Troy Denning - Return of the Archwizards 2 - The Siege

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THE SIEGE Return of the Archwizards, Book II

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Cover art by Jon Sullivan

Map by Dennis Kauth

First Printing: December 2001

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 00-191039

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CHAPTER ONE

26 Tarsakh, The Year of Wild Magic (1372 DR)

Twenty Lords of Shade stood chest-deep in a lake that had never before known

the color of light, pulling strands of shadow up from the milky bottom and

splicing them into a curtain of umbral darkness that hung down from the

cavern's thousand-needled ceiling. Save for the ripples of grime rinsing out

of their travel-worn cloaks, the water was as clear as air, and thou-sands of

limestone cave pearls could be seen gleaming in the inch-deep shallows along

the shore. Farther out in the heart of the pool, a gar-den of white faerie

stalks rose out of the limpid depths and blossomed across the surface in a

carpet of alabaster mineral pads. Of the hundred natural wonders Vala

Thorsdotter had witnessed since departing her home in Vaasa, this one was

by far the loneliest and the eeriest, the one that felt most forbidden to

human eyes.

"This will be the ruin of it, you know."

Galaeron Nihmedu was sitting on his haunches beside Vala, watching the

shadow lords work. Tall and solidly built for a moon elf, he had the pale skin

and regal features common to his race, but two decades of Tomb Guard postings

along the Desert Border South had left his face rugged and weather-beaten

enough to be considered handsome even by Vaasan standards.

"The ruin of what?" she asked.

"The lake," Galaeron explained." The dirt washing out of their clothes will

settle on the cave pearls and stop them from growing. The oil from their

bodies will work its way into the mineral pads and break them up. A hundred

years from now, this will be just another mud hole."

Vala shrugged. "It's in a good cause."

"Spoken like a human." Galaeron's tone was more remorseful than unkind. "And

I find myself in agreement. How sad is that?"

"Not as sad as feeling sorry for yourself," Vala answered sharply. Elves

worshiped beauty like a god, but there were more important concerns at stake

than a lake no one ever saw, and she couldn't let its destruction sink

Galaeron into one of his dejections. "If we could ask Duirsar what he wanted,

I'm sure he'd tell us to go ahead."

"He would tell us to find another place to complete the Splicing—or not to

finish at all. Elves do not destroy nature's treasures to save their own."

Vala rolled her eyes. "Galaeron, you know this is the only way. If the

phaerimm aren't contained, they'll destroy more than this one lake. Far more."

"Being the only way seldom makes something the right way."

Galaeron looked back to the lake, watching the shadow lords weave their dark

curtain, then laid a hand on Vala's arm.

"But what's done is done," he said. "You can stop worrying about me."

"Sure I can," Vala said. "Someday."

Her gaze followed Galaeron's out across the lake. The cavern was lit by

three magic glowballs hovering among the stalactites. The shadow lords working

most directly beneath the brilliant light looked most human, with swarthy

complexions, dark hair, and gem-colored eyes. Others, laboring in the dim

boundaries or shadowed areas, looked more like silhouettes, their lithe bodies

bending and stretching in ghostlike whorls as they stooped down to pluck dark

filaments out of the water. They would braid three strands together and give

the resulting ribbon a single half twist, then splice it into the curtain

fringe. After half^ a dozen splices, they would weave a few strands of

shadowsilk into the fibers and speak an arcane word, and a dark fog would fill

the empty spaces and solidify into a translucent veil of murk.

Galaeron and Vala watched in silence for another quarter hour, then Galaeron

said, "They're sly, these Shadovar."

"That surprises you?"

"They a]ways surprise me." Galaeron pointed at the shadowy curtain. "You see

the way they're turning the fibers back on themselves?"

Vala gave a tentative nod. "I see, but I don't under-stand magic."

"Dimensional twisting," Galaeron explained, "to make the shadowshell

one-sided."

Vala gave him a blank look.

"So nothing can leave," he said. "Anything that passes into the shadow goes

all the way around the shell and

comes out where it entered. It would be like stepping through a gate and

always returning to the same garden."

