The Rage (28 page)

The chore took a while, and during the course of it, he noticed something else.

“Some of the sections are plainly older than others,” he said. “They smell mustier and have seen more wear. I’ll try to use that to arrange the sections in some semblance of chronological order.”

As he finished up, Will said, “Sammaster’s supposed to be a mastermind, but apparently it still took him years to suss out the secret of the Rage. Maybe that’s because he followed some leads that didn’t pan out. So let’s say we figure out all the different places he went. If we visit every one, we could waste a lot of time, and unlike him, we haven’t got it to spare.”

“I imagine,” Kara said, “the lengthy sections of the journal are the significant ones. Where he failed to discover anything, he wouldn’t have much to write.”

Pavel separated a thick sheaf of pages from the rest. “He wrote a lot here, and it’s one of the older sections. It’s possible this is where he recorded his first breakthrough.”

“Then what does it tell you?” Brimstone demanded. “Anything?”

“What we have,” the priest said, “are kidskin pages from Elmwood and inks from Melvaunt, both towns on the shores of the central portion of the Moonsea.”

“Towns built on the ruins of older settlements,” said Dorn, the firelight glinting on the iron portions of his body, “in a country thick with forgotten tombs and abandoned, tumbledown towers. Where would you start?”

“Maybe,” Pavel thought aloud, “with the oldest thing of all.”

But it was only a guess and could easily be wrong. He flipped through the notes, looking for some additional bit of information to support his hunch. Even though he couldn’t read the wretched things, surely something—

Perhaps the Morninglord aided him, for the figure popped out at him, even though it was only a crude little doodle virtually lost among countless lines of tiny script.

“Look at this,” said the priest.

The others gathered around. Proximity to Brimstone made Pavel feel the usual pang of outrage and loathing, but he was so intent on his discovery that for once, it seemed more a simple distraction than a call to arms.

“What’s it supposed to be?” asked Will. “A misshapen, one-eyed head?”

“It’s a map,” Pavel said, “rendered in a style we Northerners rarely see anymore. But the elves sometimes put west at the top. Isn’t that right, Maestro Nightwind?”

Taegan’s mouth tightened almost imperceptibly for an instant, as if he found the question annoying, though he answered with his customary courtesy and poise.

“I really have no idea. But if you maintain it, prince of scholars, sure it must be so.”

Will cocked his head to look at the doodle sideways, then let out a whistle.

“Exactly,” Pavel said. He looked around at the rest of the company. “I assume that if even a dullard like Will comprehends, the rest of you do, also.”

“I comprehend that the place has an evil reputation,” growled Dorn, “and that even if it didn’t, it would be hard to explore.”

“Please,” Kara said, with an urgency in her comely face and sweet voice that would surely have swayed Pavel even if he wasn’t already disposed to help her. “You’re going home to the Moonsea anyway, aren’t you?”

Dorn made a spitting sound and turned away. His show of ill temper didn’t surprise Pavel, but something else did. From long experience, he knew that if the big man actually meant to refuse Kara, he would have said no in a manner so blunt and clear as to be unmistakable.

“Before you all grow too excited,” Brimstone whispered, “realize that everything the sun priest has said is pure speculation. It’s possible he’s misinterpreted the significance of the folio entirely. Still, I agree it’s worth following where the clues seems to lead. But we have other work as well.”

Will said, “If somebody doesn’t stop the cult’s mischief in the Gray Forest, we’ll soon be up to our arses in indestructible dracoliches. That could be even worse than ordinary dragons running around in a Rage.”

“Kindly allow me to attend to that,” Taegan said. “Impiltur is my home, so it seems sensible for me to expedite matters here.”

“Thank you,” Kara said. “You have a noble heart.”

“You’re far too kind,” Taegan replied. “I don’t generally fight for anything out my own well-being and satisfaction, and I’ve achieved the latter. For after all, Sammaster didn’t kill my student and burn my school. Cylla and her underlings did, and with your help, I’ve avenged myself on them. Unfortunately, however, I remain impoverished, and it hasn’t escaped my attention that the cultists have imported gems and precious metals into the wood. Exactly the plunder I need to recoup my fortunes.”

“You give yourself too little credit,” said Kara, shaking her head.

“I’ve endured my share of criticism,” said the avariel, “but never before that particular opinion.”

“You can’t storm the cult stronghold by yourself,” snapped Dorn. “You need soldiers.”

