Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

A night wind, funneled into a gale by the surrounding hills, howled down the dry canyons to tear at their clothes and sting their eyes, filling the air with a choking haze of sand. The latter, at least, was of little concern to one who did not need to breathe except to speak.

But the heated conversation taking place between their Bedine guides was disconcerting.

“What is he saying?” Gale shouted over the gusts.

Their translator shook her head. “That he will go no further. That these are cursed lands, haunted by shades, and that this wind is their sending.”

“Shades? You mean Shadovar?” Just hearing him speak that fell name was enough for some among the nomads to make a sign against evil. It wouldn't help his cause if Gale chose this moment to chasten them for their superstition. “Netheril's flying cities are ancient history, Thultanthar included. Meanwhile, we need to seek shelter from the sun before it rises. We can't count on tents to hold in this weather. You might remind him we're paying him a king's ransom for that.”

“Little good your gold does after that trouble with the bandits.”

“Those Zhents would have slit your throats,” Astarion decided it was time he stepped in, “and taken your animals for their pots. Not that there's much meat on them. I did you all a favor.”

But even he knew that was not the persuasive argument it should have been. It wasn't that he'd killed some Zhentarim agents the night before—they'd all spilled a little Zhentarim blood that night—but how he'd killed one in particular and what he'd done with the blood. The Bedine hadn't trusted their charges since. They'd taken greater care to watch Astarion around their camels.

After a little more conferring in the local tongue, the leader of the nomad band waved his hands to signal the discussion was over, his word final. Leaving the beleaguered translator to deliver the bad news.

“He will not take you to the valley you seek. But he says he will not stop you, either, if you are in such a hurry to die there.” That she delivered with an exasperated shrug. His words, not hers. “It is less than a day's journey up the canyon from here.”

“A day's journey is no good to us. We need shelter now,” Gale insisted.

With one last long glance at the nomad leader, the translator nodded. “I know a place. Let me mark it on your map. But I hope you are not a squeamish bunch. It is a tomb.”

“Then I should feel right at home,” Astarion said, tipping his head to the woman in thanks.

While Gale received her directions, Astarion began stripping their gear off the camels. “Come on,” he told Arabella, “we're going on foot from here. Say your good-byes to your pungent friends.”

“Aw, do I have to?” Over the last several days, the girl had become quite fond of their camels, and they of her. Knowing Arabella, Astarion couldn't entirely chalk that up to her using her magic to listen patiently to their grievances (which were many, by the sound of things). She had a soft spot in her heart for creatures most people thought too smelly or surly to love.

Her glowing orange stare pleaded with him over her face wrappings. “You sure we can't just bring one with us?”

Arabella's camel grunted under her gentle stroking, and stared at Astarion with its big dark, wet eyes—not unlike Gale's, come to think of it—as though seconding her motion.

“They're not ours to take,” Astarion reminded her. Besides, it would break her heart if anything befell the creature and they had to butcher its scrawny carcass for their supper. “Anyway, I'm not sure Lumpy here,” as Arabella had dubbed her mount, “will fit where we're going.”

When they were ready, what gear wouldn't go into their bag of holding strapped to their backs, their translator led them up a small hillock of old rock falls and pebbly earth, dug in with dessicated scrub brush and pincushion cactuses.

Halfway to the crest, she stopped, and pointed toward the foot of the canyon wall. “The entrance is narrow and easy to miss in the dark, but in the first rays of the sun—”

“No need for that,” Astarion assured her, “the girl and I can find it just fine.”

Their translator nodded in understanding. Though only her eyes were visible to them, she seemed sincere and even sorry when she wished them luck. Then she hastened down the hill to rejoin the other Bedine before they decided to leave this dread place without her.

As the three drew ever closer to the wall of the canyon, the myriad holes that dotted the rocky face grew more visible. Naturally eroded depressions hollowed out further, no doubt, by nesting birds and less savory creatures over the millennia. The tomb entrance could almost have been mistaken for the den of some wild beast itself. Gale did not argue when Astarion insisted he enter first, deferring to Astarion's keen blades and keener senses.

When they were satisfied the chamber inside was uninhabited—a few whip-legged cave spiders notwithstanding—they lightened themselves of their loads and unwrapped their faces. Shook a few pints of sand from their clothes. The wind continued to whistle outside, but here the dry and stale air was blessedly grit-free. Arabella conjured a flame above her right hand, as even with the help of a spell Gale's darkvision left something to be desired.

A satisfied grin tugged at Astarion's lips as he looked around himself. “This will do nicely.”

The cavern was rough-hewn. Or perhaps time and the elements had softened its hard corners. The ceiling was high enough an ogre would have no trouble standing in it, and long rectangular alcoves in the walls bore geometric borders carved in low relief that mirrored the motifs they'd glimpsed on exposed ruins along the way. Here and there, the last flecks of paint still clung to the designs.

One thing it did not have, however, was remains. “I thought you said this was a tomb,” Arabella said.

“So it is,” said Gale. “And a far older one than I've ever had the pleasure of standing in.” What was once either a stone sarcophagus or an altar occupied the center of the space, open and empty. Stripped of any ornamentation that might have given away its dedication. “If I had to guess, this place was robbed of its treasures a millennium ago. Perhaps more than once.”

“No weapons, no armor,” Astarion muttered as he scanned the barren space, “no jewels—”

“No books,” said Gale.

“And no bodies neither. Would robbers take those too?” Arabella wondered.

“Well, something did.” Astarion wasn't sure it was necessarily treasure seekers. Strewn bones clattered against the toe of his boot. Probably some poor beast, by the size of it. Though perhaps goblin. Or kobold. An old kill, in any case, if far younger than the tomb itself. The scat near it lay in dessicated clumps, like a cone of incense that has burned to ash but still holds its shape.

“These alcoves are deep enough to hold the remains of several individuals side by side,” Gale said, taking a closer look. “Perhaps this is less a tomb than it is a catacomb.”

The way his voice brightened at the notion was not lost on Arabella. “Does it really matter what you call it? They're both just places to put the dead, aren't they?”

“On the contrary. A tomb I tend to think of as the resting place of one person, perhaps with a few close family members or servants surrounding them. Although now we're venturing into territory more befitting a mausoleum.”

Astarion rolled his eyes and exchanged a knowing smile with Arabella across the room. She did ask.

“A catacomb, on the other hand—”

“I believe what he means, darling,” Astarion thought to save the wizard some breath, “is that there's a good chance there are more rooms like this one. And if there are, they might lead somewhere.”

“In short,” Gale conceded. And he waved Arabella over to him. “Come and have a look at this.”

He had found an inscription beneath one of the alcoves, carved deeply at one time into the sandstone but now smoothed with age.

“It looks like Draconic,” Arabella was surprised to see as the light of her floating flame cast shadows in the shallow grooves. “But I don't recognize some of these letters from my studies. Unless that's because they're so damaged. . . .”

She tried to sound it out anyway, skipping over the characters that were unfamiliar to her. “The first part is a name, I think. But the rest of it just sounds like gibberish.”

She glanced over to see Gale beaming at her.

“That's because the inscription isn't in Draconic. It's Loross.”

In earlier days, Astarion might have tetchily asked if he was supposed to know what that was. But seven years of cohabitating with Gale had etched certain names indelibly into his grey matter. “The tongue of old Netheril.”

“We're standing in the final resting place,” Gale told them, “of those who survived the Fall of Netheril! Quite literally, in their cases. According to this inscription, the person interred here was aboard one of the flying cities when it crashed to Toril. It isn't clear whether he walked away from the wreckage himself, but I think it's safe to assume someone must have, to bury him here and remember him by name.”

By now it surprised neither of the others that Gale could readily make sense of the otherwise dead language. Mystra might have cured him of his “folly,” as he'd not so fondly called his orb, when he returned the Crown of Karsus to her, but not his obsessive curiosity about all things Netherese.

He laid his hand flat upon the rock next to the insciption and looked up, as if hoping to peer through the tons of rock above them and back through time itself. Alas, all he had to go on were educated guesses and his imagination. “Perhaps the other survivors found enough food and water in these hills to sustain them. For a time, at least. Gods—to watch your empire come crashing down around you, forced to scurry for shelter like animals. . . . They must have thought they were living at the end of days.”

“So, if these catacombs, or whatever you want to call them, are ancient Netherese,” said Arabella, “then that means—”

“Yes. We're on the right trail!”

Astarion only hoped that was true. The way the books told it, the deserts of Anauroch were littered with the remains of Netheril's fallen cities, their long-abandoned spires sticking up out of the shifting sands like teeth from a buried jawbone. If the ruins they sought were indeed nearby, they would need more than a half-worn inscription on a burial alcove to prove it.

o—o |O| o—o

About one month ago—

“Arabella's Shadow Entangle: a semipermanent solution to an incorporeal problem.”

Gale savored every word as he handed the scroll back to her. “Quite the air of intrigue. And to have an eponymous spell before the age of twenty . . .” He whistled. “That is a rare accomplishment indeed. I hope you are relishing this, young lady.”

Arabella's lavender cheeks warmed with pride under the praise, and she straightened in her best Blackstaff robes. Sixteen years old now, at full height she stood just taller than her adopted father—that is, if one counted the very tips of her horns.

Unlike her peers, she had spent the last few years engaged in special studies, as rushing off on adventures every few months would have made it impossible to keep up with regular lectures. Which meant that when she was in Waterdeep, a good portion of her time at the Academy was spent under the tutelage of the current Blackstaff, Vajra Safahr, who had urged her to transcribe her unique sorceries into writing.

As much as Arabella was able, anyway. Three years into it and all she had to show for her efforts was a scroll detailing the somatic and verbal components of the spell she had first invented when she was trying to survive in the Shadow-Cursed Lands. A spell she had mastered at nine more or less by thinking it and willing it to happen. That didn't feel like the great accomplishment everyone constantly reminded her it was.

But as her gran Morena was fond of saying, it was all a matter of perspective.

“Didn't you have any spells named after you?” she asked Gale.

That soured the look on his face somewhat, a sore subject even decades later. “You would expect that of a prodigy, wouldn't you? Alas, Gale's Automated Messenger seems to be mired in a perpetual state of peer review. As if it's my fault it never comes out the same for everyone. I suppose I'll just have to rely on my many published theses to cement my academic legacy.”

At the echo of footsteps on polished stone, they turned to see Astarion hurrying up the spiral staircase.

He took one look at the closed oak doors, another at them. “You didn't go in?”

“We wanted to wait for you,” Gale told him. “This is a momentous occasion, after all.”

“I'm sorry, darling,” Astarion said to Arabella, while he rubbed the back of Gale's shoulders in thanks, “I would have been here sooner, but, well, blasted sunlight and all.”

“Don't worry about it,” Arabella assured him. She truly didn't mind the extra wait. Her nerves were getting the better of her anyway.

A little more than three years ago, Arabella had stolen one of Khelben Arunsun's blackstaves from its wards to prove to her doubting peers that her stories about her deeds in the druids' grove were true. Blackstaff Safahr had been furious, and for a while Arabella was convinced the headmistress had kicked her out of school for that breach of trust.

Their reconciliation had taken some time—and quite a bit of humble pie on Arabella's part—but she now understood Safahr had been more concerned for her safety and that of the other students in her charge. Not only did she want Arabella to earn the credit she deserved for her unique sorceries, but to share what she could with other scholars of the magical arts for the benefit of all. Just with less thievery going forward.

However, knowing her intentions were good didn't make the Tethyrian woman any less intimidating.

Safahr was sitting behind her desk when the three entered, her own blackstaff leaning within easy reach beside her. And standing at her left shoulder was the Lady Blackstaff herself, Arunsun's widow and daughter of Mystra, Laeral Silverhand.

None of the professors Arabella would have expected to see were in attendance. Though she did recognize Nharaen Wands, Blackstaff's head librarian and an authority on enchanted texts. As well as Eiruk Wesker, a human around Gale's age with short black hair whose brooch marked him as a representative of the Watchful Order of Magists and Protectors.

Arabella knew Wesker from the teas he'd had with Safahr in this tower. They'd tried to keep the subject of those teas quiet, but Arabella was still enough of an unrepentant snoop to know they concerned enchanted items. The Watchful Order were a rival school to Blackstaff, whose arcanists saw it as their sworn duty to, among other things, catalog the locations and owners of potentially dangerous magical artifacts.