"Not much gardening in Vaasa," Vala commented, trying to wrap her mind

around the idea of twisting a dimension. "You can tell that just by watching?"

Galaeron looked at her askance. "The magic isn't difficult." His expression

grew distant and dark, and he peered through a section of uncompleted curtain

into the black depths beyond. "If I can understand it, so can they."

" They,' Galaeron?" Vala asked. She didn't like the emphasis Galaeron had

placed on the word they—or the look that had come to his eyes. "The Shadovar?"

"No." Galaeron touched two buckles, and his Evereskan chain mail loosened

its form-fitting embrace. "Them. You know." He continued to speak as he pulled

off his armor. "They're out there, somewhere there in the dark."

"Who, Galaeron?" Vala asked, more concerned about what had come over

Galaeron than what was lurking in the dark. "The phaerimm?"

Galaeron nodded. "Giant scaly slugs that've been down here in the dark for a

long time, since before I felt the cave breathe, since before I followed that

little crack down here to this place no one has ever left."

He let his chain mail breeches clink to the ground, then waded out into the

water, kicking cave pearls loose with every step.

"They were out there then," he said, "and they're out there now, lurking in

the dark, their tails just aching to stick someone with an egg."

"Galaeron, you know that can't be." Vala was fumbling at her own buckles,

struggling to remove her heavy scale mail. "Wait!"

She was furious with herself for being caught off guard; she had seen him

slipping toward dejection but allowed herself to be taken in by his

reassurances.

"Galaeron, you're imagining things."

He half turned, a wild look in his eyes, and spoke over his shoulder. "You

know how they like that, Vala, putting an egg in some wretch's gut and

watching it grow until it's as big as his arm and squirming up his throat.

They love that. It's the only thing they love at all."

Vala let her armor clank to the stone and splashed in after him, her shins

still covered by her greaves. The Change had never been this deranged before.

"There aren't any phaerimm," she called, loudly enough to draw the attention

of the Shadovar. "Prince Escanor checked."

"No, he didn't. Not well enough." Galaeron sank to his chin as the bottom

dropped away beneath him, then floated back to the surface and began to swim

toward the curtain. "They're out there. It makes sense. They have to be

there."

Vala reached the drop-off and swam after him, half breaststroking and half

treading water because the weight of her greaves prevented her from floating

her legs to the surface.

"Maybe they don't know where we are," she suggested. "Or maybe they couldn't

get here. Not everyone can just turn into a shadow and slip down a crack, you

know."

Galaeron rolled into an easy backstroke. "How long did they take to capture

the Sharaedim? Five days—five days to take what Evereska has held for fifteen

centuries." A hand came down on the edge of a mineral pad, shattering the

whole thing and sending it fluttering to the lake's milky bottom. He appeared

not to notice. "If I can find this place, they can find this place."

"There is a difference between can and have, elf." It took a moment to

recognize the raspy voice. While Prince Escanor was ten places away splicing

strands into the shadow curtain, his magic made him sound as though he were in

the water beside them. "If the phaerimm were here, they would have attacked by

now."

"The phaerimm are here—they must be—and have they attacked?" Galaeron asked,

facing the prince. "No, they haven't. So, you're wrong. Absolutely wrong."

Escanor's copper-glowing eyes flared. "How am I wrong, elf?" He began to

wade toward them, a bugbear-sized silhouette limned in silver spell-light

"Explain."

Galaeron looked as though he were about to answer, then he cocked his head

and, passing within a lance-length of an astonished shadow lord, vanished

through a breach in the curtain. Vala followed as quickly as she was able, but

the steel greaves on her shins made her slow. Escanor, swimming as well, beat

her through the gap. She cringed at what was likely to follow. One did not

ignore a prince of Shade Enclave.

