It says something mildly stupid about me that this has been here all this time and I somehow never found it.
Well, at least I have now, and it's good so far! I'm only through chapter 3, but I found the FF.net version and favorited it so I can read at work. Awesome. ^_^
It says something mildly stupid about me that this has been here all this time and I somehow never found it.
Well, at least I have now, and it's good so far! I'm only through chapter 3, but I found the FF.net version and favorited it so I can read at work. Awesome. ^_^
To be fair, I'm horrible at self-promotion. Makes me feel all egotistical and dirty.
It says something mildly stupid about me that this has been here all this time and I somehow never found it.
Well, at least I have now, and it's good so far! I'm only through chapter 3, but I found the FF.net version and favorited it so I can read at work. Awesome. ^_^
To be fair, I'm horrible at self-promotion. Makes me feel all egotistical and dirty.
Glad you like it though. ^_^
If it makes you feel any better, I don't know thing one about self-promoting. I try, but I always get the feeling that I am doing something wrong.
Honestly, it's slow-going. I've had to readjust to a busy work schedule thanks to my new (and better!) job, so my free time to write has gone up in smoke. Plus I have an original piece that I've been trying to revise for my writer's group.
But I promise, this project has not been forgotten! It just may take a little while for the next installment this time around. If I don't have it done by the end of May, you can officially bonk me on the head.
*takes out his bonking stick* I'll hold you to that.
Just kidding. I know just how busy life can get. There's no need to rush things, so by all means, take all the time you need. Just know that I'll be waiting. I'm always waiting.
Honestly, it's slow-going. I've had to readjust to a busy work schedule thanks to my new (and better!) job, so my free time to write has gone up in smoke.
“How many are there?” Jaheira asked in a hushed voice.
Montaron reappeared, almost melted out of the shadows that clung to the cavern walls. “Three. One of ‘em’s usin’ those damn fire arrows though.”
The druid nodded solemnly, and gazed beyond the tunnel once again. The cavern opened into another hollow chamber, this one filled with a pool of water. After Imoen’s nearly fatal encounter across the lava bridge, the adventuring company dared not risk facing another ambush again. An expert at stealth and stalking, they relied on Montaron’s judgement to see what lay ahead—namely, the three kobolds poised to shoot them down before they crossed yet another stone bridge above the spring.
They didn’t have much cover between them and the kobold archers waiting across the water. By hugging the rock wall, they stood just out of bow range. If they meant to take the little buggers out, they would have to get closer and risk being shot. With six against three, the odds were in their favor, but as Markra’s gaze drifted back to Imoen, he shook that feeling off. After all, it would only take a single well-aimed arrow to bring one of them down.
“Very well,” Jaheira said again after a few long moments. “Everyone, come close to me. I’ve a plan that will strengthen our chances.”
The others did as she said, huddled close and surrounded her in a circle. Once they were settled, a purple light sparkled between Jaheira’s fingers.
“Facio. Voco. Ferre.” The magic words rolled off her tongue as her hands danced to a silent rhythm. In a flash, the orb of purple light spread from her hands and showered over the rest of the party, then transformed into a soft blue. Silvanus’s holy symbol—a green oak leaf—hovered above their heads, and even after it had disappeared, the air hummed with a power sacred to the forest god.
Markra couldn’t explain it, but as the spell fell into him, he felt stronger. More sure of himself, as if he could do anything so long as he had the blessings of a god on his side. And Silvanus would surely approve of their mission to restore balance in Nashkel, clear out the destructive kobolds, fill in the tunnels and return the land to its rightful state of forest and brush and—
Wait, what am I thinking? Markra blinked and shook his head, as if that could cast out the intrusive thoughts. Looking around at his companions, he could guess the rest of them were feeling the same. Montaron’s toothy grin seemed giddier than before, while Imoen licked her lips and reached for her bow quiver. Xzar’s brow furrowed as he also shook his head erratically. Of them all, Khalid was the only to stay neutral, perhaps because he’d felt the spell’s affects before.
“There,” Jaheira breathed as she lowered her hands. “Now that we’ve been endowed by the protection of Silvanus, our arrows will be more likely to find their mark, and theirs to miss.”
“I do hope you’re not trying to convert us to your forest-prancing ways, druid,” Xzar drawled with his arms crossed over his chest.
A wry smirk touched Jaheira’s lips, but did not reach her chilling eyes. “Nothing of the sort, Xzar; it only lasts a few minutes. Though once the spell’s worn off, you might find yourself dearly missing it.” Then she pulled out her sling and loaded a stone into it.
“On my count, we go. Hit as fast and hard as you can, and we might take them down before they draw their strings. Are we ready?”
They answered her with a series of nods, and drew all of their ranged weapons. Three with bows and three with slings.
Standing on a ledge overlooking the water, the three kobold archers chattered and chuckled amongst themselves. But Markra’s party were hardly soft-footed, heavy steps echoing off the hollow chamber. Upon hearing them, their canine ears twitched, and they aimed their bows at the approaching adventurers across the way. One arrowhead licked with the fire Montaron had warned them about.
They would not be given the chance to shoot.
All at once, three arrows and three polished sling bullets flew through the air and dug into the kobolds. With fletching speared through its eye, one of them shrieked and tumbled off the ledge, splashing into the water below. Another took a bullet to the head and an arrow to the chest. That one loosed an arrow just moments before it fell, but the shock made its aim flimsy, and the arrow veered off toward the water, several feet below the adventurers’ feet.
Only one remained, the commando armed with flaming arrows. Though two shafts dug into its leg and arm, and it’d took a stone just above its eye, the kobold barked and hissed with a vengeance as it drew back its bow and fired.
Khalid cried out as the blazing arrow pierced his shoulder. He’d been trying to reload his bow when the enemy caught the underside of his arm. Imoen shouted his name, but none of them could afford to stop firing with one kobold still alive. Sparing the half-elf a quick glance, Markra pulled back another arrow to his cheek and aimed straight for the kobold’s heart. In one swift flight, his shot found its mark, and the monster slumped to the ground.
With the enemy dispatched, everyone lowered their weapons. Jaheira rushed to Khalid’s side as he struggled to pull out the arrow shaft. But before her healing magic could engulf his wound, Khalid grabbed her wrist and held it in place.
“I-I am all right, dear,” he assured her. “It’s r-really not as b-bad as it looks… My armor took most of the b-brunt.”
Jaheira jerked her hand free as she shot him a scolding glare. “Don’t speak such nonsense. You could lose your entire leg, and you would still insist it wasn’t ‘as bad as it looked.’”
Despite her harsh words, her husband chuckled. “Please, love, I-I’m not that m-modest.” Though he winced as she squeezed his arm, as if to remind him what pain feels like. “Ah! All…all right, p-perhaps it is a little more than I th-th-thought…”
“You are a warrior, Khalid.” The soft blue light glowed in Jaheira’s hands once again as she pressed her fingers to his wound. “I’ll not risk you going into battle with a wound in your shield-arm.” Then she said the magic words, and his arm was like new again.
As Khalid was healed, Markra ventured toward the rocky bridge, gazed before him, and let out a low whistle of awe. A large rock dome took the center of the chamber, a cave within a cave surrounded by water on all sides. Faint light bounced off the glassy water and lit the place just enough to see, though Markra could not tell where it was coming from. He found one uneven hole in the side, near the ledge where the kobolds had stood watch and the only entrance he could see.
“I…think we might’ve found their lair,” Markra realized.
The others joined him, gazing at the egg-like cave for themselves.
“Yes,” Jaheira agreed with a nod. “So it would seem.” Then she stepped before them and took her rightful spot as leader once again. “All of you, remain cautious. We know not what we might find inside—perhaps an entire kobold horde, or worse. Silvanus’s blessing will last for a time yet, but once it’s worn off, I cannot cast another to protect us, especially if we’re caught in the lick of combat. Are we ready?”
They answered her by brandishing their melee weapons, and they crept inside.
Despite their worst fears, the cave was empty. Stalagmites grew out of the cavern floor along the walls and cast long shadows under the flicker of torches. Empty indeed, but habited, as the presence of fire told them. It was not very large; even in the low light, Markra could see the back of the cave. But there was a second passage on the right, a natural arch adorned with hanging stalactites. Much like a monster’s mouth and its rows of teeth.
Markra peered around the corner and found a second room that branched off the passage. Unlike the rest of the cavern, this space was furnished. Rugs covered the ground, purple and gray and adorned with tassels, while pillows piled into the corners. A round, wooden table hugged the left wall, paired with only two chairs. But the strangest object was a giant chair draped with a gray cloth in the farthest part of the room, elevated on a pair of makeshift platforms. A chest rested at its feet, like an offering box.
The elf’s brow furrowed as he stepped inside, one hand on his sword hilt. The person behind the mine’s sabotage must live in this room.
Before he could turn back and tell the others what he’d found, however, a guttural voice echoed off the walls.
“Eh? How’d you get in here?”
Markra froze. The stranger had been hiding in his blind spot, just beyond his line of sight into the chamber. Now that he’d stepped into view, Markra got a clear look at him: a half-orc, almost two heads taller than him, dressed in chainmail that clinked as he walked. It was the small tusks jutting over his lips, the faint green tint of his skin, and his sheer size that betrayed his ancestry. On a chain around his neck, Markra spotted the divine symbol of Cyric, a jawless skull inside a purple sunburst. Better known as the Prince of Lies.
Upon locking eyes with Markra, the half-orc raised his morningstar and his shield, taking a defensive stance. “Tazok must have dispatched you, and my traitorous kobolds let you pass, didn’t they? I knew I could not trust them! Armed as such, you have obviously been sent to kill me! By Cyric, not a measure of ore leaves these mines unspoiled, and I am still to be executed!? I’ll not lose my head over this!”
“Markra, what have you done?” Jaheira’s voice hissed as she and her husband appeared on his either side. But Markra held up a hand, urging them to be quiet and keep out of sight. A thousand thoughts swam through his head, trying to process every hidden message in the half-orc’s words. Tazok. His traitorous kobolds. Unspoiled ore. So this person had someone even higher above him giving orders, and the kobolds really were just pawns in a scheme.
Of the many stories he’d read and heard about half-orcs while growing up, none of them boasted to the race’s intelligence. Perhaps he could trick the cleric into giving more information. Even better, perhaps he could also avoid any potential violence.
“Uh…” Markra gaped a moment, trying to scrounge together a proper response. “Yes… Fool, Tazok is…very upset with you! Reveal your treachery, and perhaps he will spare you!”
The half-orc sulked, and he lowered his guard just an inch. “Tazok is unfair. I have no desire to cheat him, or thee!” Then he pointed to the chest beneath the giant seat, a toothy grin stretching across his lips. “My letters will show, they are in that chest. Take them, take them and Tazok will see!”
“I got a bad feelin’ about this…” Montaron muttered a ways behind them. Markra glanced at Khalid and Jaheira out of the corners of his eyes, not daring to even turn his head, lest give away their position. Once they gave him a cautious nod, he walked into the room. Past the cleric, over the rugs, and toward the chest. Cyric’s symbol glared down at him from a tapestry on the wall, wicked and foreboding.
To Markra’s surprise, the chest wasn’t even locked. He lifted the latch, and with a yawning creak, he opened the lid. Inside lay a bundle of scrolls—two bound and sealed with wax, and the rest tied with string—two healing potions, and a bag of gold coins.
But that was only a glimpse. Before he could discern the rest of the chest’s contents, the half-orc’s vile chuckle brought Markra’s head up, and the chest closed tight once again. The cleric had brandished his morningstar and shield, and raised the pointed weapon high above his head.
“Fools!” the half-orc shouted. “You’ll never have the chance to take anything! Minions, come forth and kill the intruders!”
A flood of bloodthirsty yips bounced off the cavern. It was no trick of the hollow room: they were surrounded. Kobolds poured out of small holes in the floor, the walls, so many at once it was a wonder the cave didn’t collapse. Beyond Markra’s line of sight, he heard Xzar’s shrill scream and Imoen spewing curses the way Winthrop used to whenever he burned himself on the fire. Jaheira and Khalid spun around and drew their weapons in the archway, but they were quickly backed into the furnished chamber by the cackling mob of kobolds.
Cursing himself for underestimating the half-orc’s trickery, Markra shot to his feet and drew his sword. He dashed forward, but before he could close the gap between them, the half-orc’s hands lit with purple sparks as he hurried a magic chant.
“Cupio. Virtus. Licet!”
A golden orb flew out of his palms and disappeared into Markra.
Then he stopped. Sword up, knees bent, one leg in front of the other, frozen in a run. Cold crept into him, settled in his veins and stilled his blood like water turning to ice. He tried to bend his arms, close his eyes, step to or back, move any part of himself, but found he could not. Panic swelled in his throat, but he couldn’t even open his mouth and scream. Only his quick, deep breaths reassured him that he hadn’t been turned to stone, but stuck in his open stance, a still statue and completely helpless… He may as well have been.
The half-orc chuckled as he drew his morningstar and stomped toward Markra. “Now, what to do with you? Shall I send you back without your arms, or your legs? That’ll show Tazok. That’ll show him not to cross Mulahey!”
Markra’s heart pounded faster, the only movement in his whole body and one he could not control. Move! he yelled at himself, urged his muscles with all his being, but they refused to obey. Move, damn you! He’s going to kill you—now MOVE!
Khalid’s cry bounced off the cavern as he charged Mulahey, just in time to block the heavy morningstar with his shield. A part of his shield collapsed inward beneath the spiked orb as Khalid’s knees bent under the weight. Mulahey growled, tried to pry his weapon loose, and staggered as he nearly took Khalid’s shield off with it. Though using the momentum of the pull, Khalid slashed at Mulahey’s chest. The blade scraped across the many chain links and tore open his tunic, but it wasn’t strong enough to do any serious damage. At the very least, he put some much-needed distance between them.
Meanwhile, behind Khalid and Mulahey, Jaheira stood in the archway nearly lost in the kobold swarm. The monsters were slippery and always on the move, but thanks to Silvanus’s divine favor, her staff struck more often than it missed. Montaron stepped into view and buried his shortsword deep into a kobold’s calf, and slowly worked his way to Jaheira’s side. Markra had no idea where Imoen and Xzar were—likely in the previous chamber, just as surrounded as the rest of them, except they were not so well-suited for a brawl. With their sheer numbers, the rabid kobolds could be tearing them apart limb from limb, and Markra could do nothing but wonder and watch.
Then a light flashed. It cast a frightening shadow of the toothy archway on the walls. Kobolds began dropping to the floor, stretched on their backs with their eyes shut and tongues lolling. As if the mad necromancer had sensed Markra’s voiceless concern, he heard Xzar begin to sing.
“Nighty niiiiight, and good niiiiight… Go to sleep, my lil’ demon dogs!”
He shrieked the last bit, before another steel-on-steel clash stole Markra’s attention back. Khalid and Mulahey. Still exchanging blows, weapons and shields banging like thunder in the confined space. Though the half-orc had strength and size on his side, Khalid was quicker and had Silvanus’s faith still in his heart. He didn’t give an inch of ground; he couldn’t afford to. A chill ran down Markra’s spine, for Khalid was the only person standing in the way of the evil cleric and his own bloodied elven corpse.
Khalid continued to push until he had Mulahey backed against the wall. He swung relentlessly at his sides, but there were few breaks in the half-orc’s defenses. No one could sneak behind him with the rows of stalagmites and a cave wall at his back, and his large shield encompassed his entire torso and most of his lower body. What weak spots he did expose he kept out of Khalid’s reach with the wave of his morningstar, and unlike Khalid’s sword, it wouldn’t take much for Mulahey’s choice of weapon to pierce through armor.
Finally, the tides changed as Khalid drove his blade home into Mulahey’s thigh. Steel sunk into flesh, a hiss so deafeningly quiet after the crash of melee combat. Mulahey bit back a howl with immense effort heard through his teeth, and his head lowered.
Then, Markra felt it wear off. The blessing of Silvanus, the strength of the tree god leaving him and everyone else in his party all at once. Khalid’s face fell, no doubt also feeling the change, and retracted his sword.
But before he could retreat, Mulahey lifted his head again, an evil grin spread across his face. He bashed his shield into Khalid’s face, and the swordsman staggered back, disorientated. For just a moment, his shield dropped, and his sword arm fell limp to his side, but it was enough. Mulahey slammed his morningstar into Khalid’s torso and sent him flying across the cave. He hit the wall with a rumble, crashed into a row of stalagmites and reduced them to rubble. Then he fell limp, dents in his armor where he’d taken the blow.
Khalid!! Markra screamed, anguished, cursed himself and his body one-hundred fold, only to hear it echo back at him inside his own head.
Jaheira voiced his silent cries as she clobbered through the row of kobolds and ran to her husband. With most of the kobolds asleep thanks to Xzar’s spell, she could leave Montaron and the others to deal with them. She dropped to her knees and checked his pulse, then uttered the healing incantation as her hands glowed to life.
Markra expected Mulahey to stop her, but instead, he grasped at the Cyric holy symbol around his neck. He chanted a few prayers beneath his breath that Markra didn’t care to discern, and made a gesture with his fingers over his heart.
A beam of light shined down on him from the sky, pure and white and glorious as if from the heavens themselves. Markra’s eyes twitched, struggling to close against the blinding rays. Thankfully, the light vanished as soon as it came, but when it had gone, Mulahey glowed with the divine glimmer of his god. White and purple, Cyric’s chosen colors, burning in his body’s every contour.
As Jaheira focused on healing Khalid, Mulahey stepped toward her. Still, Markra remained trapped in his shell of a body, kicking and screaming inside as he watched. Except this time, something clicked. The cold in his core slowly melted away, and a welcoming warmth returned to him. First his toes and fingers shuddered, and his hands curled tighter around his sword. Then his arms, shoulders, and legs—aching after being stuck in such an awkward position. He stumbled a little as a rush of momentum came back at once, and so his body was his again, chest and shoulders rising and falling with each breath.
Overjoyed and relieved beyond measure, Markra loosed the scream that’d been building in him since the fight began, and charged.
But Mulahey was not fool enough to have forgotten him. As Markra’s sword sliced the air between them, the cleric raised his shield to block. One-handed and unfazed, as if he were stopping a bug. The magic blade simply bounced off the shield with hardly a scratch, and Markra nearly stumbled, shocked.
Mulahey swerved his morningstar around to punish Markra’s reckless charge, but the elf was quicker and ducked out of the way. The morningstar came crashing down and left a small crater in the floor where Markra once stood. Khalid’s earlier wound didn’t even seem to slow him down as he took his weapon off the ground and swung it again, this time at Markra’s head. He swerved back and felt the tip of a spike just a breadth from his nose.
He lunged again as Mulahey struggled to bring his morningstar back around, only to clash against his shield once again. When it wasn’t the spiked weapon putting distance between them, it was the shield getting in his way. He would make no progress if he continued this frontal assault.
But if I can get to his back…
A whizz split the air as a loose arrow dug into Mulahey’s back shoulder. Markra spotted Imoen, peeking around the corner with her bow as she reached for another arrow from her quiver. Mulahey flinched once, but didn’t bother to turn around. So Markra charged again, fully expecting the cleric to raise his shield. That was the plan: with iron in the shoulder of his shield-arm, it should be easier to break through his defenses. Though Mulahey seemed to realize that, instead swinging his morningstar around to knock Markra’s sword off its aim.
Anyone else might have lost their footing and their weapon after colliding with such a strong swing, but Markra’s elven blood kept him light on his feet and steady. Another arrow struck him, this time in the back of Mulahey’s already-wounded thigh. At last, the cleric staggered, for though Cyric’s blessing might have helped stave off the pain, it did not make him invincible. He did not lower his shield or his weapon, but he fell to one knee, and that was all Markra needed.
He swerved, crouched, and dashed behind Mulahey. Knees bent, legs apart, and low to the ground. Markra loosed one last yell as he rose from his prowling stance and slashed into Mulahey’s backside. As the sword found its mark, giant shards of ice grew like crystal out of the blade’s arc and pierced through half-orc’s chain armor. He stood frozen for a moment before the ice shattered, and he collapsed in a shivering heap.
Wounded, bleeding, but very much alive, Mulahey rolled on the floor and stared up at the approaching Markra. The holy glamor had faded from his body and he heaved for breath, fatigue finally catching up with him. He raised a hand to him, fingers splayed, waving desperately.
“I yield, I yield to thee!” Mulahey gasped. “Mercy, I beg thee! Accept my surrender?”
Markra pointed his sword at his nose, earning a flinch out of the half-orc. After imprisoning him in his own body and terrorizing his friends, Markra had half a mind to run him through and be done with it. But no, he had to think about this.
“Only if you tell us what’s been happening here,” Markra answered. “Who’s Tazok? Who sent you? And why target the iron mines?”
Mulahey nodded, a little too enthusiastically. “Yes, there in the chest are all my letters! Take them and leave me be. I will bother you no more.”
His gaze slid toward the chest, and Markra followed it with his own, though he hesitated. Glaring back at Mulahey, he pressed the tip of his sword just enough so it would touch the skin.
“You already tricked me once with that,” he snapped. “I won’t fall for it again, half-orc.”
“But this time, I tell the truth!” Mulahey insisted. “Look, you have already bested me. What more harm could I do to thee? Your answers are in that chest; take them and leave, or not take them at all.”
Markra took a deep breath. In… Out… Such a precarious thing, the life of this mad half-orc. The perpetrator of all the crimes in the Nashkel mines and servant of a lying god. Once he’d been on the winning side, ready to chop off Markra’s limbs as he watched helplessly like a statue, and now he lay bleeding on the floor beneath his magical blade.
It wouldn’t take much to end him. One tiny push was all Markra needed. That would puncture the skin, and the blood would flow out so fast he would choke on it. A simple motion with no more effort than a hand wave, yet what relief would come over him, watching the blood gather on the cavern floor… If only for this moment, Markra held all the power in the world—the difference between life and death. Being and unbeing.
He need only make a choice. Such an easy choice.
All it would take was one
little
push—
Markra screwed his eyes shut for a second and shook his head. No, no one should have that much power over another living person, no matter who they were. By gods, where had those thoughts come from? They’d been his, but he hardly recognize himself in any of those feelings.
As if to rebel against the unwelcomed bloodthrist in his head, Markra lowered his sword just a fraction and gazed back at the chest. Keeping the blade pointed at the half-orc, he carefully backed off until the chest came within arm’s reach. Only when he touched the lid’s surface did he take his eyes off the half-orc, and glanced once again into the chest’s contents.
“Marky! Look out!”
He’d barely glimpsed the curled scrolls a second time when Imoen’s voice jerked him back. He half-turned to see Mulahey draw up from a crouch and swing his morningstar with both hands at him. Caught off-guard, Markra couldn’t move fast enough, and the spiked head dug into his right leg and threw him to the ground. He screamed as the cold metal tore into his thigh and rend the soft underbelly of flesh, the weak spot in his leg armor.
Clutching his bleeding leg, Markra glared at the approaching Mulahey. He towered over him with his weapon high above his head, a desperate rage burning in his eyes.
“I’ll have your skulls for coming here!” he shouted. “You’ll ruin everything!”
“No!” Jaheira shouted. Behind Mulahey, Markra saw her run towards them and brandish her quarterstaff, but he doubted she’d make it in time. Khalid still lay slumped against the wall, shaking with effort as he tried to get to his feet. Imoen shot another arrow from her corner, but it went wide and struck the far wall. He’d lost sight of Xzar and Montaron long ago, and for all he knew, were still preoccupied with the kobold mob.
The fallen elf closed his eyes, cursing his own foolishness, and waited for the morningstar to bash in his skull…
He heard a gasp. A choke, the hiss of metal run through flesh. Markra opened his eyes, and saw Mulahey, still as a statue, with the tip of a blade protruding through his chest. Right where his heart should have been.
He only stayed that way a moment longer before his morningstar fell from his hands and clattered to the floor, then he toppled over. Behind him, Montaron pulled his shortsword free from his corpse, and wiped the blood off the blade using the dead man’s own tunic.
So, the halfling had been waiting in the shadows, biding his time for the most opportune moment to strike. Bruised and scratched from his scuffle with the kobolds, but far better off than the rest of them. A part of Markra seethed at the thought—that Montaron had stood back and watched when he could have stepped in at any earlier time. But none of that mattered now. Montaron’s plan had worked, no matter his methods, and he saved Markra’s life. The haggard elf had no right—or energy—to be angry.
“Montaron…” Markra croaked. It was all he could manage with the fiery throbbing in his leg. “Th-Thank you.”
“Don’t bother thankin’ me just yet, lad,” Montaron said.
And to Markra’s horror, he laid the tip of his shortsword against his throat.
Ronan: "Yes, Markra is dead. He died as he lived: on his back and looking for help."
Miria: "That would define you more accurately than him."
Ronan: "Only for you, sweet thing."
Miria: "I think I'm just gonna go throw up in that jar over there."
Emerin: "Would you both just stop bickering and wait for the next part?"
Miria: "But the wait is killing me!"
Brian: "Do not fear, friends! No doubt the spirit of justice shall swoop down upon the villainous fiend and save our troubled hero from certain death!"
Miria: "How is it certain death if there's any chance at all that he will be saved?"
Ronan: "Doing the impossible is what a hero is best at, right Brian?"
Brian: "Smiting evil is what heroes are best at, villain!"
Ronan: "Well, Brian, what are you waiting here for, then? Go and smite that evil halfling for justice!"
Brian: "Yeah, I'm not that stupid."
Ronan: "Surprising."
Miria: "So, I guess I'm getting an ale. Anyone else want to come along?"
Ronan: "I'm good for it."
Emerin: "You're always good for it, you drunken sod."
Ronan: "I don't get drunk. My body heat burns the alcohol away too quickly."
Miria: "Hey, maybe we should take this conversation elsewhere? I'm worried we might be hogging the thread."
Ronan: "Yeah, Em. Way to distract all of the readers with your nonsense."
Emerin: "MY nonsense?!"
Miria: "Seriously, guys, we're starting to get looks."
Brian: "That is good! All should see the force of righteous fury that stands before them!"
Ronan: "We're not standing, you dingbat."
Emerin: "I hate you guys."
Ronan: "We love you too, Em."
Brian: "Aha! A confession most dire! Don't worry, Em, I won't allow this villain to take advantage of your youthful good looks and naïveté in order to defile the purity of your virgin soul!"
Emerin: "Brian, what in the hells are you babbling about?!"
Kaiser: "Isn't it obvious? He loves you, and he wants to express that, but he can't because he has trouble finding the right words. As a result, he lashes out at anyone who tries to get between the two of you in the only way he really knows how to."
Gods. There's no nice way to say it: this chapter was a bitch.
But it's done! WOO! And only one hour before July!!
...I'm disappearing again for July. Don't expect another chapter for a while. I gots some revisions ta do.
Enjoy~!
Chapter 13 (Part I)
“Wha…” Markra stared unblinking at the end of Montaron’s sword, just a breath away from cutting his throat open. “Montaron, what are you—”
“Traitor!!” Jaheira shouted as she drew her quarterstaff and got to her feet. Behind her, Khalid also struggled to stand, leaning on the cavern wall for support. “So, you show your true colors when we are weak and catching breath. I knew we could not trust you!”
