“Janik Martell?”

Not looking at the black-haired man beside him, Janik stared at the Blackcap Mountains far below the airship. He had watched the man since the voyage began, having pegged him as one of the Royal Eyes of Aundair. He gave a slight nod even as his left hand moved to the hilt of his short sword at his belt.

“I’d like to ask you a few questions.” The man’s voice was low and heavy. “In the name of Queen Aurala of Aundair.”

Janik pushed a wayward strand of tawny hair over his right ear and lifted his eyes toward the horizon, where the mountains sank down into hills and flowed into the plains and vineyards of Aundair. “We’re not across the border yet.”

“And it’s my job to make sure you don’t get across the border if I don’t like your answers.”

Janik looked at the other spy, studying him. He was shorter than Janik by a hand’s breadth, and his hair was cut short. He wore a midnight blue coat open in front, revealing light armor—and the hilt of his sword—underneath. The two eyed each other for a moment, then Janik turned back to look down at the mountains again. “So ask,” he said.

“What’s your destination?”

“Fairhaven.”

“How long are you staying there?”

“As short a time as possible.”

“What’s your business there?” As the man asked the question, Janik felt the pressure in his mind that meant someone wanted access. No way, he thought, and mentally slammed a door in the intruder’s face while looking around to see who had cast the spell. A wiry man lurked in the shadows across the deck, holding a scroll. Janik spotted an open pouch bulging with scrolls at the man’s belt and guessed that he was an artificer. Janik scowled and gripped the hilt of his sword.

The other man shrugged, raising both palms as if to ward off an angry outburst. “Just a spell to check the truth of your words, Martell. Understandable in our line of work.”

“I don’t like sneaking spellcasters.” Janik jerked his head toward the artificer, who was rummaging in his pouch for another scroll. The Aundairian agent looked lazily over his shoulder, then turned back to Janik.

“I don’t suppose there’s any way we’re going to convince you to submit to this spell? Prove you have nothing to hide?”

“Not a chance.”

“All right. Haunderk—” The man made a sign to the artificer, and the wiry man slunk off toward the rear of the ship. “So what is your business in Fairhaven?”

“It’s personal.”

“Well, I hope you won’t take it personally if I have you put off the ship.”

Janik held his adversary’s steady gaze. No, the man wasn’t bluffing. After a long moment, he gave a grim smile and held out his hand. “You never told me your name.”

The Aundairian hesitated for a moment, then smiled and shook Janik’s hand. “Kelas ir’Darran.”

“All right, Kelas ir’Darran.” Janik released his hand. “I’m visiting your fine capital to find my old friend Mathas Allister, who worked with me during the war. No doubt you have him under constant surveillance. I hope to enlist his aid for another mission.”

“Another expedition to Xen’drik, in Breland’s service?”

“Maybe Xen’drik, but not for Breland. We’ve been invited to Thrane, to an audience with the Keeper of the Flame herself.” Janik smiled to himself as he watched Kelas stiffen. Aundair and Breland had been enemies during the Last War, but had also been allies at times. Nothing but bad feelings ran between Aundair and Thrane. “Look, Kelas,” he said. The Aundairian turned away from Janik to look at the fields of his homeland drawing closer beneath the airship. “I’m going to Aundair to collect my friend and leave. Honestly, I don’t know what the Keeper wants with us. But if it’s the least bit political, I’m out. I’m not interested in that kind of work for Breland, let alone Thrane.”

“You don’t know what she wants?”

“No idea. But she summoned me, so I can only assume it has something to do with my expertise, which is Xen’drik, not subterfuge against Aundair.”

“And why would Janik Martell emerge from three years of quiet teaching in Sharn to answer a summons from the Keeper of the Flame? I thought you followed the Sovereign Host.”

“I used to. And I certainly have no interest in the faith of the Silver Flame. This isn’t about religion. It’s—well, like I said before, it’s personal.” A sudden flash of anxiety hit Janik as he thought again about Dania’s letter. He fought it down, but his voice was choked as he said, “Another old friend asked me to come.”

Perhaps aware of Janik’s discomfort, Kelas stared out over the bulwarks without saying anything. Janik turned away as well and stared blindly at the ring of elemental fire that surrounded the airship, keeping her airborne and propelling her through the skies. As they stood in silence, the mountains dwindled to foothills and Aundair stretched out in autumnal splendor beneath them. Janik lowered his gaze to the mosaic of red, yellow, orange, and brown leaves radiant in the evening light far below, enjoying a different experience of autumn than he had in Sharn—where the change of seasons just meant more rain.

“Well, Janik Martell,” Kelas said at last, “welcome to Aundair.” He clasped Janik’s hand again and smiled. “I hope your stay in Fairhaven is pleasant—and short.” He turned and walked aft, leaving Janik alone with his thoughts.

Janik pulled Dania’s letter from the breast pocket of his coat and tapped it idly against the bulwarks. He hadn’t seen Dania or Mathas since leaving them at an airship dock in Sharn three years ago. They had just returned from their famous expedition to Xen’drik. On a mission for King Boranel of Breland, Janik had led his friends to ancient Mel-Aqat, a temple-city known from numerous ancient inscriptions. That mission had cemented Janik’s reputation as a scholar and explorer, and it had shattered his life.

He had spent the last three years hiding—hiding from Mathas and Dania, hiding from the memory of that expedition and its disastrous outcome. The memory of Maija, his wife, betraying him.

He had thrown himself into his work—his teaching at Morgrave University, his translation of the stone tablets he had brought back from Mel-Aqat. Working, constantly moving, he had succeeded in suppressing those memories, at least during daylight. But the letter had brought them all back, and as he looked at the page in his hand once more, after reading it over and over for three days, it still made his chest tighten.

Janik lifted his gaze to the horizon, watching a hippogriff soaring in the distance. He stuffed Dania’s letter into his coat pocket and tried to force his thoughts back to where they had been before Kelas interrupted—planning his search for Mathas. He rattled off a mental list of places the old elf favored: fine restaurants, booksellers, perhaps a wizard’s college or even a university. Mathas could teach Xen’drik history as well as Janik could, if he ever desired to do so. But soon he felt the same clenching anxiety that hit him every time he tried that line of thought. Searching for Mathas was one thing. Finding him was something else entirely.

“Sovereigns! What’s he doing?”

The cry jolted Janik out of his reflections. A woman had shouted, part of a well-dressed couple who had kept to themselves on the trip so far. Janik guessed they were newlyweds, celebrating their recent marriage with an airship journey. The young bride was pointing into the sky above the port side while her husband craned his neck curiously.

A hippogriff swooped low over the airship, and Janik saw what had drawn the woman’s attention. A man was on the hippogriff’s back, not strapped into a saddle and harness, but standing. Just as Janik realized what was happening, the man jumped.

Janik pulled his short blade from its sheath and leaped toward the wheelhouse, where the windwright pilot steered the ship. The jumper landed hard on its roof—hard enough to drive the airship’s stern downward. Janik stumbled as he ran across the rocking deck toward the wheelhouse, but he kept his feet. He watched the man drop from the roof to the stairway leading up from the deck, and saw one of the House Lyrandar guards, stationed there to protect the pilot from just such an event as this, crumple under the man’s blade. Janik reached the bottom of the steps as the man disappeared into the wheelhouse.

He sprang up the stairs by twos, just in time to see the other Lyrandar guard fall, his neck slashed by a broad arc from the killer’s sword. The windwright stood clutching the helm, his knuckles white and his eyes wide with terror. The attacker turned, and Janik got his first look at the man’s face—except he was not a man. A featureless mask of metal formed his face, and beneath a black cloak, his body was similarly composed of metal, wood, stone, and strange sinewy cords. His bastard sword was the gleaming silver-black of adamantine, with gold tracings etched into the blade. He gave Janik the merest of glances, then turned his attention to the windwright. “Martell,” he said as he stalked toward the terrified pilot, “they told me you’d be the first one here.”

Janik did not waste time responding. He leaped over the first guard’s body toward the warforged, hoping to push him away from the pilot and into the bulkhead. He ducked under the swinging adamantine sword and slammed hard into the killer’s chest, but his opponent didn’t even miss a step. Janik tottered backward and slashed at the thing’s elbow, aiming for sinews between hard plates. The warforged jerked his arm to the left and Janik’s blade clattered against the hard plating on the forearm. The bastard sword went up and slashed down on the windwright’s skull, sending a spray of blood into the air as the pilot collapsed.

The airship lurched as the elemental bound into a fiery ring surrounding the ship felt the hands holding its reins fall slack. The warforged stumbled. Janik pressed the momentary advantage, slashing at his opponent’s neck. The adamantine sword batted Janik’s smaller blade away.

“You wield your blade with skill, Martell,” the warforged said, his voice strangely human coming from such an inhuman frame, “but there is no strength behind your blows.”

“You’re giving me fencing lessons?” Janik decided to buy time by letting the warforged have his conversation. “How do you know my name?”

“I know all about you, Martell.” The killer’s voice was mocking as he launched a fierce offensive with his whirling blade. “Your life and loves, your strengths, and especially your weaknesses.” Janik dodged and parried the relentless assault, his breath coming faster with the exertion. “Captain Kavarat told me.” The voice of the warforged betrayed no hint of fatigue.

Krael Kavarat, Janik thought. I should have guessed.

When Maija had left him, she had delivered the Ramethene Sword right into the hands of Krael Kavarat, an officer of the Emerald Claw who had been Janik’s rival and enemy for a decade.

First a letter from Dania, now an assassin sent by Krael.

“It seems my past is determined to catch up with me,” he said. Striking the adamantine blade as hard as he could to knock it wide, he slashed from his right, trying to drive the warforged toward the stairway. Momentarily surprised by Janik’s renewed barrage, his foe stepped closer to the stairs, turning his back to the wheelhouse’s only entrance.

Just where I want you, Janik thought with grim satisfaction. Now we wait.

He fell into a defensive stance, intent on keeping the adamantine sword away from him.

“So Krael sent you to kill me,” he said. Continuing the conversation was the best way to keep the killer distracted, he figured, though speaking had become a real effort.

“That’s right. Crashing the airship was my idea, though.” There was a trace of a smile in the voice of the warforged, though his face was expressionless.

Crashing the airship?

Since the initial lurch at the death of the windwright, Janik had not paid attention to the ship’s movement, but he suddenly noticed that the deck was slanted toward the prow.

Better finish this up quickly, he thought, though he had little hope of success.

Janik’s patience was rewarded as another man appeared in the wheelhouse doorway, almost directly behind the warforged. It was Kelas, the Aundairian spy, bastard sword in hand. His eyes flicked from Janik to his opponent, to the dead guards and the pilot, and quickly back to the warforged. Swiftly and silently, he stalked up behind the warforged and brought his sword down in a deadly arc. At the last instant, the killer twisted and the sword cut into his shoulder instead of cleaving his skull. Roaring in surprise and pain, the warforged spun around to retaliate—and Janik took the opportunity to hack with his short blade at his opponent’s shoulder. This time, it was a solid blow. The warforged nearly dropped his sword, but quickly shifted it to his left hand.

“About time you got here, Kelas,” Janik said, smiling at the Aundairian.

Kelas nodded, his eyes wide and fixed on their opponent, the warforged had turned sideways, and Janik could see that he was trying to keep both humans in view while sizing up his opportunities for escape.

“Whose idea was it to get yourself trapped in a small room with two opponents?” Janik said. “Probably Krael’s. He’s never been too concerned about the lives of his minions—especially those who fail.”

The warforged had lost interest in idle conversation. But Janik’s words apparently reminded him of his purpose, and he renewed his assault on Janik, swinging his sword left-handed with undiminished strength, trying not to expose his back to Kelas. Again Janik focused on defense until Kelas could distract the warforged. Just as Kelas maneuvered behind their opponent, the warforged took a halfhearted swing at Janik and then rushed for the door. Kelas’s sword glanced off the back plates of the warforged, then their foe was out the door. Janik saw him knock the Aundairian artificer off the steps as he bolted down. Hurrying to the door himself, Janik watched the warforged run to the bulwarks and throw himself over the side.

For an instant, Janik prepared to rush to the bulwarks himself, to see what happened to the assassin. But a commotion on the deck wrenched his attention to a more immediate concern. Passengers clung to each other, sought shelter belowdecks, or knelt down and prayed for deliverance. The ring of fire that normally burned steadily leaped and crackled as if trying to break free of the magical bonds that held it in place around the ship. From the deck where the warforged had knocked him flat, the artificer cried out, “The airship’s going to crash!”

Janik spun around and hurtled up the stairs to the wheelhouse, pushing past Kelas in the doorway. Standing over the fallen windwright pilot, he examined the helm of the airship. “I wonder how you use this thing,” he said to himself.

“No pressure, Janik,” Kelas called from the doorway, “but if you’re going to figure it out, you’d better do it soon.”

Hearing the fear in the Aundairian’s voice, Janik gripped the wheel. He felt pressure at the edges of his mind again, similar to the artificer’s divination only a short time ago. Janik’s instinct was to snap his mind shut as he had before, but he forced himself to receive this contact. It was a wordless voice of rage and rebellion, and Janik recognized it as the elemental bound in a fiery ring around the airship.

“It wants to be free,” he muttered.

No, damn you. Up! He used the strange telepathic connection to command the elemental. Up!

Janik felt as if he had caught a dragon turtle on a fishing line. Pain stabbed through his head. He felt the elemental trying to throw the mental yoke from its mind. He sensed, though he could not see, the wild leaps of the fiery ring and thrashing tongues of flame coursing along the veins of magical tracery that covered the body of the ship. The deck of the ship bucked wildly—but she remained airborne.

Janik’s fists clenched the wheel. He pulled on it as if it were a horse’s reins, willing the elemental to obey him. He squeezed his eyes shut and the ship disappeared from around him—the bucking deck, the screaming passengers, the dead pilot. He felt as if he stood alone in the middle of a giant ring of wildly burning fire. As he pulled on the wheel with his hands and pulled on the fiery ring with his mind, it seemed to grow smaller, tamer.

“Up!” he shouted, and the ship moved up.

Surprised, Janik opened his eyes. Immediately, the ship jerked hard to port as the elemental felt his hold weaken. No! Obey me! With his renewed focus, the ship moved smoothly once more.

“Take her higher, Janik,” Kelas said, still standing in the door of the wheelhouse. “We’re still awfully close to the ground.” He paused. “But that was well done, I must say.”

Janik allowed a smile to flicker across his face before exerting his will on the elemental once more. This time, it responded immediately and smoothly to his telepathic command, gently lifting the airship higher while keeping the deck level. He was vaguely aware of cheers and a quiet babble of relief from the passengers on deck, but the more he stretched his attention beyond the little wheelhouse, the more he felt his control over the elemental slip.

“Now what?” he said to Kelas. “I can’t keep this up forever.”

“I’ll get word to House Lyrandar,” the Aundairian replied. “Maybe they can get another pilot up here.”

“Another pilot? How are they going to do that?”

“Call in a favor from the teleporters of House Orien, maybe? They’re dragonmarked. They’ll figure it out.” Kelas jumped down the steps to the deck, leaving Janik alone in the wheelhouse.

In contrast to the ride from Sharn, Janik enjoyed the journey from Fairhaven to Flamekeep. Agate Star was an airship built for luxury, easily twice the size of the ship Janik had sailed on from Sharn. Her main deck boasted a grand pavilion containing a luxurious dining room, a lounge, and even a small library, though Janik found nothing on its shelves to catch his interest. The deck had room for chairs, and the cabins below were spacious and comfortable.

Janik and Mathas had boarded in the late morning and expected to arrive in Flamekeep shortly after dawn the next day. The old friends enjoyed a fine luncheon together. As always, Janik let the elf choose wine for him, and did not regret the decision—Mathas had extensive knowledge of wines and exquisite taste. Their conversation ranged widely over their shared past without ever straying too close to Maija or dwelling on Dania. Janik was eager to hear of Mathas’s activities over the past three years, and found with some surprise that he had plenty of tales to share as well.

Janik spent the afternoon on the deck while Mathas retreated to his cabin to study. He watched the plains and rolling hills of Aundair far below, idly wondering at what point they became Thrane. No natural feature marked the border, which he supposed might be the reason it had been so hotly contested during the war. He saw two different places—easily a three-day journey apart—where the land still had not recovered from some pitched battle fought there in the last years of the war. He supposed one or the other might lie on the border set in the Thronehold Accords. He wondered how long it took for the earth to heal a scar like that.

As the autumn sun drew near the horizon behind the ship, bathing the deck in golden light and long shadows, Janik changed into formal clothes and joined Mathas in the dining room. In place of the sunlight and chatter of luncheon time, the dining room was now dancing with candles and alive with the soft music of a small orchestra. Janik found Mathas at a small table near the window, just as he had in Aundair the day before.

“I find myself drawn to windows these days,” Mathas said as Janik took his seat. “I don’t know what it is—I can find endless amusement in just staring out, no matter what’s on the other side.”

Janik peered out the window himself. The fiery glare of the airship’s elemental ring all but drowned out the Ring of Siberys in the deep blue sky, the golden belt of dragonshards that circled the world. He looked at Mathas and grinned. “You must be getting old.”

“Nonsense,” Mathas said. He sipped his wine. “I was old when you were born. In fact,” he continued, “I believe the last time I was in Thrane was before you were born. King Thalin was such a strange man, so … devout. His presence made those around him feel uneasy, as though they might be called upon to praise the Silver Flame at a moment’s notice. I expect the Keeper of the Flame will be much the same.”

“Is it true she’s a child, this Jaela Daran? Eight years old?”

“I believe she must be eleven by now, but yes, a child,” Mathas said. “Ruling part of Galifar like a queen, Sovereigns help us.”

“There must be a regent or something—someone who does the work of government on her behalf?”

“I believe so—a council of clergy of some sort. It’s absurd to imagine an eleven-year-old in charge of affairs of state.”

“Quite. Do you think we’ll be dealing with this council, then? Or someone else?”

“I have no idea,” Mathas said, then he gave a laugh. “Maybe Dania.”

“Sovereigns help us,” Janik replied, rolling his eyes dramatically.

When a waitress approached the table, the two fell silent, not wanting to offend the young woman, who proudly displayed the emblem of the Silver Flame around her neck. She took their order and withdrew, and Janik took the opportunity to change the subject.

“I neglected to mention—Dania is not the only old friend who has suddenly inserted herself back into my life.”

Mathas raised his eyebrows. “Who else?”

“I received a … communication from Krael Kavarat on my way to Aundair. The messenger nearly crashed the airship.”

