Archmage (11 page)

They had battled and defeated a major demon, banishing the beast back to the smoke of the Abyss. Indeed was this one a foul beast, especially so in the measure of House Barrison Del’Armgo, because they knew that Marilith served at the pleasure of Matron Mother Quenthel Baenre.

Matron Mother Mez’Barris personally greeted the victorious but battered group with spells of healing, and ordered a great feast in their honor, in honor mostly of Malagdorl, whom she proclaimed openly as the greatest weapons master of Menzoberranzan.

“You did not kill the son of House Barrison Del’Armgo?” Lolth asked Marilith when they were together again in the Demonweb Pits.

“He will grimace in pain for many days, whatever spells the priestesses might employ, but he lives,” Marilith assured her. “I killed only the one warrior.”

Lolth nodded her appreciation. “And Malagdorl of Barrison Del’Armgo will be celebrated in many corners not loyal to House Baenre,” she said. “Matron Mother Mez’Barris will be emboldened, surely, perhaps enough to even speak of this at the next meeting of the Ruling Council.”

Lolth nodded again, certainly understanding and appreciating that this chaotic creature had stayed her murderous hands, had suppressed that which came so naturally to her, and instead had acceded to Lolth’s requests—no small feat for a major demon in the heat of combat!

“It will not be a hundred years,” Lolth assured her.

“How long?”

“Yes, do tell, Spider Queen of Chaos?” asked a third voice, and the two turned to regard the balor Errtu, striding over to join them. “When the archmage diminishes the barrier of the Faerzress, you will find your freedom,” Lolth promised, looking to Errtu.

“Freedom to kill the weapons master of Barrison Del’Armgo,” Marilith said. She cooed, a discordant sound that resembled some strange cross between a purr and a hiss.

“Freedom to crush the son of House Baenre,” Errtu growled. Lolth just nodded and smiled at one and then the other, offering tacit approval. Their tasks would not be as easy as they presumed, she knew.

For as chaos grew in her beloved city, the Houses would grow strong once more, ever on alert. Even creatures as mighty as these would realize in the dark elves formidable enemies—enemies aided, of course, by the blessings of the Spider Queen.

Marilith slithered away, but Errtu remained, and Lolth became keenly aware of his penetrating stare. She turned to him at last and noted his toothy smile.

“What do you know, balor?” she asked.

“You strengthened House Baenre under the matron mother,” the beast replied. “You foiled me, and the plot against her, with my prisoner K’yorl. You gave to Quenthel the memories of Yvonnel the Eternal, and so tightened her grip on the City of Spiders.”

“I needed unity and singular purpose.”

“But now the dragons have failed. And now the Weave is beyond you once more, and so . . . you allow your minions to fall back to chaos. Indeed, you coax the city of Menzoberranzan back to a state of nervous chaos."

“Order bores me.”

“Great risk.”

Lolth shook her head and snickered.

“Will your children of Menzoberranzan not need that unity and strength when demon lords stalk the Underdark?” Errtu asked bluntly, and Lolth’s eyes flared dangerously, warning him to silence. The Spider Queen calmed quickly, though.

“For some tasks, the drow are stronger in chaos,” she replied. “And beware, always angry Errtu, for the Houses of Menzoberranzan will not suffer the whims of a balor.”

That set the hulking Errtu back on his heels, and a simmering growl escaped his toothy maw.

“And beware now,” she warned. “I will make of you a demon lord, or I will hang you in a cocoon beside Balor, to be nibbled by spiders until I decide otherwise.”

On eight clicking spider legs, Lady Lolth walked away.

The cheers filtered through the dark and reached the House Baenre compound, where the matron mother and Sos’Umptu stood on a balcony, looking out across Qu’ellarz’orl, the noble section of Menzoberranzan, to the west and the sprawling compound of House Barrison Del’Armgo.

“I liked them much better when they resided in the Narbondellyn,” the matron mother quipped. The Second House’s move to this plateau in the city’s southern reaches was a relatively recent event. “The family Armgo is a collection of peasants, and nothing more.”