“I wouldna be too hasty, if I were you, Jaheira…” said Montaron, barely sparing the druid a glance out the corners of his eyes. “Yer reckless temper’ll get somebody killed.”
No doubt on cue, as soon as Montaron finished his sentence, they heard Imoen cry out. Everyone stared back to the toothy archway—save for Montaron, who gave a cruel smirk down at Markra. Xzar had a squirming Imoen in his grasp, a knife poised for her kidneys if she fought too much. Not only that, but she seemed wounded: a dark spot on her side where blood slowly oozed through, perhaps from the kobold mob. Not a bad gash, but immensely unhelpful at its best.
“No…” Jaheira gasped, just loud enough for Markra’s ears.
Xzar cackled with not a trace of madness. Only wicked triumph. “Ohh, what’s the matter, sweet wildling? Well, not so ‘wild’ anymore, are you now!?”
Jaheira grasped her staff tighter, knuckles almost popping. “You filthy cowards…! To think I’d fought beside you, Zhentarim scum!”
“Hard to hide a nature once it’s bred in yer bones,” Montaron muttered, “but aye, ye were right, girlie. We are Zhentarim both.”
Markra’s heart pounded in his throat—as if he needed any more reminders of the deadly steel aimed there. His own blood slathered over his fingers as he tried to staunch the flow out his leg, but his hands could only do so much. Head reeling, not just from the lost blood, he struggled to even process what was happening, let alone find a way out.
Xzar and Montaron were agents of the Zhentarim, and he’d read enough about the murderous organization to know their bloody history. But no matter how creepy and tasteless and violent as they’d seemed, Xzar and Montaron had been his companions. Never really his friends, but still companions. He’d thought them capable of many things—murder, larceny, foul magic and tactics that Markra detested on many levels. But not betrayal. Never betrayal.
Which made him wonder: How long have they been planning this?
“Just…tell me why,” Markra choked out. “Why here, why now, why…why do any of this?”
“To keep their secrets buried here with us!” Jaheira snapped, shooting a fierce glare at the wizard and halfling. “The Zhentarim have been the ones behind this all along!”
Montaron matched her glare, at last looking away from his hostage on the ground. “Do yer pointed ears hear nothin’ at all, ya daft woman? I already told ye—the Zhentarim got nothin’ to do with this Iron Crisis.”
Xzar nodded as he chimed in. “Indeed, but someone certainly wants you to think so, you and everyone else on the Sword Coast. Monty and I had been sent to find whoever was spreading lies about our Family and silence them, which naturally led us here to the mines of Nashkel.” He grinned wider as he gazed at Markra. “What we did not anticipate was our dear Markra here falling into our laps, and his many surprises.”
“How much ye think the Zhentarim would pay fer an elf who can heal without the gods’ help?” Montaron asked Xzar over his shoulder. “Mind, his head’s already worth 200 gold to the right buyer.”
“I would say double. Triple even!” Xzar flashed another crooked smile at Markra. “Oh, you needn’t look so hurt, my ex-sworn-compatriot. Think of it as…a flattery of sorts, of the highest esteem. It’s not often Monty and I risk our hides for so much gain. You might even like the Zhentarim; at least they haven’t pledged to kill you once we turn you in…yet.”
Listening to them made Markra’s blood boil, his teeth grind together as he held back the rage. Money? His own party members and fellow travelers were going to kill his friends and hand him over to some bloodthirsty crime family, as if he were common property. For money? Silently, Markra took back any kind word or thought he’d ever had for Xzar and Montaron, cursed them one-hundred fold, and dearly wished that he hadn’t stopped Jaheira from attacking them back in the tunnels.
He reached for that anger, grasped it tight and didn’t let go. If they wanted to sell him to the Zhentarim, they would need proof of his healing abilities, and they would have none of that if Montaron killed him now. His most potent emotions had healed Imoen when she lay dying on the stone bridge; time to find out if they could heal himself as well.
Rage poured over him, hot and righteous and oh so sweet. It burned in his veins and flowed out his fingers. Markra screwed his eyes shut, begging every god he knew for some direction, and felt his hands heat up. Divine-magic sizzled against his wound, a similar sensation to Jaheira’s healing spells, but faster, wilder, and much less gentle. He’d always thought of her magic like a stream, soothing and cool and invigorating. This was a torrent, the bite of salty ocean waves ravaging against his skin. Markra bit the inside of his mouth to keep from crying out, but it quickly passed. In a matter of moments, the slash in his leg closed, his veins reconnected, and the blood burned off of a new layer of skin.
He would need to aim at something other than Markra’s neck. Something that would hurt and disable, but not quite enough to kill. Montaron pulled back his sword just an inch and swung, but Markra reached for his own blade lying beside him, curved his aim upward, and blocked. The metal-on-metal clang was deafening in the small cavern, bouncing back and forth off the walls.
Seeing her chance, Imoen rammed her elbow into Xzar’s ribs, earning a yelp out of the necromancer, and pried herself free. Jaheira and Khalid split from the wall—Khalid to Imoen, and Jaheira to Markra. Still aching from his wounds, Khalid should do better against a mad mage than an experienced halfling fighter. Jaheira’s staff lashed out of her hands like a mantis’s arm, aimed straight for Montaron’s head, but he was too short and slippery. Montaron ducked out of the way and pivoted on his heels so he faced both her and the rising Markra at once.
The halfling chuckled under his breath as he eyed the two of them. “So, this be where we come to, eh? Ye’ve grown, boy, I’ll grant ye that. But truth be told, ye don’t stand a lick o’ chance against me.”
“You’re not giving me much of a choice,” Markra snapped, just before he lashed out first. The ice blade almost glistened in the low cavern light as it clashed against Montaron’s shorter sword. Jaheira followed with a yell and a long sweep of her quarterstaff, aimed for Montaron’s feet. But the halfling jumped over the stick and parried yet another slash from Markra’s sword.
Though the odds were in their favor at two-to-one, Montaron was small and dexterous in both hands. He switched sword-hands with ease whenever it suited him, and made it even more difficult for Markra and Jaheira to disarm him. He ducked another whack of Jaheira’s staff, then dashed forward and made it inside her range. Before Jaheira could block, Montaron ran his blade across her stomach, protected only by a layer of leather.
Biting back a cry of pain, Jaheira covered her stomach with one arm. Montaron’s sword had left a cut in the leather and in the blouse underneath, but it wasn’t quite enough to break her skin. Still, it hurt, and Jaheira didn’t wear much to absorb the brunt force. Markra reached out with a thrust aimed for Montaron’s head, but the halfling spun around Jaheira and dodged with a smirk. Markra stumbled once, quickly regained his footing, and watched as Montaron poised his sword at Jaheira’s back.
But Jaheira was not so slow and hurt as she’d appeared. Loosing another scream, she twisted around and swung her quarterstaff once again in a fierce, horizontal stroke. This time, it struck Montaron in the side of the head and sent him rolling across the ground. The halfling traitor was down—but not out just yet. Holding his sore head, where a trail of blood had begun to flow, Montaron spat out a bloody tooth and crawled back on his feet.
“That damn hurt, ya dirty elf bitch,” he growled as he wiped his mouth clean.
“You should have thought twice about the people you double-crossed!” Jaheira shouted back, and ran at him. Staff high and gripped in both hands, she swung it over her head like an executioner’s axe. But the blow was slow and easy to trace, so it missed Montaron as he stepped out of the way. He lunged again, a desperate thrust pining for Jaheira’s thigh. Before it could connect, Markra stood between them and smacked Montaron’s sword off its aim with his own blade. The halfling staggered, a sign of clumsiness that Markra rarely saw in him. Montaron was nothing if not sure on his feet, but the blow to his head must have crippled his balance.
They stared at each other, betrayer and betrayed, for several breaths. Gazes devouring, scrounging for the slightest of motions. Swords that had once fought together now poised to stab one another. Markra heard Jaheira’s footsteps and felt her presence next to him, but he dared not look away from his enemy.
At last, he spotted it: Montaron’s free hand slipping behind his back, perhaps to grab something. Markra leaped at him, thrusting, but Montaron swerved out of the way, the blade’s tip barely slicing his cheek. Markra spun on his heel as his thrust turned into a sideways slash, chasing the nimble halfling. So face-to-face, he clearly saw what Montaron had pulled from his waist pack—a vial of murky, gray liquid. Before Markra could stop him, Montaron unplugged the cork and chugged the potion in one quick swig.
Then he vanished.
Markra regained his footing and gazed disbelieving at the spot where Montaron once stood. He found no sign that the halfling had ever been there, not even a shadow.
“Wh-What the—”
Before he had the chance to lose his mind, however, Markra felt Jaheira’s back press against his, her long coils of brown hair brushing his neck. He met her gaze out of the corners of his eyes.
“Stay calm,” she urged him, “and stay alert. He drank an invisibility potion. I think he aims to end one of us. Most likely me, if he still intends to keep you alive.”
Markra took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, then closed his eyes. They would do him no good against an invisible foe; better that he rely on his elven ears for guidance, just as he had at the Friendly Arm Inn. That assassin had used the shadows to protect him, deadly and unseen. How different could an invisibility potion be?
Far away, water dripped on stalagmites. Bugs skittered and buzzed about the floor as torches faintly hissed and sputtered. Closer were the sounds of combat, of Imoen, Khalid, and Xzar fighting each other. Magic hummed and crackled through the air, followed by a pained cry from Jaheira’s husband. Imoen shouted his name, then cursed, but no matter how much he wanted to, Markra couldn’t help them now. The moment he dropped his guard would be the moment he gave Montaron the chance to plunge his sword into either his or Jaheira’s back.
Something tapped against the ground floor. So soft, Markra barely heard it under everything else, but it was there. On his right, closer to Jaheira than to him. Anyone else might have dismissed it, but Markra knew the sound, having traveled long enough with Montaron to recognize it. The quiet soles of his thin-padded boots against the earth, adept at sneaking around in silence.
Markra nudged Jaheira’s elbow with his own, and she nodded. So, even her half-elven ancestry gave her ears an edge. But they waited, and waited, and the sound didn’t appear again. Montaron must have realized they’d heard him and stayed his blade. Markra reached out with his hearing again, but he found it difficult to concentrate on anything besides the relentless pounding of his own heart. He took deep breaths, trying to calm it, but every moment spent in silent anticipation was torture.
Until, at last, Jaheira gasped. She veered right, nearly twisting her ankles, as something cut open the side of her tunic. As if the air had sliced across her, swift and clean, mere inches from a deadly blow. But as the world seemed to slow down and Markra spun around, he watched the space between them shimmer and ripple, shaped like the deformed outline of a small man. In moments the mirage became real, and Montaron reappeared.
Leaned forward in mid-lunge and eyes wide in disbelief, he barely caught Jaheira’s gaze before she swung her staff and whacked his shortsword out of his hand. Then, with the flick of her wrists, she drove the other end into his chest and tossed him to the ground.
Montaron coughed out all the breath in his lungs as his back hit the floor, hands grasping for his missing weapon. Before he could recover, Jaheira leaped on top of him and pressed her staff horizontally against his throat. The halfling winced as her knees dug into the soft underbelly of his arms, and her muscular legs almost crushed his. Though even with Montaron pinned and disabled, Markra came around and kicked his shortsword out of reach, just in case.
“How does it ‘damn hurt’ now, traitor?” Jaheira snarled. “Better or worse?”
Glowering, Montaron tried to spit in her face, but he struggled to gather any breath as her staff nearly crushed his windpipe, let alone saliva. Markra lowered his sword as he stood beside them, finally convinced that the halfling was no longer a threat. Though looking at Jaheira, he noticed a red smear slowly growing around the newest slit in her tunic.
“Are you all right?” he asked her.
“I’m fine,” she insisted, though her voice was full of effort. Jaheira cast a glance over her shoulder, back toward the entrance where the chambers intersected. Beyond their line of sight, another zap of magic flashed, followed by the hiss of arrows and Imoen cursing up a storm.
“I’ll hold this one. You go and help the others.”
Hearing Imoen in danger, Markra needed little encouragement to dive into battle once again. Still, he hesitated, looking again at the wound on Jaheira’s waist. “Are you sure? You’re injured—”
“It’s just a graze.” She threw him a steely glare, but it softened a bit upon seeing his concerned expression. “Markra, please. My husband is fighting, as is Imoen. Trust in me and help our friends.”
So even while wounded, there would be no negotiating Jaheira’s orders. Still, between just the two of them, they had very little choice. Markra nodded, gripping his sword tighter around its hilt, and headed into the other cavern.
Kobold corpses covered the floor, many with their throats slashed after being put to sleep by Xzar’s magic. They’d chased the treacherous wizard into the first cave, trapped him in a corner with the gnashing stalagmites at his back. Xzar had an arrow in one shoulder and a few tears in his green robe, but Imoen and Khalid looked even worse. The pair of them stood side-by-side, haggard and panting, Imoen with a feeble arrow drawn to her cheek. She likely had trouble shooting straight with that wound in her side, and the fabric of Khalid’s clothes was dotted with holes, singed as if by fire around the rims. His exposed skin underneath was raw and pink.
Xzar held in his hands a bundle of scrolls, while a few lay scattered on the floor nearby. Markra had forgotten the many magic pages they’d gathered on their journey to Nashkel, but now he knew why Xzar had insisted on keeping so many of them. Not only because he would find the most use for them, but to build himself a stash, waiting for the right moment to unleash his horde. Markra’s fists clenched as he realized, for that moment was now.
Upon seeing the elf approach, Xzar’s wild eyes lit up and his lips curled into another wicked grin.
“Ah, dear Markra,” he began. “Where’s Monty? Has he gone and lost to you already?”
Markra greeted him with the flash of his sword, tilting its blade so it caught the light. “Yeah. You could say that.”
Whatever glee Xzar had scrounged together immediately vanished, his face tightening in a scowl as he stomped his foot. “Gah, that miserable half-man! Proven worthless, time and time again! Will the incompetence never cease!?” But he cleared his throat and stifled his rage as he stroked one of the scrolls in his arms. “Ah, but no matter. I’d grown tired of the boor anyway. This way, I needn’t share the reward.”
“Careful, Marky!” Imoen called to him. “He’s been keepin’ us back with all those spells!”
Khalid nodded, and immediately regretted it as his helmet slid a little too far over his head. Its straps must have loosened during the fight. “H-His whole m-manner seems different than b-b-before… It’s as i-if…he really knows what he’s doing this time.”
“Of course I know what I’m doing!” Xzar snapped, and stuck his chin out high like an insulted noble. “Hmph! I’ve always known what I’d been doing. It’s hardly the fault of the actor if the audience is too stupid to tell the difference.”
“Then…” Markra paused to lick his lips, his mouth suddenly very dry. “The road outside Candlekeep, the Friendly Arm, even during your sex-change… All of that was just an act? A lie?”
Xzar grinned yet again, and began to gnaw on his fingers. Wide-eyed and neurotic, just as Markra had always known him to be. “Not all of it,” he said. “I really did have quite the fancy for you when I was a woman, you know. A shame you rejected me at every heart-wrenching turn!”
And despite the earlier betrayal that had unfolded before him, Markra’s cheeks turned a faint pink. Of everyone in their group, he’d always been the first to dismiss Xzar’s “crush” as nothing more than a lunatic’s delusion, perhaps even a part of the belt’s curse. But…
“W-Wait… Really?” Markra stumbled. “I never…thought you were serious…”
“Oh, don’t flatter yourself, boy.” Just like that, Xzar’s madness vanished again, replaced by a grimace. “You couldn’t hurt a fly, let alone my heart. Besides, it never would have worked between us; I am Xzar, destroyer of worlds and fame necromancer of the Zhentarim. And you… To put it kindly, are a whelp better served as coins in my purse!”
He reached for a scroll and let it unfurl from one hand. Its red runes began to glow, like embers.
“You’ll pay for Monty’s life with one of your own, dear Markra…and your friends!”
The scroll shuddered in Xzar’s hand, like a wall against a battering ram. Khalid raised his shield as Imoen took another shot at Xzar with her bow. But her arrow went wide and missed its chance to disrupt the spell. Markra charged at him with his sword up, rushing to close the gap between them, but he wasn’t fast enough. An orb of white light flew out of the scroll—aimed not at him, but Khalid.
Imoen shouted his name as the half-elf warrior stumbled, as if about to faint. Markra ran to his side and began surveying whatever damage was done. Except…he found nothing wrong. The spell hadn’t done anything to him; no burns, no scars, not even the tiniest scratch. Yet, Khalid groaned and shook his head, oblivious to the helmet swerving back and forth with the motion.
“Khalid?” Markra asked. “What’s wrong, are you all right?”
At his voice, Khalid’s head snapped in his direction, and Markra got a good look at his eyes. Shining like candles in the dark, a pink light glimmered in the pits of his pupils. No doubt a product of Xzar’s spell, but Markra had no idea what its purpose was.
Not until Khalid swung his sword at him, trying to cleave him in half.
Markra parried with a yelp, the metallic clash of their blades ringing in his ears. He veered back on his heels, almost falling over against the unexpected force, when Khalid lashed out again. Markra stepped awkwardly out of the way, pain shooting up his ankle.
“Khalid!!” Imoen screamed, but the half-elf didn’t seem to hear, even as her voice bounced off the cavern walls. “What’re ya doing!? Stop it! You’ll hurt him!”
Another clang echoed in the cave as Markra blocked another strike, only this time, he didn’t shrink away. He held his ground with bent knees as his sword locked with Khalid’s, caught in a stand-still. Though unable to pull away from his possessed friend, Markra spared a brief glance over his shoulder and saw Xzar’s growing smirk.
“What did you do to him, Xzar!?” Markra growled.
“Well, I need a new minion now that Monty’s out of action,” Xzar cackled. “He could never replace him, but the half-wit should do for now. Go on, half-wit, bring me my prize! Whole or in pieces, it matters not to me—so long as he’s still alive!”
As if in reply to his new master, Khalid grunted and pressed harder against Markra’s sword. Under his relentless weight and the throbbing ache in his sprained ankle, Markra’s knees buckled.
“K-Khalid…!” he pleaded through gritted teeth. “Come on, it’s me, Markra! Snap out of it!”
The warrior replied with a yell as his sword broke free of their shared stance, and lifted the blade high over his head. His helmet finally toppled over, and his scraggly orange curls unfurled like a wild lion’s mane. Markra hardly recognized the humble, kind man he’d come to like over their journey, and Xzar would pay dearly for twisting him.
“You creep!” Imoen shouted as she drew back another arrow to her cheek, aimed straight at Xzar. “Give Khalid back, ya mongerin’ riff-raff! Before I make you!!”
“Oh, you’ll do no such thing.” Xzar reached for yet another scroll, even as the pile in his arms spilled over. “No, I think I’d rather watch you cower in a corner, like all little girls should! Go on, little girl! Cower before my might!”
Her arrow flew. It grazed Xzar’s good shoulder, but it still wasn’t enough to stop him. His hands danced yet again as the magic in another scroll became his, before a white orb shot out and vanished into Imoen. Markra cried out to her, but with Khalid keeping him at bay, there was nothing he could do. Imoen suddenly lowered her bow and began to run around in circles, terrorized at every little crack and point in the cavern’s shadows. Just like that day on the Friendly Arm’s doorstep, when an unnatural Horror had gripped her’s and Markra’s hearts and rendered them helpless.
Xzar laughed yet again as he reached for a different scroll. Markra bit off a curse as he half-watched the necromancer between Khalid’s blows.
It’s all those damn scrolls, he thought. That’s what’s giving him all this power, not his natural casting abilities. If I can just stop him from using them somehow…
He glanced once at the collection of fallen scrolls around Xzar’s feet, like the feathers of a molting bird. Some were open and blank, but others still had their bindings, and potentially their magic unused and unspoiled. What kind of spells had the necromancer dropped, Markra wondered. Was he keeping track of his paper armory, or was there something in that pile that could be of use to him?
It was a long shot. Such scrolls could contain anything from an Identify to a Fireball, neither of which would be all that helpful. But of the three of them, Markra was the only one to have kept his sanity, and the only one capable of reading arcane-magic, thanks to Gorion’s tutelage.
He had to try.
Khalid’s sword arced in a horizontal slash, but Markra back-stepped just out of his range. With some much-needed distance between them, Markra dashed for Xzar. The mage had already begun casting a spell on Imoen and could not change his target, even as the elf came into view. But he dropped his most recent spell to hop out of Markra’s way, for fear that he might strike him down. At the very least, Markra had spared Imoen of another magical assault.
He paid no attention to Xzar as he scooped up one of the scrolls, but as he rose to his feet, he stood right in the path of Khalid’s shield. Thunder clanged inside his helmet as the shield bashed into his head. Temples aching, legs shaken, Markra teetered for a moment before Khalid kicked him to the ground. Somewhere far away, beneath the incessant ringing in Markra’s sensitive ears, Xzar cackled and cheered for Khalid to beat his rotten face in.
When Markra next opened his eyes, he saw Khalid loom over him. Sword gleaming above his head, orange hair clinging to his sweat-matted face, hatred swelling behind the pink glare in his eyes. Tremors wracked his body in its every tiny motion; his hands curled around his sword, his feet as they took a step… Even the corners of his mouth couldn’t stop twitching. If there was anything left of his old friend, Markra knew it had to be in those shudders, like a marionette fighting the pull of its strings.
“K-Khalid…” Markra coughed. “Listen, think about what you’re doing. You don’t wanna hurt me, or Imoen, or anyone, do you? You’re better than this. Think of Jaheira; what would she say if she saw you now?”
At the mention of his wife, Khalid blinked. He groaned and shook his head, but as he forcused on Markra once again, Xzar’s spell blazed in his eyes just as vengeful as before.
Without looking away, Markra slid one hand over the ground behind him, and grasped for a rugged stone just larger than his hand.
“Answer me, Khalid.” He spoke harshly this time, trying to imitate the stern druid. “Look at yourself and what you’re doing and tell me: what would she say?”
“J-Ja… Jaheir…a…”
In his hesitation, Markra tossed the rock at Khalid’s head. It struck him just above his right eye—hard enough to draw blood, but nothing that wouldn’t heal. The half-elf yelped and held his now-aching head as Markra clambered to his feet, put distance between them, and undid the scroll.
The picture of an empty eye stared back at him. Markra struggled to read the archaic runes etched into the paper: “Blindness.”
He cursed. Not a damage spell, nothing that could disrupt Xzar’s casting, or burn his supply of scrolls. But as he groped for a solution in his frantic, desperate thoughts, he realized something—Xzar can’t read the scrolls if he can’t see them.
“Veritas. Credo. Oculos.” Running a hand over the runes, Markra croaked out the spell’s words and drew on the magic within. Not unlike when he called upon the Weave to cast from his thoughts, he tapped into the paper like a bucket into a well. Crimson sparks lit his fingers, pulled from their home in the parchment and made into his own.
Xzar’s laughter died as his gaze fell upon Markra. He reached for another scroll with one hand and clumsily threw a stone at him with the other. Even if he’d struck him, Xzar was too late: Markra had chosen his target for the spell, and magic does not miss.
An orb of white light flashed between his palms and flew at Xzar. The wizard tried batting it away with his hands, only to watch it disappear into him. Then he screamed, dropped all of his scrolls, and began rubbing his eyes with his bleeding fingers.
“My eyes!” he cried. “What have you done to my eyes!? I cannot see! I cannot see!!”
It worked. Markra breathed a giant sigh of relief as he dropped the Blindness scroll, now blank and empty. Thank gods it worked…
He wasn’t out of the woods just yet. Upon hearing footsteps approach him from behind, Markra spun on his heel and raised his sword in a slash. Though instead of crashing with Khalid’s weapon, as he’d expected, his blade met his shield, raised high so it covered its wearer’s head and shoulders.
“M-Markra, wait!” Khalid blubbered on the other side. “It’s me! I’m free, I-I’m myself again!” Then he lowered his shield just a fraction, enough so Markra saw his eyes. Sure enough, not a trace of the pink sheen remained. “See?”
He heaved a second sigh as he lowered his sword and embraced Khalid, slapping the other man hard on the back. “Gods, Khalid…! Any second longer, and I could’ve killed you!”
“I-I feel that I should be the one saying that, M-Markra…” Khalid murmured. “I’m sorry… I tried to fight it, b-but the spell was just so s-s-strong.”
“It’s fine. Water under the bridge. Just glad to have you back.”
He gave Khalid’s shoulder another hearty pat before he glared at Xzar. The wizard had fallen to his knees in the heap of his useless scrolls, mourning the loss of his vision. Markra suspected the impairment wasn’t permanent, but he wasn’t about to let a traitor know that. He caught Imoen still running around in circles, although she’d slowed her pace by now, a fatigue dragging down her slumped shoulders and hanging head.
“I’ll help Imoen out of her Horror,” Markra said again. “It shouldn’t last much longer now. Then… Let’s figure out what to do with these bastards.”
***
Once Imoen’s spell was broken and they’d gathered themselves, they tossed Xzar into Mulahey’s chamber. And not a moment too soon, for Jaheira was beginning to lose her grip on Montaron. The bleeding above her hip had slowed to a stop, but the dull pain certainly hadn’t helped her keep the halfling pinned. Khalid took over the spot as Imoen and Markra found some rope, and with it, bound the traitors’ feet and wrists.
Xzar stared into the nothingness, still without vision, as Montaron fixed them all with a murderous glare. Markra matched it with one of his own, hands crossed over his torso as he stood before his ex-comrades. Khalid massaged his sore head, still without his helmet, as Imoen plundered the gods-forsaken chest full of Mulahey’s letters. Jaheira paced before the malicious pair, tapping her quarterstaff like an officer’s crugdel.
“Zhentarim spies,” the druid sneered, “you have lied to us, likely written letters to your friends in Zhentil Keep filled with our secrets, and finally tried to kill us on a mission we’d all been assigned.” She stood still and locked eyes with them. “I ought to kill you both where you stand.”
That earned him a kick in the arm from Jaheira’s boot. Xzar cringed beside him.
“It is fortunate for you that I, however, am not the one to decide your fate,” she continued, and much to everyone’s bewilderment, she stepped aside and made room for Markra to come forward. “Your treachery began when you tried to harm Markra. It was his balance you hoped to destroy, and as such, it’s only fitting that he should determine what will happen to you. Yes?”
She looked at him for confirmation, and he nodded. Though as he moved closer to the traitors who’d threaten to sell him for a profit and kill his friends, his heart thudded harder, faster. Here he was again: two lives placed into his hands, a disgusting pair that he could squeeze between his fingers if he wished. It wasn’t a position of power he desired, and yet, Xzar and Montaron had wronged him in one of the most dreadful ways they could.
He refused to let them go unpunished.
“C-Come now, dear Markra…” Xzar had the gall to grovel as he stared unseeing past Markra’s head. “You really wouldn’t hurt us, would you? Think of all we’ve been through together—”
He leaned a little too close, but Jaheira punched him back in place, before Markra had the chance to.
“You’re in no position to beg, Xzar,” Markra snapped, and at his voice, Xzar’s head turned toward him, “least of all, to me.”
