“They will destroy you,” Jestry insisted, but Sylora shook her head and wore an expression of complete confidence.
“I’ve spoken to Valindra at length,” she repeated with gravity. “And I’ve studied the history of Valindra Shadowmantle, once a mistress in the fabled Hosttower of the Arcane. She was accomplished in life, and she will become even more powerful in undeath, as her mind heals.”
Jestry stepped back and looked Sylora over carefully. “You see her as a conduit to your own immortality,” he said suddenly, then he gasped, obviously fearing he’d gone too far.
But Sylora grinned. “You are but twenty years old and I near middle age,” the sorceress explained. “You’ll one day understand. Now, go.” She pointed to the path, which seemed a tunnel through the dark trees lining its sides, branches intertwined so tightly that even the light of the full moon failed to penetrate.
“You’re going to perform the summoning of the devils,” Jestry said. “I would wish to witness the glory of your call to the Nine Hells.”
“No summoning tonight,” Sylora assured him. With a knowing smirk, Sylora glanced to her side and nodded as the lich Valindra came drifting out of the shadows, the Scepter of Asmodeus in hand.
“Through some magic I don’t know—perhaps with the scepter’s ties to the Nine Hells, perhaps with the skull gem I allowed her to take from my tent—Valindra has sensed something unusual on the outskirts of Neverwinter,” Sylora announced to Jestry and to the group of Ashmadai standing ready in front of the tree tunnel. “You will escort her as she demands. You will do anything that she demands!” Her voice rose powerfully as she finished, the threat all too clear. Her wide eyes scrutinized each and every member of the party.
“But not you,” she whispered to Jestry out of the corner of her mouth. “You are my eyes and ears and nothing more, whatever Valindra demands. Of you, I ask only that you return to me with a full recounting of the night’s events.” She turned to face him as she stepped back, putting him between her and the other Ashmadai. “I would not have my lover slain by a lich, to be raised horrid and cold and useless to my needs.”
Jestry could hardly draw breath. Her lover? Could it be? Was she at last offering him that which he had most desired since the day Szass Tam had put the Ashmadai war party under her command?
Sylora glanced back at him only once. “Don’t disappoint me,” she whispered in a throaty voice. “We will know great glory here, you and I. And great pleasure.”
She crossed paths with Valindra then, the lich drifting past her and tittering quietly, muttering something the distracted Jestry could not discern—not that he was paying her any heed in any case. He just stood there as Valindra floated past him as well, telling him to “Greeth Greeth, move along!”
But he couldn’t tear his eyes off the spectacle that was Sylora Salm. The high, stiff collar of her black gown perfectly framed her hairless head, her smooth and creamy skin glistening in the moonlight. That head struck Jestry as the perfect orb, held on the pedestal of that collar, and so entranced was he that it took him many heartbeats to allow his eyes to rove down the curving, shapely form, to the high slit in the back of the dress, and there he stared once more, his heart stopping then leaping at each flash of white skin, catching the moonlight with every alluring step.
Her lover, she’d teased.
Her lover.
He had to succeed, had to survive through this dangerous night. Jestry took a deep breath and steadied himself, finding the control required of an Ashmadai. He even managed to tear his eyes away from the departing Sylora, to spin around … and to realize that Valindra and the others had already started away.
He began to sprint, but barely took a step before he found himself glancing back yet again toward the woman he so desired.
But she was not to be seen, having melted into the night.
Jestry Rallevin reminded himself of who he was, and of the danger ever-present around him—danger to him and to his beloved Sylora Salm. They had faced Szass Tam and had barely escaped the archlich’s murderous wrath.
They had to start winning. Sylora needed the carnage to feed her Dread Ring. Jestry had to make it happen for her.
For them.
He ran down the dark tree tunnel toward the distant torchlight.
Sylora Salm was glad to be alone, at last. She brought forth the strange scepter of black wood from a fold in her cloak and held it up in front of her glistening eyes.
She could feel the energy in it, vibrating with power. This was a conduit to the Dread Ring, a dark scepter for a dark queen.
She glanced back at the cave complex she and her Ashmadai called home and an image came to her. Just to the left of the opening, up behind the front rocks of the cave, sat a small skeleton of a tree, just a single, twisted trunk with a single broken branch pointing forward, looking out like a sentry beside the cave entrance.
Sylora climbed the stones to stand beside the dead tree. She tapped the wooden scepter against the dark trunk and gasped as a blast of energy flowed through her. Her fingers tingled and a burst of ash came forth from her scepter, spraying the dead tree, covering it in blackness.
The ground shuddered violently and to the other side of the small hill, a boulder broke away and tumbled down.
Sylora looked around, not understanding.
The ground shuddered again, and on the other side of the small hill, another boulder broke away and tumbled down.
Sylora looked around, not understanding.
The ground shook again. The skeletal tree began to grow.
