Skein of Shadows (dungeons and dragons) Page 11

  Fair enough. But that reminded Sabira of the question she really wanted answered.

  “Why doesn’t Zawabi want the Wayfinder expedition inside the refuge?” she asked, frowning as she thought back on the warforged’s words. Kupper-Nickel had told her about the djinn who controlled the oasis from his circular prison at the eastern edge of the small settlement. The Wayfinder had, however, neglected to mention that the powerful creature and the man who was supposed to lead her to Tilde were at odds with each other.

  “He believes nothing good can come of opening the pits of Khyber up to surface exploration.”

  “You’ve seen the trouble Lailat’s caused,” Quilli piped up. “Can you blame him for being worried about what ir’Kethras might stir up?”

  “Who is Lailat?” Sabira asked before the dwarf inquisitive could beat her to it. The two warforged and the orc gathered around to hear the answer.

  It was Kupper-Nickel who responded.

  “A demoness known as the Queen of Six Swords who dwells in Serpent’s Pass. Zawabi has long feuded with her, but there is little he can do against her directly from the confines of his circle.”

  “Six swords?” Greddark asked, puzzled. “So, what? She’s indecisive? Uses a different one every day and rests on Sar? Doesn’t sound like much of a threat to me.”

  “No…,” Sabira said slowly, thinking. A female demon who used six swords and laired in a place named for a serpent. She’d received training on all manner of foul creatures she might face in the performance of her duties for House Deneith. Though she’d never encountered one, she knew what Lailat must be. A single one of the demoness’s foul sisters had once wiped out almost an entire contingent of Deneith Defenders who’d passed too near her lair in the aptly named Demon Wastes of western Khorvaire.

  “No. If I’m right, she’s a very dangerous threat indeed.”

  At Greddark’s quizzical look, she continued.

  “Lailat is a marilith.”

  The only change in Greddark’s expression was a slight raise of his bushy eyebrows; her revelation had clearly not enlightened him.

  “A marilith is a demon with the upper body of a six-armed woman and the lower body of a snake. One of them took out Lavira Tagor’s entire bodyguard in the Labyrinth.” Well, most of her bodyguard. One man had survived to see the then-Keeper of the Flame back to civilization. With the help of a tribe of orcs who worshiped their own Binding Flame, the lone Defender had guided Keeper Tagor back across the Icehorn Mountains into the relative safety of the Eldeen Reaches.

  What the Keeper had been doing in the Demon Wastes at the time was anyone’s guess, but Baron Breven had decided it wasn’t worth the lives of any more of his people and canceled the religious leader’s contract after that.

  Greddark did look surprised at that, and even more so when Jester interrupted.

  “Oh, I think I know that one! Though in the version I heard, one man survived. Of course, I’m sure that was pure embellishment on the part of the storyteller. It makes for a more exciting story if a single survivor lived to tell the horrors that the Keeper himself would never reveal. I’d have done the same, if I’d been the bard spinning the tale. Then tailored the manner of those horrors to the tastes of my audience, to better encourage their coins into my hat.” The red-armored warforged paused, metal finger to lipless metal mouth. “Well, if I had a hat, of course. I should probably see about acquiring one.”

  “One Defender did survive,” Sabira said shortly, sorry now she’d brought it up. She couldn’t help thinking of Elix being summoned by the new Keeper, and wondering if whatever mission the girl had for him might end the same way. Or worse. “But that’s not the part of the story that should concern you.”

  “Oh?” Jester asked, and Sabira made a note to see about outfitting the would-be bard with moveable eyebrows. She was sure some artificer-maybe even Greddark-could come up with a trick to make it work, and it would add even more drama to his theatrical tones, make those coins jump from purse to hat that much faster.

  “ One marilith took out close to a dozen Defenders-that’s more than twice our number of extremely well-trained fighters, in case some of you aren’t quite so good with math. The djinn who controls this place can’t even face one of them alone, but she and her kind are not what he’s afraid of-they’re not why he won’t let ir’Kethras set foot in his oasis.”

  She paused, waiting for the question.

  Surprisingly, it was Skraad who obliged.

  “Then what is he afraid of?”

  “That whatever we’ll find in Tarath Marad will be even worse.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Mol, Barrakas 9, 998 YK

  Zawabi’s Refuge, Xen’drik.