Though his lips pursed in thought, and his glare lost its edge. “But… You are right. I’m not going to kill you.”
Xzar, Montaron, and Imoen all gawked at him. Jaheira simply lowered her head and shut her eyes—masking her disapproval, Markra guessed—while Khalid stood idly by.
“Marky, what’re ya saying?” Imoen protested first. “These guys just tried ta kidnap you!”
“I’m well aware, Imoen,” Markra explained. “But… Even if it was for their own ends, they were still members of this party—our comrades. They may have forsaken that pledge when they turned on us, but that doesn’t mean we have to. If we kill them now, we’ll be no different from them.”
“Oh, Markra! Dearest, merciful, idiot Markra!” Xzar, with surprising accuracy, threw himself at the elf’s feet and groveled. Montaron simply rolled his eyes and shook his head at his partner. “I take back every ill thought and word I’ve voiced against you, my beautiful fool! Once we return to Nashkel, I’ll order a toast in your name!”
Though despite Xzar’s showering affections, Markra kicked the slimy wizard off his boots.
“Whoever said ‘we’ would be returning together?”
Xzar massaged the newest sore spot in his cheek with his grimy sleeve. “But… You said—”
“I said I wouldn’t kill you. I didn’t say anything about bringing you with us.” Markra shrugged. “You Zhentarim agents are the resourceful type, right? So find your own way out. The rest of us will go back to Nashkel and share the story of your treachery with Barrun. His local authorities can decide what to do with you then…if you make it out of here alive.”
Something about the way Xzar crumpled beneath him, the way Montaron beheld him as if for the first time, made him snap inside. As if maybe—just maybe—trying to kidnap Markra and kill his friends might not have been the best idea. Well, “merciful” he may be, they’d underestimated his abilities for the last time. What did they expect me to do? he silently asked. Roll over like a dog and comply?
“And one last thing,” Markra said, before he grabbed Xzar by the collar of his robe, and let him dangle like a squirming hanged man in his grasp. “Don’t come after us. I don’t care what motivation you’d have—if you or Montaron come anywhere near me and my friends again, then that next time, I will kill you. Understand?”
Xzar nodded over and over again, pleading until Markra finally let him down, and none too gently. With that, Markra dusted off his hands and turned his back. He met the gazes of his awestruck party, and motioned his head toward the exit.
“Let’s go,” he said. “I think we’re done here.”
“W-Wait!” Xzar cried out one last time, but Markra had already begun walking. “You can’t just leave us here!”
“Oh yes I can,” Markra snapped back.
“But our bonds! You’ve not untied our bonds!!”
“I know.”
“Just how are we to escape with our hands and feet tied and useless!?”
The real Xzar had returned again, relinquishing the madness act and screaming his question in rage. At last, satisfied at the change, Markra spared the fuming necromancer a final glance over the shoulder. “I thought you were the harbinger of death and destroyer of worlds, Xzar. A rope shouldn’t be too hard. Figure it out.”
And with that, he strode out of the abandoned chamber. After a couple paces, the sound of boots on stone assured him that his remaining party—his real allies—followed his stead. Mulahey’s corpse caught his eye as he walked by; Imoen picked up some of his belongings. Most notably, a shiny ring, a coinpurse of gold, and a cloth with Cyric’s symbol on it. How fitting, Markra grimly realized, that they’d been exposed to treachery while surrounded by the Prince of Lies.
As he passed under the cavernous rows of teeth, Montaron’s seething voice snagged his ears.
“Sleep lightly, taskmaster,” he said. “Ye’ve not seen the last of us.”
For your sakes, I better have, Markra thought, but did not voice. The traitors did not deserve another word out of him.
I realize it's been months sense I last posted in this thread and the last thing you want to read is me talking about the real world instead of delving back into my fictitious one. But, alas, stuff's happened.
It occurs to me that starting tomorrow, I will have a second job. I've been working for Target since March, and the money's been good (as far as retail goes), but it's not the kind of career I want to pursue for the long-term. So, after volunteering and applying over and over again the past year, I finally was hired by a public library in a town close to mine. I'll be working 15 hours a week as a Page in that library, on top of the hours I already work for Target.
Needless to say, my life's about to get really crazy. I barely have enough time as it is to scrape by and write short stories for my weekly writer's groups, let alone bond with my loved ones. And eat and sleep and all those other bodily functions. But with two jobs, especially going into holiday season, some weeks I won't even be able to manage that anymore.
So, as much as it pains me to say it, I don't know when I'll continue this again. I've not given up on it, but my priorities are all over the place right now. I just don't have the time to dedicate to this that I used to.
I'd like to thank everyone once again who've given me such wonderful feedback and encouraged me to keep going. You helped me believe in my abilities when I doubted myself. As a girl with tons of self-esteem issues dating back to elementary school, it really means a lot. Thank you.
I'll be back here someday with a new chapter. Promise!!
I will have a second job. I've been working for Target since March, and the money's been good (as far as retail goes), but it's not the kind of career I want to pursue for the long-term. So, after volunteering and applying over and over again the past year, I finally was hired by a public library in a town close to mine. I'll be working 15 hours a week as a Page in that library, on top of the hours I already work for Target.
Congratulations of getting a job after "volunteering and applying over and over again"!
Now, when you'll work in a library, should we call thee "Nonnahswriter of the (Candle)Keep"?
Trust me, I know very much that life just LOVES to stomp on a writer's muse. Write when you have the energy and creativity to handle writing, or you probably won't like the result anyway. Forcing yourself never works.
Trust me, I know very much that life just LOVES to stomp on a writer's muse. Write when you have the energy and creativity to handle writing, or you probably won't like the result anyway. Forcing yourself never works.
I don't entirely agree with this. True, you don't want to push yourself; a lot of writers need to take breaks, sometimes entire months to recharge, and there's nothing wrong with that so long as it doesn't impede on your creative process. What I've found though is that the difference between a professional writer and a hobby writer is that the professional writes when they can, where they can, whether they're in the mood or not. Deadlines don't wait. Readers are impatient. And at the end of the day, it's almost always better to have written trash than to not have written anything at all. Even trash can be transformed into something worthwhile, given enough time and effort; you can't do anything with nothing.
Then again, you've got a professional like George R. R. Martin who doesn't write for even years at a time and doesn't suffer a single bushwhack from his publisher, so who knows.
@Nonnahswriter I probably should have differentiated between fanfic and professional work, yes. I mean, if you are working on a deadline for a publisher, obviously, yes: force something out or you're screwed. We can't all have as much freedom as the Game Of Thrones guy. XD
But fanfic? That's just for fun, both sides of the coin. You're not obligated to ever finish the story at all! Unless you actually like your fans. And who could? I'm one of your story's fans, and even I don't like me; pale, scrawny thing that I am.
Nonnahswriter's writing is amazing. Here's my own version of the intro.
"He or she who fights mons should see him/herself not becoming mon. When you look at a byss, the byss stairs you too." -Fried Rich Neechee
A spawn of ball staggers on top an iron throne, but the other ball spawns by name Sirrah Vok and brakes a door to stillness and play loud music.
First ballspawn says no Vok can't, but actually Vok can and will be the last but YOU go first and get pointed at. So "YOU" go back on you back and spawn words there are others I can show you PLEASE PLEEEEEEASE bonk off the helmet
Vok lifts otherspawn and breaks stolen goods seller and chokes otherspawn. The gag is funny and vok laughs, then drops the balls pawn off the throne. dethroned ballspawn dies and bleeds to death and the blood hits sign says BOULDERSG ATE more loud music
Thanks for what you have shared so far and enjoy the new RL Chapter. A Library gig sounds great and the whole field of Library stuff is in the process of exploding, methinks as Infotech spawns new ways of mining the huge databases that the world's various Libraries represent.
Some feedback on the most recent installment. I really, really wanted Xzar to be dead. Somehow the idea of just leaving them behind does not work for me. And in the climactic moment when Montaron sees Xzar bite the dust he slips out of the grasp of whoever is holding him and makes his escape.
That being said, the blow-by-blow with Mulahey was truly gripping. I have always felt that the encounter with Mulahey needed to have a bit more depth to the interaction with a fuller unfolding of what the whole point of the Iron Crisis was all about. Hmmmm....
Some feedback on the most recent installment. I really, really wanted Xzar to be dead. Somehow the idea of just leaving them behind does not work for me. And in the climactic moment when Montaron sees Xzar bite the dust he slips out of the grasp of whoever is holding him and makes his escape.
I know.
But I have to keep them alive if I want to use their quest in a possible BG2 novelization. I can't just magically bring them back to life later. (Well, I could if I were utilizing the Forgotten Realms resurrection systems, but I'm not because that's one huge headache by itself.) I completely understand your feeling, and I went back and forth on the issue multiple times before finally deciding to let them live. But, oh well. No changing it now.
Thank you for your feedback. It really helps a lot!
It is such a treat to be able to "chat" with someone with an authorial mind like yours, even thus once removed. Just picked up a book at my favorite PTA Thrift Shop that immediately released [or threatens to] a pent-up flood of story ideas for an RPG set along the Silk Road, perhaps 13th-14th Cent, just as its heyday was passing.
To wit: Shadow of the Silk Road by Colin Thubrow [@2007], a modern retracing of the route by a celebrated travel-writer. Just the first few pages describing his somewhat mystical beginning of the journey with a visit to the Tomb of the Yellow Emperor, has me enthralled to the point of goose bumbs!!
The character I have in mind is built around the idea that He/She is singularly skilled at reaping a small fortune from the aftermath of war in some fashion: gambling perhaps and speculating in loot that drunken soldiers are eager to convert to coin. And somehow unkowingly comes into possession of.....
Note: first time I have ever used the expression "to wit"!! Now I will have to research what it actually means and whether I used it meaningfully.... Fun!!
Note2: I am fortunate to live in a college town [Chapel Hill, NC, USA] which has a first-rate Independent Bookstore [Flyleaf Books] with an active schedule of authors on tour as well as a twice-monthly Prompt Writing group. Keeps the juices flowing.
(I also changed the title thread, because I think it's safe to say by now that this is definitely not a "possible fanfiction" anymore. )
Chapter 14
Their bodies bruised and sore, open wounds stinging against the dry air, it was a long, tiring walk back to the entrance of the mines. The tunnels seemed strangely empty on their journey back, riddled with kobold bodies both old and new. Perhaps when Mulahey had been killed, a majority of the kobolds fled back into the shadows. No matter the reason, the stillness was a welcome to the battered party, and once they’d traveled far enough to likely avoid any trouble with Xzar and Montaron, they set up a brief camp and rested.
They took shelter in an alcove, cut off and isolated from the main tunnels, and with only one way in and out—just in case anything were to try sneaking up on them. Khalid surveyed the damage done to his shield as he guarded the cave’s mouth, and with a sigh, he laid it on the ground. Jaheira leaned against the far wall, legs crossed, one glowing hand on her hip as she healed her injury. Imoen slept in the corner, using the soft underbelly of her arm as a pillow.
Watching his adoptive sister brought a heaviness to Markra’s eyes, his exhausted body almost lulling to sleep without his command. Still, he would not allow himself the chance to rest without first reading the documents they’d recovered from Mulahey’s chest. Most of them had been magical, and Markra had every intent of scribing them later, but two were letters from the mysterious Tazok.
“That was unwise.”
Markra looked up from the letters and peered at Jaheira. She did not meet his gaze, fixated on her healing spell, but she didn’t need to.
And there it is, Markra thought, for he’d honestly been wondering when Jaheira would voice her inevitable disapproval. He bit the inside of his mouth to hold in a curse, and took a calm breath before answering.
“You’re the one who gave me the choice,” he reminded her.
She nodded, but still didn’t look up. “I did. I’d hoped you’d choose wiser.”
“What’s done is done, and I’m not going to waste time bickering about it,” he snapped, and to emphasize his point, he went back to reading the letters without another word. Thankfully, Jaheira didn’t press him, falling to silence as she finished healing her hip.
No doubt uncomfortable in the awkward quiet, Khalid cleared his throat. “Wh-What do the letters s-say, Markra? Have you learned a-anything?”
He breathed a long sigh out his nose. “A few things. For one, Mulahey’s kobolds were never supposed to kill any of the miners; their deaths were an accident.”
“Their numbers likely grew beyond his control,” Jaheira speculated. “Nature is not so easily tamed by a single outsider acting as its king. Does it say where the kobolds came from?”
“Sounds like Tazok sent them somehow.” Markra flipped back to an earlier letter, eyes squinting as he read in the low light. “‘I have sent you the kobolds and mineral poison that you require. Your task is to poison any iron ore that leaves these mines. Don’t reveal your presence to the miners or you will find yourself swamped by soldiers from the local Amnian garrison.’”
“Then their goal wasn’t to k-k-kill the miners a-at all…” Khalid murmured. “Th-This was all about the iron.”
“There’s more. Tazok writes about his ‘superiors,’ and how they’d hired some mercenary groups called the Blacktalon and the Chill. They’re the same bandits who’ve been raiding the merchant caravans up and down the Sword Coast. Not just stealing iron, but disrupting trade and stifling the flow of it too.”
“Holy Silvanus…” Jaheira swore under her breath, and traced the tree god’s symbol above her heart. “The vein runs deeper than I had thought…”
Markra nodded grimly. “Whoever’s behind this, their plan doesn’t stop at the Nashkel mines. This is something much bigger than one monster clean-out. The only question is—”
“Who are they?” Khalid finished. “Is there any clue?”
“I was getting to that. It says here, if Mulahey was to encounter any problems, he should contact a man named Tranzig in Beregost, staying at Feldepost’s Inn. If we want to find more answers, that’s our next best option.”
“Well, let us discuss our ‘next best option’ once we are rid of these caves,” Jaheira concluded, and groaned as she stood, massaging a sore spot on her back. “It has been stifling, traversing the darkness and breathing such poisoned air.”
“Agreed,” Markra said, then returned the letters to his pack and gently shook Imoen awake. Once the party had gathered themselves again, they returned to their long, backward trek.
The air quality was just a horrendous going up than it was the first time going down, but like the rest of the tunnels, now they’ve been emptied. Not just of kobolds, but the impoverished miners had also retreated, perhaps for rest.
When they finally found the exit to the outside, night had fallen. Darkness blanketed the quiet mine, broken by flickering lanturns on carts and railings like stars against the sky.
Peering through the blackness, Emerson’s warning shrieked in the back of Markra’s mind. “You’ve got one day. If I see you after that, I’ll have a new shaft dug for each of ya!”
Just how long were we inside the mines? Markra thought nervously.
“HEY!”
The party jolted in place as Emerson’s shout rang out across the pit. From one of the high rafters, the fiery red-headed officer scrambled down to meet them, bumping carts and knocking over tools along the way. He still wore his work uniform, but it was wrinkled and lopsided, as if haphazardly donned just after waking.
“Steady, dear,” his wife replied as she touched his hand. “I will handle this.”
But instead of screaming in their faces and spewing curses, like all of them had been expecting, Emerson beamed a joyous smile and threw his arms around the closest person he found—Markra. Even under his protective armor, the elf stiffened in his embrace.
“Bless my soul, you made it back alive!” Emerson exclaimed, then he pulled apart and cupped his rough hands around Markra’s face, as if to make sure he was real. “If you don’t mind me saying, you’re about the most beautiful sight I’ve seen in weeks!”
As Markra batted Emerson’s hands off of him, Imoen chuckled under her breath. “Yeesh, Marky. First Xzar, now Emerson? Ya sure are popular with the men these days.”
“I ain’t talking about his looks, ya nincompoop!” And in an instant, the old Emerson was back, earning a flinch out of Imoen as he shrieked at her. “I’m talking about the mine, my mine! I swear by the gods of old, I’ll ne’er say another ill-word ‘bout you adventuring-types again.”
So he said, but Emerson’s smile dipped slightly. “Well… Not for a day or two anyway.”
“What happened?” Jaheira asked.
“A miracle! We’d been at it for hours after you went in, and twas all the same, iron after iron crumbling to bits. And then, toward the end of the day, the stone stopped breaking. The iron was pure again! We didn’t even find anymore of those so-called ‘demons’ snooping around trying to take my men! All our troubles are over, thanks to you!”
“Then that settles it,” Markra concluded, and shared a knowing look with his party. “The kobolds really were the ones behind the poisoned ore.”
“Kobolds, eh? That what they call the little beasties?” Emerson asked, and at Markra’s nod, he waved his hand and shrugged it off. “Well, no matter. They’re gone now, and that’s what counts! I’ll be tellin’ the men to get back to work starting tomorrow—we’ve got ore to mine! Still can’t ship it for fear of bandits, but that ain’t my problem. Best you tell the mayor of what you did here. He’ll pay ya quite handsomely for all your hard work.”
“He is right,” Jaheira agreed, and already took a few steps toward the ramp that would carry them out of the mining pit, and back on the surface of Naskhel’s outskirts. “Come. We must report to Berrun.”
“Oh, I don’t mean right now,” Emerson clarified himself, just before Jaheira could walk off without waiting for them. “You’re gonna need to wait til morning to tell him; Berrun’s gonna be sound asleep this time of night, and he don’t take visitors when he’s sleeping.”
Her shoulders slumped, but Khalid patted her back with a kind smile, ever the comforting one. “Now now,” he said, “I-I don’t believe Berrun’s planning to d-d-disappear on us a-any time soon. Wh-Why don’t we return to Nashkel, a-and get a well-deserved r-r-rest?”
Markra nodded, surveying his companions up and down. “We look like hell.” He took a whiff of his own arm and instantly regretted it, gagging. “Smell like it too. I’m with Khalid; I think we all could use a break, and a bath.”
“Ooh!” Imoen’s hand shot up first as she bounced on her tip-toes, a little too eager. “I call dibs on the tub!”
“I suppose it cannot be helped…” Jaheira sighed at last. “Even I admit Nature has taken its toll on me. Very well. We will see Berrun come morning.”
With that, the battered party gathered themselves once more and marched up the rocky walls.
***
Hours later, the golden lantern light of sleeping Nashkel pierced the darkness, present in only the few open businesses: the local inn, the Belching Dragon tavern, and the Temple of Helm. Upon seeing the welcoming light, the weary travelers picked up their pace, a newly inspired spring in their steps.
Imoen took in a deep breath and stretched her arms toward the sky. “Ahhhh, smell that fresh evnin’ air! I can’t wait to collapse in a nice soft bed after all this!”
Hearing the satisfaction in her voice earned a grin out of Markra. “Does that mean I get the bath first, if you’re intent on collapsing when we first get there?”
“No!” she yelped, a little too defensively. “I meant, I’m gonna collapse after I take a bath.”
“If any of us should have the bath first,” Jaheira chimed in, “it should be Khalid and I.”
Then she threw a knowing smirk at her husband that made him blush, and Markra instantly caught her meaning. Her and Khalid. In the bath. At the same time.
Blood rushed to Markra’s cheeks while Imoen outright gagged at them. “I did not need to hear that,” he murmured, and started blinking profusely, as if that could chase away the awkward visions conjured by his imagination.
In the uncomfortable silence, however, Markra heard it. Thanks to his elven ears, he detected the faintest hiss, like a weapon being drawn from its sheath. He lifted his gaze, drawn to the inn, and spotted the dark silhouette of a cloaked figure leaning on the wall.
On instinct, he reached for Imoen’s arm and held her still, but it seemed Khalid and Jaheira had also noticed something amiss, for they had stopped walking too.
“Jaheira…” Markra whispered.
“I see him,” she muttered back, already reaching for her quarterstaff. “You there. Waiting for someone, perhaps?”
The figure stood upright and strode toward them. Markra barely heard his footsteps.
“I am Death come for thee,” the stranger hissed, a quiet male voice. “Surrender, and thy passage shall be…quicker.”
He tilted his head toward Markra, and while he couldn’t see his eyes in the dark, Markra knew he was looking straight at him. Another assassin after my bounty.
“I know not who you think we are,” Jaheira snapped, and as if on cue, she and her husband brandished their weapons at once, “but we’ll not surrender to anyone. Leave us be.”
The killer shrugged. “Struggle if you must, dead ones. I do not mind working for my money. Why Nimbul has been hired to deal with the likes of you, I’ll never know.”
Before Markra could begin to wonder whether or not the man had let his name slip into third-person, or if he’d been speaking of someone else, his hands blazed and began to dance. Jaheira and Khalid charged him, hoping to close the distance, but they weren’t fast enough. The man called Nimbul suddenly split into five Nimbuls—all exactly alike, mirroring each other’s every motion and breath.
Khalid cleaved one of the Nimbuls right in half—only to watch it dissipate before him. The now-four Nimbuls retaliated, each drawing a short sword from their hips and lunging after him. Without his battered shield to protect him, Jaheira grabbed her husband by the arm and tugged him back, just beyond the blades’ deadly reach.
Markra and Imoen stayed back, both pulling out their bows, but before either of them had prepared a shot, magic crackled in Nimbul’s hands once again. Purple sparks lit his fingers, and with a flurry of swift hand motions, a golden orb flew from his hands and—no. Markra recognize this spell, the same one that’d been used on him and Imoen so long ago at the Friendly Arm Inn. A Horror that’d stripped away all his senses, overwhelmed him with fear, and left him fleeing for his life. Aimed straight for Khalid and Jaheira.
“Look out!” he yelled to his older companions, but it was no use: magic does not miss. The orb flashed between them and blinked out of existence, and just as Markra feared would happen, the Horror took hold. Jaheira and Khalid immediately lowered their weapons and began running around in circles.
“Better part of valor, better part of valor!” Khalid babbled as he sped past the younger pair, while Jaheira sputtered curses in Silvanus’s name that earned a shudder even out of Imoen.
Another hum of magic drew Markra’s attention back, and saw four wickedly thin smiles stretched across Nimbul’s faces. Pink sparks lit his fingers this time, yet another familiar and dangerous spell.
Magic Missile, Markra realized. A Magic gods-forsaken Missile.
“Shoot him!” he ordered Imoen as he pulled the bowstring to his cheek. “Don’t let him cast!”
His arrow flew, but it soared through another illusionary Nimbul and disappeared into the bushes behind him. Imoen missed altogether, almost striking the walls of Nashkel’s inn. With another crackle and a hum that split the air, Nimbul threw out his hands and unleashed the Magic Missile. Aimed, not at Markra, but Imoen.
All Magic Missiles measured a wizard’s strength—the more powerful the wizard, the more missiles he could fire at once, and the more damage they dealt. Markra’s were still simple, small, singular; the ones that hit Imoen were anything but. Imoen shuddered in place and cried out as three missiles burned into her torso, then she crumpled to the ground, dropping her bow to cover her stomach with both hands.
“Imoen!” Markra knelt beside her to get a better look. Beneath her shirt, burns ravaged up and down her stomach—not horrendous, but certainly not harmless either. She’d live, but judging by the grind of her teeth and the tremors in her body, the pain was crippling.
Nimbul’s cackling drew his attention back. The hooded man stalked closer to him, all three versions of him smiling wickedly. “Then there were two, and thou look worse for wear. Don’t make this harder than it must be, boy. The eternal sleep beckons thee.”
Markra said nothing as he put his bow away and drew his sword. Gods, he was so tired. His knees shook as he rose to his feet again and the sores of old wounds throbbed with his every motion. After all they’d survived in the mines, he’d be damned if he died here, just footsteps from the inn’s refuge. But if he did die tonight, he knew why—his enemy had planned this attack all too well, striking when he knew they were most vulnerable.
The three Nimbuls raised their shortswords once they were within reach, but Markra skidded aside and lashed out with his own blade. Another apparition vanished, but that only gave the real Nimbul a chance to swipe at him again. The tip of his shortsword caught Markra’s sleeve, slicing across his arm. Biting back a hiss, the elf stepped backward and slashed at the air between them. He half-hoped the motion would summon a flurry of magic icicles, but alas, the sword remained silent.
Nimbul closed the gap again, swift in his light clothes, and aimed a thrust at Markra’s face. The points of two blades glinted at him, unnervingly close, but Markra veered just out of range. One of the blades missed entirely, but the other grazed his cheek, just deep enough to draw blood.
But illusionary swords do not cut, which meant that sword was real, and so was the Nimbul who held it. Seeing his chance, Markra lunged for the real Nimbul—and this time, the pale shimmer of ice danced across his blade.
Nimbul’s eyes widened as he ducked out of the way, but not fast enough to avoid a gash in his side. Flecks of frost thinly spread over his clothes as Markra tore through the fabric and cut into the skin. No blood poured from the wound, likely frozen in place, but it was enough. Both Nimbuls staggered and gripped their sides with one hand, heaving identical clouds of visible breath.
“Oh, now you have done it,” Nimbul sneered. “These were Nimbul’s favorite garbs.”
Markra pointed his sword at him, refusing the bait. “Who sent you after me? Who killed Gorion and put the bounty on my head!?”
The assassin chuckled. “You truly are the fool if you’ve not discovered it already. Nimbul need not waste words on thee.”
He drew back his hand, coated in his own cold blood, and another pink glow lit his fingers. Markra gasped and leaped at him. He’d only have moments to guess which Nimbul was the real one—but he guessed wrong. The final of Nimbul’s illusion evaporated as Markra’s sword passed through it, and the real Nimbul raised his hand again.
Heat seared into Markra as the Magic Missile flew into him. It tremored up and down his limbs, besieged him like thousands of tiny hot needles scouring his skin. Not once, not twice, but three times, for each missile that found its home in his body. Wracked in pain, Markra whimpered and fell to his knees, dropping his sword.
“Now comes the sleep,” Nimbul whispered as he leaned over Markra, gripping his shortsword tightly. Palm over pommel, fingers wrapped around the hilt, like an acolyte prepared to sacrifice an offering. “Close thine eyes, oh dead one. Nimbul shall deliver you.”
Markra reached for his sword, but Nimbul kicked it out of the way. Besides, his bones were too heavy, too much in pain. His vision blurred, barely able to keep his eyes open. If he could just tap into his anger, his desperation, he could draw out his gift and heal his wounds. But try as he might, he felt nothing of the mysterious power. Only a hole in his heart, empty and yearning to be filled.
No! Markra tried calling to it. Not now, not when I need you most! You worked before, why won’t you answer me!?
Still nothing, not even the faintest stir of warmth. No use, then. Imoen was too injured to help, Khalid and Jaheira had run off to who-knows where, and it seemed even the gods had abandoned him.
This can’t be my fate, he thought again, too afraid to speak aloud. I can’t die here, not after coming this far!
But before Nimbul could run him through, an enormous yell bellowed through the night. They turned toward it, and in the darkness, Markra saw a man barreling at them. Not Khalid—this man was too tall and broad to be him. But a fighter none the less, dressed in rattling mail with a giant, two-handed sword over his head.
“Go for the eyes, Boo!” the stranger howled. “Go for the eyes!! RAAAAGH!”
“What in—” Nimbul began, but couldn’t finish. Something flew at his head and climbed under his hood—small, round, and squirming. The next Markra knew, Nimbul was screaming his head off, lowered his shortsword, and clawed desperately at whatever besieged his face.
So of course he couldn’t fight back when the warrior charged at him, loosed another wild roar, and cleaved Nimbul right in half.
