The Rage (38 page)

“Vorasaegha,” he said. “My name is Taegan Nightwind. Your friends the moon elves sent me to ask you to come forth.”

Nothing answered except for a jay chattering in the meshed branches overhead. Well, he hadn’t expected it to be that easy.

“The city is gone now,” he continued, “and the elves themselves, much changed. But they still revere your memory and pray you’ll help them as you did before, to cleanse the forest of corruption. Since your time, a new evil has come into the world. An insane wizard named Sammaster invented a way of infusing dragons with the most virulent kind of undeath .”

He pressed on, spinning the tale of the Cult of the Dragon and of his own protracted duel with it, looking for any subtle sign that something under the moist earth with its

coating of slippery rotten leaves could hear him. He couldn’t discern one.

He concluded by once again imploring Vorasaegha to reveal herself. Still, nothing happened. He felt a crushing disappointment.

“Louder,” Jivex said.

“I beg your pardon?”

“She has dirt in her ears, and more of it piled between you and her. Maybe you need to yell.”

Taegan smiled wryly and said, An interesting conjecture, but I doubt that’s truly the problem.”

He turned. Corlas was standing with Uthred, the wizard who’d protected the archers’ retreat when the Warswords routed. Like the knight, the latter was a relatively young man, but affected long, wheat-colored, grandfatherly whiskers that he probably felt made him look more the learned and formidable battle mage. It was plain from their glum expressions that both humans understood what had just occurred. Or failed to. Still, Taegan supposed he ought to say it anyway, for form’s sake.

“I’m sorry. The creature has apparently slipped too far from this world and its cares for us to summon her back. The gray trees warned it might be so.”

Corlas unconsciously squared his shoulders, bucking himself up.

“Well,” said the knight, “at least we’re one army again. Maybe we can retreat. in good order, muster reinforcements in Lyrabar, and march back.”

“if everyone else isn’t already off fighting to the east,” Uthred said somberly. “Still, you’re right, it’s the only way. Jivex, will you and your folk continue helping us conceal ourselves from the enemy?”

“That’s it?” the faerie dragon shrilled. “You’re just giving up? My kin and I have been wasting our time on you.”

“We truly will return if we can,” Taegan said.

And maybe we’ll have a dozen dracoliches running around by then. Won’t that be fun?”

Taegan looked at his human companions and said, “Sune knows, I wouldn’t choose to flee, not if I could see any hope of avenging our fallen comrades and smashing the cult now.”

‘In our present circumstances,” Codas said, “every minute we can use to distance ourselves from the enemy is precious. But I suppose we can spare a few more.”

Uthred made a sour face, but said, “Why not?”

Taegan faced the mound, then on impulse went down on his knees and set his sword on the ground as he might lay it at the feet of the queen. Who knew, it might help. He recited the same string of pleas and explanations he’d offered before. By the end, his mouth was dry, and to all unaltered appearances, that was the only thing he’d accomplished.

“That’s it, then,” Uthred said.

Jivex flitted up to the wizard, hovered at the right height to glower at him eye to eye, and said, You humans are a bunch of quitters.”

“I cast some divinations,” Uthred said. “Once something powerful lay in this ground, but now, only faint traces of its magic remain.” He looked at Taegan. “Maestro? Are you ready to go?”

“Yes,” Taegan said. “No. I concede it makes little sense, but give me one last chance.”

“I realize,” Codas said, “that Jivex saved your life. We all owe him and the other faerie dragons a huge debt. But we can’t repay it by persisting in an effort that’s manifestly futile.”

“I know,” Taegan said. “I won’t deliver my entire oration a third time. I just need another minute.”

The knight shrugged. “Do what you must.”

Which was what, exactly? At first, Taegan had no idea what to try that he hadn’t attempted twice already. Then intuition, or perhaps mere desperation, prompted him.

“I myself am an elf,” he said, and it felt strange to proclaim it with such fervor. “I, who summon you. This is my elf blood. Feel it. Smell it. Taste it. Recognize it, damn you.”

Taegan drew his dagger, sliced the heel of his palm, and squeezed red droplets onto the ground.

They simply made a stain, without glowing, catching fire, or doing anything else overtly supernatural. They didn’t even soak into the soil with unusual quickness. Nothing stirred.