“Well, we told Cylla we were going to confer with the authorities,” Taegan replied. “Apparently, I actually am.”

“Just give the rest of us time to disappear,” Kara said. “Queen Sambryl employs a troupe of bronze dragons. It’s likely some of them have offered their allegiance to Lareth as well. I don’t need any more of his agents accosting me.”

“Perhaps the time has come for you to plead with him again,” Pavel said.

“It’s as Brimstone said,” Kara replied. “So far, all we really have is speculation. Much as I’d like to, I can’t believe it would change his mind, especially now that I’ve fought Llimark, Moonwing, and Azhaq.”

“It appears we have our strategy,” Brimstone said. Raryn said, “Not quite. What will you be doing while the rest of us are running about risking our necks?”

“For now, I’m the weapon we hold in reserve. Rest assured, I’ll take the field when the time is right.”

“Don’t count on it,” said Pavel to the dwarf. “You know how a common vampire must linger close to his coffin. Most likely this dead thing before us has some similar limitation that makes him fear to stray too far from home.”

“You know nothing!” the gray wyrm snarled. “Our business is done, so go. Or stay. All this talk has made me thirsty.”

When Dorn stepped onto the balcony outside the room he and his comrades had rented, he found Raryn taking the night air. Clad only in his breeches, indifferent to the cold night wind that stirred his long white hair, the arctic dwarf stood gazing out across Lyrabar. The moon had set, and to human eyes, the countless temples and mansions were little more than streaks of pale blur, but of course, Raryn could see considerably more.

“You couldn’t sleep either?” the tracker asked.

Dorn grunted.

“I wanted another look at this place,” Raryn said. “As we worked our way south, the galley put in at a whole series of interesting towns, but this is the grandest of the lot. It’s a pity we have to leave before we’ve had a chance to explore it.”

“I just hope,” Dorn said, “we can go away quicker than we came. We need to book passage on a faster ship, one that doesn’t stop at every dilapidated but and rotting dock along the shore or go by way of Sembia. We’re lucky spring is at hand. More skippers will be putting out to sea.”

“So we can probably find one who’s looking to make a fast run up the Dragon Reach back to our usual hunting grounds. That should make you happy, but you don’t look it. Does it still rankle that Taegan flirted with Kara, and she smiled back at him?”

“What in the name of Baator are you talking about?” Raryn shrugged and said, “You glowered at them like you’re glaring at me now.”

“If I did, it was just because the avariel’s manner gets on my nerves. It’s all pose and affectation. But he’s proved he’s solid enough where it counts, and I have no reason to care what passes between him and the wyrm. He’s seen what she is. If he still hankers after her, it’s his lookout.”

“I don’t think he does, really. As you said, he’s just decided to wear a certain mask.”

They should get along well, then, since she’s a fraud, too.”

“I knew you hadn’t forgiven her deceptions. You make it plain whenever we’re all together. That’s why I was surprised when you didn’t argue against helping her any further.”

Dorn snorted and said, “We’ve already played that game, and I know how it ends. I say no, the rest of you say yes, and I wind up giving in to avoid breaking up the partnership. Why go through the same stupidity another time? But I don’t like this, and it’s not just because I hate working for a dragon.”

“What is it, then?”

This affair is just too huge. Have you really thought about it, even to the extent of just putting it all together into words? We’re supposed to spoil the schemes of an infamous undead archmage and his cult of followers. That’s how we preserve the sanity of the entire race of wyrms and keep them from either laying waste to all Faerűn or becoming invincible dracoliches and ruling humans and dwarves forever after. It’s like something out of those old, long-winded sagas that take all night for a bard to chant. It’s a task for these Chosen and Harpers we keep hearing about or whole armies of knights and wizards, not a handful of ruffians like us.”

“Well, Taegan is supposed to scare up some men-at-arms. As for the rest of it, it wasn’t the Chosen who ran into Kara or wound up in possession of the folio. It was us, and wishing won’t make it otherwise.”

Dorn felt chilly and pulled his cloak tighter around him. “It’s all right for Pavel. He decided early on that the Morninglord wants us to carry out this task, and even Brimstone’s involvement failed to shake his conviction.”

“Maybe he’s right.”

“Maybe, but since I’m not able to feel what he feels, it doesn’t help me. Will sees all life as a game and himself as the cleverest player of all. So even matters as weighty as

these can’t overawe him, especially if greed is undermining his judgment.”

