Windwalker

Prelude

In many a Waterdeep tavern, ballads are sung of an ancient city doomed by the evil of its inhabitants. According to the tale, the city was swallowed by rock and sea, and the gods raised a vast headstone to mark its grave.

Most of the revelers who join in drunken refrain have no idea they’re drinking in the shadow of this "headstone," which is in fact Mount Waterdeep. Few realize that the city of Skullport lies directly beneath them, and that it is far from dead.  Its streets and shanties sprawl untidily through a series of enormous stone caverns, and surrounding networks of tunnels delve throughout the northlands and under the sea itself.

In a time not long past, in a remote corner of one of these warrens, a dark figure floated along the ceiling of a narrow stone passage. His innate drow magic kept him aloft, well above the magical wards and alarms that would betray his approach. He pulled himself from one jagged handhold to the next, moving carefully toward the moment that had filled his dreams since the day he’d first met Liriel Baenre.

Gorlist, the warrior son of the wizard Nisstyre and second in command of the mercenary band Dragon’s Hoard, struggled to tune out the alluring clash of weapons echoing through nearby stone corridors as drow fought drow. The enemy whose death he desired above all others would not be among the sword-wielding priestesses of Eilistraee.

A warning heat began to kindle in the drow’s left cheek. He slapped a hand over the dragon-shaped tattoo emblazoned there with magical ink -- a talisman that warned of nearby dragons and named with faint, colored light the creature’s kind and nature. No telltale glow spilled through his fingers. There was a dragon ahead, but a deep dragon, a creature of darkness.

The drow scowled. Of course that would be Pharx, for what deep dragon would allow an interloper so close to its lair? Pharx was a powerful ally; any battle the dragon joined would be short and decisive. Victory was important, of course, but Gorlist had his own vengeance to consider.

With an impatient flick of his ebony fingers, Gorlist dispelled the levitation magic holding him aloft. He swooped toward the tunnel floor like a descending raven and hit the stone floor at a run. The time for secrecy and stealth was past.

Gorlist raced toward his father’s hidden sanctum, leaving in his wake blinding explosions of magical lights and alarms that keened like vengeful banshees. The wall ahead shifted, and a ten-foot, two-headed ettin broke away from the stone. The monster rose up before him, blocking the passage with menacing bulk and a spiked club. Gorlist ran through the utterly convincing illusion as easily as a pixie might flit through a rainbow.

The tunnel traced a curve and then ended abruptly in solid stone. Gorlist sped around the tight turn and hurled himself at the wall, leaping high into the air and snapping both feet out in a powerful double kick. The "stone" gave way, and he crashed through the hidden door.

Wood shattered, and spellbooks tumbled to the floor as the concealing bookshelf gave way. Gorlist rolled quickly and came up in a crouch, a long dagger in each hand. With a swift, practiced glance he took in the small battlefield.

His father’s chamber was empty.

It was also a disaster. Cracks slithered up the stone walls. Artwork hung askew or lay broken on the mosaic floor, which had buckled and heaved until it was little more than a pile of rubble. Part of the ceiling had given way, and chunks of it lay in heaps against one wall. Dust still rose from the recent stonefall, and water released from some tiny, hidden stream overhead dripped steadily onto the rubble.

Gorlist nodded, understanding what had happened. As he’d anticipated, Liriel Baenre had come to reclaim the magical artifact Nisstyre had taken from her. The wizard had responded with a tiny, conjured quake – a canny move on Nisstyre’s part. There were few things the people of the Underdark feared more than a stonefall tremor. It had sent the troublesome wench scurrying out into the open – and to a place that offered Nisstyre every possible advantage.

Bloodlust sang in the warrior’s veins as he picked his way through the ruined chamber and sprinted down a tunnel leading to the hoard room cavern. Pharx would be there, ready to protect his treasure. Surely this was the battlefield Nisstyre would choose!

Gorlist was nearly there when a shriek of terrible anguish seared through the air. Without slowing his pace, he seized the flying folds of his cape and drew the magical garment around him in a shield of invisibility.

He burst onto a walkway encircling the vast cavern, squinting into the bright torchlight – or so it seemed to his sensitive drow eyes – that filled the hoard room with flickering shadows. Pharx’s lair was dominated by an enormous heap of gold and gems. The hoard glittered in the light of several smoking torches thrust into wall brackets. The object of Gorlist’s deepest hatred climbed this pile, moving with a dancer’s grace over the shifting treasure.