What the Order or Wesker could want with her entanglement spell, Arabella had no idea.

But it did not escape her notice that all four wore the same ring: a silvery band inlaid with a garnet. The mark of the Blackstaff's most trusted confidantes, the Moonstars.

They ceased their whispering when Safahr stood, beckoning Arabella and her adopted fathers in. “And shut the door behind you.”

“This is something of a surprise,” Gale said when he saw Wesker. “Surely the Watchful Order doesn't think a novel low-level spell is a matter dire enough to warrant their scrutiny, even if it does concern shadow magic.”

That elicited some grumblings and exchanged glances, some shifting in seats.

“We're not here tonight to discuss Arabella's sorcery, I'm afraid,” said Safahr. “This concerns Gray Hands business.”

o—o |O| o—o

They rested through the morning hours, after which Gale and Arabella broke their fast with a small luncheon of cold rations.

Astarion felt no need to scrounge for small prey. Though he was never quite free of his hunger, the Zhentarim blood he'd had a few nights before was holding him over well enough.

“Did you have to bite him in front of the camels?” Arabella scolded him at the reminder. As if it weren't their human guides they should have been worried about.

“I'm sure they've seen much worse, sweeting. You know the Bedine eat young camels on long treks into the wastelands. Besides, he already had one hole in him, and I hadn't had a drop to drink in half a tenday. I wasn't about to let all that fresh blood go to waste.”

On second thought, however, perhaps she did have a point. Astarion might have used a bit more discretion. “I guess I thought everyone would be too busy fighting for their own lives to notice if I snuck a quick nibble.”

“Quick or no, I can't say I blame our guides for reacting the way they did,” Gale mused. “The Bedine have a history of being mistreated by vampiric liches, before the Shadovar returned to this realm to use them sorely in their turn.”

In any case, what was done was done. They couldn't be certain their guides would have been any more amenable to taking them to the valley's doorstep if they hadn't witnessed Astarion's feeding habits firsthand, what with tales of a malevolent shadow spirit guarding the place. Astarion might have only handed them a convenient excuse to turn back early.

“Perhaps this is for the best,” Gale said. “Better the cool shade of these caverns than out there, boxed in a canyon after daybreak, yes?”

For their suspicions had proved correct, and after a little searching in the back of the catacombs, they'd found a narrow, uphill passage that wound deeper into the hills.

An ancient stream must have carved it out, one of many that in greener times had watered an entire community. Now only flash floods fed by rain on the peaks flowed through these canyons, and those were few and far between. The rose-colored sandstone walls flowed in smooth waves as though scraped with a potter's rib, while fine sand cushioned their footsteps. At times, sunlight filtered through cracks high in the rock and shone golden rune-like shapes upon the walls above their heads.

Occasionally they passed signs of habitation, whether in the form of steps and causeways cut into the living rock, eroded clay-lined irrigation channels, or graffiti left by treasure hunters who had come before them.

At one point they came to a vast chamber traversed by a winding pathway of stepping stones, its high ceiling arched like the dome of a tabernacle and pierced by a single pillar of sunlight. The merest step off the path of stones set the sandy ground on either side of it resonating like a drum. All the more reason to suspect the stones had been placed there for a good reason and that it would be wise not to stray from them.

They were halfway across the cavern when Astarion spotted a large shape stirring beneath the sand. Periscopic eyes, mottled like amber and protruding from a massive warty head, blinked above the surface. Astarion put a shushing finger to his lips, and silently drew one of his daggers from its sheath.

A giant toad was one of the last creatures they would have expected to encounter in an environment as dry as this. But then, beasts previously unknown to civilized men were discovered in Anauroch's remote corners with regular frequency, well adapted to their harsh desert environs. Perhaps enough moisture, carried on the night winds, was trapped beneath the domed ceiling to keep a small colony of amphibians from drying out completely.

But that was speculation for another day. The three adventurers decided to risk dashing to the end of the cavern rather than wait and see if the toad, or any more of its brethren that might be hidden under the sands, was feeling peckish. A deep croak of disappointment reverberated beneath the dome as they reached the safety of the narrower passage on the other side.

o—o |O| o—o

The three leaned in close to study the page of the letter in Gale's hand. On it was a sketch, rendered with precise attention to detail, of a broken clay tablet inscribed with characters that looked like Draconic.

“And you say this came from the Scimitar Spires?” Gale asked.

“That is the story as we understand it,” said Safahr. “A Bedine shepherd boy found it a few days after a rainstorm on the mountains, and his father, knowing an antiquary would pay a pretty gold piece for it, sold it to our contact in Addas Babar. He thinks it may have washed out of the canyons during a flash flood.”

“In that case, you're lucky he approached your antiquary before the Zhentarim got wind of it.”

“But can you read it?” Laeral said impatiently as she paced behind Safahr.

“Of course.” Gale sat up straighter, affronted there might have been any doubt. “What's left of the inscription, anyway. This is typical Loross associated with the late flying cities period, well within my wheelhouse.

“It reads,” and he cleared his throat: “'After the city fell, those who remained sought refuge in the' . . . well, 'cauldron' would be the most direct translation, but let us suppose for the moment the writer meant a caldera or valley. So, 'those who remained sought refuge in the valley of the serpent gods'. . . . You don't suppose that's a reference to the sarrukh?”

“The thought had occurred to us,” said Magister Wesker, “that the writers stumbled upon some ruins of the creator race hidden in those mountains. Ruins that have remained unknown to us all this time by virtue of their remote location.”

“Then again,” Wands was eager to remind him, “it might just as easily refer to a landmark. Perhaps a serpentine shape to the rock, or the meander of one of the canyons as seen from above. Without more information, we would be wise to temper our excitement.”

“The rest is too damaged for a full translation,” Gale said, “but there is a mention at the bottom here to a 'secret they hid underground.' I gather from context the writers credited this secret, whatever it may be, with their salvation.”

A chill ran up Arabella's spine at those words. A secret underground? If Gale was reading this tablet correctly, it might be a treasure map! Glancing over at Astarion, she could see he was practically salivating at the same idea.

But Wands merely shook her head as Gale handed the letter back to Safahr.

“Buried secrets. Serpent gods. It's an attractive notion, is it not, Professor Dekarios? I'll grant that much. But as I've already explained to the others, I suspect what we are dealing with may be nothing more than a forgery.”

“Really? How can you be sure?” Astarion said, practically begging her to think again. And usually he was the first to decry something as a fake or a scam.

“If it is, it's a clever one,” Gale conceded. “A forger would have to be nearly as fluent in old Netherese as myself to have copied the syntax of that era so perfectly.”

“Are you saying our antiquary friend is having a lark at our expense?” said Laeral. “To what end? What could it possibly profit him to lie about this?”

Gale, however, seemed reluctant to go so far as to make that accusation. “From what you've told me, it sounds as though he truly believes the inscription to be genuine. To be quite frank with you, I would like nothing more myself. But Nharaen does have a point. The Anauroch desert does not suffer from a lack of tantalizing legends of lost wonders.”

“Well put,” said Wands. “As I said from the start, Vajra, this reeks of an old Zhentish trap, one that has surely already ensnared many a brave treasure seeker.”

“You doubt there are still ruins unaccounted for in those mountains?” Wesker said to her.

“I know that the records tell us the Shadovar conducted an extensive search of the Anauroch upon Thultanthar's last return to the material plane. That they would have mapped the Spires thoroughly I have no doubt, seeing as they were stationary for a time over their western flanks. If even they could not find this so-called 'Valley of the Serpent Gods,' what proof do we have it actually exists?”

The words were out of Arabella's mouth before she could think to censor herself: “You could send us to take a look.”

It seemed to her that was what this entire conversation was leading up to anyway. Someone might as well cut to the chase.

“Agreed.” Gale nodded. “I am Blackstaff's foremost authority on ancient Netheril. I could speak with your antiquary myself and examine this tablet for authenticity. If there truly were some lost enclave of survivors of Karsus's Folly, as that inscription would have us believe, then they deserve to have their story told. They deserve to be remembered.”

Laeral and Safahr exchanged a knowing smile. A rare thing to see on the headmistress's lips, at least in Arabella's experience.

“I don't know why I thought we would have to work harder to convince you,” Safahr said.

“Gale, Arabella,” said Laeral, “and Astarion, of course—would you be willing to travel to Addas Babar on behalf of the Gray Hands to see to the veracity of that inscription? It is imperative we know whether this lost valley really does exist. And if it does, where we can find it, and what our operatives should expect when they arrive.”

“If there are any Netherese artifacts remaining in the Spires,” said Wesker, “let alone sarrukh, they must be secured by the Order before the Black Network or someone worse can get their hands on them.”

“And made available for study by Blackstaff's scholars,” Safahr added pointedly, “rather than hidden away in the Order's vaults.”

“O-of course.” A faint blush tinged Wesker's cheeks. “Under careful supervision, naturally.”

“So, what are we all thinking this 'buried secret' refers to?” Astarion asked the room. “Nether Scrolls?”

A dozen eyes turned to him.

“What?” he said to Gale's sideways glance. “I pay attention.”

“I suppose it's no secret some of the Scrolls remain in the wind,” Wesker conceded. “But we have no reason to believe that is what's hidden there. It could be anything. From lost relics and royal jewels to, well, potsherds and old graffiti. Or you could unearth a dangerous weapon.” Which brought the magister to another of his misgivings. “Are you sure these are the three you want to entrust with such a delicate task, Vajra? Given Professor Dekarios's history with Netherese artifacts?”

Safahr returned his question with a surprised blink. “You doubt their abilities, knowing their record of success with the Gray Hands already? Surely Volo wasn't entirely lying about the role they played in saving Baldur's Gate from an elder brain.”

“A Nether brain, to be precise,” Gale couldn't help but correct her, in doing so practically making Safahr's point for her. “And Volo may have embellished the truth to some degree.”

“Watered it down, if anything,” Arabella concurred.

“But the magister does bring up an excellent point,” Astarion said. “A vampire . . . in the desert . . . A blasted landscape exposed to the direct sun with hardly a tree or any other form of shelter to be found? Don't get me wrong,” that with a sly little grin, “I'm in. But I expect to be well compensated for the added, ah, shall we say, environmental peril to my person.”

By the purse of Wesker's lips, it seemed to take all his self-restraint not to comment on Astarion's mercenary motives.

Laeral couldn't help a chuckle at his cheek. “I believe you'll find the commission for this task to be more than adequate, Astarion. And, as usual,” she added with a glance Wesker's way, “any mundane trinkets our Gray Hands find along the way fall outside our jurisdiction.”

“That's just what I like to hear.” And Astarion flashed a toothy grin as he looked across at Gale and Arabella. “How soon can we leave?”

o—o |O| o—o

They ascended a stairwell cut into the rock by the glow of dancing lights, until at last illumination up ahead hinted at an opening to the outside world. The afternoon light was like a beacon after the deep shadows of the rock passage.

The stairs led them to an antechamber, where a massive slab of jade-colored stone leaned propped to one side, cracked in half. At one point it had probably blocked the exit, locked either by magic or mechanical means, but previous adventurers had rendered the door permanently useless some time ago.

“A crying shame, if you ask me,” Gale tutted as he went in for a closer look, pulling one of the dancing lights over with him. “Even if this development does work in our favor.” Knowing him, he'd probably been looking forward to solving some sort of brainy puzzle in order to gain egress from the twisting passageways. “Look at the craftsmanship of this relief! Even now it appears completely unworn by the passage of time. And if I were to hazard a guess, these carvings were already ancient by the time the Netherese arrived.”

As he and Arabella crowded in closer, Astarion could make out upright, tailed figures carved into the slab. Lizardfolk of the native sand-colored race called laerti, or asabi by the Bedine. Dressed in trapezoidal kilts, they were depicted at a variety of tasks: sowing and reaping in terraced fields, harvesting the fruit or buds of some viney crop, and engaged in what appeared to be brewing, of all things, in clay amphorae as tall as they were. Which was saying something as the average adult laerti easily topped seven feet.

And offering the end result as a libation of thanksgiving to the beings they revered as gods: serpentine people with looping tails in lieu of legs and humanoid arms. The gold leaf had been stripped from the relief in the distant past, but enough flecks clung stubbornly to the crevices to indicate that at one time the sleek scaled bodies must have shimmered brilliantly under torchlight.

