Forsaken House Page 33

  The fellow bared his fangs in a sinister snarl and started a spell of his own, but Araevin closed on him before he could finish casting. He took three fingers off the fey’ri’s hand and spoiled the enemy’s spell.

  “You will die for that, paleblood!” the demonspawn hissed.

  He drew his own sword with his good hand—a short blade of sinister reddish iron—and parried two more of Araevin’s attacks before going on the offensive, snarling and spitting as he tried to bat the elf’s sword aside and get inside his guard. Their blades met two times, then three, and Araevin circled his point under the fey’ri’s blade and sank Nurthel’s sword just under the fellow’s ribs, where his breastplate met the mail of his shirt. The fey’ri staggered back two steps, then sank to the floor.

  Araevin seized a set of keys hanging from a peg on one wall, and hurried into the dungeon. He found Ilsevele’s door first, and after fumbling with the keys, he threw open the cell.

  “Ilsevele!”

  Ilsevele stared up at him in amazement and said, “Araevin? But how—?”

  “Explanations can wait,” he promised her. He knelt beside her and took her in his arms. “Are you well? Did they hurt you?”

  She shook her head and replied, “I was not handled at all gently, but it could have been much worse. They said they were saving me for one of their lords, who was away fighting in the High Forest.” She shuddered. “What they told me about him … I think I would have taken my own life first.”

  “That won’t be necessary,” Araevin said.

  Beneath her bruised visage he could glimpse the marks despair and fear had left on her, but she rapidly rallied, her courage and hope rekindling like a blaze springing up from a tiny ember.

  “Maresa is nearby,” she said, struggling to her feet. “We must free her, too.”

  “I know. Here, take this in case we get into a fight.”

  Araevin handed Ilsevele Nurthel’s short sword, then he moved to the cell where he had seen the genasi and quickly unlocked that one as well.

  “Maresa?” he called.

  The genasi looked up at him, her snow-white skin pale as moonlight in the shadows of the cell.

  “Could you have made any more noise in the guardroom?” she snapped. “It sounded like a damned thunderstorm out there.”

  Araevin asked, “Do you want me to go back and try to do it more quietly?”

  “Too late for that now,” Maresa said. She climbed to her feet and brushed off her scarlet tunic. She met Araevin’s eyes, and the determination in her face softened just a bit. “Not that I’m ungrateful, of course. How in the world did you manage this? The last I saw you, you were enslaved by Sarya’s enchantments.”

  “I will tell you both the whole story later. Suffice it to say that I am no longer under her control.” Araevin looked up and down the hall. “Here, Maresa, you take this wand. The command word is nemehl. It fires a bolt of disrupting power, so make sure you do not point it at anyone you are fond of.”

  “Don’t worry about that,” said Maresa. She took the wand, baring her teeth in a predatory smile.

  “Araevin, there’s another prisoner here, down at the end of the hall,” Ilsevele said. “I heard her sobbing yesterday. We must take her with us, if we can.”

  Araevin and his companions quickly checked the other cells, finding them all empty except for one. A small sun elf woman, hardly more than a girl really, lay curled on the floor, so weary and heartbroken that she had actually passed from Reverie into actual sleep, something that elves did only when gravely ill or wounded. They unlocked the door and moved in to rouse the girl.

  “Hello? Are you well enough to walk?” Ilsevele asked, kneeling by the elf lass.

  The girl roused herself, and looked up at the three of them with astonishment. She was dressed in the sturdy pants and tunic of a traveler, and Araevin noticed that she wore the padded arming coat of a suit of heavy armor that had obviously been taken from her. She seemed a little on the slight side to be a warrior.

  A cleric? he wondered.

  “Who are you?” she managed.

  “I am Ilsevele Miritar. Until a few moments ago, I was a captive like you. This is Maresa Rost, and this is Araevin Teshurr, our rescuer.”

  “I am Filsaelene Merwyst. Can you really get me out of here?”