Liriel no longer looked the part of a pampered Menzoberranzan noble. The erstwhile drow princess was clad in simple black leathers, and the sword on her hip was undistinguished by artistry or magic. Her elaborate braids had been loosed, and thick wavy hair tumbled down her back like a wild, whitewater stream. Gorlist could not see her face, but it was emblazoned in his mind: the patrician tilt of her small, stubborn chin, the cat-like amber hue of her scornful gaze. For a moment Gorlist could see nothing but Liriel, and his thoughts held nothing but hatred.

Then his sharp eyes caught an anomaly: a smooth wash of gold amid the jumbled treasure. Beneath the acrid dragon musk lay the stench of burned flesh — a not uncommon scent in a dragon’s lair, but under the circumstances, ominous. Shock and fury clenched at Gorlist’s throat as he caught sight of the dying drow embedded up to his chest in cooling, molten gold.

There was no mistaking Nisstyre, despite the ravages of a heat so furious it could melt coin as if it were butter. A large, glowing ruby was embedded in the seared forehead, and its magical light dimmed with the swift ebbing of the wizard’s life force.

Liriel plucked the gem from Nisstyre’s forehead and gazed into it like a seer contemplating a scrying stone – which, in fact, the ruby truly was. She greeted the unseen watcher with a smile such as a queen might give a vanquished rival, or a hunting cat use to taunt its prey.

"You lose," she said.

Crimson light flared as if in sudden temper, and then abruptly died. Liriel tossed the lifeless stone aside and half-ran, half-slid down the pile toward the dragon-shaped shadow edging into view against the far wall.

So do you, Gorlist silently retorted, pushing aside his disappointment that the female’s much-deserved death would not come at his hands.

Then the dragon staggered into the cavern, and Gorlist’s lips shaped a silent, blasphemous curse. It was not Pharx after all, but a smaller, stranger creature: a two-headed purple female. Obviously the dragon had seen battle, and her presence indicated that she had prevailed over Pharx -- but not without price. From his position, Gorlist could see the deep acid burns scoring the female’s back.

But Liriel could not see the wounds, and she greeted the dragon with a fierce smile. They exchanged a few words that Gorlist could not hear. The dragon seemed about to say more, but its left head finally succumbed to injury. Enormous reptilian eyes rolled up, and the head flopped forward, limp and lifeless.

For a moment the right head regarded the demise of its counterpart. "I was afraid of that," the half-dragon said clearly, and then the second head crashed face-first into Pharx’s treasure.

Liriel threw herself to her knees and gathered the dragon’s left head in her arms. "Damn it, Zip," she said in tones ringing with grief and loss.

The right head stirred, lifted. "A word of advice: Don’t trust that human of yours. An utter fool! He offered to follow me into Pharx’s lair and help in battle if needed. In return, he asked only that I kill him if he raised a sword against any of Qilué’s drow. Best deal I was ever offered."

The dragon turned aside, and her fading eyes held a conspiratorial gleam. "You’re on your own now."

Gorlist followed the direction of the dragon’s gaze, and his crimson eyes narrowed. A young human male strode swiftly toward Liriel, his black sword naked in his hand and his concern-filled gaze fixed upon the mourning drow.

"He lives," Gorlist muttered flatly, disgusted at himself and Nisstyre for allowing the human’s survival. When last they’d seen this man, he had been sprawled beside a dying campfire, pale and silent. The drow mercenaries had seen only what Liriel had wanted them to see: the distraction offered by her unclad body, and the lie of her pet human’s "death." The truth had hidden behind the dark elves’ fascination with the deadly game – known among drow as the "Spider’s Kiss" in honor of the female spider who mated and killed – that Liriel had tacitly invited them to contemplate. Gorlist granted the quick-thinking female and her devious little ploy a moment’s grudging admiration.

But all Liriel’s cunning seemed to have vanished with the dragon’s death. She cradled the enormous purple head in her lap, rocking it tenderly, all but oblivious to the crescendo of approaching battle.

The drow warrior sneered. So there it was: the princess’s weakness. If the loss of a dragon could so distract her, imagine her state when her human friend lay dead at her feet!

Anticipation sped Gorlist’s steps as he unsheathed his sword and crept, silent and invisible, toward the unwitting pair. Liriel gently put aside the dragon and rose. She jolted back as she found herself nearly face to face with her human companion. Her astonishment turned to rage, lightning quick, and in full drow fury she hurled herself at the man, pushing him toward one of the exit tunnels.

"Get out of here!" she screamed. "Stupid, stubborn. . . human!"

