master of Sorcere knew that the ice would have no wounding effect on the demon, but it was thick enough to stop it. Pharaun smiled briefly at his handiwork. The uridezu, frozen solid in a thick block of ice, slowly sank to the lakebed, leaving a trail of bubbles in its path.

  The second uridezu swam in fast, a stream of glowing purple maggots fanning out behind it. The tiny worms came from its ruined left eye, an old wound that had evidently festered for a very long time.

  Pharaun tried to swim away from it, but the rat-demon was faster. It whirled in the water and brought its leathery pink tail to bear on the wizard. Pharaun took the hit with a grimace. It hurt.

  As the uridezu twisted around, obviously meaning to shred Pharaun with its ragged claws, the Master of Sorcere touched his steel ring. The rapier appeared before him, and Pharaun set it against the demon with a thought. The dancing sword scored a deep slash, and the uridezu's attention—as Pharaun had planned—was drawn entirely to defending itself against the magically animated blade.

  Content to let the rapier keep the demon busy, Pharaun kicked away from the duel, pulling his hand crossbow and a quarrel from his belt at the same time. When the bolt was set and cocked, Pharaun called on the power of his brooch to levitate quickly up and out of the lake. The second his face broke the surface he coughed out lungfuls of fluid. He shot into the air a dozen feet above the water and hung there, black droplets pattering off him to rain back down onto the rippling surface of the Lake of Shadows.

  The wizard turned his attention to the ship of chaos. Never had the vessel seemed so aptly named. Quenthel and the draegloth fought for their lives against the rat-demon boarding party. Before Pharaun could get the whole situation sorted, Jeggred ripped a gash in the belly of one uridezu that was deep enough to spill its bowels onto the deck. It crumpled in a heap of steaming entrails at the blood-soaked draegloth's feet.

  Pharaun counted four more of the demons, in addition to Raashub. The captain had gathered seven of his kind.

  The wizard looked down, checking on the progress of the dancing rapier. The animated blade slit the swimming uridezu's throat. The demon shivered then went limp in the water, slowly floating to the surface. Its scalding blood sent coppery-smelling steam rising into the air below the hovering mage.

  Pharaun recalled his rapier. Leveling his hand crossbow, he looked back at the ship of chaos. Quenthel held one uridezu at bay with her whip while another rushed her from behind. Pharaun couldn't get a clear shot, so he paused, and that was all the time it took for the uridezu behind her to bite Quenthel in the neck.

  Blood welled up around the deep wound, and the high priestess gnashed her teeth in pain. With a hard, sharp jerk of her shoulder, Quenthel knocked the demon away. From a distance it was difficult for Pharaun to see, but he was sure the uridezu left a few teeth in the mistress's neck.

  Movement from Jeggred caught Pharaun's eye. The draegloth advanced on Raashub. A wave of panic coursed through the Master of Sorcere. Attack or no attack, they needed Raashub to pilot the ship. Jeggred had been itching to kill the captain since they'd first claimed the vessel, and the boarding action was excuse enough for him to finally make good on his many threats.

  Pharaun, fully aware of the irony of the situation, threw a spell that set a wall of invisible force between the uridezu captain and the advancing draegloth. Jeggred hit the wall hard, setting him back on his heels for a moment. Raashub cowered away from the draegloth then started to sniff the air in front of him, as puzzled by his unexplained, last-second reprieve as was Jeggred.

  Quenthel threw an elbow at the uridezu that had bitten her, but the demon was able to avoid the blow. Quenthel's attacks were spasmodic and haphazard, and Pharaun knew it was only a matter of time before the two uridezu she faced managed to kill her.

  The Master of Sorcere made his way quickly through a spell and sent its energy flowing out from him to the uridezu that had bitten Quenthel.

  An enormous, disembodied black hand faded into existence from the thin air, and Pharaun took control over it with a thought. The uridezu that were harrying Quenthel stepped back from the hand but too slowly for the demon that had bitten her. The hand closed around the creature and began to squeeze.

  Taking stock of the situation again, Pharaun saw that Jeggred had moved on to another uridezu, leaving Raashub to grovel behind the wall of force.

  The wizard had only to will the spell-hand to squeeze as hard as it could and he could leave it to its own devices. As the uridezu trapped in the hand started
gasping for air, Pharaun tightened his finger around the trigger of his hand crossbow and sent the bolt whizzing through the air. The missile slammed into the other demon's chest. It paused and turned to look at the source of the projectile.

  The uridezu in the hand had its mouth wide open, but no sound came out. All the air had been squeezed from its lungs. Pharaun reloaded his hand crossbow, and the conjured hand squeezed even tighter. The demon's eyes bulged, and Pharaun couldn't help but watch.

  The wizard launched another bolt at the demon that was still managing to dodge the high priestess's whip. The missile slammed home, pushing the uridezu toward Quenthel. The rat-man was staggered but far from dead—which was more than Pharaun could say for the creature in the hand. Its body bulged past the breaking point then burst in a torrent of blood and tissue. A few agonizing seconds later and it was dead.

  Pharaun reloaded his hand crossbow again and watched the uridezu his last bolt had pushed toward Quenthel. The high priestess advanced quickly, scourge in one hand, the other wrapped into a tight fist.

  The Mistress of the Academy hit the uridezu that faced her so hard its head burst into several large pieces that fell completely away from its shoulders. The rat-demon's glistening gray-and-yellow brain came free and went skipping out across the still surface of the lake. Pharaun knew that her strength was coming from a magic item, and he made a mental note to stop being surprised by feats of strength from the priestess.

  Movement and light from below him caught Pharaun's attention. The uridezu he'd frozen in place had finally managed to break free, and it was moving with great whips of its ratlike tail. It swam up and toward Pharaun, who was still hovering and dripping above the water.

  Pharaun cast a spell that let him push the advancing demon back down into the water. The Master of Sorcere continued pushing until the uridezu slipped beneath the layer of silt. He pushed harder until the creature finally hit the rocky lake bed, four feet under the drifting sediment. He pressed, crushing the monster into the lake bed. He could feel the thing's back break but kept pressing still.