Markra flinched and looked away as both halves of Nimbul hit the ground. A clean cut, thanks to Nimbul’s lack of any armor, but still a grotesque sight. The stranger seemed hardy fazed at all, grinning widely as he returned his sword to the scabbard strapped to his back. He knelt and extended his arm to Nimbul’s contorted face, then whatever had mauled the assassin came scurrying up his arm until it sat on his shoulder.
Markra had to squint to get a decent look at the creature, but he swore he saw… No, it couldn’t be. That small sack of fur, four tiny claws, large beady eyes…
A hamster? he thought in disbelief. Nimbul died to a hamster?
The stranger turned and offered his hand to the fallen elf, smile brimming from ear to ear. Markra saw him better now that he faced him: the man was human, and even taller than he’d first thought. Lightly tanned, skin adorned with tiny scars, and ears pierced by tiny silver rings. Stretched across half his bald head was a round, purple tattoo, shaped like an upside-down teardrop with a hole in its center. As to its meaning, Markra had no idea, but he struggled to keep himself from staring at it.
“Hail, fellow warrior!” the man shouted, seemingly oblivious to the volume of his own voice. “That was a close one! Ooh, you are lucky Boo and I were near, or that would have left a nasty scar! Are you all right, friend?”
He wasn’t, but Markra nodded anyway and took the stranger’s hand. He flinched as he was yanked to his feet, pain throbbing in his every pore. But it all dulled away as he stared past his savior to look at Imoen. She’d started to come to, but struggled to just sit herself up.
“Imoen!” Markra moved to run to her, but stumbled instead, too weary to keep his balance. The warrior was kind enough to hold him steady as he walked, then dropped to Imoen’s side and helped turn her over. “You okay, Imoen? Can you hear me?”
“Nngh…” she groaned, and squinted up at him through tired eyes. “I’ll feel better…once I get that bath…”
That tugged a hopeless grin from Markra’s lips. “You look like you’d rather pass out than bathe.”
“One or the other… I don’t care which.”
“M-Markra! Imoen!”
Khalid’s voice pulled their attention. Looking up, they saw him and Jaheira running toward them, freed of the Horror that’d gripped their hearts. Accompanying them behind was a squadron of Nashkel soldiers and Berrun Ghastkill. The mayor looked to have been dragged out of bed, disheveled and hastily dressed, but his sword was drawn and ready.
As Jaheira dropped to Imoen’s side to survey her and Markra’s wounds, Berrun gaped at the strewn corpse on the ground. “What in Helm’s name happened here?”
“W-We were under a-attack,” Khalid panted. “B-B-But—”
“It’s okay, Khalid,” Markra reassured him. “We were rescued. By…”
“Minsc!” At the elf’s questioning gaze, the stranger answered, pointing a righteous thumb at himself. “A traveling warrior of Rasheman! And his loyal companion, Boo!”
The hamster on his shoulder squeaked in delight, so Minsc cradled the sandy creature in his hands and scratched behind its little ears.
Everyone else simply stared dumbstruck at the adoring creature.
Minsc gasped and drew Boo back, as if to shield him from an unseen onslaught. “How rude! Boo is no regular rodent! He is a miniature giant space hamster.”
He answered so matter-of-factly, it silenced the thousands of undoubtedly brewing questions it had spurred.
“Ah… Yes, well…” Even Berrun, proud leader of Nashkel, seemed to have lost his words. He cleared his throat once as if to clear it of nerves. “Minsc and…Boo, you have just saved our very own heroes of Nashkel, and much deserve my thanks.”
He took a long, gracious bow, though Minsc waved him off, flushing lightly.
“No, no! Minsc and Boo need no thanks! There was evil afoot! And wherever evil goes, my boot follows close behind!”
“Regardless, the sancitity of this town is my responsibility. My guards never should have let that vagabond inside.” Berrun sighed and met Khalid’s gaze, the closest of their group to him. “For this slight, you have my sincerest apologies. I will wake Nalin so he may tend to your wounds, and you may sleep beneath the roof of our inn free of charge tonight.”
“Thank you, Berrun,” Jaheira concluded, pulling her eyes away from Boo the hamster. “And as for our payment for clearing the mines—”
“I will have the money for you come morrow. Until then, please rest. You’ve certainly earned it.” Berrun flashed that winning smile, nodding at all of them. “It would seem that I was right to trust you. Though I do wonder a bit what happened to the other pair I’d hired, Xzar and…Montaron, wasn’t it?”
“They didn’t make it,” Markra snapped. “And if your men happen to find them sneaking around, please keep it that way.”
Berrun raised an eyebrow at that, but said nothing. No doubt he’d suspected Xzar and Montaron’s true nature back when they’d met, maybe even before that, even if he didn’t know the lengths of their betrayal. He nodded to one of his men, and the soldiers departed under his wordless orders.
“I’ll fetch Nalin now,” Berrun reassured them one more time, and at Khalid’s nod, he left them. Freed of the mayor, Khalid rejoined the rest of them, peering at Imoen over his wife’s shoulder.
“H-How are you, Imoen?” he asked.
Imoen offered a weak smile. “It hurts… But at least I don’t got two arrows stickin’ outta me. I guess that’s an improvement.”
“She will be fine once Nalin gets here,” Jaheira agreed with a nod, but looked once at Markra as he loosed a breath he’d been holding. “You look worse for wear as well.”
He shrugged. “Someone had to keep him busy.”
“Aye!” Minsc chimed in, so loudly he earned a wince out of all four of them. “The boy fought bravely in the wake of villainy! True, Minsc and Boo might have finished him off, but he was already weakened by the time we arrived! What is your name, young warrior?”
“I’m Markra,” he answered, pointing at himself, and then at his companions. “This is Khalid, Jaheira, and Imoen. We came here to help Nashkel’s mines, and had just gotten back when…” He paused, unsure how much more he should share, so instead he nudged his head toward the assassin’s remains. “When that happened.”
Minsc nodded a couple times, his eyes growing wider. “The Iron Crisis, eh? I’d heard of the mines’ troubles while I stayed in town the past night. You mean to say, you’re the ones who’ve solved their problems?”
“Indeed, it was us,” Jaheira said.
“Huzzah!” Suddenly, Minsc threw one arm into the air, while the other held his hamster, a righteous smile across his lips. “Rangers and hamsters everywhere, rejoice! You are exactly the kind of heroes I’ve been searching for!”
“What—”
Markra barely began to form his question when Minsc suddenly dropped to his knees and bowed. He’d placed Boo back on his shoulder, and Markra may have been imagining it, but it seemed even the hamster had taken a humble stance.
“My fellow adventurers, I implore you lend me your ears!” the ranger wailed. “As every warrior of Rasheman, I am in the midst of completing my dejemma. But my charge and loyal companion Dynaheir was snatched from me by villainous gnolls! I had sworn to protect her, when the vile beasts swooped down on us by cover of darkness, and separated us! I must get her back, but Boo and I are but ranger and hamster, and we cannot do it alone. Please, won’t you help me destroy their evil, and rescue my Dynaheir from their clutches?”
The four of them all looked at each other, searching each other’s eyes for an answer. Markra certainly didn’t care for another neck-risking adventure, not after the perils they’d faced in the Nashkel mines. Still, if what Minsc said was true, he couldn’t simply ignore a plight to rescue someone either—especially if they were trapped by gnolls. The dog-headed, bristle-furred monsters were famous for hunting and feasting on intelligent, humanoid creatures. Depending on how long his friend’s been a captive, Minsc couldn’t have much time to lose.
From their troubled expressions, Markra’s friends must have known that too.
“We hear your plea, ranger,” Jaheira began at last, “but we have a mission of our own that we must attend to as well. One, much like yours, that cannot wait.”
Minsc’s head jerked up, almost jostling poor Boo off his shoulder, looking as if he’d just been slapped. “Then you… You will not help?”
“Th-That’s not what she’s s-saying,” Khalid intervened, and placed a kind hand on Minsc’s arm. “Why d-don’t we speak f-further on this matter, once we are less w-w-wounded?”
That seemed to help him simmer off, though his lips pursed as he chewed on Khalid’s words. Boo squeaked in his ear, and Minsc frowned at him, but after a tiny excuse for a glaring match between them, he nodded and rose to his feet.
“Aye, very well,” Minsc concluded as he dusted himself off. “Boo has chosen to trust you, and so, I will trust you too! We shall talk again in the Nashkel inn, where we will exchange ale and tales of adventure around the table!”
Boo squeaked again—louder this time, and almost…angry. A look of recognition crossed Minsc’s face, and he stroked the hamster’s head with his large finger. “Oh, don’t worry Boo, I remember the last time. No more of that Tanagyr’s Stout for Minsc! Much too strong for my road-weary stomach…”
And with that, the tall ranger turned his back to them and walked away. Once he was safely out of ear-shot, Markra threw a despaired look at Imoen and lowered his voice.
“Okay, honestly, why do I keep running into weirdos?”
“Says the guy with unexplained magic and a price on his head,” Imoen scolded teasingly. “You’re a weirdo now too, in case you forgot.”
Markra sighed, and once again, his gaze wandered back to Nimbul’s remains. “Believe me, I’ve been trying… No such luck.”
Still, at least he had one point of sanity going for him, and Markra reassured himself of it as he watched Minsc disappear inside Nashkel’s inn:
At least I don’t talk to miniature giant space hamsters.
They waited a while longer before Nalin appeared. Even in the dead of the night, the priest of Helm walked the streets clad in his uncomfortable set of plate armor. Upon recognizing the troublesome band, Nalin cursed and almost turned back to his temple, but after he failed to find Xzar and Montaron among them, he begrudgingly offered his services.
Once they’d been fully healed, they gathered the assassin’s belongings, hoping for any clues that could reveal the origins of Markra’s bounty. Aside from a couple magic scrolls and unique pieces of equipment, the only item of worth was a note in jagged handwriting:
“Nimbul,
The money you have recieved from Tranzig should cover your usual fee. Your assignment is a difficult one, but I'm sure that you are up to the task. There is a group of mercenaries who should be coming through Nashkel in the next few days. They are led by a whelp named Markra. You are to kill Markra and all that travel with him. I warn you; they might not look like much, but they are very dangerous. Good hunting!
-Tazok”
“Look at that,” Markra chuckled as he showed the letter to his friends. “We’re considered ‘very dangerous’ now.”
“Don’t let your head swell so big,” Jaheira scolded him. “That letter also called you a welp.”
“These people want me dead; I’ll take whatever I can get.” Markra fished for one of the previous letters out of his pack and compared them side by side. “There’re those names again, Tranzig and Tazok. The same people who’d been in contact with Mulahey.”
“Then whoever was behind the contamination of Nashkel’s mines was also after you.”
Imoen’s face scrunched up in confusion. “But that don’t make a lotta sense. What would a buncha guys like them want with Marky? They can’t know that we ruined their plans yet, it’s too soon. What’s the connection?”
“Maybe they heard a bounty was in town,” Markra guessed with a shrug, “and opted to go after it while they had people down here. Kill two birds with one stone and all that.”
But he didn’t voice what he was really thinking: that this was nowhere near a mere coincidence. If his suspicions were true, then the people who’d tried to poison the mine and steal his life were also the ones who’d murdered Gorion all those nights ago. Like Imoen said, it didn’t make sense; if their goal was to destroy Nashkel’s iron and fuel the Crisis, how did the assassination of a nobody from Candlekeep fit in?
Yet despite their jagged points and curves, Markra couldn’t help but fixate on the same puzzle pieces and think: These must fit together somehow. And judging from the frowns on Khalid’s and Jaheira’s faces, they felt the same.
“W-We will know more once we f-find this T-T-Tranzig,” Khalid concluded. “I-In the meantime…”
He nodded toward the doors to the Nashkel inn, thin enough that they could hear the boisterous cries of Minsc from inside. Or his voice was just that loud. As soon as she laid eyes on it, Jaheira visibly tried to suppress a shudder—and failed to do so.
Markra had to admit, somewhere in the dark recesses of his heart, a small, devious part of him rather enjoyed watching the druid struggle to keep her composure.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, a smirk tugging at his lips. “Afraid it’ll bite if you’re not careful?”
Jaheira spun, eyes blazing, mouth open for a nasty retort—only to cringe when another shout from Minsc leaked through the door, along with the clang of tankards hitting the table. Music hummed through the wood as he led the patrons inside into a sea chanty—ignoring the fact they were nowhere near the sea. At her sides, Jaheira’s hands balled into fists.
“Oh, that man is an affront to Nature!” she huffed. “A ranger? More like a mockery! Did you see the way he handled that creature? That rodent, th-that…”
“Miniature-giant space hamster?” Markra asked.
“A perfectly normal-sized, bred by the earth hamster! By Silvanus’s might, I have every right to march in there and offer him a piece of my mind for—”
Before she could do just that, however, Khalid put his hands on his wife’s shoulders and eased her back a step.
“E-Easy, dear… Easy…” he urged her. “Remember what the a-archdruid said? To maintain Nature’s balance, o-one must also maintain—”
“—calm,” Jaheira finished. Though still shaking, she took a couple deep breaths through her nose. “I am calm. I am balanced, and I am…calm.”
She waited a few minutes more, until at last she reached for the door knob and twisted it around. “As calm as I can be, at any rate…”
The strum of bard strings and upbeat drums crashed into them as the door swung open. It seemed all of Nashkel’s soldiers had come to the inn to celebrate—or at least, a good many that had now been relinquished of their duties for the night. The innkeeper stayed safely behind the counter cleaning glasses as his waitress hurried to every table, dodging spills and mouthy men. At the largest table in the center, Minsc had his arms around a pair of uniformed soldiers, singing and swaying to the tune. Even the beer seemed to dance with them, sloshing inside their steins.
“Barrel o’er the sea, say I, The barrels filled with water! The only drink me sailors need Is a lap o’ our capn’s daughter!”
The song continued like that for a while, each stanza more ridiculous than the last. From what Markra gathered in the lyrics, it was about a ship journeying too slowly across the sea, and the sailors had to dump supplies overboard to increase their speed. Instead of despairing over what to lose and what to keep, the men insisted that they could throw everything overboard and somehow survive—thanks to the affections of their captain’s daughter.
Imoen hummed quietly along, no doubt having learned it from Winthrop. Markra’s head bobbed slightly to the tune, but Jaheira didn’t seem so impressed. The longer it went on, the deeper the frown creased on her face. Not even Khalid’s gentle back-rubbing could relax her.
As it finally ended, Minsc and his group raised their steins in the air chugged the last of their beer. Spectators surrounding them clapped and whistled as all three cups slammed on the table at once, completely empty. Minsc grinned from ear to ear—made even goofier by the mustache of foam over his lip—as he tossed a coin at the musicians behind him.
“A many thanks for the cheery tune, comrades!” the ranger bellowed. “A fine end to the villainy that gripped this town!”
The rest of the Naskhel soldiers shouted in agreement, toasting to one another. It was only until his miniature crowd had dispersed and returned to their mingling did Jaheira at last walk inside, everyone else following close behind.
Spotting them, Minsc’s eyes lit up and he raised his hand in greeting.
“Ah, you came!” he said. “Boo was beginning to wonder about you!”
Boo squeaked. Too small for him to notice before, Markra spotted the hamster perched on Minsc’s shoulder like a pirate’s parrot. How the little furball had managed to stay on during its master’s joyful singing, Markra could only begin to guess.
“We did,” Jaheira replied as she and the rest of them took seats around the table. “You look rather elated, ranger, considering your companion’s been kidnapped by gnolls.”
“One cannot give in to the sorrow wrought by evil, for that too is a part of its villainy! Just how are we to champion justice and deliver a swift butt-kicking if we are always down in the dumps?”
Though he said that, Minsc’s smile dipped slightly, and he wiped the mug foam off his face with a rag. “But, ah… It is hard to stay strong without Dynaheir. Boo said I needed cheering up.”
Another lively squeak. Markra raised an eyebrow, but he nodded at Minsc anyway. Yeah, the hamster told him to. Right. Just smile and nod, Markra. Nothing unusual about that.
“So!” Minsc began again, eager to change the subject. “Have you considered my quest, friends?”
“First we got some questions,” Imoen answered with the raise of her hand, as if she were still in school. “For one, when did ya say you and your Aunty Dyna got separated?”
“Aye! It must have been… Two nights ago now!”
“And yer sure she’s still a-okay? All peach and roses? All four limbs attached?”
“Imoen—” Markra began to scold her, but Minsc cut him off by ramming his fist on the table, so strongly the dinnerware jumped and rattled in place.
“My Dynaheir does not falter in the face of evil!” he shouted. “She is a powerful spellcaster, an invoker and trained wychlaran! Though vulnerable while she is alone and surrounded, I know she won’t succumb so easily!”
Rssk! hissed the hamster. Strange, in the pits of those dark, beady little eyes, Boo almost looked…sinister.
“W-We understand, Minsc,” Khalid recovered, ever the nervous diplomat, “b-but we must consider every p-p-possibility there is, i-if we are to risk our lives going a-after her.”
“Which leads us to our next question,” Jaheira continued. “Do you have any idea where these gnolls had come from, and where they might have taken her? Wild animals and monsters teem the Sword Coast, however I’ve yet to hear of any massive gnoll uprising this far south.”
Minsc chuckled. A low, throaty laugh paired with a twinkle in his eyes. “Ah, and now we get to the good part! Feast your eyes on this, heroes!”
Then he reached under the table and grabbed a scoll case. Once opened, he spread a map of the Sword Coast across the table, tossing plates and cups aside as he did. Markra recognized the familiar roads and rivers, the many tiny triangles that mapped the forests, and the houses marking towns and cities. Scribbled in the blank spaces were notes and arrows and question marks that barely qualified as chicken-scratch, let alone written words and symbols.
“These past two nights, I have been tracking the gnolls,” Minsc explained. “They are crafty creatures when they wish it, but none so clever as to deceive a ranger’s eye! Dynaheir and I had camped here, along the riverside, when they sprung from the bushes! Following their trail since, I have discovered they must have a base somewhere closeby!”
“And that somewhere is…?” Markra asked.
Minsc pointed at the map—southwest of Nashkel. “Somewhere down here!”
The four of them just stared at the map a while. Patrons chattered in the background, gossiped about the mine and the heroes who’d saved it. The same heroes now rendered dumbstruck.
“That’s all?” Jaheira asked after the long silence.
Minsc winced. “W-Well, Minsc is not so good with specifics… That is more Boo’s specialty. But I know it is somewhere in that area! Thereabouts. In general. Give or take a few days’ walk.”
“But you know nothing else about it?” Jaheira persisted. “You don’t know its geography, its distance? Do you even know the number gnolls expected to occupy this so-called ‘base’?”
“Oh, there will be many! Minsc is certain of that!” Though he scratched the back of his head sheepishly. “But just how much is ‘many’… That is less certain.”
Before anyone else could comment, Minsc immediately lowered his head and bowed again, looking rather desperate as he hovered over his empty stein and marked-up map.
“But that is why I’ve come to seek your aid!” he exclaimed. “Please, my Dynaheir… She is my charge. I have failed to protect her, and now, it is my duty to bring her back. If I cannot, then my dejemma, my passage, my pride as a warrior… None of it will matter. I will have lost a friend and an ally, and no amount of butt-kicking or Boo belly-scratches would ever be the same without her.”
Listening to him, watching the concern melt into his features and wax his earlier gusto, Markra’s tightly-clenched heart slowly opened up. Suddenly, he felt bad for acting so snarky before; strange and confusing and downright mad Minsc may be, he was still just a man, one who’d lost someone important to him. Though he couldn’t understand the language of miniature-giant space hamsters, Markra did understand that feeling of loss. Of grief. Of sheer desperation. He would turn all the realms upside-down if he thought it would bring back Gorion.
Try as he might, Gorion was lost to him and no amount of pleading and world-turning would ever bring him back. But Dynaheir… If she still lived, if they could really rescue her, Minsc could be spared of that pain. He wouldn’t have to drown himself in beer and song just to make himself feel better.
“It’s okay,” Markra spoke at last, and put a hand on the big man’s arm. “We’ll help you, Minsc. We’ll get her back.”
He didn’t have to look to feel Jaheira’s glare digging into him. Already he began to imagine the dozens of ways in which the druid could torture him. But it was worth it to see Minsc’s beaming smile stretch from ear to ear and see his spirit soar again.
“Ohh, praise be to Mielikki!” Minsc cried. “Thank you, my new friends! Together, we shall hunt down evil and roll it in a ball for kicking!”
“Well, that’s all fine and dandy,” Imoen began, tugging on Markra’s sleeve to get his attention, “but what about Tranzig? We don’t know how long he’s gonna hang out at Feldepost’s, and we don’t know how long it’ll take to rescue Dyna.”
“Precisely,” Jaheira agreed through gritted teeth. “That gnoll camp lies in our opposite direction, Markra. A chance like this won’t come by again, and for the whole of the Sword Coast, we must get to the bottom of this Iron Crisis. Minsc, I’m sorry about your friend, and I wish we could help, but I simply don’t see how our paths may align. We cannot do both.”
Markra’s lips pursed. “Maybe we can.”
“What are you—”
“We split up. One group goes with Minsc to hunt down the gnolls, and the other heads to Beregost to interrogate Tranzig. Once Dynaheir’s safe, both groups can meet at Feldepost’s and exchange information from there.”
For the second time since Markra had known her, he’d shocked Jaheira into a gaping silence. Khalid’s eyes were almost as large as the plates beneath him. Imoen simply blinked and scratched her head, unsure what to think.
“Out of the question,” Jaheira immediately shot down.
“I-It’s not a terrible p-p-proposition…” Khalid stuttered, but winced at a glare from his wife. “B-But dangerous. And reckless. And certainly rash. But m-mostly dangerous.”
“Marky, you know I’ll follow ya til the ends of the Realms, no matter what you say,” Imoen added. “But uh… Are you sure about this?”
“It is risky,” he admitted, “and under better circumstances, I’d never suggest it. But I really think this is the best way for everyone to get what they want. With Minsc, we’ll send three people to the gnolls and two at Tranzig.”
“Three?” Jaheira bawked. “You don’t even know how many will be there, and you’re only sending three?”
“Four once we get Dynaheir back.”
“Assuming she still lives!”
“She does live!” Minsc interrupted, shaking his fist at Jaheira. “I know it in my heart of hearts, the warm, grumbly part of my soul! My Dynaheir is still alive!”
“By ‘warm and grumbly,’ you don’t mean your stomach, do ya?” Imoen asked.
“Ooh! Come to think of it, I’d forgotten to order food after singing! Oh, waitress!”
“Enough, both of you!” Jaheira shouted, banged her hands on the table, and shot to her feet. Imoen and Minsc flinched, but it was Markra who held her attention, all of her frustration. Markra vaguely remembered a phrase about the killing power of looks, but it was a feeble memory, faded and phantasmal next to the death-glare burrowing into him.
“C-Calm,” Khalid whispered beside her. “Remember the calm.”
She took in one shuddering breath. Held it, waited a few beats, and finally exhaled. Her face was still red. Her death-glare persisted. At least she kept her quarterstaff still slung on her back, but Markra had no idea how much longer that would last.
“Four people,” she said.
“Yes,” Markra agreed.
“Against dozens of gnolls.”
“Which are not much stronger than kobolds.”
“Traversing a road riddled with iron-hungry bandits.”
“No, the bandits are pillaging the roads between towns. They have no interest in the lowland areas leading to the gnoll camp.”
“And the other two interrogate Tranzig, a man we know nothing about with connections we also know nothing about.”
“What we do know is that he’s just one man, and two people should be more than enough to handle him.”
“Says the man who was nearly killed hours ago while surrounded by three of his friends.”
“Yeah, after two of those friends ran off like chickens without their heads.”
Jaheira’s cheeks burned, a mix of rage and fluster. Her fingers scraped against the table, curling into fists. “That was not—”
“—your fault,” Markra finished, gentler this time. “I know. I’m not blaming you. But Jaheira, while you and Khalid were helpless, Minsc stepped in—when he didn’t have to—and saved my life. Not just me either, but Imoen too. Shouldn’t we find some way to repay him?”
Slowly, as her gaze swept over her party and took in their expressions, Jaheira lost her edge. Less like a panther poised to spring and more like the thoughtful, intelligent woman Markra knew her to be—somewhere under all her bravado, at least. Chewing her lip, she looked at Minsc, then Imoen, then back at her husband. Khalid smiled and rubbed her back, and while Markra wasn’t married, he didn’t need to be to understand the loving gesture: “I’ve got you. Whatever you decide, I’m right here.”
She heaved a tired sigh and met Markra’s eyes again. “This isn’t a good idea.”
Not perfect, no, he silently agreed with her. Not by any means.
But in the end, he shrugged. “It’s the best I can do. Dynaheir will die if we don’t do something. Please, Jaheira, let’s help him. We owe him that much.”
Minsc nodded vigorously, almost jostling his poor hamster from its roost, but neither of them paid him any mind. Even the patrons around the inn seemed to quiet, curiously drawn to the spat, while the bards played a mellow tune in the background. To anyone else, the drop in volume would’ve simply signaled the end of a busy night, but to Markra’s sensitive ears, the whole multiverse may as well have stopped to listen.
At last, Jaheira drew back from him and stood over the table, the high and dignified leader again.
“Very well. We do this your way,” she decided at last. “Markra, for your insistence that we aid the ranger in his quest, you will be accompanying Minsc to the gnoll camp, along with Khalid. Imoen, you and I will head to Beregost and accost Tranzig.”
“HUZZAH!” Minsc leaped from his seat, chair legs scathing across the floor. Then he dipped down and grabbed Markra in a giant bear hug around the shoulders. “Minsc and Boo would ask for no better heroes to save Dynaheir from her captors! Many thanks again, my pointy-eared friend!”
“No problem,” Markra squeaked out, and heaved for breath once Minsc released him and his windpipe. Beaming, the ranger cradled Boo in both his hands and scratched his little ears affectionately.
“Now, come, Boo! Adventure comes at the crack of dawn, and we’ve much to do to prepare!”
Squee, squeal! chirped the hamster, and with barely a wave goodnight, Minsc charged down the hallway and disappeared into one of the rooms.
Jaheira slumped back in her seat. “The ranger speaks true… If we are all in agreement, then we should retire for the evening.”
Neither Khalid nor Imoen voiced any protest, but Marka’s lips pursed. He wanted to help Minsc, and he knew as soon as he accepted his quest that he would be part of the rescue. But he’d be leaving without Imoen, and in truth, he was far more interested in what they’d learn from Tranzig in Beregost. Though he’d convinced the druid of his plan, her chosen combination wasn’t quite what he’d wanted.
But it’d took all he had to confront Jaheira, driven her to the edge of her patience and barely kept her from tipping over. Markra had no desire to push her further. After one final look around the table, Jaheira nodded and leaned her head toward her husband.
“Then, Khalid my dear,” she sighed. “it is late. Let us go to bed.”
“O-Of course,” he soothed her, took her hand and walked her to their room.
Once they’d gone, Markra sighed and hung his head. “Well, if she didn’t hate me before, she sure does now.”