But the young man easily removed himself from Liriel’s grasp and turned toward the main tunnel. The clamor of swords announced that battle was almost upon them.

"It is too late," he said in bleak tones. As he spoke, magical energy crackled in a nimbus around him – an aura faintly visible to the magic-sensitive eyes of the watching drow warrior. Before Gorlist could blink, the human began to take on height and power.

The drow caught his breath. Once before he had seen this rather common-looking young man transform into a mighty berserker warrior. He remembered little of the battle that had followed, for the memory had been seared away by the healing potions that had brought him back from defeat and near-death.

No fighter, neither human nor elven nor even drow, had ever before bested Gorlist with a sword. For a moment he burned to erase this insult in open combat.

Then Liriel brandished a familiar gold amulet – the Windwalker, the artifact that Nisstyre had considered so important. She snatched a battered flask from the human’s belt, pulled the cork free with her teeth, and tipped the flask slowly over the golden trinket.

Shock froze Gorlist in mid-step. Nisstyre had coveted the Windwalker for its ability to hold strange and powerful magic. With the help of this treasure, Liriel had brought her undiminished drow powers to the surface, something few drow had been able to accomplish. Yet she was willing to throw away her dark elven spells, so that the magical fires of this human’s kindling berserker rage would not consume him.

It was unbelievable, unconscionable! What drow would willingly surrender such an advantage?

For a moment Gorlist was truly torn. He yearned to reveal himself, to defeat the human, to savor the pain the man’s death would inflict upon Liriel. Then the human began to sing in a deep bass voice. Gorlist could not understand the words, but he sensed the power of ritual behind the song.

Any delay would put his main prize at risk. Better to dispatch the male quickly and savor the second, more important kill. Still shrouded with invisibility, Gorlist darted forward, his sword high.

The human’s transformation ended with a surge of magical growth, one so sudden and powerful that it sent him stumbling forward. The stroke that should have cleaved his skull dealt only a glancing blow. But Gorlist noted the swift flow of blood, and knew that, unchecked, it would suffice.

The ritual song stopped abruptly, but the man’s fall was slow, astonished, like the death of a lightning-struck tree. Liriel caught him in her arms, staggering under his weight. With difficulty she eased him to the ground. A small cry escaped her when she noted the white flash of bone gleaming through the garish cut.

Gorlist flipped back his cape, revealing himself and his bloodied sword. "Your turn," he said with deep satisfaction.

Liriel froze. The eyes she lifted to him were utterly flat and cold, as full of icy hatred as only a drow’s could be. In them was no grief, no loss, no pain. For a moment Gorlist knew disappointment.

"Hand to hand," she snarled.

He nodded, unable to contain his smirk of delight. Obviously the princess was not as unaffected as she pretended to be. If her heart had been untouched and her head clear, she would have never agreed to face a superior fighter with nothing more to aid her than steel and sinew!

The stupid female closed the Windwalker, locking away whatever magical advantage she might have taken. She rose and pulled a long dagger from her belt.

They crossed blades. The strength of Liriel’s first blow surprised Gorlist – and unleashed a wellspring of fury.

He slashed and pounded at her, raining potential death blows in rapid, ringing succession. Gone was his yearning for a slow death, a lingering vengeance.

But the princess had learned something of the warrior’s art since their last meeting. She was as fast as he, and skilled enough to turn aside each killing stroke. But her strength was no match for his, and Gorlist drove her steadily, inexorably, toward the cavern wall. He would pin her to it, quite literally, and leave her there to rot.

Through the haze of his battle rage, Gorlist noted the tall, preternaturally beautiful drow running lightly along the far edge of the cavern. Qilué of Eilistraee had arrived, and fast behind her came a band of armed priestesses! His victory must come quickly, or not at all.

But the newcomers paid little heed to the furious duel. Lofting a silvery chorus of singing swords, they rushed to meet the mercenaries that yet another band of females herded into the open cavern.

Liriel had also noted her allies’ arrival. She made a quick, impulsive rush toward them, in her relief forgetting the uneven floor. She tripped over a jeweled cup, stumbled to one knee. Gorlist lunged, his sword diving for her heart.

But Liriel was faster still. She rose swiftly into the air, and the warrior, deprived of his target, found himself momentarily off balance. Before he could adjust, she spun like a dervish and lashed out with one booted foot.

To his astonishment, Gorlist felt himself falling. The floor of the hoard room seemed to drop away, throwing him into a maelstrom of faint, whirling lights and magical winds.