  “We will try,” Ilsevele promised. “How long have you been here, Filsaelene? How did the daemonfey capture you?”

  The girl sat up, her arms wrapped around her torso, and said, “About two months, I think. I was traveling with a company of adventurers, heading for the old ruins of Elvenport. The fey’ri ambushed us near the ruins of Hellgate Keep. They … they killed my companions, but they told me that they spare sun elves.” She shivered, and added dully, “They said I would make good breeding stock.”

  “Aillesel Seldarie,” Ilsevele breathed. “Did they—?”

  “No, not yet,” Filsaelene said. “They seem to have almost forgotten me. I think they are engaged in some dark enterprise or another, something that has absorbed their attention for several tendays now. I heard many more fey’ri here for a time before most of them left.”

  “How did the fey’ri bring you here?” said Araevin.

  “I was marched here. It’s only thirty miles or so from Hellgate Keep.”

  “Do you know where this place is?” Araevin asked.

  Despite his success in teleporting to the daemonfey hall, he had no idea where it stood.

  “Beneath the ruins of Myth Glaurach. We’re in the northern end of the Delimbiyr Vale, in the foothills of the Nether Mountains. You teleported here, then?”

  “Yes,” Araevin answered. “And that is how I intend to leave.”

  Araevin looked at Ilsevele and Maresa. All he wanted was to take them out of danger at once, but if he did so, Sarya would soon discover their escape. For that matter, she would not be long in discovering Nurthel’s failure. When she did, she would likely reexamine the defenses she had woven over Myth Glaurach’s mythal, and she might have skill enough to ensure that Araevin would not be able to easily return. He had an opportunity that he might not have later, an opportunity important enough to hazard his life, as well as the lives of his companions.

  “We should get moving,” he said. “There is something I want to do before we leave.”

  “What is that?” Ilsevele asked.

  “This place is guarded by a mythal stone that the daemonfey have turned to their own purposes. I think I can do something about it. Without the mythal’s defenses, there will be nothing to obscure our scrying spells or deflect our attacks against this place. I suspect that the daemonfey would find its loss hard to bear, though it means delaying our departure for a short time.”

  “You can damage mythals?” Ilsevele asked in surprise. “I didn’t realize you knew such lore.”

  “I didn’t, but I do now,” Araevin answered. “I will explain that later, as well.”

  “I can’t say I like the idea of staying here one minute longer than I have to,” Maresa said. “But if we can set something on fire before we leave, I’m all for that.”

  “I trust your judgment, Araevin,” said Ilsevele.

  “This way, then.”

  He led them to the guardroom, where the two dead fey’ri lay crumpled on the floor. There they found a sturdy vault in which the prisoner’s belongings—or most of them, anyway—had been stored. In a few moments, Maresa had her rapier on her hip and her crossbow in her hands, while Ilsevele shrugged her mithral shirt over her shoulders and restrung her bow. Filsaelene put on a breastplate emblazoned with the symbol of Corellon Larethian, and armed herself with a slender long sword.

  “Everybody ready?” Araevin asked.

  His comrades nodded, determination plain on their faces.

  Araevin began another spell, and drew a glowing portal of blue energy in the air.

  “Follow me quickly, before the door closes,” he said, then he ducked through, reappearing an instant later in the well of the mythal s
tone.

  The chamber was much as he had envisioned it from the glimpse his spell eyes had afforded. It was a bell-shaped space, high and wide, at the bottom of a shaft that rose up into illimitable darkness. The floor was natural rock, rough and uneven, and in the center stood the mythal stone, a boulder about eight feet in diameter and somewhat flattened. The only remarkable thing about the stone was its color, a rosy pinkish hue that seemed almost translucent. Striated bands of green moss clung to its lower surface. He could feel the magical power in the air, as intense as a slap in the face. The only illumination in the room was a thin golden phosphorescence that seemed to dance on the walls, as faint as an aurora.

  Ilsevele, Maresa, and Filsaelene followed him through the blue doorway, which faded an instant later. They stared at the mythal, silent with awe.