“We’ll see you out of the wood safely,” the faerie dragon said, an unaccustomed dullness in his voice.

“Thank you,” Taegan replied. He rose and inspected the gash in his hand. He’d sliced it fairly deeply. “We brought along a priest or paladin, didn’t we? if he has any healing left after tending the wounded, perhaps he could look at this.”

“Mystra’s stars!” Uthred swore, his eyes widening.

“What is it?” Taegan asked.

“Come away,” the wizard said. Taegan realized that the divinatory spells Uthred had mentioned must still have been altering his perceptions, revealing phenomena other people couldn’t see. “Come away from the mound.”

Taegan beat his wings and leaped clear. Jivex whizzed after him. The slight hump in the ground began to shake as if experiencing its own private little earthquake. The maples lashed back and forth.

In time, the trees toppled, crashing against each other. An archer had to scramble to keep one from falling on him. Fissures snaked through the mound, splitting it into pieces. The fallen maples jolted upward and tumbled aside as the entity beneath them heaved herself into the light of day.

It occurred to Taegan that the process was a bit like a hatchling struggling forth from an egg, but everything else about Vorasaegha bespoke might and majesty. She was at least as huge as any of the other drakes he’d encountered. Her gleaming bronze scales, from which the dust slid as if it had no power to sully her, were blue-black along the edges, while her eyes shone like luminous green pearls, without visible pupils. Such details were marks of the extreme age that only made a dragon stronger.

Still, the awe she inspired in every trembling observer lay in more than her physical appearance. While plainly as solid as metal, Vorasaegha nonetheless had an elusive out unmistakable uncanniness about her. Though her existence

predated theirs by centuries, she might almost have recreated herself specifically to battle dracoliches, for she was their counterpart, a wyrm who’d cheated death for benevolent reasons instead of selfish ones.

She turned her gigantic serpentine head toward Taegan. Her radiant gaze was terrifying even though nothing about it conveyed hostility.

“You called me,” she rumbled.

“Yes, Milady.”

“I didn’t believe I’d ever walk this world again. These are surely the final hours.”

Taegan took a deep breath to steady himself and said, “Then we’d better make them count.”

“Come here.”

Taegan walked to her. She lowered her head, and her forked tongue, longer and thicker than his arm, flicked forth to swipe across his hand. Its touch was rough and wet, and afterward, his cut was gone.

“Now,” said the dragon, “tell me what you need of me.”

TWENTY-ONE

I,,:, A. • , , •

16 Tarsakh, the Year of Rogue Dragons

It made Dorn edgy simply to float at anchor with the sail lowered. He glowered out across the purplish expanse of the Moonsea and saw the same nothing as before.

“To Baator with this,” he growled.

“He promised he’d join us,” Kara said with a sigh. “Please, give him a little longer.”

“Just because we’ve fooled the Zhentarim up to now, that doesn’t mean they won’t eventually figure out we stole one of their patrol boats. Besides, we’re wasting daylight, and we’d have to be even stupider than we evidently are to do this after dark.”

“On the other hand” said Raryn, “if we’re going, we might as well go as strong as possible.”

His long hair and goatee shining particularly white in the sunlight, the arctic dwarf sat on a

coil of rope sharpening the point of his new harpoon with a hone.

Upon reaching Thentia, the hunters had discovered that, wonder of wonders, their partners among the city’s motley collection of wizards had been doing their jobs for a change, Instead of squandering all their time on bizarre experiments, they’d actually enchanted some items to replace the gear the travelers tended to lose or damage in the course of fulfilling their commissions. The mages had, for example, produced a new bastard sword and quiver of arrows for Dorn, and a new curved hornblade and pouch of skiprocks for Will.

Most of those weapons and pieces of armor were packed away. They wouldn’t help the hunters where they were headed. Fortunately, by rummaging through the wizards’ storerooms and scouring the marketplace, they’d managed to lay hands on a few implements that would.

“I’m tired of waiting, too,” said Will from the top of the mast. “We could at least toss Pavel overboard and see what happens. Then the rest of us will know what to expect.”

“I had a similar thought,” the priest replied, wrapped in a garment that, out of the water, appeared to be nothing more than a leather cloak. “The gods know, you’ve never been good for anything else, but perhaps you could finally play a useful role as chum.”

