three children hiding-badly-nearby, gawking at the sight of the magnificent unicorn.
“Did you have to speak to her in such a manner?” Drizzt asked, climbing up on Andahar’s strong back.
“I was speaking to you,” Dahlia retorted. “I care nothing for her.”
“Perhaps that’s your problem,” said Drizzt.
“More likely it’s your folly,” said Dahlia.
They rode away from the farm and down the road in silence after that, and Drizzt even stopped the magical bells from singing their sweet song, for it seemed out of place there, as if the music would lend neither hope nor joy, but would instead simply mock the broken country.
More farms came into view around every bend, and none were in better repair than the one they’d just left. Most of the farmhouses and barns were simply burned-out shells, and more than one settlement within a sea of overgrown and ruined fields showed nothing more than a few charred beams and the stones of a lonely, abandoned hearth.
“Farmer Stuyles’s home, I wonder?” Dahlia teased at one such ruin.
Drizzt ignored her. On one level, he was angry with Dahlia, but on another level he was worried she was right. He couldn’t find any logic with which to argue against her unstoppable cynicism. All of that, of course, led him back to farmer Stuyles and the band of “highwaymen.” Could he deny their justifications? The obvious truth lay bare before him now: With the fall of any pretense of civilization in Luskan, the surrounding farmlands, neglected by any organized militia, fell victim to bandits and even to minions of the new powers of the City of Sails. Everything those men and women had worked to build, everything their parents and grandparents for many generations had built, had been stolen away. The idea that they could simply pack up and relocate in the now-wild realms of Faerun seemed preposterous.
So what were they to do? Depend on the magnanimity of the high captains of Luskan? The emissaries of Bregan D’aerthe? The Lords of Waterdeep?
Was it a crime for a hungry man to steal food, a freezing man to steal clothing, in a world where a destitute man had no recourse to law?
Drizzt was glad that he hadn’t exacted punishment on Stuyles and his band, and every former farm they passed reinforced his decision. But that truth did little to dent the pain such a bleak reality presented to the idealistic, optimistic dark elf.
At long last, the walls of Luskan came into view. Drizzt pulled Andahar up and slipped off the side of the unicorn. As soon as Dahlia did likewise, he dismissed the steed, who thundered away, each stride diminishing him by half until he was no more.
“Why did you stop me?” Drizzt asked.
Dahlia looked at him, perplexed, and he tapped his pouch.
“You thought to save the farmer woman with a few gold coins,” Dahlia said.
“Help her, not save her.”
“Damn her, you mean.”
“What do you mean?”
“What might any merchants have thought when a peasant farmer woman or one of her filthy children showed up at market bearing gold?” Dahlia asked.
“I could have given them silver, or copper even,” the drow argued.
“Even so, were she to possess coins, then all the thieves of the land would decide she was worth robbing. This land is filled with thieves, and worse. Are you so blinded by your eternal faith in goodness that you cannot even see that simple truth?”
“You’re my instructor, then?”
“When you need it,” Dahlia quipped.
“And my guardian, my guide to salvation?”
“Hardly that! In truth, given the nature of my lessons, I might be quite the opposite. A demon come to show you the path to… entertainment.”
Drizzt shook his head and started walking down the road to Luskan, showing little amusement at Dahlia’s barbs.
“If you had wanted to help her, you might have hunted a rabbit or a deer for her table,” the elf woman said. “Or simply gathered some firewood.”
“And you knew that and said nothing back at the farm, when we might have done some good.”
“You confuse me with someone who cares.”
Drizzt spun back on her, and seemed on the edge of an explosion.
“Drizzt Do’Urden, saving the world one peasant at a time.” Dahlia spat on the road at Drizzt’s feet, then stood back easily, staff in hand as if inviting him to attack her.
But Drizzt was too buried in the confusion of the day and the shadows of the world. With a helpless snort, he started off again toward the City of Sails. Dahlia caught up to him in but a few strides.
“We’ll find a way, our way,” she said.
“To help?”
“To entertain ourselves at least. And consider, when Sylora Salm’s skull cracks beneath the weight of my staff, the world will be a brighter and better place.” She started to grin, but Drizzt shook his head.
“The light will come earlier,” he promised. “For Sylora will already be dead by my blades by the time you strike.”
“A challenge?”
Now the drow did manage a smile.
“I do so love a challenge, and beware, for I never lose,” said Dahlia.
“Even if you have to kill me first to ensure your personal victory, I expect.”
“Keep thinking that way,” Dahlia played along. “I welcome doubt.”
3
Valindra stood across a clearing from a small house on the southern reaches of Neverwinter. The glow from a hearth within whispered warmth against the chill of night, but seemed a solitary thing indeed this far from the returning population of the old city.
“In there?” Jestry asked skeptically. “The one you seek? Alone?”
A deathly cold breeze blew by them, and Valindra’s smile widened as she nodded. “Why would she not be?”
“She?” Jestry hugged his strong arms tight to ward off the chill. The path to the cottage could hardly be called a road, and there were no other houses within at least several hundred yards of the place. Neverwinter Wood was in the midst of a war, of course, and the roads were full of bandits-many of the folk who’d come to rebuild Neverwinter were less than respectable. Why would anyone live out there alone? How could anyone survive out there alone?
“Sylora Salm values you,” Valindra remarked, catching the Ashmadai warrior off guard. “I know not why. You seem… dull.”
Jestry scowled at her, but quickly reminded himself that he was dealing with a lich, and one considered quite insane.
“So do-Greeth! Greeth!-come in with me to meet my new friend,” Valindra said.
Jestry blinked and fell back. Her wild incantation in the middle of the sentence threw him off guard, but he thought he detected a bit of a curl to Valindra’s lips. Had she shrieked intentionally to disturb him? That was the thing about Valindra: how could he know?
“I’ll send others and coordinate the sentries,” Jestry replied.
“You will come in with me,” Valindra corrected. “Alive or dead.”
Jestry felt that cold breeze again and he sensed a hunger there.
“I know of one who would covet your lifeless body,” Valindra teased, and Jestry’s eyes widened. It took all of his willpower to stop him from letting out a scream.