“Aw, don’t be like that,” Imoen reassured as she patted his shoulder. “I think she’s warming up to ya! At least she didn’t start yelling at you this time.”
“Somehow, that doesn’t make me feel any better.”
“Little victories, Marky! Keep addin’ up those little victories, and you’ll win her over someday! Ya just gotta keep up the good fight!”
She balled her hands into fists and punched the air before her like a cage fighter to a crowd, complete with breathy sound effects. But Markra wasn’t so impressed, rolling his eyes at her.
“Uh-huh. Right.” Then he rose to his feet and stretched. “Well, until then, I’m gonna go take a bath. We’ve got another long trip ahead of us tomorrow, and I’m not starting it by smelling like sulfur.”
“Okay!” Imoen complied, but a second later her grin disappeared, replaced by a pout. “Hey, I wanted the bath first!”
“Oh?” He’d already turned on his heel, but flashed a smirk over his shoulder. “Would you like to come join me?”
“Haha, nope!” she yelped, and even crossed her arms over her chest like a giant X. Just as Markra knew she would.
“You’ll just have to wait ‘til I’m out, then,” he said with a shrug.
“Meanie-head! Tub-snatcher! Conniver of all things hygienic! May the gods have mercy on your soul for stealing a girl’s rightful bath-time!”
Shaking his head—but smiling now—Markra pushed in his chair at the table and followed the rest of his companions down the hall. Already he dreamed of steamy hot water and herbal soaps rejuvenating his soul, so close he could almost smell them.
Comments
Well, at least I have now, and it's good so far! I'm only through chapter 3, but I found the FF.net version and favorited it so I can read at work. Awesome. ^_^
Glad you like it though. ^_^
But I promise, this project has not been forgotten! It just may take a little while for the next installment this time around. If I don't have it done by the end of May, you can officially bonk me on the head.
Just kidding. I know just how busy life can get. There's no need to rush things, so by all means, take all the time you need. Just know that I'll be waiting. I'm always waiting.
Chapter 12
“How many are there?” Jaheira asked in a hushed voice.
Montaron reappeared, almost melted out of the shadows that clung to the cavern walls. “Three. One of ‘em’s usin’ those damn fire arrows though.”
The druid nodded solemnly, and gazed beyond the tunnel once again. The cavern opened into another hollow chamber, this one filled with a pool of water. After Imoen’s nearly fatal encounter across the lava bridge, the adventuring company dared not risk facing another ambush again. An expert at stealth and stalking, they relied on Montaron’s judgement to see what lay ahead—namely, the three kobolds poised to shoot them down before they crossed yet another stone bridge above the spring.
They didn’t have much cover between them and the kobold archers waiting across the water. By hugging the rock wall, they stood just out of bow range. If they meant to take the little buggers out, they would have to get closer and risk being shot. With six against three, the odds were in their favor, but as Markra’s gaze drifted back to Imoen, he shook that feeling off. After all, it would only take a single well-aimed arrow to bring one of them down.
“Very well,” Jaheira said again after a few long moments. “Everyone, come close to me. I’ve a plan that will strengthen our chances.”
The others did as she said, huddled close and surrounded her in a circle. Once they were settled, a purple light sparkled between Jaheira’s fingers.
“Facio. Voco. Ferre.” The magic words rolled off her tongue as her hands danced to a silent rhythm. In a flash, the orb of purple light spread from her hands and showered over the rest of the party, then transformed into a soft blue. Silvanus’s holy symbol—a green oak leaf—hovered above their heads, and even after it had disappeared, the air hummed with a power sacred to the forest god.
Markra couldn’t explain it, but as the spell fell into him, he felt stronger. More sure of himself, as if he could do anything so long as he had the blessings of a god on his side. And Silvanus would surely approve of their mission to restore balance in Nashkel, clear out the destructive kobolds, fill in the tunnels and return the land to its rightful state of forest and brush and—
Wait, what am I thinking? Markra blinked and shook his head, as if that could cast out the intrusive thoughts. Looking around at his companions, he could guess the rest of them were feeling the same. Montaron’s toothy grin seemed giddier than before, while Imoen licked her lips and reached for her bow quiver. Xzar’s brow furrowed as he also shook his head erratically. Of them all, Khalid was the only to stay neutral, perhaps because he’d felt the spell’s affects before.
“There,” Jaheira breathed as she lowered her hands. “Now that we’ve been endowed by the protection of Silvanus, our arrows will be more likely to find their mark, and theirs to miss.”
“I do hope you’re not trying to convert us to your forest-prancing ways, druid,” Xzar drawled with his arms crossed over his chest.
A wry smirk touched Jaheira’s lips, but did not reach her chilling eyes. “Nothing of the sort, Xzar; it only lasts a few minutes. Though once the spell’s worn off, you might find yourself dearly missing it.” Then she pulled out her sling and loaded a stone into it.
“On my count, we go. Hit as fast and hard as you can, and we might take them down before they draw their strings. Are we ready?”
They answered her with a series of nods, and drew all of their ranged weapons. Three with bows and three with slings.
Standing on a ledge overlooking the water, the three kobold archers chattered and chuckled amongst themselves. But Markra’s party were hardly soft-footed, heavy steps echoing off the hollow chamber. Upon hearing them, their canine ears twitched, and they aimed their bows at the approaching adventurers across the way. One arrowhead licked with the fire Montaron had warned them about.
They would not be given the chance to shoot.
All at once, three arrows and three polished sling bullets flew through the air and dug into the kobolds. With fletching speared through its eye, one of them shrieked and tumbled off the ledge, splashing into the water below. Another took a bullet to the head and an arrow to the chest. That one loosed an arrow just moments before it fell, but the shock made its aim flimsy, and the arrow veered off toward the water, several feet below the adventurers’ feet.
Only one remained, the commando armed with flaming arrows. Though two shafts dug into its leg and arm, and it’d took a stone just above its eye, the kobold barked and hissed with a vengeance as it drew back its bow and fired.
Khalid cried out as the blazing arrow pierced his shoulder. He’d been trying to reload his bow when the enemy caught the underside of his arm. Imoen shouted his name, but none of them could afford to stop firing with one kobold still alive. Sparing the half-elf a quick glance, Markra pulled back another arrow to his cheek and aimed straight for the kobold’s heart. In one swift flight, his shot found its mark, and the monster slumped to the ground.
With the enemy dispatched, everyone lowered their weapons. Jaheira rushed to Khalid’s side as he struggled to pull out the arrow shaft. But before her healing magic could engulf his wound, Khalid grabbed her wrist and held it in place.
“I-I am all right, dear,” he assured her. “It’s r-really not as b-bad as it looks… My armor took most of the b-brunt.”
Jaheira jerked her hand free as she shot him a scolding glare. “Don’t speak such nonsense. You could lose your entire leg, and you would still insist it wasn’t ‘as bad as it looked.’”
Despite her harsh words, her husband chuckled. “Please, love, I-I’m not that m-modest.” Though he winced as she squeezed his arm, as if to remind him what pain feels like. “Ah! All…all right, p-perhaps it is a little more than I th-th-thought…”
“You are a warrior, Khalid.” The soft blue light glowed in Jaheira’s hands once again as she pressed her fingers to his wound. “I’ll not risk you going into battle with a wound in your shield-arm.” Then she said the magic words, and his arm was like new again.
As Khalid was healed, Markra ventured toward the rocky bridge, gazed before him, and let out a low whistle of awe. A large rock dome took the center of the chamber, a cave within a cave surrounded by water on all sides. Faint light bounced off the glassy water and lit the place just enough to see, though Markra could not tell where it was coming from. He found one uneven hole in the side, near the ledge where the kobolds had stood watch and the only entrance he could see.
“I…think we might’ve found their lair,” Markra realized.
The others joined him, gazing at the egg-like cave for themselves.
“Yes,” Jaheira agreed with a nod. “So it would seem.” Then she stepped before them and took her rightful spot as leader once again. “All of you, remain cautious. We know not what we might find inside—perhaps an entire kobold horde, or worse. Silvanus’s blessing will last for a time yet, but once it’s worn off, I cannot cast another to protect us, especially if we’re caught in the lick of combat. Are we ready?”
They answered her by brandishing their melee weapons, and they crept inside.
Despite their worst fears, the cave was empty. Stalagmites grew out of the cavern floor along the walls and cast long shadows under the flicker of torches. Empty indeed, but habited, as the presence of fire told them. It was not very large; even in the low light, Markra could see the back of the cave. But there was a second passage on the right, a natural arch adorned with hanging stalactites. Much like a monster’s mouth and its rows of teeth.
Markra peered around the corner and found a second room that branched off the passage. Unlike the rest of the cavern, this space was furnished. Rugs covered the ground, purple and gray and adorned with tassels, while pillows piled into the corners. A round, wooden table hugged the left wall, paired with only two chairs. But the strangest object was a giant chair draped with a gray cloth in the farthest part of the room, elevated on a pair of makeshift platforms. A chest rested at its feet, like an offering box.
The elf’s brow furrowed as he stepped inside, one hand on his sword hilt. The person behind the mine’s sabotage must live in this room.
Before he could turn back and tell the others what he’d found, however, a guttural voice echoed off the walls.
“Eh? How’d you get in here?”
Markra froze. The stranger had been hiding in his blind spot, just beyond his line of sight into the chamber. Now that he’d stepped into view, Markra got a clear look at him: a half-orc, almost two heads taller than him, dressed in chainmail that clinked as he walked. It was the small tusks jutting over his lips, the faint green tint of his skin, and his sheer size that betrayed his ancestry. On a chain around his neck, Markra spotted the divine symbol of Cyric, a jawless skull inside a purple sunburst. Better known as the Prince of Lies.
Upon locking eyes with Markra, the half-orc raised his morningstar and his shield, taking a defensive stance. “Tazok must have dispatched you, and my traitorous kobolds let you pass, didn’t they? I knew I could not trust them! Armed as such, you have obviously been sent to kill me! By Cyric, not a measure of ore leaves these mines unspoiled, and I am still to be executed!? I’ll not lose my head over this!”
“Markra, what have you done?” Jaheira’s voice hissed as she and her husband appeared on his either side. But Markra held up a hand, urging them to be quiet and keep out of sight. A thousand thoughts swam through his head, trying to process every hidden message in the half-orc’s words. Tazok. His traitorous kobolds. Unspoiled ore. So this person had someone even higher above him giving orders, and the kobolds really were just pawns in a scheme.
Of the many stories he’d read and heard about half-orcs while growing up, none of them boasted to the race’s intelligence. Perhaps he could trick the cleric into giving more information. Even better, perhaps he could also avoid any potential violence.
“Uh…” Markra gaped a moment, trying to scrounge together a proper response. “Yes… Fool, Tazok is…very upset with you! Reveal your treachery, and perhaps he will spare you!”
The half-orc sulked, and he lowered his guard just an inch. “Tazok is unfair. I have no desire to cheat him, or thee!” Then he pointed to the chest beneath the giant seat, a toothy grin stretching across his lips. “My letters will show, they are in that chest. Take them, take them and Tazok will see!”
“I got a bad feelin’ about this…” Montaron muttered a ways behind them. Markra glanced at Khalid and Jaheira out of the corners of his eyes, not daring to even turn his head, lest give away their position. Once they gave him a cautious nod, he walked into the room. Past the cleric, over the rugs, and toward the chest. Cyric’s symbol glared down at him from a tapestry on the wall, wicked and foreboding.
To Markra’s surprise, the chest wasn’t even locked. He lifted the latch, and with a yawning creak, he opened the lid. Inside lay a bundle of scrolls—two bound and sealed with wax, and the rest tied with string—two healing potions, and a bag of gold coins.
But that was only a glimpse. Before he could discern the rest of the chest’s contents, the half-orc’s vile chuckle brought Markra’s head up, and the chest closed tight once again. The cleric had brandished his morningstar and shield, and raised the pointed weapon high above his head.
“Fools!” the half-orc shouted. “You’ll never have the chance to take anything! Minions, come forth and kill the intruders!”
A flood of bloodthirsty yips bounced off the cavern. It was no trick of the hollow room: they were surrounded. Kobolds poured out of small holes in the floor, the walls, so many at once it was a wonder the cave didn’t collapse. Beyond Markra’s line of sight, he heard Xzar’s shrill scream and Imoen spewing curses the way Winthrop used to whenever he burned himself on the fire. Jaheira and Khalid spun around and drew their weapons in the archway, but they were quickly backed into the furnished chamber by the cackling mob of kobolds.
Cursing himself for underestimating the half-orc’s trickery, Markra shot to his feet and drew his sword. He dashed forward, but before he could close the gap between them, the half-orc’s hands lit with purple sparks as he hurried a magic chant.
“Cupio. Virtus. Licet!”
A golden orb flew out of his palms and disappeared into Markra.
Then he stopped. Sword up, knees bent, one leg in front of the other, frozen in a run. Cold crept into him, settled in his veins and stilled his blood like water turning to ice. He tried to bend his arms, close his eyes, step to or back, move any part of himself, but found he could not. Panic swelled in his throat, but he couldn’t even open his mouth and scream. Only his quick, deep breaths reassured him that he hadn’t been turned to stone, but stuck in his open stance, a still statue and completely helpless… He may as well have been.
The half-orc chuckled as he drew his morningstar and stomped toward Markra. “Now, what to do with you? Shall I send you back without your arms, or your legs? That’ll show Tazok. That’ll show him not to cross Mulahey!”
Markra’s heart pounded faster, the only movement in his whole body and one he could not control. Move! he yelled at himself, urged his muscles with all his being, but they refused to obey. Move, damn you! He’s going to kill you—now MOVE!
Khalid’s cry bounced off the cavern as he charged Mulahey, just in time to block the heavy morningstar with his shield. A part of his shield collapsed inward beneath the spiked orb as Khalid’s knees bent under the weight. Mulahey growled, tried to pry his weapon loose, and staggered as he nearly took Khalid’s shield off with it. Though using the momentum of the pull, Khalid slashed at Mulahey’s chest. The blade scraped across the many chain links and tore open his tunic, but it wasn’t strong enough to do any serious damage. At the very least, he put some much-needed distance between them.
Meanwhile, behind Khalid and Mulahey, Jaheira stood in the archway nearly lost in the kobold swarm. The monsters were slippery and always on the move, but thanks to Silvanus’s divine favor, her staff struck more often than it missed. Montaron stepped into view and buried his shortsword deep into a kobold’s calf, and slowly worked his way to Jaheira’s side. Markra had no idea where Imoen and Xzar were—likely in the previous chamber, just as surrounded as the rest of them, except they were not so well-suited for a brawl. With their sheer numbers, the rabid kobolds could be tearing them apart limb from limb, and Markra could do nothing but wonder and watch.
Then a light flashed. It cast a frightening shadow of the toothy archway on the walls. Kobolds began dropping to the floor, stretched on their backs with their eyes shut and tongues lolling. As if the mad necromancer had sensed Markra’s voiceless concern, he heard Xzar begin to sing.
“Nighty niiiiight, and good niiiiight… Go to sleep, my lil’ demon dogs!”
He shrieked the last bit, before another steel-on-steel clash stole Markra’s attention back. Khalid and Mulahey. Still exchanging blows, weapons and shields banging like thunder in the confined space. Though the half-orc had strength and size on his side, Khalid was quicker and had Silvanus’s faith still in his heart. He didn’t give an inch of ground; he couldn’t afford to. A chill ran down Markra’s spine, for Khalid was the only person standing in the way of the evil cleric and his own bloodied elven corpse.
Khalid continued to push until he had Mulahey backed against the wall. He swung relentlessly at his sides, but there were few breaks in the half-orc’s defenses. No one could sneak behind him with the rows of stalagmites and a cave wall at his back, and his large shield encompassed his entire torso and most of his lower body. What weak spots he did expose he kept out of Khalid’s reach with the wave of his morningstar, and unlike Khalid’s sword, it wouldn’t take much for Mulahey’s choice of weapon to pierce through armor.
Finally, the tides changed as Khalid drove his blade home into Mulahey’s thigh. Steel sunk into flesh, a hiss so deafeningly quiet after the crash of melee combat. Mulahey bit back a howl with immense effort heard through his teeth, and his head lowered.
Then, Markra felt it wear off. The blessing of Silvanus, the strength of the tree god leaving him and everyone else in his party all at once. Khalid’s face fell, no doubt also feeling the change, and retracted his sword.
But before he could retreat, Mulahey lifted his head again, an evil grin spread across his face. He bashed his shield into Khalid’s face, and the swordsman staggered back, disorientated. For just a moment, his shield dropped, and his sword arm fell limp to his side, but it was enough. Mulahey slammed his morningstar into Khalid’s torso and sent him flying across the cave. He hit the wall with a rumble, crashed into a row of stalagmites and reduced them to rubble. Then he fell limp, dents in his armor where he’d taken the blow.
Khalid!! Markra screamed, anguished, cursed himself and his body one-hundred fold, only to hear it echo back at him inside his own head.
Jaheira voiced his silent cries as she clobbered through the row of kobolds and ran to her husband. With most of the kobolds asleep thanks to Xzar’s spell, she could leave Montaron and the others to deal with them. She dropped to her knees and checked his pulse, then uttered the healing incantation as her hands glowed to life.
Markra expected Mulahey to stop her, but instead, he grasped at the Cyric holy symbol around his neck. He chanted a few prayers beneath his breath that Markra didn’t care to discern, and made a gesture with his fingers over his heart.
A beam of light shined down on him from the sky, pure and white and glorious as if from the heavens themselves. Markra’s eyes twitched, struggling to close against the blinding rays. Thankfully, the light vanished as soon as it came, but when it had gone, Mulahey glowed with the divine glimmer of his god. White and purple, Cyric’s chosen colors, burning in his body’s every contour.
As Jaheira focused on healing Khalid, Mulahey stepped toward her. Still, Markra remained trapped in his shell of a body, kicking and screaming inside as he watched. Except this time, something clicked. The cold in his core slowly melted away, and a welcoming warmth returned to him. First his toes and fingers shuddered, and his hands curled tighter around his sword. Then his arms, shoulders, and legs—aching after being stuck in such an awkward position. He stumbled a little as a rush of momentum came back at once, and so his body was his again, chest and shoulders rising and falling with each breath.
Overjoyed and relieved beyond measure, Markra loosed the scream that’d been building in him since the fight began, and charged.
But Mulahey was not fool enough to have forgotten him. As Markra’s sword sliced the air between them, the cleric raised his shield to block. One-handed and unfazed, as if he were stopping a bug. The magic blade simply bounced off the shield with hardly a scratch, and Markra nearly stumbled, shocked.
Mulahey swerved his morningstar around to punish Markra’s reckless charge, but the elf was quicker and ducked out of the way. The morningstar came crashing down and left a small crater in the floor where Markra once stood. Khalid’s earlier wound didn’t even seem to slow him down as he took his weapon off the ground and swung it again, this time at Markra’s head. He swerved back and felt the tip of a spike just a breadth from his nose.
He lunged again as Mulahey struggled to bring his morningstar back around, only to clash against his shield once again. When it wasn’t the spiked weapon putting distance between them, it was the shield getting in his way. He would make no progress if he continued this frontal assault.
But if I can get to his back…
A whizz split the air as a loose arrow dug into Mulahey’s back shoulder. Markra spotted Imoen, peeking around the corner with her bow as she reached for another arrow from her quiver. Mulahey flinched once, but didn’t bother to turn around. So Markra charged again, fully expecting the cleric to raise his shield. That was the plan: with iron in the shoulder of his shield-arm, it should be easier to break through his defenses. Though Mulahey seemed to realize that, instead swinging his morningstar around to knock Markra’s sword off its aim.
Anyone else might have lost their footing and their weapon after colliding with such a strong swing, but Markra’s elven blood kept him light on his feet and steady. Another arrow struck him, this time in the back of Mulahey’s already-wounded thigh. At last, the cleric staggered, for though Cyric’s blessing might have helped stave off the pain, it did not make him invincible. He did not lower his shield or his weapon, but he fell to one knee, and that was all Markra needed.
He swerved, crouched, and dashed behind Mulahey. Knees bent, legs apart, and low to the ground. Markra loosed one last yell as he rose from his prowling stance and slashed into Mulahey’s backside. As the sword found its mark, giant shards of ice grew like crystal out of the blade’s arc and pierced through half-orc’s chain armor. He stood frozen for a moment before the ice shattered, and he collapsed in a shivering heap.
Wounded, bleeding, but very much alive, Mulahey rolled on the floor and stared up at the approaching Markra. The holy glamor had faded from his body and he heaved for breath, fatigue finally catching up with him. He raised a hand to him, fingers splayed, waving desperately.
“I yield, I yield to thee!” Mulahey gasped. “Mercy, I beg thee! Accept my surrender?”
Markra pointed his sword at his nose, earning a flinch out of the half-orc. After imprisoning him in his own body and terrorizing his friends, Markra had half a mind to run him through and be done with it. But no, he had to think about this.
“Only if you tell us what’s been happening here,” Markra answered. “Who’s Tazok? Who sent you? And why target the iron mines?”
Mulahey nodded, a little too enthusiastically. “Yes, there in the chest are all my letters! Take them and leave me be. I will bother you no more.”
His gaze slid toward the chest, and Markra followed it with his own, though he hesitated. Glaring back at Mulahey, he pressed the tip of his sword just enough so it would touch the skin.
“You already tricked me once with that,” he snapped. “I won’t fall for it again, half-orc.”
“But this time, I tell the truth!” Mulahey insisted. “Look, you have already bested me. What more harm could I do to thee? Your answers are in that chest; take them and leave, or not take them at all.”
Markra took a deep breath. In… Out… Such a precarious thing, the life of this mad half-orc. The perpetrator of all the crimes in the Nashkel mines and servant of a lying god. Once he’d been on the winning side, ready to chop off Markra’s limbs as he watched helplessly like a statue, and now he lay bleeding on the floor beneath his magical blade.
It wouldn’t take much to end him. One tiny push was all Markra needed. That would puncture the skin, and the blood would flow out so fast he would choke on it. A simple motion with no more effort than a hand wave, yet what relief would come over him, watching the blood gather on the cavern floor… If only for this moment, Markra held all the power in the world—the difference between life and death. Being and unbeing.
He need only make a choice. Such an easy choice.
All it would take was one
little
push—
Markra screwed his eyes shut for a second and shook his head. No, no one should have that much power over another living person, no matter who they were. By gods, where had those thoughts come from? They’d been his, but he hardly recognize himself in any of those feelings.
As if to rebel against the unwelcomed bloodthrist in his head, Markra lowered his sword just a fraction and gazed back at the chest. Keeping the blade pointed at the half-orc, he carefully backed off until the chest came within arm’s reach. Only when he touched the lid’s surface did he take his eyes off the half-orc, and glanced once again into the chest’s contents.
“Marky! Look out!”
He’d barely glimpsed the curled scrolls a second time when Imoen’s voice jerked him back. He half-turned to see Mulahey draw up from a crouch and swing his morningstar with both hands at him. Caught off-guard, Markra couldn’t move fast enough, and the spiked head dug into his right leg and threw him to the ground. He screamed as the cold metal tore into his thigh and rend the soft underbelly of flesh, the weak spot in his leg armor.
Clutching his bleeding leg, Markra glared at the approaching Mulahey. He towered over him with his weapon high above his head, a desperate rage burning in his eyes.
“I’ll have your skulls for coming here!” he shouted. “You’ll ruin everything!”
“No!” Jaheira shouted. Behind Mulahey, Markra saw her run towards them and brandish her quarterstaff, but he doubted she’d make it in time. Khalid still lay slumped against the wall, shaking with effort as he tried to get to his feet. Imoen shot another arrow from her corner, but it went wide and struck the far wall. He’d lost sight of Xzar and Montaron long ago, and for all he knew, were still preoccupied with the kobold mob.
The fallen elf closed his eyes, cursing his own foolishness, and waited for the morningstar to bash in his skull…
He heard a gasp. A choke, the hiss of metal run through flesh. Markra opened his eyes, and saw Mulahey, still as a statue, with the tip of a blade protruding through his chest. Right where his heart should have been.
He only stayed that way a moment longer before his morningstar fell from his hands and clattered to the floor, then he toppled over. Behind him, Montaron pulled his shortsword free from his corpse, and wiped the blood off the blade using the dead man’s own tunic.
So, the halfling had been waiting in the shadows, biding his time for the most opportune moment to strike. Bruised and scratched from his scuffle with the kobolds, but far better off than the rest of them. A part of Markra seethed at the thought—that Montaron had stood back and watched when he could have stepped in at any earlier time. But none of that mattered now. Montaron’s plan had worked, no matter his methods, and he saved Markra’s life. The haggard elf had no right—or energy—to be angry.
“Montaron…” Markra croaked. It was all he could manage with the fiery throbbing in his leg. “Th-Thank you.”
“Don’t bother thankin’ me just yet, lad,” Montaron said.
And to Markra’s horror, he laid the tip of his shortsword against his throat.
“We ain’t done here.”
...
I'm sorry. >_>;;
Ronan: "Yes, Markra is dead. He died as he lived: on his back and looking for help."
Miria: "That would define you more accurately than him."
Ronan: "Only for you, sweet thing."
Miria: "I think I'm just gonna go throw up in that jar over there."
Emerin: "Would you both just stop bickering and wait for the next part?"
Miria: "But the wait is killing me!"
Brian: "Do not fear, friends! No doubt the spirit of justice shall swoop down upon the villainous fiend and save our troubled hero from certain death!"
Miria: "How is it certain death if there's any chance at all that he will be saved?"
Ronan: "Doing the impossible is what a hero is best at, right Brian?"
Brian: "Smiting evil is what heroes are best at, villain!"
Ronan: "Well, Brian, what are you waiting here for, then? Go and smite that evil halfling for justice!"
Brian: "Yeah, I'm not that stupid."
Ronan: "Surprising."
Miria: "So, I guess I'm getting an ale. Anyone else want to come along?"
Ronan: "I'm good for it."
Emerin: "You're always good for it, you drunken sod."
Ronan: "I don't get drunk. My body heat burns the alcohol away too quickly."
Miria: "Hey, maybe we should take this conversation elsewhere? I'm worried we might be hogging the thread."
Ronan: "Yeah, Em. Way to distract all of the readers with your nonsense."
Emerin: "MY nonsense?!"
Miria: "Seriously, guys, we're starting to get looks."
Brian: "That is good! All should see the force of righteous fury that stands before them!"
Ronan: "We're not standing, you dingbat."
Emerin: "I hate you guys."
Ronan: "We love you too, Em."
Brian: "Aha! A confession most dire! Don't worry, Em, I won't allow this villain to take advantage of your youthful good looks and naïveté in order to defile the purity of your virgin soul!"
Emerin: "Brian, what in the hells are you babbling about?!"
Kaiser: "Isn't it obvious? He loves you, and he wants to express that, but he can't because he has trouble finding the right words. As a result, he lashes out at anyone who tries to get between the two of you in the only way he really knows how to."
Emerin: "..."
Miria: "..."
Ronan: "
Brian: "
Kaiser: "But that's none of my business."
But it's done! WOO! And only one hour before July!!
