vague sense that he had been unconscious for a long time, and he wondered vaguely why he wasn’t dead. The nightshard, though, was pulsing with violet light. He stretched out a hand, bruised and bloody, and touched it.
His mind exploded with thoughts and memories-his own and the other’s. He fell back to the rock floor, his eyes glued to the nightshard, and could no longer determine who he was or how he’d arrived there. A distant voice echoed in the vast cavern above him, but it no longer sounded like anyone he knew.
“Gaven?”
For a moment the hand that was gently shaking him belonged to Rienne. Her head was on his shoulder, her silky black hair spilling across the bed, and they were twenty-five again. Then he woke, and there was Cart, leaning over him like a mother. When the warforged saw Gaven’s eyes open, he straightened up.
“Time to eat.”
Gaven shook his head to clear the dream from his memory, and sat up on the bed. The door stood open, and Darraun was not in the room. Gaven thought he heard voices from across the hall.
“Were you here the whole time I slept?” he asked.
“I was. Your faithful hound,” the warforged said. There was a smile in his voice, though his face wouldn’t allow it.
“Did I say anything while I was sleeping?” Gaven tried to make the question sound casual.
“Who’s Mara?”
“What?”
“I’m joking,” Cart said. “During the war, I knew a man who talked in his sleep. Usually about whatever woman had most recently claimed his heart. We used to give him a hard time.”
Gaven tried hard to imagine the warforged as just one of the men and women in a squad of soldiers. For a moment he saw Cart in battle, an axe raised over his head, strange, cold light glinting on his adamantine plating.
“No, you didn’t say anything,” Cart said, gently hitting Gaven’s shoulder with the back of his hand. “You snore when you sleep on your back, though.”
“Sorry,” Gaven said. Dreadhold had taught him to avoid confrontation, back down, apologize.
“Doesn’t bother me. And Darraun snores louder. Come with me. Haldren’s waiting.” Cart stepped aside and waited for Gaven to get to his feet, then followed him out the door.
Darraun stood in the doorway to Haldren’s room, speaking quietly to the old sorcerer. Gaven could see Senya behind Haldren, buckling her sword belt at her hip. Haldren saw Gaven emerge from the room, and cut Darraun off.
“Ah, Gaven!” he said. “I hope you are well rested. Shall we eat?”
Without waiting for an answer, Haldren swept out of the room and down the stairs. Cart followed Gaven at the rear of their little procession.
Haldren was willing to settle for substandard accommodations for the sake of privacy, but he had extravagant taste in food. He led the way to Whitecliff’s finest restaurant and ordered for everyone.
“It has been almost two years since I have enjoyed a fine meal,” he said, “with all due respect for our friend Darraun’s expertise at the campfire. Gaven, I can barely imagine how starved you must be for such a repast.”
Starved was the wrong word-Gaven couldn’t remember what a fine meal tasted or smelled like. He remembered the smell of the fish on the campfire, though, and his mouth began to water.
When the food came, it was overwhelming. Half a dozen aromatic smells blended together to form something exquisite. He attacked his plate.
“I am pleased to see you enjoying your meal so much, Gaven,” Haldren said. “It is far better than the offerings at our last lodgings, is it not?”
Gaven nodded and took another bite of pheasant.
“Pheasant can be both dry and dull in the wrong hands,” Haldren said, addressing the table at large. “But when prepared by my good friend Marras, it is never either.” He gestured toward the kitchen. “So, Gaven, how was your sleep?”
Haldren clearly hoped that the good food would help to draw him out. Gaven chewed slowly, considering how to respond, then swallowed and said, “Not so different than Dreadhold.”
“Ah, yes,” the sorcerer said, his voice hushed. “Probably best not to mention our last lodgings by name, don’t you think? Wouldn’t want to attract any undue attention.”
Gaven looked around. His eyes met those of a dwarf who quickly looked away. The pheasant suddenly did not taste so exquisite.
“Did you have pleasant dreams?” Haldren leaned forward as he asked it.
“No.” For an instant, Gaven remembered his dream about Rienne, but then darker images flashed into his mind.
“What did you see, Gaven?”
Gaven’s eyes fixed on the old man’s mouth, just as he had seen it through the shutters in their doors in Dreadhold. A dribble of pear-cider sauce stained Haldren’s white beard.
“I don’t really remember.”
Haldren exploded. “Damn you, Gaven, don’t get coy now!” His voice was a rasping whisper, barely able to contain his fury. “I brought you out of that place because of the information locked away in that twisted little brain of yours. If you suddenly get clever and decide to start withholding information, I’ll send you back there-or off to Dolurrh. Don’t think for a second that I won’t kill you if you stop being useful.”
Gaven glanced around the table. Senya studied her plate while Cart peered around them to see if Haldren’s outburst had attracted the attention of nearby patrons. Darraun watched the two of them with unconcealed fascination.
Gaven took a bite of his squash.
Clearly convinced that he was dealing with an idiot or a madman, Haldren brought his anger under control-to Senya’s visible relief-and tried a different approach. He made his voice light, conversational, and he lowered his eyes to his plate as he spoke.
“Did you see the hordes of the Soul Reaver again, Gaven?”
Writhing tentacles in the darkness, a blinding beam of light stretching up to the sky. Gaven tried to remember his dream about Rienne and found that he couldn’t. Her hair became a mass of writhing snakes, reaching for him.
“No,” he said.
Haldren saw his unease and pounced. “What is it, Gaven? You remember something else?”
“The Soul Reaver itself,” Gaven said, as if in a trance. Haldren leaned forward in his chair. “Falling or flying down from a great height, sinking into a chasm as deep as the bones of Khyber. Endless dark beneath the bridge of light. There the Soul Reaver waits.”
Besides Haldren, who wore a look of smug satisfaction, the other three stared at Gaven with varying degrees of surprise. Senya might have been awed-her mouth was partly open, and her eyes wide. Darraun smiled, but there was something else in his expression that Gaven couldn’t read. And Cart’s face, of course, was a mask, but he rubbed his chin in a way that looked thoughtful.
Well enough, Gaven thought, let Haldren think he won this one.
Better that than to reveal what he had really dreamed.
CHAPTER 5
The meal finished, Darraun took charge of Gaven and Cart.
“The three of us need to stock up on supplies for our little jaunt to Aerenal and wherever else Haldren’s magic takes us,” he explained to Gaven as they left the restaurant. “Haldren and Senya are going to try to make contact with some people in Aundair who will be helping us later.”
“Helping us do what?” Gaven said.
Darraun arched an eyebrow at Gaven. That was the first time he’d heard the half-elf ask a question, and he