Vala passed through the gap and found them standing close together in the

shallows, Galaeron's lean form submerged to the waist and Escanor's to the

knees. Like all the shadow lords, the prince was swarthy and powerful, with a

mouthful of ceremonial fangs and a long, raw-boned face that lent a demonic

aura to an already otherworldly mystique. They were standing close together,

speaking intensely but quietly.

"... are spell collectors," Galaeron was saying. He sounded less irrational

but just as intense. "They haven't attacked because they want to watch the

Splicing."

"You suggest they're spying on us?" Escanor asked.

"If I can learn to use shadow magic, why can't the phaerimm?" Galaeron

replied. "If they understand it, they control it."

"What you say stands to reason, as far as it goes." Escanor glanced over as

Vala touched bottom beside them, then looked back to Galaeron. "But if the

phaerimm were here, we would have detected their magic. They cannot hide that

from us."

"Only phaerimm know what the phaerimm can do," Galaeron said. He was looking

past the prince into the darkness, studying it as though he could find the

enemy by sheer force of will. "And only a fool would believe otherwise."

Escanor's eyes brightened to a fiery red. "Watch that tongue, elf. A shadow

crisis excuses only so much."

Vala slipped between the two, placing her back to Escanor and raising a hand

to silence the elf before he could make a retort. "Galaeron, you know better.

The Shadovar have killed more phaerimm than all of Evereska's High Mages

together, and Prince Escanor has slain three personally. If there is a fool

here, it is the one who speaks to him as though he were some Waterdhavian

pikesman on his first march beyond the city gate."

The rebuke shocked Galaeron into silence, for Vala was the one person in the

world whose loyalties he could never question, the one person in the world who

could break through the Change to tell him such things. Together, they had

traveled the dark pathways of the shadow fringe, fought beholders, liches, and

illithids, seen their friends and comrades die in ways horrible beyond

imagining. Vala had stood fast through everything and nursed him back to

health when all was done, and that had connected her to his true nature in a

way no shadow crisis could obstruct.

Galaeron continued to stare past Vala and Escanor into the darkness for a

long time, then finally shifted his gaze back to the Vala and said, "I didn't

mean to imply that the Shadovar are anything but the finest warriors."

He looked to Escanor, but his eyes retrained distant and dark. "The prince is

right. If the phaerimm were using magic to conceal themselves, I'm sure your

divination spells would reveal where they're hiding."

Galaeron held Escanor's gaze a moment, then glanced toward the cave ceiling.

The prince seemed oblivious. "Good." His eyes did not even stray from

Galaeron's face. "We're almost done with the Splicing. Evereska need hold only

a few months longer, elf. The phaerimm are doomed."

"My city is grateful for the aid of Shade Enclave, Prince, but it would not

do to underestimate our enemies." Galaeron furrowed his arched brows and again

rolled his eyes toward the ceiling. "I recall one of our high mages saying the

same thing shortly before a phaerimm larva tore its way from his throat."

This drew only a condescending smirk from the prince. "When will you learn,

elf? We are not your high mages." He reached over Vala to clap a huge hand on

Galaeron's shoulder. "The Shadovar have been preparing for this war for

centuries."

Vala barely heard this last part, for Galaeron's efforts had drawn her

attention to the mass of limestone fangs hanging down overhead, each with a

single drop of water clinging to its stony tip. With broad roots narrowing

down to sharp points, the stalactites were shaped more or less like phaerimm,

save that they lacked spiny hides and four thin arms. There were hundreds in

the lit area alone. At only three to six feet, most were too short to be

phaerimm, a few were so long their flattened tips actually touched the lake

surface, but a handful hung down in the ten-foot range. It didn't take Vala

long to locate three with suspiciously dry tips and odd dark lines where their

bases pressed against the ceiling.

"... that right, Vala?" Escanor asked.

"Is what right?" Hoping that all the blood had not drained from her face,

Vala tore her gaze from the ceiling and tried to look calm. "Sorry."

Escanor cocked a disapproving brow but said, "I was just assuring Galaeron

that we Shadovar were hardly likely to make the same mistake as the elves and

Waterdhavians."