...I'm disappearing again for July. Don't expect another chapter for a while. I gots some revisions ta do.
Enjoy~!
Chapter 13 (Part I)
“Wha…” Markra stared unblinking at the end of Montaron’s sword, just a breath away from cutting his throat open. “Montaron, what are you—”
“Traitor!!” Jaheira shouted as she drew her quarterstaff and got to her feet. Behind her, Khalid also struggled to stand, leaning on the cavern wall for support. “So, you show your true colors when we are weak and catching breath. I knew we could not trust you!”
“I wouldna be too hasty, if I were you, Jaheira…” said Montaron, barely sparing the druid a glance out the corners of his eyes. “Yer reckless temper’ll get somebody killed.”
No doubt on cue, as soon as Montaron finished his sentence, they heard Imoen cry out. Everyone stared back to the toothy archway—save for Montaron, who gave a cruel smirk down at Markra. Xzar had a squirming Imoen in his grasp, a knife poised for her kidneys if she fought too much. Not only that, but she seemed wounded: a dark spot on her side where blood slowly oozed through, perhaps from the kobold mob. Not a bad gash, but immensely unhelpful at its best.
“No…” Jaheira gasped, just loud enough for Markra’s ears.
Xzar cackled with not a trace of madness. Only wicked triumph. “Ohh, what’s the matter, sweet wildling? Well, not so ‘wild’ anymore, are you now!?”
Jaheira grasped her staff tighter, knuckles almost popping. “You filthy cowards…! To think I’d fought beside you, Zhentarim scum!”
“Hard to hide a nature once it’s bred in yer bones,” Montaron muttered, “but aye, ye were right, girlie. We are Zhentarim both.”
Markra’s heart pounded in his throat—as if he needed any more reminders of the deadly steel aimed there. His own blood slathered over his fingers as he tried to staunch the flow out his leg, but his hands could only do so much. Head reeling, not just from the lost blood, he struggled to even process what was happening, let alone find a way out.
Xzar and Montaron were agents of the Zhentarim, and he’d read enough about the murderous organization to know their bloody history. But no matter how creepy and tasteless and violent as they’d seemed, Xzar and Montaron had been his companions. Never really his friends, but still companions. He’d thought them capable of many things—murder, larceny, foul magic and tactics that Markra detested on many levels. But not betrayal. Never betrayal.
Which made him wonder: How long have they been planning this?
“Just…tell me why,” Markra choked out. “Why here, why now, why…why do any of this?”
“To keep their secrets buried here with us!” Jaheira snapped, shooting a fierce glare at the wizard and halfling. “The Zhentarim have been the ones behind this all along!”
Montaron matched her glare, at last looking away from his hostage on the ground. “Do yer pointed ears hear nothin’ at all, ya daft woman? I already told ye—the Zhentarim got nothin’ to do with this Iron Crisis.”
Xzar nodded as he chimed in. “Indeed, but someone certainly wants you to think so, you and everyone else on the Sword Coast. Monty and I had been sent to find whoever was spreading lies about our Family and silence them, which naturally led us here to the mines of Nashkel.” He grinned wider as he gazed at Markra. “What we did not anticipate was our dear Markra here falling into our laps, and his many surprises.”
“How much ye think the Zhentarim would pay fer an elf who can heal without the gods’ help?” Montaron asked Xzar over his shoulder. “Mind, his head’s already worth 200 gold to the right buyer.”
“I would say double. Triple even!” Xzar flashed another crooked smile at Markra. “Oh, you needn’t look so hurt, my ex-sworn-compatriot. Think of it as…a flattery of sorts, of the highest esteem. It’s not often Monty and I risk our hides for so much gain. You might even like the Zhentarim; at least they haven’t pledged to kill you once we turn you in…yet.”
Listening to them made Markra’s blood boil, his teeth grind together as he held back the rage. Money? His own party members and fellow travelers were going to kill his friends and hand him over to some bloodthirsty crime family, as if he were common property. For money? Silently, Markra took back any kind word or thought he’d ever had for Xzar and Montaron, cursed them one-hundred fold, and dearly wished that he hadn’t stopped Jaheira from attacking them back in the tunnels.
He reached for that anger, grasped it tight and didn’t let go. If they wanted to sell him to the Zhentarim, they would need proof of his healing abilities, and they would have none of that if Montaron killed him now. His most potent emotions had healed Imoen when she lay dying on the stone bridge; time to find out if they could heal himself as well.
Rage poured over him, hot and righteous and oh so sweet. It burned in his veins and flowed out his fingers. Markra screwed his eyes shut, begging every god he knew for some direction, and felt his hands heat up. Divine-magic sizzled against his wound, a similar sensation to Jaheira’s healing spells, but faster, wilder, and much less gentle. He’d always thought of her magic like a stream, soothing and cool and invigorating. This was a torrent, the bite of salty ocean waves ravaging against his skin. Markra bit the inside of his mouth to keep from crying out, but it quickly passed. In a matter of moments, the slash in his leg closed, his veins reconnected, and the blood burned off of a new layer of skin.
Xzar’s gleeful smile fell, replaced by scorn. “Monty, he’s healing! Stop him!”
He would need to aim at something other than Markra’s neck. Something that would hurt and disable, but not quite enough to kill. Montaron pulled back his sword just an inch and swung, but Markra reached for his own blade lying beside him, curved his aim upward, and blocked. The metal-on-metal clang was deafening in the small cavern, bouncing back and forth off the walls.
Seeing her chance, Imoen rammed her elbow into Xzar’s ribs, earning a yelp out of the necromancer, and pried herself free. Jaheira and Khalid split from the wall—Khalid to Imoen, and Jaheira to Markra. Still aching from his wounds, Khalid should do better against a mad mage than an experienced halfling fighter. Jaheira’s staff lashed out of her hands like a mantis’s arm, aimed straight for Montaron’s head, but he was too short and slippery. Montaron ducked out of the way and pivoted on his heels so he faced both her and the rising Markra at once.
The halfling chuckled under his breath as he eyed the two of them. “So, this be where we come to, eh? Ye’ve grown, boy, I’ll grant ye that. But truth be told, ye don’t stand a lick o’ chance against me.”
“You’re not giving me much of a choice,” Markra snapped, just before he lashed out first. The ice blade almost glistened in the low cavern light as it clashed against Montaron’s shorter sword. Jaheira followed with a yell and a long sweep of her quarterstaff, aimed for Montaron’s feet. But the halfling jumped over the stick and parried yet another slash from Markra’s sword.
Though the odds were in their favor at two-to-one, Montaron was small and dexterous in both hands. He switched sword-hands with ease whenever it suited him, and made it even more difficult for Markra and Jaheira to disarm him. He ducked another whack of Jaheira’s staff, then dashed forward and made it inside her range. Before Jaheira could block, Montaron ran his blade across her stomach, protected only by a layer of leather.
Biting back a cry of pain, Jaheira covered her stomach with one arm. Montaron’s sword had left a cut in the leather and in the blouse underneath, but it wasn’t quite enough to break her skin. Still, it hurt, and Jaheira didn’t wear much to absorb the brunt force. Markra reached out with a thrust aimed for Montaron’s head, but the halfling spun around Jaheira and dodged with a smirk. Markra stumbled once, quickly regained his footing, and watched as Montaron poised his sword at Jaheira’s back.
But Jaheira was not so slow and hurt as she’d appeared. Loosing another scream, she twisted around and swung her quarterstaff once again in a fierce, horizontal stroke. This time, it struck Montaron in the side of the head and sent him rolling across the ground. The halfling traitor was down—but not out just yet. Holding his sore head, where a trail of blood had begun to flow, Montaron spat out a bloody tooth and crawled back on his feet.
“That damn hurt, ya dirty elf bitch,” he growled as he wiped his mouth clean.
“You should have thought twice about the people you double-crossed!” Jaheira shouted back, and ran at him. Staff high and gripped in both hands, she swung it over her head like an executioner’s axe. But the blow was slow and easy to trace, so it missed Montaron as he stepped out of the way. He lunged again, a desperate thrust pining for Jaheira’s thigh. Before it could connect, Markra stood between them and smacked Montaron’s sword off its aim with his own blade. The halfling staggered, a sign of clumsiness that Markra rarely saw in him. Montaron was nothing if not sure on his feet, but the blow to his head must have crippled his balance.
They stared at each other, betrayer and betrayed, for several breaths. Gazes devouring, scrounging for the slightest of motions. Swords that had once fought together now poised to stab one another. Markra heard Jaheira’s footsteps and felt her presence next to him, but he dared not look away from his enemy.
At last, he spotted it: Montaron’s free hand slipping behind his back, perhaps to grab something. Markra leaped at him, thrusting, but Montaron swerved out of the way, the blade’s tip barely slicing his cheek. Markra spun on his heel as his thrust turned into a sideways slash, chasing the nimble halfling. So face-to-face, he clearly saw what Montaron had pulled from his waist pack—a vial of murky, gray liquid. Before Markra could stop him, Montaron unplugged the cork and chugged the potion in one quick swig.
Then he vanished.
Markra regained his footing and gazed disbelieving at the spot where Montaron once stood. He found no sign that the halfling had ever been there, not even a shadow.
“Wh-What the—”
Before he had the chance to lose his mind, however, Markra felt Jaheira’s back press against his, her long coils of brown hair brushing his neck. He met her gaze out of the corners of his eyes.
“Stay calm,” she urged him, “and stay alert. He drank an invisibility potion. I think he aims to end one of us. Most likely me, if he still intends to keep you alive.”
Markra took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, then closed his eyes. They would do him no good against an invisible foe; better that he rely on his elven ears for guidance, just as he had at the Friendly Arm Inn. That assassin had used the shadows to protect him, deadly and unseen. How different could an invisibility potion be?
Far away, water dripped on stalagmites. Bugs skittered and buzzed about the floor as torches faintly hissed and sputtered. Closer were the sounds of combat, of Imoen, Khalid, and Xzar fighting each other. Magic hummed and crackled through the air, followed by a pained cry from Jaheira’s husband. Imoen shouted his name, then cursed, but no matter how much he wanted to, Markra couldn’t help them now. The moment he dropped his guard would be the moment he gave Montaron the chance to plunge his sword into either his or Jaheira’s back.
Something tapped against the ground floor. So soft, Markra barely heard it under everything else, but it was there. On his right, closer to Jaheira than to him. Anyone else might have dismissed it, but Markra knew the sound, having traveled long enough with Montaron to recognize it. The quiet soles of his thin-padded boots against the earth, adept at sneaking around in silence.
Markra nudged Jaheira’s elbow with his own, and she nodded. So, even her half-elven ancestry gave her ears an edge. But they waited, and waited, and the sound didn’t appear again. Montaron must have realized they’d heard him and stayed his blade. Markra reached out with his hearing again, but he found it difficult to concentrate on anything besides the relentless pounding of his own heart. He took deep breaths, trying to calm it, but every moment spent in silent anticipation was torture.
Until, at last, Jaheira gasped. She veered right, nearly twisting her ankles, as something cut open the side of her tunic. As if the air had sliced across her, swift and clean, mere inches from a deadly blow. But as the world seemed to slow down and Markra spun around, he watched the space between them shimmer and ripple, shaped like the deformed outline of a small man. In moments the mirage became real, and Montaron reappeared.
Leaned forward in mid-lunge and eyes wide in disbelief, he barely caught Jaheira’s gaze before she swung her staff and whacked his shortsword out of his hand. Then, with the flick of her wrists, she drove the other end into his chest and tossed him to the ground.
Montaron coughed out all the breath in his lungs as his back hit the floor, hands grasping for his missing weapon. Before he could recover, Jaheira leaped on top of him and pressed her staff horizontally against his throat. The halfling winced as her knees dug into the soft underbelly of his arms, and her muscular legs almost crushed his. Though even with Montaron pinned and disabled, Markra came around and kicked his shortsword out of reach, just in case.
“How does it ‘damn hurt’ now, traitor?” Jaheira snarled. “Better or worse?”
Glowering, Montaron tried to spit in her face, but he struggled to gather any breath as her staff nearly crushed his windpipe, let alone saliva. Markra lowered his sword as he stood beside them, finally convinced that the halfling was no longer a threat. Though looking at Jaheira, he noticed a red smear slowly growing around the newest slit in her tunic.
“Are you all right?” he asked her.
“I’m fine,” she insisted, though her voice was full of effort. Jaheira cast a glance over her shoulder, back toward the entrance where the chambers intersected. Beyond their line of sight, another zap of magic flashed, followed by the hiss of arrows and Imoen cursing up a storm.
“I’ll hold this one. You go and help the others.”
Hearing Imoen in danger, Markra needed little encouragement to dive into battle once again. Still, he hesitated, looking again at the wound on Jaheira’s waist. “Are you sure? You’re injured—”
“It’s just a graze.” She threw him a steely glare, but it softened a bit upon seeing his concerned expression. “Markra, please. My husband is fighting, as is Imoen. Trust in me and help our friends.”
So even while wounded, there would be no negotiating Jaheira’s orders. Still, between just the two of them, they had very little choice. Markra nodded, gripping his sword tighter around its hilt, and headed into the other cavern.
Kobold corpses covered the floor, many with their throats slashed after being put to sleep by Xzar’s magic. They’d chased the treacherous wizard into the first cave, trapped him in a corner with the gnashing stalagmites at his back. Xzar had an arrow in one shoulder and a few tears in his green robe, but Imoen and Khalid looked even worse. The pair of them stood side-by-side, haggard and panting, Imoen with a feeble arrow drawn to her cheek. She likely had trouble shooting straight with that wound in her side, and the fabric of Khalid’s clothes was dotted with holes, singed as if by fire around the rims. His exposed skin underneath was raw and pink.
Xzar held in his hands a bundle of scrolls, while a few lay scattered on the floor nearby. Markra had forgotten the many magic pages they’d gathered on their journey to Nashkel, but now he knew why Xzar had insisted on keeping so many of them. Not only because he would find the most use for them, but to build himself a stash, waiting for the right moment to unleash his horde. Markra’s fists clenched as he realized, for that moment was now.
Upon seeing the elf approach, Xzar’s wild eyes lit up and his lips curled into another wicked grin.
“Ah, dear Markra,” he began. “Where’s Monty? Has he gone and lost to you already?”
Markra greeted him with the flash of his sword, tilting its blade so it caught the light. “Yeah. You could say that.”
Whatever glee Xzar had scrounged together immediately vanished, his face tightening in a scowl as he stomped his foot. “Gah, that miserable half-man! Proven worthless, time and time again! Will the incompetence never cease!?” But he cleared his throat and stifled his rage as he stroked one of the scrolls in his arms. “Ah, but no matter. I’d grown tired of the boor anyway. This way, I needn’t share the reward.”
“Careful, Marky!” Imoen called to him. “He’s been keepin’ us back with all those spells!”
Khalid nodded, and immediately regretted it as his helmet slid a little too far over his head. Its straps must have loosened during the fight. “H-His whole m-manner seems different than b-b-before… It’s as i-if…he really knows what he’s doing this time.”
“Of course I know what I’m doing!” Xzar snapped, and stuck his chin out high like an insulted noble. “Hmph! I’ve always known what I’d been doing. It’s hardly the fault of the actor if the audience is too stupid to tell the difference.”
“Then…” Markra paused to lick his lips, his mouth suddenly very dry. “The road outside Candlekeep, the Friendly Arm, even during your sex-change… All of that was just an act? A lie?”
Xzar grinned yet again, and began to gnaw on his fingers. Wide-eyed and neurotic, just as Markra had always known him to be. “Not all of it,” he said. “I really did have quite the fancy for you when I was a woman, you know. A shame you rejected me at every heart-wrenching turn!”
And despite the earlier betrayal that had unfolded before him, Markra’s cheeks turned a faint pink. Of everyone in their group, he’d always been the first to dismiss Xzar’s “crush” as nothing more than a lunatic’s delusion, perhaps even a part of the belt’s curse. But…
“W-Wait… Really?” Markra stumbled. “I never…thought you were serious…”
“Oh, don’t flatter yourself, boy.” Just like that, Xzar’s madness vanished again, replaced by a grimace. “You couldn’t hurt a fly, let alone my heart. Besides, it never would have worked between us; I am Xzar, destroyer of worlds and fame necromancer of the Zhentarim. And you… To put it kindly, are a whelp better served as coins in my purse!”
He reached for a scroll and let it unfurl from one hand. Its red runes began to glow, like embers.
“You’ll pay for Monty’s life with one of your own, dear Markra…and your friends!”
The scroll shuddered in Xzar’s hand, like a wall against a battering ram. Khalid raised his shield as Imoen took another shot at Xzar with her bow. But her arrow went wide and missed its chance to disrupt the spell. Markra charged at him with his sword up, rushing to close the gap between them, but he wasn’t fast enough. An orb of white light flew out of the scroll—aimed not at him, but Khalid.
Imoen shouted his name as the half-elf warrior stumbled, as if about to faint. Markra ran to his side and began surveying whatever damage was done. Except…he found nothing wrong. The spell hadn’t done anything to him; no burns, no scars, not even the tiniest scratch. Yet, Khalid groaned and shook his head, oblivious to the helmet swerving back and forth with the motion.
“Khalid?” Markra asked. “What’s wrong, are you all right?”
At his voice, Khalid’s head snapped in his direction, and Markra got a good look at his eyes. Shining like candles in the dark, a pink light glimmered in the pits of his pupils. No doubt a product of Xzar’s spell, but Markra had no idea what its purpose was.
Not until Khalid swung his sword at him, trying to cleave him in half.
Markra parried with a yelp, the metallic clash of their blades ringing in his ears. He veered back on his heels, almost falling over against the unexpected force, when Khalid lashed out again. Markra stepped awkwardly out of the way, pain shooting up his ankle.
“Khalid!!” Imoen screamed, but the half-elf didn’t seem to hear, even as her voice bounced off the cavern walls. “What’re ya doing!? Stop it! You’ll hurt him!”
Another clang echoed in the cave as Markra blocked another strike, only this time, he didn’t shrink away. He held his ground with bent knees as his sword locked with Khalid’s, caught in a stand-still. Though unable to pull away from his possessed friend, Markra spared a brief glance over his shoulder and saw Xzar’s growing smirk.
“What did you do to him, Xzar!?” Markra growled.
“Well, I need a new minion now that Monty’s out of action,” Xzar cackled. “He could never replace him, but the half-wit should do for now. Go on, half-wit, bring me my prize! Whole or in pieces, it matters not to me—so long as he’s still alive!”
As if in reply to his new master, Khalid grunted and pressed harder against Markra’s sword. Under his relentless weight and the throbbing ache in his sprained ankle, Markra’s knees buckled.
“K-Khalid…!” he pleaded through gritted teeth. “Come on, it’s me, Markra! Snap out of it!”
The warrior replied with a yell as his sword broke free of their shared stance, and lifted the blade high over his head. His helmet finally toppled over, and his scraggly orange curls unfurled like a wild lion’s mane. Markra hardly recognized the humble, kind man he’d come to like over their journey, and Xzar would pay dearly for twisting him.
“You creep!” Imoen shouted as she drew back another arrow to her cheek, aimed straight at Xzar. “Give Khalid back, ya mongerin’ riff-raff! Before I make you!!”
“Oh, you’ll do no such thing.” Xzar reached for yet another scroll, even as the pile in his arms spilled over. “No, I think I’d rather watch you cower in a corner, like all little girls should! Go on, little girl! Cower before my might!”
Her arrow flew. It grazed Xzar’s good shoulder, but it still wasn’t enough to stop him. His hands danced yet again as the magic in another scroll became his, before a white orb shot out and vanished into Imoen. Markra cried out to her, but with Khalid keeping him at bay, there was nothing he could do. Imoen suddenly lowered her bow and began to run around in circles, terrorized at every little crack and point in the cavern’s shadows. Just like that day on the Friendly Arm’s doorstep, when an unnatural Horror had gripped her’s and Markra’s hearts and rendered them helpless.
Xzar laughed yet again as he reached for a different scroll. Markra bit off a curse as he half-watched the necromancer between Khalid’s blows.
It’s all those damn scrolls, he thought. That’s what’s giving him all this power, not his natural casting abilities. If I can just stop him from using them somehow…
He glanced once at the collection of fallen scrolls around Xzar’s feet, like the feathers of a molting bird. Some were open and blank, but others still had their bindings, and potentially their magic unused and unspoiled. What kind of spells had the necromancer dropped, Markra wondered. Was he keeping track of his paper armory, or was there something in that pile that could be of use to him?
It was a long shot. Such scrolls could contain anything from an Identify to a Fireball, neither of which would be all that helpful. But of the three of them, Markra was the only one to have kept his sanity, and the only one capable of reading arcane-magic, thanks to Gorion’s tutelage.
He had to try.
Khalid’s sword arced in a horizontal slash, but Markra back-stepped just out of his range. With some much-needed distance between them, Markra dashed for Xzar. The mage had already begun casting a spell on Imoen and could not change his target, even as the elf came into view. But he dropped his most recent spell to hop out of Markra’s way, for fear that he might strike him down. At the very least, Markra had spared Imoen of another magical assault.
He paid no attention to Xzar as he scooped up one of the scrolls, but as he rose to his feet, he stood right in the path of Khalid’s shield. Thunder clanged inside his helmet as the shield bashed into his head. Temples aching, legs shaken, Markra teetered for a moment before Khalid kicked him to the ground. Somewhere far away, beneath the incessant ringing in Markra’s sensitive ears, Xzar cackled and cheered for Khalid to beat his rotten face in.
When Markra next opened his eyes, he saw Khalid loom over him. Sword gleaming above his head, orange hair clinging to his sweat-matted face, hatred swelling behind the pink glare in his eyes. Tremors wracked his body in its every tiny motion; his hands curled around his sword, his feet as they took a step… Even the corners of his mouth couldn’t stop twitching. If there was anything left of his old friend, Markra knew it had to be in those shudders, like a marionette fighting the pull of its strings.
“K-Khalid…” Markra coughed. “Listen, think about what you’re doing. You don’t wanna hurt me, or Imoen, or anyone, do you? You’re better than this. Think of Jaheira; what would she say if she saw you now?”
At the mention of his wife, Khalid blinked. He groaned and shook his head, but as he forcused on Markra once again, Xzar’s spell blazed in his eyes just as vengeful as before.
Without looking away, Markra slid one hand over the ground behind him, and grasped for a rugged stone just larger than his hand.
“Answer me, Khalid.” He spoke harshly this time, trying to imitate the stern druid. “Look at yourself and what you’re doing and tell me: what would she say?”
“J-Ja… Jaheir…a…”
In his hesitation, Markra tossed the rock at Khalid’s head. It struck him just above his right eye—hard enough to draw blood, but nothing that wouldn’t heal. The half-elf yelped and held his now-aching head as Markra clambered to his feet, put distance between them, and undid the scroll.
The picture of an empty eye stared back at him. Markra struggled to read the archaic runes etched into the paper: “Blindness.”
He cursed. Not a damage spell, nothing that could disrupt Xzar’s casting, or burn his supply of scrolls. But as he groped for a solution in his frantic, desperate thoughts, he realized something—Xzar can’t read the scrolls if he can’t see them.
“Veritas. Credo. Oculos.” Running a hand over the runes, Markra croaked out the spell’s words and drew on the magic within. Not unlike when he called upon the Weave to cast from his thoughts, he tapped into the paper like a bucket into a well. Crimson sparks lit his fingers, pulled from their home in the parchment and made into his own.
Xzar’s laughter died as his gaze fell upon Markra. He reached for another scroll with one hand and clumsily threw a stone at him with the other. Even if he’d struck him, Xzar was too late: Markra had chosen his target for the spell, and magic does not miss.
An orb of white light flashed between his palms and flew at Xzar. The wizard tried batting it away with his hands, only to watch it disappear into him. Then he screamed, dropped all of his scrolls, and began rubbing his eyes with his bleeding fingers.
“My eyes!” he cried. “What have you done to my eyes!? I cannot see! I cannot see!!”
It worked. Markra breathed a giant sigh of relief as he dropped the Blindness scroll, now blank and empty. Thank gods it worked…
He wasn’t out of the woods just yet. Upon hearing footsteps approach him from behind, Markra spun on his heel and raised his sword in a slash. Though instead of crashing with Khalid’s weapon, as he’d expected, his blade met his shield, raised high so it covered its wearer’s head and shoulders.
“M-Markra, wait!” Khalid blubbered on the other side. “It’s me! I’m free, I-I’m myself again!” Then he lowered his shield just a fraction, enough so Markra saw his eyes. Sure enough, not a trace of the pink sheen remained. “See?”
He heaved a second sigh as he lowered his sword and embraced Khalid, slapping the other man hard on the back. “Gods, Khalid…! Any second longer, and I could’ve killed you!”
“I-I feel that I should be the one saying that, M-Markra…” Khalid murmured. “I’m sorry… I tried to fight it, b-but the spell was just so s-s-strong.”
“It’s fine. Water under the bridge. Just glad to have you back.”
He gave Khalid’s shoulder another hearty pat before he glared at Xzar. The wizard had fallen to his knees in the heap of his useless scrolls, mourning the loss of his vision. Markra suspected the impairment wasn’t permanent, but he wasn’t about to let a traitor know that. He caught Imoen still running around in circles, although she’d slowed her pace by now, a fatigue dragging down her slumped shoulders and hanging head.
“I’ll help Imoen out of her Horror,” Markra said again. “It shouldn’t last much longer now. Then… Let’s figure out what to do with these bastards.”
***
Once Imoen’s spell was broken and they’d gathered themselves, they tossed Xzar into Mulahey’s chamber. And not a moment too soon, for Jaheira was beginning to lose her grip on Montaron. The bleeding above her hip had slowed to a stop, but the dull pain certainly hadn’t helped her keep the halfling pinned. Khalid took over the spot as Imoen and Markra found some rope, and with it, bound the traitors’ feet and wrists.
Xzar stared into the nothingness, still without vision, as Montaron fixed them all with a murderous glare. Markra matched it with one of his own, hands crossed over his torso as he stood before his ex-comrades. Khalid massaged his sore head, still without his helmet, as Imoen plundered the gods-forsaken chest full of Mulahey’s letters. Jaheira paced before the malicious pair, tapping her quarterstaff like an officer’s crugdel.
“Zhentarim spies,” the druid sneered, “you have lied to us, likely written letters to your friends in Zhentil Keep filled with our secrets, and finally tried to kill us on a mission we’d all been assigned.” She stood still and locked eyes with them. “I ought to kill you both where you stand.”
“Technically, girlie,” Montaron snapped, “we’re kneelin’.”
That earned him a kick in the arm from Jaheira’s boot. Xzar cringed beside him.
“It is fortunate for you that I, however, am not the one to decide your fate,” she continued, and much to everyone’s bewilderment, she stepped aside and made room for Markra to come forward. “Your treachery began when you tried to harm Markra. It was his balance you hoped to destroy, and as such, it’s only fitting that he should determine what will happen to you. Yes?”