“An Emerald Claw assassin?” Mathas looked shocked.

“A warforged assassin. I don’t know about Emerald Claw. But he admitted Krael sent him. To kill me.”

“That’s bizarre. Why now?”

“Exactly. I haven’t heard a word from or about Krael since he walked off with Maija and the Ramethene Sword. And why should I? I’ve been no threat to him these last three years—he’s had plenty of opportunity to send assassins after me in Sharn. But no, he sends his latest killer after me now, after Dania has invited me to Thrane.”

“Clearly he knows something about our mission. Probably more than we do at this point.”

“My thought exactly,” Janik said. “It gives me a bad feeling. Whatever the Keeper, or Dania, or whoever has in mind, it’s clear that Krael will be involved.”

“On the bright side, maybe we’ll have the opportunity to kill him this time.” Mathas smiled grimly.

“That would be good,” Janik said. “That would be really good.”

Janik awoke with a much clearer head and made his way to the main room of the suite. Mathas had returned to his chair and his weighty tome, which was draped over his lap. An empty plate lay on a side table beside the elf, and plenty of food remained spread on the larger table.

Mathas looked up and smiled as Janik emerged. “A day on an airship is like two on the ground,” he said. “Traveling always exhausts me.”

Janik laughed. “It wasn’t that long ago you spent a year traveling to Mel-Aqat and back.” He sat on the edge of the chair facing his friend and started loading a plate for himself.

“And a year in the wilderness is like ten in the city. No wonder I feel so old.”

“No wonder.” Janik bit into a ripe plum, then dabbed his chin with a white napkin. “I’ve been summoned back to the Cathedral tomorrow.”

“Of course you have. They served us lunch.”

Janik smiled. “Rather than turning us out on the street? You’re right. Apparently whoever is behind this isn’t going to give up that easily.”

“And who is behind this? Did you get any sense of that?”

“It’s hard to say.” Janik took another bite of his plum and continued with his mouth full. “The Keeper had six attendants who did most of the talking.” He swallowed. “Four of them spoke, and none said more than a sentence or two. I couldn’t tell whether one of them was pulling the strings.” He stared thoughtfully at the wall and took another bite of his plum.

“Well,” Mathas said, “while you were there, I learned a little more about the government of Thrane. The girl has mostly abdicated control of the government to a Council of Cardinals, and she concerns herself primarily with the spiritual well-being of the people.”

“Interesting,” Janik said. “I don’t think I was dealing with Cardinals.”

“No, I’m sure you would know if you had been.”

“But if they’re the ones really running the country, why wasn’t I talking to them?”

“Perhaps this isn’t the kind of job you thought it was.” Mathas watched Janik consider this for a moment. “Did the Keeper speak at all?”

“She spoke first, just welcoming me here. Then when she spoke again, all the attendants looked surprised, like she had strayed from the script.” He poured himself a glass of wine. “Probably played trump too early.”

“Trump?”

“Oh, she was good. She pulled almost a prophetic vision thing—had me going for a moment.”

Mathas leaned forward with interest. “What did she say?”

“Something like, ‘What you have lost is still in those ruins.’ And then, ‘The Silver Flame calls you there.’ Trying to make it sound like this job’s divinely ordained, and hoping to make it personal.”

“What have you lost, Janik?”

“Oh, don’t you start now! I work for money, not out of some quest for personal fulfillment. I don’t care what this one pays. I’m not going back there.”

“It seems to me you’ve lost a great deal, then.” Mathas’s voice was quiet, in contrast to Janik’s outburst.

“Yes, I have.” Janik stood. “I’ve lost the woman I loved and one of my best friends. I’ve lost any belief I used to have that the universe was a just and fair place ruled by a Host that cares about such things. I’ve lost my passion for my work, my thirst to learn more about the ancient civilizations of Xen’drik. I’ve lost everything that matters to me. But I’ve been to Mel-Aqat and I know what’s there, and I’m not going to find those things there.” He stormed to the door, grabbing his coat from a nearby chair.

“Where are you going?” Mathas asked.

“I need to walk, clear my head,” Janik said. He threw the door open. The knight Tierese was there, a respectful distance away. He called to her. “Am I allowed to go into the city and look around?”

“Of course,” the knight replied. “If you would like, I can arrange a carriage for you.”

Janik stepped out of the room, then looked back at Mathas. “I’m sorry I lost my temper, Mathas,” he said, then pulled the door closed behind him and addressed Tierese. “Thank you. That won’t be necessary.” He swept past the knight and stalked down the hall toward the stairs.

“An escort?” Tierese said to his back. “Flamekeep is quite safe, but to be sure …”

“No.” He sped down the steps, out of the palace, and into the city beyond.

It’s good to be home, Janik thought as a skycoach shuttled him among the towering buildings of the city toward his apartment near Morgrave University. Even if only for a few days.

Janik had his own mental list of tasks to accomplish during their two days in Sharn, and he hadn’t shared every item on the list with Mathas and Dania. Foremost among them was digging through some historical texts and perhaps talking to a few colleagues to see if he could determine what the Church of the Silver Flame might want from Mel-Aqat. He was the acknowledged expert on that site, but his knowledge of the teachings and history of the Church of the Silver Flame was lacking, and he wanted to know what interest the Church might have in those ruins. Searching for a way to re-imprison some vaguely-defined evil spirit, he felt sure, was a cover for a more concrete goal.

Recruiting a fourth member for their group was higher on his list of priorities than he had let on to the others. He could tell that Dania would rather have a cleric on the expedition—preferably a cleric of the Silver Flame. He fully expected her to return with a cleric sent by the Church. The last thing he wanted was to be forced to bring some Silver Flame crusader along because he didn’t have a stronger candidate to offer.

As he jumped off the skycoach onto a balcony near his apartment, he made a mental list of the most important books and scrolls that mentioned Mel-Aqat, planning his research. In contrast to his exhaustion upon arriving in Fairhaven and Flamekeep, he found himself energized and excited to be back in Sharn. He paused a moment on the balcony, looking at the towers stretching as far as he could see. Above him, it was nearly impossible to distinguish the lights of high windows in Morgrave University from any stars that might have been in the sky. He breathed deeply, savoring the air and its myriad odors, glad to be back in familiar surroundings.

Turning the key in his apartment door, he suddenly remembered that Adolvo Darriens had been an outspoken follower of the Silver Flame. His commentary on the ancient elven text known as the Darriens Codex, named in his honor, might shed some light on the Church’s interest in Mel-Aqat. He pushed his door open, and the key fell from his hand and clattered on the bare stone floor.

The place was a shambles. The outer room—his study and sitting room—was littered with books that had been torn from the shelves and tossed carelessly aside. His two cushioned chairs were overturned and a glass case in which he stored his private collection of antiquities had been smashed. At a glance, Janik judged that only one or two items were missing, though several others were damaged. Through the open doors in the hallway, he could see that the kitchen and his bedroom had been similarly ransacked.

“Damn you, Krael,” he swore under his breath. He drew his sword, stepped into the outer room, and pushed the door closed behind him. He made his way on silent feet around the small apartment, making sure that no agent of Krael’s remained. When he was satisfied that the place was empty, he sheathed his sword, barred the door, retrieved his dropped key, and started putting books back on their shelves.

An hour later, Janik righted one of the overturned chairs and collapsed into it, feeling the weight of his exhaustion settling on him. With one hand on his forehead, he looked up at the bare spaces on his shelves.

“The Darriens Codex,” he said, pointing at the empty shelf. “Edgeler. The Scorpion Hymns. Gautier. Zhavaan. And the Serpentes Fragments. Well done, Kavarat. You got everything important. Well damn done.”

He sat there staring at the empty places until sleep seized him.

Sometime during the night, Janik must have shuffled from the chair to his bed. He woke up lying on top of the covers, still wearing his clothes, blinking as the dawn light poured through the uncurtained window. He got up, washed, and changed his clothes. With a last rueful glance at the empty spaces on his bookshelves, he made his way out the door.

He walked a long route he had walked hundreds of times before, from his apartment to the university and its teeming Commons, his favorite place to eat breakfast. He noticed for the first time how many dark alleys opened along his path, how many places an attacker could hide. Every time he saw a warforged, his hand reached almost involuntarily for his sword, though he recognized none of them as Krael’s assassin.

This is ridiculous, he thought. I’m jumping at shadows. Fifteen years of all kinds of adventure, digging through ruins, spying for Breland, hiking across Xen’drik, and I’ve never been like this.

He rested his left hand on the hilt of his short sword and strode more deliberately along the streets and bridges of the City of Towers, forcing himself not to peer around every corner.

Janik reached the Commons and bought a piece of fried dough sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar. Food in hand, he looked around at the students and faculty clustered at tables throughout the plaza, hoping to spot a colleague he could talk to about Mel-Aqat. Seeing no familiar faces, he made his way to his office, eating as he went.

He paused outside his office door, licking the last sugar crystals from his fingers. He fully expected to find his office ransacked, even though nothing there was as precious or important as the books that had been stolen from his home. He turned the key in the lock, dropped his right hand to his sword hilt, and pushed the door open with his left.

Nothing seemed out of place, to Janik’s surprise. Everything was as he had left it two weeks earlier. Which meant that either Krael’s agents hadn’t managed to gain access to his office since it was in a public area, or they had known that what they really needed was in his apartment. Maybe it had been a lucky guess—they tried his apartment first and found everything they were looking for. It was hard to imagine that anyone working for Krael knew that much about his books.

Except Maija. That thought stung like a Xen’drik scorpion. Dania had seen Maija and Krael together in Karrnath. Was Maija still working with Krael, telling him where to find Janik’s books? Was she Krael’s lover now?

He pushed those thoughts aside. He dropped his pack on the desk, pulled a journal and writing set out of it, and left the office again, locking the door behind him. The university library couldn’t afford a copy of the Serpentes Fragments, but it did have copies of all Janik’s published papers, including the article in which he first spelled out everything the Fragments said about Mel-Aqat. As he walked to the library, he formulated a plan. All thoughts of Krael and his warforged assassin fled from his mind.

“Krael,” Janik said, the name like a curse on his lips.

“Almost certainly,” Mathas replied, walking into the sitting room. He took a seat on the chair that Janik had righted two nights before, arching an eyebrow at the one that was still overturned. Janik closed the door, bolted it, and turned to Mathas, lifting the chair off the floor and setting it upright so he could sit down.

“This is ridiculous,” Janik said. “He sends an assassin after me—twice!—breaks into my apartment and steals my books, and then steals the ship we’ve commissioned to take us to Xen’drik! What’s next?”

“If I had to guess, I’d say that next is getting to Mel-Aqat before we do, and getting his filthy hands on whatever it is we’re looking for.”

“That cannot happen,” Janik said. “I’ll give my soul to the Keeper before I let Krael beat me at anything again.”

“Careful what promises you make, Janik. But you’re right, we’ve got to stop him.”

“Are we almost ready to go?”

“I think we’re close. I brought our food stores to the docks to stow them aboard his ship and found out that Nashan left. Dania has our documents. I bought new boots, and I think she did as well. I think we could leave today.”

“Then let’s see what our letter of credit from the Church of Silver Flame can buy in this town, shall we?”

Mathas grinned. “I’ll contact House Lyrandar immediately.” He stood up and faced the door, then turned back. “We’re supposed to meet with that artificer, the dwarf.”

Janik groaned. “There’s not enough time to figure out who he is and whether we can trust him.”

“I agree.”

“Can you get a message to him? Let him know we’re leaving earlier than expected and we can’t meet him?” “I will try.”

“Do you think I’m being too cautious?”

“No, of course not,” Mathas said quickly. He paused. “But then, we both knew Maija for years.”

“So we did,” Janik muttered. “Maybe the three of us will be enough.” He opened the locks on the door for Mathas. “Sea of Fire, I’m not even sure I trust you any more.”

Mathas smiled. “I’m glad to know the feeling is mutual.” He stepped out the door. “I’ll let you know what I hear from Lyrandar. Where can I find you?”

“My office. Thank you, Mathas.”

“Watch your back, Janik. Krael knows he hasn’t won yet.”

“Thanks for the reminder,” Janik called as he pushed the door closed and bolted it tight.

Janik grabbed his sheathed sword from the floor as he leaped to his feet. He pulled the sword free and rushed to the cabin door, kicked it open, and sprang up the stairs to the deck. Auftane held his huge mace in one hand and a scroll in the other, dodging the tridents of three sahuagin as he tried to read the scroll. Janik ran to the artificer and plunged his sword into the back of one of the sea devils, which crumpled to the deck with a gurgling yelp.

Janik’s arrival gave Auftane the opportunity he needed to cast the spell on his scroll. A ring of whirling silver blades appeared around him, cutting into the flesh of both sahuagin. They cried out but did not fall. Janik glanced around the deck.

Auftane had raised an effective alarm. The three sahuagin that had surrounded him must have been the first to reach the deck, though plenty more were crawling over the bulwarks now. Sailors appeared on deck in clusters, rushing to cut at the fishlike creatures as they tried to climb aboard. Near the bow, Captain Avaen and his first mate stood back to back, surrounded by a group of five sahuagin. Dania was charging up the steps from her cabin, and Mathas touched her to imbue a spell just before she jumped up to the deck.

The two sahuagin near Auftane backed away from the whirling blades and sought another target, and Janik proved to be the closest. They maneuvered around the ring of blades and came at Janik from opposite sides, their tridents lowered. Janik ducked their onslaught, then somersaulted past one of them and shoved it hard toward its ally. It met the leveled trident of the other sahuagin and slumped to the deck.

Janik had hoped the two sahuagin would impale each other, and he cursed his poor aim. But Auftane quickly stepped up to the remaining sea devil, and it died in the ring of whirling blades before he could even swing his mace. Janik raised his sword in a quick salute to the artificer, then ran toward the bow to help the beleaguered captain.

Two sea devils threatened Janik as he ran. He drove his sword into the chest of one, then heaved its corpse toward the other. As the sahuagin stumbled, Janik ran on, noting with a backward glance that Dania had moved to engage it. The attackers surged over the sides of the ship in an apparently unending stream, and though he and his friends had little trouble cutting them down, the sailors were not faring as well. Janik jumped over the bodies of two fallen sailors on his way to the bow, and he saw that more were falling under the sahuagin assault.

By the time Janik reached them, the captain and his mate had felled two of the creatures surrounding them, but three more arrived just as Janik did. Despite the newcomers, Janik’s arrival tilted the balance dramatically. The sahuagin fell quickly when their attention was divided between the sailors inside their ring of tridents and Janik’s darting blade outside it. Moving swiftly around the ragged circle of sea devils, Janik guided his sword to vital spots, never needing more than one blow to finish an opponent. He killed four and reached the fifth just as the first mate’s cutlass hacked through its neck.

“Thank you, Janik!” the captain called. The first mate, a pretty woman with almond-shaped eyes, gave him a grim smile before running to help a group of sailors nearby.

Janik surveyed the deck again, looking for where his help was most needed. Auftane had fallen back to the cabins, where he and his ring of blades were providing an effective shield for Mathas, who propelled fiery rays and bolts of acid at nearby foes. Dania was on the starboard side amid a thicket of sailors and sea devils, her sword rising and falling in a deadly rhythm. An aura surrounded her that Janik had never seen before, almost a shimmer of radiance—but Janik supposed that was the spell Mathas had cast on her, some kind of protective ward. Avaen was making his way toward Dania and the sailors, while the first mate had joined another trio of sailors on the port side, who looked a little overwhelmed.

Janik hurried to help the sailors, trapping one sea devil between his own blade and the first mate’s, quickly bringing it down. His arrival—and the quick deaths of three more sahuagin at the end of his blade—shook the sea devils’ morale and they started edging toward the bulwarks. Out of nowhere, a sahuagin hurtled across the deck from the starboard side, crashing into Janik. The sharp points of his trident only grazed Janik’s shoulder, but its body slammed hard into him, forcing him against the bulwark rail.

Janik hung there for what felt like many heartbeats. The sahuagin was wedged on top of him, its weight pushing him toward the open air and the churning sea below. It got one foot onto the rail and used the leverage to push him up higher. Over its shoulder, Janik saw the first mate’s blade come down onto its back, and it threw its head backward in pain. In the same instant, the rail beneath him splintered and he plummeted into the water, holding fast to the lifeless body of the sea devil.

The cold water swallowed him.

Well, Janik thought, this is a problem.

Lyrandar Dayspring was still moving, quickly sliding past him and disappearing in the dark. Blood was flowing freely from his shoulder, though it wasn’t a deep wound—and blood in the water where there were already sea devils could mean only one thing: sharks. Two things stood in his favor—his short sword was still in his hand, and the attack had come so quickly that he hadn’t had time to put his boots on.

He couldn’t think of any others.

Janik tore off his shirt, which had threatened to drag him down. Free of its clutches, he fought his way to the surface and filled his lungs with air, spitting out the water that had filled his throat. Away from the lanterns on the ship’s deck, the sea was darker, but the Ring of Siberys stretched its arc high across the sky to paint the night in soft golden light. He saw the ship as a silhouette against the glowing sky, her torches like dancing stars as she slowed and turned her port side to him. He knew they probably wouldn’t come back to him—they couldn’t risk running the ship over him. As soon as they cleared the sahuagin from the deck, he was sure they’d send a launch back to look for him.

That might be too late. A half-dozen yards away, Janik saw the unmistakable shape of a shark’s fin cutting through the water toward him. Bracing himself against the sting of salt water in his eyes, he took a deep breath and plunged his head underwater, quickly looking around him. So far, it looked like only one shark had arrived, and not a very big one at that.

It was upon him. At the last moment, Janik threw his body backward in the water, anticipating that the shark would aim for his wounded shoulder. The shark glided over him. Janik drove his sword upward, but without leverage in the water, he could only manage a glancing blow on the shark’s belly. It was enough to draw blood—and enough to drive the shark into a frenzy.

It circled back toward him quickly, its mouth open wide. Choosing his mark, Janik thrust his sword into the roof of its mouth. It was a good blow—Janik was pretty sure he hit the brain. Unfortunately, that didn’t stop the shark from closing its mouth around his forearm and raking his flesh with rows of teeth. It didn’t have the strength to hold on—or to bite through the bone—and Janik wrested his arm and his sword free. The blood—his and the shark’s—was blackening the water, and it was only a matter of time before more sharks came, probably accompanied by their sea devil masters.

Janik clumsily slid his sword into his belt and started to swim. He doubted he could reach the ship, but perhaps he could meet the launch before the sharks got him.