"I'm sure you won't," Galaeron said, still trying to draw the prince's gaze

to the ceiling. "But new mistakes will prove—"

"Rare, I'm sure," Vala said, taking Galaeron's arm.

The prince should have recognized the elf's signal, and they didn't dare

push things too far. Once the phaerimm realized they were discovered, they

would attack instantly—and there were few mistakes more grave than letting a

phaerimm have the first blow.

"If you will excuse us, Prince," Vala said, "it's time we let you return to

your work."

Escanor dismissed them with an easy wave. "Of course."

Vala drew Galaeron away, her iron grasp permitting no argument. Once they

were a few steps away, with their backs facing the suspicious stalactites, she

released his arm and began to twist her hands through the gestures of

Evereskan finger talk.

You're never going to get Escanor to look up. As Vala made the statement,

she was careful to remain alert to any alien presences in her mind. The

phaerimm were not so adept at telepathy that they could eavesdrop on a

person's thoughts without revealing their own presence, but it never hurt to

be careful—not around these enemies. Are you sure they were phaerimm?

No, Galaeron admitted, but it's better to be sure they aren't. You saw what

I was looking at?

Disguised as stalactites, Vala said. Her tempo was slow and awkward, for it

was a complicated language and she

had only taken up its study as a way to pass the time while Galaeron lay

immobile with a pair of broken ankles. Dry tips and a dark line where they're

pressing their bases to the ceiling.

Galaeron raised his brow. I missed the lines, he said. We can't run the risk

of alerting them. We have to take them ourselves.

Ourselves? Vala shook a fist downward to show emphasis. How?

You take the closest one, Galaeron instructed. Throw your sword. I'll blast

the other with a shadow bolt.

Vala's fingers turned slow and clumsy. / thought you were done casting

spells.

You have another way? Galaeron's gestures came so fast and sharp Vala could

barely follow his meaning. Maybe you can convince Escanor he's wrong—without

alerting the phaerimm?

The question required no answer. Vala knew as well as Galaeron that the

prince could not be persuaded that he had made a mistake. They had no choice

except to launch the attack on their own, and that meant Galaeron would have

to use shadow magic to have any effect at all on the phaerimm, and using his

shadow magic meant giving a little more of himself over to the darkness that

was slowly devouring him from within.

Resigning herself to the heartache of watching the Galaeron she knew slip

even deeper into shadows, Vala gave a curt nod, then asked, What about the

third one?

You're joking, Galaeron replied.

/ could be wrong, but I'm not joking. One above Escanor, one over the

mineral pads—

That one I missed. Galaeron's fingers fell motionless for a moment, then he

said, /'// have to try a shadow door.

Bad idea, Vala said, even more concerned. Shadow magic was far more

dangerous for the wielder than

normal Weave magic. If a magic-user overreached his limits, he invited in just

the sort of darkness already consuming Galaeron. You're barely holding on as

it is.

Then it's good you are watching over me. I am grateful—very grateful.

Vala looked away, then spoke aloud. "Galaeron, it isn't fair to hold me to

that promise ... not now."

"Nevertheless, I do hold you to it." Galaeron's voice was firm. "When the

time comes, you must not hesitate."

"If, Galaeron." They reached the shore, and Vala sat down to remove her

greaves. "If the time comes."

Galaeron turned away without answering and started down the shore, moving

far enough away that they both could not be struck down by the same spell.

Vala looked back across the lake to where the shadow lords were just closing

the last few breaches in the shadow curtain. Though the shadow lords had left

their armor on shore, all were armed with glassy black weapons similar to

Vala's darksword—one reason, no doubt, that the enemy was being so careful to

remain concealed.

The two phaerimm Galaeron had noticed hung about fifty feet apart in a rough

line on the interior side of the curtain. On the flanks of their conical

bodies, Vala could see a regular pattern of bumps where their body thorns lay

concealed beneath the hardened lime-mud they had used to disguise their scaly

hides. The third phaerimm, the one Galaeron had missed, hung over the mineral

pads about forty paces away, barely noticeable in the gloomy boundary between

dark and light. Though Vala had no way of guessing whether the creatures had

seen enough to defeat the shadow curtain, the simple fact that they were

making no attempt to stop the final Splicing made clear what they believed.

