power she felt through that mindlink.
How cleverly evil disguised itself, in the flesh of the brightest and most radiant.
'You do,' Leis'anna said with a little curl of her lip.
When the sun elf awoke, it was to a sensation of lightness and warmth. He slowly realized that he lay nude in a wide, soft bed. A warm hand caressed his brow, and he looked up a pale arm to see a dark-haloed lady with pale eyes smiling down at him.
Yldar wondered if it had all been a dream, and whether he was not back in Evermeet.
Then he remembered the cultists, the lair, and Cythara's agonized scream, and he gasped. He realized that the elf maid was Twilight, clad in a simple white shift.
'Worry not,' she said. 'You're safe. I've taken a room at the Axe and Hammer. You're surrounded by a veritable army of battle-hardened dwarves even Elminster'd think twice about. No one shall find us here.'
Yldar half-rose, wincing at the effort, and reached for his tunic on the edge of the bed. Twilight intercepted his arm, leaning between elf and garment. She held his hand between them for a long, quiet breath. Then she pushed him back to the pillows and kicked up out of his reach.
'Stand aside! I have to-'
'Shiny, really. In your delicate condition, you're in no shape to face stairs, much less a cabal of demon- cultists.' Twilight's tone was almost chiding.
'But-'
'I didn't go to all that work to save that gleaming body of yours just to have you get it torn up again.' She looked him up and down and smiled, that wry upturn of the edge of her lips that set Yldar's hairs standing on end with anticipation. 'It's too pretty.'
He elbowed the feeling aside. 'Away from me, traitor!' he snapped. 'You left Cythara to her death!'
'Don't be ridiculous,' Twilight said. 'She's the traitor. She told me enough in the temple: I said, 'The Bracer's not real,' and she leaned in to say, 'I know.' '
'Lies.'
'Naturally, you don't believe me,' said Twilight. 'Fine. Ask me anything-I promise the truth. Nothing less. My word.'
'The word of a thief?' Yldar's voice was sarcastic. 'It will have to do.'
'Very well, then,' he replied. 'For a beginning: what's your name?'
'Fox-at-Twilight, like I told-' 'Your real name,' Yldar corrected. Twilight bit her lip. 'Ask me anything else.' Yldar scowled. 'Very well. Is it true?' 'Is what true?'
'That you work with the demonists. That's why you
' knew they had the Bracer and where to go. Why you knew everything.'
Twilight rolled her eyes. 'I could tell you, but who would you believe? Me, a thief, or your precious sister, who you still think, despite all evidence to the contrary, is a friend?'
'Speak, and we'll see what I think,' Yldar said.
'Fine,' Twilight said. 'Do I work with them? No-perish the thought! Too hung up on power, darkness, and manipulation-not a sense of humor among the whole lot. Bor-tng. Demons. Ever heard a demon lord tell a joke? No? Well, of course, you've never met one, but take my word for it. Graz'zt, Orcus-thoroughly unfunny. The only ones who're worse are the archfiends, Mephistopheles in particular-'
'You're babbling,' Yldar said.
'What? Right,' Twilight said. 'No, I don't work for them. Hardly done anything for them.' She shrugged dismissively. 'Just a little minor work here and there… a theft-nothing serious… maybe something like… I don't know… this.' She revealed the silver Bracer on her right arm. 'Nothing big.'
'You stole Coronal Ynloeth's Bracer in the first place?' Yldar asked. 'From who?'
'Whom,' Twilight corrected. 'No one important… Coronal Ynloeth. Vaporized himself with his swords, you know. Wasn't that a surprise-'Whoop: no Bracer, no protection. Damnation.''
Yldar's face went ashen and his mouth gaped open.
'I jest, I jest,' Twilight said. 'Should've seen your face, though-priceless.' She laughed. 'If such a thing is possible.'
The sun elf swallowed. He sat again and pulled the covers back so he could rise. 'But, but-' He scowled. 'Doing the right thing has no price-your spirit has no price, or did you sell it so long ago for wit and beauty?'
In a flash of motion that would have made any duelist proud, Twilight slapped him. So much for worrying about his delicate condition.
'Easy for you to make judgments,' she said. 'Your black and white morality is a luxury that those of us who didn't grow up in the lap of Evermeet serenity can't quite afford.'
Yldar was about to retort, but she kept on.
'The Realms aren't as simple as you suns think. Your precious Retreat-ha! Escape is more like it. You simply could not bear to see a race that lived more passionately, more fully than yourselves. And so you ran-in fear of the world.'
'B-b-but-' said Yldar, but there was no stopping her.
'Life doesn't fit into your haughty, academic… arithmetic! Humans see farther than you elves, in ways you never imagined. Elves fear the humans because the humans are what elves fear to become-alive, vibrant! They see more to life than just good and evil, honor and duty. They know passion and beauty, real love- spontaneity. I bet you suns don't even-'
This time Yldar was the one to interrupt, and that with a kiss that shocked both of them. Uncharacteristically, Twilight hesitated-she was stunned.
Yldar broke the kiss. 'Sorry,' he said. 'I… I didn't know what I was…'
Pouncing like a tigress, Twilight cut off his next words by locking his lips in a fierce, passionate kiss that left Yldar breathless even as she knocked him tumbling back. He didn't even think of protesting as she crushed him into the feather mattress. The pain of cuts and bruises faded into nothing, overcome by the heat that pulsed through him.
It was like nothing he had ever felt. Yldar had known the love of women before, but never had one pressed against him so hard, so fiercely…
Twilight pulled back, tugging on his lip as she did, and appraised him with lustful eyes. 'After yestereve, I was wondering what it might feel like to do that when you «weren't complaining,' she said in that ironic way of hers. 'And I was right.' She untied her bodice with a flick of the wrist and a single pull of the string.
Then Yldar blinked as rationality tried to return, and whispered half-heartedly, 'But I thought I was in no shape-'
'Shape enough for this,' she said. With a snap, she undid her raven hair, and it tumbled over bare shoulders. Words failed him.
– — Cythara awoke into a place of darkness.
Even her keen elf eyes could not penetrate a thumb's breadth in front of her face. From the rich, muggy air beating on her skin, she knew she was nude. Though she should have been cold, instead all was sweltering and heavy, bringing out a thick sweat that soaked every inch of her skin. She moved to brush her brow, but her hand would not move. She must be chained down, spread-eagled.
Cythara tried to call out, but she realized, with a start, where she was. Blood coursed through her like fire and her lungs pulsed rapidly, tearing air in and out of her body.
She lay upon the altar of Graz'zt.
She had thought all was silent but for the buzzing in her head, but she became aware of a dull beat that was not her heart pounding. It was the beat of a drum, and though she could not see it, somehow she knew the covering was the skin of a sentient creature. Her pulse quickened.
Through sheer will, she calmed herself. This was not a surprise-she had chosen this path, and now she had to walk it.
Then the chanting began.
Deep, low, and haunting, she could hear voices all around her, intoning words of darkness. The language was Abyssal, she knew, but twisted somehow, as though passing through the jet blackness distorted the words.
