But the tiefling had gained an advantage and he would not surrender it. Claw, that terrible sword, inflicted heavy damage with each strike, damage that went beyond the torn skin and muscle, broken bones and spurting blood, damage that reached right to the heart of the umber hulk’s existence, the core of its soul.

The creature turned, and turned some more, and turned yet more as it screwed itself down to the ground, where Alegni finished it off with a great overhead chop, splitting the beast’s skull in half.

“You should have finished the task with the cataclysm,” Szass Tam scolded Sylora. The sorceress had just informed him of the new information Arunika had supplied regarding the heroic exploits of Herzgo Alegni. “He gains strength and alliance with the villagers.”

“I struck at them hard,” Sylora countered.

“You?”

“The Abolethic Sovereignty—and I count their alliance as my victory.”

“Fair enough,” Szass Tam admitted, but he chucked his disgust with every word. “Some villagers were killed, but once again, the Netherese became their heroes, did they not?”

Sylora lowered her eyes. She couldn’t answer that.

“It was a good attack,” Szass Tam unexpectedly concluded. “Many of the villagers were killed—I sense their souls feeding the Dread Ring now. And not one of our zealots was slain, not a zombie destroyed. Now we must convince the settlers that the reason you attack them is their alliance with the Netherese.”

“Arunika,” Sylora reasoned, and Szass Tam nodded.

“She can be quite persuasive, I’m told,” the archlich said.

“I need more Ashmadai,” Sylora dared to remark, and to her surprise, Szass Tam nodded once more.

Sylora breathed easier, her mind already concocting the lies she would feed through Arunika, already thinking of new ways to wound the settlers, to turn them against the Netherese.

But her relief proved short lived.

“You took from the Dread Ring,” Szass Tam stated.

Sylora looked up at him with surprise.

“I feel its power diminished, stolen by you.”

The sorceress shook her head, trying to make sense of it, for Szass Tam’s tone had taken a darker turn—and that usually meant someone was going to die, horribly.

“I didn’t …”

“Into a scepter, perhaps?” Szass Tam remarked, and Sylora understood then.

“J-Jestry’s weapon … yes,” she stammered.

“You took from the Dread Ring.”

“I asked the Dread Ring for strength,” Sylora protested.

“Strength it provided, to its own detriment.”

“Master, I …” Sylora started, but stuttered and shook her head, trying to figure a way out of this.

“Jestry’s weapon, you say?” Szass Tam prompted her, and she jumped on that sliver of hope.

“My champion, yes! He is being prepared to—”

“Your champion?” the archlich remarked.

“Our champion,” Sylora corrected. “Your champion. Jestry of the Ashmadai. I’ve strengthened him. With the help of the aboleth ambassador, I’ve molded him into a warrior above all other Ashmadai, a warrior worthy of Szass Tam.”

“You stole from the Dread Ring.”

“I strengthened his scepter, creating a weapon truly fitting a champion of Szass Tam,” Sylora explained. “He will face Dahlia.”

“Dahlia?”

“She returns, and brings with her a powerful ally.” Sylora swallowed hard and considered whether or not she should complete her tale, as the spirit of Dor’crae had relayed it through Valindra Shadowmantle. But she realized by Szass Tam’s posture that she had no choice but to reveal it all.

“Hadencourt is gone,” she explained. “Dahlia and her drow companion destroyed him and his devil bodyguards. She knew he was Ashmadai. She knew he was allied with me. She’s fully a traitor now, and intends to defeat me and our mission here, and so, yes, Master, I dipped Jestry’s weapon in the Dread Ring and prayed for it to lend the weapon some of its power. If Dahlia is successful, the Dread Ring will be imperiled, and that we cannot have.”

Szass Tam let her words hang in the air for a few moments before finally replying, “You chose well. Dahlia must be destroyed. Do not fail me in this.”

“More warriors?” Sylora dared to remind him. “That Ashenglade will be fully garrisoned?”

Szass Tam nodded. “Presently,” he said. “Prove to me that your … that my champion is suitable.” For dramatic effect, he raised his skinny, almost skeletal arms up high, the voluminous sleeves of his great robes sliding back from his dark skin. “Finish this unpleasantness with Dahlia. Oh, my disappointment in that one! I will have her before me—dead or alive, it does not matter!”

He ended with a flourish and the ash lifted up around him, obscuring his increasingly insubstantial form as he melted into thin air, returning to Thay.

Then Sylora did breathe easier. She hated those moments with Szass Tam. Even when she had nothing but good news to deliver, as when she’d revealed Ashenglade to him, she could never be quite sure what his reaction might be. Many claimed he was unstable, insane, and perhaps that was true, but Sylora equally suspected that Szass Tam used his unpredictability to his advantage. She was never balanced when speaking with him, never prepared for what might come her way, never certain he wouldn’t kill her for some reason or another, for some excuse she hadn’t even considered.

Yes, she realized, he really was her master.

