Waterdeep (12 page)

Midnight crawled back to her doorway, and, for a moment, both she and Adon stared down into the hole. When the air finally cleared, they both saw that Bhaal’s crumpled form lay in the rubble, its neck cocked at a severe angle and obviously broken. The small body, sprawled and twisted, had been crushed in a dozen places.

But the avatar’s eyes remained opened, and they were staring at Adon with deliberate wrath. The god curled first his left hand into a fist, then his right.

Midnight gasped, unable to believe the avatar still lived.

“What does it take to kill you?” Adon cried.

As if in answer, Sneakabout stuck his head out of a hole below the cleric’s doorway. It was where the beam supporting the landing should have been.

“That didn’t do it?” the halfling asked. “What have you dragged me into?”

“What happened?” Midnight asked, still staring in wonder at the collapsed landing.

“It was a trap,” Sneakabout noted casually. “A last line of defense. The landings in this tower are designed to collapse, in case the keep is breached and the residents need to slow down pursuit while they retreat to the roof.”

As the halfling spoke, Bhaal drew a knee up to his chest, then propped himself into a sitting position.

“Never mind,” Adon said, pointing at the avatar.

Sneakabout gestured at the top of Aden’s doorway. “There’s a crank behind the door!” he cried, waving his hand for emphasis. “Turn it!”

The cleric stepped behind the door. The crank was where Sneakabout said it would be. The cleric began turning it. A terrible, rusty screech filled the room. The beam overhead - the one that supported the landing on the third floor - began moving.

“Hurry!” Sneakabout screamed.

Midnight backed away from her door, sensing it might be wiser to be completely inside her room when the landing fell.

Adon cranked harder. The supportive beams slowly withdrew, and a stone dropped out of the landing. Then two more dropped. Then a dozen. Finally, the whole thing crashed down, falling through the hole where the second floor landing should have been.

Sneakabout poked his head out of his hole again, and Midnight crawled to look out her doorway. The Cormyrian reinforcements finally reached the second floor, Kelemvor stumbling along behind them. Everybody peered through the hole and stared at the rubble on the first floor.

“Is he dead?” Sneakabout asked.

Adon shook his head. “No. When a god’s avatar dies, the destruction is immense.”

“A god!” Sneakabout gasped, nearly tumbling out of his hole.

Adon nodded. “Cyric wasn’t lying. Bhaal is chasing us.” The cleric paused and pointed at the rubble. “That’s him.”

As if in response to Adon’s revelation, the dust clouds cleared, Bhaal lay buried under a small pile of rock, a hand and foot protruding from beneath the stones.

“He looks dead to me,” Sneakabout declared.

The hand twitched then it pushed a stone away.

Midnight gasped. “If we can’t kill him,” she said, looking to Adon, “isn’t there some way to imprison him?”

Adon frowned and closed his eyes, searching his memory for some trap that might hold a god. Finally, he shook his head, “Not that I know of.”

The hand pushed another stone away.

“To the first floor, men,” ordered the Cormyrian sergeant.

“Quick, before he frees himself!” Kelemvor added, turning and leading the way down the stairs - to die in a hopeless fight, Adon thought.

“Perhaps we should leave now,” Sneakabout offered weakly.

Midnight was not listening. As soon as she had suggested imprisoning Bhaal, a spell unlike anything she had ever studied had formed in her mind.

The mage went back into her room and rummaged through her cloak, then emerged with two balls of clay and some water. After soaking the first ball in water, Midnight crumbled it between her fingers and sprinkled it over the pile of rubble below.

“What are you doing?” Sneakabout asked, watching the bits of mud fall.

“Encasing him in stone,” Midnight explained calmly. She continued crumbling the clay.

“Magically?” Adon asked.

“Of course - do I look like a stonesmith to you?”

“What if you miscast it?” Adon objected. “You might bring the tower down around our ears!”

Midnight frowned. The spell’s appearance had excited her so much that she hadn’t considered the possibility of it going awry.

Bhaal shoved away several more stones.

“What do we have to lose?” Midnight asked. The magic-user closed her eyes and focused on her magic. She quickly uttered the chant, crushing the last of the first clay ball.