  After Jester’s scare, Sabira declared that there would be no jumping from the gangplank, Zawabi’s paranoid edict notwithstanding. There was more than one way off an airship, as she well knew-though the last time she had cause to leave one without the benefit of a gangplank, there’d been a few enraged yrthaks involved. After she related the tale to Greddark, the artificer made a few adjustments and their motley group disembarked the airship on life rings, tethered to the deck with long ropes and weighted down with sand bags for a speedy, but relatively safe, descent.

  When they were all on the narrow ledge, spread out like statuettes on a shelf, Sabira barked out quick orders. She wanted to get moving before the wind blasted them again. The footing was much less sure here, and they no longer had the dubious protection of the railing between them and the canyon floor. And while the distance they had to fall from the ledge was shorter than it had been from the deck of the airship, it would also now involve bouncing off the canyon wall, so the end result was likely to be the same-bloody and decidedly unpleasant. Better to get on firmer ground where the capricious wind was an annoyance, not a deadly threat.

  Sabira sent the two warforged and Skraad climbing up the western side of the canyon to where ir’Kethras’s caravan waited. Meanwhile, she and Greddark made their way up the eastern side toward the settlement, where Kupper-Nickel had told them they could find the other Wayfinder. Quilli had agreed to accompany them at Kupper-Nickel’s insistence, ostensibly to keep them from coming to unexpected harm on the precarious route to the oasis. Sabira had no doubts about the sailor’s real job, however-preventing them from doing anything to anger Zawabi and endangering the warforged Wayfinder’s berthing rights.

  They followed the narrow ledge along the canyon wall, in some places having to inch along slowly with their backs pressed up against the sheer rock. Sabira couldn’t fathom how ir’Kethras was able to get supplies up this tortuous route. Breven had mentioned that the Wayfinder was a wizard; perhaps he teleported them from the oasis to the caravan? She certainly hoped so. She didn’t really want to have to make this trip twice.

  The ledge finally widened out and joined the rising canyon floor. As they climbed upward, small patches of green scrub began to appear, nurtured by water from the nearby oasis. By the time they’d reached the plateau that housed the djinn’s settlement, they were greeted by massive trees older than Sabira and Greddark put together, their drooping green limbs dotted with white and purple flowers.

  The path led them up behind one of the settlement’s large white stone and wood buildings. As they passed it on their right, Quilli told them it housed Masei’s Imports, which was actually an export business. Sabira imagined it wasn’t a particularly profitable one-in order to export products, you had to have things people actually wanted to buy. What could the owner possibly have to sell, other than sand, rocks, and an occasional scorpion stinger?

  Another building on the left played home to a dwarf smith and her team of apprentices who made finely crafted weapons for those foolhardy enough to come to the desert without their own. Greddark perked up at the woman’s name.

  “Forgemaiden? I knew a pair of sisters from that family back in the Holds. Hair like molten gold, arms like warhammers, legs-”

  “I don’t really want to know
what their legs were like, thanks,” Sabira said quickly, wrinkling her nose in distaste. Dwarven compliments ran the gamut from utilitarian to graphic and often included detailed descriptions of the exploits that had prompted the appreciative remarks in the first place. Not the mental image she wanted in her head when she met Brannan ir’Kethras for the first time. Or ever, really.

  “I wonder if this Jaidene is a younger sister, or maybe a cousin. Come to think of it, the hilt on my blade is a little loose. Maybe-”

  “You’d have better luck at the Watering Hole at this time of day,” Quilli interrupted with a salacious grin, pointing up ahead and to the left. “She’ll be taking breakfast there with her apprentices and the refugees. So the forge’ll be empty, if she decides to finish early and give you a look at her… warhammers.”

  “Onatar’s branding iron, don’t encourage him!” Sabira swore at the halfling sailor, but Quilli just laughed.

  Greddark quirked a bushy eyebrow at the two of them.

  “I think I’m insulted. I assume we’ll be leaving at sundown. That’s not near enough time for a dwarf of my considerable knowledge to truly appreciate a good warhammer.” He harrumphed and stalked off in the direction Quilli had indicated. The two women followed him up a wooden ramp onto a stone patio that boasted a large bonfire and several long tables filled with people eating and talking quietly. A dark-skinned human woman in red dancer’s silks greeted them warmly as they entered the outdoor tavern.