After several hard strokes, Janik looked behind him and saw the water churning with sharks in the place where he had killed the first one. Feeding on the dead, he supposed. He swam harder toward the hulking shadow of Dayspring, still far away. The salt water stung in the wounds on his shoulder and arm, and he knew he was leaving a trail in the water that the sharks could follow to food. But he could do nothing about that.

A dark shape suddenly stood out from the darkness of the surrounding water—a boat! A long rowboat, one of the ship’s lifeboats, was creeping through the water in his direction, though at its current heading, it would pass him far to his left.

“Over here!” he called out, waving his arms over his head. With his right hand out of the water, he realized for the first time just how much blood he was losing. The boat changed its course slightly and sped up, heading directly toward him. He could see two oars working as fast as the sailors could row.

But not fast enough. One of the sharks disentangled itself from the churning frenzy. Janik could see its dorsal fin barely breaking the water behind him. He pulled out his sword, but his hand was stiff around the hilt and he was having a hard time focusing his eyes. He turned his back to the oncoming boat and drew a shaky breath before lowering himself under the water to meet the onrushing predator.

This shark was considerably larger than the one he’d killed before. He recognized it as a devil shark, named for the enlarged scales on its forehead and the leading edges of its fins, which gave it a sinister, almost fiendish appearance—and, appropriately, the creatures were often found in the company of the sahuagin. Janik fumbled with the sword in his hand, then shifted it to his left. The shark swam past Janik on the right. Janik turned to keep it in sight, and noticed that the rowboat had almost reached him. He felt a surge of hope even as his lungs cried out for air. He kicked himself to the surface, gasping.

“Janik!” Dania’s voice was close, but the shark was closer. It had completed a circle around him and turned inward. He felt it slam into him, but felt no tearing of teeth—either it had already eaten its fill, or it was softening him up. An instant later, a coil of rope splashed into the water beside him. He grabbed it with his right hand, keeping a firm grip on his sword as he tried to wrap the rope firmly around his right arm.

As soon as she was sure he had the rope, Dania pulled it back into the boat, dragging Janik through the water like a fish on a line. Or like a baited hook, Janik thought grimly. As he started to move, the shark recognized the danger of losing its prey, and it lunged at him with its mouth wide open.

Carefully watching the shark’s approach, Janik planted a kick on its snout just as it was about to close its teeth on his legs. It veered sharply away, but immediately started circling back for another pass. Then Janik’s body slammed into the side of the boat. As Dania started hauling him up the side, he blacked out.

Stormreach had once been a city of giants—in fact, Janik’s first published paper had described the crumbling ruins that still surrounded the modern settlement. The first human settlers had been pirates who used it as a base for raids on ships bringing dragonshards and other treasures from Xen’drik to Khorvaire. Eventually, the city became a base for trade—a place for explorers, dragonshard prospectors, and treasure-seekers to stock up on supplies, a market where they could trade their finds, and a port for semi-regular routes to Khorvaire. Naturally, the dragonmarked houses—particularly House Tharashk and House Lyrandar—were among the first to establish a presence, and they devoted considerable effort and resources to eliminating the pirates.

In modern Stormreach, house enclaves and supply markets stood in clusters of buildings along with all the ordinary trades found in any small city, crowded in by the huge stones of the ancient ruins. The city was dangerous—partly because many of its residents were little better than pirates, and partly because traveling from one part of the city to another often meant a long walk through barren ruins along a rarely-patrolled road. It was possible, though, never to leave the area nearest the docks, and that was Janik’s inclination every time he visited the city.

By midday, Janik and his companions were off the ship, grateful to feel solid ground under their feet again. Mathas and Auftane went into the city to find lodging. Dania went to the local church of the Silver Flame. Janik arranged to meet them for dinner at a restaurant called Forest’s Bounty, then went with Avaen into a dockside tavern.

The captain took a deep drink from his ale and wiped the foam from his mouth. “Well, Janik,” he said, “I hope your expedition is a success.”

“Thank you,” Janik said. “What are your plans?”

“There’s always cargo to carry back to civilization, and usually passengers as well. And it’s rare enough to see a Lyrandar ship here that I can usually get very good terms. But I’m not sure I’m ready to sail Shargon’s Teeth again.”

Janik nodded. “I know that feeling. Would you like to ferry us down the western coast? I can pay you pretty well, but I can’t pretend it’s not dangerous.”

“And danger is exactly what I want less of,” Avaen said. “I appreciate the offer, but I must decline.”

“I understand. What will you do, then?”

“I think I’ll take a position in my house enclave here, at least for a while. I don’t think I can be landbound for too long—perhaps in a year or so, the sea will call me back. In the meantime, Stormreach will be a change of pace, something new to help me—” He broke off.

He didn’t need to finish. Janik understood. A change of pace was exactly what he had needed three years ago, after Maija disappeared with Krael. He raised his mug, and Avaen raised his to meet it, his eyebrow arched quizzically.

“To fresh starts,” Janik said.

“To fresh starts,” Avaen repeated. They clinked their mugs together and finished their drinks in silence.

“You got the name right, Krael,” Janik shouted back. Even as his mind screamed about the danger of walking into the semicircle formed by Krael and his allies, anger drove his feet forward, closer to his adversary.

Krael Kavarat was an enormous man, as tall and muscular as any orc, though his bloodline was pure Karrnathi human as far as Janik knew. He wore a suit of full plate armor which somehow seemed too small to contain his great bulk. He also wore the characteristic helm of an Emerald Claw officer, covering half his face with its stylized clawlike design. He was clean shaven, but blond hair cascaded over his shoulders from beneath the edge of his helm.

“And Dania,” Krael said. “Back in Janik’s company since your Sentinel Marshal met his end in Karrnath?”

“Sentinel Marshal?” Janik said quietly, throwing Dania a sidelong glance. She waved her hand dismissively, keeping her attention focused on Krael.

“It’s so nice to see you all together again. Mathas too! Aren’t you going to introduce me to the dwarf?”

“Shut up, Krael,” Janik spat. The vampire’s words stung, making Janik painfully aware that they were not all together again. He felt Maija’s absence as if it were a wound. “You sent your warforged assassin after me twice, you robbed my apartment, and stole our ship. Stop talking like you’re some long-lost friend.” Janik was close enough that he didn’t need to shout, and he could see Krael’s allies closing in on both sides. Dania was close on his right, but not close enough to get in the way of his sword arm. He heard Mathas and Auftane right behind him.

“Don’t forget that I took your Maija away,” Krael said, grinning. Then the smile vanished from his face. “Her, you can have back, as far as I’m concerned.”

“What are you here for, Krael?”

Krael gave a small shrug, but a spasm of anger on his face belied his feigned indifference. “Revenge.”

“That makes two of us, then,” Janik said, pulling his sword from its sheath in a flash of steel. Like a ripple of water, steel flashed all around the ring of Krael’s allies. Dania drew her longsword. Only Krael, Mathas, and Auftane stood empty-handed.

“You misunderstand me, Janik,” Krael said. “You are not the one I want revenge against. Although I suppose it would be pleasant enough to watch you die.”

“This is a bad idea, Janik,” Dania whispered at his elbow. “Krael is strong, to say nothing of his friends here.”

“Put those weapons away!” Several of Krael’s allies turned to see Stormreach guards hurrying up the street toward them. Janik and Krael were frozen, each waiting for the other to make a move. Around the semicircle of Krael’s Emerald Claw lackeys, a few swords and flails found their way back to belts. Glancing behind Krael, Janik could see why. Stormreach didn’t entrust the task of keeping order in the city to roughnecks pulled from the farms and dressed up in uniforms. The Stormreach guards were highly trained soldiers, mostly former officers from the armies of the Five Nations, and included some real muscle in the form of ogres and an occasional hill giant. One of those giants walked up behind Krael at that moment, and the great hulk of a vampire stood only as high as the giant’s waist. Sever, the warforged assassin, tugged at Krael’s arm, looking back at the approaching giant and his two human compatriots.

Janik felt sure that the giant and the two humans could wipe the street with him, his friends, Krael, and all the Emerald Claw thugs. But he didn’t care. He had nursed this hatred and anger for three long years. He gripped his sword tightly. He wanted so badly to plunge it into Krael’s body, to hurt and kill him and make the bastard pay for what he’d done. Janik didn’t care what happened to him in the process. It didn’t matter that Krael was a vampire, it didn’t matter that the warforged next to Krael had nearly killed him twice already, and it didn’t matter that a hill giant was standing behind Krael, lifting a tree trunk over his shoulder, getting ready to clear the street with it. He didn’t care that he couldn’t win—he just wanted to fight.

Dania still clutched her sword and Janik could feel the tension in her. He suspected she was having the same kinds of thoughts. What had happened when she met Krael in Karrnath? He realized he didn’t know, but it had stirred up the same degree of hatred in her heart, and her newfound devotion to the Silver Flame had done nothing to diminish the rage she felt toward Krael. He stole a sidelong glance at her and caught a glimpse of the fire in her eyes. She would stand behind him.

“Janik?” Mathas said. “I am inclined to believe this is not the time and place for this confrontation.”

Janik didn’t respond, but Dania shifted her stance slightly.

“I think the elf is right,” Auftane whispered. “I think we could take the lackeys, and you can leave the warforged to me, but I’m worried about the vampire. To say nothing of the giant.”

Dania turned toward Janik.

“It would be unfortunate if we were forced to harm well-meaning members of the Stormreach guard in the course of battling our foes,” Mathas added.

“They’ve got a point,” Dania said. “We’ll have our shot at Krael, I’m sure.”

“You’re right,” Janik said. “Let’s get out of here.” He shifted his sword to his left hand and slid it into its sheath while raising his other hand to point at Krael. “Some other time, Krael!” he called.

The vampire hadn’t moved, but was still staring at Janik and Dania. Janik turned his back on Krael, took Dania’s arm, and hurried down the block toward a nearby tavern. Mathas and Auftane followed. Janik refused to look back at Krael—he couldn’t stand to see that satisfied smirk again. A group of people had gathered outside the tavern door to watch the confrontation, alerted by the call of the Stormreach guard. Janik ignored their laughs and whispers and pushed through. He led his friends to a table near the raging fire, and they all sat down.

“So tell me about Karrnath, Dania,” Janik said when they all had drinks in their hands and the hubbub had died down.

Dania scowled and stared into her tankard. She was silent for a moment, collecting her thoughts, then took a deep breath. “I went there to work for a friend of my late father’s,” she said, “an exorcist of the Silver Flame named Kophran ir’Davik. He was a pompous ass, as I believe I might have mentioned before.” Mathas grinned and nodded. “Along with a Sentinel Marshal, Gered d’Deneith—”

“Krael mentioned him,” Auftane interjected.

“Yes. The three of us tried to fight the influence of evil in Atur.” She paused and sighed again. “It was a bit like trying to put out a forest fire by spitting on it. Atur has earned its nickname, the City of Night. Anyway, one evening we went to a house where every inhabitant had been brutally murdered. Blood and bodies were strewn everywhere. Gered determined that two vampires were involved, one a shifter, and one a human—well, that one turned out to be Krael. Gered and I followed a trail away from the house and encountered Krael in an alley. We talked for a little while before Gered and I realized he was one of the vampires we’d been hunting, and then—” She broke off suddenly, swallowing hard.

“He killed Gered?” Mathas said softly.

Dania breathed a deep sigh. “Not quite. He started drinking Gered’s blood, but then Kophran came back.” She took another steadying breath. “Kophran filled the alley with silver light, and that drove Krael away.” Her voice trailed off and a half smile lingered on her lips.

“What about Maija?” Janik’s voice was barely audible above the din of the tavern.

“Well, it turned out that Krael and Maija had awakened this old shifter vampire named Havoc as part of their search for the Tablet of Shummarak.”

“You mentioned that on the ship,” Mathas said. “What is that tablet?”

Janik answered the elf’s question. “It’s an important serpent text from Xen’drik, dealing with the legendary war between the dragons and the fiends in the first age of the world. Specifically, it describes how the allies of the dragons, the couatls, bound the lords of the fiends deep within Khyber.”

“Sacrificing their own physical forms to trap the fiends within their spiritual coils,” Dania added, repeating what Kophran had told her. “And supposedly the Tablet of Shummarak goes on to reveal a means by which the bonds of the couatls’ coils might be broken, releasing the lords of the demons upon the earth again.”

Janik raised his eyebrows, wishing he had discussed the Tablet with Dania earlier.

“So Krael and Maija were hoping to find the Tablet and destroy the world?” Auftane asked.

“Undoubtedly part of some Emerald Claw plot,” Janik said.

“So we tried to learn more about this vampire, Havoc. He was rumored to have owned the Tablet some time before the Last War. And we managed to track him down—we found all three of them in a little shrine beneath the city. Havoc, Krael, and Maija.” She swallowed hard again. “That’s when Gered died. Maija cast a horrible spell, and he just … went out. Like pinching a candle.” She shook her head. “Kophran killed Havoc—or forced him to turn to mist, or something. I guess you can’t really kill a vampire. Maija disappeared—teleported away, I think, and Krael ran as well. Kophran figured Havoc was in charge of the operation, and insisted we take steps to finish him off. We ended up chasing a cloud of mist through half the sewers and catacombs under the city until it reached Havoc’s original crypt. Then we were able to destroy him for good, or Kophran said we had. But I didn’t see Krael or Maija again. We hunted for them for a long time, but as far as we could tell, they both left Karrnath entirely.”

“Did she … did Maija say anything?” Janik asked.

“Quite a bit, actually, considering that we were doing our level best to kill each other.”

“You fought her?” Somehow this seemed impossible to Janik. Some part of him, he realized, had long assumed that there was just some misunderstanding that would all be resolved the next time he saw Maija. That was why he had rebelled so strongly against Dania’s assertion that Maija was beyond redemption. And to imagine Dania actually trying to kill her, so convinced that Maija was lost to evil that she would take her life—his head started to swim.

“Of course I fought her, Janik.” Dania’s voice was gentle but firm. “Have you heard what I’ve been saying? She was working with a pair of vampires. She killed Gered—a Sentinel Marshal and a good man. As far as I could tell, she was trying to release the lords of demonkind and set them loose on the world. Of course I fought her.”

Janik nodded but turned aside, staring into the fire.

“What did she say, Dania?” Mathas asked.

Dania paused, trying to remember the details of their intense fight beneath the streets of Atur. “She mocked me. Every damned word was a mockery. She was so full of … of spite, malice, contempt. She said the vampires had grown tiresome or outlived their usefulness, and I asked her if that was what had happened at Mel-Aqat—whether she just tired of us. That’s when she cast the spell that killed Gered—it was like a wave of death crashing over me.”

As Dania spoke, a series of memories raced through Janik’s mind. They started, as thoughts of Maija always did, with Mel-Aqat—as she took the Ramethene Sword from Janik’s hand and ran over to Krael, offering it to him hilt first. Krael had seemed taken aback—he took a defensive stance as she approached, as if he thought she would attack him with the sword. When she handed him the weapon, Janik couldn’t hear what they said, but Krael still seemed suspicious. She had been mocking then, too—shouting back at him as she disappeared into the wilderness with Krael.

“Sorry about this, Janik,” she had said, not sounding sorry at all, “but when the opportunity for something bigger and better comes along, you need to take it.”

Dania fell into silence and no one else said anything. Janik was lost in his memories—remembering that a sardonic edge had crept into Maija’s voice before they left the ruins. Mathas had asked in the airship approaching Sharn whether something had happened in the ruins, and now Janik realized that something had. He couldn’t identify what it was or when it happened, but Maija had said several things that had irritated him as they departed the ruins. At the time, he blamed the strain of travel and the stress of their days exploring Mel-Aqat. But she had always been the one who bore up the best under pressure—she would soothe their frayed nerves with inspiration and comfort that sometimes seemed to come straight from the Sovereign Host—from Olladra’s hearth or Boldrei’s embracing arms.

A now-familiar ache seized Janik’s chest as he remembered lying in her arms in the ruins at night. The touch of her hands always seemed to soothe away the aches and bruises and hurts of the day even more than her spells of healing did. Her love for him had always felt like tangible proof of the Sovereigns and their divine love. She had been his priest in a very real sense—standing between him and the Host, bringing his prayers to them and delivering their responses, whether in the form of divine magical power or in the soft words she whispered to him at night.

And he had lost that. Their last night in the ruins, she had held him, but her hands had no comfort and her words were biting. Instead of soothing away his worries and fears, she had mocked them—gently, but the words had stung when he needed reassurance and consolation.

“A wave of death,” he said into the silence, echoing Dania’s words. “Why does that sound like an omen of things to come?”

“Well, thank you for that cheerful thought,” Dania said.

“If it’s an omen,” Mathas said, “perhaps it’s a warning of the consequences of failure. If we released something from Mel-Aqat, perhaps that something is the reason that Maija and Krael were looking for the Tablet of Shummarak. Maybe the thing we released is seeking to release something greater. If one fiend-lord were released from its prison, waves of death might be a very accurate description of what would come next. If they were all released …”

“They won’t be,” Dania said firmly. “We’re here to make sure of that. I seem to have steered this conversation toward predictions of doom, and I’m sorry. Gered’s death was terrible, and Maija will pay for it, but her evil spell is not a portent of our future or the world’s. The Silver Flame has called me to this work and empowered me for it, and I will not fail.” She slammed her fist on the table, a little harder than she intended, and Auftane started in surprise.

“Of course we won’t,” the dwarf said. “You think it’s safe to head to the restaurant now?” Dania and Mathas laughed.

Janik stood up, his face grim. “I’m not hungry. I’ll see you all in the morning.” He turned and walked out of the tavern, his companions too surprised to call after him.

“Mathas, did I say something out of line?” Dania asked.

“No, no,” Mathas said, patting her hand. “You just have to understand that Maija is still a fresh wound for Janik.”

“It’s been three years!”

“Well, then an open, festering wound. He has never bandaged it or treated it—he’s like an animal who keeps biting at a wound so it can’t heal. Maija was his healer, caring for his body and soul. Without her, he doesn’t know how to heal the wound in his heart.”

“I worry about his soul,” Dania said softly.

“So do I,” Mathas said. “Losing Maija seems to have driven him away from the Sovereign Host.”

“And he seems quite uncomfortable every time I mention the Silver Flame.”

“Yes, though I suspect that has as much to do with his experience of your church in Sharn as it does with the overall state of his soul.”