Finding no signs of any enemies beyond the three already located, Vala stood

and waded back into the lake,

angling toward Prince Escanor to avoid alerting the phaerimm. She had no idea

how Galaeron had sensed the enemy's presence—or why that had brought on a

Change—but she felt confident in his conclusions. Every good warrior knew the

value of camouflage, and the thornbacks were nothing if not good warriors.

When Vala drew within throwing range of the nearest phaerimm, she stopped

and looked back. Galaeron was just setting a loop of shadowsilk on a stone

beside him. He peeled another strand off the mat of dull fabric he was

holding, then soaked it in a drop of armor oil and glanced in Vala's

direction. She nodded. He pressed the filament to the limestone wall, his lips

already moving as he spoke his spell incantation.

A film of oily shadow spread across the ceiling, filling the cavern with a

soft, rainlike patter as thousands of drops of water lost their tenuous hold

and plummeted into the lake. Vala drew her darksword and in a single smooth

motion sent it whirling up at the nearest phaerimm. The glassy black blade

tore a three-foot gash across the thornback's body and became lodged with

little more than the hilt showing.

The stain on the ceiling swept past overhead. The astonished phaerimm came

loose one after the other, the hardened lime-mud camouflage falling in cakes

from their squirming bodies and their strange language of winds stirring the

air into whistling vortexes. The phaerimm hit the water almost as one and sank

beneath the surface.

Escanor and his shadow lords stopped working and whirled toward the splash

rings, shouting to each other in their own language and trying to make sense

of what was happening.

"Phaerimm!" Vala stretched her hand toward the one she had attacked and

thought of her darksword, and the

blade rose out of the water and flew back into her grasp. "Three of them!"

She heard Galaeron intoning his second spell and looked over to see him

flipping the ring of shadowsilk toward the place the third phaerimm had

entered the water. A disk of black shadow appeared two inches above the

surface. Vala was distracted as the startled phaerimm activated their floating

magic and began rising out of the water. The two nearest the curtain came up

in the midst of the astonished shadow lords, who quickly proved the truth of

Escanor’s boasts by assailing them with shadow webs and darkswords.

Even caught off guard, the phaerimm reacted like the terrors they were,

unleashing a flurry of fire strikes and lightning bolts that left a dozen

Shadovar bobbing dead in the darkening waters. A pair of scorched shadow lords

popped up beside Vala, their arms and legs blasted off by the force of the

strike that had killed them. Vala threw her sword again, only to see her

target scythed down the middle by a falling wall of black glass as Escanor

unleashed his own magic.

Vala glanced over to see the third phaerimm's tail vanishing into the circle

of shadow Galaeron had placed over its splash ring. The elf himself was

pointing across the lake roughly in her direction. Knowing the creature would

be disoriented for a moment when it emerged from Galaeron's shadow door, Vala

nodded and reached out to summon her sword back.

Galaeron's finger shifted in Prince Escanor's direction.

"No, Galaeron!" Vala cried. "Here!"

Too late. The third phaerimm had already reappeared, stunned and disoriented

by its dizzying journey through the shadow plane. But Escanor happened to be

turning to attack their other surviving foe, and so this thornback

appeared behind him instead of in front. Vala's stomach turned to ice. With

the prince at least twenty paces away and in a direct line beyond the dazed

phaerimm, she did not dare throw her sword again.

She started toward him, yelling, "Escanor, behind you!"

The prince cocked his head in response but only stretched a hand toward the

second phaerimm, who was assailing five of his lords with a roaring storm of

meteors. A sphere of spinning darkness shot from his hand and streaked through

the thing's torso, leaving a basket-sized hole in the heart of its body. The

creature splashed into the lake and slowly sank out of sight.

The third phaerimm was already bringing its tail out of the water, ten steps

away.

