Slowly, he lowered his hands.
One of the other elves stepped forward, handing the dhaeraowathila a helm filled with blood. The priest held it out. Sorrell glanced down, wondering whose blood it was, then decided it didn't matter.
He dipped the broken ends of the bolt in it then raised them to his face. He touched one to each cheek, just below the eye, and waited. Blood dripped onto his hands, and trickled down his wrists.
'Do you swear to serve Shevarash?' the priest asked.
'I so swear,' Sorrell answered.
'To be his weapon of vengeance against the drow?'
'I so swear.'
'To give no quarter, and to demand none? To carry the fight ever onward and downward? To continue on, until your own death should come?'
Sorrell gave a wry smile. Death would be welcome. A release. 'I so swear.'
'Never again to laugh, never to smile, until the day the last drow lies dead?'
Sorrell's jaw tightened. He could feel a blaze kindling in his own eyes. 'I so swear.'
With a savage yank, he pulled his hands downward, painting twin streaks of red down his cheeks.
Blood tears.
The dhaeraowathila lowered the blood-filled helm and said, 'Then welcome, brother. Welcome to our war.'
Sorrell waited on the veranda that encircled the High Council chamber. Snowflakes blew in through the veranda's latticelike outer wall and swirled around his boots. The floor shifted slightly as the tree branches that supported it bent in the wind. Sorrell's shoulders hunched, but not against the morning's cold. Tension bent him like a strung bow as he silently composed the plea he was about to deliver. His fists clenched. His entreaty had to work. It had to.
After a moment, a door opened. A wood elf with a high forehead framed with graying hair stepped out, shutting the door behind him. His clothes were of green velvet, embroidered with gold; on his right index finger was a gold ring with an enormous carved emerald: a council seal stone.
Sorrell touched his right hand to his heart and bowed low. 'Councilor Relhthorn.'
Hands clasped Sorrell's shoulders and straightened him. The older elf stared at the dried blood on Sorrell's cheeks. One hand shifted slightly, as if to wipe it away, then returned to Sorrell's shoulder. The older elf squeezed Sorrell's shoulders tightly, and for a moment Sorrell thought he was going to be drawn into a hug.
'Sorrell. Welcome home, nephew.' The older elf he took a step back, reestablishing a formal distance. 'What is so urgent that you insisted on interrupting an emergency meeting of the High Council?'
Sorrell's jaw clenched. 'I heard about this morning's attack, Uncle Alcorn. Everyone in the temple was talking about it after the High Council summoned the dhaeraowathila. You're going to send one of the Dark Avenger war bands out.' He touched the handle of his club. 'I want to go with them.'
Alcorn shook his head. 'You're untrained. The war band we're sending won't take you-especially on a mission of such importance. The two attackers came through the portal that joins us to the Yuirwood; somehow, they discovered how to use it. They were part of a scouting party, and must be hunted down before they can return with this information to whatever drow city sent them. If we fail, Cormanthor could face an attack in force-and at the worst possible time.'
Sorrell nodded. After six hundred years of debate, the High Council had finally come to a decision. Cormanthor, like Eaerlann before it, would be abandoned to the encroaching humans. The elves would retreat to Evermeet, a land the humans could never defile. Even then, preparations were being made-preparations that would all be for naught, if the drow attacked in the meantime.
Sorrell squared his shoulders. 'The drow that was killed. I heard…' His voice dropped to a raw whisper. 'They say his fist was blackened with pitch. Is it true?'
It took Alcorn a moment to meet Sorrell's eyes. 'It's true.'
Those two simple words punched into Sorrell like blows, leaving him slightly dizzy. He took a deep breath. 'Uncle, can you not see the hand of Shevarash at work? Midwinter Night, and I am accepted into his faith. The very next morning, there is an attack by the same group of drow who…' He paused, choked down the emotion that clawed at his throat with fingers of ice. 'Please,' he pleaded, his script forgotten. 'This might be my only chance to avenge Dalmara and… and…'
Alcorn's eyes softened. He glanced at the door that led to the High Council chambers, then back at Sorrell. 'I'll see what I can do.'
O
Sorrell returned to the room the Dark Avengers had assigned him. It was sparsely furnished, with only a chest to hold his belongings and a hard wooden bench for Reverie. The walls were of plain stone, bereft of the carvings and paintings that usually decorated an elven dwelling. He sat on the edge of the bench, twisting the leather thong that hung from the grip of his club, wondering if his uncle would follow through on his promise.
The answer came a moment later, when Pendaran, the priest who had initiated Sorrell into Shevarash's faith, opened the door. The dhaeraowathila wore a plain brown cloak and trousers, a contrast to the polished armor he'd worn the night before. The scars on his hands and the gnarled mass of scar tissue where the tip of his left ear had been attested to his many battles. Sorrell had heard that the sun elf had been an officer in Evermeet's cavalry before joining Shevarash's faithful.
Pendaran held a worn pack in his hands. He tossed it onto the bench where Sorrell sat, then folded his arms across his chest. His face and hands were a dull metallic gray, as if his skin had been painted.
Sorrell stared at the pack, realizing what it meant. He nearly smiled, catching himself just in time. 'I'm going?'
Pendaran's wheat-blond eyebrows pulled down into a scowl. 'By order of the High Council, yes.'
Sorrell's heart beat a little faster as he rose to his feet. And so it began-his chance at vengeance. 'You won't be sorry.'
'We'll see.' Pendaran nodded at Sorrell's club. 'I noticed that your weapon is ensorcelled. Do you know how to use it?'
Sorrell lifted his club. Made of black thornwood, it only had a simple haste dweomer placed on it, but Pendaran was right in one respect: Sorrell knew this weapon. He'd spent months learning from the best fighters he could find, and more months smashing massive gnarlwood nuts, imagining each to be a drow head. Practicing hard, until the weapon felt as natural in his hand as a lute Imce had. He could hold the heavy club at arm's length, level with his shoulder, for an entire afternoon without so bnuch as a twinge in his muscles. He was as strong as any warrior-a far cry from the man he had once been. 'I know how to use it,' he assured Pendaran.
The sun elf nodded. 'You'll be joining the Silent Slayers-the band of crusaders that I lead. You'll be club bearer.'
'Shevarash's fifth and final weapon,' Sorrell recited. I'The club Maelat, which he carries together with Shama, his spear, and Ukava, his sling, when he appears in the guise of Elikarashe, as he is called in the songs of the Yuir.' He nodded at the quiver at Pendaran's hip. 'His other two weapons are the Black Bow, and Traitorbane, his sword.'
Pendaran's eyebrows raised slightly. 'For a novice, you already know a lot about our faith.'
'I learned that from a song years ago. Long before-'
'Before the assassins of the Blackened Fist struck,' Pendaran finished for him. 'Your uncle told me why you're here.' His eyes bored into Sorrell's. 'That's why I agreed to take you. Not because of the High Council's orders, but because this is your fight.' He paused. 'You will have to do everything you're told, exactly as you're told, the instant you're told. Understood?'
Sorrell gave a fierce nod. 'Understood.'
Pendaran's eyes blazed. 'We will have our vengeance. The drow have no mercy, and deserve none. They're vermin that kill man, woman and-'
Sorrell blinked in surprise. 'They killed your child?'
'She may as well have been.' Pendaran's mouth ticked with silent emotion. 'Her name was Alfaras. She was a moon-horse. A loyal mount, fierce in battle-until a drow bolt found her heart.'