Chapter 13: The Poison in Their Hearts

DAHLIA WATCHED THE COLD WATER BREAKING LEFT AND RIGHT as she dipped the cloth into the stream. Beside her, Drizzt picked at one of the wounds where a broken piece of barbed quill had stubbornly stuck. His entire right arm was covered in blood again. He flexed his hand and clenched his fist, pushing even more blood forth from the many wounds.

Dahlia rubbed the soaked cloth over the drow’s arm, washing away the majority of the blood and revealing his wounds to be a series of punctures rather than one long cut.

Drizzt held his arm up, turning it in the sunlight. He motioned to Dahlia, who moved the wet cloth near enough for him to bite it. He pushed the small knife into his forearm. He grimaced and twisted, then retracted the blade, dropped it, and reached back to his arm to remove the stubborn quill.

The drow let go of the cloth and sighed, shaking out his hand before dipping his arm into the cold stream.

“Wretched little beasts,” he remarked, staring at the quill for just a moment longer before flicking it into the stream.

“How many wolves have said the same of porcupines?”

“I know of few porcupines who find the courage to chase wolves through the forest.”

“Perhaps they’re wiser than devils, then,” Dahlia quipped, but while that brought a smile to Drizzt’s lips, the woman couldn’t quite manage one.

“Hadencourt is gone,” Drizzt assured her.

Dahlia nodded absently.

“The threat is passed. Our road to Neverwinter Wood, and Sylora Salm, is clear.”

Again she nodded, but it was clear she was hardly listening. She didn’t look at Drizzt either. Her gaze roved the shadows of the trees clustered along the riverbanks.

“Sylora is prepared for us,” she said. “We’ll not have the element of surprise in our favor. Hadencourt was her agent.”

“We don’t need to continue,” Drizzt replied. “We can turn aside now. The whole of the North is open to us.”

“No,” Dahlia stated flatly.

“We can return another time, not too far in the future, then,” Drizzt offered. “Perhaps now that Hadencourt and his minions are gone, we’ll regain a measure of surprise. Perhaps if we delay, just a bit, Sylora will let down her guard.”

“No,” Dahlia said. “There never was a chance to surprise her, and I was a fool to think otherwise. Sylora Salm is a seasoned veteran of Thay and a great disciple of Szass Tam. Hadencourt merely reaffirms what I already knew: Sylora Salm has eyes all around her, and now that she’s warned of our intent, she’ll never let down her guard.”

“What do you know?” Drizzt asked, sensing that something more was going on, particularly from the way Dahlia kept looking into the shadows, as if she expected some devil or other monster to charge out at them then and there.

“Dor’crae,” Dahlia admitted. “He’s still around, or will be again presently. I’m certain of it. He can find us and we cannot know of his presence.”

“As I said, we could turn aside—”

“No,” Dahlia cut him short.

Drizzt watched her for a while, trying to read her eyes as she continued to stare off into the forest. There was little caution to be found there, and quite a bit of seething anger. She hated Sylora, of course, but it seemed to the drow that there was something more than that.

“Are you always so eager to kill?” Drizzt asked quietly, though there was nothing quiet about the implications of such a question.

Dahlia kept staring off into the distance then suddenly snapped her head around to consider the drow.

“Sylora, Beniago …” Drizzt remarked. “Do you know only one manner of negotiation?”

Her face tightened with anger, but it didn’t hold. She seemed sadder and more wounded then, and Drizzt regretted his off-hand remark.

“What anger drives you?” he pressed on anyway. Drizzt rose from beside the stream and paced toward her, but took a circuitous route around her. “She’s beautiful. She’s accomplished—a skilled warrior, a hunter, a tactician.”

He continued to circle. “She’s young and can command the world at her feet. Every road is open to her, yet she ever chooses those trails that will lead her to the greatest danger.”

“Does Drizzt Do’Urden shy from a fight?” she asked.

“Do I hunt the wolves in the forest?”

The porcupine reference did bring a bit of smile to Dahlia’s fair face.

“For one who avoids trouble, your blades carry the smell of much blood,” Dahlia retorted. “And for all of your bluster now, are you not walking that same dangerous road beside me?”

“I have my reasons.”

“I know your reasons,” Dahlia replied. She grabbed Drizzt’s hand as he moved around her and pulled him down roughly so she could kiss him.

He didn’t resist.

Drizzt moved to the top of the ridge overlooking the stream. He saw Dahlia below him, splashing water on her face. He looked at her curiously for just a moment, for something seemed … different. Then he realized her braid was back, and as he considered the water dripping from her shining face, he recognized that mesmerizing woad pattern of bluish spots.

His initial reaction was to pull back. Before he even considered the elf’s exotic look, his instincts made him react negatively to this harsher appearance. He was surprised by his response, for he’d previously found Dahlia’s exotic hair and woad enticing. And still she was beautiful—he couldn’t deny that. This was a more dangerous look, but wasn’t that, after all, what Drizzt’s life had become?