Skein of Shadows (dungeons and dragons) Read online

  Those would be easy enough for her to bypass now that she knew they were there, but she had to assume the circular chest was trapped as well.

  “Harun, toss me a dagger.”

  The Blademark peeled a blade from a brace he wore across his chest and flipped it to her, never taking his eyes off the surrounding walls and their purplish, pulsing runes.

  Tilde caught the dagger easily by the hilt, and hefted it in her hand for a moment, gauging its weight. Then she reversed it so that she was holding it by the blade, aimed, and threw.

  The weapon flew through the air, straight at the chest. Just before it would have reached the smooth wood, electricity arced out from the base of the chest, forming a crackling blue shield. The dagger bounced off the magical barrier and clattered to the floor, its blade twisted and smoking.

  But Tilde had the measure of the chest’s defenses now and was able to dispel them with an arcane word. Another word, along with a feather from her pouch, and her feet left the ground. She sailed up and over the perilous floor to land safely beside the rock outcropping and the treasure it held. As she did, she heard a voice in her head.

  Welcome, Daughter of Sentinel. I have been waiting for you.

  The voice was soft, feminine, and utterly mesmerizing. Tilde thrilled to the words, her pulse pounding in her throat, then despaired and nearly cried out when the voice went silent.

  She understood intuitively that the only way to get it back was to open the chest, but that doing so required blood. She slammed her palm down onto a shard of rock jutting from the outcropping then jerked it sideways, cutting a long gash in the soft skin. As the blood began to seep from the wound, rich and red, she smeared her hand across the smooth, curved wood.

  Ahhh…

  The voice returned, and a shiver of pure pleasure coursed through Tilde at the approval she heard there. A noise started behind her, like stone grating on stone, and she thought she heard Harun call to her, but the words came from a vast distance and were soon forgotten as she basked in the voice’s approbation.

  Well done.

  As the voice purred in her mind, the top of the chest spun and lifted of its own accord, floating up into the air to reveal the coffer’s contents.

  Inside, on a cushion of rich crimson velvet, rested a figurine the size of Tilde’s head. A spider, its limbs formed of an iridescent metal and its abdomen a sphere carved from the largest, most flawless Khyber shard Tilde had ever seen. Light pulsed and swirled in its blue-black heart, and Tilde could not stop herself from reaching out to it, even as a small voice in the back of her mind screamed at her to stop. But Tilde could no more heed those distant screams than she could the tortured ones coming from Harun’s throat, somewhere behind her.

  As her fingertips brushed the surface of the dragonshard, the metal spider reared up and sank its icy-cold fangs into her wrist. Pain unlike any Tilde had ever known stabbed up her arm and into her chest, and she knew she was being poisoned. But even as she thought that, the pain changed, became hotter, sharper, more intense. She realized it wasn’t just poison flowing through her veins.

  It was corruption.

  As she fell into unconsciousness, she found some last vestige of will to reach up and snap her gold medallion in half. With the last of her strength, she called out to Shieldwing. The bat, still half-mad with the noise of the high-pitched alarm and now with his mistress’s agony, flew at her, his claws gouging her throat as he snatched the chain from around her neck.

  “Ned…,” she murmured regretfully, sinking into darkness, only to hear the voice respond again, this time with obvious hunger.

  Saba.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Mol, Lharvion 23, 998 YK

  Vulyar, Karrnath.

  Sabira Lyet d’Deneith stretched and yawned without opening her eyes, luxuriating in the feel of the soft feather mattress and fine linens. After a week of hard riding on the back of a recalcitrant carver, she’d have been happy with a cot and a blanket, so the huge bed seemed like a gift from Olladra, the Sovereign Goddess of Feast and Fortune. As did the man Sabira shared it with.

  She reached out blindly toward the other side of the soft mattress, expecting to feel the warmth of Elix’s skin beneath her seeking fingers. Instead, all she felt was a tangle of cool sheets.

