“He will not need it.”
Arunika smiled at him slyly. “That remains to be seen.”
“What do you know?” the monk asked hopefully.
“If Herzgo Alegni is to be Lord of Neverwinter, then who will come to join the settlers? What man or elf or dwarf or halfling or any other race will come in to join the glorious rebuilding of Neverwinter when it is under the domination of the likes of a Netherese tiefling barbarian like Lord Alegni?”
“What Shadovar, then?” the suddenly-cynical Brother Anthus said. “Or orcs. He will attract orcs, no doubt!”
“And invite the Lords of Waterdeep to turn their eyes and arms to the north?” Arunika replied with a laugh. “Alegni thinks he achieved a great victory with the death of Sylora Salm, but in truth, his power came from the fear of an enemy. As that enemy diminishes, so will he, do not doubt. Soon enough, he will grow bored and fly away. Or his Netherese masters will send him back into the forest in search of the artifacts, as was his original mission. Or he will overstep and invite war with Waterdeep, and he will lose.”
She nodded solemnly at Brother Anthus, even rubbed the forlorn monk on the shoulder. “The Sovereignty will return in a decade or two, fear not. Few understand them, but their pattern is not to abandon a place once they have laid the base of a new home. Use these years wisely, my young friend,” she advised. “Make of Brother Anthus a great name in Neverwinter, so that when the aboleths return, they will see in you a powerful ally.”
The monk looked up at her and tried to nod, albeit unsuccessfully.
“I will help you,” Arunika promised.
“You are staying?”
“To watch the downfall of Alegni? Surely!” She laughed, uncomfortably perhaps, but she was indeed feeling quite jovial at that moment, for in trying to bolster Anthus, Arunika had herself found a new way to view the recent dramatic developments. She wasn’t sure that everything, or anything, of what she had predicted would come to pass-perhaps Alegni would remain as Lord of Neverwinter for fifty years.
But her hopes of his demise were quite plausible, even probable, she had come to realize.
And there remained an even more immediate solution, a powerful group allayed against Alegni, the same trio who had defeated Sylora, who seemed every bit the Netherese lord’s equal. Perhaps they would rid Arunika of the troublesome shade.
Perhaps Arunika would find a way to help facilitate that.
As she considered the delicious possibilities, the succubus found herself feeling even more jubilant. She would survive this, as Anthus had predicted. She would survive and she would thrive, whoever proved victorious in the struggles for Neverwinter. She looked Brother Anthus in the eye, her grin from ear to ear.
“What?” he managed to ask in the heartbeat before Arunika fell over him passionately.
Not long after, Arunika walked the quiet and dark streets of Neverwinter, her edginess hardly smoothed, her passion hardly sated.
Arunika hailed from the Nine Hells, not the Abyss, and though a place no less evil, the distinction between demon and devil rested mostly in the contrast between chaos and order. Arunika liked an orderly society. Lawful by heritage, by nurture, by the very essence that gave her form and substance, uncertainty unsettled her.
It made her edgy. It made her itchy.
Poor Brother Anthus. For all of his youthful enthusiasm, he could not match or sate the passionate succubus.
She had thought the Sovereignty would give her the pleasure of order here in Neverwinter. Perfect order, demanded internally and externally. But now they were gone and so many roads had opened. Too many roads for Arunika’s comfort, but she knew that it would pass as she came to better command the ultimate destination.
The agitated devil shook her head repeatedly as she followed every potential turn to its logical conclusion. What of Valindra? What of Szass Tam? What of the trio now hunting Alegni?
And most of all, what of Alegni and the Netheril Empire? Even with the potential pitfalls opening all around him, it seemed to Arunika that Alegni held the upper hand. Despite her assurances to Brother Anthus, Arunika understood that if Alegni survived the near future, he would become Lord of Neverwinter, perhaps for many years. Her meeting with Valindra had shown her the truth of the Thayans, and they would not threaten the power of Alegni and his Shadovar.
This likely outcome was not to Arunika’s taste, of course, but she was of the Nine Hells. The strong imposed the rule, and the rule was more important than the ruler.
Her preference, thus, seemed irrelevant.
She glanced back to the south, where Anthus lay on her floor, exhausted beyond consciousness, then shifted her gaze just a bit to the west, to an inn on a small hill, and a room looking back toward the river and the Herzgo Alegni Bridge.
Arunika did not like the uncertainty, but she knew what she must do if she wished to remain in the region, and more importantly, if she wished to help shape those rules that would govern this tumultuous area.
Now she walked with purpose, along the boulevards running south and west.
She could battle uncertainty by situating herself properly for all potential outcomes.
That was her litany, and it did help to calm her a bit as she passed by the darkened windows of sleeping Neverwinter. Emotionally, at least, though there remained the physical agitation, which Brother Anthus could not calm.
As she neared the inn, Arunika glanced around to ensure that there were no witnesses. Leathery wings appeared on her back as she willfully minimized her disguise, and then her wings spread wide.
As much a hop as flight put the succubus on the balcony of a particular room at that fine inn, and there she folded her wings once more and leaned on the railing, her back to the darkened city, her eyes watching the darkened room beyond the wood and glass door before her.
A long while passed, but she did not mind, as she worked even harder to clarify the possibilities and her potential within each.
Finally, she heard the lock click and a few moments later, the balcony door swung open and Herzgo Alegni stood before her, his expression a mixture of sly anticipation and hardened resolve.
Most of all, Arunika recognized, he was not surprised to see her. She stood on a balcony some thirty feet from the ground, with no stairway and only a locked door providing access, and yet, he was not surprised to see her.
His twisted warlock minion had extracted much from Invidoo, Arunika knew then more clearly, as she had suspected.
She answered Alegni’s hard look with a disarming smile.
“Keep your enemies closer,” Alegni remarked, the second half of a common warrior litany.
“Enemy?” Arunika asked innocently-so much so that she made it obvious to Alegni that she was denying nothing.
Alegni couldn’t resist her expression, her posture, her playful retort, and a grin spread on his broad face.
“You have won, Herzgo Alegni,” Arunika stated flatly. “What enemies remain?”
“Indeed,” he replied unconvincingly.
Arunika smiled all the wider, coyly, and let her wings spread wide once more as she walked deliberately toward the hulking tiefling. “How close would you like your enemies?” she asked quietly, her voice husky and promising, and her devil wings embraced him.
“Close enough to kill,” Alegni answered.
Arunika couldn’t resist that tease. Where Brother Anthus failed, Herzgo Alegni excelled.
THE SPELLSPINNER
It is not the dwarf homeland, Jearth’s fingers flashed to Ravel Xorlarrin. The forward scouts of the expedition, a tenday and a half out of Menzoberranzan, had come upon a vast cavern, its walls tiered and worked. First word back along the lines had been promising that this might be a lower barracks or undercity of some sorts, something with which Jearth apparently did not agree.