She looked at him for confirmation, and he nodded. Though as he moved closer to the traitors who’d threaten to sell him for a profit and kill his friends, his heart thudded harder, faster. Here he was again: two lives placed into his hands, a disgusting pair that he could squeeze between his fingers if he wished. It wasn’t a position of power he desired, and yet, Xzar and Montaron had wronged him in one of the most dreadful ways they could.
He refused to let them go unpunished.
“C-Come now, dear Markra…” Xzar had the gall to grovel as he stared unseeing past Markra’s head. “You really wouldn’t hurt us, would you? Think of all we’ve been through together—”
He leaned a little too close, but Jaheira punched him back in place, before Markra had the chance to.
“You’re in no position to beg, Xzar,” Markra snapped, and at his voice, Xzar’s head turned toward him, “least of all, to me.”
Though his lips pursed in thought, and his glare lost its edge. “But… You are right. I’m not going to kill you.”
Xzar, Montaron, and Imoen all gawked at him. Jaheira simply lowered her head and shut her eyes—masking her disapproval, Markra guessed—while Khalid stood idly by.
“Marky, what’re ya saying?” Imoen protested first. “These guys just tried ta kidnap you!”
“I’m well aware, Imoen,” Markra explained. “But… Even if it was for their own ends, they were still members of this party—our comrades. They may have forsaken that pledge when they turned on us, but that doesn’t mean we have to. If we kill them now, we’ll be no different from them.”
“Oh, Markra! Dearest, merciful, idiot Markra!” Xzar, with surprising accuracy, threw himself at the elf’s feet and groveled. Montaron simply rolled his eyes and shook his head at his partner. “I take back every ill thought and word I’ve voiced against you, my beautiful fool! Once we return to Nashkel, I’ll order a toast in your name!”
Though despite Xzar’s showering affections, Markra kicked the slimy wizard off his boots.
“Whoever said ‘we’ would be returning together?”
Xzar massaged the newest sore spot in his cheek with his grimy sleeve. “But… You said—”
“I said I wouldn’t kill you. I didn’t say anything about bringing you with us.” Markra shrugged. “You Zhentarim agents are the resourceful type, right? So find your own way out. The rest of us will go back to Nashkel and share the story of your treachery with Barrun. His local authorities can decide what to do with you then…if you make it out of here alive.”
Something about the way Xzar crumpled beneath him, the way Montaron beheld him as if for the first time, made him snap inside. As if maybe—just maybe—trying to kidnap Markra and kill his friends might not have been the best idea. Well, “merciful” he may be, they’d underestimated his abilities for the last time. What did they expect me to do? he silently asked. Roll over like a dog and comply?
“And one last thing,” Markra said, before he grabbed Xzar by the collar of his robe, and let him dangle like a squirming hanged man in his grasp. “Don’t come after us. I don’t care what motivation you’d have—if you or Montaron come anywhere near me and my friends again, then that next time, I will kill you. Understand?”
Xzar nodded over and over again, pleading until Markra finally let him down, and none too gently. With that, Markra dusted off his hands and turned his back. He met the gazes of his awestruck party, and motioned his head toward the exit.
“Let’s go,” he said. “I think we’re done here.”
“W-Wait!” Xzar cried out one last time, but Markra had already begun walking. “You can’t just leave us here!”
“Oh yes I can,” Markra snapped back.
“But our bonds! You’ve not untied our bonds!!”
“I know.”
“Just how are we to escape with our hands and feet tied and useless!?”
The real Xzar had returned again, relinquishing the madness act and screaming his question in rage. At last, satisfied at the change, Markra spared the fuming necromancer a final glance over the shoulder. “I thought you were the harbinger of death and destroyer of worlds, Xzar. A rope shouldn’t be too hard. Figure it out.”
And with that, he strode out of the abandoned chamber. After a couple paces, the sound of boots on stone assured him that his remaining party—his real allies—followed his stead. Mulahey’s corpse caught his eye as he walked by; Imoen picked up some of his belongings. Most notably, a shiny ring, a coinpurse of gold, and a cloth with Cyric’s symbol on it. How fitting, Markra grimly realized, that they’d been exposed to treachery while surrounded by the Prince of Lies.
As he passed under the cavernous rows of teeth, Montaron’s seething voice snagged his ears.
“Sleep lightly, taskmaster,” he said. “Ye’ve not seen the last of us.”
For your sakes, I better have, Markra thought, but did not voice. The traitors did not deserve another word out of him.
I realize it's been months sense I last posted in this thread and the last thing you want to read is me talking about the real world instead of delving back into my fictitious one. But, alas, stuff's happened.
It occurs to me that starting tomorrow, I will have a second job. I've been working for Target since March, and the money's been good (as far as retail goes), but it's not the kind of career I want to pursue for the long-term. So, after volunteering and applying over and over again the past year, I finally was hired by a public library in a town close to mine. I'll be working 15 hours a week as a Page in that library, on top of the hours I already work for Target.
Needless to say, my life's about to get really crazy. I barely have enough time as it is to scrape by and write short stories for my weekly writer's groups, let alone bond with my loved ones. And eat and sleep and all those other bodily functions. But with two jobs, especially going into holiday season, some weeks I won't even be able to manage that anymore.
So, as much as it pains me to say it, I don't know when I'll continue this again. I've not given up on it, but my priorities are all over the place right now. I just don't have the time to dedicate to this that I used to.
I'd like to thank everyone once again who've given me such wonderful feedback and encouraged me to keep going.
I'll be back here someday with a new chapter. Promise!!
/endlifeupdate
Now, when you'll work in a library, should we call thee "Nonnahswriter of the (Candle)Keep"?
Then again, you've got a professional like George R. R. Martin who doesn't write for even years at a time and doesn't suffer a single bushwhack from his publisher, so who knows.
But fanfic? That's just for fun, both sides of the coin. You're not obligated to ever finish the story at all! Unless you actually like your fans. And who could? I'm one of your story's fans, and even I don't like me; pale, scrawny thing that I am.
"He or she who fights mons should see him/herself not becoming mon. When you look at a byss, the byss stairs you too."
-Fried Rich Neechee
A spawn of ball staggers on top an iron throne, but the other ball spawns by name Sirrah Vok and brakes a door to stillness and play loud music.
First ballspawn says no Vok can't, but actually Vok can and will be the last but YOU go first and get pointed at. So "YOU" go back on you back and spawn words there are others I can show you PLEASE PLEEEEEEASE bonk off the helmet
Vok lifts otherspawn and breaks stolen goods seller and chokes otherspawn. The gag is funny and vok laughs, then drops the balls pawn off the throne. dethroned ballspawn dies and bleeds to death and the blood hits sign says BOULDERSG ATE more loud music
Some feedback on the most recent installment. I really, really wanted Xzar to be dead. Somehow the idea of just leaving them behind does not work for me. And in the climactic moment when Montaron sees Xzar bite the dust he slips out of the grasp of whoever is holding him and makes his escape.
That being said, the blow-by-blow with Mulahey was truly gripping. I have always felt that the encounter with Mulahey needed to have a bit more depth to the interaction with a fuller unfolding of what the whole point of the Iron Crisis was all about. Hmmmm....
Cheers and thanks again!
But I have to keep them alive if I want to use their quest in a possible BG2 novelization. I can't just magically bring them back to life later. (Well, I could if I were utilizing the Forgotten Realms resurrection systems, but I'm not because that's one huge headache by itself.) I completely understand your feeling, and I went back and forth on the issue multiple times before finally deciding to let them live. But, oh well. No changing it now.
Thank you for your feedback.
To wit: Shadow of the Silk Road by Colin Thubrow [@2007], a modern retracing of the route by a celebrated travel-writer. Just the first few pages describing his somewhat mystical beginning of the journey with a visit to the Tomb of the Yellow Emperor, has me enthralled to the point of goose bumbs!!
The character I have in mind is built around the idea that He/She is singularly skilled at reaping a small fortune from the aftermath of war in some fashion: gambling perhaps and speculating in loot that drunken soldiers are eager to convert to coin. And somehow unkowingly comes into possession of.....
Note: first time I have ever used the expression "to wit"!! Now I will have to research what it actually means and whether I used it meaningfully.... Fun!!
Note2: I am fortunate to live in a college town [Chapel Hill, NC, USA] which has a first-rate Independent Bookstore [Flyleaf Books] with an active schedule of authors on tour as well as a twice-monthly Prompt Writing group. Keeps the juices flowing.
*strolls into thread*
*drops a chapter and runs*
(I also changed the title thread, because I think it's safe to say by now that this is definitely not a "possible fanfiction" anymore.
Chapter 14
Their bodies bruised and sore, open wounds stinging against the dry air, it was a long, tiring walk back to the entrance of the mines. The tunnels seemed strangely empty on their journey back, riddled with kobold bodies both old and new. Perhaps when Mulahey had been killed, a majority of the kobolds fled back into the shadows. No matter the reason, the stillness was a welcome to the battered party, and once they’d traveled far enough to likely avoid any trouble with Xzar and Montaron, they set up a brief camp and rested.
They took shelter in an alcove, cut off and isolated from the main tunnels, and with only one way in and out—just in case anything were to try sneaking up on them. Khalid surveyed the damage done to his shield as he guarded the cave’s mouth, and with a sigh, he laid it on the ground. Jaheira leaned against the far wall, legs crossed, one glowing hand on her hip as she healed her injury. Imoen slept in the corner, using the soft underbelly of her arm as a pillow.
Watching his adoptive sister brought a heaviness to Markra’s eyes, his exhausted body almost lulling to sleep without his command. Still, he would not allow himself the chance to rest without first reading the documents they’d recovered from Mulahey’s chest. Most of them had been magical, and Markra had every intent of scribing them later, but two were letters from the mysterious Tazok.
“That was unwise.”
Markra looked up from the letters and peered at Jaheira. She did not meet his gaze, fixated on her healing spell, but she didn’t need to.
And there it is, Markra thought, for he’d honestly been wondering when Jaheira would voice her inevitable disapproval. He bit the inside of his mouth to hold in a curse, and took a calm breath before answering.
“You’re the one who gave me the choice,” he reminded her.
She nodded, but still didn’t look up. “I did. I’d hoped you’d choose wiser.”
“What’s done is done, and I’m not going to waste time bickering about it,” he snapped, and to emphasize his point, he went back to reading the letters without another word. Thankfully, Jaheira didn’t press him, falling to silence as she finished healing her hip.
No doubt uncomfortable in the awkward quiet, Khalid cleared his throat. “Wh-What do the letters s-say, Markra? Have you learned a-anything?”
He breathed a long sigh out his nose. “A few things. For one, Mulahey’s kobolds were never supposed to kill any of the miners; their deaths were an accident.”
“Their numbers likely grew beyond his control,” Jaheira speculated. “Nature is not so easily tamed by a single outsider acting as its king. Does it say where the kobolds came from?”
“Sounds like Tazok sent them somehow.” Markra flipped back to an earlier letter, eyes squinting as he read in the low light. “‘I have sent you the kobolds and mineral poison that you require. Your task is to poison any iron ore that leaves these mines. Don’t reveal your presence to the miners or you will find yourself swamped by soldiers from the local Amnian garrison.’”
“Then their goal wasn’t to k-k-kill the miners a-at all…” Khalid murmured. “Th-This was all about the iron.”
“There’s more. Tazok writes about his ‘superiors,’ and how they’d hired some mercenary groups called the Blacktalon and the Chill. They’re the same bandits who’ve been raiding the merchant caravans up and down the Sword Coast. Not just stealing iron, but disrupting trade and stifling the flow of it too.”
“Holy Silvanus…” Jaheira swore under her breath, and traced the tree god’s symbol above her heart. “The vein runs deeper than I had thought…”
Markra nodded grimly. “Whoever’s behind this, their plan doesn’t stop at the Nashkel mines. This is something much bigger than one monster clean-out. The only question is—”
“Who are they?” Khalid finished. “Is there any clue?”
“I was getting to that. It says here, if Mulahey was to encounter any problems, he should contact a man named Tranzig in Beregost, staying at Feldepost’s Inn. If we want to find more answers, that’s our next best option.”
“Well, let us discuss our ‘next best option’ once we are rid of these caves,” Jaheira concluded, and groaned as she stood, massaging a sore spot on her back. “It has been stifling, traversing the darkness and breathing such poisoned air.”
“Agreed,” Markra said, then returned the letters to his pack and gently shook Imoen awake. Once the party had gathered themselves again, they returned to their long, backward trek.
The air quality was just a horrendous going up than it was the first time going down, but like the rest of the tunnels, now they’ve been emptied. Not just of kobolds, but the impoverished miners had also retreated, perhaps for rest.
When they finally found the exit to the outside, night had fallen. Darkness blanketed the quiet mine, broken by flickering lanturns on carts and railings like stars against the sky.
Peering through the blackness, Emerson’s warning shrieked in the back of Markra’s mind. “You’ve got one day. If I see you after that, I’ll have a new shaft dug for each of ya!”
Just how long were we inside the mines? Markra thought nervously.
“HEY!”
The party jolted in place as Emerson’s shout rang out across the pit. From one of the high rafters, the fiery red-headed officer scrambled down to meet them, bumping carts and knocking over tools along the way. He still wore his work uniform, but it was wrinkled and lopsided, as if haphazardly donned just after waking.
“O-Oh no,” Khalid stumbled, already half-hiding behind Jaheira.
“Steady, dear,” his wife replied as she touched his hand. “I will handle this.”
But instead of screaming in their faces and spewing curses, like all of them had been expecting, Emerson beamed a joyous smile and threw his arms around the closest person he found—Markra. Even under his protective armor, the elf stiffened in his embrace.
“Bless my soul, you made it back alive!” Emerson exclaimed, then he pulled apart and cupped his rough hands around Markra’s face, as if to make sure he was real. “If you don’t mind me saying, you’re about the most beautiful sight I’ve seen in weeks!”
As Markra batted Emerson’s hands off of him, Imoen chuckled under her breath. “Yeesh, Marky. First Xzar, now Emerson? Ya sure are popular with the men these days.”
“I ain’t talking about his looks, ya nincompoop!” And in an instant, the old Emerson was back, earning a flinch out of Imoen as he shrieked at her. “I’m talking about the mine, my mine! I swear by the gods of old, I’ll ne’er say another ill-word ‘bout you adventuring-types again.”
So he said, but Emerson’s smile dipped slightly. “Well… Not for a day or two anyway.”
“What happened?” Jaheira asked.
“A miracle! We’d been at it for hours after you went in, and twas all the same, iron after iron crumbling to bits. And then, toward the end of the day, the stone stopped breaking. The iron was pure again! We didn’t even find anymore of those so-called ‘demons’ snooping around trying to take my men! All our troubles are over, thanks to you!”
“Then that settles it,” Markra concluded, and shared a knowing look with his party. “The kobolds really were the ones behind the poisoned ore.”
“Kobolds, eh? That what they call the little beasties?” Emerson asked, and at Markra’s nod, he waved his hand and shrugged it off. “Well, no matter. They’re gone now, and that’s what counts! I’ll be tellin’ the men to get back to work starting tomorrow—we’ve got ore to mine! Still can’t ship it for fear of bandits, but that ain’t my problem. Best you tell the mayor of what you did here. He’ll pay ya quite handsomely for all your hard work.”
“He is right,” Jaheira agreed, and already took a few steps toward the ramp that would carry them out of the mining pit, and back on the surface of Naskhel’s outskirts. “Come. We must report to Berrun.”
“Oh, I don’t mean right now,” Emerson clarified himself, just before Jaheira could walk off without waiting for them. “You’re gonna need to wait til morning to tell him; Berrun’s gonna be sound asleep this time of night, and he don’t take visitors when he’s sleeping.”
Her shoulders slumped, but Khalid patted her back with a kind smile, ever the comforting one. “Now now,” he said, “I-I don’t believe Berrun’s planning to d-d-disappear on us a-any time soon. Wh-Why don’t we return to Nashkel, a-and get a well-deserved r-r-rest?”
Markra nodded, surveying his companions up and down. “We look like hell.” He took a whiff of his own arm and instantly regretted it, gagging. “Smell like it too. I’m with Khalid; I think we all could use a break, and a bath.”
“Ooh!” Imoen’s hand shot up first as she bounced on her tip-toes, a little too eager. “I call dibs on the tub!”
“I suppose it cannot be helped…” Jaheira sighed at last. “Even I admit Nature has taken its toll on me. Very well. We will see Berrun come morning.”
With that, the battered party gathered themselves once more and marched up the rocky walls.
***
Hours later, the golden lantern light of sleeping Nashkel pierced the darkness, present in only the few open businesses: the local inn, the Belching Dragon tavern, and the Temple of Helm. Upon seeing the welcoming light, the weary travelers picked up their pace, a newly inspired spring in their steps.
Imoen took in a deep breath and stretched her arms toward the sky. “Ahhhh, smell that fresh evnin’ air! I can’t wait to collapse in a nice soft bed after all this!”
Hearing the satisfaction in her voice earned a grin out of Markra. “Does that mean I get the bath first, if you’re intent on collapsing when we first get there?”
“No!” she yelped, a little too defensively. “I meant, I’m gonna collapse after I take a bath.”
“If any of us should have the bath first,” Jaheira chimed in, “it should be Khalid and I.”
Then she threw a knowing smirk at her husband that made him blush, and Markra instantly caught her meaning. Her and Khalid. In the bath. At the same time.
Blood rushed to Markra’s cheeks while Imoen outright gagged at them. “I did not need to hear that,” he murmured, and started blinking profusely, as if that could chase away the awkward visions conjured by his imagination.
In the uncomfortable silence, however, Markra heard it. Thanks to his elven ears, he detected the faintest hiss, like a weapon being drawn from its sheath. He lifted his gaze, drawn to the inn, and spotted the dark silhouette of a cloaked figure leaning on the wall.
On instinct, he reached for Imoen’s arm and held her still, but it seemed Khalid and Jaheira had also noticed something amiss, for they had stopped walking too.
“Jaheira…” Markra whispered.
“I see him,” she muttered back, already reaching for her quarterstaff. “You there. Waiting for someone, perhaps?”
The figure stood upright and strode toward them. Markra barely heard his footsteps.
“I am Death come for thee,” the stranger hissed, a quiet male voice. “Surrender, and thy passage shall be…quicker.”
He tilted his head toward Markra, and while he couldn’t see his eyes in the dark, Markra knew he was looking straight at him. Another assassin after my bounty.
“I know not who you think we are,” Jaheira snapped, and as if on cue, she and her husband brandished their weapons at once, “but we’ll not surrender to anyone. Leave us be.”
The killer shrugged. “Struggle if you must, dead ones. I do not mind working for my money. Why Nimbul has been hired to deal with the likes of you, I’ll never know.”
Before Markra could begin to wonder whether or not the man had let his name slip into third-person, or if he’d been speaking of someone else, his hands blazed and began to dance. Jaheira and Khalid charged him, hoping to close the distance, but they weren’t fast enough. The man called Nimbul suddenly split into five Nimbuls—all exactly alike, mirroring each other’s every motion and breath.
Khalid cleaved one of the Nimbuls right in half—only to watch it dissipate before him. The now-four Nimbuls retaliated, each drawing a short sword from their hips and lunging after him. Without his battered shield to protect him, Jaheira grabbed her husband by the arm and tugged him back, just beyond the blades’ deadly reach.
Markra and Imoen stayed back, both pulling out their bows, but before either of them had prepared a shot, magic crackled in Nimbul’s hands once again. Purple sparks lit his fingers, and with a flurry of swift hand motions, a golden orb flew from his hands and—no. Markra recognize this spell, the same one that’d been used on him and Imoen so long ago at the Friendly Arm Inn. A Horror that’d stripped away all his senses, overwhelmed him with fear, and left him fleeing for his life. Aimed straight for Khalid and Jaheira.
“Look out!” he yelled to his older companions, but it was no use: magic does not miss. The orb flashed between them and blinked out of existence, and just as Markra feared would happen, the Horror took hold. Jaheira and Khalid immediately lowered their weapons and began running around in circles.
“Better part of valor, better part of valor!” Khalid babbled as he sped past the younger pair, while Jaheira sputtered curses in Silvanus’s name that earned a shudder even out of Imoen.
Another hum of magic drew Markra’s attention back, and saw four wickedly thin smiles stretched across Nimbul’s faces. Pink sparks lit his fingers this time, yet another familiar and dangerous spell.
Magic Missile, Markra realized. A Magic gods-forsaken Missile.
“Shoot him!” he ordered Imoen as he pulled the bowstring to his cheek. “Don’t let him cast!”
His arrow flew, but it soared through another illusionary Nimbul and disappeared into the bushes behind him. Imoen missed altogether, almost striking the walls of Nashkel’s inn. With another crackle and a hum that split the air, Nimbul threw out his hands and unleashed the Magic Missile. Aimed, not at Markra, but Imoen.
All Magic Missiles measured a wizard’s strength—the more powerful the wizard, the more missiles he could fire at once, and the more damage they dealt. Markra’s were still simple, small, singular; the ones that hit Imoen were anything but. Imoen shuddered in place and cried out as three missiles burned into her torso, then she crumpled to the ground, dropping her bow to cover her stomach with both hands.
“Imoen!” Markra knelt beside her to get a better look. Beneath her shirt, burns ravaged up and down her stomach—not horrendous, but certainly not harmless either. She’d live, but judging by the grind of her teeth and the tremors in her body, the pain was crippling.
Nimbul’s cackling drew his attention back. The hooded man stalked closer to him, all three versions of him smiling wickedly. “Then there were two, and thou look worse for wear. Don’t make this harder than it must be, boy. The eternal sleep beckons thee.”
Markra said nothing as he put his bow away and drew his sword. Gods, he was so tired. His knees shook as he rose to his feet again and the sores of old wounds throbbed with his every motion. After all they’d survived in the mines, he’d be damned if he died here, just footsteps from the inn’s refuge. But if he did die tonight, he knew why—his enemy had planned this attack all too well, striking when he knew they were most vulnerable.
The three Nimbuls raised their shortswords once they were within reach, but Markra skidded aside and lashed out with his own blade. Another apparition vanished, but that only gave the real Nimbul a chance to swipe at him again. The tip of his shortsword caught Markra’s sleeve, slicing across his arm. Biting back a hiss, the elf stepped backward and slashed at the air between them. He half-hoped the motion would summon a flurry of magic icicles, but alas, the sword remained silent.
Nimbul closed the gap again, swift in his light clothes, and aimed a thrust at Markra’s face. The points of two blades glinted at him, unnervingly close, but Markra veered just out of range. One of the blades missed entirely, but the other grazed his cheek, just deep enough to draw blood.
But illusionary swords do not cut, which meant that sword was real, and so was the Nimbul who held it. Seeing his chance, Markra lunged for the real Nimbul—and this time, the pale shimmer of ice danced across his blade.
Nimbul’s eyes widened as he ducked out of the way, but not fast enough to avoid a gash in his side. Flecks of frost thinly spread over his clothes as Markra tore through the fabric and cut into the skin. No blood poured from the wound, likely frozen in place, but it was enough. Both Nimbuls staggered and gripped their sides with one hand, heaving identical clouds of visible breath.
“Oh, now you have done it,” Nimbul sneered. “These were Nimbul’s favorite garbs.”
Markra pointed his sword at him, refusing the bait. “Who sent you after me? Who killed Gorion and put the bounty on my head!?”
The assassin chuckled. “You truly are the fool if you’ve not discovered it already. Nimbul need not waste words on thee.”
He drew back his hand, coated in his own cold blood, and another pink glow lit his fingers. Markra gasped and leaped at him. He’d only have moments to guess which Nimbul was the real one—but he guessed wrong. The final of Nimbul’s illusion evaporated as Markra’s sword passed through it, and the real Nimbul raised his hand again.
Heat seared into Markra as the Magic Missile flew into him. It tremored up and down his limbs, besieged him like thousands of tiny hot needles scouring his skin. Not once, not twice, but three times, for each missile that found its home in his body. Wracked in pain, Markra whimpered and fell to his knees, dropping his sword.
“Now comes the sleep,” Nimbul whispered as he leaned over Markra, gripping his shortsword tightly. Palm over pommel, fingers wrapped around the hilt, like an acolyte prepared to sacrifice an offering. “Close thine eyes, oh dead one. Nimbul shall deliver you.”
Markra reached for his sword, but Nimbul kicked it out of the way. Besides, his bones were too heavy, too much in pain. His vision blurred, barely able to keep his eyes open. If he could just tap into his anger, his desperation, he could draw out his gift and heal his wounds. But try as he might, he felt nothing of the mysterious power. Only a hole in his heart, empty and yearning to be filled.
No! Markra tried calling to it. Not now, not when I need you most! You worked before, why won’t you answer me!?
Still nothing, not even the faintest stir of warmth. No use, then. Imoen was too injured to help, Khalid and Jaheira had run off to who-knows where, and it seemed even the gods had abandoned him.
This can’t be my fate, he thought again, too afraid to speak aloud. I can’t die here, not after coming this far!
But before Nimbul could run him through, an enormous yell bellowed through the night. They turned toward it, and in the darkness, Markra saw a man barreling at them. Not Khalid—this man was too tall and broad to be him. But a fighter none the less, dressed in rattling mail with a giant, two-handed sword over his head.
“Go for the eyes, Boo!” the stranger howled. “Go for the eyes!! RAAAAGH!”
“What in—” Nimbul began, but couldn’t finish. Something flew at his head and climbed under his hood—small, round, and squirming. The next Markra knew, Nimbul was screaming his head off, lowered his shortsword, and clawed desperately at whatever besieged his face.
So of course he couldn’t fight back when the warrior charged at him, loosed another wild roar, and cleaved Nimbul right in half.
Markra flinched and looked away as both halves of Nimbul hit the ground. A clean cut, thanks to Nimbul’s lack of any armor, but still a grotesque sight. The stranger seemed hardy fazed at all, grinning widely as he returned his sword to the scabbard strapped to his back. He knelt and extended his arm to Nimbul’s contorted face, then whatever had mauled the assassin came scurrying up his arm until it sat on his shoulder.
Markra had to squint to get a decent look at the creature, but he swore he saw… No, it couldn’t be. That small sack of fur, four tiny claws, large beady eyes…
A hamster? he thought in disbelief. Nimbul died to a hamster?
The stranger turned and offered his hand to the fallen elf, smile brimming from ear to ear. Markra saw him better now that he faced him: the man was human, and even taller than he’d first thought. Lightly tanned, skin adorned with tiny scars, and ears pierced by tiny silver rings. Stretched across half his bald head was a round, purple tattoo, shaped like an upside-down teardrop with a hole in its center. As to its meaning, Markra had no idea, but he struggled to keep himself from staring at it.
“Hail, fellow warrior!” the man shouted, seemingly oblivious to the volume of his own voice. “That was a close one! Ooh, you are lucky Boo and I were near, or that would have left a nasty scar! Are you all right, friend?”
He wasn’t, but Markra nodded anyway and took the stranger’s hand. He flinched as he was yanked to his feet, pain throbbing in his every pore. But it all dulled away as he stared past his savior to look at Imoen. She’d started to come to, but struggled to just sit herself up.
“Imoen!” Markra moved to run to her, but stumbled instead, too weary to keep his balance. The warrior was kind enough to hold him steady as he walked, then dropped to Imoen’s side and helped turn her over. “You okay, Imoen? Can you hear me?”