  “Keep watch for me,” Araevin told them. “I will be busy for a short time. Be on guard against enemies teleporting into the room. My efforts may be detected.”

  “That’s a cheerful thought,” Maresa muttered, but she moved to comply. The women spread out, surrounding Araevin and the mythal. Araevin glanced at his companions to make sure he knew where they were in case he had to flee quickly. Then he turned to address the mythal.

  First he cast his spell of magesight again. As before, the mythal’s weave of interlocking enchantments and wards became visible to him, brighter and even more clear than before. The mythal itself was a great, blazing sphere of gold, its depths complex and ever-shifting like the dancing of a great flame. The red-gold strands of the daemonfey modifications crisscrossed the surface of the sphere, but did not enter its depths. Much as a red glass held before a lantern would change the color of the light produced, so Sarya’s spells altered the effects produced by the mythal without changing its essential nature.

  She knows something about what she is doing, he decided. But her understanding is incomplete. She could have anchored those strands in the very fundament of the mythal, but she lacked the mythalcraft to do so.

  Of course, he himself could not have perceived even that much without the knowledge the Nightstar had grafted to his mind.

  “It’s a good thing Sarya did not get her hands on the Nightstar,” he murmured. “If she had had access to Saelethil’s lore, she could have done terrible things indeed.”

  “What do you see, Araevin? Can you do what you thought you might be able to do?” Ilsevele asked.

  Even with the magical training she had, it was clear that she did not perceive the mythal stone as he did.

  “I believe so,” he said.

  He took a deep breath, and began to speak the words of a high and complex spell he was attempting for the first time. One of the spells recorded in the Nightstar, it was not a spell of high magic, but it was close. It stood near the pinnacle of what was possible without high magic, and few mages could have mastered its difficult symbology and intricate weavings. When he had prepared spells from the selukiira in Ithraides’ vault, he’d readied the powerful evocation on the chance that his suspicions about Sarya’s mythal might prove true.

  The spell allowed a knowledgeable mage to modify mythals. It would never work against a mythal whose creators could oppose it, or even against a mythal secured in the proper way by a new master, but Myth Glaurach’s mythal had no living defenders—or none who chose to present themselves, anyway—and its powers were open to all spellcasters who stood within its bounds. In the days of Eaerlann, that might have been a sign of trust: trust in the power of the mythal’s wards to keep evil influences outside, trust in the wisdom of Myth Glaurach’s leading wizards to intervene against any abuse of the mythal’s power, even a sign of trust in the good intentions of those who entered the City of Scrolls. Araevin doubted that Sarya shared such trust. She simply lacked the mythalcraft to seal the device, or possibly even understand that it could be sealed. On the other hand Saelethil had no such lack.

  Araevin felt his perception sinking into the great golden orb at the mythal’s heart. Carefully he sifted through the strands of magic until he found the shining white filaments that represented the laws binding and governing the device. With the care of a master musician seeking to elicit a single perfect note from his instrument, Araevin focused his willpower into a pure blade of thought, and reached in to adjust the mythal’s governing.

  Stop.

  Araevin looked up, startled. He sensed that he was in two places at once. On the physical level, he stood a few feet from the pale pink stone, his eyes closed in concentration, one hand extended toward the device. His companions watched him anxiously. But the voice had not come from there. The voice had emerged from the metaphysical, the level of thought and magical consciousness in which his mind was engaged.

  You are not Sarya, the voice continued. It was a melodious and powerful voice, a voice that hinted at great beauty and wisdom, but there was a dark timbre to it that Araevin did not care for. He studied the mythal closely, but he saw no sign of another mind. Who are you?

  Who wants to know? he replied, standing on his guard, summoning his willpower to repel a mental assault if such a thing should come.

  I am not to be bantered with. Identify yourself at once.

  Araevin sensed the menace and towering willpower behind the words, but he relaxed his guard. The speaker was not present in the mythal. He was speaking through the device in some way, using the mythal as a medium.