“I know I'm far from what you'd call the religious sort, but even I can tell those are sarrukh they're worshiping,” Astarion pointed out.

“The creators of the Nether Scrolls,” Gale agreed in a reverent whisper. “The question remains, were some of them still alive on this plane when this door was carved, or was it erected in their memory?”

“Who cares? Either way, this has to be what we came for.”

“The Valley of the Serpent Gods,” Gale concurred. “We've found it, Astarion!”

His eyes sparkled with the wonder of discovery as he turned Astarion's way, his grin of triumph so delicious to behold it was all Astarion could do not to kiss it off him.

Then Gale sobered as he squinted into the dark. “Where did Arabella make off to?”

“Um, guys?” came her voice from beyond the doorway. “You might want to come see this.”

They found her standing at the edge of a colonnade carved out of the living rock. Beyond her, in the bright light of afternoon, they glimpsed the lost valley for the first time. Gale's literal translation of a cauldron was not far off the mark as the whole thing was shaped like a vast cooking pot carved out of the rosy-gold sandstone by water and wind and time.

And by civilized hands. Encircling the interior of the valley, one structure after another had been excavated out of the rock itself. More colonnaded hallways were dug into the stone walls, but also windows and delicately arched stone bridges and causeways. A network of winding stairs hugged the cliffs, connecting the open doorways of darkened domiciles. Massive communal spaces with broken mosaic floors which may have been once been market squares and temples followed the same terraced aesthetic as the fields depicted on the door. And everywhere, statues of serpentine beings, the sarrukh, stood silent guard over the structures. Some colossal. Some life-sized. All in various states of disrepair.

And all of it was draped in green scrub brush and hanging vines, scraggily desert trees and the occasional palm. It was the greenest place the three had seen since coming to the desert. Even the oases their Bedine guides had stopped at to water their camels paled in comparison. That was thanks to two waterfalls that plummeted down the western and northern walls of the caldera, heavy at this time of year with storm water running off the high, jagged peaks of the Spires. Stains in the stone showed how the course of the waters above had changed over centuries, tracing the paths of other falls long dried up. Down below, the ruined retaining walls of terraced fields peeked through the sparkling mist, before the waters of the falls drained into a lush marsh.

Gale let out a laugh at the splendor of it, and slipped his arm around Astarion's waist.

“It was a refuge after all,” he said. “A reliable source of water in the middle of the desert. And structures ready and waiting to be lived in once more.”

“Let's not get too ahead of ourselves,” Astarion reminded him. “We haven't found any evidence the Netherese made it here yet. Aside from the tomb we entered through, that is.”

“You're right, of course. A more thorough examination of these ruins is in order before we can make that determination. However, this discovery alone is worth the trip. An ancient laerti city! Proof they were once capable of impressive feats of artistry and engineering.”

“How big do you suppose this place is?” Arabella said, leaning over the balcony to peer at the valley floor below. “We've gotta be, what, three stories up?” And there was no telling yet how many more stories sat over their heads. “There must be a way down around here somewhere.”

“I'm sure we'll figure something out if there isn't one. But first,” Gale reminded them, “we should look for a place to make camp. We may be more sheltered here than in the open desert, but we don't want to be caught without shade when the sun starts creeping under our cover.”

By “we,” he clearly meant Astarion. But Astarion could speak for himself.

“We still have a good hour or two yet before we need to worry about that, don't you think, darling? Besides, I have my hood.” It may only have lent Astarion resistance to the sun's rays, but resistance was better than nothing at all. “And I know how eager you both are to explore.”

No sooner had he said so, however, than the railing under Arabella's hands cracked and tumbled in chunks down to the valley floor below.

Her quick reflexes allowed her to leap back at the first sign it was giving way. But as she glanced at the stone surrounding them, searching for any more cracks, it occurred to all of them that these ruins, despite surviving the weathering of untold thousands of years, might no longer be as structurally sound as they appeared.

“Alright,” Gale conceded, “but on that note, we explore with caution. Don't wander too far from the others. And if you do run into trouble, yell, and wait for help to come to you. Or better yet, use your sending stone.”

Arabella slipped her hand into her breeches pocket just to make sure hers was still there. The sending stones were among the magical equipment Magister Wesker had lent them for this mission, so the three could keep the Moonstars abreast of their party's progress. It was reassuring to know that if one of them ever got separated from the others—as had actually happened on a Gray Hands expedition last year, when they temporarily lost Astarion in a snowstorm—they could use the stones to find each other again. Sometimes Arabella wondered how the three of them had ever survived their earlier adventures without sending stones. They certainly would have come in handy in the dense jungles of Chult, or the dark, twisting dwarven tunnels of Iltkazar.

As her dads wandered down the colonnade away from the waterfall—Gale excitedly speculating about the Netherese colony that might have lived here a thousand years ago—Arabella went closer. There were other rooms cut into the rock, though it was nigh impossible to tell now whether they had originally been used as storage or living quarters, or for some other purpose entirely.

Scorch marks on the floor hinted at an old campfire. Not ages old, but maybe several decades. Weathered graffiti on the walls was in Thieves' Cant, matching symbols they'd glimpsed in the caverns and tight canyons along the way. The symbols brought back fond memories of the Dragon's Lair in the druid grove and scribbling messages on the walls with the other tiefling kids. It was entirely reasonable to assume that, “lost” as this valley purportedly was, Arabella and her dads were not the first group of adventurers to dare the trek here.

The proof was in the scraps of rotting cloth that were bundled in one corner, littered with dry leaves and the droppings of some small animal that must have claimed them for a nest. She tried not to jump to conclusions about what had happened to the last people to visit this place. But they had left some of their equipment behind: a small pickaxe, perhaps made for gnomish hands, gone to rust from constant exposure to the mist off the waterfall, and a length of rope.

The rope, at least, hadn't rotted yet, being of fine, tightly braided elven silk. The kind of quality gear seasoned adventurers would bring with them. And not be easily parted from. If it was as old as the pickaxe, its owner wouldn't be coming back for it any time soon. So Arabella slipped the rope into her pack, reasoning that it never hurt to have more.

She was about to call out to Gale and Astarion about her find when another noise stopped her: a strange, raspy sort of screech she could just make out over the roar of the waterfall. It sounded like it came from some sort of bird, but not one Arabella had ever encountered before. And it was coming from a tangle of dead bushes next to the valley wall, where an old fall had worn away the ceiling and outer edge of the colonnade.

On closer inspection, it wasn't a dead bush but a big nest. An aerie! Arabella's heart sped up its pace. Edging closer, she saw the three fluffy babes inside weren't actually birds at all, but strange creatures with the wings of eaglets and the heads of deer fawns, complete with the tiny buds of what would one day grow into antlers.

They flopped about in an ungainly manner when they saw Arabella, stretching their down-covered wings and peering at her with eager smiles on their queer, bucktoothed little faces.

Arabella was enamored instantly.

“Well, hello to you, too,” she cooed at the chicks. “And just what in the Hells are you three supposed to be?”

She hadn't cast Speak with Animals yet, but even if she had, she wasn't sure chicks this young would have the knowledge or life experience to answer that question. “I guess we'll have to see if we can't figure that out when your parents get back,” she said more to herself than the chicks.

The adults were probably soaring far above at this time of day, riding the drafts of warm air as they searched for food for their young. It was probably best Arabella leave before her presence near the nest was spotted.

As she was turning to do just that, she jumped at the shadow that suddenly appeared on the ground beside her. Her heart hammered like it was going to leap out of her chest before she realized it was just the shadow of a man.

“Hrast, Fangs, you should know better by now than to sneak up on me like—”

At the hiss, she turned around. And came face-to-face not with Astarion, but with a giant deer-like thing, its razor-sharp front teeth jutting forward like a beak, stained by old blood, its breath reeking of carrion, a murderous gleam in its red eyes. The chicks' smile no longer seemed cute when Arabella realized it was the grin a hungry predator gives its breakfast.

“Arabella! Run!”

Gale's horrified shriek distracted the creature just long enough for Arabella to duck into the nearest doorway.

With not a second to spare. The creature lunged at her, its snout butting against her hastily cast shield and pushing her deeper into the room before its jaws could snap shut. By some miracle, the span of its antlers prevented the creature from getting any further inside. But that did not stop it from trying different angles, trying to snag Arabella with its taloned feet while it buffeted the walls with powerful wings.

Then it screamed, reeling from the arrow sinking deep into its side at the same it was hit with the sapping necrotic force of Gale's bone chill. But the attack only seemed to make the thing more angry, and as Arabella watched its antlers and talons leave deep groves in the soft sandstone, she wondered just how much time she had before the doorway was wide enough for the creature's head to fit inside.

She couldn't wait any longer. The shadows were deep at the back of the room, the monster's bulk blocking much of the sunlight. A few calming breaths and she vanished, becoming one with the shadows themselves, reemerging a few doors down in the dark corners of the room where she'd found the rope.

Arabella wasted no time tearing out the door and running back in the direction she had come, where Gale and Astarion were hurrying to meet her.

The creature turned its gaze to follow her, but did not immediately give chase. Instead, it threw back its head and bellowed like a banshee. As if one of those monsters was not enough, its cry was soon echoed from the sky over their heads. Another one was circling, watching the three interlopers with baleful eyes. It swooped down to perch on the roof of the opposite colonnade, flanking them. This one's mane and rack of antlers was even fuller, its rust-colored feathers shot through with steely blue. The father.

“No, no, no, this isn't good,” Gale muttered as he sized up their odds. “One of those beasts is foul enough, but a mated pair? Now they'll have something to prove to one another.”

“So a bit like us, then?” Astarion gritted through a tight smile, nocking another arrow.

“The only way this could be worse was if they had a nest of growing kits to feed.”

Now was probably not the best time, Arabella decided, to tell her dads it was worse. “I don't get it. What are those things?”

“Perytons,” said Gale. “A tad out of their usual range, but then this valley is hardly your usual oasis.”

“Those are perytons?” Arabella had read about them in Gale's big illustrated bestiary what now felt like ages ago, but the woodcuts had not done the creatures justice at all. If she could just remember what the book had said about their weaknesses—

But the perytons had had enough of waiting. The male swooped, talons first—and rolled to the side as Astarion loosed his arrow. Astarion's aim was true, but the peryton was swifter in the air than a creature that size had any right to be, and the arrow shot right through its wing feathers without striking flesh, barely an irritation. He circled around for another strike as Astarion was reaching for another arrow, forcing Astarion to drop to the ground to avoid the creature's meaty feet. Even so, the razor-sharp talons sliced through his leathers, the proof left in streaks of bright blood on the stone before Astarion felt the sting of ripped flesh in his shoulder.

And while their attention was diverted by the male, his mate swooped up from below, digging deep into the rock wall with her piton-like talons as she went in for a bite. Arabella spun to face her with a blight spell half cast, but the peryton managed to grab hold of Arabella's cloak with her beak-like teeth and jerk her off her feet, disrupting the spell before Arabella could even finish the somatic components.

A jolt of lightning made the female break off before she could rear her head for another attack. And as she retreated to circle at a safe distance, Arabella scrambled to her feet. If not for Gale's hand under her elbow, hoisting her up, she wasn't sure she'd have been able to stand on the first try, her knees were like aspic the way they wobbled under her.

“Are you alright?”

To that, Arabella could only nod breathlessly.

“Whatever you do, don't let them grab hold of you!” Gale warned her. “It's our hearts they're after.”

“Oh, that's all, is it?” Astarion said, lining up another shot and letting it fly. “Just our hearts, nothing we can't do without.”

“Not your heart,” Gale corrected him. “Mine and Arabella's. Living hearts, plucked warm and beating from their victims. To a peryton there is no gift more romantic. Nor any morsel more nourishing to their young.”

And Arabella could think of three hungry mouths that would just love to tuck into hers.

“Wonderful,” Astarion snorted, “just what I always wanted, to be the prize in some monstrosities' mating ritual—”

That thought was cut short, however, when the male dove again, and Astarion once more had to roll out of the way to avoid being knocked off the cliff to the running waters below. The peryton's powerful feet missed him by inches, the beating of his wings threatening to blow Astarion and the others over the edge anyway.