“The church in Sharn is hardly a fair representative of the church as a whole. I mean, it has its share of corrupt patriarchs—”

“And pompous asses,” Auftane interjected.

“And people like Kophran, yes,” Dania said. “But I am convinced there is no greater force for good at work in the world. Mathas, when I went to Karrnath, I was as ruined as Janik is. My past felt like an enormous weight on my shoulders. We were hunting these vampires, and for a while I was convinced that I was as bad as they were. I couldn’t stop thinking of all the people I killed during the war. Kophran didn’t help that, of course—he treated me as though I were not quite a person. But there were two things that got me out of that. One was the realization of what vampires are—they’re warped by pure evil stronger than anything that grows in human hearts. And the other was my taste of the Silver Flame, my experience of pure good. I felt it wash over me when Kophran drove Krael away.”

“So how do you account for the evil you say has grown in Maija’s heart?” Mathas said. “You said she was not a vampire.”

“No, but I am not convinced that she is human any more.”

“What do you mean?” Mathas’s brow furrowed, spreading deep wrinkles over his face.

“I’m not sure. It’s possible that she has made a pact with some demon, or one of the Dark Six. Perhaps it is her use of evil magic that has so deeply corrupted her. Maybe both, and those two things could certainly be related.”

“But not human?”

“I don’t know, Mathas. She’s not a vampire. She’s still alive, near as I can tell, but she’s more evil than anyone I’ve encountered since. She’s the only living person whose evil was almost tangible like that—like what I could feel from the vampires. That’s what I mean.”

Dania looked at the dwarf beside her, who had been sitting quietly through most of her conversation with Mathas. “I’m sorry, Auftane,” she said. “We seem to spend a lot of time talking about the past.”

“I suppose it’s a good thing I find such topics interesting,” Auftane replied with a smile.

“Damn it, why do we spend so much time talking about Maija?” Dania threw her hands in the air. “It’s been three years since she walked out on us.”

“The topic of Krael, at least, seems relevant to our current expedition,” Auftane said.

“True, and it is hard to separate one from the other,” Mathas observed. “They left Mel-Aqat together, and you encountered them together in Karrnath, Dania. I’m not sure that Maija is completely irrelevant, either. Perhaps it was only by chance that we did not meet her on the street tonight.”

“That would have been ugly,” Dania said. “Janik was bad enough after seeing Krael.”

Dania appeared in the doorway, casting a long shadow into the room. “There’s no sign of the crew,” she said. “Nashan is dead?”

Janik nodded, pushing the captain’s eyelids closed. “Send Auftane to tell the wharf guard, will you?” he said. “I want to look through Nashan’s log before they get here.” Dania stepped away from the door and Janik stood up. He opened all the shutters to let in the daylight, then began rustling through the parchments scattered across the desk and floor.

When Dania returned a quarter hour later, she found him sitting beside Nashan’s body, a neat stack of parchments beside him and the leather-bound captain’s log open in his lap, showing two blank pages. He was staring vaguely toward a porthole.

“Janik?” she said.

“He fed on Nashan every day for the month it took them to get here,” Janik said, still staring toward the porthole. “His lackeys killed off the sailors one by one. Apparently the Emerald Claw agents with him could sail the ship by themselves, at least well enough to get them here once they were through Shargon’s Teeth. Nashan was the last one alive, the only one to see port. And Krael left him in no shape to get off the ship.” He shook his head. “And for no reason. He writes that they just seemed to enjoy killing people—the warforged most of all. Nashan seemed unsure whether to be more afraid of Krael or Sever. But he was powerless—he wrote that whenever Krael looked at him, he just went limp.”

“I know the feeling,” Dania muttered.

Janik looked at her for the first time. “What do you mean?”

Dania sank down to the floor beside Janik. “The first time we encountered Krael in Atur,” she said slowly, “we were talking, exchanging barbs like we did here last night. But closer, face-to-face—the point of my sword was at his neck, even. I didn’t know yet that he was a vampire. And then the next thing I knew, he was in my head, his voice right in my mind, commanding me—and I couldn’t resist. He made me attack Gered, made me stand by while he drank Gered’s blood. He wanted me to watch my friend die. If Kophran had not returned when he did …”

“You didn’t mention that before,” Janik said quietly.

“Can you blame me? It still hurts to admit it—that I stood by helplessly while my friend nearly died. I know it wasn’t my fault, but …” She shrugged. “Well, I have no intention of doing that again, standing by while a friend dies.”

They sat in silence for a moment, then heard the heavy tramp of feet along the dock that signaled the arrival of the wharf guard. Janik jumped to his feet, and offered a hand to Dania.

“Thanks,” Dania said softly, squeezing his hand before letting it go. She walked toward the cabin door as the sound of feet came up the gangplank and onto the deck. “In here,” she said, and the guard captain came in. A gnome, he had no need to duck through the doorway, and he strode over to Nashan’s body. Two human guards stood outside the doorway, craning their necks to peer in.

“What happened here?” the gnome said, and Janik gave him a quick summary, finishing by handing over the captain’s log. He gave the gnome a description of Krael, though he had little hope of the wharf guard finding the vampire or having the strength to overcome him. An hour later, they were allowed to leave.

“Well,” Janik said, “now it’s even more important that we get underway as soon as possible. Krael is unlikely to stick around for long with that mess in his wake.”

“Let’s find Breddan,” Dania said. “Where’s this wreck of a ship you told us about?”

“Just up there,” Janik said, pointing vaguely ahead. “Unless Krael has sabotaged her.”

“Don’t even joke about it,” Mathas muttered. “I wouldn’t be surprised at this point.”

They quickened their pace and reached Breddan’s ship, Silverknife. To Janik’s relief, the ship was crawling with sailors and shipwrights making repairs, and he quickly spotted Breddan on the poop deck.

“Janik! Dania!” Breddan called out. “Come aboard!” He jumped down to the main deck and met them at the top of the gangplank.

Janik was impressed. The money he had given Breddan had clearly been put to good use. Silverknife looked worlds better than the last time he’d seen her. More than that, Breddan looked better. When they had first met, the hobgoblin seemed awkward and a little slow. Now he was sprightly and agile. Janik wasn’t sure whether the money had put the spring back in Breddan’s step, or whether he was simply more at home on the deck of his ship than he was on land. Perhaps both factors were at work, but the improved appearance of the ship and her captain made Janik feel much better about his chances for success on this journey.

“To what do I owe the honor of this visit?” Breddan said with a small bow.

“You’ve done a fine job fixing up the ship,” Janik said.

“Thank you. I am proud of my ship, and proud to be able to maintain him as he deserves.”

It took Janik a moment to remember that ships were masculine in the goblin tongue. He smiled, casting his eyes on Silverknife again, imagining her as a hulking male bugbear.

Dania hadn’t missed a beat.

“You haven’t met our other companions,” she said. “This is Mathas”—the elf bowed—“and Auftane.” Auftane extended his hand with a wide smile, and Breddan shook it.

“Welcome aboard my vessel. I hope you find him comfortable on your journey.”

“Breddan,” Janik said, “about that journey. You said you’d be ready to leave in two more days, right?”

“The day after tomorrow, yes.” Breddan looked a little nervous, anticipating Janik’s next question. “That was our agreement.”

“What are the chances we could leave earlier? Any earlier. Tomorrow if we have to, or even today? The ship looks great, we’ve got supplies packed and ready to be loaded, and we can help with anything more that needs to be done.”

“Is there trouble?”

“No. No, it’s not like that. Well, not exactly. See, we need to get where we’re going before a rival of ours does. We just learned he has arrived in Stormreach, and he’s not likely to stay long. We want to make sure we set sail before he does and lessen his chances of getting there before us.”

“Hmm.” Breddan did not look happy at this, and he stroked his stringy beard for a moment. “Let me ask my boatswain. Make yourselves at home.” He hurried toward the aft ladder and disappeared into the hold.

Janik looked around. Not seeing any place where he could get comfortable, he stayed on his feet. Mathas sank into a kneeling position, resting his hands on his knees and closing his eyes. Dania leaned against the bulwark behind her, and Auftane stood beside Janik, shifting uncomfortably.

“What do you make of that?” the dwarf asked Janik. “Is he up to something?”

“No,” Dania and Mathas said at once. Mathas did not open his eyes.

“I trust Breddan completely,” Dania said. “He’s got a good heart, and he wants to be treated right. He knows that if he wants fair treatment, he’s got to give it.”

Auftane nodded. “Mathas, what’s your explanation?”

Janik laughed. “You have to understand Mathas,” he said. “He can read volumes from the way someone holds his hands while he talks.”

“At the risk of perpetuating this endless joke, which Janik seems to enjoy so much,” Mathas said, opening his eyes long enough to give Janik a sidelong glare, “when Breddan was not speaking, his eyes were flicking around the ship. They came to rest on each item still needing attention. He was checking off a list of things to do and worrying that he might not be able to get them done in time, even for our original departure time.”

Auftane nodded. “Makes sense to me.” He held his hands behind his back and rocked on the balls of his feet.

A moment later, Breddan returned from the hold, and Mathas rose smoothly to his feet. The hobgoblin was shaking his head, which they all could read as a bad sign.

“To be blunt,” Breddan said, “one week was a hopeful estimate. I think we can still set sail the day after tomorrow, but we will still be making repairs during our first few days of travel. I cannot imagine leaving any earlier than that.” Janik scowled, but said nothing. “There is one thing I wonder about,” Breddan continued. “This rival of yours—is he a very large man with long blond hair?”

“Krael,” Janik said. “Have you seen him?”

“My boatswain tells me that he was here last night, making inquiries about our work. I was not aboard, or I would have sent him on his way.”

“So he knows we’re taking this ship,” Dania said. “Breddan, you are in danger.”

“Cavaan said he seemed dangerous,” Breddan said, stroking his beard.

“He is dangerous,” Dania said. “He’s a vampire. Breddan, listen—we just saw the ship he took from Sharn to get here. He killed every man aboard, the captain last of all. Krael is extremely dangerous.”

Breddan’s eyes were wide, and he fixed them on Dania. “Why don’t you destroy him? Isn’t that the call of the paladin?”

“If an opportunity arises to destroy Krael, be assured that I will take it,” Dania said. “But I know his power, and he is surrounded by many allies. To attack him in his strength would be suicidal, and the Silver Flame calls no one to useless death.”

The hobgoblin nodded. “Perhaps it was a mistake to accept this mission. But I cannot return the money you have given me, and I will not break my word to you. I think …” he paused, and this time Janik noticed the way his eyes scanned the ship, “I think we will sail before the sun sets tonight. It will be difficult, and I’ll need your help. We’ll need to work through the night as well, but at least we will be out of port. And with the help of the Silver Flame, we will not be food for sharks or vampires.”

“Put us to work,” Janik said. “Mathas, I’d like you to get our things together—anything left in our rooms, and the supplies we need loaded aboard. Then, please go to House Kundarak and get the rest of Breddan’s payment. I assume you’ll prefer running errands around town to hard labor on the ship.” He smiled, and Mathas nodded. “The rest of us are under your command, Breddan.”

The day went by in a frenzy of activity. Janik mended sails and spliced ropes and could never quite shake the feeling that Breddan gave him those jobs because he thought Janik was useless for anything else. Janik also made periodic sweeps of the ship, checking for any sign that Krael had infiltrated.

Dania spent a great deal of time in the water, demonstrating an amazing ability to hold her breath while exerting herself, and before long, the sailors were calling her kak-darzhul, the Goblin name for the warforged. Auftane proved his value once again. He spent most of the day in the hold while Janik worked on the deck under the blazing sun. Janik heard the sailors whisper in awe about the dwarf—how he excelled at every task though he professed no experience. They said he chanted spells as he worked and wove magic into the wood of the ship. In only a few hours, Auftane had significantly increased the morale of the ship’s crew, an accomplishment not to be taken lightly.

As the sun barely slipped behind the tops of the highest buildings in the city, casting long shadows over the docks and the harbor, Breddan declared the Silverknife ready to sail, and the sailors gave a mighty cheer. Janik looked around the deck at the crew—his first look at all the sailors together. They were a motley bunch—a number of hobgoblins and goblins, a big bugbear covered with matted fur and missing one eye, an assortment of bedraggled humans, a halfling who looked like a recent immigrant from the Talenta Plains, and a surly half-orc with no tongue. Breddan was not a former pirate, but clearly, many of his sailors could not make the same claim.

Despite the strange blend of crewmen, they worked well together. On Breddan’s orders, they moved into action as if they shared a common mind and a single will. They were boisterous, to be sure, yelling more than was necessary and chanting songs in Goblin that Janik felt sure would make Dania blush—and it was rarely easy to make Dania blush. In fact, Dania seemed caught up in the spirit of the crew and contributed some soldiers’ marching songs in Common that made the goblins screech with laughter. Auftane joined in the high spirits as well, and bellowed as loud as the human crew-members in Dania’s call-and-response chants. Janik was too tired to do more than grin as Dania clambered in the rigging like she’d been born on a ship. Mathas sat beside him, clearly worn out from his day’s activities.

“Another departure,” Janik said with a sigh. “You ever feel like you’re always leaving places and never really arriving anywhere?”

“What do you mean?” Mathas said. “Every journey has its end. We set sail from Sharn and landed in Stormreach. Was that not an arrival?”

“But as soon as we arrived in Stormreach, we starting getting ready to leave. When we get to Mel-Aqat, we’ll turn around and leave. We’ll come back to Stormreach, go back to Sharn. And then what?”

“Then what, indeed?”

“I don’t know,” Janik said. “I just wish that I could arrive somewhere and feel like I had come home.”

Mathas nodded, smiling as he looked at Dania. Janik turned and watched Dania laughing with Breddan in the bow, saw Auftane slapping the bugbear’s back, and he felt the quiet presence of Mathas beside him. In a way, it wasn’t the departure or the travel he minded so much, and the presence of his friends was a comfort not too different from the feeling of home. But something was missing—someone was missing, and he could almost feel the brush of her hair against his face.

“I can’t see her any more,” Dania said, and Janik slammed his fist into the bulwark.

The four companions were perched at the prow, less than a week from the end of their journey across the Phoenix Basin. Two weeks had passed since the ship appeared behind them. A week ago, she had come even with them, though she kept her distance. For all their apprehension, the passing of the other ship had been uneventful. Dania and Mathas could see figures moving on the deck, but even when Dania borrowed the lookout’s spyglass, she was unable to identify them.

The other ship never closed within hailing distance or showed any threat. Janik even entertained occasional doubts that Krael was on the other ship—maybe it was a Morgrave or Wayfinder expedition to Mel-Aqat or some other site in the great desert Menechtarun. Maybe she was keeping a safe distance out of fear of pirates. Most of the time, though, he listened to his dread, and as the ship sailed out of sight ahead of them, he felt a crushing defeat.

“How long until we make land?” Janik asked no one in particular.

“I just checked with Breddan,” Auftane answered. “We’ll probably wake up on the fourth day from now in sight of land, and once we choose our harbor, we should drop anchor by midday.”

“And how much faster is Krael going?”

“Well, it took him two weeks to gain about twenty miles on us,” Auftane said, furrowing his brow in concentration. “So he’ll probably make landfall sometime during the night, just before we arrive.”

“So his head start will depend on how much darkness he still has once he lands,” Janik said. “If he gets to shore only a little before dawn and he needs to stop, then we could easily catch up and pass him in our first day’s travel.”

“Assuming we get to shore well before sundown,” Dania said.

“And passing him might not be that simple,” Mathas said. “If he has soldiers with him, they could set up patrols around their camp. We would have to give it a wide berth to avoid them.”

“And are you vampire experts sure he can’t travel during daylight?” Janik said, looking from Dania to Mathas.

“I’m not sure of anything,” Dania said, even as Mathas shook his head.

“No?” Janik said, his eyebrows raised.

“He has enough people with him to crew a ship,” Mathas said. “In theory—”

“That’s enough people to carry his coffin through the jungle?” Janik said.

“If not his coffin, then maybe an urn holding his mist form—or something,” Dania said.

“But the living ones need to rest, too,” Auftane pointed out. “They can’t travel night and day.”

“But it’s possible they could take the lead early on and keep it,” Janik said. “That’s exactly what I didn’t want to hear.”

“You worry too much, Janik,” Dania said, putting a hand on his shoulder. “We can’t know how it will turn out until we’re there. Let’s concentrate on getting to shore and getting to Mel-Aqat as quickly as we can.”

“You’re right,” Janik said. He sighed, then smiled. “As much as it pains me to admit it.”

A playful push from Dania sent Janik off balance, and he stumbled a few steps, laughing.

Janik and Auftane stood at the crest of a dune, watching the blazing boat drift out to sea. It missed the anchored ship, to Janik’s dismay, but served its other purposes. Janik knew that Dania wouldn’t approve of simply hacking a hole in the boat’s hull, so this let them get rid of the boat without resorting to simple sabotage. It also provided the dead soldiers with a dignified end, rather than leaving them to rot on the beach and be picked apart by crabs.

“Now to find Krael and the rest of his soldiers,” Janik said as the blazing boat floated out past the ship.

“We’re not going to follow them all the way to their camp and fight them alone, are we?”

“No. All I need is to see some clear tracks, and I should be able to get a sense of how long they’ve been gone. With any sense of the land, I can figure out what course they’re taking. Once we get that, we can meet up with the others and plan our own course.” He started back down the dune to the place where the boat had been stowed.

“If you don’t mind my saying so, you and Dania have an … interesting relationship.”

Janik grunted.

“You care a lot about each other.”

“You are the most inquisitive dwarf I’ve ever known. Aren’t your people supposed to be more, I don’t know, taciturn?”

“I suppose I’ve never been an exemplar of my race,” Auftane said, looking away. “I’m sorry if I’ve pried.”

“No, it’s all right, Auftane. Everyone else on this trip knows all about it, and you’ve been with us all these months and held your tongue this long. You’ve got a right to understand. Especially since she and I seem to have such a tendency to blow up at each other.”

Janik walked in silence for some time. Auftane chewed on his lip, waiting for Janik to answer the question.

“Maija and I were married just before we all took our first trip to Xen’drik, fifteen years ago. I had been in love with her for years, since long before she introduced me to Dania. So Dania was always just a good friend—a very good friend, even more than Mathas, and in some ways, more than Maija. At least that’s how I looked at our relationship. I always had Maija, my true love, my wife, and I had a wonderful friendship with Dania. The best of both worlds, you might say.