“They celebrate the triumph of Malagdorl, whom they fancy as the reincarnation of Uthegental now, apparently,” Sos’Umptu remarked. “Of Malagdorl and a company of elite warriors,” came the fast reminder. “Still, Marilith was no minor foe.”

The matron mother turned slowly to regard her sister, her face locked in a mask of anger. “Would you like to go and join Mez’Barris in her celebration?” The high priestess, Mistress of Arach-Tinilith and seated on the Ruling Council, did not shy away from the threat. “We must acknowledge the implications of this unexpected victory for Matron Mother Mez’Barris’s fighting dog. Was there a greater demon in the city at this time than Marilith? And if so, if Marilith can be so readily banished, then why not the others?"

“Let them spend their time and blood chasing the demons about the shadows,” the matron mother said evenly, her voice low, belying her expressed confidence. “There are other demons awaiting my call.” She turned sharply on Sos’Umptu, before the other could remark that there might be, but now there was one less of this particularly devastating type of demon to be summoned.

“I am surprised by the descriptions we have heard of the fight,”

Sos’Umptu said. “Marilith did not call in any demonic assistance, and her use of magic was limited, apparently. Her pride betrayed her, so it would seem, but still, that one always before seemed more wise than proud."

“Clearly not,” said Quenthel, though she wasn’t really disagreeing with any heart, for she, too, had entertained some level of surprise regarding that very point. A creature of Marilith’s power wouldn’t normally fear a squad of seven drow, but Marilith had known Uthegental in centuries past, and so, too, understood well the power of Barrison Del’Armgo warriors. Across Qu’ellarz’orl, the cheers climbed higher.

Likely there were more drow there than those of House Barrison Del’Armgo, Quenthel knew, and it wasn’t hard for her to imagine what other Houses might have scurried through the dark alleyways to join in the celebration.

The matron mother nodded and reinforced her resolve. More demons, she thought.

Kimmuriel sensed the distraction in his student. He continued to guide Gromph through the mental exercises, holding fast his own mental barrier against which the archmage could throw his blasts of psionic energy.

Until this day, Kimmuriel had noted tremendous gains in Gromph’s control and power, but psionic energies were contingent upon focus, particularly in novice users.

Gromph was distracted. His waves of energy barely challenged Kimmuriel’s mental barriers. Kimmuriel doubted that Gromph could make a goblin stutter in its advance with this pathetic display.

The veteran psionicist didn’t relay that disappointment to the archmage. Quite the contrary, his telepathic responses back to Gromph hinted of growing power and an impressive psionic assault.

Kimmuriel felt the acceptance of those compliments, but knew his time here would prove short.

And so, along with the compliments, he sent a suggestion, just a hint, that the psionic powers could be coaxed to work in conjunction with arcane magic. This would be no foreign concept to Gromph. The archmage had deigned to dabble in psionics with this very hope in the forefront of his thoughts—and why wouldn’t the greatest practitioner of the Art not hope for such an enhancement from his newest “hobby”?

And with that hint, Kimmuriel gave to Gromph the beginnings of the spell he had been taught in the Abyss, the spell he believed would deliver K’yorl back to Menzoberranzan, where she could wreak her psionic wrath on House Baenre.

“Enough!” Gromph shouted suddenly, breaking Kimmuriel from his trance.

Kimmuriel blinked open his eyes and looked at his student, his expression one of puzzlement. “Archmage?” he innocently asked.

“What kind of fool do you take me to be?” Gromph said with deathlike flatness.

A wave of panic rolled up through the normally composed psionicist, and he seriously considered teleporting from that room at once—though of course Gromph would chase him and find him.

“Spare me your false accolades,” Gromph clarified, and it was all Kimmuriel could do to suppress a great sigh of relief. “I know I have failed this day.” He strode away, to the small balcony of his room here at Sorcere, on the elevated plateau of Tier Breche, clenching and unclenching his fist as he went—and alternately producing a magical flame and crushing the life from it, one after another with practiced ease.