Enough with this shit. Astarion would not stand for being played with like a mouse under a cat's paw any longer. “Back to the cave!” he shouted as he sprang to his feet and away from the cliff's edge. “Now!”

But the perytons knew this game all too well. How many victims they had already captured this way, the three adventurers could never know. While the female circled, looking for the next opportunity to strike, the male swooped into their path back to the cave entrance, cutting off their one sure avenue of escape.

Gale and Arabella managed to skid to a halt before they rushed down his rancid gullet, Gale firing a barrage of magic missiles. The force of each blast momentarily held the beast back, but then it was once more at their heels, harrying them as they ran in the only direction left for them to go: out onto the causeway that bridged the gap between the two colonnades, and out into the blazing sun.

Arabella raised a grasping vine from the stone as they ran, and its blackened brambles snagged the peryton out of the air mid-swoop, pulling him down to the rock with a crash that made the causeway tremble.

Arabella's whoop of triumph died in her throat when a loud crack rang out like a shot, reverberating through the valley and the stone beneath their feet. The causeway may have looked stable enough to support their weight when they'd stepped out onto it, but they could not be so sure it would hold them and the perytons. They'd just have to take their chances and hope it lasted long enough for them to reach the other side.

Astarion, however, was far less worried about the stone beneath his feet than the sun overhead. The causeway, open to the sky above, shone golden under the afternoon rays like a steel billet plucked from the smith's fire. Astarion gritted his teeth against the first tingling that promised burning to come as he ran out into the light, confident his enchanted hood could see him safely to the other side of the causeway and its shaded colonnades before severe damage set in.

But the female peryton had other ideas. Scorched and bleeding steadily from the arrow still lodged in her side, and full of righteous anger at the ill treatment of her mate, she dropped hard onto the other end of the causeway, spreading her wings and hissing revenge at the adventurers. Her eyes rolled from one of them to another, their whites flashing. She would tear out their hearts if it was the last thing she did, out of spite if nothing else.

So be it. If these abominations wanted a heart so badly, they could choke on Astarion's.

“You have Dimension Door prepared?” he asked Gale as he swung his bow onto his back.

“You know I always do when we travel. One never knows what might happen. Why, what are you—”

“Just get Arabella to the other side the moment the way is clear!” Astarion said as he pulled two of his daggers from their scabbards, gripping them tight as if that might keep his hands from shaking.

Before he could change his mind, Astarion turned back and dashed toward the peryton male, still trying to free himself from Arabella's vine. Leaping upon him, he plunged both daggers deep into the monstrosity's breast. The peryton thrashed against his restraints, trying in vain to throw Astarion off.

But it was the female who bellowed in outrage, flying to her mate's aid. She grabbed Astarion in her talons in a desperate attempt to pry him off her mate.

Seeing that, any thought of Dimension Door vanished from Gale's mind. He couldn't leave Astarion to be torn apart.

Besides, Arabella was already out of his reach, managing to finish her blight spell this time as she ran to Astarion's aid, and putting all the power into it she could muster.

With one last scream as she felt her life force sapped away, the peryton female expired, falling back onto the causeway with Astarion still grasped in her talons. The stone fractured beneath her dead weight and she plummeted to the valley floor far below, taking her captured prey and her still struggling mate down with her.

Arabella could only stare after them, the breath shocked from her lungs, while the causeway bucked and pitched beneath her feet. As if through an ocean of crashing waves she heard Gale call her name.

But she turned too late to grab his outstretched hand as the world dropped out from under her.

Chapter Text

A tenday and a half ago—

“By the sound of things,” Gale said as he ticked another item off his list, “we'll be spending a good deal of our journey on foot. We shall have to pack light.”

“Alright, then,” Astarion couldn't help but tease, “just how many books should I expect to find in our bag of holding?”

“You'll be pleased to hear I've forgone the usual assortment of reading material and pared it down to the barest of necessities.” Though Gale's cheeks did color guiltily as he turned away from Astarion. “Just a couple compendia on ancient Netheril and its contemporaries, to fill in any pertinent gaps in my knowledge. A handful of journals, of course, for notes along the way. And maps. Can't forget maps. Where would we be without them? A selection of useful spell scrolls. My spellbook, naturally, but I hardly think that counts as it won't actually be in the bag of holding.”

“Well, so long as we're going by necessity, I will be bringing all of my blades. One never knows which will come in handiest at any given moment.”

At least Astarion wore those strapped to his person, six in a leather cuirass with built-in scabbards (four along the ribs for knives and daggers, two across the back for short swords), which also had pockets for his lock-picking tools, plus four more in a set of thigh holsters, all of which he had customized himself over the years.

He twirled the last two daggers and slid them into their sheaths, checking the fit was still snug and secure, and wondered aloud, “Think I have room on here to fit a few more?”

“Should we have need for more than ten of your blades, then we probably have far more dire problems to worry about.”

The appreciative smirk aimed his way, however, told Astarion he cut a striking figure in his leathers, bristling with deadly weapons. And that if it were up to Gale, he wouldn't mind if one night he caught his husband in those leathers and little else.

Satisfied, Astarion unfastened the cuirass to set atop the growing pile of equipment, careful not to snag his hooded cloak as he did so. That hood was his current pride and joy, enchanted by Gale to afford Astarion the same level of resistance from the sun's rays as magical darkness, albeit with none of the inconveniences to his vision and in a form of protection that traveled with him. It only seemed appropriate, then, that the design of interlocking circles Astarion had chosen to embroider around its hem in jet silk thread was inspired by the décor of the Sharran temple beneath Reithwin Town.

Resistance was still a far cry from immunity, of course—a fact Gale was much harder on himself for than Astarion thought he had any right to be—but seeing as this trip was expected to take them through treeless deserts, even resistance could prove a life-saver.

“No pitons, as usual,” Arabella sighed, dumping about ten of them into the bag of holding with a sharp irony clang before Astarion could do more than sputter in protest about the added weight. “Or rope, I see. How many times do I have to remind you two? We can't always rely on flying and teleportation spells to get us out of trouble.”

“Yes, O wise one! Your advice has been duly noted.” That said with a fond ruffle of her hair so Arabella knew Gale was only being facetious. “Just remember to leave enough room for the rations and crockery.”

“I know. I will.”

“And you packed plenty of bolts for your crossbow?”

“Yeah. This isn't my first adventure, you know.”

“You're sure you don't want to come with us?” Astarion asked Tara as she sat watching the proceedings. “And miss all this excitement?”

“I'm getting too old to go traipsing halfway round the world on another dungeon crawl,” she muttered, stretching up on her forelimbs. “And you know I've never been particularly fond of deserts. Just one big latrine as far as the eye can see.” Not to mention, she'd had enough of old Netheril and its fell magic to last several tressym lifetimes. “Someone has to hold down the fort in your absence. Besides, if all goes well, you three will be back in Waterdeep with an after-action report for Ms. Safahr in no time.

“But I wouldn't complain if you managed to bring home some beholder meat for my troubles. And do give my warmest regards,” Tara added with a toothy grin, “to the beardy tramp.”

Of course Gale heard that. “Just please use different words when you do.”

“As if I would ever be so crass,” Astarion assured him, throwing a knowing wink Tara's direction.

But he did promise her that he would look after Gale and Arabella and bring them both back in one piece. Somehow, for a man who otherwise detested promises, that had become a painless one to make in the last few years. Perhaps because if Astarion ever broke it, it would be because he was dead. For good this time.

They set out late that afternoon after clearing a space in the parlor. Carpets rolled up and furniture pushed to the peripheries, their pile of equipment divvied up equally onto their persons, the patterns and sigils glowed upon the parquet as Gale began the ritual incantation. There was the requisite expression of surety that something crucial had been forgotten, followed by the usual assurances it had not. The two living had forgone supper, for as Gale reminded them from experience, teleportation across such vast distances had a tendency to be unkind to a full stomach.

As for Astarion, he found he rather liked the sensation of teleportation. The momentary disorientation as if from spinning in circles too many times. The delicious pull behind the navel that mimicked the feeling of falling in lust. And the relief of appearing at their destination without ever having stepped out a door, no need to worry about seeking shelter from the sun.

The heavy curtains had already been drawn in anticipation of their arrival, the lack of light around their edges indicating the sun had set some time ago in the Eastern Heartlands. In the dimness, Astarion found himself surrounded by a collection of preserved specimens and scientific instruments, and so many haphazard piles of tomes and scrolls it made Gale's library back in Waterdeep look positively neat and tidy. Though the smell of so much ink and parchment was a homely one to him by now.

“Ah, excellent,” came a familiar voice, “you all made it through, safe, sound, and intact I see. Welcome back to Shadowdale, Gale m'boy.”

“Elminster~” Gale beamed as he dropped his bags, and stepped forward to embrace his old mentor.

As the arcane glow of the teleportation circle faded, the lantern light came up, and there stood the Sage of Shadowdale himself, in his own tower, and looking quite comfortable in an old crimson robe and slippers, bareheaded, with no staff in hand. Astarion was half tempted to poke him, just to make sure he was in fact the genuine article this time, not merely another simulacrum of the wizard left to greet his guests.

“Hey, Beard Man, it's been a while,” said Arabella, bouncing on the balls of her feet while her tail swished happily, an impish smile showing off the points of her teeth. “Real nice place you got here!”

Elminster let out an affronted harrumph at the reviled old nickname, but there was a mirthful twinkle in his grey eyes when she said it. “I should say so! And you are most welcome in it, young lady. As are you, Astarion.”

That with a more sober nod. An acknowledgement of the inconveniences of Astarion's vampiric nature, and a willingness to accommodate them. Such a simple gesture on the face of it, but in it was more sincere respect than Astarion had ever felt from the old man in their seven years of acquaintance.

“Thank you,” was all he could think of to say back, but he meant it.

“Now,” Elminster rubbed his hands together, “did Laer send what I requested?”

“As promised,” said Gale, “six wheels of the finest Waterdhavian cheese to restock your larder for the year.”

“Poppycock, she knows full well—as do you, m'boy—that this is merely to see me through spring. Now then, you three, leave your things and come join me in the kitchen. By the aroma tickling the old olfactories, I should say that supper is just about served.”

A couple of homunculi strode into the room like dark little shadows, splitting the luggage between them for transfer to the appropriate rooms.

“Er, not those,” Elminster was quick to say of the cheeses, “I'll be taking them with me.” And so saying he grabbed them up and loaded two wheels into everyone's arms but his own, whether they liked it or not.

“Do make yourselves comfortable,” he said over his shoulder as he led the way. “My humble abode is yours for the duration of your furlough. —But do not touch anything! Not unless you are eager to lose an appendage, or find yourself spirited away to dimensions unknown.”

Funny how he seemed to know exactly where Astarion's free hand was wandering as he brought up the rear. Perhaps the old tramp really was hiding a third eye under his thinning gray mane.

In the kitchen, they found pots simmering away on the stove, dutifully being stirred by enchanted spoons. Gale set down his wheels of cheese to put his head over the largest pot and inhale deeply. Then he opened the oven door to see what was crackling inside, eager as a boy who'd just spied his name day presents.

“Roulade a la Marsember!” he remarked with an impressed raise of his brows. “With the Dales' own venison, I'll wager. Elminster, you needn't have gone through so much trouble on our account.”

Elminster merely shrugged as if to say, true, he probably shouldn't have, but it was too late to do anything about that now.

“Did you bake this fresh, too?” Gale said, stealing a bit of crust from the perfectly golden loaf of bread sitting out to cool.

“That is from a neighbor of mine,” the old wizard mumbled with a wave of his hand. “Pleasant woman, can always be trusted to have the latest news, but keeps pestering me to take that girl of hers under my wing. As if any young thing who can muster a few cantrips is destined to be an archmage.”

Astarion had been warned on numerous occasions not to trust the doddering old man routine, however, and the knowing smile Elminster once again exchanged with Arabella did not escape his notice. Their time together may have been brief, a mere six months at most of wandering the Sword Coast while Elminster coached Arabella on the finer points of channeling the Weave. But there was a fondness there still, six years later. Perhaps the rarity with which they actually got to meet like this, face-to-face, had only served to deepen it.