  She cracked one bleary eye open to confirm what her hand had already told her. Elix had left sometime while she slept, not wanting to wake her after the exhausting week she’d had. Sunlight slanted into the bedchamber from the west, and Sabira realized she’d slept through half the night and most of the day. She needed to get up. Today was her Badge Day-the anniversary of the day she’d been inducted into the elite ranks of the Sentinel Marshals-and though Elix had tried to hide it from her, she knew he had a special dinner planned in her honor. And while she still wasn’t sure it was an occasion worth celebrating, she wasn’t churl enough to spoil his surprise, especially now that they had a chance to be together without any unwanted missions or unhappy memories to come between them.

  Throwing the blankets off of her, Sabira scrambled from the bed and went to the wardrobe. Though she still had a room over at the Whetstone, she spent enough time at Elix’s family manor that she’d moved most of her clothing and other personal belongings here to his suite of rooms. She opened the intricately-carved darkwood door to reveal several sets of clothes hanging neatly, including those she’d worn last night, now cleaned and pressed. Her shard axe hung in its harness on the back of the door, the Siberys dragonshard from which the urgrosh derived its name glinting golden in a stray sunbeam.

  She paused, considering. The urgrosh was so much a part of her, she felt naked when not wearing it for any length of time, but it was hardly appropriate dinner attire, especially in the home of one of the wealthiest and most influential members of House Deneith. Count Wilhelm d’Deneith-Elix’s father and her old partner Leoned’s uncle-might not say anything about her spending more nights than not under his roof, but he’d definitely have a scathing comment or two for her if she showed up at his table with a weapon on her back.

  She ran regretful fingers over the shard axe’s leather-wrapped haft and turned her attention to finding something suitable to wear. Wilhelm also insisted that his houseguests dress for dinner, which was why she seldom stayed to eat.

  After a moment of indecision, she selected a pair of gray leather pants with marginally fewer stains than the rest. Then she chose one of Elix’s crisp white tunics emblazoned with the Deneith chimera done in the House’s signature green and yellow-the lion head on her right shoulder, the goat on the left, and the dragon front and center on her chest. Her boots had also been scrubbed while she slept, so after plaiting her copper-colored hair into a quick braid, she pulled them on, spared a quick glance at the mirror hanging on the back of the other wardrobe door, and decided it would do. Wilhelm should know her well enough by now to realize that clean was about as close to dressed up as she was ever likely to get.

  She exited Elix’s rooms and followed the long hallway to the massive double staircase that dominated the manor foyer. Thick Brelish rugs silenced her footsteps, and the portraits of generations of Deneiths watched her impassively as she passed beneath their hard eyes and proud chins. She paused, as always, at the last painting on the left before the hallway gave way to the foyer balcony.

  Leoned’s dark eyes looked down on her, and not even the artist’s heavy hand and penchant for grimness could completely hide the twinkle that always lay in their depths, accented by the small scar above his left eyebrow. A scar she had given him, during a sparring session where he hadn’t moved quite fast enough.

  Once, that familiar face would have filled her with sharp guilt and suffocating grief, but now there was only a deep sadness and, sometimes, the beginnings of a smile. Ned had been a good partner, and he would have made an outstanding Marshal. She wouldn’t be celebrating her own Badge Day this evening if it weren’t for him and the sacrifice he’d forced her to make, but she no longer blamed him fo
r that. Just as she no longer blamed Aggar, the dwarf he’d died to keep safe. Or even herself, for choosing between them.

  Well, most of the time, anyway.

  A bell sounded somewhere on the lower level, and Sabira left off her musing to hurry down the staircase and into the small, intimate dining room just off the kitchen where the Count usually took his meals. To her surprise, the room was empty.

  Frowning, she made her way through the kitchen toward the formal dining room, her mouth beginning to water as the scents of all her old favorites wafted enticingly around her. The heady aromas of vedbread-still warm enough that the cheese inside would be gooey-brine sausage stew, and apple and ice-berry tarts filled the air, and her stomach grumbled in response. Sabira realized she hadn’t eaten when she’d arrived last night; she’d been too tired to do more than take a quick bath and tumble into bed, and Elix’s waiting arms.