It was a minor spell, surely, but still, the notion that Gromph could enact it repeatedly as such an afterthought, like the magical doodle of a great artist, sent a shiver up the psionicist’s spine. He considered again that which he had done in implanting the beginnings of K’yorl’s spell—or Errtu’s spell, perhaps.

Briefly, Kimmuriel thought himself quite the fool for even attempting such a thing.

“Have you seen them?” Gromph asked, pulling open the decorated door—all black adamantine, but worked with the flare more common to an iron grate, with swirls and spikes and rolling designs. “Have you seen them slithering all about the city?”

“The demons,” Kimmuriel reasoned.

“The matron mother’s demons,” Gromph clarified, leaning on the balcony’s railing, limned with purple faerie fire that rushed to engulf his hands as he grasped the bar.

“Can creatures of the Abyss truly belong to any other than their own whim?”

Gromph glanced back over his shoulder to regard the psionicist.

“They serve her simply by going about their business as demons,” the archmage explained. “That is the beauty of the matron mother’s design.”

“Then more glory to House Baenre,” Kimmuriel said, and Gromph snickered but didn’t bother to look back, clearly not in agreement.

“I will return in half a tenday for our next encounter,” Kimmuriel said.

“I will still be distracted.”

“Then I will engage with the illithids before we meet again,” Kimmuriel improvised. “Perhaps I can gain some insights into the ways of demons, perhaps of controlling them. You might gain advantage over the lesser creatures of the Abyss at least.”

This time, Gromph turned to regard the psionicist. The archmage crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back on the balcony rail. The faerie fire engulfed him almost fully.

He didn’t flinch. Kimmuriel could sense his intrigue.

“Half a tenday?”

The archmage nodded, and Kimmuriel stepped away, far away, stepped all the way back to the World Above and his private chambers in the city of Luskan along the northern Sword Coast.

Gromph, meanwhile, continued to lean against the rail for a long while in deep contemplation, thinking that perhaps he was beginning to see the greater benefits of this new pursuit of psionic training. The archmage pictured the Faerzress, the source of magical energies within the Underdark, the barrier between the material Underdark and the lower planes that lent this land its dark energies.

Many times before had Gromph pictured this place, and he had visited the Faerzress several times in his long life, and indeed had spent many days there once, when he was adding enchantments to his already fantastic robes.

But now he viewed the Faerzress differently, with a new spark of insight. Now he saw the extraplanar barrier embedded within those glowing stones.

A spark of psionic insight, he thought.

Gromph had not become Archmage of Menzoberranzan, nor had survived as such for centuries untold, by acting rashly, and so he threw aside any foolish notions of incorporating this thought into any such dangerous and formidable spellcasting as that of calling for a major demon.

For now.

H
er tempo increased, her movements becoming sharper and less fluid, but her strikes more deadly.

Doum’wielle couldn’t figure out exactly what the sword was trying to do. The sentient weapon was guiding her, telepathically prodding her—thrust, riposte, feint, parry.

Step back!
she heard in her thoughts. She had not moved quickly enough for Khazid’hea’s liking. Then she sensed the great regret of the sword, as if she, as if they, had failed. Before she could inquire, though, the sword was prodding her once more, the same routine, but now slowly again, and adding in the step. Over and over, building muscle memory. Doum’wielle still did not question. She came to believe that this sentient weapon was preparing her for a fight with Tiago—or more to the point, she admitted to herself, she desperately wanted to believe that was Khazid’hea’s plan.

The Baenre fiend had taken her again the night before, in the forest by the road now beyond the Silver Marches, the violation all the more wretched because she knew it was not wrought out of any honest emotions he held for her—that would still be bad enough!—but simply to remind her that he could take her whenever he wanted, for whatever reason he wanted.

She would love to feel her sword violating his body . . .