The patrol boat jolted as if it had run aground on a reef or sandbar, though that was plainly impossible. Dorn and his companions staggered, fighting for balance.

All around the sailboat, beautiful mermaids leaped into view and somehow pirouetted along the surface of the lake, with only the tips of their green, piscine tails touching the waves. Then their comely faces warped into grotesque ugliness. They puffed out their cheeks and spat prodigious jets of water. Though Dorn tried to dodge, the frigid spray soaked him anyway.

Or at least it seemed to, but the next instant, he was dry, and the mermaids vanished like popping soap bubbles. Kara sighed like a mother enduring the antics of a mischievous child and peered over the side.

“We know it’s you, Chatulio,” she said. “Show yourself.”

A dragon with scales the metallic orange of newly minted coppers swam out from under the boat, and treading water with his feet and wings, lifted his head to peer over the side. His blue eyes shining, he gave the bard a gap-toothed leer.

“I just thought I’d show the small folk what I can do.”

Kara replied, “Thus wasting magic we may soon need to save our lives.”

“If you can’t have a laugh, what’s the use of living anyway? Introduce me to your friends,”

That took a few moments then, with Chatulio looking on curiously, it was time to make the final preparations. Essentially it was a matter of casting spells and drinking potions. Pavel prayed for Lathander’s blessing, bolstering the party’s vigor, courage, and luck. Kara sang a charm that would enable her to breathe underwater. Dorn gulped a lukewarm, sour tasting elixir that was supposed to confer the same benefit, and a sweeter one generally employed to give a person the power to float up into the air. Under water, it would keep the weight of his iron limbs from dragging him helplessly to the bottom.

Still, when he picked up his long spear and joined his companions at the side, he felt a pang of trepidation. As a child, he’d loved to swim, but that was long ago. Evidently sensing his anxiety, Kara touched him on the arm. He didn’t know how that made him feel or how to respond.

“Last one in is a three-legged tortoise,” said Will.

He sprang high and somersaulted into the water, and his comrades jumped after him.

Dorn had to force himself to stop holding his breath. The first inhalation of water was cool in his lungs, more substantial than air, out not unpleasantly so. He experimentally willed his weight away, then brought it back a bit at a time until he achieved the neutral buoyancy that served a swimmer best. Meanwhile, Kara swelled into dragon shape, while Pavers cloak spread itself into the winged, rippling shape of a manta ray. Dorn had to peer closely to make out the human-form within. The hunters hoped that if they had to fight, the disguise would give the cleric a chance to weave his magic unnoticed by those who might otherwise do their utmost to disrupt the casting.

Dorn pointed at the bottom, and they all swam downward around the anchor line, toward the spires of Northkeep.

A thousand years ago, it had been the first human city on the Moonsea, until a “Dark Alliance” of giants, chromatic dragons, orcs, and other hostile creatures sacked it, then performed a magical rite to sink the very isle on which it sat. As best as Pavel, Kara, and Brimstone could guess, it was the first location Sammaster had visited and written about extensively, and it certainly seemed a plausible site to harbor ancient and forgotten lore, about the madness of wyrms or anything else.

Yet as Dorn contemplated the devastation spread out below him, he wondered if such a secret could possibly have survived the conflict that had broken the ramparts, the upheaval that thrust them beneath the currents, or all the centuries that had passed since, wrapping the feet of the towers in weed and miring them in silt. Even if it had, could seekers who lacked Sammaster’s level of arcane power and knowledge find it in a sprawling, ruinous underwater warren or recognize it if they did?

For that matter, could they even survive the attempt’? Because Northkeep, though devoid of life, was still inhabited. Dozens of grisly tavern tales agreed that the ghosts of those who’d perished in the fortress-city’s defense abided there still and had a brutal way with trespassers. On moonless nights, they rang the bells in the tallest towers, perhaps to warn mortals away. The sound was audible for miles across the water. Growing up in Hillsfar, Dorn had heard it himself, and wrapped his pillow around his ears to muffle the eerie tolling.

Keeping a wary eye out for wraiths and other dangers, Dorn and his companions dived lower, toward the imposing castle-like complex at the center of the ravaged city. There