"Watch your back!" she cried.

A murky aura of darkness—more of Galaeron's magic, Vala guessed—enveloped

the phaerimm, but the spell did not prevent the creature's tail from catching

Escanor in the pit of the stomach as he spun to meet the attack. The barb sank

to its root, doubling the prince over and drawing an eerie gurgle of anguish.

Vala hurled her darksword. The blade tumbled three times, then sank

hilt-deep in the phaerimm's torso. The creature began to flicker between

material and immaterial, and Vala was astonished to realize that Galaeron had

not cast his spell to protect the prince but to trap the phaerimm beside him.

Had Galaeron finally been taken by his shadow self?

Escanor wailed in pain and slipped off the barb, then rolled to his back and

floated, groaning. Vala called her darksword back to her grasp and began to

angle in the prince's direction.

"Vala, no!" Galaeron splashed into the water. "The phaerimm! It knows too

much!"

Vala glanced at the prince, who, unlike most of his wounded lords, was at

least floating face up. She decided to place her trust in Galaeron a little

longer. She sprang at the phaerimm, her black sword blocking the tail as it

arced toward her throat, lopping the dangerous barb off at the root. On the

backswing, she removed two of the thing's four arms, then reversed her grip,

jammed the blade into the creature's enormous mouth, and split it down the

side.

The dark aura vanished from around the phaerimm— only to reappear an instant

later as Galaeron recast his snare spell. The phaerimm flickered between

materiality and immateriality again as it tried once more to teleport away,

and again Vala sank her sword deep into its body. It pummeled her with one of

its remaining arms, and the other clamped onto her throat, trying to crush her

windpipe. She kneed it in the flank and felt sharp pain as one of its body

thorns impaled her thigh. The phaerimm began to overpower her, pulling her

face toward the fang-filled mouth atop its shoulders. She croaked in

Galaeron’s direction.

He was already pointing a sliver of obsidian at the creature and yelling a

string of mystic syllables. A finger-thin ray of darkness left his hand,

catching the phaerimm in one of its remaining arms and severing it at the

elbow. Vala snapped the other with a palm strike, then kicked free and brought

her darksword around in three eviscerating swings.

The thing's heart slipped out of the second gash, still beating. Vala sent

it flying off with a flick of her blade, and the phaerimm dropped, motionless,

into the water. She struck again and again, not stopping until she had opened

it from tail to lip and left it floating in the water like a dressed eel.

Galaeron waded up. "Are you hurt?"

"I'm alive." She shook her head clear and gave herself a cursory glance,

then looked over and found herself staring into a pair of black, empty eyes.

"G-Galaeron? How many spells did you cast?"

Instead of answering. Galaeron pushed her toward Escanor's floating form.

"See to the prince and the others," he said as he turned and started toward

the shadow curtain. "I'll finish the Splicing."

CHAPTER TWO

28 Tarsakh, the Year of Wild Magic

1 he city appeared just before dusk, hovering low over a rosy desert butte, a

distant diamond of umbral murk silhouetted against the purple twilight of the

eastern sky. As usual, it was surrounded by wisps of black fog, giving it the

appearance of a storm cloud, a mirage, or an angry djinn. The V-shaped specks

of a hundred or so vultures wheeled in lazy circles beneath the city, chasing

the constant rain of garbage that dropped from its refuse chutes.

"There," Galaeron said.

Though it had been two days since he'd completed the Splicing, the icy

tingle of shadow magic still permeated his body—and he hungered for more,

longed to cast spells until he was numb and cold from head to foot,

until he was filled with the power of shadow and beyond mortal frailty.

Instead, he pointed at the floating city and said, "See it?"

"So far?" Malik complained.

A pudgy little man with a moon-shaped face and bug eyes, Malik el Sami yn

Nasser was the Seraph of Lies, a favored servant of the evil god Cyric and an

oddly stalwart traveling companion who had saved Galaeron's life more than

once.

"I apologize for my accursed luck," the little man said. "It has always been

its nature that just when I think matters could seem no worse, a turn of bad

fortune comes along to prove me wrong."