A jolt shocked Doum’wielle, startling her and jerking her upright, the weapon lowering as all strength seemed drawn from her arm.

You think in pedestrian terms,
the sword scolded.

Doum’wielle took a deep breath and tried to steady herself.

Would you like to kill him?

Yes.

Do you think that would hurt him?

I would make it hurt.

She could feel the sword’s amusement, silent laughter mocking her.

Tiago Baenre does not fear death,
the sword explained.
But there is something else that he does fear.

Doum’wielle spurned the obvious question, and instead she considered all that she was doing here, and Khazid’hea’s grand plan. “Humiliation,” she said aloud, and she felt the sword’s agreement.

And she felt the call to get back to her work. Khazid’hea guided her again, thrust and parry, sharp and fast. She moved ahead, but only briefly, then quick-stepped back, holding balance, sword going out left-low and right-high in rapid succession. Though she was alone on the field, she could feel the parries as surely as if her weapon had actually struck steel.

Left and right.

And that clue, left and right, showed her the truth of this exercise. She understood clearly then that her sword wasn’t preparing her for any fight with Tiago, who fought with one sword. Khazid’hea was training her to battle a two-handed opponent: Drizzt Do’Urden.

And Khazid’hea knew that drow ranger well, and knew Drizzt’s companion Catti-brie even more intimately. She had wielded the sword, which she called Cutter, for a short time, long ago.

And Cutter had dominated her.

A question formed in Doum’wielle’s mind, but she blurted it, not wanting to give the sword the satisfaction of reading it from her thoughts.

“Why not return to Catti-brie?” she asked. “You can control her and easily strike Drizzt down.”

She felt the sword’s seething response.

Doum’wielle dared a little laugh at her pompous weapon’s expense.

“She is a Chosen of Mielikki now,” she taunted. “She has progressed, grown stronger. Too strong for you, for you are the same. You know this.”

Are you enjoying this?
the sword asked.
Do you believe that you, too, will grow beyond me? Do you believe that I will let you?

Doum’wielle swallowed hard. That was as direct a threat as Khazid’hea had ever given her.

Do you believe that you can grow beyond me, that you can succeed without me?
the sword went on.
Will you seek your friends, your mother, perhaps? Not your father, surely, for he is a rotting corpse.

To go along with the telepathic words, Khazid’hea imparted an image of Tos’un lying in the bloody snow, under the glaze of dragon’s breath. At first Doum’wielle thought it her own memory—and in a way, it surely was—but then her father began to rot, skin sliding away, maggots writhing. Wicked Khazid’hea had taken her memory and had perverted it.

One day.
Doum’wielle reacted to Khazid’hea’s questions before she could think the better of it.

Khazid’hea quieted her thoughts, and she felt as if the sword was leaving her alone then, to reason her way through it all. She truly did not believe that she could survive now without executing the plan, and she could not hope to do that without Khazid’hea.

Perhaps the sword was subtly within her thoughts, but Doum’wielle didn’t believe so. She came to see her relationship with the powerful sentient weapon in a different light then, not as a matter of dominance and servitude, but each serving as a tool to help the other attain its desires.

Doum’wielle brought the sword up in front of her eyes, marveling at its workmanship and the sheer beauty of the fine-edged blade. The large flared crosspiece had been worked intricately and beautifully, set with a red gem in the center, like a wary eye.

Doum’wielle’s own eyes widened as the pommel became a unicorn’s head, then turned dark, the shape of a panther—Guenhwyvar!

Or was it transforming? Was it really, or was it making her see those images?

But it remained a panther. She ran her trembling hands over it and could feel the contours exactly as she saw them.

Her father had told her that when he had found the blade in a rocky valley, its pommel had been exactly this, a replica of Guenhwyvar’s feline face. She had thought it an exaggeration, but indeed, the resemblance was striking.

Before her eyes, under the touch of her fingers, the pommel changed again, in shape and in hue, and became white.