When she opened her eyes, the rubble had turned to a syrupy, translucent fluid the color of ale. She had expected mud, not pine sap, but at least Bhaal’s mangled form remained encased. His hateful eyes were focused on Midnight, and he was struggling to free himself.

Kelemvor and the Cormyrians charged into view on the first floor then stopped at the edge of the golden glob. One tried to stick his sword through the goo and stab Bhaal, but the syrup gripped his blade and would not release it.

“What’s the meaning of this?” the sergeant demanded.

“How are we supposed to attack through that mess?”

“I wouldn’t advise attacking at all,” Adon replied, “unless you have no other choice.”

Midnight soaked the other clay ball then began sprinkling it over the yellow glob.

“Just what do you think you’re doing?” the sergeant demanded, pointing at Midnight’s hand with his sword.

Sneakabout replied for the magic-user. “Never mind. By the way, I’d stand back if I were you.”

Midnight closed her eyes and recited another spell, this one designed to turn the sticky mess solid. When she finished, the golden fluid began hardening. The avatar’s struggles slowed and completely stopped within seconds.

The Cormyrian sergeant tapped the yellow glob with his sword. The blade chimed as if he had tapped granite.

“Where did you learn that?” Adon asked.

“It just came to me,” Midnight replied, her voice weak and tired. “I don’t understand myself.” She suddenly felt very dizzy, and realized that the spell had taken more out of her than she’d expected.

Adon stared at Midnight for a moment. Each day, it seemed the mage learned something new about her magic. Thinking of his lost clerical powers, he could not help but feel a tinge of jealousy.

“Will this hold?” Kelemvor asked, tapping the glob.

Adon looked at Bhaal’s prison. The liquid had dried into eighteen inches of clear, crystalline rock. Inside, the avatar continued to stare at Midnight.

“I hope so,” Adon replied, resting his own gaze upon Midnight’s weary face.

Despite a fitful night of sleep, Midnight woke just an hour after dawn. Slivers of light slipped through the seams in the window shutters, illuminating her room in eerie green tones. She pulled her cloak on and opened the window. Where the sun should have hung was an immense, multifaceted eye similar to a fly’s or spider’s. It burned with a radiant green light that turned the entire sky to emerald and cast a lush glow over the gray mountains around High Horn.

Midnight blinked and looked away. Atop the keep’s inner wall, the sentries marched their routes without paying the eye any attention. The magic-user wondered if she were imagining the thing, but when she looked back, the eye still hung in the sky.

Fascinated by the magnitude of its hideousness, Midnight studied the green orb for several minutes. Finally, she decided her captivation was pointless and dressed.

The mage proceeded with the task of dressing slowly, stopping to yawn often. After imprisoning Bhaal, Midnight had fallen into a restless sleep that did little to replenish her energy. Though the god’s attack had terrified her, the ride from Eveningstar had fatigued the mage to the point where staying awake had been out of the question.

Her slumber had been short-lived, however. Two guards had come to lay planks over the collapsed landing, interrupting her rest. Midnight had spent the next two hours flinching at High Horn’s unfamiliar sounds then finally drifted into an unsettled sleep that had lasted until she woke to the green dawn.

Though still drowsy and exhausted, Midnight knew it would be pointless to return to bed. Sleeping during the day was difficult for her, especially with the clamor of castle life outside the window. Besides, the magic-user was anxious to turn her thoughts to the spell she had used last night.

The spell had simply appeared in Midnight’s mind, which both puzzled and delighted her. Magic was a rigorous discipline, demanding careful and tedious study. The mystical symbols that a mage impressed upon her brain when studying a spell carried power. Casting the spell discharged the power, draining all memory of the symbols until the spell was studied again. That was why Midnight’s spellbook had been her most valued possession.

But the stone-to-mud spell had appeared in her mind without study. In fact, she had never studied it, and had considered it beyond her ability to cast.

Flushed with excitement, Midnight decided to summon another spell. If she could call mystical symbols at will, the loss of her spellbook would be a trivial - perhaps even lucky - thing.

She closed her eyes and cleared her mind. Then, remembering how Kelemvor had spurned her last night, she tried to trace the symbols for a charm spell into her brain.