  The thought of the young captain eased the frown from her face, and the corners of her mouth were just twitching upward when she pushed open the servants’ door and entered the dining room. The fledgling smile froze on her lips when she saw the room’s occupants.

  There were guards at both the kitchen door she’d entered through and on either side of the dining room’s main doors. Stone-faced dwarves in the livery of House Kundarak stood at attention, battle-axes in hand. She didn’t have to be a mage to know those blades were heavily-spelled, possibly the equal to her own urgrosh, the absence of which she felt sharply in the face of this unexpected threat.

  Count Wilhelm didn’t even allow his own guards in the dining room; he considered it uncivilized. If there were warriors from another House here, it couldn’t be with his permission.

  She tensed, mentally calculating how long it would take her to reach the knives on the table and how much damage she might be able to do with them before the dwarves brought her down. But as she surveyed the men sitting around the table, she saw that they were relaxed and seemingly unconcerned about the armed dwarves in their midst.

  Count Wilhelm was at the head, of course, his brown hair shot through with silver and still worn in tight military fashion, though he hadn’t served Deneith in that capacity in many years, leaving that to Elix, and Ned before him. But he still sparred with his swordmaster every morning, and Sabira knew soldiers half his age who weren’t as fit of form. There was no paunch hiding under the bloused shirt he wore, no slackness in the muscles that propelled him to his feet at her entrance, followed by three others.

  Elix, in another of his tunics, this one green with a small chimera embroidered over his heart, beat his father to his feet and smiled hugely at her over the laden table. Across from him, on Wilhelm’s left, was another dwarf-Aggar Tordannon, the heir to the dwarven city of Frostmantle and her own brother, now that she had been formally adopted into his clan by the Ceremony of Blood, Steel, and Stone. His fiery red beard clattered as he stood, the newly-polished beads woven into its many braids dancing with the sudden movement. True to form, Aggar’s clothes were as glaring as the Deneiths’ were understated-a scarlet tunic sporting the Tordannon crest, bright purplish blue pants and a cloak the color of new spring leaves, edged in orange. Just looking at him for too long made her head ache.

  But not as much as the sight of the man standing beside him. Though she hadn’t seen him in almost two decades, Sabira would recognize that stubborn set of jaw and the hard glint in those gray eyes anywhere-she saw them every time she looked in the mirror. The tension that had just begun to ooze away returned in full measure and her hand reached instinctively for an axe-haft that wasn’t there.

  Khellin Lyet, lately of Dreadhold.

  Her father.

  “Saba,” he said, the smile twisting his thin lips not quite making it to his eyes. “So good to see you again.”

  Sabira highly doubted that. That last time she’d seen him, he was being led out of a courtroom in Karrlakton after having been convicted for the attempted assassination of Baron Breven. Considering it was her testimony that had sent him away, she imagined she was the last person in all of Eberron he ever wanted to lay eyes on again.

  He was certainly on her list of least favorite faces, which begged a question.

  “What in the name of the Dark Six is he doing here?”

  Khellin’s smile widened, and even though her question hadn’t been directed at him, he replied with more than a hint of smugness.

  “Why, I was invited, of course.”

  Sabira turned her gaze to Elix, whose own smile disappeared at the look on her face.

  “ Why?”

  How? was another good question, considering Khellin had been sentenced to life, and no one got out of Dreadhold, Eberron’s most secure prison, on good behavior. Though she saw now that the older man still wore magewrought shackles on his wrists, so it was only a temporary furlough. Which also explained the presence of the Kundaraks. The dwarves were in charge of the prisoners at Dreadhold, and it was clear they felt their duty extended beyond the walls of that massive island fortress.

  “I asked him here, Saba,” Elix answered, holding out a pleading hand to her. “Come, sit, and I’ll explain everything.” When she hesitated, his gaze softened. “Please.”

  That was when she noticed the black velvet box sitting on the place setting next to his. Long and thin, and marked with the symbol of Boldrei, the Sovereign Goddess of Hall and Hearth, it was just the size to hold a necklace.

