1600 DR-THE YEAR OF UNSEEN ENEMIES
They saw the shape of the giant black rock from many leagues away. It loomed on the horizon before they were even close enough to pick out its features. There was little traffic on the road that afternoon, and their horses’ hooves crunched in the road’s crushed obsidian, making a sound like tiny beads of glass breaking.
Lakini saw that the imposing facade of the monolith, a forbidding and uniform black from a distance, was threaded all over its surface with greenery. Pockets carved by man or nature held, like great black bowls, clusters of ferns; bright green moss studded the dark rock like peri-dots in a matrix. Threads of spring water crawled silver down the monolith, and here and there the stone had been carved to divert the moisture away from the openings that served as doors and windows and into basins on the ground where it pooled, fresh and ready for use.
At the base of the side facing the great volcanic plain, the entrances of great caverns yawned. Animals- beasts of burden as well as cows and goats-were tethered outside, and Lakini realized the caves served as stables as well as storage chambers. She studied the structure with a practiced eye, as she would a fortress, and saw that as long as there was a way to block entry from the underlying caverns, the place would be all but impregnable. A wide path curved around the lava cone, presumably merging into a stone staircase that led to the summit-but a few defenders on top could hold off many attackers.
As she and Lusk approached, she lifted her eyes to that summit. It was flat, but at the rim rough rocks were silhouetted against the blue sky like jagged black teeth. Although the day was pleasantly warm and the light against the mountains was golden, a shiver went down her spine at the sight. She blinked and thought she saw a flicker of green, bilious and alien, unlike the natural green of the plants that clung to the side of the Hold. She watched carefully and saw it dance, like the ghost lightning that played in ships’ masts, over the jagged stones.
Lakini glanced at her companion to see if he noticed anything. If he did, he didn’t mention it, although his gaze flickered over the surface of the rock as fast as the strange green lightning. She wondered if Lusk, too, felt that the closer they got to the maw of the caverns, the more they were being
Several figures waited for them at the base of the Hold. Lakini recognized Kestrel Beguine and her husband. Standing beside Kestrel was a well-grown girl of about fourteen, with enough of Kestrel’s eyes and cheekbones and Arna’s mouth to prove she must be their daughter. Kestrel also had a baby cradled in her left arm, most of its weight supported by a sling she wore across her shoulders.
Someone with the bearing of a fighter stood beside Kestrel. Lakini smiled, and she recognized Ansel Chuit from the way he held his shoulders, ready to turn in any direction, and from how close he held his hand to the hilt of the sword on his belt. She hadn’t forgotten his lesson.
As Lakini and Lusk dismounted, stable hands-or should they be called cave hands? she wondered-ran to them and took their mounts by the bridles, guiding them into the chambers at the base of the rock. Lakini wondered how far underneath they went, and if there were subterranean chambers below this one.
The hands seemed to know what they were doing, taking the time to gentle the horses as they led them. Of course, with the kind of traffic from across Faerun that Jadaren Hold saw, they would have to care for many strange beasts of a variety of temperaments.
Their careful handling of her horse reminded her of Bithesi, and she felt a sudden pang.
Kestrel and Arna stepped forward to greet them. Lakini felt the resistance that she associated with the green light increase as the Jadaren scion held out his hand, and then suddenly ebb away as she touched it. Did the light, and the odd feeling in the air, have something to do with the wards that were said to bind the monolith?
“Welcome, devas,” said Kestrel. “Welcome to Jadaren Hold.”
To Lakini’s surprise, she found she liked the familial chaos of Jadaren Hold, and the bustle of a place that was a trade center as well as a home. Children ran in and out of the archives where records of goods, their origins, destinations, and prices were kept. The private chambers and hall of records were securely warded, but there were public areas where those on business for their Houses and employers gathered to bargain and negotiate and often enough that there was a festival air to the place.
Kestrel and Arna’s home proved to be a happy one, not the least because the Jadaren heir had the sense to allow his wife to keep the records and manage accounts how she pleased. Kestrel seemed happy in her new home and family, which included twin boys as well as the daughter, Brioni, and the baby, who was named Bron after his uncle. Lakini sensed none of the hidden dangers that Sanwar insisted were menacing his niece.
“It’s a puzzle to me as well,” said Kestrel, later that night, as she showed Lakini to her accommodations in the family quarters.
She had aged since Lakini last saw her, but the lines around her eyes were laugh lines, for the most part.
“I know my uncle Sanwar keeps the welfare of the family foremost in his mind, and sometimes I wonder … Well, I’ll say it: I wonder sometimes if his obsessive nature has addled his good sense, together with his animosity toward my husband’s family.” She touched a charm at her throat. It was glass bead, with dark colors swirled together, and threads of metal or a similar material embedded within. “Still, he did insist this charm would keep me safe, and maybe it has, all this time.” She laughed. “He is so proud of his skill with sorcery. I wouldn’t like to take credit away from him.”
“He said the danger to you was deeply buried, and the Vashtun and the Second of Shadrun thought his concerns legitimate,” said Lakini. “Perhaps its source is not a rogue element within the Jadaren clan, but a visitor or rival.”
Kestrel shrugged. “Perhaps. I don’t intend to live in fear, especially under the protection of Shadrun-of-the- Snows.”
After Kestrel departed to see to the evening meal, Lakini examined her assigned room with interest. She didn’t usually pay much attention to her living space. So long as it was clean and quiet, any room would do. Devas didn’t sleep overmuch and had few possessions to clutter up a bedroom.
This room was simple in its lines and luxurious in its appointments, with a soft bed piled with cushions and rich tapestries over two of the walls. One portrayed a hunting scene, with weaponless horsemen pursuing a unicorn that looked back at them over its shoulder, as if enticing them on, and one a mountain lake with many pairs of colorful birds embroidered about it. It occurred to the deva that in a place with few windows, such decorations provided a view of the world that was otherwise lacking.
Two walls had been left bare. One, with the door to the labyrinthine tunnels outside in the center, was dull and rough to the touch, although any sharp ridges had been ground down. The other wall, smooth, flat, and polished to a mirror-bright finish, was a floor-to-ceiling surface of shining black glass.
Lakini’s reflection stared back at her, looking like her own dark twin frozen in ice. As she stared, the markings across her eyes shifted and changed, splitting apart and becoming Lusk’s stripes. Lusk stood before her, rimmed in green fire.
Startled, she reached out to him, her fingers touching only the cold surface of the wall. His hand lifted to meet hers. The green flame surrounding his form swelled and consumed him, and as he burned, she saw his face twist, and melt, and re-form.
Lusk stood before her with a tiger’s face.
She jerked her hand away from his. She blinked, and Lusk was gone. It was only her own reflection in the wall, her eyes burning in the pale mask across her face.
She’d laid her sword on the bed, thinking she didn’t need it inside the safety of the Hold. Now she slung it on its accustomed place on her back, and strode out to walk the unfamiliar halls of Jadaren Hold, wondering what bothered her most about her vision-that Lusk was burning, or that he didn’t seem to care.
THE DOCKS, LLORBAUTH, ERLKAZAR
1600-THE YEAR OF UNSEEN ENEMIES
The warehouse roof arched high overhead, supported by thick timbers of hundreds of years’ growth. Small spaces between the timbers exposed only the black night sky overhead.
Sanwar wondered if Saestra’s intention in using and maintaining it was to suggest a royal audience chamber. If so, the shifting of the floor beneath his feet as it floated on its supports and the whiff of the livestock that had