“Sunrise,” Doum’wielle breathed, and swayed, for now the sword’s pommel looked like a pegasus, snowy white save a hint of pink in her flowing manes, with feathery wings tucked in tight and head bowed as if in sleep. Doum’wielle had loved that creature dearly. When Sunrise had grown too old to take flight, Doum’wielle had tended her, and when Sunrise had died, peacefully, a dozen years before, young Doum’wielle had cried for many days.

“She is with Sunset now,” her mother had told her, referring to Sunrise’s mate, who had been slain in the war with Obould, shot from the sky by the orcs.

A twinge of anger shot through Doum’wielle. How could she have ever sided with the ugly orcs in the war?

The thought flew from her mind—she was too taken with the image to realize that Khazid’hea had forced it away—and she focused again on the image of the pommel.

“As if in death,” Doum’wielle whispered.

Peaceful sleep,
Khazid’hea quietly whispered in her mind.

She felt contented as she continued to stare at the beautiful pommel— and truly no elf craftsman could have made a better likeness of the beloved pegasus. It was as if the image of Sunrise in her mind had itself formed the artwork now in front of her.

“As if,” she said with a self-deprecating snicker. She realized then that that was exactly what had happened. Khazid’hea had found that precious memory and had “seen” it as clearly as Doum’wielle could.

And now Khazid’hea replicated the beautiful pegasus on its malleable pommel.

On the pommel of Doum’wielle’s sword.

Her sword. Her partner.

She gave a little laugh as she considered her relationship with Tiago, who thought himself her lover, her master even.

But no. Her intimacy with Khazid’hea was a far greater thing, and one of mutual consent.

She knew that now. The sword would lead her to that which she desired. The sword would keep her alive. The sword would bring her to great glory.

Will you grow beyond me?
Khazid’hea asked.

“I cannot,” she said, and the words were from Doum’wielle’s own heart then. “I will grow with you, and you with me.”

I will not dominate you, Little Doe,
the sword promised.

Doum’wielle slowly shook her head.
Nor I you,
she thought, and she believed. She stroked the pegasus sculpture lovingly. “You know my heart.”

Soon after, they went back to their practice, and Doum’wielle’s movements came more easily and fluidly, and she fought better than she ever had before.

Khazid’hea was pleased.

Even by dwarf standards, the squat stone buildings tickling the skyline above the tall gray wall of the city of Mirabar could not be considered beautiful. They spoke of utility and efficiency, and that was no small bonus to the dwarf mind-set, but even Bruenor, glancing upon them again from afar, from the field beyond Mirabar’s closed gates, could not begin to feel the lift of his heart he might know when standing outside of the cross-walls and angled towers of Citadel Adbar. Even the city of Silverymoon, so reminiscent of elves, could stir a dwarf’s heart more than this block of boredom.

But that was Mirabar, where the marchion and the great lords hoarded wealth in personal coffers instead of financing any gaudy displays of aesthetic pleasure. Mirabar was the richest city north of Waterdeep, famously thick in the spoils of vast mining operations. The overcity, what they saw now peeking above the wall, was but a fraction of the marchion’s holdings, with a vast array of subterranean housing and mining operations.

“Bah, but we should no’ have come here,” Emerus said to Bruenor as they looked across the fields to the place—and could see already that the guards of Mirabar had grown animated, running all about.

“Are our brothers in there not Delzoun, then?” Bruenor answered calmly. “Mirabarran first, I’m thinking, and few friends in there o’ Clan Battlehammer and Mithral Hall,” said Emerus, and Bruenor knew it was true enough. The marchion and his city had not been thrilled when the mines of Mithral Hall had reopened, nor had they been the best of hosts when King Bruenor had passed through this place on his return to Mithral Hall with the news of King Gandalug’s death, more than a century before in 1370 DR.