“Grab the hundur sauce from the panty, would you, m'girl,” Elminster said to her, “and a nice wine to go with the main course. A deep red, if you please. Arterial even. And speaking of, you should find a special treat in there for our sanguivorous friend as well.”

“Why, Elminster,” Astarion couldn't help himself, “have you been marinating a kobold in your wine cellar just for me?”

Though Elminster was a good sport about the kobold comment, the special treat turned out to be the blood of the stag who was to be the others' main course. (“Bled while its heart still beat,” Elminster made sure to inform Astarion. “I understand the freshness makes all the difference.”) Thus the four of them were able to properly enjoy a supper together, each in his or her own preferred way.

Yet another thoughtful gesture on the wizard's part that Astarion begrudgingly found himself moved by. Perhaps he had been too harsh on the old tramp, assuming Elminster still hadn't forgiven him for the less than charitable way Astarion had treated them when they first met on the mountain pass. When he'd made the trip to Waterdeep to celebrate Gale and Astarion's official union three years ago, Elminster had made it quite clear that he thought Gale could do better in his choice of life partner.

Perhaps the old wizard had finally accepted that it was too late to do anything about that now as well. Whatever his true feelings toward Astarion, Elminster seemed determined to play the part of a gracious host, if only for Gale and Arabella's sake.

In which case, the least Astarion could do was be a gracious guest and play along.

The roulade sliced into succulent medallions and drowned in sauce, the broth served and wine poured (with just a single glass for Arabella, as she was only sixteen), they pored over their plans for the next leg of their journey, over the Dales and through the woods to Dagger Falls.

“I take it you'll be wanting to acquire horses while you're in town,” Elminster said.

Gale shared a guilty look with Astarion as he swallowed his mouthful of venison. “'Want' is a strong word, but needs must where the devil drives. The fastest way to Dagger Falls is on four legs, after all—barring teleportation spells, of course. I'm hoping Arabella will be able to work her usual magic and interview our prospects ahead of time, see if she can't find a nice patient mare who's well accustomed to novice riders.”

“Novice, fiddlesticks! Where is the confidence I've grown accustomed to from you, Gale?” Elminster asked him. “You mean to say that in all your years of adventuring, you've yet to learn to properly sit astride a mount?”

“It isn't as though his technique is lacking for practice,” Astarion purred, and couldn't help the smile that bloomed across his lips watching Gale blush furiously at the suggestion.

“You mustn't be afraid to seize the reins, m'boy,” Elminster said, miming doing so himself and not helping one bit to lessen Gale's embarrassment, “dig in your heels and show your steed once and for all who is riding whom!”

“I'm not entirely convinced the problem lies with my technique,” Gale insisted, flatly refusing to turn his head and acknowledge the impish grin Astarion was sending him. “Or my confidence. And you're hardly one to lecture me on the finer points of equestrianship, Elminster! Put me in the driver's seat of a wagon and it's an entirely different story. Gods only know how I would have survived half our adventures if not for Arabella's gift for speaking with animals.”

When he looked over at her, Gale was taken aback to see Arabella hunched over in her seat and staring despondently down at her plate, pushing her food around rather than eating it.

Seizing upon the chance to change the subject, he asked her, “Is something the matter, my dear? You've hardly touched your supper.” Even the glass of wine she'd been eager to try was barely lower by a sip. “Now that I think about it, you do look a little green around the proverbial gills.”

“Venison can be a bit rich for some's liking,” Elminster chimed in. “I seem to recall a young tiefling filly, gamboling about the wilderness, who preferred rabbits and robin eggs to the redder meats.”

“It's nothing to do with your cooking, Elminster,” Arabella assured him with a pained smile. “I'm just not very hungry tonight is all.”

Gale nodded sagely at her answer. “Of course. Teleportation can have that affect on a person when they aren't used to traveling over such long distances. No, no, it's perfectly normal,” he went on when Arabella attempted to speak up in her own defense, “Elminster and I should have remembered that heavy foods have a tendency to exacerbate the problem—”

“Oh, for gods' sakes,” Astarion blurted, “isn't it obvious the girl is on her monthlies?”

“Astarion!” Arabella groaned, scrunching down even lower in her seat as if trying to disappear.

“What? It's nothing to be embarrassed about.”

The color of Arabella's cheeks begged to differ.

“But it's not your business to share! And how do you even—no, never mind,” she corrected herself, “I forgot. Vampires and their hrasting noses!”

“Bells,” Gale said, brimming over with sympathy, “why didn't you tell us?”

“Because it's really none of your concern! It's not like there's anything you can do about it. And you two always have to make it weird every time I try to talk about lady issues.”

Arabella did have a point there. She may have had no problem with Astarion taking her measurements and altering her clothes, even as her body had changed through adolescence, or going to Gale with her frustrations about her studies or peers or life in general. But it was Gale's mother who typically handled the feminine matters she couldn't count on her son or Astarion to grasp the finer nuances of, no matter how good their intentions. If not for Astarion's hrasting nose, as Arabella put it, they might not have known she'd started having her monthlies until whenever Morena deigned to tell them.

“Well, better to get these things over with at the start of a journey, I always say. If I may hazard a guess as to your symptoms,” Elminster said to Arabella, unfolding himself from his chair, “aches in the tissues of the lower abdominal region? A slight but persistent biliousness? Perhaps a vague sensation of malaise?

“I have just the cure for what ails you,” he said to Arabella's enthusiastic nods, “or as close as nature has ever come to producing a cure. A little concoction that worked wonders on myself the few years I spent as a member of the fairer sex.”

“Wait, when was this, Elminster?” Gale asked him, turning in his seat. “You never told me that story.”

“Didn't I? Oh, well, hmm, herr,” the old wizard mumbled, busying himself with his rack of herbs, “it was the old Mystra's idea, if you must know. To teach me a lesson. Demonstrate to an impetuous young man just how it feels to inhabit the body of a distaff mage, with all that body's, er, particular foibles.”

“What's a distaff?” Arabella asked Astarion.

“I'll tell you when you're older. So, let me get this straight. For a time, Elminster Aumar, paragon of wizardly masculinity, was, in fact, Elminstra?”

“Elmara, to be precise,” Elminster corrected him, unperturbed by Astarion's mocking tone. “And I learned more about magic, to say nothing of my fellow man, in that handful of years than at any other time in my long arcane career. Save perhaps when Laeral and her sisters came into my life. No amount of book-learning can teach you better than lived experience, m'boy. And little experience is more instructive than walking a few hundred leagues in the opposite sex's boots.”

“I-I don't know what to say,” said Gale, clearly still flabbergasted to learn his old mentor had such skeletons in his pantry.

“Maybe you should give it a try yourself sometime, Gale,” Astarion said. “You might learn a thing or two.”

“It couldn't hurt,” Elminster agreed.

“What makes you think I haven't?” Gale muttered to the cat-with-canary grin Astarion was sending him. Then stuffed another bite of venison into his mouth before it could spill any more details.

Then it was Astarion's turn to be speechless. Not that he ever particularly wanted to hear about Gale's past escapades with Mystra, but for that story he might have to make an exception.

“Here you are, m'girl,” Elminster said, handing a steaming mug of tea to Arabella. Astarion could smell ginger and cinnamon from where he sat, though according to the old sage, “The secret, for future reference, is a pinch of noblestalk powder. I've yet to meet an ailment it won't alleviate. Give it a few minutes to steep, then let us see if we can't have you back to feeling like your old self again.”

o—o |O| o—o

After supper, Elminster asked to speak with Arabella alone. No doubt taking the opportunity to impart some of his wisdom on her ahead of their upcoming journey.

Leaving Gale and Astarion to peruse the old wizard's collection of books, and enjoy the cool night air of the Dalelands in spring with its serenade of frog-song. Soon enough they would be enjoying the desert's day- and nighttime extremes, and missing this mildness. There was also the matter of readjusting Gale's internal clock to a schedule of travel by night and sleep during the day, but luckily for them he had always been something of a night owl, accustomed to losing himself in a good novel or treatise until the first light of dawn appeared on the horizon.

When they saw Arabella again, her color and her mood looked much improved. “I take it from the bounce in your step that tea worked wonders,” Gale said.

“Yep. Seems Elmara really knew her stuff.” A wistful smile appeared on Arabella's lips as she said, “I wish I could have gone on an adventure or two with her back in the day.”

Elmara aside, she and Elminster must have had a productive talk. Arabella had a tome under her arm Astarion didn't recognize from Gale's collection, in addition to her spellbook.

“By the way, Elminster wants to see you in his office, Fangs.”

Astarion had to look to Gale just to make sure they'd both heard her right. “Whatever could he want with me?”

Either Arabella didn't know or she wouldn't say. It wasn't as though Astarion had much in common with Elminster. So he put off the meeting for as long as he thought he could get away with.

When he did let himself into Elminster's study, the old wizard was nowhere to be seen. It would have been the perfect opportunity to rifle through his collection of curiosities, if Astarion hadn't taken Elminster's warning about lost limbs to heart.

Glancing over the cluttered desk, he spied a curious item. A thin panel of oak wood that had the likenesses of a group of stolid, mostly elven mages carved into it. Bending down for a closer look, Astarion had to marvel at the uncanny precision of the carving. It was downright lifelike! As if someone had captured one precise moment in time down to the slightest detail in the fold of their clothes, the lines and emotions on their faces, even the play of the light in the leaves of the trees.

“Ah yes, the annual staff picture of Windsong Tower.”

It wasn't easy for a human to sneak up on Astarion, but somehow Elminster had made it halfway across the study before he'd given any indication of his presence.

“There's a pergola that lecturers gather—or rather, gathered under at the wintertime ball. Someone would get a block of oakwood from the great bough of Windsong, and they would all pose as the block fetcher sculpted the image into the wood with a transmutation spell. The little ritual was so bleakly funny I can barely recall it without feeling like I need to wash my mouth out with lime juice,” Elminster said with a wry chuckle. “Anyway, the lecturers would talk turkey, paying especial attention to the body language of the people around them, for these were not simply colleagues. They were also rivals in the strictest sense of the word.”

Windsong. Astarion recalled that name. One of the great schools of magic in Myth Drannor, formerly old Cormanthyr, where the most complete set of Nether Scrolls ever accumulated in one place had been transformed and preserved in living tree form: the Quess'Ar'Tetanthvar. The foundational texts of the elves' arcane arts.

At least, they'd been preserved in that form until one and a quarter centuries ago, when the scrolls were stolen and scattered to the winds.

“Now all that remains of that proud institution is a picture of equally proud minds, transmuted for all posterity onto a humble slab of oakwood. I should know. I was the one who took that picture.”

“Myth Drannor was one of the places I planned to see,” Astarion said, “if I ever got free of Cazador. I had some grand plan for returning to the place of my ancestors. Not that I remembered the first thing about who they were, let alone whether they came from this part of the world. But I'd heard tales of Myth Drannor's incomparable beauty, and I suppose that was reason enough to want to go.”

Reason enough to dream. Reason enough to convince him the legendary mythal of the elves might have the power to heal what had been broken in him. As if a mere place could ever do that.

He wasn't sure why he was confessing all this to Elminster, of all people. Perhaps Astarion only needed to hear it aloud to put the futility of those dreams behind him, once and for all. “Imagine my disappointment to finally win my freedom, only to learn it had been turned into a smoking pile of rubble a mere five years earlier.”

“Hmm, yes,” Elminster grumbled, “I am sorry to say that was another one of mine.”

For a second, Astarion thought the old wizard must have been referring to another artifact in the room. “I thought the Shadovar were responsible for Myth Drannor's destruction.”

“The falling city of Thultanthar might have dealt the crushing blow, it is true, but someone had to knock it out of the sky.” Just the act of admitting it seemed to age Elminster before Astarion's eyes. He seemed to get smaller, his movements stiffer, as if a great invisible weight had been dropped upon his shoulders. “One accumulates quite the body count when one reaches thirteen hundred years of age.”

Astarion could only imagine. The colleagues who had come and gone, their brilliant minds lost to time. The mentors, the students. The lovers. Astarion may have been responsible for hundreds of deaths himself—perhaps even thousands—but only one had nearly broken him. He couldn't imagine thirteen centuries' worth of Sebastians.

“I am relieved, to say the least,” Elminster said, “that Gale was not among them.”