  Or a bracelet.

  Her knees went weak as she realized suddenly why Elix had arranged for her father to be released from prison, however temporarily. Why he’d asked Aggar, her hearthbrother, to come. Even why his own father was here.

  This wasn’t a Badge Day celebration.

  It was a betrothal party.

  “Elix, I-”

  She wasn’t sure what she’d been going to say. They’d only just admitted their feelings for each other a few months ago, having banished Ned’s ghost once and for all. And even though she loved having him to come home to-or having a home at all, for that matter-that little black box and everything it represented frankly terrified her, and she wasn’t entirely sure why.

  Was it because, on some level, it would mean giving up a measure of freedom? But freedom to do what? Sleep with any man she wanted? There was only Elix. Freedom to remain a Marshal? Elix was a Deneith-he’d never ask her to give that up. Freedom to come and go as she pleased, traipsing over miserable ground to track down dangerous criminals for ungrateful clients and not nearly enough pay? Was that really a freedom she wanted to keep?

  Was it because she still harbored some feelings for Ned, because deep down, she’d wanted him to be the one to give her such a bracelet, and not Elix? But, no. Leoned had been her partner, closer than even a spouse, and that hadn’t stopped her from caring for Elix, then or now.

  Or was it because, in her heart, she knew that as much as she loved him, she wasn’t good enough for him, and never would be?

  She was saved from having to answer by the big double doors at the other end of the dining room crashing open and a harried-looking steward rushing in, followed almost immediately by Baron Breven himself, the dragonmark on his cheek standing out in sharp contrast against the lividity of his face.

  “Wilhelm! What is the meaning of this underling refusing me entrance? Since when-”

  Then the bald, stern-faced patriarch of House Deneith caught sight of Khellin.

  “What in the name of the Dark Six-?”

  Sabira bit back a vindicated smirk as the head of her House was reduced to the exact same epithet she’d used at the sight of her father.

  Then Breven saw her, and understanding dawned. He looked over at Elix pityingly.

  “You’re asking her now?”

  Wilhelm moved out from behind the table quickly, hurrying over to the Baron and casting a dark look at his son as he passed.

  “My lord, please accept my apologies! If you’ll just join me in my study-”

  Breven interrupted him brusquely.
/>   “No time for that.” He held up a necklace from which dangled a golden semicircle depicting half of the Deneith chimera. Sabira and Elix exchanged shocked looks of recognition as Breven continued. “Tilde’s gone missing.”

  “… the drow-Xujil, I think his name was-made it back to the surface with the bat and gave the medallion to ir’Kethras, who had it couriered to me in Karrlakton.” They sat around the dining room table, the spread of Karrnathi delicacies untouched and long-cold before them. Khellin had been removed from the room under armed escort and was being held on Baron Breven’s private airship, which was docked at the nearby tower. Considering that the crew of the Barony was fiercely loyal to Breven, down to the Lyrandar who piloted it, Sabira wasn’t entirely sure he’d be making it back, Kundarak guards or no.

  When no one else responded, none of the Deneiths willing to state the obvious in front of Wilhelm, whose face was white with grief, Aggar finally spoke up.

  “It’s been almost two weeks, then. What reason is there to believe she’s even still alive?”

  Breven cast a glance at the Count, and Sabira thought she caught a glimpse of something suspiciously like sympathy there. He carefully avoided looking at her.

  “After Leoned died and we were unable to recover his remains from that cave-in, Tilde created a sort of reverse summoning spell to return her body to my study in Sentinel Tower in the event of her death. She didn’t want Wilhelm to have to suffer that same uncertainty twice.”

  Elix’s hand closed over Sabira’s beneath the table. She didn’t dare look at him for fear of releasing the tears that burned suddenly behind her eyes, but she returned his grasp with a grateful squeeze.

  “So you want to send in another party to do what, exactly?” she asked when she could be sure her voice wouldn’t break. “Rescue her? Or put her out of her misery?”

  Wilhelm blanched at her words and even Elix looked appalled, but Breven didn’t blink.