Bruenor sighed as he thought of the good friends he had made here, though, of Torgar Delzoun Hammerstriker and Shingles McRuff, who had led four hundred Mirabarran dwarves to the cause of Mithral Hall in the first war with King Obould. And the Mirabarran survivors of that war had stayed and pledged fealty to Clan Battlehammer. Many of their descendants—none of whom had ever returned to Mirabar—were on the road now with Bruenor. He thought of Shoudra Stargleam, the human woman, Sceptrana of Mirabar in those long-ago days, who had come to Mithral Hall to fight Obould, who had given her life for the cause.

He thought of Nanfoodle the gnome, and he could not hide his smile as the memories of his dear little friend flooded his thoughts. He remembered Nanfoodle blowing up the entire ridge north of Keeper’s Dale, launching frost giants and their war machines into the air in a blast that would have shown a bit of humility to Elminster himself.

Nanfoodle had gone on the road with Bruenor in his search for Gauntlgrym, and had served the dwarf as friend and ally throughout decades of dangerous searching. Many tears had slipped down the cheeks of Bruenor Battlehammer when he had knelt before the grave of Nanfoodle the gnome.

Nanfoodle of Mirabar.

“All them dwarfs o’ Mirabar who put their Delzoun blood afore Mirabar came to yer side in the Obould War,” Emerus said. “Them that stayed here stayed in fealty to the marchion o’ Mirabar.”

“That was a hunnerd years ago.”

“Aye, and so ye’re more removed from them than e’er,” said Emerus. “Mirabar’s ne’er been friend to the citadels o’ the Silver Marches. She’s held her love o’ trade with the Sword Coast above any loyalty to fellow dwarfs!”

“Bah, they were just knowin’ that our weapons and armor were better than they could be makin’,” said Bruenor. “And our mithral bars more pure. If them lords o’ Waterdeep got a gander o’ Adbar mail or Felbarr swords, or the purest mithral that gived me own hall her name, then Mirabar’d become no more than a trading post where east’d be meetin’ west!”

“Aye, me friend,” Emerus said, and he clapped Bruenor on the shoulder. His smile didn’t last, though, and he quickly grew more somber.

“They’ve not changed their song about ye,” he said. “We might still be turning aside, tellin’ ’em that our road’s to the north and Icewind Dale.”

“The dwarfs o’ Mirabar’re Delzoun,” Bruenor said. “They got a right to know. They got a right to come along and fight for our home, for the Throne o’ the Dwarf Gods and the ancient Forge that burns with the power of a primordial beast o’ fire. A fine Delzoun leader I’m being if I walk aside this place without leavin’ the truth!”

His mounting speech fell off when he noted the approach of Drizzt, Catti-brie, Ragged Dain, and Connerad Brawnanvil.

“If ye’re tellin’ the dwarfs o’ Mirabar, ye’re tellin’ the marchion and all the rest,” Emerus reminded. “Them humans in Mirabar ain’t much for likin’ Mithral Hall or yerself, even if they’re not believin’ ye’re who ye say ye be. They owe ye no loyalty and so ye should be expectin’ none.”

“I ain’t.”

“And where’re ye thinkin’ the news’ll go?” Emerus said.

“Right to the Sword Coast,” Drizzt interjected.

“Aye,” said Emerus. “To Waterdeep and to Neverwinter, and no doubt them dark elves in Gauntlgrym’ve got spies all about, and agents in Neverwinter. And so if ye go into Mirabar and tell the dwarfs the truth o’ yer—of
our
march, then ye’re likely tellin’ them drow that we’re coming for ’em!”

“Aye, and so be it,” said Bruenor, and he strode forward to step up a low bluff and better view the distant city. “We got four thousand Delzoun dwarfs standing behind us. Them drow’ll know we’re comin’ long afore we’re crossin’ the underground lake to Gauntlgrym’s top door. And so be it. Once we got the top floor and the throne, we’ll chase them into the Underdark.”

“It is one drow House,” Drizzt said to Emerus. “Powerful with magic, but not numerous.”

“How many?”

“They will have slaves to fight for them—goblins and . . .”