“You and I both.” The usual snark abandoned Astarion, seeing just how heavily it still weighed upon Elminster to think that seven years ago he almost did lose Gale. Whether to the orb, the Crown, or Elminster's own Mystra-sent mission.

“And for that I have you to thank, Astarion. No, no need to offer up alternative explanations for Gale's change of heart, you and I both know why he chose to defy Mystra. And I am grateful for it. I realize we two have seldom seen eye to eye. But despite what you may think, I harbor no ill will toward you.”

The old sage's candor put Astarion momentarily off balance. Could he be blamed if to steady himself he reached for the comfortable familiarity of sarcasm? “Really? You could have fooled me with all the garlic in Gale's supper tonight.”

Elminster blinked at him a moment. 

Then laughed aloud. “Dear boy, I meant no offense. To the olfactories or otherwise. I'm afraid old habit rather took the reins when planning the evening's menu. Your peculiar little allergy entirely slipped my mind, if you can believe it. And Gale always has been partial to garlic.”

Still was, though he had accepted a life with little of the stuff in it for Astarion's sake. “I suppose he does deserve a treat for good behavior now and then.”

Even if Astarion couldn't quite shake the suspicion Elminster had done it on purpose, to discourage any amorous activity in his guest bedrooms.

“He does, indeed,” the old wizard agreed. “Nor is he the only one.”

That was when Astarion noticed the old wizard had a fine wooden box in his hand, about the dimensions of a large tome. “Take these as a peace offering of sorts, if you feel so inclined. To be used in the course of your travels.”

“An apology from Elminster? Those are rarer than teats on a dragon.”

But Astarion took the parcel with a gravity mirroring that with which it had been given. It surprised him that Elminster would want to give him anything, after the frosty way they'd treated each other in the past.

If Astarion had still needed to breathe, then when he opened the lid of the box, his breath might have caught in his throat.

“I take it by your countenance,” said Elminster, “you recognize the make of that dagger.”

He did indeed. The bluish sheen, all but glowing on its cushion of velvet, woven organically into the steel like mineral veins, or roots growing through a cracked boulder. “It's a sussur blade,” Astarion murmured, unable to take his eyes off it. “I had one like it when we went up against the brain. Not so fine as this, though. May I?”

Elminster gestured his assent, and Astarion hefted the blade in his hand. The craftsmanship was exquisite. Elvish, if Astarion had to say. And undoubtedly old, given the provenance it had come to him by. Astarion would not have been surprised if this blade had been forged in Myth Drannor itself. By the way it sliced through the air he could tell its sharpness. And there was a wicked hook in the blade, a few inches above the hilt and pointing backward, that his roughly-forged one had lacked.

Somehow when faced with this superior specimen, Astarion grew quite nostalgic for his old dagger. “Mine is probably at the bottom of the Chionthar right now. If not in some lucky sahuagin's webby little hands.”

“Ah, good, so you're familiar with its particular properties.”

“If you mean its magic-suppressant properties, then yes.” He could still recall how Gale had recoiled when they'd found the sussur tree in the Underdark, and when anyone who'd gathered its flowers came near him. It could not have been a pleasant sensation to have his connection to the Weave so suddenly severed. Especially when he was still playing host to an unstable orb and couldn't be sure how it would react.

“Then you should know,” Elminster said, “that a sussur blade is most effective when it is left in its target.”

Of course. Now that someone said it aloud, that made perfect sense. The hook on this particular blade would seem designed to ensure it did not easily slip out of whatever, or whoever, it was buried in.

Coming from Elminster, however, that piece of advice resonated like a command.

“I won't forget it,” Astarion assured him. He set the blade back in its box, his attention at last drawn to its other occupant, a band of coppery metal inset with an amethyst cabochon. “And this?”

“That,” said the old wizard, “is a Ring of Mind Shielding. You shall need to attune to it, but once you have, your mind shall be an impenetrable fortress unto itself. No one may read your thoughts or implant their own, unless you expressly allow them to do so.”

“That doesn't sound like the sort of gift that's given lightly.” Never mind the price of such an item. For Elminster to give Astarion something like this, he must have thought he had damn good reason.

“You would do well to wear it on your person until you are safely back in Waterdeep. Oh, but I should caution you against dying in it, m'boy, as your soul may become irreparably trapped. In which case the only succor you may hope to find from that lonely prison are the private thoughts of whatever unfortunate creature puts on the ring next.”

“I'll keep that in mind.” And hopefully not the other way around. The mere thought of haunting a magic ring for all eternity was horrific.

There was something Elminster still wasn't telling him. For the second time tonight, Astarion wondered if the old wizard had divined some coming woe, some terrible fate that would require such specialized tools as these to ward off. “What exactly are you worried we're going to encounter on this trip? Mind flayers?” If it were merely that, surely that was nothing he and Gale couldn't handle. “Beholders?”

“Hopefully neither,” Elminster said as much to himself as to Astarion, “but anything is possible in the Anauroch. No, it is a far older peril I fear, that fell lurker beneath the sands. Though surely the last of them were eradicated by the Shadovar decades ago. . . . In any case, one can never be too careful, can one?”

Astarion wasn't sure he was following, but he would have to ask Gale if he knew what the old man meant later. Whatever it was that haunted Elminster's thought, he seemed hesitant to come out and say it. As if even to speak its name was to give the thing life, and power.

“But while we are on the subject,” Elminster said, taking Astarion's arm in his grip, “tell Gale that he is to have Intellect Fortress prepared at all times. And he should see to it Arabella learns the spell as soon as possible.”

If Astarion had to guess, that was the girl's intention with the tome she was carrying when he last saw her. No doubt she was well on her way to knowing the spell already.

But, “Why me? Gale was your student. If it's so important, why not tell him yourself?”

“Because he is more likely to heed my advice if it comes from you.”

As he said so, Elminster's fingertips dug into Astarion's flesh with a steely strength Astarion would not have expected of the old sage. He had no choice under that vice grip but to swear he would pass Elminster's wisdom along.

“You know,” Elminster said, “you remind me of someone I once knew, a very long time ago. A young rogue with a devilish sleight of hand, and a healthy mistrust of magic and all who would use it to further their own egoistic aspirations.”

“And who was this rogue exactly?” Astarion played along. “An old lover?”

That earned him a dark chuckle. “Only on the loneliest of nights. Though I suppose you might say we were intimate in other ways. My friend did not place much faith in the gods, let alone our Lady of Mysteries. But she had faith in him, and a part for him to play in all that was to come. Yes, some might even say a leading role.”

For a moment it was as if Elminster were looking far away, through a window deep into the past. Then he nodded, and focused his gray eyes on Astarion once more, sharp as an eagle's.

“I cannot blame you, m'boy, if your experiences have left you little trust to spare the Weave. But there is a place for you already in its warp and woof, even if you do not see it.”

At the knock on the door, the two of them drew apart.

“I hope I'm not interrupting anything," Gale said as he peeked around the door. "You two've been in here so long I thought I'd better make sure you were both still in one piece.”

“No interruption at all, darling.”

Astarion closed the box as nonchalantly as he could and left it on the nearest table. He could come back for it later. After their talk, he was certain Elminster would not let him leave Shadowdale without its contents. But he did not want to answer any questions about them and their ominous implications at the moment.

“We were just discussing our favorite subject.”

“Oh?” It did not escape Astarion's notice how Gale stood up a little straighter, shoulders more proudly squared.

“I was just asking Elmara here,” Astarion said, turning to Elminster, “how was the sex?”

“Ao preserve us,” Gale chided him, “must your mind always be in the boudoir?”

“What? It's a fair question. Inquiring minds are desperate to know. I mean, I assume there was sex. It would be a terrible waste of an opportunity if there wasn't.”

To Astarion's relief, Elminster appeared to be quietly tittering into his beard. “Let us simply say the experience was . . . elucidating, and leave it at that. Shall we?”

“Ugh,” Gale groaned, “spare me the details of that conversation. It feels a bit too much like listening to one's own parents go on about their love life. And I am suddenly realizing,” he added, looking very sorry indeed, “that I owe Arabella an apology. Make that several years' worth.”

“So we'll buy her something pretty when we get to Addas Babar. A reward for all her putting up with us,” Astarion said.

“You really think a bauble is going to assuage that level of existential trauma?”

“I wouldn't worry myself overly much about it, m'boy,” Elminster said as he laid a reassuring hand on Gale's shoulder. “If I know anything about that girl, then like a feather in a whirlwind, blown hither and thither, you'll find that when the dust has all settled she'll have weathered the storm just fine. Yes, and come out on top of things, I dare say.”

Chapter Text

Theirs was a blessedly uneventful ride north from Shadowdale, traveling through moon-dappled woods and the occasional stretch of downs beneath starry-white dogwoods, wild lilac and apple in bloom. Fording trickling streams from the safety of their mounts. Glimpsing in the half-lit hours of dawn and dusk deer and bear, and once or twice—unless their eyes were playing tricks on them—a dryad, following them to the edges of her territory. They rested through the noon hours of one day in the barn of a generous halfling farmer, another in the hollowed trunk of an enormous tree. Though campfires and forest fires had blackened the interior, not only did the tree still stand, it flourished, with verdant boughs reaching skyward far overhead.

On the road, they were serenaded by Astarion endlessly whistling “Endless Spring,” with unseen owls and whippoorwills providing accompaniment at night, woodpeckers the rhythm section by day. It seemed he could not get the tune out of his head, as if the god of bards had written it with travels on horseback through just such pleasant weather as theirs in mind.

The most trouble they encountered was from a pack of wolves, who realized their mistake when a vampire tackled the first wolf to lunge for a bite. When Arabella told them in speech they could understand to get if they knew what was good for them, they wasted no time heeding her advice. If not for Gale inadvertently sending the wrong signal to his mare and causing her to bolt, their party would have come through the incident without injury, though thankfully the most serious wound he suffered was to his pride.

At Dagger Falls' plunging waters they rested in actual beds, and enjoyed a hot meal they didn't have to prepare themselves. The inn's hospitality was poor compared to Elminster's, but they made the most of their accommodations, knowing those were the last of such comforts they could expect for some time.

From there the three turned west, heading into the pass through the fey-haunted Border Forest, and straight into Zhentarim territory. Their Gray Hands credentials might have given them carte blanche within the walls of Waterdeep, but the Blackstaff's authority did not extend to the Eastern Heartlands. If their affiliation were discovered at any point in the crossing, the three might have met the same fate as any small band of Harpers traveling openly along the Black Road.

By the time the forests thinned to sparse, scraggily pines, dry as tinder, the hot air off the desert filling their lungs came as a relief. Their destination was not far off: Addas Babar, an old D'tarig trading post of cool mud-brick caravanserais, narrow alleyways, and the last fresh water for leagues, around which a sprawling tent city had sprung up.

In the centuries since its founding, the Zhentarim had gained more of a foothold in the area, resulting in an uneasy truce between their agents and the half-dwarven natives. But beneath the town's shady awnings, the streets bustled with human Bedine, orcish tribesmen and the reptilian laerti, as well as traders of every stripe, for the most part going about their business in peace.

Luckily the antiquary was well enough known in town that each time the three asked for directions, someone invariably pointed the way. It was midmorning when they arrived at the entrance of the shop, tucked away off a well-trodden side street of the market. Its clutter of chipped pots and stone idols, moth-eaten tomes and mounted skeletons, and various metal accoutrements dangling from the rafters, was guarded only by a burgundy-haired young woman in dusty leathers, who was fast asleep in an alcove inside the door.

Gale tentatively cleared his throat. “Er, hello? Is the antiquary at home? We were told this is his shop.”

The bright yellow head of a kobold popped up from behind a display to trill, “Be withs youse lickety-spit!” before promptly disappearing once more.

The three adventurers exchanged glances, raised brows. Astarion shrugged, and he and Arabella moved deeper into the shop, examining the wares as they went.

Gale squeezed past stacks of wooden crates toward where he had last seen the kobold, hoping to exchange another word with the creature.

And very nearly backed into the crates when a broad, seven-foot-tall laerti appeared from behind a behir skull, looming over him. More disconcerting than the lizardman's sudden manifestation, or the unblinking stare of his amber eyes, was the fact that his long body and stubby limbs were squeezed into a fine doublet and breeches, he had a monocle over one eye, and he leaned on a cane.