“Well, Dania’s perspective is a little different. She’s a couple years older than I am, but she’s never been married, she’s never really had anyone—anyone except this group of friends and allies. I get the sense that when she was in the army, she felt like she needed to be tougher than all the men in her unit, and that put off any possible suitors. Plus, she comes from a noble family, which almost certainly was not true of her comrades-at-arms. Anyway, when I met her, she’d never really been in love or had a lover.

“Look, there are some tracks.” They had reached the place where the boat had been hidden, and Janik pointed at the sand nearby. He led Auftane to the spot and knelt down to examine the tracks more closely. After a moment, he got to his feet. “Let’s follow them a little way. I want to see where the tracks go into the scrub—that’ll make it easier to judge how old they are.”

Janik led Auftane around the dune and farther inland, then picked up his story where he left off. “So it sounds bad for me to say this, but Dania pretty much fell in love with me as soon as Maija introduced us. It was terribly awkward for her, because Maija was probably her best friend up to that point. And to her credit, she hid it quite well. I don’t think Maija or I ever knew until she told me later.” Janik heaved a sigh. “So after our first expedition to Mel-Aqat … you know what happened there?”

“I think I’ve pieced together most of the story,” Auftane said. “Maija betrayed you to Krael and left with him?”

“I took that pretty hard. Sea of Fire, we all did, Mathas and Dania, too. I guess it was natural for me to look for comfort from my best friend, and it was natural for her finally to confess the love she’d kept inside for twelve years. But what we did—well, it was a mistake.”

“You became lovers?”

“Exactly. My feelings for Maija didn’t change—they still haven’t. And when we got back to Sharn, well, I just sort of disappeared. I don’t think she took that very well. Eventually she left Sharn and went to Karrnath. So the first time I saw her since we got back was just before we started this expedition. Which might explain why there was some tension between us at the start of the trip.”

“Right,” Auftane said. “Good thing that tension is completely dissipated now.”

“Right,” Janik said through clenched teeth.

For three more weeks they marched through the rain along the river, which swelled more and more with each day. Dania’s task grew more difficult as the once-dry scrub drank up the foul rain and sprouted prickly leaves. The mud sucked at their boots, slowing them. They mostly walked in silence, and sat down to eat in the evening sullen and soaked to the bone.

They saw no further sign of Krael and his allies until they reached the Sky Pillars and turned away from the river, south toward the great golden desert called Menechtarun.

During the last week of their journey along the river, the mountains drew nearer and nearer on their right side, and the Fangs of Angarak rose up on the horizon ahead of them. Eventually, the river bent away from the Sky Pillars, veering due east toward the distant Fangs, and Janik led them south. Around mid week, the rain stopped, then the sky grew clear, and by the next morning, the sun shone hot on their skin and dried their clothes. The vegetation was dry, brittle scrub again, and it became more widely scattered across the dry earth.

Early the next morning, Mathas spotted a crumbling tower rising above the foothills to their right, as if it had been built to watch the narrow passage they were following between the two mountain ranges.

“I think I saw someone up there, moving around,” he said. He seemed older with every passing day as the strain of the journey took its toll on him, but he never complained—and he remained alert.

“If you saw him, he probably saw us,” Auftane said.

“You underestimate Mathas’s eyes,” Janik said. “And we still have some cover here, as long as these bushes hold out.”

Dania pointed into the hills above the ruined structure. “We could head up here and circle around above it. You can see there used to be a wall that would have blocked our way, but it’s long gone.”

Janik tried to follow Dania’s pointing finger, blinking several times as he tried to make out the wall she was talking about. “I’ll take your word for it,” he said. “But we need to stay out of sight of the tower as much as we can. Let’s start by getting behind that ridge.” He started walking, crouched low in the bushes, and the others followed, doing their best to stay out of sight.

They reached the cover of the ridge and heard no suggestion that they had been spotted. Mathas slowly climbed the ridge and peered up at the tower, and even his keen eyes saw no one moving there. They kept the ridge between themselves and the tower as they made their way up into the hills.

“Churning Chaos!” Dania exclaimed. “What is that?”

Janik’s eyes had been fixed on the top of the tower, just coming into view over the ridge, and he turned around to see Dania. She was looking up and ahead of them, and he followed her gaze to a stretch of level ground at the base of a short cliff. For a moment he had no idea what had prompted her exclamation. Then he noticed that what he had taken for rubble collected at the bottom of the cliff was not rubble at all.

It was a field of bones. Skulls, helmets, breastplates, swords, arm bones, leg bones, and ribs made a jumble of death and ruin.

Dania rushed ahead and Janik followed close behind, keeping one eye on her and the other on the tower. He crested the rise, pleased to see that Dania was crouched near a large boulder, keeping out of sight of the tower as she surveyed the field of death before her. Janik crouched beside her. Behind him, Mathas and Auftane stayed under the cover of the ridge, looking up at the scene.

Janik quickly noticed what Dania had seen from below. These were not the sun-bleached bones of a centuries-old battle. Many of them still hung together, sprawled as they had fallen in battle. Cloaks, boots, the leather straps of armor—all lay intact. And the armor bore the insignia of a grasping green claw.

“The Emerald Claw?” he breathed. “What in the world?”

Dania pointed toward the base of the cliff, and Janik saw a piece of fabric stirring in a slight breeze. Carefully moving closer, he saw broken beams of wood, more of the Emerald Claw skeletons, and a single hand jutting up from the wreckage of what he guessed had been a palanquin. Unlike all the other bones in this place, the hand was still clothed in flesh, dry and shrunken, but otherwise intact.

With a glance at the tower, Janik picked his way over a few skeletons and leaned over where the corpse lay. He was startled to see a face grinning up at him, its eyes wide open but dark. Its lips were shrunken back from its teeth.

“Sea of Fire,” he muttered.

The dead man was draped in robes of emerald and black, with a sparkling ruby and onyx amulet around his withered neck. The hand Janik had seen from afar was outstretched in front of the body, while the other was folded beneath its owner’s back at an unnatural angle. The legs and lower torso were crushed beneath the palanquin, while the upper body was nested on sumptuous black cushions.

“Mathas,” Janik called, “would you come here, please?” “What is it, Janik?” Dania asked as the elf started toward them.

“I’m guessing we’ve got a cleric or necromancer here, and I want Mathas to check him out.”

“Is it possible that whatever killed these soldiers somehow stripped the flesh from their bones? Some vile spell?” Dania asked.

“Anything’s possible.” Janik turned to Mathas as the elf reached them. “Mathas, would you take a look at that body? Tell me anything you can about him and the spells he might have been casting.”

As Mathas bent to examine the robed man’s corpse, Janik turned his attention to the ground around them.

“Well, it’s easy enough to see the prints of the soldiers’ boots,” he said. “They fought in close ranks, but their opponents pushed them all around the field. They were clearly overpowered, but that’s not a big surprise—the four of us would probably have overpowered this rank and file.” He looked more closely at the ground near the shattered palanquin. “Their foes did not wear boots,” he pronounced. “Looks like clawed toes … and fur.”

“Some kind of animal?” Dania asked.

“Two legs. Not very big.”

“Based on the scrolls in his pouches, this gentleman was clearly a necromancer,” Mathas announced. “I would hazard a guess that these soldiers were dead long before they reached this place.”

“Dead before?” Janik said, looking up at Mathas. “Undead?”

“Krael and the necromancer probably killed them all at the first dawn,” the elf answered. “So they could keep marching day and night.”

“Carrying the necromancer in the palanquin,” Dania added. “And probably carrying Krael as well, at least during the day.”

“And the warforged could walk forever without getting tired,” Janik said, “just like these poor bastards.” He kicked absently at a shield near his feet. “I guess the ones we killed on the beach really did have the easy job.”

“So now we know how they got so far ahead of us,” Auftane said, still hanging back at the edge of the carnage. He looked at Janik. “We should move along now, shouldn’t we?”

Janik laughed. “Why, Auftane! What are you doing back there? Come on into the thick of things.”

“Well, you didn’t give me any instructions, so I figured I’d … keep watch?”

Nearly drowning out the dwarf’s last words, a horn blasted a loud, low note from the ruined tower. At the same time, two brawny figures leaped down from the cliff above them, heavy swords flashing in the sunlight. Janik recognized the sound he had heard in the rain three weeks before. But he had little time to think about it as a sword flashed toward him.

Dania sprang forward and interposed her shield between the scimitar and Janik’s head, and Janik reeled backward, getting his first good look at their attackers. They stood a hand’s length taller than him, and were clad in heavy armor formed of overlapping metal scales. Their swords had cruel teeth along one edge, and their shields bore spiked edges, making them as much weapons as defensive tools. Beneath their pointed helmets, the faces of tigers snarled in a blood fury.

Janik glanced at Mathas and saw that the elf was deep in concentration on a spell. Dania’s sword was dancing furiously with the blade of one creature, and she seemed to have the duel under control. Meanwhile, the other had charged toward Auftane, who was startled and stumbling backward, away from the creature’s assault. Janik raced to help the artificer.

Despite his reluctance to enter the field of bones and his initial surprise at the creature’s charge, Auftane recovered by the time Janik reached him and was battling in fine form. He swung his mace hard at the creature’s head just as Janik arrived, and Janik drove his short sword into a gap in the creature’s armor at its shoulder.

The blow should have drawn a huge gout of blood and crippled the creature’s sword arm. Janik felt his thrust pushed back, however, almost as if some magic within the thing’s body repelled the metal of his sword. It bled, so Janik knew it was a living creature, but he could tell he would need more than a few well-placed blows to take it down. Auftane’s hard swing also seemed less damaging than it should have been.

As the creature roared and sidestepped away from him and the dwarf, Janik stole a quick glance over his shoulder at Dania. She was having a little more luck piercing her foe’s hide, but not much. Mathas seemed to have done better—the other creature looked a little scorched from one of the elf’s spells.

“What are we dealing with here?” Auftane called out.

The faces of tigers. Something fell into place in Janik’s mind, and he shouted, “These are fiends of Khyber!”

As he turned his attention back to the fiend nearer to him, Janik heard Dania say, “Then let’s see how you like a taste of holy power, fiend!” Her sword struck like a peal of thunder against her opponent, and the creature roared in pain and rage.

Janik dodged a great sweep of his foe’s sword, but the clawlike spikes on the creature’s shield raked his arm as he tumbled out of the way. “Damn!” he muttered as he thrust his sword toward the fiend’s shield arm. His blow was almost an afterthought and barely grazed the creature’s orange fur.

“Holy power, eh?” Auftane murmured, stepping backward out of the creature’s reach while its attention was focused on Janik.

“Got any of that in your wands there, Auftane?” Janik said. Even as he spoke, though, he saw the dwarf using his fingertip to trace symbols on the wooden shaft of his mace. As Janik feinted and parried the fiend’s much heavier sword, Auftane stepped forward again, swinging another powerful blow at the creature’s tigerlike head.

This blow mattered, Janik was sure—the dwarf’s mace crackled with power as it connected, and Auftane carried his swing through in a stream of crimson. The fiend staggered and snarled. It kept its feet, but Janik had the clear sense that it lacked the strength to roar.

He took the opportunity to drive his sword into its gaping mouth. He placed the strike perfectly, and the blow should have killed the fiend in an instant, but somehow, the blade refused to cut. He might as well have been stabbing the creature with a feather.

Snarling, the fiend bit down on Janik’s blade, holding it tightly between its teeth. In the instant before Janik realized what was happening and he released his grip on the hilt, the fiend swung its shield into Janik’s ribcage with crushing force, sending him sprawling backward to the ground. It spat the sword onto the ground and stepped forward, raising its cruel blade over its head.

A blast of brilliant light engulfed the fiend, accompanied by a deafening clap of thunder. When Janik’s vision cleared, he saw the fiend still standing over him, but its sword had slipped from its hand and its eyes were rolled back in its head. Behind it, he could see Mathas standing near Dania, looking with satisfaction at the result of his lightning spell. The fiend slumped to the ground, joining its companion in oblivion.

“Sea of Fire,” Janik muttered, struggling to his feet. “Let’s not do that again. Suppose there are more of those?”

“Someone blew that horn,” Auftane said, handing Janik his sword.

“You’re right,” Janik said as they walked over to Mathas and Dania. “I think I heard the same horn three weeks ago, if that’s possible.”

“Low sounds like that can travel quite far,” Mathas said.

Dania looked puzzled. “Could Krael have been that far ahead of us?” she asked.

Janik buried his fingers in his hair. “If they were really traveling day and night without ever stopping, I suppose they could.”

Dania used her foot to roll the nearer fiend onto its back, looking at its tigerlike face matted with blood. “So these things attacked Krael and his party here, probably three weeks ago, when you heard that horn, Janik. The skeleton soldiers probably fell quickly, and the necromancer died.”

“But Krael and the warforged escaped,” Janik said, scowling.

“That seems most likely,” Mathas said. “Although perhaps they were captured.”

“What I most dislike about this,” Dania said, “is the horn. Somebody blew it, obviously, which means more of these fiends are probably in that tower. But more to the point—”

“Somebody was meant to hear it,” Auftane said.

“Exactly,” Dania said. “Which suggests we’ve just found an outpost of a little fiend kingdom.”

“Janik,” said Auftane, “how far are we from Mel-Aqat?”

“From Mel-Aqat?” Janik pulled the sheaf of parchments from his pack and produced his map. He held his little finger up to the map, then compared it to the map’s scale. “About a hundred and fifty miles,” he said.

“A hundred and fifty miles of barren desert,” Mathas added. “Probably three weeks of travel.”

“Three weeks …” Auftane mused. “And you heard the horn three weeks ago, right?”

“You think the horn could be signaling someone in Mel-Aqat,” Janik said. “I think you might be right.”

“You recognized these fiends?” Auftane asked. “From your last visit there?”

Janik took a deep breath and let it out slowly, rubbing his hand over the stubble on his chin as he collected his thoughts. “I recognized them from texts,” he said, “not from experience. The earliest descriptions of Mel-Aqat describe giant statues of people with the heads of tigers, so naturally I’ve done some research about what those were supposed to depict. You remember in Stormreach, when we were talking about the Tablet of Shummarak? About the great war that supposedly raged between fiends and dragons in the first age of the world? Well, the legends describe those fiends—or at least some of them—as having the heads of tigers.”

“Rakshasas,” Mathas said. “I have read of them as well.”

“Exactly,” Janik said. “The most powerful of these rakshasas were called rajahs, their rulers, and they were ultimately bound within the earth—”

“By the couatls,” Dania interrupted, “the allies of the dragons. They sacrificed themselves to bind the fiends forever.”

“Right,” said Janik. “But the servitors of the rajahs were not all bound or destroyed. Several ranks or breeds of these fiends served the rajahs. Some wielded powerful magic. A black-furred variety served as scouts and assassins. And there was a warrior caste, called zakyas. I’m guessing that’s what we have here.”

He paused, running his hands through his hair. “It is possible that Mel-Aqat was a place where one of the rakshasa rajahs was imprisoned.”

“What?” Dania turned to face Janik.

“I’m beginning to see some of the pieces of the puzzle here,” Janik said, staring at the tiger-headed demon on the ground. “I don’t know how they fit together yet, but I think I see some pieces.”

He furrowed his brow in concentration.

“Some of the most ancient texts that mention Mel-Aqat—the same ones that describe the statues of these demons—call it the Place of Imprisonment. I’m certain that the ziggurat at the heart of the ruins is the locus of that imprisonment. That ziggurat is the one structure still standing in the city, and we could not find a way inside it on our last visit. So I have considered the possibility that your church is correct, Dania, and we released this rakshasa rajah from the Place of Imprisonment on our last visit. But I don’t think that’s the case, partly because we never got into the ziggurat.”

Dania’s face was flushed. “Unless the Ramethene Sword was a key of some kind,” she said, “and removing it from its place opened the prison.”

“That might be possible—if it weren’t contradicted by every extant text about the Ramethene Sword,” Janik snapped. “If your carefully reasoned theory had any validity, you would expect to see descriptions of the sword as a key, or a linchpin, or a keystone, maybe a cornerstone. Instead, it’s described—as one would expect for a weapon of war—in terms of its capabilities as a weapon. It’s the Sunderer, the Fleshrender, the Axis of Destruction. You are too hasty to assume the worst, Dania. But the most important reason I don’t believe we released the rajah is that the world would have noticed by now. By all accounts, these creatures possess power to rival the Dark Six, and little subtlety. If one had been released into the world three years ago, I’m fairly confident that Stormreach would not still be standing, at the very least.”

Dania looked unconvinced, but Janik ignored her to continue his train of thought.

“That said, I suspect that the possibility of Mel-Aqat being the Place of Imprisonment for one of these fiend lords is not irrelevant to what we’re doing here. Dania said that Krael and Maija were looking for the Tablet of Shummarak in Karrnath. I told you before that the Tablet is an ancient inscription that describes what we’ve just been talking about—the fiends that ruled the world in ancient times, and the couatls that imprisoned them in the earth. Thanks to Krael stealing the most important books from my library, I have no idea whether there’s a specific connection between the Tablet and Mel-Aqat, but it seems pretty obvious there’s a general connection. Both of them are connected to these ancient fiends.”

Auftane interrupted. “So you think Krael and Maija were looking for the Tablet so they could use it to free the fiend imprisoned at Mel-Aqat?”

“I think that’s possible, yes,” Janik said. “Although I still have no idea how much Maija is involved in all of this. I only know what Dania told me.”

“We have no evidence that she is here with Krael,” Dania said. “Assuming she’s still alive, she would have slowed the party down.”

“Unless she was also riding in the palanquin with that necromancer,” Mathas added.

“Not very likely,” Janik said. “No, I don’t think Maija is here. But the other piece is these zakya warriors. Again, I think there’s some connection to Mel-Aqat, but I’m not sure what it means. We’re relatively close to Mel-Aqat, close enough that the horn might have been meant for someone there. But we didn’t see any fiends there last time. So does that mean that the imprisoned rajah has been freed, and these zakyas are serving him? But then what’s Krael doing here?”

Janik heaved a deep sigh. “Oh, it makes my head ache. This is the sort of problem best addressed in a quiet library, not out in the wild.”

“And what are we going to do about that horn?” Dania added, casting a wary glance toward the tower nearby. They were mostly shielded from the view of anyone in the tower, but they had hardly been careful about hiding since the first attack of the rakshasas. “Do you think we should attack the tower, Janik?”

“I think it all depends on what’s in there. Mathas?”

“Of course, Janik,” Mathas said. “I will require some time.” He turned toward the tower and closed his eyes, beginning a low chant and tracing complex symbols in the air with his hands.