Midnight did not need to try for long, however. Nothing happened, and the magic-user immediately knew that nothing would. She sat down and analyzed every detail of the previous night’s events. After the collapsed landings had failed to kill Bhaal, she had realized their only hope was to imprison the god - and a method for doing so had come to her.

But Midnight couldn’t remember any of the spell’s mystical symbols, and realized that the incantation had come to her in pure, unadulterated form. She puzzled over this for several minutes. In effect, mystical symbols were spells, for symbols put the spellcaster in touch with the magic that powered her art. It was impossible to cast a spell without using a mystical symbol.

With sudden clarity, Midnight understood what had happened. She had not cast a spell at all, at least not as most magic-users thought of one. Instead, she had tapped the magic weave directly, shaping its power without symbols or runes.

Her stomach fluttering, Midnight decided to try summoning the charm spell again. This time, she concentrated upon the desired effect instead of the symbols associated with it. The power swelled within her and she intuitively knew how to say the words and make the gestures that would shape the magic into her charm spell.

Midnight’s hand went to her chest and she ran her fingers over a flat, smooth line crossing her collarbone. That was where, just weeks before, the chain of Mystra’s pendant had grafted itself to her chest.

“What have you done to me?” she asked, looking toward the heavens. Of course, no one answered.

As Midnight contemplated the magic weave in her room on the second floor, a dozen hungry Cormyrian officers stood in the banquet room on the first floor. They had been awaiting the arrival of Lord Deverell, and dawn repast, for over an hour.

Finally, the lord commander stumbled into the room. His eyes were sunken and bloodshot and his skin pallid yellow. His condition had nothing to do with Bhaal’s attack of the night before. Lord Deverell had slept through the entire battle and knew about it only because his valet had recounted it for him.

Although he had drunk less ale than Lord Deverell, Kelemvor was less accustomed to the potent drink and was in a condition similar to the lord commander’s. However, he was still in bed, having earlier informed a maid that he would not be rising before midday. Adon, too, remained in bed, finally resting quietly after a series of dreams involving Bhaal and various forms of slow death.

Sneakabout was the only one of the four companions present when Lord Commander Deverell took his seat. Though any other host might have found the absence of Sneakabout’s friends strange, perhaps even rude, it did not trouble Deverell. In fact, it made him feel less guilty about rising so late, and these days he could do with less guilt. The night officers were sure to grumble about his valet’s inability to rouse him last night, and Deverell couldn’t blame them. Lately, there had been too many occasions for similar remarks. But he felt he could not be blamed for keeping himself entertained in the forlorn halls of High Horn.

Deverell waved the officers and Sneakabout to the table. “Sit,” he said wearily. “Eat.”

The officers sat without comment. From conversations he’d had earlier, the halfling knew that the Cormyrians were in a foul mood. Most had spent the night on cold ramparts and were anxious to go to bed, though ceremony dictated they break bread with their lord first.

Serving wenches brought out steaming bowls of hot cereal. Deverell looked at the gruel and pushed it away in disgust, but Sneakabout dug in with a hearty appetite. He liked boiled grains more than roasted meat or sweet cake.

A moment later, Deverell turned to the halfling. “My steward tells me you broke into his office last night.”

Sneakabout gulped down a mouthful of oats. “The need was great, milord.”

“So I hear,” Deverell replied, shaking his head sadly. “My thanks for your quick thought.”

“Think nothing of it, milord. It was but gratitude for your hospitality.” Though raised in Black Oaks, Sneakabout had seen the inside of enough palaces to know the mandates of courtesy.

A murmur of approval rippled through the room. The lord commander tried to smile and inclined his head. “Your words are kind, but I must apologize. I promised safe refuge, and my failure to provide it is a grievous violation of host duty.”

“It wasn’t your fault, Lord Deverell,” Midnight said, stepping into the room.

Lord Deverell and the others stood to acknowledge her presence. “Lady Midnight,” Deverell observed. “You look well this morning.” Midnight smiled, appreciating the flattery - though she knew her fatigue showed. The magic-user approached the table, continuing to speak. “You mustn’t feel bad on our account. Our attacker was Bhaal, Lord of Murder.”