Before his heart could pick up the beat stolen by shock and rage, he was flung out into cold, dark water. He fought off the urge to take a startled breath and swam doggedly for the surface.

It was all too clear what had happened. Eilistraee’s priestesses had killed some of his fellow mercenaries and stolen the medallions that granted magical transport to the tunnels surrounding the hidden stronghold. Judging from the number of females in the hoard room, Gorlist had lost at least thirty fighters. Most of them had been aboard ship and ready to set sail. Worse yet, Liriel knew of this plan, and knew just where to find the hidden magical gate. Her "retreat" from his assault had been calculated, every step and stumble of it! The knowledge of this pained Gorlist nearly as much as the burning of his air-starved lungs.

Gorlist burst free of the water and dragged in several long, ragged gulps of air. He dashed the back of one hand across his eyes, then squinted toward the bright light of battle.

The situation was grim. A small crowd of drow children – valuable slaves bound for a dark elven city far to the south – huddled together on the dock. Their wary, watchful red eyes reflected the light of the burning slave ship.

Gorlist’s second ship was still intact, but that was the best he could say for it. His minotaur boatswain slumped over the rail, its broad, brown-furred back bristling with arrows. The crow’s nest flamed like a candle. The drow archer stationed there had tried to leap free and had become entangled in the rat lines. His garish crimson leathers identified him as Ubergrail, the best archer in the Dragon’s Hoard. He hung there, slain by his own crimson arrows – Qilué was known for her disturbing sense of justice – and looking like a bright insect caught in Lolth’s web. Other, nameless dark shapes bobbed in the water around Gorlist, giving silent testament to his band’s defeat.

But a few males still stood and fought. Heartened, Gorlist swam steadily for the ship. He pulled himself up one of the lines leading to the rail, one that would place him nearest the fighting.

When he neared the top, he summoned a burst of levitation magic to speed his way. He shot up over the rail. Dispelling the magic, he dropped to the deck in a crouch, close to a comrade’s side.

As he rose, the "comrade" whirled toward him. A black fist flashed toward Gorlist’s face and connected with a force that snapped his head to one side. He instinctively moved with the blow, using the momentum. Drawing his sword as he turned, he blinked away the stars that danced mockingly before his eyes.

When his vision cleared, he beheld his opponent – a tall, silver-haired drow male who crouched in guard position, waiting for Gorlist to gather himself for battle. The stranger’s foolish chivalry and silvery hair proclaimed him a follower of the hated goddess Eilistraee.

Gorlist’s lip curled in a sneer, and he made a contemptuous beckoning gesture with one hand. The silver-haired drow lifted his sword in challenge, shouting, "For the Dark Maiden, and our lady Qilué!"

The mercenary fisted his beckoning hand and twisted it palm down, releasing a dart hidden in his forearm sheath. Immediately his opponent shifted his sword to deflect the projectile. It exploded on impact, sending a slick of viscous black liquid skimming over the blade.

In less than a heartbeat, the metal of sword and hilt melted and flowed into a steaming, lethal puddle – too quickly for the drow defender to understand his doom, or to toss aside his blade. Flesh and bone dissolved along with the molten steel, and the drow stumbled back, staring in disbelief at the ragged shards of bone protruding from his wrist. His back hit the aft mast hard and he started to slide down it.

Immediately Gorlist lunged forward and thrust his sword between two ribs – not deep enough to kill, but enough to hold the wounded drow upright. His victim didn’t seem to notice this new injury.

"Look at me," Gorlist demanded softly.

Stunned eyes flashed to his face.

"Isn’t it enough that we must answer to the females of Menzoberranzan and their accursed Lolth? What male would cast off this yoke, only to worship Eilistraee?"

"Elkantar," the drow said in a rapidly fading voice. "I am Elkantar, redeemed by Eilistraee, beloved of Qilué."

These words filled Gorlist with fierce joy. He slammed his sword forward, felt it bite into the wooden mast behind the traitorous male, then wrenched it free.

"That was a rhetorical question," he told the dying drow, "but thank you for sharing."

"You! Drider dung!" shouted someone behind him, delivering the insult in strangely accented Drow.

Gorlist’s moment of dark pleasure shattered. He spun to face the speaker, who strode toward him, a sword gripped in her left hand. The warrior was furious, female and—as if those things were not trouble enough—fairy.