“Mystra's mantle, you startled me!” Gale breathed, willing his heart to quiet its racing. And, lest he come off as rude, endeavored in his best, stilted Lizardfolk: “Um, evening, good saer. I are wanting speech for, er, old-thing trader whose shop is assistance me—”

“For pity's sake, man,” boomed the laerti in a cultured Neverwintan accent, “I speak Common. And you are savaging an elegant tongue!”

“Oh, thank the gods.” Whatever embarrassment Gale might have felt at that pitiful display of linguistics paled next to his relief at no longer having to tie his tongue in knots trying to produce those sounds. “Perhaps you can help us, then. I'm Gale Dekarios, of Waterdeep, and I'm looking for the proprietor of this shop, Obed Polson—”

“Doctor Polson, I think you mean.”

“Y-yes. Is he here? It's urgent we speak with him.”

The laerti drew himself up to his full height and said, “I am Dr. Polson.”

“I'm sorry,” Astarion cut in, “I was under the impression we were looking for . . . well, a man.”

“I am a man. Do not let these,” the laerti gestured to his broad frame, “mere trappings of meat fool you. I acquired them while studying Abeiran ruins in the badlands, when I inadvertently double-crossed an alhoon, waking up in this body as payment. Ha! Let it never be said those squid-faced bastards are without a sense of humor. As we speak, halfway to Azirrhat there is a man wandering around with the mind of a reptilian!”

He tapped his own scaly pate with the handle of his cane and laughed. At least, the other two assumed from context he was having a chuckle at his own expense, and not in fact gasping for air.

“Probably sporting a fiendish sunburn, poor chap. Not hard to guess who got the shorter end of that stick, eh?”

Having one's body swapped with a lizardman's by a mind flayer lich was not exactly Gale's idea of a good joke, but perhaps it was not his place to judge.

“Um, right. Dr. Polson, my associates and I came here at the behest of Blackstaff Safahr. She received your letter with great interest, but has concerns as to the authenticity of the artifact in question. If you would allow us to examine it, we would be most grateful. We thought it safest if we didn't carry any insignia on our persons, in case we were stopped on the Black Road,” Gale said, producing an illusory emblem of the Gray Hands in the air above his palm, “but should you need proof of our credentials—”

“Cease that at once, lad, if you value that hand!” And with a scowl, Polson glared toward the doorway. “Zhentish eyes are everywhere in Addas Babar.”

When the other two looked over their shoulder, they only saw the sleeping young woman. And Arabella, whose shrug indicated she hadn't noticed anything that would be cause for alarm herself.

“Wait here a moment.” said Polson. “And don't—”

“Touch anything,” Astarion said, “unless I want to lose a limb or be spirited off to planes unknown, yes, yes, I know.”

Polson eyed him queerly, as if Astarion truly had stolen the words right out of his mouth. Then he disappeared into the back room, his thick tail somehow missing every precariously situated item in its path as it swept along behind him.

“That is our preeminent antiquarian?” Astarion hissed to Gale when he was gone. “The one whose expertise we're supposed to trust? You don't actually buy his story about having his body swapped with a lizard's.”

“I don't think I've ever met an alhoon, but from our own experiences with illithids, I wouldn't put it past the capabilities of one who has risen to the level of a lich.”

It didn't escape Gale's notice how Astarion nervously twisted an amethyst ring round his finger with his thumbnail while they waited. A ring Gale was sure he hadn't seen before the start of this journey.

But before he could mention it, the kobold assistant reappeared, his arms laden with pieces to be put out on display.

“Is your master alright?” Astarion asked him. “I mean is he all there, mentally speaking?”

“What, you thinks alhoon forgets a piece?”

Astarion let out a long sigh. “I'm just trying to get a sense of how firm his grip on reality really is. Did you ever know him in a different body?” But the kobold merely blinked at him blankly. “What I mean is—and yes, I do realize I'm not the best one to be saying this, but—has he looked in a mirror recently?”

Astarion's misgivings were cut short when Polson poked his tawny head through the beaded curtain and gestured to them. “Come, come, gentlemen. We haven't all day.”

The three crowded into the back room lit by the diffused glow of lamps, while Arabella stayed in the outer room of the shop to keep watch. Polson tinkered with the head of a gargoyle that was mounted on this side of the beaded curtain, and the faint shimmer of a ward appeared in the doorway. So the antiquary's shop was not as poorly guarded against thieves and Zhentarim as Gale had first thought.

The front of his shop may have been a cluttered mess, but it was clear from the orderly display cases that lined the back room that this was where the real treasures were kept. The central work table had been cleared of everything but a few fine picks and brushes, and the clay tablet pictured in Safahr's letter.

It was a humble thing, lying there drab and rusty brown next to the brilliant color of the velvet cloth it had been wrapped in.

And yet Gale could not keep the awe from his voice. “This is it?” The only known testament to a lost enclave of Netherese survivors, and he was in the same room as it. Breathing in its dust. “It's much smaller than I imagined from the letter.”

Though no less significant, if it proved the genuine article. As with the Astral Prism, sometimes the most important finds were those small enough to slip inside a pouch or pocket.

He began to cast an identification spell before he remembered his manners. “May I?”

“Do what you came to, old boy,” said Polson.

The tablet was cool in Gale's hand, its once smooth clay surface ground down and pitted by water and sand and time. In his other hand, a magnifying glass made of glowing, swirling Weave appeared between thumb and forefinger. As the divination spell did its work, it typically peeled fine layers of magic off an item's surface, revealing impressions of the hands and words that had enchanted it, giving insight into its capabilities, its powers. The tablet, unfortunately, gave back almost nothing. Mere ghosts of echoes of ancient memories.

Though perhaps that was telling in its own right. With the death of Mystryl, however momentary, and the destruction of their cities, the survivors of Karsus's Folly would have been thrown to the mercies of whatever materials and knowledge of older ways they could scavenge. Not for the first time since setting out on this journey, Gale wondered how the people of a more advanced civilization must have felt, to suddenly find themselves bereft of their technology, their high magicks. He couldn't help but mourn them—and mourn with them, for the grandeur of the flying cities they had lost. Just as he did every time he allowed his imagination to journey back in time, and soar and fall with the citizens of old Netheril.

“Well? What's the verdict?” Astarion asked him as the spell waned. “Is it a forgery?”

“I didn't detect any evidence of illusory magic, but nor is that proof the artifact is two thousand years old either.”

“But is it Netherese?”

“I believe so,” Gale said with a nod. “But there's only one way to know for sure. If we could see where the tablet came from with our own eyes, we might find other signs that could point us to a definitive answer.”

“Have you read the inscription yourself?” Astarion asked Polson as they exited the back room, the tablet having been returned once more to its protective wrapping.

“Of course. I had to capture its likeness exactly in my letter to Vajra, and I could hardly be expected to do that without a keen understanding of my subject.”

“Then do you have any idea where we might find this Valley of Serpent Gods it mentions?”

Polson rubbed his chin between his thumb and fingers, as if long used to stroking a beard a laerti would never grow. “Not by that name, no. Though there is a place near where the tablet was found that may fit the description. If it truly exists. Ancient maps point to a temple complex being there at one time, dedicated to gods who are surely long dead by now. Many a treasure seeker has attempted the difficult trek—”

“And none have come back,” said the young woman with the burgundy hair, no longer sleeping near the door. “At least, none who weren't empty-handed and half-mad from thirst.”

Now wide awake and moving about, she was slighter than Arabella and perhaps a handful of years older, built like a cat burglar. Gold-flecked eyes surrounded by dark lashes flashed out of a face browned by the sun, but not yet wizened by it.

Gale didn't bother to hide his interest when he said to her, “You sound as though you have more than a passing familiarity with this place.”

“I know of it. It's in the canyonlands below the peak the Bedine call the Three-Humped Camel. But no one goes there but gnolls and wild animals. That whole area's said to be guarded by a malevolent place spirit.”

“The Lying Shadow,” Polson grumbled to himself. “Nomad superstition and balderdash.”

The woman just flicked him a wry smile. “Real enough. You've never met anyone who's come back from it, have you, Doc?”

“What if we wanted to see this place ourselves?” Arabella said, prompting the woman to give her a hard, appraising look from horns to tail. “Could we trust you to show us the way, and not sell us out to the Zhents?”

The woman spit on the floor of the shop at Arabella's mention of the Black Network, as if to get the bitter taste of that name out of her own mouth.

Much to Polson's horror. “Nadiyah, what have I told you about exposing the artifacts to humidity!”

“I would help you to kill them,” Nadiyah swore to Arabella, “and hide the bodies after.”

Judging by the enthused grin Arabella shot her dads, this woman clearly had her stamp of approval.

“Besides, you will need local guides, or you will never survive the open desert of the Sword. Which means you will probably also need a translator. I'm guessing your Midani,” Nadiyah said to Gale, “is as good as your Lizardfolk?”

Gale's chastened scoff was answer enough.

“Some of the local caravan drivers owe me a favor. For a fee, I could arrange for one of them to guide you. Or see you safely to your valley's doorstep, at least.”

“You would speak with the Bedine on our behalf?” Astarion asked.

“I am Bedine,” said Nadiyah, her squared shoulders daring anyone to refute her.

“There is one condition,” Gale said. “We travel at night and camp during the daylight hours. I'm afraid that is non-negotiable. Will it be a problem?”

Nadiyah's keen eyes honed in on the crimson hue of Astarion's, and the flash of sharp canines behind his smile. “Your partner here melts in the sun?”

“Something like that,” Astarion said.

She gave the matter some thought. “That will require a steeper fee, but I am sure it can be arranged. One of the drivers owes me a rather large favor.”

o—o |O| o—o

When the world stopped moving, Gale lay still to take stock.

He appeared to be in an underground cavern, the ceiling of which the shattered causeway had punched through. By some fortunate happenstance he hadn't been crushed by falling rock, and when he cautiously moved his limbs, everything appeared to be intact and in working order. A haze of sand and dust hung in the air, making it difficult to draw breath without coughing. But he'd avoided catastrophe. Not a bad outcome for barely managing to get Feather Fall off in time.

He had to find the others. Everything else could wait. He could not stop replaying the last few seconds before the world dropped out from beneath them in his mind. The panicked disbelief on Arabella's face as the stone bridge gave way, himself unsure if his spell had been able to reach her. Gale had to believe she had ridden out the fall. She was young and quick on her feet, not to mention quick with her magic.

But he could not say the same for Astarion. Last Gale had seen of him, he had a peryton's talons digging into his back. Putting the worst from his mind, Gale scanned the broken rubble for any sign of movement. But all the dust from the cave-in only rendered the bright patches of daylight more blinding, and the deep black shadows inscrutable.

It was the moaning that guided him, once the ringing in his ears had quietened enough to hear it. Gale raced toward the sound, as fast as the unstable terrain would allow him.

Where Astarion had landed, a shaft of sunlight pierced the ceiling above. Already one side of his face and his left hand had begun to sizzle and turn an ashen gray. If not for his enchanted cloak—well, Gale did not want to contemplate what he might have found had Astarion not been wearing it.

A heap of broken rock slabs pinned Astarion from the back down, preventing him from moving out of the sun's rays on his own. Between that and the agony he must have been in, it was a wonder Astarion was able to cry out for help at all.

“I'm here, Astarion,” Gale assured him, tugging off his robe and draping it over any part of Astarion that was exposed to the sunlight. “Hold on just a little longer. I'm going to get you out of there.”

“Hurry,” Astarion grunted. At least, that was what Gale assumed he was trying to say. He was already so weak, even the usual gods damn you for emphasis was too much effort to utter.

Extracting him wasn't going to be a simple task. There was one large slab in particular, angled against the others, that had to be removed if Gale had any hope of freeing Astarion, but he feared one wrong move and it could slip, crushing Astarion further. And he could afford no further delay in his rescue.

Lucky for them, then, that Gale had prepared Telekinesis at their last rest.

Arabella cried out just as he had begun to lift the slab with the spell, nearly disrupting Gale's focus.

“The perytons,” she explained as she slipped and climbed through the rubble toward them. “For a second I thought I saw one of them move.”

The male lay crumpled on his side, his eye open and staring at them lifelessly. Of the female, only a wing could be seen sticking up from the pile of broken rock. Gale had all but forgotten about the creatures in his desperation to help Astarion, but he felt no pity for them. They would still be alive if they'd left him and his family alone.