The sorceress backed away, nearly tripping and falling to the ground.
The tree widened, and with a great grinding sound, it climbed upward, ten feet, twenty, thirty. The hill grumbled in protest and stones tumbled. There came a cry from inside the cave, and an Ashmadai man stumbled out of the entrance, coughing and covered in dirt.
“Lady Sylora!” he cried.
She stood in front of a tower of ash, a tower that very much resembled a dead, skeletal tree. High above the clearing, beneath what had once been a broken tree branch, an opening had formed in the tower, creating a covered balcony.
The Ashmadai called to her again, but Sylora paid him no heed. She backed down the hillside, her gaze never leaving the ash tree tower. In her hand, the scepter called for more.
So Sylora, giddy with power, complied. She walked out some fifty paces from the cave opening and drew a line in the earth with the tip of her scepter, her conduit to the eager magic of the Dread Ring. By the time she completed the first half of her semicircle, moving to the side of the rocky hill, the initial points of her scratching bubbled with lava as the Dread Ring reached deep into the ground, bringing forth the residual power of the decade-old cataclysm.
She left a ten-foot gap before marking the second half of her creation, and by the time she was done with that curving line, the first wall had begun to erupt from the ground. Molten stone roiled and fell over itself as the wall climbed higher, to ten feet and more.
Sylora giggled like a child at play, and laughed all the more when the zealot called to her again, begging explanation.
His answer came gradually as Sylora Salm completed the wall, building a narrow channel moving out from the gap, turning boulders into smaller structures and two dead trees into smaller guard towers overlooking the wall.
Other zealots arrived from the nearby forest, all looking on with wide eyes, some falling to their knees to offer prayers to their devil god, others rushing in to see Sylora and to ask the same questions.
But she gave them no explanation and merely disappeared into the cave opening.
A few moments later, she reappeared, higher up in the tower, standing in the opening of the broken branch, her balcony.
“My lady?” the first of the Ashmadai inquired again.
There was reverence in his voice. There was awe showing clearly in all of their upturned faces.
Sylora liked that.
“Behold Ashenglade,” she said to them, a name that had just popped into her thoughts. “Finish it!”
She disappeared back into the tower and the zealots looked around in confusion.
“Double gates for the entryway!” one offered.
“And a roof!” said another, and so they went to work.
Inside the treelike tower, complete with three stories and a circling stairway, Sylora Salm reclined and listened to them going about their tasks. For a decade, the sorceress had lived in the forest or in the caves or in one or another abandoned house.
Now she understood—Szass Tam had made it clear to her. Since she had come to Neverwinter Wood, more than a decade ago, she had treated her time there as a step to something else, something grander. That had been her mistake. Now the Dread Ring had shown her the error of her ways, had forced her to take ownership of the mission, of the place, and soon, of Neverwinter itself.
Chapter 2: Because He had to Know
DRIZZT AND DAHLIA FOLLOWED THE COASTAL ROAD NORTH OF Port Llast. Andahar’s steady gait moved them swiftly toward Luskan, his speed and endurance doubling the pace of a normal mount even though he carried two riders. With less than a day left in their journey, Drizzt surprised Dahlia by veering the unicorn from the road, turning west along a side trail.
Dahlia slapped him on the shoulder and offered him a quizzical look when he glanced back.
“I prefer a different gate,” the drow explained.
“Different? They are the same, all three,” the elf protested.
“I was in the city only recently. The guards—”
“Are never the same, and could be at any of the gates in any case,” said Dahlia. “You have not been in Luskan in tendays, and likely all the ships in her harbor are changed, and thus, most of the guards serving the high captains have rotated ship to dock and dock to ship. What matter then, which gate?”
Drizzt didn’t answer, other than to hunch a bit forward and urge Andahar on more swiftly.
Dahlia started to argue once more, but when she looked ahead and saw the rolling farmland, she reconsidered. Given their encounter south of Port Llast, and given what she knew of Drizzt Do’Urden, she could guess why he felt compelled to probe inland, the farmlands, before entering the city.
Even from afar, it was obvious that most of the fields were overgrown with high weeds and grasses. A few trees had even taken root. Saplings showed in many places, and one field sported a small copse that had obviously been growing for decades.
As Drizzt and Dahlia crested on a high rise, they came in sight of a rickety farmhouse and barn, and at last saw some cultivated land, but it covered far less than a single acre. It seemed more of a garden than a farm.
Drizzt held Andahar there for a bit, surveying the spreading lands below for some time. He kicked the unicorn into a slow trot, veering to follow the remains of a broken post fence.
“Look,” Dahlia said, pointing past him, beyond the tall grasses and near the garden to a pair of children. At the same time, the children spotted the riders and split away from each other, fleeing with all speed into the heavy grass. A third child, younger still, came into view near the barn only briefly before crawling into the darkness underneath the low entry porch.
“Not warm to visitors,” Drizzt remarked.