“Nngh…” she groaned, and squinted up at him through tired eyes. “I’ll feel better…once I get that bath…”
That tugged a hopeless grin from Markra’s lips. “You look like you’d rather pass out than bathe.”
“One or the other… I don’t care which.”
“M-Markra! Imoen!”
Khalid’s voice pulled their attention. Looking up, they saw him and Jaheira running toward them, freed of the Horror that’d gripped their hearts. Accompanying them behind was a squadron of Nashkel soldiers and Berrun Ghastkill. The mayor looked to have been dragged out of bed, disheveled and hastily dressed, but his sword was drawn and ready.
As Jaheira dropped to Imoen’s side to survey her and Markra’s wounds, Berrun gaped at the strewn corpse on the ground. “What in Helm’s name happened here?”
“W-We were under a-attack,” Khalid panted. “B-B-But—”
“It’s okay, Khalid,” Markra reassured him. “We were rescued. By…”
“Minsc!” At the elf’s questioning gaze, the stranger answered, pointing a righteous thumb at himself. “A traveling warrior of Rasheman! And his loyal companion, Boo!”
The hamster on his shoulder squeaked in delight, so Minsc cradled the sandy creature in his hands and scratched behind its little ears.
Everyone else simply stared dumbstruck at the adoring creature.
“Is that…” Jaheira spoke first, cautiously. “…a rodent?”
Minsc gasped and drew Boo back, as if to shield him from an unseen onslaught. “How rude! Boo is no regular rodent! He is a miniature giant space hamster.”
He answered so matter-of-factly, it silenced the thousands of undoubtedly brewing questions it had spurred.
“Ah… Yes, well…” Even Berrun, proud leader of Nashkel, seemed to have lost his words. He cleared his throat once as if to clear it of nerves. “Minsc and…Boo, you have just saved our very own heroes of Nashkel, and much deserve my thanks.”
He took a long, gracious bow, though Minsc waved him off, flushing lightly.
“No, no! Minsc and Boo need no thanks! There was evil afoot! And wherever evil goes, my boot follows close behind!”
“Regardless, the sancitity of this town is my responsibility. My guards never should have let that vagabond inside.” Berrun sighed and met Khalid’s gaze, the closest of their group to him. “For this slight, you have my sincerest apologies. I will wake Nalin so he may tend to your wounds, and you may sleep beneath the roof of our inn free of charge tonight.”
“Thank you, Berrun,” Jaheira concluded, pulling her eyes away from Boo the hamster. “And as for our payment for clearing the mines—”
“I will have the money for you come morrow. Until then, please rest. You’ve certainly earned it.” Berrun flashed that winning smile, nodding at all of them. “It would seem that I was right to trust you. Though I do wonder a bit what happened to the other pair I’d hired, Xzar and…Montaron, wasn’t it?”
“They didn’t make it,” Markra snapped. “And if your men happen to find them sneaking around, please keep it that way.”
Berrun raised an eyebrow at that, but said nothing. No doubt he’d suspected Xzar and Montaron’s true nature back when they’d met, maybe even before that, even if he didn’t know the lengths of their betrayal. He nodded to one of his men, and the soldiers departed under his wordless orders.
“I’ll fetch Nalin now,” Berrun reassured them one more time, and at Khalid’s nod, he left them. Freed of the mayor, Khalid rejoined the rest of them, peering at Imoen over his wife’s shoulder.
“H-How are you, Imoen?” he asked.
Imoen offered a weak smile. “It hurts… But at least I don’t got two arrows stickin’ outta me. I guess that’s an improvement.”
“She will be fine once Nalin gets here,” Jaheira agreed with a nod, but looked once at Markra as he loosed a breath he’d been holding. “You look worse for wear as well.”
He shrugged. “Someone had to keep him busy.”
“Aye!” Minsc chimed in, so loudly he earned a wince out of all four of them. “The boy fought bravely in the wake of villainy! True, Minsc and Boo might have finished him off, but he was already weakened by the time we arrived! What is your name, young warrior?”
“I’m Markra,” he answered, pointing at himself, and then at his companions. “This is Khalid, Jaheira, and Imoen. We came here to help Nashkel’s mines, and had just gotten back when…” He paused, unsure how much more he should share, so instead he nudged his head toward the assassin’s remains. “When that happened.”
Minsc nodded a couple times, his eyes growing wider. “The Iron Crisis, eh? I’d heard of the mines’ troubles while I stayed in town the past night. You mean to say, you’re the ones who’ve solved their problems?”
“Indeed, it was us,” Jaheira said.
“Huzzah!” Suddenly, Minsc threw one arm into the air, while the other held his hamster, a righteous smile across his lips. “Rangers and hamsters everywhere, rejoice! You are exactly the kind of heroes I’ve been searching for!”
“What—”
Markra barely began to form his question when Minsc suddenly dropped to his knees and bowed. He’d placed Boo back on his shoulder, and Markra may have been imagining it, but it seemed even the hamster had taken a humble stance.
“My fellow adventurers, I implore you lend me your ears!” the ranger wailed. “As every warrior of Rasheman, I am in the midst of completing my dejemma. But my charge and loyal companion Dynaheir was snatched from me by villainous gnolls! I had sworn to protect her, when the vile beasts swooped down on us by cover of darkness, and separated us! I must get her back, but Boo and I are but ranger and hamster, and we cannot do it alone. Please, won’t you help me destroy their evil, and rescue my Dynaheir from their clutches?”
The four of them all looked at each other, searching each other’s eyes for an answer. Markra certainly didn’t care for another neck-risking adventure, not after the perils they’d faced in the Nashkel mines. Still, if what Minsc said was true, he couldn’t simply ignore a plight to rescue someone either—especially if they were trapped by gnolls. The dog-headed, bristle-furred monsters were famous for hunting and feasting on intelligent, humanoid creatures. Depending on how long his friend’s been a captive, Minsc couldn’t have much time to lose.
From their troubled expressions, Markra’s friends must have known that too.
“We hear your plea, ranger,” Jaheira began at last, “but we have a mission of our own that we must attend to as well. One, much like yours, that cannot wait.”
Minsc’s head jerked up, almost jostling poor Boo off his shoulder, looking as if he’d just been slapped. “Then you… You will not help?”
“Th-That’s not what she’s s-saying,” Khalid intervened, and placed a kind hand on Minsc’s arm. “Why d-don’t we speak f-further on this matter, once we are less w-w-wounded?”
That seemed to help him simmer off, though his lips pursed as he chewed on Khalid’s words. Boo squeaked in his ear, and Minsc frowned at him, but after a tiny excuse for a glaring match between them, he nodded and rose to his feet.
“Aye, very well,” Minsc concluded as he dusted himself off. “Boo has chosen to trust you, and so, I will trust you too! We shall talk again in the Nashkel inn, where we will exchange ale and tales of adventure around the table!”
Boo squeaked again—louder this time, and almost…angry. A look of recognition crossed Minsc’s face, and he stroked the hamster’s head with his large finger. “Oh, don’t worry Boo, I remember the last time. No more of that Tanagyr’s Stout for Minsc! Much too strong for my road-weary stomach…”
And with that, the tall ranger turned his back to them and walked away. Once he was safely out of ear-shot, Markra threw a despaired look at Imoen and lowered his voice.
“Okay, honestly, why do I keep running into weirdos?”
“Says the guy with unexplained magic and a price on his head,” Imoen scolded teasingly. “You’re a weirdo now too, in case you forgot.”
Markra sighed, and once again, his gaze wandered back to Nimbul’s remains. “Believe me, I’ve been trying… No such luck.”
Still, at least he had one point of sanity going for him, and Markra reassured himself of it as he watched Minsc disappear inside Nashkel’s inn:
At least I don’t talk to miniature giant space hamsters.
Challenge accepted
But, seriously, it'll be nice huge novella once finished -> BG extended universe.
And completely unpublishable because it's too damn long.
They waited a while longer before Nalin appeared. Even in the dead of the night, the priest of Helm walked the streets clad in his uncomfortable set of plate armor. Upon recognizing the troublesome band, Nalin cursed and almost turned back to his temple, but after he failed to find Xzar and Montaron among them, he begrudgingly offered his services.
Once they’d been fully healed, they gathered the assassin’s belongings, hoping for any clues that could reveal the origins of Markra’s bounty. Aside from a couple magic scrolls and unique pieces of equipment, the only item of worth was a note in jagged handwriting:
“Nimbul,
The money you have recieved from Tranzig should cover your usual fee. Your assignment is a difficult one, but I'm sure that you are up to the task. There is a group of mercenaries who should be coming through Nashkel in the next few days. They are led by a whelp named Markra. You are to kill Markra and all that travel with him. I warn you; they might not look like much, but they are very dangerous. Good hunting!
-Tazok”
“Look at that,” Markra chuckled as he showed the letter to his friends. “We’re considered ‘very dangerous’ now.”
“Don’t let your head swell so big,” Jaheira scolded him. “That letter also called you a welp.”
“These people want me dead; I’ll take whatever I can get.” Markra fished for one of the previous letters out of his pack and compared them side by side. “There’re those names again, Tranzig and Tazok. The same people who’d been in contact with Mulahey.”
“Then whoever was behind the contamination of Nashkel’s mines was also after you.”
Imoen’s face scrunched up in confusion. “But that don’t make a lotta sense. What would a buncha guys like them want with Marky? They can’t know that we ruined their plans yet, it’s too soon. What’s the connection?”
“Maybe they heard a bounty was in town,” Markra guessed with a shrug, “and opted to go after it while they had people down here. Kill two birds with one stone and all that.”
But he didn’t voice what he was really thinking: that this was nowhere near a mere coincidence. If his suspicions were true, then the people who’d tried to poison the mine and steal his life were also the ones who’d murdered Gorion all those nights ago. Like Imoen said, it didn’t make sense; if their goal was to destroy Nashkel’s iron and fuel the Crisis, how did the assassination of a nobody from Candlekeep fit in?
Yet despite their jagged points and curves, Markra couldn’t help but fixate on the same puzzle pieces and think: These must fit together somehow. And judging from the frowns on Khalid’s and Jaheira’s faces, they felt the same.
“W-We will know more once we f-find this T-T-Tranzig,” Khalid concluded. “I-In the meantime…”
He nodded toward the doors to the Nashkel inn, thin enough that they could hear the boisterous cries of Minsc from inside. Or his voice was just that loud. As soon as she laid eyes on it, Jaheira visibly tried to suppress a shudder—and failed to do so.
Markra had to admit, somewhere in the dark recesses of his heart, a small, devious part of him rather enjoyed watching the druid struggle to keep her composure.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, a smirk tugging at his lips. “Afraid it’ll bite if you’re not careful?”
Jaheira spun, eyes blazing, mouth open for a nasty retort—only to cringe when another shout from Minsc leaked through the door, along with the clang of tankards hitting the table. Music hummed through the wood as he led the patrons inside into a sea chanty—ignoring the fact they were nowhere near the sea.
At her sides, Jaheira’s hands balled into fists.
“Oh, that man is an affront to Nature!” she huffed. “A ranger? More like a mockery! Did you see the way he handled that creature? That rodent, th-that…”
“Miniature-giant space hamster?” Markra asked.
“A perfectly normal-sized, bred by the earth hamster! By Silvanus’s might, I have every right to march in there and offer him a piece of my mind for—”
Before she could do just that, however, Khalid put his hands on his wife’s shoulders and eased her back a step.
“E-Easy, dear… Easy…” he urged her. “Remember what the a-archdruid said? To maintain Nature’s balance, o-one must also maintain—”
“—calm,” Jaheira finished. Though still shaking, she took a couple deep breaths through her nose. “I am calm. I am balanced, and I am…calm.”
She waited a few minutes more, until at last she reached for the door knob and twisted it around. “As calm as I can be, at any rate…”
The strum of bard strings and upbeat drums crashed into them as the door swung open. It seemed all of Nashkel’s soldiers had come to the inn to celebrate—or at least, a good many that had now been relinquished of their duties for the night. The innkeeper stayed safely behind the counter cleaning glasses as his waitress hurried to every table, dodging spills and mouthy men. At the largest table in the center, Minsc had his arms around a pair of uniformed soldiers, singing and swaying to the tune. Even the beer seemed to dance with them, sloshing inside their steins.
“Barrel o’er the sea, say I,
The barrels filled with water!
The only drink me sailors need
Is a lap o’ our capn’s daughter!”
The song continued like that for a while, each stanza more ridiculous than the last. From what Markra gathered in the lyrics, it was about a ship journeying too slowly across the sea, and the sailors had to dump supplies overboard to increase their speed. Instead of despairing over what to lose and what to keep, the men insisted that they could throw everything overboard and somehow survive—thanks to the affections of their captain’s daughter.
Imoen hummed quietly along, no doubt having learned it from Winthrop. Markra’s head bobbed slightly to the tune, but Jaheira didn’t seem so impressed. The longer it went on, the deeper the frown creased on her face. Not even Khalid’s gentle back-rubbing could relax her.
As it finally ended, Minsc and his group raised their steins in the air chugged the last of their beer. Spectators surrounding them clapped and whistled as all three cups slammed on the table at once, completely empty. Minsc grinned from ear to ear—made even goofier by the mustache of foam over his lip—as he tossed a coin at the musicians behind him.
“A many thanks for the cheery tune, comrades!” the ranger bellowed. “A fine end to the villainy that gripped this town!”
The rest of the Naskhel soldiers shouted in agreement, toasting to one another. It was only until his miniature crowd had dispersed and returned to their mingling did Jaheira at last walk inside, everyone else following close behind.
Spotting them, Minsc’s eyes lit up and he raised his hand in greeting.
“Ah, you came!” he said. “Boo was beginning to wonder about you!”
Boo squeaked. Too small for him to notice before, Markra spotted the hamster perched on Minsc’s shoulder like a pirate’s parrot. How the little furball had managed to stay on during its master’s joyful singing, Markra could only begin to guess.
“We did,” Jaheira replied as she and the rest of them took seats around the table. “You look rather elated, ranger, considering your companion’s been kidnapped by gnolls.”
“One cannot give in to the sorrow wrought by evil, for that too is a part of its villainy! Just how are we to champion justice and deliver a swift butt-kicking if we are always down in the dumps?”
Though he said that, Minsc’s smile dipped slightly, and he wiped the mug foam off his face with a rag. “But, ah… It is hard to stay strong without Dynaheir. Boo said I needed cheering up.”
Another lively squeak. Markra raised an eyebrow, but he nodded at Minsc anyway. Yeah, the hamster told him to. Right. Just smile and nod, Markra. Nothing unusual about that.
“So!” Minsc began again, eager to change the subject. “Have you considered my quest, friends?”
“First we got some questions,” Imoen answered with the raise of her hand, as if she were still in school. “For one, when did ya say you and your Aunty Dyna got separated?”
“Aye! It must have been… Two nights ago now!”
“And yer sure she’s still a-okay? All peach and roses? All four limbs attached?”
“Imoen—” Markra began to scold her, but Minsc cut him off by ramming his fist on the table, so strongly the dinnerware jumped and rattled in place.
“My Dynaheir does not falter in the face of evil!” he shouted. “She is a powerful spellcaster, an invoker and trained wychlaran! Though vulnerable while she is alone and surrounded, I know she won’t succumb so easily!”
Rssk! hissed the hamster. Strange, in the pits of those dark, beady little eyes, Boo almost looked…sinister.
“W-We understand, Minsc,” Khalid recovered, ever the nervous diplomat, “b-but we must consider every p-p-possibility there is, i-if we are to risk our lives going a-after her.”
“Which leads us to our next question,” Jaheira continued. “Do you have any idea where these gnolls had come from, and where they might have taken her? Wild animals and monsters teem the Sword Coast, however I’ve yet to hear of any massive gnoll uprising this far south.”
Minsc chuckled. A low, throaty laugh paired with a twinkle in his eyes. “Ah, and now we get to the good part! Feast your eyes on this, heroes!”
Then he reached under the table and grabbed a scoll case. Once opened, he spread a map of the Sword Coast across the table, tossing plates and cups aside as he did. Markra recognized the familiar roads and rivers, the many tiny triangles that mapped the forests, and the houses marking towns and cities. Scribbled in the blank spaces were notes and arrows and question marks that barely qualified as chicken-scratch, let alone written words and symbols.
“These past two nights, I have been tracking the gnolls,” Minsc explained. “They are crafty creatures when they wish it, but none so clever as to deceive a ranger’s eye! Dynaheir and I had camped here, along the riverside, when they sprung from the bushes! Following their trail since, I have discovered they must have a base somewhere closeby!”
“And that somewhere is…?” Markra asked.
Minsc pointed at the map—southwest of Nashkel. “Somewhere down here!”
The four of them just stared at the map a while. Patrons chattered in the background, gossiped about the mine and the heroes who’d saved it. The same heroes now rendered dumbstruck.
“That’s all?” Jaheira asked after the long silence.
Minsc winced. “W-Well, Minsc is not so good with specifics… That is more Boo’s specialty. But I know it is somewhere in that area! Thereabouts. In general. Give or take a few days’ walk.”
“But you know nothing else about it?” Jaheira persisted. “You don’t know its geography, its distance? Do you even know the number gnolls expected to occupy this so-called ‘base’?”
“Oh, there will be many! Minsc is certain of that!” Though he scratched the back of his head sheepishly. “But just how much is ‘many’… That is less certain.”
Before anyone else could comment, Minsc immediately lowered his head and bowed again, looking rather desperate as he hovered over his empty stein and marked-up map.
“But that is why I’ve come to seek your aid!” he exclaimed. “Please, my Dynaheir… She is my charge. I have failed to protect her, and now, it is my duty to bring her back. If I cannot, then my dejemma, my passage, my pride as a warrior… None of it will matter. I will have lost a friend and an ally, and no amount of butt-kicking or Boo belly-scratches would ever be the same without her.”
Listening to him, watching the concern melt into his features and wax his earlier gusto, Markra’s tightly-clenched heart slowly opened up. Suddenly, he felt bad for acting so snarky before; strange and confusing and downright mad Minsc may be, he was still just a man, one who’d lost someone important to him. Though he couldn’t understand the language of miniature-giant space hamsters, Markra did understand that feeling of loss. Of grief. Of sheer desperation. He would turn all the realms upside-down if he thought it would bring back Gorion.
Try as he might, Gorion was lost to him and no amount of pleading and world-turning would ever bring him back. But Dynaheir… If she still lived, if they could really rescue her, Minsc could be spared of that pain. He wouldn’t have to drown himself in beer and song just to make himself feel better.
“It’s okay,” Markra spoke at last, and put a hand on the big man’s arm. “We’ll help you, Minsc. We’ll get her back.”
He didn’t have to look to feel Jaheira’s glare digging into him. Already he began to imagine the dozens of ways in which the druid could torture him. But it was worth it to see Minsc’s beaming smile stretch from ear to ear and see his spirit soar again.
“Ohh, praise be to Mielikki!” Minsc cried. “Thank you, my new friends! Together, we shall hunt down evil and roll it in a ball for kicking!”
“Well, that’s all fine and dandy,” Imoen began, tugging on Markra’s sleeve to get his attention, “but what about Tranzig? We don’t know how long he’s gonna hang out at Feldepost’s, and we don’t know how long it’ll take to rescue Dyna.”
“Precisely,” Jaheira agreed through gritted teeth. “That gnoll camp lies in our opposite direction, Markra. A chance like this won’t come by again, and for the whole of the Sword Coast, we must get to the bottom of this Iron Crisis. Minsc, I’m sorry about your friend, and I wish we could help, but I simply don’t see how our paths may align. We cannot do both.”
Markra’s lips pursed. “Maybe we can.”
“What are you—”
“We split up. One group goes with Minsc to hunt down the gnolls, and the other heads to Beregost to interrogate Tranzig. Once Dynaheir’s safe, both groups can meet at Feldepost’s and exchange information from there.”
For the second time since Markra had known her, he’d shocked Jaheira into a gaping silence. Khalid’s eyes were almost as large as the plates beneath him. Imoen simply blinked and scratched her head, unsure what to think.
“Out of the question,” Jaheira immediately shot down.
“I-It’s not a terrible p-p-proposition…” Khalid stuttered, but winced at a glare from his wife. “B-But dangerous. And reckless. And certainly rash. But m-mostly dangerous.”
“Marky, you know I’ll follow ya til the ends of the Realms, no matter what you say,” Imoen added. “But uh… Are you sure about this?”
“It is risky,” he admitted, “and under better circumstances, I’d never suggest it. But I really think this is the best way for everyone to get what they want. With Minsc, we’ll send three people to the gnolls and two at Tranzig.”
“Three?” Jaheira bawked. “You don’t even know how many will be there, and you’re only sending three?”
“Four once we get Dynaheir back.”
“Assuming she still lives!”
“She does live!” Minsc interrupted, shaking his fist at Jaheira. “I know it in my heart of hearts, the warm, grumbly part of my soul! My Dynaheir is still alive!”
“By ‘warm and grumbly,’ you don’t mean your stomach, do ya?” Imoen asked.
“Ooh! Come to think of it, I’d forgotten to order food after singing! Oh, waitress!”
“Enough, both of you!” Jaheira shouted, banged her hands on the table, and shot to her feet. Imoen and Minsc flinched, but it was Markra who held her attention, all of her frustration. Markra vaguely remembered a phrase about the killing power of looks, but it was a feeble memory, faded and phantasmal next to the death-glare burrowing into him.
“C-Calm,” Khalid whispered beside her. “Remember the calm.”
She took in one shuddering breath. Held it, waited a few beats, and finally exhaled. Her face was still red. Her death-glare persisted. At least she kept her quarterstaff still slung on her back, but Markra had no idea how much longer that would last.
“Four people,” she said.
“Yes,” Markra agreed.
“Against dozens of gnolls.”
“Which are not much stronger than kobolds.”
“Traversing a road riddled with iron-hungry bandits.”
“No, the bandits are pillaging the roads between towns. They have no interest in the lowland areas leading to the gnoll camp.”
“And the other two interrogate Tranzig, a man we know nothing about with connections we also know nothing about.”
“What we do know is that he’s just one man, and two people should be more than enough to handle him.”
“Says the man who was nearly killed hours ago while surrounded by three of his friends.”
“Yeah, after two of those friends ran off like chickens without their heads.”
Jaheira’s cheeks burned, a mix of rage and fluster. Her fingers scraped against the table, curling into fists. “That was not—”
“—your fault,” Markra finished, gentler this time. “I know. I’m not blaming you. But Jaheira, while you and Khalid were helpless, Minsc stepped in—when he didn’t have to—and saved my life. Not just me either, but Imoen too. Shouldn’t we find some way to repay him?”
Slowly, as her gaze swept over her party and took in their expressions, Jaheira lost her edge. Less like a panther poised to spring and more like the thoughtful, intelligent woman Markra knew her to be—somewhere under all her bravado, at least. Chewing her lip, she looked at Minsc, then Imoen, then back at her husband. Khalid smiled and rubbed her back, and while Markra wasn’t married, he didn’t need to be to understand the loving gesture: “I’ve got you. Whatever you decide, I’m right here.”
She heaved a tired sigh and met Markra’s eyes again. “This isn’t a good idea.”
Not perfect, no, he silently agreed with her. Not by any means.
But in the end, he shrugged. “It’s the best I can do. Dynaheir will die if we don’t do something. Please, Jaheira, let’s help him. We owe him that much.”
Minsc nodded vigorously, almost jostling his poor hamster from its roost, but neither of them paid him any mind. Even the patrons around the inn seemed to quiet, curiously drawn to the spat, while the bards played a mellow tune in the background. To anyone else, the drop in volume would’ve simply signaled the end of a busy night, but to Markra’s sensitive ears, the whole multiverse may as well have stopped to listen.
At last, Jaheira drew back from him and stood over the table, the high and dignified leader again.
“Very well. We do this your way,” she decided at last. “Markra, for your insistence that we aid the ranger in his quest, you will be accompanying Minsc to the gnoll camp, along with Khalid. Imoen, you and I will head to Beregost and accost Tranzig.”
“HUZZAH!” Minsc leaped from his seat, chair legs scathing across the floor. Then he dipped down and grabbed Markra in a giant bear hug around the shoulders. “Minsc and Boo would ask for no better heroes to save Dynaheir from her captors! Many thanks again, my pointy-eared friend!”
“No problem,” Markra squeaked out, and heaved for breath once Minsc released him and his windpipe. Beaming, the ranger cradled Boo in both his hands and scratched his little ears affectionately.
“Now, come, Boo! Adventure comes at the crack of dawn, and we’ve much to do to prepare!”
Squee, squeal! chirped the hamster, and with barely a wave goodnight, Minsc charged down the hallway and disappeared into one of the rooms.
Jaheira slumped back in her seat. “The ranger speaks true… If we are all in agreement, then we should retire for the evening.”
Neither Khalid nor Imoen voiced any protest, but Marka’s lips pursed. He wanted to help Minsc, and he knew as soon as he accepted his quest that he would be part of the rescue. But he’d be leaving without Imoen, and in truth, he was far more interested in what they’d learn from Tranzig in Beregost. Though he’d convinced the druid of his plan, her chosen combination wasn’t quite what he’d wanted.
But it’d took all he had to confront Jaheira, driven her to the edge of her patience and barely kept her from tipping over. Markra had no desire to push her further. After one final look around the table, Jaheira nodded and leaned her head toward her husband.
“Then, Khalid my dear,” she sighed. “it is late. Let us go to bed.”
“O-Of course,” he soothed her, took her hand and walked her to their room.
Once they’d gone, Markra sighed and hung his head. “Well, if she didn’t hate me before, she sure does now.”
“Aw, don’t be like that,” Imoen reassured as she patted his shoulder. “I think she’s warming up to ya! At least she didn’t start yelling at you this time.”
“Somehow, that doesn’t make me feel any better.”
“Little victories, Marky! Keep addin’ up those little victories, and you’ll win her over someday! Ya just gotta keep up the good fight!”
She balled her hands into fists and punched the air before her like a cage fighter to a crowd, complete with breathy sound effects. But Markra wasn’t so impressed, rolling his eyes at her.
“Uh-huh. Right.” Then he rose to his feet and stretched. “Well, until then, I’m gonna go take a bath. We’ve got another long trip ahead of us tomorrow, and I’m not starting it by smelling like sulfur.”
“Okay!” Imoen complied, but a second later her grin disappeared, replaced by a pout. “Hey, I wanted the bath first!”
“Oh?” He’d already turned on his heel, but flashed a smirk over his shoulder. “Would you like to come join me?”
“Haha, nope!” she yelped, and even crossed her arms over her chest like a giant X. Just as Markra knew she would.
“You’ll just have to wait ‘til I’m out, then,” he said with a shrug.
“Meanie-head! Tub-snatcher! Conniver of all things hygienic! May the gods have mercy on your soul for stealing a girl’s rightful bath-time!”
Shaking his head—but smiling now—Markra pushed in his chair at the table and followed the rest of his companions down the hall. Already he dreamed of steamy hot water and herbal soaps rejuvenating his soul, so close he could almost smell them.