As for Arabella, both her knees were scuffed and bleeding through her torn breeches, and there was a cut on her forehead near the base of one of her horns that would need to be examined more closely when they had the time to spare for tending to wounds. That she was up and on her feet was promising enough for now.

“Stay back,” Gale warned her. “I don't want you anywhere near this slab when it comes down. . . . There. Quickly now—”

Once he had maneuvered the slab safely away from them, Arabella wasted no time digging into the rest of the rubble that covered Astarion's legs, rolling the heavy chunks of rock away. The stones beneath him were soaked with his blood, but with sunlight streaming into the cavern, and a regular trickle of loose sand and pebbles raining down from above to testify to the roof's instability, they could not afford to give Astarion a thorough looking-over in situ.

“Get his other side,” Gale said. “We've got to move now, before any more of this ceiling gives way!” And together he and Arabella hoisted Astarion to his feet between them.

They had only gone half a dozen steps when Arabella tried to loop Astarion's arm around her neck, and his anguished protests stopped them in their tracks.

“It's my shoulder,” he gritted out. “Godsdamned peryton practically—hnn—tore my arm off! You have to push it back into its socket.”

“What?" Arabella blanched. "You can't be serious.” She'd trained for just this sort of occurrence on one of their previous missions with the Gray Hands. But knowing how a thing was supposed to be done and doing it for real were two very different matters. What if she did it wrong and made things worse—even left Astarion maimed?

“Oh, for gods'— A little more pain isn't going to kill me,” Astarion said to the uncertainty on her face. “I survived worse in Cazador's kennel than anything you could do to me, girl. So stop giving me that look and get it over with!”

Gale nodded his encouragement. Every moment they stood still was tempting fate, not to mention gravity, and he had faith Arabella knew what to do.

Even if she didn't sound so confident herself. “Alright,” she huffed, as much to buck up herself as Astarion, and maneuvered his arm into position. A swift push and it snapped back into place with a sickening pop.

Astarion's scream ricocheted off the cavern walls. But after a quick word of healing to chase away the pain, he was ready to move again, with Arabella supporting his side. “Thank you, my dear. That feels better already.”

Beyond the strewn piles of rubble and out of the reach of the sun's rays, the ground leveled and their eyes had a chance to adjust to the dimness around them. This place too had been excavated by artisans' hands, the high ceiling over their heads supported by thick pillars every several yards.

Now that they were no longer in imminent danger, Gale's relief gave way to regret. “Damn it all, I should have known 'Lying Shadow' didn't refer to any place spirit or Shadovar, but perytons!” Those monstrosities were nearly as infamous for casting deceptive shadows, shaped like ordinary men and women, as they were their predilection for living, beating hearts.

“And what good would that have done us?” Astarion said. “We still would have had to pass through their territory.”

“Yes, but we might have been able to prepare ourselves better, kept a lower profile—tried to avoid being detected instead of striding in like we owned the damn place.

“And what were you even thinking, throwing yourself at those beasts armed with nothing but daggers?” he muttered to Astarion, now that they were firmly entrenched in the subject of What Went Wrong. “Could you be any more reckless?”

“I'm sorry, I thought I was giving you and Arabella a plum opportunity to escape,” Astarion hissed back.

“By sacrificing yourself?”

“No. No,” Astarion insisted, “I wasn't sacrificing myself, Gale, I was providing a distraction. You were supposed to get the girl to safety! Then I would worm my way out of there, just like I always do, and find a way to join up with the two of you later. And if you had just done as you were told—”

“You would be dead!”

“I had the damn birds right where I wanted them. Everything was under control!”

“Not from where I was standing.”

“So you both messed up!” Arabella chided them. “You're even, alright? Now can you please give it a damn rest?”

She was right, of course. As she so often was, Gale found. He could be cross with Astarion for the choices he'd made all he wished, but it wouldn't change what had already happened. Nor the fact they were both still alive (or as alive as Astarion could be said to be). They had all survived the causeway's collapse in one piece, even if the worse for wear. Far better to count their blessings than bicker about how things might have turned out.

“I suppose we are here now,” Gale conceded, “wherever here is. At very least we're safe from the sun.”

Perhaps it was a good thing Astarion was unable to cast a reflection. He need never see how badly the sunlight had ravaged his face and neck. The peeling flakes of ashen skin, the fissures deep in the tissues, the pale bloodless peek of what might have been bone through his brow. The milky white film over his left eye, like that of a broiled fish. To speak nothing of the gashes and bruises that were no doubt hiding beneath his leathers. Gale could barely look at Astarion without feeling sick with sympathy. And remorse, for not doing more to prevent his suffering.

“We may as well make camp. You aren't fit to go anywhere for a while.”

“Nonsense,” Astarion groaned as he lowered himself gingerly onto a fallen pillar. “I just need a brief rest and I'll be right as rain.”

“You know what would help you heal faster—”

“What, so we can both be out of commission in a strange place with who knows what else lurking in the shadows, waiting to eat us? Forget it. I am not drinking your blood.” And he clucked his tongue. “Talk about reckless ideas.”

“You're just being obstinate.”

“I am being realistic. Darling. I'll be fine. I'm a fast healer as it is.”

Not that fast. The last time Astarion had fallen victim to the sun, it had taken days for his flesh to look and feel right again. To speak nothing of the emotional toll it had taken on him, this weakness that was in no wise his fault yet reminded him every chance it got of his cursed nature. Those were days they could not afford. This mission had already taken a turn that had nearly proved fatal. They had to be more careful.

“My dear,” Astarion said, finally noticing of the wound on Arabella's forehead, “you hit your head.”

She reached up to touch the cut, tenderly probing the blood that had already started to congeal. “It's just a scratch compared to yours.” Then she winced at herself. “Sorry. I didn't mean—”

“No, I'm sure you're right," Astarion grumbled. "I suppose I ought to be grateful I can't see myself in a mirror. Just tell me I still have my nose.”

“Um, does most of it count?”

Gale suppressed the instinctual reaction to tell him it wasn't that bad. That would have been a lie, and Astarion would have seen right through it.

But bad as the burns were, they were only surface damage. “I'm more worried about these puncture wounds at the moment,” Gale said instead, taking stock of the ragged holes punched through Astarion's leathers. Where his clothes peeked through underneath, they were soaked with blood. “Those talons went deep.”

“Well, lucky for me, I no longer need most of those organs, and infection can't gain much of a foothold in a body that's already dead.”

Excuses and obfuscations, that was all Gale heard. “It's not infection that concerns me, Astarion, but the loss of blood.” Gale unsheathed his own knife. “We'll need to get you out of your armor.”

Astarion flinched back from him and reached for the straps of his cuirass himself, though it clearly pained him to do so. “I don't need your help with that. I'm wounded, I'm not some child in need of coddling.”

But it had never been Gale's intention to use the knife to cut Astarion's armor off him. Gale shoved his sleeve up to his elbow, and opened a shallow incision in his left arm before he had time to brace for the pain. By the time Astarion turned and saw what Gale was really doing, it was too late to stop him.

“You're not really going to make me waste it, are you?”

Perhaps Gale had gone a step too far this time. Astarion glared daggers up at him, nostrils flaring, and for a moment, Gale wondered if his husband really would let him bleed all over the cavern floor.

“You godsdamned,” Astarion muttered, “stubborn—” then seized Gale's wrist, catching the drip of blood before it could fall and latching his lips over the cut.

It wasn't very deep. Gale had no reason to fear bleeding out. And reluctant as Astarion may have been to partake, his body had other ideas, driving him to suck ravenously, desperate to increase the flow of blood it needed to repair itself. Astarion shuddered at his own instincts, even as his fingers gripped Gale's wrist tight, holding it in place. If he just got it over with quickly, no doubt he was reasoning, he could pretend he didn't enjoy the taste and how thoroughly it satisfied him.

Arabella turned away as soon as she saw Astarion lean in, and began to fuss with what was left of their equipment.

It was when she picked up her crossbow and bolts that Gale asked her, “Where are you going?”

“To get away from the two of you,” Arabella muttered.

Then, realizing how cruel that must sound given the extent of Astarion's injuries: “And to find some food and fresh water. And whatever else we dropped in the fall. Maybe get a sense of just what we're dealing with with this place.”

“Not by yourself, you're not,” Astarion tore himself away from Gale's arm to protest.

Even though it was clear to everyone but him that “You're certainly in no condition to come with me.”

“Well, it's too risky for you to go alone. And with that head wound besides—”

“I told you, it's nothing. I didn't even hit it that hard.”

“Take this with you,” Gale said, and created an arcane eye hovering in the air between them. He knew what Arabella was going to say when she started to roll her eyes, but, “That's non-negotiable, young lady. We don't know what else is out there. At least this way, if you do run into trouble, help won't be far behind.”

Not that an anemic wizard and a sunburnt vampire with gods only knew how many bruised or broken bones under his leathers would be much help in an emergency, but they were better than nothing.

“Fine,” Arabella huffed in resignation, swinging their fishing basket over her shoulder. “But I'll be careful. I still have the shadows on my side after all.”

Of that, Gale had little doubt. Watching her go, knowing his arcane eye was not far behind, he bound his arm and began to make camp. Practically pushing Astarion back down when he tried to get up to help. Fresh infusion of blood or not, his body still needed its rest.

There was, of course, the matter of starting a campfire. Gale was able to illuminate a small area of the cavern with dancing lights, but their cool, ghostly glow was hardly enough to cook by. “I don't suppose we'll find any dry tinder in this place.”

“Arabella knows the score well enough by now,” Astarion said as he leaned back against the fallen pillar, trying with mixed results to make himself more comfortable. “I'm sure she'll bring back something we can use.”

Gritting through the discomfort, he managed to relieve himself of his short swords, only to find that one of them had bent in the fall and been rendered all but useless.

“Wonderful.” The sword's clattering ring echoed through the cavern as Astarion tossed it past his feet. “We'd better hope that, whatever else may be lurking down here, we won't need more than eight of my blades to fight it off.”

“Eight?” If Gale did his arithmetic right, the bent sword minus the two daggers still buried with the perytons should have left him with seven.

But Astarion was already unsheathing one of the daggers, as if to reassure himself it was still there.

Gale recognized the bluish sheen instantly. “I thought you lost your sussur dagger back in Baldur's Gate.”

“I did. This one was a gift. And I would be very upset if anything happened to it.”

A gift, was it? “I think I can guess who from,” Gale said. “Same person who gave you that ring, by any chance? Oh, don't try and play coy. It wasn't difficult for me to puzzle out. I'd never seen it before we left Elminster's, and I figured if you had found a new ring somewhere along the road,” Gale couldn't help adding with a fond smile, “you'd have been insufferable with your bragging about it.”

Now that the gremishka was out of the bag, Astarion had no trouble confessing the rest. “It's a Ring of Mind Shielding, if you must know. The beardy old tramp seemed to think we'd have need of it on this trip.”

“Hmm, which explains why he'd want me to have Intellect Fortress ready at all times.”

“Does it, though? He wouldn't say what it is he thinks we're going to encounter. Not alhoons, I hope. I've had enough of those tentacled freaks and their ilk to last me another two centuries. Our old hero friend aside, of course.”

No, if Gale's suspicions were correct, it was a far more fearsome creature than mind flayer liches that Elminster had in mind. They were in the right part of the world, after all. It would only be fitting if, chasing Netherese ghosts, they ran into Netheril's old nemesis as well.

And they might have, if they'd set out on this adventure half a century ago. But the phaerimm had been extinct in the Realms for the last twenty years. Surely Elminster gave Astarion those gifts out of a mere abundance of caution. If pockets of the old enemy had survived, that knowledge would not have been swept under the proverbial rug or hidden in some magister's vault. It would be a matter of highest concern to everyone who channeled the Weave. 

“If we do run into any alhoons,” Gale said, “please try not to antagonize them, no matter how easy they make it to do so. You know I'd love you even as a kobold, but I've grown quite attached to this body of yours. Sunburns and all.”

“Uhh,” Astarion grimaced, “that is not a joking matter.”

Of course it wasn't. And Gale hadn't been joking. But Astarion would never get the recuperative rest he sorely needed if Gale kept handing him more reasons to argue.