“Will’s good at his trade. As are you.”

Dorn, scowling, replied, “I’m a big, mean freak with a knack for slaughtering big, mean animals. Maybe I help a few people that way, folk who would otherwise get eaten. But the notion that thousands of men and women I’ve never even met will live or die depending on not just my ability to hunt but to unravel arcane mysteries and the gods only know what else… it’s laughable and terrifying at the same time. You’re sensible. Doesn’t it bother you?”

“When I was a boy,” Raryn said, “living with my tribe on the Great Glacier, we went forth every day and hunted. If we found enough game, everyone could eat, and everyone would live. If we failed, some or even all of us would die. It was very simple. Then I developed a yen to see what lay beyond the ice, and drifted south to the lands of men.”

“Where you found everything was much more complicated.”

“No,” Raryn said, grinning. “That’s what I expected to find, but truly, I discovered life was just the same in its essence. The only complicated thing is the way ‘civilized’ folk fret about their problems. You twist and pick at them until they look bewildering, but really, they’re not.”

“I don’t understand.”

“You said it yourself. Ever since you ran away from Hillsfar, you’ve fought to protect others, and you still are. The fact that more people are in jeopardy this time around doesn’t change anything. Just do your work as usual.”

Dorn smiled slightly. He felt a little better, though he wasn’t quite sure why. The dwarf’s stark perspective on duty, struggle, and survival didn’t actually seem all that comforting.

“This way of thinking heartens you, does it?” Dorn asked.

“Well, when it fails, I tell myself that none of this foolishness with indecipherable papers and conspiracies of rogue

dragons matters a hair on a mole’s rump. Surely Mystra and the Chosen know all about Sammaster’s scheme and are even now hurrying to foil it. We just can’t tell it from our vantage point.”

If we really believed that, we could cut Kara loose and forget all about the cursed Rage.”

But where would be the sport or profit in that?”

“Nowhere, I suppose.” He used his hand of flesh and blood to clap Raryn on the shoulder. “I guess I’ll see if I can get at least an hour or two of sleep. We want to be down at the harbor well before the morning tide.”

I Tarsakh, the Year of Rogue Dragons

Before his academy burned, Taegan had possessed a number of outfits so fine they were even suitable for a formal appearance before the Council of Lords. Now he was down to one, purchased with coin he’d obtained by selling the pearl ring Kara had pressed on him at their parting. She tried to give him other jewels, but he’d refused her. Foolish of him, perhaps, but she was a comrade, not a patron, and it just hadn’t felt right.

In point of fact, the new suit was only barely good enough. Cognizant of his misfortunes, all the best tailors had refused to create anything new for him until he paid the considerable sums he already owed. He’d had to make do with a journeyman’s efforts. He straightened his scarlet caffa doublet, checked the hang of his newly oiled leather scabbard, and tugged his billowing black

cambric sleeves down, making sure he looked as elegant as possible.

The liveried servants, evidently responding to a signal he’d failed to notice, swung open the tall, arched double doors. A herald thumped a staff on the floor and announced him. Taegan strode over the threshold.

The white marble hall with its high, barrel-vaulted ceiling was a place of blank surfaces and simple lines, considerably more austere than Taegan would have expected of an important chamber within the royal palace. That, however, was not the biggest surprise awaiting him. Everyone said Impiltur’s queen was more devoted to her pleasures than the cares of government and generally content to leave the latter to her ministers. Yet Sambryl, a thin, sharp-featured, but comely middle-aged woman with dyed brassy hair piled high in an elaborate coiffure, attended their deliberations that afternoon, enthroned alone on the higher tier of the semicircular dais. She had a sour look about her. Perhaps she wished she was elsewhere, or maybe she was simply cold. In keeping with its severe appearance, the hall lacked a fireplace or any other means of warding off a chill.

Nine of the twelve lords sat along the step below their sovereign. The other three were evidently otherwise engaged or absent from the citadel entirely. Paladins all, not merely barons but mystic warriors sworn to one or another of the gods of light, they wore—as protocol required, evidently—: plate armor and white surcoats emblazoned with their arms, which incorporated emblems of Ilmater, Lathander, Helm, or Sune. They’d left off the helmets, though. No doubt it made it easier to hear one another’s pronouncements_