Gorlist might have notions foreign to most of his Underdark kin, but he shared in full measure their hatred of surface elves. This particular fairy elf was tall, with moon-white skin and sleek ebony hair – a bizarre reversal of drow beauty. A streak of silver hair, the mark of Eilistraee, hung in a disheveled braid over one mail-covered shoulder.

Gorlist ran a few steps toward the female. He stopped suddenly, letting her close the distance between them, then delivered a high feinting jab. She ducked and answered with a lunging attack, a quick move that sent her silvery braid swinging forward. Gorlist parried the darting sword with a rising circular sweep of his blade, catching her weapon and moving it out wide. Reached under the enjoined swords, he seized the fairy elf’s braid, determined to rip it from her scalp.

A dagger appeared in the elf’s right hand. Up it flashed, severing a few inches of braided hair. The lock in Gorlist’s hand flared with sudden light, and then flowed into a new and deadly shape. Suddenly he was holding a small viper. Its tongue flashed like miniature lightning as it tasted the drow’s scent, and its head reared back for the strike.

Gorlist hurled the tiny monster to the deck. It landed with a splat, breaking apart into a hundred tiny silver balls. These rolled together and reshaped into a tiny dragon. The diminutive monster hissed and leaped into flight, hurtling straight for the tattoo burning silver-bright on Gorlist’s face.

The drow refused to be drawn by either distraction. He kept his sword in guard position, swatting the little dragon aside with his free hand. The thing let out an indignant soprano squawk and flapped out of reach.

Gorlist and the elf exchanged a few blows, taking each other’s measure, testing defenses. The female was tall – nearly a head taller than he, with a reach that exceeded his. Worse, she seemed to understand the ever-shifting patterns of drow swordplay. She met each attack with a casual, almost contemptuous ease. For several moments they moved together in perfect coordination, like light and shadow. All the while the silvery dragon circled them like a seabird following a fish-laden ship.

Suddenly the dragon faded into mist, which expanded into a bright, hazy cloud. This settled down over the embattled pair – a deliberate and mocking reversal of the globe of darkness that drow often employed in battle. The last thing Gorlist saw with any clarity was the smirk on the fairy elf’s face.

He squinted into the too-bright mist. The elf’s outline was still visible, and her sword reflected the defused light as it swooped toward his hamstring. Gorlist leaped high above the blade, throwing himself into a spin to gain distance from the second, third and fourth attack that any drow would surely have planned and ready.

This impulse saved him: a second, unseen weapon scraped along his leather jerkin, and the stroke that would have disemboweled him merely drew a stinging line across his backside.

Gorlist landed and lunged in one quick, fluid movement. But his sword plunged through shadow without substance – the elf was gone, leaving an illusion behind. He overextended, but instead of adjusting his footing, he threw himself several steps forward in hope of outpacing the bright globe. His abysmal luck held: the Lolth-spawned light clung to him.

Suddenly a dark form appeared in his path. Gorlist pulled up short, nearly toe-to-toe with one of his own mercenaries. Instantly they fell apart, snapping into guard position with mirror-image precision. The mercenary’s eyes widened with horror as he realized he faced his commander. He lowered his weapon and immediately dropped to one knee, baring his neck as a sign of submission.

Gorlist also turned away. Holding his sword with both hands, he whirled back, putting all his strength into the blow. The blade hewed through flesh and bone, and the mercenary’s head tumbled across the deck. Before the body could fall, Gorlist snatched the medallion from the severed neck.

"Surrender accepted," he muttered as he draped the medallion around his own neck.

He bolted for the side of the ship and vaulted over the rail. The fairy’s globe followed him all the way to the water. He dropped into the wonderful darkness and was instantly swept into the magical passage.

Gorlist emerged in a familiar stone tunnel and immediately kicked into a run. The ships were lost, but perhaps the mercenaries he’d left behind were faring better.

He ran through several passages before he heard the song: a jubilant paean to Eilistraee voiced by Qilué’s priestesses.

Fury surged through him, speeding his steps into a headlong sprint. But even as he ran, Gorlist acknowledged the truth:

The Dragon’s Hoard band was defeated. He was alone, without resources or allies. Everything Nisstyre had built over years of effort was gone.

Or nearly everything.

Gorlist veered off into a side passage, one that led to his own private stash. It would provide a new start. One way or another, Liriel Baenre would die. He would leave no means untested, scorn no alliance – no alliance, no matter how deadly or distasteful.

Suddenly Gorlist knew what he must do. As soon as he could, he would return to the hoard chamber. He would find Nisstyre’s ruby, and then he would seek out someone who hated Liriel nearly as much as he did. . .

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