  “Hello, travelers. My name is Oh’tula.”

  She gestured to the end of one table where three spots were just opening up as an old human couple followed another red-garbed woman toward some wagons clustered not too far away. As they took the newly-vacated seats, a yellow-eyed warforged came up to them.

  “The name’s Raff. I run this little watering hole. Can I get you something?”

  Greddark opened his mouth to speak, then closed it again as he caught sight of something just beyond the warforged. Sabira, who was sitting across from the dwarf, turned to look at what had caught the inquisitive’s attention. It was another dwarf-a woman, with long blonde hair flowing free except for a single braid over each ear and thickly muscled arms adorned with wide gold bands. Jaidene Forgemaiden, she presumed.

  As Sabira turned back, Greddark was rising. He returned Sabira’s dark look with a shrug.

  “What? The hilt really is loose.”

  Then he looked up at Raff with a hopeful expression.

  “Tell me you have tea, and I may never leave.”

  As Greddark sipped his sweet mint tea and plied his countrywoman with news of their homeland in exchange for information on the desert, Sabira sampled cactus sap and boiled scorpion and waited for ir’Kethras to arrive. Having fought many of her breakfast’s larger brethren in the islands north of Stormreach, Sabira was somewhat dubious about trying the desert delicacy, but she found that the meat inside the hard carapace was actually both tender and flavorful. The sap, on the other hand, was thick and oily and left her wanting to go drink from the oasis.

  “In the desert, water is a kiss.”

  Startled, Sabira looked up to see yet another dwarf standing in front of her, this one with an odd spiraling tattoo that started up on his forehead, curved down across his right eyelid and continued on to his cheek. There, the swirling design almost disappeared into a thick brown beard that was plaited into two heavy braids, both of which were free of adornment. He wore a blue shirt, brown vest and green pants and boasted a painful-looking sunburn across every exposed inch of flesh.

  “Wayfinder Skavyr,” he said by way of introduction, understandably not offering her one of his very red hands. He nodded at the halfling. “Quilli. You and your tart tongue can run back to Kup now. I’ll take responsibility for your ‘guests’ for the nonce.”

  Quilli snorted, clearly not liking being dismissed, but liking her job of nursemaid to Sabira and Greddark even less.

  “You just make sure Zawabi knows that,” the sailor said warningly as she stood. “After what happened last time-”

  “Is that old rust-bucket still complaining about that? Brannan paid him for his losses. I don’t know what he’s so worried about, anyway. What’s Zawabi really going to do from inside that circle? The djinn needs Kup as much as Kup needs him-who else is going to ferry fighters out to this Forge-forsaken place to do his bidding, if not the Wayfinders?”

  Quilli’s expression hardened and she crossed her arms in front of her chest, waiting. Still seated at the table, Sabira had a lower vantage point, and she could see what the dwarf couldn’t-the halfling’s fingers twitching toward the dagger she wore on her belt.

  Skavyr heaved a long-suffering sigh.

  “Fine. I’ll make sure the djinn knows. Happy now?”

  Quilli’s fingers relaxed, as did Sabira. She wasn’t sure what she’d have done if the sailor and the Wayfinder had come to blows. She had a feeling Zawabi wouldn’t consider his refuge to be part of her jurisdiction as a Sentinel Marshal, and she didn’t think she could argue the point. Nor did she know which Wayfinder it behooved her to ally with-Kupper-Nickel or Brannan. Brannan could take her to Tilde, but Kupper-Nickel was the only one who could get her home again afterward. Then again, there was a better than fair chance she wouldn’t make it that far, so she should probably put her money on Brannan.

  “Fair winds and following seas,” Quilli said to her, touching the brim of her hat briefly before taking her leave of them.

  Skavyr slid into the halfling’s seat across from Sabira.

  “ Sarrgh,” he muttered under his breath, and Sabira blinked at the insult.

  “I think it’s rather unlikely that her father was a manticore, considering her lack of facial hair,” she remarked. “Her mother could have been an orc, I suppose-I’d have guessed a kobold, myself.”