"In this desert, things look farther than they are," Vala said. Limping a

little from her wounded thigh, she started down the dry wash at their backs.

"We'd better get moving, or we'll lose sight of it when dark really falls."

Nodding, Galaeron turned to follow. As a precaution against attack, Shade

Enclave appeared only briefly each evening and always in a different place.

Given that Escanor's company had failed to finish the Splicing and raise the

shadowshell at the appointed time, it made sense to put some distance between

the floating city and the Sharaedim battlefields. Assuming they were lucky

enough to reach the city before it vanished again, Galaeron only hoped they

would not fall victim to any new defenses intended for the phaerimm.

In the bottom of the wash, they found the Shadovar survivors preparing the

company's mounts for departure. Though most of the shadow lords had already

recovered from the cavern battle, Escanor had taken an egg when he was impaled

and remained incoherent with fever. The longer it stayed inside him, the

harder it would be to remove, but his chances were far better than

those of most humans would have been. Shadovar were fast healers. Most of

their wounds had closed within an hour after the battle, so it seemed likely

that the prince would survive even a difficult extraction.

Galaeron followed Vala over to the nominal leader of the group in Escanor's

incapacity, a ruby-eyed lord so swarthy that he looked more like an obsidian

statue than a live man.

"Lord Rapha," Vala said, "we've located the enclave."

"That is well." Rapha did not look up. He was looping a length of shadow

strand around the hands of a dead comrade, using it to secure the man in his

saddle. "We'll soon be ready."

Galaeron and his companions waited for Rapha to ask where or how far off the

enclave was, or to give some indication that he was concerned about getting

Escanor to the city quickly.

Rapha ignored them.

Finally, Galaeron said, "The enclave is a long way off. You might want to

send Escanor ahead."

The Shadovar fixed his ruby eyes on Galaeron. "Concerned for the prince, are

we?"

"Of course," Vala said.

"Most concerned," Malik agreed. He hesitated for a moment, then was unable

to keep from adding, "But we are even more concerned for ourselves. We know

who will be blamed if he dies."

This drew a sour smile from the shadow lord. Like everyone in the company,

Rapha knew that Malik had been cursed by the goddess Mystra to speak only the

truth or not all. It was an irony in which Shadovar seemed to take special

delight.

Rapha clapped a hand on the little man's shoulder. "You have nothing to

fear, my stubby friend. You were not even at the Splicing."

"But>>0M were," Galaeron said, wondering what Rapha was playing at. "You

know I meant no harm to the prince."

"I know what I saw," Rapha said. "You used a shadow snare to keep the

thornback trapped beside the prince."

"Had I let the thing teleport away, the shadowshell would be no prison at

all," Galaeron retorted. "Those phaerimm were there to learn its secret, and

what they discovered was important, or they would have attacked us long before

I found them."

Rapha considered this, then his voice grew quiet and menacing. "How is it

you know so much about the phaerimm, elf? Why could you find them when twenty

shadow lords could not?"

Galaeron glanced away. "I can't say why," he admitted. "It just seemed right

that they would be there."

"It just seemed right," Rapha echoed dubiously.

"I think his shadow knew," Vala said. "He didn't say anything about them

until his shadow self asserted itself."

Rapha shook his head impatiently. "The shadow self is only an absence of

what a person is, a darker image of himself that he creates simply by being

what he is. It cannot know more than its creator, any more than its creator

can know it."

Galaeron shrugged. "Then I can't explain it," he said. "I just had a feeling

they would be there—and I was right"

"And risking Prince Escanor's life?" Rapha asked. "You just had a feeling

about that?"

"I had to do it to save the shell," Galaeron said. "I knew that, just like I

knew the phaerimm would try to teleport away."

Rapha shook his head. "You can't be sure," he insisted. "Your shadow self

has you in its grasp. Your thinking could have been subverted—"

"But I can be sure that he needs a healer—and soon," Galaeron interrupted.