  I am Araevin Teshurr. To whom am I speaking?

  Sarya will destroy you for playing with her toy, the voice observed. You would be well advised to desist in your use of the mythal, and flee before she returns.

  I intend to take Sarya’s toy away from her. And I note that you have still not answered my question.

  Is this a coup of sorts? Do you think to overthrow your mistress and replace her? The voice laughed, a curiously childlike sound for the menace and power behind it. All right, then. If you succeed, I will consent to extend to you the same arrangements I offered Sarya.

  What arrangements? Araevin asked. Who are you?

  I am Malkizid. You may contact me through the mythal stone. But do not trouble me until you have deposed Sarya. I have no interest in dealing with underlings.

  Then the voice was gone, and with it the sense of menace.

  He returned his attention to the governing concordance of the mythal, and with one decisive stroke he imposed a new set of rules to restrict access to the mythal’s powers. Only spellcasters without the stain of evil in their souls would gain the benefit of the mythal’s abilities. Then he added a secure lock to prevent the governance from being rewritten again, creating a magical password to protect the mythal from further changes. An original creator of the device, if any still lived, would be able to contest Araevin’s restrictions. But Sarya would find them difficult to overcome indeed.

  With that attended to, Araevin looked for the brazen strands of Sarya’s weaving. With one quick cut he unbound them all. Spells and wards of a dozen varieties abruptly discorporated, fading into nothingness. The myriad strands anchoring Sarya’s summoned demons to Faerûn vanished as well. Araevin was not certain if the monsters would be destroyed, banished, or simply fade back into their own native dimensions, but he was sure that they would not long remain in Faerûn, whatever happened. He ended his spell and brought himself back to wakefulness in the real, physical world.

  “It is done,” he announced.

  Ilsevele glanced around, surprised and asked, “Are you sure? It doesn’t seem like anything has changed.”

  “I’ve severed the daemonfey from this mythal. They will miss its power very shortly, I think. We should get out of here before they do. Everybody, join hands.”

  “I’m all for that,” Maresa replied. “Where are we going?”

  Araevin hesitated.

  “I hadn’t thought that far ahead,” he admitted.

  “Evereska?”

  The others nodded agreement. He stepped over to his companions, rested one hand over Ilsevele’s and the other over Mar
esa’s, and cast the final teleporting spell he had readied for the day. The four of them disappeared from the daemonfey vaults beneath Myth Glaurach.

  “What in the world?” Seiveril whispered.

  He paused in his fighting, staring at the scene around him. He was not alone. Elf, fey’ri, orc, and ogre alike looked up in amazement.

  Every demon on the battlefield stood transfixed, screeching in immortal rage and agony as brilliant white spears of light struck down from above, pinning each in place. Tendrils of colorless power arced and snapped from demon to yugoloth, covering the battlefield in an electric web of magical fire.

  The white spears of light grew brighter still, broadening into shining columns that engulfed the monsters of the lower planes.

  The pillars of light vanished all at once, and with them each of the demons, devils, yugoloths, and fiends who had marched with the daemonfey army. Seiveril sensed the abrupt banishment of the monsters from Faerûn as a wave of icy severance that rippled across the battlefield and back again. He blinked the afterimage of the brilliant spears from his eyes, astonished.

  “Seiveril! What just happened?” Fflar demanded. The moon elf shielded his eyes with his left forearm, holding Keryvian in his right. Despite all the blood the ancient baneblade had spilled that evening, its steel was still pure and unsullied. The holy fire of the sword burned it clean of demon blood.

  “The demons were unsummoned,” Seiveril answered. “They’re banished. Whatever was holding them here has failed.”

  “Will they return?” Fflar turned, sweeping his eyes over the battlefield on all sides. “Are they truly banished, Seiveril?”

  “I believe they are,” Seiveril replied. He had sufficient skill in summoning spells to recognize the end of one when he saw it. He surveyed the battlefield, looking for any sign of the fiends. Everywhere he looked, the remaining warriors of both sides still stood amazed.