Janik turned to Auftane. “You did something to your weapon that made it more effective against them. What was that? I felt like I was stabbing them with a spoon instead of my sword.”

“Like many creatures of evil,” Dania said before Auftane could answer, “these fiends are susceptible to holy might. Without that power behind your blows, your sword could not pierce their defenses.”

“So we know Dania’s black-and-white interpretation of events,” Janik said, looking at Auftane. “I want to hear yours, Auftane. You’re no paladin. What did you do to your mace?”

“Well, Dania’s interpretation is correct,” the dwarf replied. “More or less. The world is full of opposing powers, and it’s simple enough to find one power to use against another. When you’re fighting a creature of cold, you make your weapon fiery. And when you’re fighting fiends, you make it holy.”

“But how do you do it?”

Auftane laughed. “That’s what I do. Everything has magic in it—it’s just a matter of adjusting it to get the effect you want. It’s relatively easy to do, if you only need it to last a short time. With enough time and the right materials, you can make it permanent.”

“So you could do it to my sword?”

“Sure,” the dwarf said, “for about an hour and a half.”

“Long enough for us to clear out that tower.”

Mathas made a last dramatic gesture and fell silent, standing like a statue with his eyes closed. The others watched him in silence for several moments, then he began to speak.

“I didn’t see anything between here and the tower,” Mathas announced. “There’s not much to the tower at all—from this side it looks mostly intact, but if you go around the other side, the walls are crumbled away. There’s one more fiend by the doorway, it looks like—yes, there’s another one perched on a ledge higher up, looking toward us. With an enormous horn. I think that’s all, just those two.”

“Go ahead and send the eye around in a wider circle,” Janik said. “Let’s make sure there aren’t more hiding in the hills.”

“Very well,” the elf said. After a short silence, he said, “No, nothing. Looks like we’re clear.”

“Great,” said Janik. “Let’s go get those two.”

“Wait, Mathas,” Dania said. “Can you see if there’s a way for us to approach the tower under cover? Can we circle behind somehow?”

“Hold on,” Mathas said. “I’m not sure … yes, perhaps. If we start going that way—”

Without opening his eyes, Mathas pointed away from the tower, to where a shallow gulley ran down from the level spot where they stood.

“—we should be able to come around more or less from behind. I think we can get fairly close before we come into view.”

“Excellent,” Dania said.

“Good thinking, Dania,” Janik said. “Are we ready?” Mathas’s eyes fluttered open, and he nodded.

“Here,” Auftane said, “let me have your sword.”

Janik’s left hand dropped to the scabbard at his belt before he realized that he still held the blade in his right. He wiped it clean on the dead necromancer’s robe before handing it, hilt first, to the dwarf.

Auftane took the sword, holding it gingerly in his hands. He dipped his thumb into a small jar he had produced from one of the many pouches at his belt, and began tracing glyphs and symbols on the blade.

“It was faster when he did it before,” Janik said with an apologetic glance at Mathas, who grinned.

“I can do it faster, but it takes a lot out of me,” Auftane said, continuing to trace symbols on the sword and sounding a bit distracted. “In the thick of battle, it’s worth it. Since we have the time, I might as well take it.”

“Fair enough,” Janik said.

The four companions stared into the air, watching the winged serpent snaking across the sky. Its wings shimmered with rainbow colors in the bright sunlight, and its movements were stunningly graceful, as if it were dancing. It drifted slowly over them, tracing a wide arc across the sky, centered above the ruined city. If it saw them, it showed no sign—it did not seem to linger above them or slow its progress as it passed over them. Janik watched it until it was a tiny speck and then vanished from his sight, then his gaze fell on Dania.

She was still spellbound, her eyes fixed on a distant point in the sky where her keen eyes could still make out the couatl’s writhing dance. Tears streamed down her cheeks, past the upturned corners of her mouth. Janik watched her face for a long time, saw her smile brighten as she observed some new nuance in its movements. She looked radiant—her expression struck him as a softer, warmer version of the holy flame that had wreathed her sword in battle against the fiends. It was an expression he had seen on Maija’s face in rare moments when she was deep in prayer, and it stirred something in his soul that he had not felt in a very long time.

He watched Dania while she stared up at the couatl. When she finally lowered her gaze, it fell on Janik, and he quickly averted his eyes, embarrassed to have been caught staring at her. His embarrassment grew when he realized that Auftane and Mathas had been watching him, and he found himself wondering how much of his feelings had shown on his face. Mathas had a mild scowl on his face, but Auftane was grinning broadly.

Collecting himself quickly, Janik barked at Mathas. “Is that eye of yours still in the ruins? Or are all three of them staring at me?”

Mathas started, then closed his eyes again. “Back in the ruins. Just coming over the … Sovereigns!”

“Now what?” Janik demanded.

“They have rebuilt more than the wall,” Mathas said. “And they are still building. Like the wall, they are simply stacking pieces of the ruins on top of each other, in random fashion. The ziggurat is still standing, of course, right at the center of the wall’s circle. Then it looks like mounds of rubble are heaped up here and there around it. Hmm. They appear to be random, but I wonder—What?” His eyes popped open.

“What is it, Mathas?” Dania asked, putting a hand on the elf’s shoulder.

“Someone canceled the spell. That means—”

“They know we were watching,” Janik said. “Do they know where we are?”

“No way to know,” Mathas said.

“I think I know,” said Dania, pointing toward the ruins.

Janik followed her finger, but couldn’t see anything. “You know, I’m getting tired of this. Why didn’t my mother marry an elf?”

“They’re coming,” Dania said. “In strength.”

The fiend paused for only a heartbeat. Janik saw its feline mouth curve into a wicked smile and the muscles of its shoulder tense to drive the shield down.

Something hit the rakshasa like a stone from a catapult, knocking it off Janik completely. Janik leaped to his feet and saw Dania on the ground, tangled with the fiend, which looked more like a fierce tiger locked in a death struggle than a warrior in armor. It roared as it tried to roll Dania onto her back, and it ignored its weapons in favor of trying to bite her neck.

Janik took a deep breath as he picked up his sword from the ground, trying to calm his pounding heart. He moved as fast as he could to the zakya and Dania, but he felt like he was running in a dream, as if his feet were mired in swampy ground.

“Get it off her, Janik!” Mathas was yelling. He was poised to cast a spell, but he didn’t want to risk catching Dania in the blast. Dania was struggling, but she seemed unwilling to loose her sword, even though she couldn’t possibly bring it to bear in such close quarters.

Janik reached them. With his left hand, he grabbed a fistful of the zakya’s fur and skin between its helmet and its armor, pulling with all his strength to draw its head back. It snarled and tried to twist its head around to bite his arm, then Janik drove his sword up under its chin.

Again he felt that his sword had grown blunt, that it couldn’t bite through the unnatural flesh. But it didn’t matter. Dania broke free of the zakya’s grasp, found her feet, and stepped backward, swinging her sword with all her strength. Her weapon hit the creature and erupted in a burst of silver flame, then cleaved through its neck as the flame seared its fur and flesh. Janik pulled his hand back from the flames in surprise, leaving his sword embedded in the zakya’s chin. The sword landed, impaled in the fiend’s severed head, at Janik’s feet. Its body slumped to the ground.

“Thanks for getting it off me,” Dania said.

“Thanks for keeping my head on me,” Janik replied. He bent to pull his sword free, and tested the point with his finger. “Auftane?” He looked around for the dwarf, finding him beside Mathas.

“Give me the sword,” Auftane said, anticipating Janik’s request. He took the blade and traced symbols on it as he had done before, then handed it back to Janik. “That ought to help.”

“Thank you.” Janik checked the point again out of habit, then slid the sword back into its sheath. “On second thought,” he said, pulling it out again, “I expect I’m going to need this again soon.”

“I can’t quite believe we’re not still fighting,” Dania said. “Those two certainly made enough noise to draw attention.”

“Well, we don’t know how many of these things are here,” Janik said. “The party that came after us was large, so maybe they didn’t leave many behind.”

“Sounds pretty optimistic,” Auftane observed.

“It’s a pleasant enough fantasy,” Janik said. “But it’s probably a trap.”

“Now that’s the Janik I know,” Dania said with a wry smile. “Where now?” Auftane asked.

“A place to talk about this that’s not out in the open,” Janik said. “It would have been good to come in here with a plan.”

“We were making our way toward a plan,” Dania said, “but they caught us off guard. Sneaking up on our camp in the middle of the night—honestly, they have no respect for the way things are supposed to be done.”

Janik laughed quietly and pointed to a heap of rubble nearby—evidently one of the efforts to rebuild the ruins. They moved quietly into its shadow and huddled together to plan their next steps.

“I see two possible approaches,” Janik said. “One would be to retrace our steps from our last journey. I have the map I made then, though I don’t know how helpful it will be with all the building they’ve been doing.” He pulled the sheaf of parchment out of his coat and rustled through it. “The other option would be to head straight for the ziggurat, assuming that whatever is going on here has its origins in that structure.” He found the map he was looking for, checked the positions of the moons to orient himself, and pulled a small, smooth stone from another pocket. The stone glowed with a dim white light, and he held it near the map so he could read it.

He pointed to a spot at the edge of his map. “I think we’re about here,” he said. “Last time we came from the west and only made it about this far.”

“May I see the map?” Mathas asked, extending a hand.

“Of course.” Janik placed it in the elf’s wizened hand and held the glowstone so it illuminated the map.

Mathas studied it for a moment. “A typical scholar’s scratches,” he sighed. “You can read these notations, can you?”

“You know I can. What are you looking at?”

“Well, I can’t make out a word of it, but if my memory serves—and I have no reason to believe that its efficacy has been dimmed by my advanced age—then we must be almost directly above the place where we located the Ramethene Sword, and not far from the entrance to that underground vault.”

“Let me see that,” Janik demanded. He snatched the map from Mathas and held the light close to it. “Of course,” he said. “You’re right. And we had thought that we might be close to finding an entrance to the ziggurat down there.”

“I’m sorry,” Auftane interrupted, “but could you back up a little bit? I’m having a hard time following you.”

“Forgive me, Auftane. I forget you weren’t with us last time. On our previous expedition, we came in from the west, over here.” He pointed to the map and trailed his finger over it, showing their route through the ruins. “None of this was here—there was no wall, and none of these stacks of blocks. We went straight to the ziggurat and searched for a long time, hoping to find a way inside. We made wider and wider circles around it, and right here—” he pointed to a spot just west of their current position—“we did some digging. We managed to uncover the outline of a large chamber. It was boring work, though, and we gave up on uncovering any more of it—especially once we stumbled onto a passage leading down into the earth, still clear enough for us to pass through. That led us down into a large vault that was pretty much intact, and that’s where we found the Ramethene Sword.”

“When we brought the sword up to the surface, Krael met us,” Mathas said, “and after that defeat we lost interest in exploring the site any further. But we believed that if an entrance to the ziggurat were found, it would likely be connected to that underground vault.”

“And that passage is near here?” Auftane asked.

“I admit that my mapping suffered in the excitement of discovery,” Janik said. “But I believe Mathas is correct. It should be close.”

“Then it could very well be that your two approaches are one,” Mathas said. “By retracing our steps to the vault where we found the sword, we might be able to reach the ziggurat and get to the heart of this.”

“That reminds me,” Janik said. “Mathas, what do you make of the arrangement of these towers, these stacks of rubble?”

“What do you mean?”

“When I was up on the wall, it struck me for a moment that there might be some pattern to their placement around the ziggurat. Does that suggest anything to you?”

“Hmm,” the elf said, stroking his chin. “I had a brief impression of a similar thought when I was scouting the ruins with my spell. But I didn’t discern anything specific.”

“A pattern?” Auftane said. He rested his hand on the nearest block of stone and closed his eyes for a moment. Janik and Mathas exchanged a quizzical glance. “Yes …” The dwarf almost sang the word, surprisingly high and clear, but quickly resumed his normal low rumble. “There are lines of power pervading this place.”

“Binding the rajah?” Dania said.

“I can’t tell their exact purpose, but binding is possible. On the other hand, this structure seems to be designed to focus the power lines. Why would the zakyas be building these towers up if they’re making the rajah’s prison stronger?”

“Maybe something else is going on,” Janik said. “Could they be arranging these lines of magic power in a different way, maybe to weaken the bonds of the prison?”

“Anything’s possible,” Auftane said with a shrug. “I would need to examine more of the structures, try to get a sense of the larger pattern to determine exactly what’s going on.”

“So what should we do?” Janik said. “Should we check out the rest of the towers, or head underground and look for a way into the ziggurat? Dania, what’s your opinion?”

“Underground.”

“Mathas?” Janik said.

“Underground, I think,” the elf said. “While I admit to some curiosity, I also cannot deny a feeling of urgency. I think we should try to get to the heart of the matter as quickly as possible.”

“Auftane?”

“I agree with Mathas. Curiosity be damned.”

“Then we’re agreed,” Janik declared. “Let’s find the way underground.”

“Dear Janik,” Maija said into the deafening silence. “How have you been? Getting along without me?” Her voice grated on the stone and scraped across Janik’s heart, mockery oozing from every syllable. “Dania told me you were perhaps a little heartbroken. Poor thing.”

“Damn you to the Outer Darkness, Maija Olarin,” Dania swore through clenched teeth.

“Tsk. Didn’t your fat exorcist friend teach you not to use such strong language, Dania? Or if not him, then perhaps that sweet boy Gered?” Maija’s expression of feigned innocence twisted into a cruel smile. “Or did he die before he could teach you much of anything?”

Janik saw Dania step in front of him, but she held her sword at her side. She stared up at Maija in silence, then staggered backward as if some invisible force had struck her. Roused from his stupor, Janik caught her before she fell on the floor and held her up as she struggled to regain her feet.

“What did you do to her, Maija?”

“Do? I did nothing.” Maija sneered. “Perhaps she asked a question and couldn’t handle the answer.”

“What happened to you, Maija?” Janik cried. “What happened to the love we shared? Where is the touch of the Sovereigns in you?”

“I very much doubt you can handle the answer to those questions, dear Janik.”

“I can’t handle not knowing. I need to know. Damn it, I deserve an answer!”

Maija’s smile stretched to a thin line. “I lied.”

The words were barely more than a whisper, but the force of them nearly knocked Janik off his feet. His arms grew weak and Dania began to slip from his grasp, but she found her feet and lifted her sword.

With a wordless shout, Dania ran forward, leaping into the air to grab the edge of the balcony where Maija stood. As she pulled herself up, Maija stepped back in surprise. She recovered quickly, though, and made a forceful gesture with her hand, as if to push Dania off the balcony.

The effect was far more dramatic than a physical push. Dania flew backward over Janik’s head and landed behind him in a clatter of steel.

“And so the end begins,” Maija whispered.

Curling her hands into twisting arcane gestures, she reached toward Janik, purple-black lightning sparking around her hands. Zakyas appeared in four of the archways around the chamber, and zakya archers stepped onto the other balconies, pulling back their bowstrings and taking aim.

Janik heard roars and shouts, the clamor of weapons and shields, the rattle of arrows hitting stone and armor. But he saw only Maija, her hands extended to him and her eyes locked on his. He felt as if her hand were locked around his throat. For a moment, he thrilled at the imagination of her touch as he stared into her eyes—his mind could almost imagine it as a loving caress. He stared into her eyes as the edges of his vision went black. A glint of red in her brown eyes was the last thing he saw before the darkness swallowed him.

“Possessed?” Krael said. “That would explain a great many things.”

“So you’re saying that the evil spirit we accidentally released while we were here is Maija?” Janik said, incredulous.

“It’s in her,” Dania said. “It has taken up residence in her body and controls her actions.”

“And that’s the evil that has devoured her?”

“That’s just it, Janik! If I’m right, then Maija is still in there—like a passenger in a carriage the fiend is driving, helpless to stop it. And that means we might be able to save her—if we can drive the fiend out of her!”

Janik could not speak. He had clung to shreds of hope for so long without having any idea what to hope for. Now, when hope seemed justified, he wasn’t sure how to deal with it.

“Dania?” Auftane said, looking up from Mathas. “What makes you think she’s possessed?”

“Look,” Dania said, “all along we’ve been baffled by what happened, unable to explain such a sudden and dramatic shift in her behavior. It was like it came out of nowhere, and we felt like she must have been keeping up an incredible charade for over a decade. But if I’m right, that’s not what happened at all—it really was a sudden change. She wasn’t lying to us all those years. When the spirit entered her, that’s when she turned against us.”

“So that makes it desirable to believe your theory,” Auftane said, “but what evidence supports it?”

“Evidence? There’s the stink of evil on her, which is stronger than the mere taint of a corrupt heart. It overpowered me back in that room. Even Krael’s evil odor isn’t strong enough to do that.”

“I’ll have to work on that,” Krael said.

Dania ignored him. “Then, there’s the connection with this place. It was here that she changed, as if the evil of the spirit imprisoned here had seized her. And, once she found that tablet in Karrnath, she brought it back here, as if she were obeying the orders of the rajah. And finally—” She paused a moment, searching for a conclusive argument. “Krael—you said possession would explain things. What things?”

Krael grimaced. “Well, as I said to you in Karrnath, I never thought much of Maija. I always thought of you and Janik as my real enemies, Mathas to a lesser extent, and Maija as sort of the annoying accomplice—Janik’s good little wife. Believe me, I was as surprised as you were when she brought me the Ramethene Sword. And when she gave me to Havoc, I was stunned. I never trusted her, but I would have expected her to go back to Janik rather than betray me to a hundred-year-old vampire.”

Janik scowled and opened his mouth to speak, but Krael cut him off.

“And then, just before we found the Tablet of Shummarak, she killed a man—a priest of the Blood of Vol, really just an innocent bystander. She used a spell on him to split him open. Blood oozed from his eyes first, then his skin erupted. I asked her where a cleric of the Sovereign Host learns magic like that.”

“Exactly,” Dania said. “A cleric of the Sovereign Host doesn’t use spells like that. But ancient demons of Khyber do.”

“I’m convinced,” Janik said, and Auftane nodded as well. “So what do we do?”

“If we can drive the fiend out of her, then we can confront it on a different footing, perhaps destroy it. No matter what, Maija should be restored to her right mind.”

“I liked the plan of killing her better,” Krael said.

“Careful, Krael,” Dania said. “There are three people in this very small room who have been hoping to kill you for fifteen years. Don’t provoke us.”