This Rapha was a sly one, accusing Galaeron of trying to harm the prince—and

wasting valuable time. "Unless you have some reason for delaying? Perhaps

you'd like to see Escanor hatch a thorn-back egg?"

Rapha's eyes flared from ruby to white-orange. "I have nothing but love for

all the princes of Shade, elf."

"Then wouldn't it be wise to have someone return him to the enclave at

once?"

"It would, had Prince Escanor been lucid enough to tell us today's word of

passing," Rapha said. "As it is, anyone who tries to enter through the shadows

will find himself plummeting through to the Barrens of Doom and Despair."

"So we must return the slow way," Vala said, placing herself between

Galaeron and Rapha to cut off further argument. "Can Escanor ride?"

"It would be better if he didn't," Rapha said. "Perhaps your friend would be

kind enough to take a passenger."

The shadow lord motioned across the wash, to where a grim-faced stone giant

with sad gray eyes was kneeling over a ten-foot block of quartzite. He was

clinking away with his sculptor's tools, fashioning a life-sized model of the

struggle between Escanor and the phaerimm that had wounded him. Though the

work was still rough, it was obvious by the snaking forms and undulating

hollows that he had captured not only the details, but the spirit and

swiftness of the battle—and from little more than a description of the events.

"I am confident Aris would be pleased to be of some small service to the

prince," Malik said. "While we were watching the camp, he said many times—if

once can be considered many—that he wished he were small enough to accompany

the rest of the company into the

Underdark and do his part to seal the fate of the phaerimm."

"Good. Will you be kind enough to ask him for me? Ill have the prince

brought over directly." Rapha waved Malik toward Aris, then turned to Galaeron

and Vala. "You can tell which mounts are yours? Well be leaving shortly."

"We'll be fine," Vala said. "I banded a leg on each of ours."

The precaution was not a frivolous one. The Shadovar's flying

mounts—veserabs—were odd, furless creatures that had no faces and uniform

midnight-blue skin. With four spindly legs, fan-shaped ears, and a pair of

gargoyle-like wings folded alongside their tubular bodies, they looked like an

unfortunate cross between bats and earthworms. Once they impressed on a rider,

their devotion was absolute—to the point that they would spit noxious fumes

into the face of anyone else who tried to mount them.

Galaeron followed her down the draw until they found a trio of veserabs

wearing copper bands on their legs. Vala pointed to one with a band on its

right foreleg. Galaeron gave the wing joint a tentative squeeze and slipped a

foot into the stirrup. The creature did not react until he lowered his full

weight into the saddle, when— much to his relief—an undulation of pleasure ran

down its long body.

A few moments later, Malik returned and climbed into his saddle, and Rapha

signaled the departure. The veserabs charged down the wash until they gathered

enough speed, then spread their wings and rose into the air in flawless

formation. Many of the shadow lords were tied across their saddles, but only

Escanor's mount was riderless. The company had recovered all of its casualties

and carried them through fifty twining Underdark miles back to the surface.

As they climbed out of the wash, a huge dome of darkness rose into view over

their shoulders at Anauroch's western edge. Even from a dozen miles into the

desert, the barrier was immense, curving away high into the sky and stretching

north and south as far as the eye could see. Through its black translucency,

Galaeron could just make out the stacked crests of the foothills of the Desert

Border South and, looming behind, the familiar crags of High Sharaedim itself.

He could not help thinking of what lay beyond those peaks, the vale and city

of Evereska—and his sister, Keya, safe within the city's protective mythal. He

knew better than to think that his warrior father had been lucky enough to

survive his duties to return to her side, but Lord Aubric Nihmedu was as

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THESIEGEReturnoftheArchwizards,BookII©2001WizardsoftheCoast,Inc.Allcharactersinthisbookarefictitious.Anyresemblancetoactualpersons,livingordead,ispurelycoincidental.ThisbookisprotectedunderthecopyrightlawsoftheUnitedStatesofAmerica.Anyreproductionorunauthorizeduseofthematerialorartworkcontainedherei...

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