  Skavyr looked at her in shock for a moment, then threw his head back and laughed. His great, throaty guffaws rang off the rocks, echoing through the canyon settlement. Judging from the surprised looks he got in response, the Wayfinder wasn’t normally prone to mirth. And given the way his laughter trailed off into hoarse coughing, that was probably a good thing.

  “Brannan didn’t mention you spoke the language of the Holds.”

  “I imagine there’s a lot he didn’t mention, since there’s a lot he doesn’t know,” Sabira replied. The Wayfinder appeared to reassess her, his eyes taking in everything from the urgrosh on her back to the scars on her armor. She waited for the inevitable recognition, but if the dwarf knew the significance of the weapon she bore, he gave no sign of it. Sabira felt a moment of relief. And if there was also a brief, unexpected sting of disappointment, she pretended not to notice.

  “Probably so,” the dwarf agreed affably enough. “He asked me to be on the lookout for you. He’s busy buying a severed gnoll’s paw from our local dust and dung seller, who swears up and down it’s actually a rakshasa hand. As if anyone who got close enough to one of those fiends to maim it would live long enough to try and hawk its body parts out here in the desert. Either way-paw or hand-Brannan got pretty excited when he heard about it. Ran straight over there. No idea what he’d want the thing for-some new spell he’s working on, I suppose. Anyway, I’m sure he’ll be back as soon as he’s done haggling.” Just then, a female drow walked up the ramp, ignoring Oh’tula’s greeting as she made for Raff. Her face was scarred and marked with white paint and she carried a scimitar in one hand, eschewing a scabbard.

  “Well,” Skavyr amended quickly, “he’ll be over as soon as he’s done and she leaves. Calyx Shattermoon. Just as nasty as the Vulkoorim she abandoned, that one.”

  Sabira studied the drow as Skavyr sat in Greddark’s spot. She had heard of dark elves who worshiped Vulkoor, a primitive scorpion deity revered in both the deep jungles and dry deserts of Xen’drik, but she’d never encountered one herself. The drow who lived outside Stormreach were far more likely to belong to the Sulatar, a tribe with an affinity for fire in all its many forms. Sabira knew litt
le about the history of the drow, but as near as she could piece it together, back when the elves had been slaves of the giants, the Vulkoorim rose up against their oppressors while the Sulatar remained loyal. The two tribes had been at odds ever since.

  Sabira wasn’t quite sure where the Umbragen fit into that hazy picture, though if she had to hazard a guess, she’d peg them as an offshoot of the rebel Vulkoorim. The fact that at least a portion of them appeared to worship yet another creature with too many legs lent some credence to that theory. She supposed she could ask Brannan, if the Wayfinder ever deigned to make an appearance.

  Or maybe she’d just ask the Vulkoori woman.

  “You could do that, I suppose,” Skavyr commented when Sabira evinced her curiosity. “But you should probably know she almost killed Brannan’s guide the first time he brought the Umbragen into the refuge. Called him ‘viler than even the clawborn.’ Considering the clawborn are the ones who bound her and left her helpless in a scorpion breeding pit as part of her initiation rites, and she thinks he’s worse… well, I wouldn’t necessarily go around advertising that you and he were going to be traveling partners soon. At least not where she can hear you and has room to draw a blade.”

  Good point. Maybe she’d just stick with her original idea of asking Brannan.

  As she waited for the Wayfinder to finish up his paw-haggling, she quizzed Skavyr about his experiences in the Menechtarun. Every so often, she’d overhear snippets of Greddark’s conversation with Jaidene-purposeful on the inquisitive’s part, she thought, to impart information to her without seeming to do so. But the multitude of dwarven voices around her, including a few scattered refugees from a prospecting mission gone wrong, reminded Sabira sharply of her latest visit to the Holds, though it was never so hot there, or so dry. And of course remembering the cold, hard mountains made her homesick for Karrnath, and the warmth of Elix’s arms.

  But thinking of the Sentinel Marshal captain brought back a sudden image of him from her dreams, splashing into that pit of bubbling magma, incinerated in a matter of agonizing seconds. The scene was so vivid that she could actually smell the hint of burnt flesh and hair and she thought for a moment she might vomit up her breakfast. But, no, it was just another specialty from Raff’s Watering Hole-goat, or maybe boar. Sabira took a deep, steadying breath and tried to focus on what Skavyr was saying.