“Without weapons, I’m fairly certain that Sever would rip all your arms off before you managed to hurt me,” Krael shot back. Sever accentuated Krael’s point by slamming one fist into his open hand.

“Krael, help me here,” Janik said, dropping to his knees in front of the vampire.

“What?” Krael said, one eyebrow arched in surprise.

“You stole all my books that have anything to do with Mel-Aqat, damn it. I assume you had a reason for doing that besides spite. What is the spirit possessing Maija?”

“Dhavibashta?”

“Don’t be stupid,” Janik said, and Krael grinned.

“What are you talking about?” Dania said.

Janik got to his feet. “Dhavibashta is the name of the rajah imprisoned here, according to the Serpentes Fragments. But it’s clear to me that whatever spirit has possessed Maija is trying to release the rajah, so it’s obviously not the rajah.”

“I’m glad to see you can function without your books,” Krael said.

“I still want them back.”

Mathas sat up, his desire to participate in the conversation finally overpowering his weakness. “Is it possible,” he said, “that the imprisoned rajah could extend its will beyond its prison to control Maija, while most of its essence remained trapped here?”

“That would mean the rajah could be using Maija to try to free itself,” Dania said. “And I confess I don’t know enough about this kind of thing to say for sure. Kophran might have been able to answer that, but—”

“But we wouldn’t want to be locked in this tiny room with a pompous ass,” Auftane said.

Janik ran his fingers through his hair. “I want to consider the more likely possibilities first.”

“And what are those?” Dania asked.

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out,” Janik snapped. “If my theory is correct, the city of Mel-Aqat was built long after the rakshasa rajah was imprisoned. The ziggurat was built to mark the site of the rajah’s prison, and the city was built around it.”

“Who built the city?” Auftane asked.

“Based on the scale of the ruins, most of the city was inhabited by giants.”

“Giants?” Auftane exclaimed. “Not the areas we’ve been in so far!”

“Right. The subterranean chambers, which include the chamber where we found the Ramethene Sword, were neither built nor used by giants. It suggests two possibilities. The pattern often seen elsewhere in Xen’drik is that of giant-sized main structures, plus attached quarters built on a human-sized scale that were used by the elf slaves of the giants. The chambers we’ve seen don’t fit that pattern. They don’t look like slave quarters—they’re far too well built and extravagant. And they’re not decorated with the typical elven motifs of skulls and scorpions. Instead, we find stylized tiger faces.”

“Hmm,” Krael said with mock seriousness. “Now who would have carved tiger faces in these ancient stone walls?”

“Right,” Janik said, ignoring Krael’s sarcasm. “I have long argued that Mel-Aqat was built by a fringe cult of giants that worshiped the rakshasa rajahs. I think now that this cult was led by a smaller cadre of rakshasas—a force of zakyas responsible for direct control of the giants, and smaller echelons of the more powerful fiends above them.”

“So you think that one of these rakshasas might be the spirit possessing Maija?” Dania said.

“That’s where my theory was heading,” Janik said.

“The Fleshrender,” Krael said.

“What?”

“The Fleshrender,” Krael said. “That’s the spirit in Maija.”

Janik’s brow furrowed. “The Fleshrender is a name for the Ramethene Sword,” he said.

“I thought so too, until just now. But what’s the one text that uses that name?” Krael asked.

“One of the Serpentes Fragments.” Janik searched his memory for a moment, then quoted:

“It’s a clear textual parallel, the Sunderer in the first couplet and the Fleshrender in the second, both referring to the sword.” Janik was thinking out loud.

“And what’s the next couplet?” Krael said.

“Something about the blade and the hand that wields it. I don’t remember exactly.”

“‘For the blade drinks the blood, and the hand that wields it feasts on the life.’ The two couplets are parallel, but not synonymous. The blade is the Sunderer, drinking the dragon’s blood. But the hand that wields the blade is the Fleshrender, feasting on the dragon’s life. See?”

Janik opened his mouth and closed it again, raising his eyebrows in surprise.

“I think you might be right, as much as I hate to admit it. But what makes you think this Fleshrender is the spirit possessing Maija?”

“Two things,” Krael said, “neither one more than a gut feeling. First, there’s the kind of magic Maija used in Karrnath. I suppose any fiend might use such spells, but they seem particularly well suited to one called the Fleshrender. Second, consider the connection to the Ramethene Sword. Like it or not, Janik, I think you released that fiend when you pulled the Ramethene Sword from its place.”

“I don’t like it, but I can’t argue that right now. So—we have a name for our enemy—though not a very pleasant name. How do we get the Fleshrender out of Maija’s body?”

“First, we get out of here,” Krael said.

“We?” Dania said. “I don’t plan on letting you out of here alive, let alone helping you escape.”

Krael looked distinctly uncomfortable and Janik felt a strange twinge in his chest. A large part of him agreed with Dania. Krael had caused him so much misery and difficulty over the last few months, to say nothing of the previous fifteen years, that helping him and accepting his help in return seemed unthinkable. At the same time, he couldn’t avoid seeing himself in Krael’s situation: helpless and at the mercy of his worst enemies. Krael had been cooperative, and, well, useful—probably because he knew he needed the help of his enemies if he was to escape.

More than that, though, Janik somehow felt that Krael wasn’t fundamentally different from himself. He had not seduced Maija away from him—Janik had grown so used to blaming Krael for what happened that he had a hard time separating his anger at Krael from his despair over Maija. And he was here for the same reason that Janik was: to claim revenge against the fiend that had destroyed his life. They had some common goals, both in the short term and in long-range pursuits.

“You need me,” Krael said. “You’ll never find your way out of here without my help, and you’ll never find Maija.”

“She might very well find us if we escape from here,” Janik said.

“And she’ll overpower you again, probably kill you this time,” Krael said. “With me and Sever along, you’ve got a fighting chance.”

“I don’t think so,” Dania said. “Now that I know what we’re facing, I think our victory depends entirely on my ability to force this Fleshrender out of Maija’s body. Two extra swords aren’t likely to make the difference—assuming we can recover our weapons.”

“Both of us are very effective without weapons.”

“Krael, stop begging,” Janik said. “It’s embarrassing.”

Krael visibly bit back another sarcastic retort and looked away, toward the door.

“Seems to me it’s an open question how any of us will escape, whether we decide to help each other or not,” Janik said. “But it’s certain that sitting in here arguing with each other isn’t going to get anyone out of this room.”

Dania looked at the floor. “Sorry, Janik.”

“Auftane, how’s your patient?”

“I’m fine, Janik,” Mathas said. “Tired, but fine.”

“Glad to hear it, old friend,” Janik said with a warm smile. He fought down the lump in his throat and turned back to Auftane. “Would you have a look at the door and see if there’s any way you can open it?”

“Sever’s tried that, too,” Krael said.

“Not to judge too hastily based on Sever’s appearance, but I suspect that Auftane is capable of more subtlety,” Janik said.

“Agreed, Martell,” the warforged sneered. “All I can say is that the door’s too strong for me.”

“And that probably means it’s too strong for any of us to break down, but my hope is that Auftane can find another way to open it.”

The dwarf was peering into a tiny hole near the right edge of the door, about halfway up its iron surface. “I suspect this is the other side of the keyhole,” he said, “but it’s too small to get at the mechanism.”

“I believe the door is barred as well,” Sever added. “Your lockpicks won’t lift the bar, Khunnam.”

“He’s right, Janik,” Auftane said, shrugging his shoulders.

Janik ran his fingers through his hair and stared at the door in silence for a moment. Finally, he sighed and shook his head. “Auftane, why don’t you take a look at Krael’s manacles. I want an assessment first, before you open them. Mathas, can you help him?”

“I’ll try.”

Auftane and Mathas huddled together behind Krael, examining the strange blue metal bonds as Sever watched over their shoulders. Janik stepped over to Dania, who had her head cocked as if she were listening to something outside the room.

“What is it?” he asked.

“Nothing,” she said. “What are you thinking?”

Janik took her arm and drew her a few steps away from the others—as far as the tiny cell would allow. “What if Krael is our only way out of here?” he whispered to her.

Dania pursed her lips and crossed her arms. “There has to be another way,” she said.

“We’d all like there to be another way, but no law of the universe says a means of escape must exist, let alone a second choice. What if he’s the only way?”

“Do you think there’s the slimmest chance we can trust him?” Dania said. “The instant he gets those manacles off, what’s to stop him from turning to mist, slipping under the door, and leaving us here to rot?”

“I can’t think of anything,” Janik said, frowning.

“Janik?” Auftane called, standing up behind Krael.

“Yes?”

Staying behind Krael and out of his line of sight, Auftane pointed at the manacles and bobbed his head, an exaggerated expression of confidence on his face. Janik nodded his understanding and turned to Dania.

He lowered his voice further. “Assuming we can extract a convincing oath from Krael that he’ll help us if we help him, are you willing to go along with that?”

“Are you asking me whether I can accept the lesser evil of helping him get free for the sake of the greater good of defeating Maija?”

“I guess so, yes.”

Dania sighed. “I have to bring him to reckoning for the evil he’s done, Janik. I have to. But if that happens after we’ve freed Maija from this Fleshrender’s grip, I can live with that.”

“Thank you,” Janik said, clasping Dania’s shoulder before turning to the vampire. “Krael?”

“Have you reached a verdict?” Krael said. “Decided my fate?”

“Your fate’s up to you, Krael,” Janik said, “though Dania assures me that she has a particular vision of it in mind. But in the short term, let’s discuss what we can do for each other.”

“A good idea,” Krael said, eyeing Dania.

“Auftane here is confident that he can release you from these manacles. He’s no doubt motivated by the opportunity to study them in more detail.”

“I’m pleased to hear that.”

“So we can set you free, and we ask for our freedom in exchange. We get you out of the manacles, you go under the door and open it from the other side. At that point, we’re even.”

“That sounds fair,” Krael said.

“However,” Janik continued, “once we’re all out that door, I don’t think we’re done with each other, as much as we all might like to be. We have a goal in common, to extract our revenge from the Fleshrender. I’m not at all confident that we’ll go about that in the same way.”

“Whatever do you mean?” Krael asked.

“I mean that while Dania might be able to force the spirit out of Maija’s body, I suspect you’re more likely to force the spirit out by killing Maija. That’s not an acceptable approach.”

“Hmm,” Krael said, a faint smile on his thin lips. “Perhaps it would be best to split up once we get out this door, and see who gets to Maija first.”

“And let you tear her apart if you reach her first?” Janik said. “No.”

“Besides,” Dania added, “the two of you can’t hope to face her alone. It seems that the six of us working together would have the best chances of reaching her, fighting through all the zakyas, and—” she caught herself.

“Killing her?” Krael said.

“And accomplishing our goal,” Dania said, turning away from the leering vampire.

Janik crouched in front of Krael again, looking him right in the eyes. “I want to trust you, Krael, and I’d rather work with you than against you on this. Can you give me any assurance that you’re not going to stab us in the back if we help you?”

“Long term? No,” Krael replied. “Short term, though, it’s just not in my interest. Leave you in here and try to face Maija and the Fleshrender alone, without even Sever beside me? That would be suicide—and believe me, I have little doubt that the Fleshrender would find some way to make sure I stay dead. You can always count on me to look out for myself, Janik. You know that.”

Janik stared into Krael’s red eyes a moment longer.

“Besides,” Krael added, “if I had wanted to betray you, I would have taken this opportunity to dominate your mind, forcing you to release me without anything in exchange.”

Even as he spoke, Janik felt the vampire’s presence probing at the edges of his mind, but Krael made no assault, no effort to take control.

Janik tore his gaze off Krael and stood. “It looks like we’re in this together.”

“For now,” Krael said.

Janik glanced at Dania, but she was distracted again. “Auftane, work your magic.”

Auftane kneeled behind the vampire and spent several moments in intense concentration. As far as Janik could see, no actual magic was needed—the dwarf had produced a set of lockpicks and was working them in a small keyhole set into one of the manacles. He chanted quietly as he worked, and Janik wondered if he was just improving his own concentration, manipulating the flow of magic in the manacles, or just singing to himself.

“There!” Auftane announced, and Krael stretched his arms up triumphantly.

“Auftane Khunnam,” the vampire said, getting to his feet, “I am indebted to you. Those were painful and damned inconvenient.”

“I look forward to giving them further study,” the artificer said.

“And now for my part of the bargain,” Krael said. Even as he finished his sentence, his body dissolved into a cloud of billowing vapors. For a moment, the mist was still recognizable as Krael, but then it lost all form and drifted to the door. It churned slightly as it seeped through the tiny crack under the door—and in a moment, it was gone.

The room fell silent.

Janik faced the door, his eyes unfocused but his ears straining for any hint of what was happening behind it. He listened for the sound of a bar being lifted or the lock opening. Beside him, he was aware of Dania rocking on the balls of her feet and flexing her fingers.

No sound penetrated the iron door. Janik heard Mathas grunt softly as he got to his feet, and Auftane made some clanking sounds, fidgeting with the manacles he’d taken off Krael. Dania let out a long, slow breath. Janik closed his eyes, every sound around him becoming an entity in a field of darkness. He could hear each of the others breathing—Dania slow and disciplined beside him, Mathas heavy and a little labored, Auftane uneven. No sound came from the warforged, or from the door before him.

A knot of worry formed in Janik’s chest, clenching his heart. Had Krael betrayed them again, leaving them here while he made his escape? Or just as bad, perhaps he had encountered zakya guards outside the cell that had overpowered him, the iron door blocking any sound of the struggle.

He opened his eyes and glanced at Dania beside him. She caught the movement of his head out of the corner of her eye and turned to meet his gaze. She shook her head slowly, then closed her eyes again.

She’s right, Janik thought. And she was right all along—we shouldn’t have trusted Krael.

“Well,” he whispered at last, “really, we’re no worse off than we were.”

“Except that our one hope is gone,” Dania said.

Janik was about to reply when a terrible clatter shattered the quiet of the room—a metallic clanging against the door. That was followed by the distinct sound of a bar being lifted off the door, then a key turning in the lock.

The door swung open, accompanied by a metallic scraping, and Krael stood in the doorway, a triumphant smile on his face.

“It damn well took you long enough,” Janik said.

Krael gestured to the floor at his feet. Scattered around him were all the weapons the zakyas had taken from them—Janik’s short sword and Dania’s long one, Auftane’s mace, and Sever’s silver-black adamantine blade, as well as the pouch of wands that Auftane carried. His own massive flail was already tucked into his belt.

“I had to kill a guard, retrieve the key, and liberate our weapons,” Krael said. “I think I accomplished all that rather quickly, truth be told.”

Krael stepped back as Janik retrieved his sword. He slid his slender blade into its sheath, then stooped to get Dania’s and Auftane’s weapons.

“That’s quite a sword you have, Dania,” Krael said. “Even the hilt bites.”

“Holiness hurts,” Dania said.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Krael said, rubbing his hands together. Janik thought he caught a glimpse of terrible burns on the vampire’s right hand, but they were healing even as he looked.

Janik handed weapons to his friends and led them into the outer chamber, leaving the warforged to pick up his own sword. A zakya lay dead near an open door on the opposite wall. The creature looked shriveled—even its thick fur could not hide the way its flesh clung to its bones. Janik suspected it had been perfectly healthy before Krael got to it, and his stomach churned with revulsion. He tried to look away, but his gaze was drawn to its staring eyes, bulging in their sockets.

Auftane’s voice shook Janik out of his morbid observation. “Where did you find our weapons?” he asked Krael.

“Heaped on a table in the next room. The guard was stationed there but he came running when I opened the door. It’s entirely possible that there was a second guard who ran the opposite direction to raise an alarm.”

“Great,” Janik said. “Then we need to move. Where do we go, Krael?”

“This way,” Dania answered, starting out the door. Janik shot her a quizzical glance, but she did not see it. She was moving slowly, her head cocked slightly to one side, her eyes not quite focused. Auftane and Mathas waited for Janik’s lead, but Krael shrugged.

“That’s what I was going to say,” the vampire said. “We’ll find Maija on the lowest level.”

“Dania,” Janik said, hurrying after her and grabbing her shoulder. “What’s going on?”

“You don’t hear it?” Dania said, facing Janik but not really looking at him. “It’s calling me.”

What in Khyber? Janik thought. He gripped both of her shoulders and brought his face close to hers, trying to force her eyes to focus on him. “What’s calling you, Dania? Is that a voice you should be listening to?”

“I … think so,” Dania said vaguely. “It’s confusing.” Her eyes suddenly focused on Janik. “I hear them both, Janik, the binder and the bound. Come on, we need to move!” She turned and continued walking. With a quick glance back at the others, Janik followed, drawing his sword as he walked.

Wait a moment, he thought, and looked back over his shoulder at Krael.

Sure enough, the vampire had the same distant expression that Dania wore. Did he hear the same voices? Seeing Janik look back, though, Krael caught himself and flashed a toothy grin at him. Janik shook his head and hurried to keep up with Dania.

Dania was nearly across the next room, which was more of a wide hallway than a chamber. A few quick steps brought Janik right up behind her as she reached the door at the far end and threw it open.

Despite her distraction, Dania’s reflexes were still razor sharp. She brought her shield up in a flash to block an arrow, and another glanced off an armor plate at her shoulder. Janik held his lantern up to light the room beyond, and nearly dropped it in surprise.

He could not see the archers. All he saw was the giant.

The huge creature—a hunched, misshapen thing—stood a few paces from the door. Its skin was mottled gray, with splotches of pink like the scars of recent burns and patches of thick hair growing in haphazard places. Its eyes were widely spaced and uneven, and its drooling mouth had only a few teeth. The great hump on its back nearly scraped the ceiling of the large room. If it could have stood erect, Janik figured it would have stood more than three times his own height. One massive hand was clenched around what had been a stone statue—legs were still visible where the giant gripped it, but the rest was chipped and worn into a featureless club.

A gallery circled the upper level of the room, and Janik guessed the archers were perched up there, taking cover behind the columns that lined its edge. Yes, he saw them, peering around the columns as they pulled back their bowstrings for another volley.

Ignoring the archers and the arrows that clattered around her, Dania charged forward to engage the giant. Inspired by her, Janik found it hard to be afraid, despite the size of the brute, and he advanced behind her. The giant swung its stone club in a wide arc as they approached. Dania jumped back and the club swept the air in front of her chest, while Janik hit the floor and rolled forward under the giant’s reach.

