Chenowyn leapt to bar his path, holding her knife both-handed before her.
The Sword-Master twitched Crackletongue back and forth. The blade hummed with energy. 'Get her out of my way,' he said. 'You know what I can do to her.'
'Chen,' Zaranda said, 'no. This is between him and me. You can't fight him.'
The girl stepped back and lowered her arms to her sides. Then she drew herself to her full height and took a deep breath. The air around her wavered, and her eyes began to glow red.
'Chen?'
Shaveli cocked an eyebrow at the redhead. 'Interesting. Are you trying to muster some magic against me, wench?' He jerked a thumb up over his shoulder. 'Not wise.'
The half-score of guardsmen aimed drawn bows at Chen from the steps. 'Any spell she casts at me,' Shaveli told Zaranda, 'will make her spring many leaks. Can't you clear the amateurs from underfoot? I'll give you a fighting chance.'
'Chenowyn, please,' begged Zaranda, who had never seen the girl's eyes actually glow before. 'He's right. Whatever wild talent you can muster now will only get you killed without helping me. Stand back and let me dispose of this filth.'
Chen's red hair stood up from her neck. Yellow sparks played through it. Then she slumped, and the fires died from her eyes and the lightning from her hair.
She drew back from between the two.
Shaveli laughed. 'Bold words from one who so recently submitted to my caresses.'
'Don't flatter yourself, Shaveli. A man who has to let a whip do his fondling for him is less than half a man, no matter how big a blade he swings.'
Shaveli snarled and thrust forward in a long, liquid lunge. Zaranda danced aside, whipping out long sword and parrying dagger. Shaveli stamped his boot, cried, 'Ha!' and aimed a lightning wrist cut at Zaranda's temple. She barely got her own sword in the way; sparks from Crackletongue's blade showered her, lodged in her hair, and made wisps of stinking smoke.
'A noble blade you carried, Countess,' the Sword-Master said. 'Too much so for the likes of you.'
He flicked the blade at her face. She threw the long sword upward to parry. Crackletongue whipped round and scored a deep gash transverse down her right thigh.
He came on, magic blade weaving a tracery of light before him. With all her skill and speed, Zaranda managed to keep the stolen blade from her vitals, though it pinked her time and again, making her sword arm run with slippery blood, opening a cut in her right cheek. She was handicapped by the knowledge that she dared not allow Crackletongue to take her blade edge-on; fine though the weapon Duke Hembreon had lent her was, its steel could not withstand the magic saber's bite.
He maneuvered her until she stood with her back to the lava river. Then he pressed, stamping and shouting, cutting and thrusting. When she felt heat that threatened to burn through the backs of her trouser legs, he feinted high and then slid forward, thrusting for her belly.
Crackletongue's tip jabbed to within an inch of her skin, but she managed to hack it aside. The shining sword looped around and, with a ringing clang, lopped off her blade a handspan from the hilt.
Shaveli saluted her with a flourish of the magic sword. 'So, Countess, shall we dance? Or will you take another step back? The lava is kinder, I promise you.'
She threw the ruined sword at his face.
He caught it effortlessly with his left hand. She jumped at him, grabbed his sword wrist, and plunged her parrying dagger hilt-deep into his belly.
'Yes,' she hissed into his pain-contorted face. 'Let's dance.'
His lips peeled back from bloody teeth. The dance has just begun,' he gritted. He reached across himself with his left hand, grabbed the wrist of the hand that held the dagger, and forced the blade back out of his body.
Zaranda felt her wrist being turned until the dagger pointed at her own body. She was taller than the Sword-Master, but his strength was greater than hers. Inexorably the dagger point was forced toward her flesh.
Sorceress and swordswoman as she was, Zaranda had' found little time in life to study unarmed combat. Still, in her travels, she had gleaned a trick or two from the hand-fighting arts of distant Kozakura.
The dagger tip touched her stomach beneath her breastplate's lower edge. Shaveli smiled a ghastly smile and pushed harder.
In grappling the Sword-Master, Zaranda had moved several feet away from the lava. Now she shifted her left-hand grip from the man's wrist to Crackletongue's hilt and cast herself onto her back. Her not-inconsiderable weight drew the Sword-Master along. As he fell onto her, she put a boot in his stomach. Then she pulled with her arms and pushed with her long, strong leg.
Shaveli flew over her head. She twisted Crackle-tongue from his grasp as he passed. With a despairing wail, he pitched headfirst into the lava.
Zaranda rolled over and sat up. 'At last,' she said, 'you've found yourself a willing embrace.'
Something moaned past her ear and went into the lava three feet in front of her. She gasped as molten-stone droplets seared her cheek. The bowmen on the steps above were drawing bead on her.
One screamed and pitched forward off the stair. He landed with a whump on the stone beside the lava and lay still. An arrow jutted from his back.
His comrades turned to stare upward. Zaranda's gaze followed. 'Stillhawk!'
The ranger stood at the top of the stair, legs braced, a short bow in hand. He plucked an arrow from his breast, nocked, drew in one smooth motion, and shot a second guardsman through the forehead.
The blue-and-bronzes cried out in consternation. Some shot back, others forsook bows for blades and ran up the stairs. None had any attention to spare for Zaranda and Chen; shooting with almost elven speed and accuracy, Stillhawk could drop them all unless they found a way to deal with him.
The women ran toward the doorway, piled through it, and came up short.
It was a great round bubble of a cave, ill lit by a smattering of torches in sconces hammered into the rough walls. By the far wall rose a glittering mound of treasure: gems, jewels, golden idols with gemstone eyes, a seeming infinitude of coins-silver, platinum, gold. Lying in the midst of the wealth, as in a nest, was a mass of glistening gray flesh almost thirty feet around.
From the mass protruded things-beings. Duergar, drow, orcs, humans-they seemed to grow from the substance of the thing. Some showed as no more than bumps on the surface; others were all but fully formed. Three tentacles, each as thick around as Shield's torso, reared from the obscene bulk, bearing great-toothed jaws. Three eyes mounted on impossibly delicate stalks weaved above the mass.
'What is it?' Chenowyn asked.
'A deepspawn,' Zaranda said. 'I should have suspected.'
Near the mound crouched Tatrina, her eyes red from weeping. Her cheeks bled where her nails had gouged them. She appeared quite bereft of reason.
'Where's Faneuil?' Zaranda asked.
Something erupted from the horror's flank. Zaranda jumped back, raising her weapons defensively-for all the good they'd do against a creature that huge.
Slime sloughed away from the writhing thing. It was the upper half of Faneuil I, king of Tethyr. The head still bore its modest crown.
The man spat filth and craned to look at the newcomers. 'Zaranda!' he croaked. 'Help me!'
He stiffened. Tension seemed to flow from him. A blissful smile crossed his face.
'Welcome,' he said-and his voice was the Voice from Zaranda's dreams, dry as desert wind stirring sand. 'I've waited a long time for you, Zaranda Star.'
'What in hell are you?' Zaranda asked.
'Not in hell, but in your world. I am lord-to-be of Faerun. I am L'yafv-Afvonn.'
Chen wrung her hands convulsively before her breast. 'What is that thing? What's going on?'
'It's a monster called a deepspawn,' Zaranda said. 'It loves to feed on intelligent prey. And anything it eats, it can duplicate from its own flesh. A perfect copy of the original in every way-except that it exists only to serve its creator's will.'
She shook her head. 'I should have seen it before. Here's where the darklings came from. And the All-