Janik came out of his roll facing the giant’s knee. The monster tried to hit him with its club, but Janik easily dodged the awkward swing. The giant kicked at him, missing him with its foot but managing to brush his head with its rock-hard kneecap. Janik spun away from the blow, ducking between the giant’s legs and slashing at its hamstring with the tip of his blade. He cut, but not very deep, and the creature wheeled to face him again, kicking clumsily at him as it turned.

That gave Dania the opportunity to close in past its wildly swinging club, and Sever charged up beside her. Their blades swung as one, biting deep into the giant’s legs. A blast of lightning from Mathas’s fingers engulfed the giant’s upper body, and Janik took advantage of its distraction to come in close and drive his sword up into its belly.

The giant howled as a gout of blood splashed down on Janik. The stone club clattered on the floor, and for an instant Janik thought he had dealt a mortal wound.

Then the giant’s arms closed around him, pulling him off the floor and squeezing him against the bloody wound in its gut. Janik’s arms were pinned to his sides, his sword hanging uselessly from his hand, and he struggled to breathe with the giant’s arms clenched around his ribs. He dropped his sword and started kicking, hoping to connect with a tender spot and startle the giant into letting him go. He heard Dania shouting, trying to capture the giant’s attention, and felt tremors rumbling the thing’s body as she and Sever continued hacking at it. The giant wheeled around to kick at them, but its grip did not weaken.

Janik’s lungs started to burn and he changed his tactics. Instead of kicking blindly, he tried to bring his legs up between his body and the giant’s, hoping to work himself free of its grasp. It almost worked. Feeling its grip slipping, the giant wrapped one meaty hand around Janik’s neck and shoulders. Janik’s head swam as the beast swung him like a club at Dania. His legs crashed into her chest, and she sprawled backward onto the floor.

Over the top of the giant’s fist, Janik saw Sever slash with lightning speed, taking advantage of the creature’s reach to cut its wrist. The adamantine sword bit deep and the behemoth released Janik with a howl of pain, sending him flying through the air. He slammed to the floor just behind Dania, dizzy and gasping for breath.

He lay helpless, the room spinning around him. Sever had the giant’s attention, his blade whirling, lines of blood trailing every time it connected with the giant’s flesh. Dania forced herself to her feet, and Mathas sent another arc of lightning to engulf the giant. Auftane stood right behind the warforged, touching various parts of Sever’s strange plated body and causing them to glow with a series of spells. His spells had a visible effect—Sever did not weaken or tire, and kept the giant almost entirely on the defensive. It had not managed to retrieve its stone club from the ground, a minor victory in itself.

Wait, Janik thought. Where’s Krael?

Even as the thought passed through his mind, a movement on the upper gallery caught his eye. Krael pushed the limp body of one of the zakya archers over the railing, then hopped up to perch on the railing himself. Krael was by no means a small man, and his plate armor dramatically increased his bulk. Janik was impressed by the grace of his movement and the apparent ease with which he balanced on the narrow railing.

Janik rolled slowly into a crouch, and saw Dania charge up beside Sever, her sword crackling with silver fire. Krael was watching the giant carefully, his huge flail in hand. As Janik stood, Krael jumped, flying through the air and landing on the giant’s hump shoulder. He swung his flail as he leaped, smashing hard into the side of the giant’s head.

Janik shook his head and quickly regretted it, putting a hand on the wall to steady himself as the room started spinning again. Dania’s sword struck true, erupting in flame, and the giant choked out a final roar as it fell to its knees.

A month ago, if Janik had tried to imagine fighting alongside Krael and his warforged assassin, he would have thought himself touched by Xoriat’s madness. But here they were, not only fighting a common foe, but working well together.

Krael balanced on the giant’s grotesque hump. He brought his flail around for another mighty blow that broke the creature’s neck with an audible snap.

Janik leaned against the wall and let himself sink down to the floor. This day had brought too many surprises already.

“Janik, my love,” Maija said with a sneer, “how kind of you to come and offer yourself in sacrifice.”

The floor rumbled as though the fiend imprisoned in the ziggurat were stirring, restive in his bonds. Janik’s eyes grew wide as he looked around for any sign that Dhavibashta might be breaking free.

“Janik,” Dania whispered, “there is still time. I need you all to keep her busy, and we need to weaken her if I’m going to force it out. Go!”

Janik needed no further encouragement. Drawing his sword as he ran, he closed the distance to Maija but came up short as the midnight sword slashed through the air in front of him, missing his throat by less than a hand’s breadth.

“Hang on, Janik!” Mathas called from near the door. “I’ll see if I can eliminate that sword!” Janik heard him chanting, but watched Maija’s mouth curl into a wicked smile.

“I don’t think so, dear Mathas,” Maija said, thrusting her hand forward as if to punch, launching an invisible force that sent Mathas crashing against the wall behind him. With the wind knocked out of him, Mathas couldn’t continue his spell. Janik brought his short sword up to block the slashing arc of Maija’s magical blade. The clash of the ebony force and Janik’s steel sent black sparks crackling into the air, stinging Janik’s eyes.

Dania advanced just behind Janik, moving with caution, her sword flaring with holy power in her hand. Auftane came up next to her, holding his mace in both hands but looking a little unsure what to do.

“Don’t hold back, Auftane!” Dania shouted, sensing his hesitation. “At least not until I can get the spirit out of her!”

“Cast me out of this vessel, Dania?” Maija said, an expression of genuine surprise crossing her face for an instant. “That seems unlikely.”

With a quick gesture, she directed her sword away from Janik to slash at Dania, catching her off guard and making a long, shallow gash in her upper arm.

“And extremely inconvenient,” Maija added.

Janik, no longer threatened by the sword, tumbled forward past Maija, coming out of his roll right behind her. He aimed a fierce jab at her lower back—a potentially crippling blow, if placed just right. At the last instant, Maija turned slightly and his eyes met hers.

So many nights he had gazed into those warm pools of brown. Her eyes had always been windows to him, letting him see everything that was in her heart, anything that troubled her—and all the love she held for him. Was it some trick of the rakshasa that he thought he saw that love still? Or was Maija showing herself to him despite the Fleshrender’s control?

His attack lost its strength and glanced off an invisible force surrounding her body. He stood helpless, transfixed by her eyes.

“Janik,” she murmured softly, “heart of my heart …”

“Janik, no!” Dania screamed. The first thing he noticed were Dania’s inhuman, quicksilver eyes, but then he saw the flash of fire in Maija’s hand. He leaped backward, throwing himself onto the floor as another blast of flame roared over him, searing him with its heat though it failed to engulf him. He landed hard but kept rolling until he could get his feet under him again. Maija’s fiendish cackle echoed louder than the blast of fire.

Auftane made a wide circle around Maija and hurried over to Janik. “Let me help you,” he said, one of his curing wands in his hand. Janik saw Mathas, leaning weakly against the far wall, launch a bolt of lightning from his fingers toward Maija.

Janik gaped in horror as the lightning forked to pass harmlessly around Maija. With a flick of her wrist, she deflected part of the spell back at Mathas. The lightning crackled up and down his body. He fell to the floor and lay still.

“Help Mathas, damn it,” Janik barked at the dwarf. He had better be alive, Maija, he thought, or … or what?

Or I’ll never forgive myself for bringing him here, he thought. He shifted his grip on his sword and advanced warily toward Maija again.

“So you’re playing the cleric, are you, dwarf?” Maija growled, and she thrust her palm in Auftane’s direction, sending him sprawling on his face. The wand clattered across the floor. “Tinkering with the power of the gods?” She emphasized her last word by slamming her fist into her open hand. Auftane convulsed once with the force of an unseen blow, then lay still.

In that instant, Janik managed to land one solid blow on Maija, his sword jabbing into her shoulder. Her cry of pain sounded like the roar of a zakya, but she ignored him, turning her attention to Dania instead.

“Now you, Dania,” she snarled. “I always knew you lusted after my Janik.”

“It wasn’t lust,” Dania said, still on the defensive against the wildly swinging sword. “Not love, either.”

Janik cocked an eyebrow as he managed to nick Maija’s other shoulder with his blade. Maija gestured dismissively at him, knocking him back.

“The truth is, Maija,” Dania said, “I wanted to be you.”

Maija stepped backward at that, making Janik wonder whether some remnant of Maija’s own will expressed her surprise that way, or whether Dania’s response had taken the Fleshrender aback. In any case, it was the distraction that Dania needed. With one mighty blow, she smashed her sword into Maija’s dancing magical blade, shattering it into tiny shards of darkness that melted into the floor. Then she extended her arm straight out in front of her, the tip of her sword leveled at Maija’s throat.

“Out,” Dania said.

Janik wasn’t sure what he had expected, but that wasn’t it. Some elaborate ritual, perhaps, or a lengthy prayer invoking the power of the Silver Flame. But not this, just a simple command—spoken with such authority that if Janik could have stepped out of his own skin, he would have. Dania’s voice echoed in the chamber, resonating with power.

Maija stood transfixed, her eyes locked with Dania’s. Slowly, Dania’s sword arm lowered, but both of them were otherwise motionless. Janik stood helpless, watching as silent conflict raged between the two women.

Silence settled on the room. In the stillness, Janik felt some resonance of the battle he was witnessing, and he realized what had failed to sink in before: Dania was no less possessed than Maija. At least four wills were involved in this battle, with Dania and the spirit inhabiting her body pitted against the Fleshrender and the far greater evil that rumbled in the earth beneath the place. Janik wondered whether Maija’s will played any part at all, or if she was just the battleground, the piece of land these titanic forces were fighting over.

Janik had spent months arguing with Dania, but he had to admit that she had been right. This was different than the Last War. He had served Breland, even described his work for the crown as the true conflict, from which the massed armies and bloody battlefields were a mere distraction. But all his intrigues and exploits were no more than a shadow.

The real war was being fought right in front of him, and it was a war Janik didn’t know how to fight. He shifted his sword in his hand, suddenly aware of its irrelevance.

The floor of the cavern began to shake—the merest tremor at first, not enough to break the silence. But it grew, until first the stone tablet rattled against the altar, then Dania’s armor softly clanked, then the room rumbled. Trickles of dust started falling from the ceiling. Janik’s body tensed for action, but he had no idea what to do.

The rumbling stopped, and Maija cried out and convulsed.

A shadow seemed to seep from her body, a smear of darkness without form or feature. It slowly separated from Maija and then sloughed her off as if stepping out of a robe. Maija slumped to the floor, discarded.

Dania didn’t move. Her hands hung at her sides, her sword dangling from one and her shield from the other. She didn’t lift either as the dark spirit slid forward, engulfed her—

And melded into her.

“No!” Janik cried.

As the darkness sank into Dania’s skin, Janik saw a spasm of pain cross her face, and she dropped to her knees, her mouth stretched in a silent howl. She drew a long, tortured breath, then began wrestling her face and body under control.

But whose control? Janik had no idea whether the Fleshrender, the argent spirit that inhabited Dania, or Dania herself was the will that moved Dania’s body. Whichever it was, it moved her body with agonizing slowness—lifting one knee off the floor and planting the foot, dragging her arms forward to rest on the raised knee, shifting the weight forward and dragging the other foot until the body stood erect. Dania’s face was calm except for a muscle twitching wildly beside one eye.

Janik stood tensed in a defensive stance, his sword gripped firmly between him and Dania. He watched carefully for a sign of who was in control and what her intentions were.

Slowly, Dania’s head lowered and turned to the right. Then her right arm rose, the sword hanging limply from her hand.

“Janik,” she said, her voice a hoarse whisper.

She extended her arm, holding the sword out toward Janik and lifting its point toward him. He stepped back.

“Take … take my sword,” she said.

“What?”

“Take it!” Her voice was regaining strength.

Janik sheathed his sword in one smooth motion. Hesitantly, he stepped forward and lifted the sword from Dania’s fingers. His hands tingled where they touched it, but the sensation was not unpleasant—certainly not the biting pain Krael had endured.

“Now, Janik,” she said. “Do it now.”

Janik’s eyes widened. “Do what?” he asked, knowing and yet dreading the answer.

“Kill me,” Dania said.

“No!”

“Kill me!” she repeated. “And the Fleshrender dies with me!”

Her eyes met his, and he realized with a start that they were again their normal dusky blue. They pleaded with him in a way her voice could not manage, even as one eye twitched, reflecting the struggle that raged inside her.

Her words at the pinnacle of the temple came back to him. “Do not let your heart be troubled, Janik. I have chosen this path, and I am not afraid.” He had not understood at the time, but now he grasped her meaning. She had known that this was how she would defeat the Fleshrender.

And she had been counting on Janik to do it, to kill her. His fingers shifted on the unfamiliar grip of her sword.

“Janik,” she said, gaining a little more control over her voice. “Back in Karrnath, I swore an oath by everything holy that my sword would bring an end to this. Please—” her voice was a desperate gasp—“fulfill my oath!” A spasm of pain passed across her face, a sign of the struggle for control that raged within her.

Janik lifted the sword and stepped back a little, testing the heft of the weapon, thinking about swinging it. For a moment, he almost convinced himself he could do it.

Then he saw her eyes again. The sword slipped from his fingers and clattered to the stone floor, sparking motes of silver light.

“I can’t, Dania.” His gaze fell on Maija, lying on the floor like a discarded robe. “I can’t do it.”

“Janik!” Dania cried, but he turned away.

As he turned, he saw a small cloud of shadow detach itself from the ambient gloom of the chamber. It quickly congealed into a human form, then Krael stood before him. The vampire ducked past Janik to pick up Dania’s sword.

Silver light flared as Krael’s hand touched the hilt, and the smell of burning flesh reached Janik’s nose.

The vampire’s voice was choked with pain. “I told you I’d return the favor if I could, Dania,” he said, grimacing in agony as the sword continued to sear his hand.

Dania did not move to defend herself. Janik felt paralyzed. He thought a flicker of a smile crossed Dania’s face, and she began to nod—or else bowed her head in acceptance.

Then Krael swung the sword with all his strength, cutting deep into Dania’s shoulder. Krael screamed along with Dania’s cry, smoke and silver fire surrounding his hand.

Janik’s heart was suddenly a lump of stone in his chest, and he couldn’t seem to draw a breath.

“No.” His lips formed the words, but he had no breath to give them.

Krael dropped the sword and stepped back. Dania was drenched in blood but her body was slow to fall to the ground. A soft white light surrounded her, a contrast to the shadow that emerged as she fell.

Janik’s heart pounded again, a brief terror seizing him as he saw the Fleshrender take shape before him. The spirit was clearly visible, like a zakya with ebon fur. It was a black flame raging, shadow streaming from its insubstantial form like a radiant darkness. Even as the life ebbed out of Dania, Janik could see the life pouring out of the fiend, for it bore the same mortal wound in its shoulder. As Dania slumped to her knees and then, lifeless, onto the floor, the fiend staggered away from her, falling to the floor a few steps away.

As Janik continued to stare, the fiend’s body dispersed into wisps of darkness and was gone.

Janik fell to his knees and stared blankly around the room. Mathas was near the door, slumped against the wall, his head lolling to one side. Auftane lay on his face halfway between Janik and Mathas. Maija’s crumpled form was close, and Dania lay in a spreading pool of blood. The serpent torc was still coiled around her neck, and the eyes seemed to stare up at him.

He looked over his shoulder at Krael.

“What was that you said about returning the favor?” he said. His own voice surprised him—it was flat, emotionless. He felt a sea of rage and pain churning inside him, but managed somehow to float on its surface, not letting himself feel it. He merely observed it, noted it, and tried to keep from collapsing on the floor.

“She helped kill Havoc,” Krael said, “and freed me from his control. And I freed her.” Krael’s voice was shaking as he cradled his wounded hand to his chest.

“Then you accomplished a great deal with that one blow,” Janik said. “You repaid your debt to her, fulfilled Dania’s oath—which I presume you prompted, one way or another—and you got your revenge against the Fleshrender for making you a vampire.”

“It’s been quite a day.”

“It certainly has.”

“What about you, Janik? Is it time for your revenge?”

“What?” Janik said.

“Aren’t you going to kill me?” the vampire said, his voice growing stronger. “I assume you still loathe me, after all our history, and I did just kill your dearest friend.”

“So you did,” Janik said, his gaze falling on Dania again. “I find I’ve lost my taste for revenge. Just go, Krael.”

Krael walked slowly to the door. He peered intently at Auftane as he walked past, and kneeled briefly beside Mathas.

“Leave him alone, Krael!” Janik called. “Leave before I change my mind.”

Krael stood and stepped into the doorway, then turned back. “They’re still alive, you know. They need some attention.”

“I’ll take care of it.”

“Janik … I’m sorry it had to end like this. Dania was a worthy adversary, a woman of spirit and purpose and conviction. I’m … I’m sorry she had to die.”

Here comes the pain, Janik thought, and he bowed his head so that Krael wouldn’t see the sudden rush of tears.

When he looked up, Krael was gone.

With an almost audible pop, the dwarf appeared in a comfortably appointed chamber.

“Home, sweet home.” He sighed, walking to stand in front of a tall mirror, shedding his pack and bags and pouches as he went. Fidgeting with the silver serpent in his hands, he looked at his reflection—covered with the dust and dirt of two months spent traveling through the Wasting Plain and the Golden Desert. Blood was still crusted in his beard, which was, at least, still neatly trimmed. He set the torc on his dresser, put his hands to his cheeks, and breathed a deep sigh, exhausted and deeply relieved that he was able to use magic to expedite his return to Fairhaven.

He took off his clothes, first draping his long coat over the back of a nearby armchair, then his vest, and his frilled shirt. He left his high boots on the floor, placed carefully together. Stripped down to his breeches, he turned again to the mirror.

He liked this body. Dwarves were solid, strong. He liked the feel of the muscles, the firmness of the skin, vaguely reminiscent of stone. And Auftane had a fine sense of style.

But it was time to bid Auftane farewell. He sighed and watched in the mirror as the reflection changed.

The squat, solid form of the dwarf grew taller and much thinner. The dark brown skin faded gradually to tan, then pasty white with freckles. He enjoyed the freckles and paid close attention to their pattern on his skin. The neat beard and waxed moustache disappeared, and he rubbed a slender hand over his smooth chin. His shoulder-length black hair became short, tousled, and sandy brown.

He always saved the eyes for last. Finding just the right shade of amber took him several attempts, then he stepped away from the mirror, taking in his full reflection.

“Welcome home, Haunderk,” he said to himself. “You need a bath before you can report to ir’Darran.”

He made his way to the door of his suite and rang the bell that would summon a servant to fill his bathtub. His eyes fell once more on the silver torc, shining on the dresser.

“And won’t Kelas be pleased with you.”