7 FLAMERULE (HIGHSUN)

YOU WANTED TO TALK,” KALEN SAID. “SO TALK.”

“Straight to the point,” the elf said. “I like that. It shows character.”

They had returned to the mostly abandoned Drowned Rat tavern to find only a dozen or so members of the gang. A pair of toughs sat in the corner, their eyes twitching at everything that moved. Behind the bar, Flick poured drinks and dispensed rations. Other survivors avoided Kalen as though he himself had brought the plague. And perhaps he had—after all, his plan had led hundreds to their deaths.

“Myrin,” Kalen had said, but she’d shaken her head and gone immediately upstairs. Sithe might have gone with her, but the sun elf with the gold eyes laid a hand on her brow and murmured a short, lyrical verse. Kalen watched as healing magic, sculpted by his words, flowed into her and she stood a little easier. A bard, then.

They took a table near the center of the common hall, and Kalen waved for mead. The elf kissed the back of Flick’s hand, causing her to blush as she poured.

“None for me, dear one,” the elf said. “I’m not staying.”

Flick went away, casting her eyes back over her shoulder at the elf.

“Well?” Kalen asked. “Who are you?”

“I have many names upon many lips,” he said. “But Lilten is the name I prefer, teller of tales, singer of songs, walker of roads.”

“Lilten,” Kalen said. “Are you an adventurer?”

“Now that is a much longer story than we have time for me to tell,” the elf said. “After all, you have a city to save, hero. Suffice it to say, I am a traveler like you. I always seem to turn up when I’m most needed—or when I’m least wanted.”

“Such as against the demon.”

“Such as.”

The elf reminded Kalen of someone, but damned if he could say exactly whom.

“You healed me when Toytere tried to kill us,” Kalen said. “Why?”

“On behalf of Lady Darkdance,” Lilten said. “But this is not the matter under discussion. There will be time enough for all of that later. Ah. My lady.” He rose and bowed gallantly.

Myrin appeared on the stairs, looking very weary but at least cleansed of the dust of travel. She seemed to be steeling herself for what was bound to be an ungentle discourse. “Kalen,” she said coolly.

“Myrin,” he said.

“My Lady Darkdance, what a pleasure.” Lilten took her hand and brought it close to his lips, but he did not kiss it as he had Flick’s hand. “You look radiant, dear one.”

“Um, thanks?” Myrin stared at the dashing elf like a puzzle that defied her every attempt to solve it. Lilten smiled back. “Kalen?”

“Pardon me,” Kalen said to Lilten, then he followed her.

Myrin stood at the end of the bar, where the shadows hung deepest. She had assumed her familiar anxious posture, clutching one arm behind her back, with one toe grinding into the floorboards. “Kalen, I know what you’re going to say—”

“Thank you.”

“—but it was my own decision. I know you don’t approve but godsdammit, you need me and … did you just say thank you?” Her eyes widened.

“Thank you.” Kalen put his hand on Myrin’s narrow shoulder. “I was wrong,” he said. “I needed you and I sent you away. It won’t happen again.”

Myrin blinked. “That—that was an entirely unexpected response,” she said. “Nor is that quite what I hoped you might say.”

“What did you hope I would say?”

“Perhaps, ‘thanks for saving the day again, Myrin,’ or ‘I’m glad to see you, Myrin,’ or ‘thanks for showing me what a wool-head I am when it comes to tactics, Myrin’—”

“All right.” Kalen squeezed her shoulder a little and took heart in the smile that crossed her face. The tension that had grown between them since their parting seemed to evaporate. He felt close to her and very comfortable in her presence. “What of Rhett?”

Her face fell and he could tell that he hadn’t said quite the right thing. She stepped out of his reach. “He’s well enough,” she said, her voice disinterested. “We marched five days to Westgate, stayed half a day, and I came right back.”

“Five days,” Kalen said. “It took you that long to decide to ignore my request.”

“You only told me to leave,” Myrin said. “You never said I couldn’t come back.”

“True,” Kalen said. “Rhett’s made contact with Levia?”

Myrin shrugged. “I never saw her myself, but Rhett looked optimistic when he returned from their moot,” she said. “Quite secretive, those Eye of Justice folk.”

“You have no idea.” Kalen nodded. “And he still wields Vindicator?”

“That was what won him Levia’s ear. Still—” Myrin bit her lip.

“Speak,” Kalen said. “What is it?”

“The sword chose you,” Myrin said. “You cannot simply abandon its call.”

Kalen shook his head. She didn’t understand—couldn’t understand. What the sword asked of him … It was not something he could give. Would she even want him to accept it, if she knew what she asked?

“Kalen, I—” Myrin looked sullen, any hint of former mirth fled. “I have to tell you something. About Rhett.”

Unease flickered in his stomach, but he suppressed it. “Can it wait?” he asked. “If it’s important, I don’t trust our new friend where he can overhear.”

A barmaid and one of the handsomer Dead Rats had wandered over to Lilten, where he seemed to be wooing them with some jest or another. He winked at Kalen, perhaps in response to the scrutiny, or perhaps because he overheard his name.

“Very well—it can wait.” Myrin sighed. “I’m still furious at you, you know.”

“Furious?” Kalen hadn’t expected that. “Why?”

Myrin blinked, startled. “You—you still don’t know?” She turned red. “I can’t believe you, Kalen Dren! One of these days, you’ll see how hard it is to—to—ahh!”

She stomped up the stairs, then paused on the first landing. She made an effort to compose herself, turned, and addressed him icily.

“I can’t imagine what you’ve wasted the last tenday doing, but I’ve just been hiking through the Shadowfell all that time without rest, and I’m very tired. Excuse me.”

She went up to her room and slammed the door.

“Troubles?”

Lilten lounged in his seat, one leg tossed over the table. His fawning adherents had gone off hand-in-hand toward the broom closet at the end of Flick’s bar. It seemed the mere presence of this elf aroused warm, sweaty feelings.

Lilten sipped at a delicate glass of blue wine—such a thing as Kalen had never seen outside the richest taverns of Waterdeep. Where had he gotten that?

Kalen wandered back to the table, his world spinning slightly. Everything felt numb, not just his body. “I think,” he said, sinking into his seat. “I think she hates me.”

“More’s the pity you think that,” Lilten said. “But to business. I find that the women we love often cloud the issue unnecessarily. Agreed?”

Kalen nodded dumbly, though he had no idea what the elf had just said. He’d thought he and Myrin had dealt with the tension between them, but now, with the last words she’d said to him, he wasn’t so sure. He remembered a tenday past, when she had slapped him. Kalen noted two creases on the elf’s otherwise perfect cheek, like ancient scars. Had those come about in the same fashion?

“For now,” Lilten said, “I think you wish to hear of Scour.”

Hot tears started rolling down her cheeks as soon as she closed the door behind her. She slumped back against it, beating her fists against the grimy wood.

She’d come back to Luskan prepared to rage at Kalen for sending her away. Then—of all things—he had thanked her for coming back. She’d ended up raging at him anyway. And what she’d said—or, rather, almost said to him … Gods!

It was all so frustrating! If only she had more power—if only she could remember when she had wielded more! Then Kalen wouldn’t doubt her. Then—

Myrin felt like screaming, but that would draw attention, which would be worse. She grabbed her grimoire, flipped it open to a simple silencing incantation, and intoned the ritual. A hazy blue glow filtered over her door and walls, ensuring her privacy. Perfect.

Her wand flashed into her hand and she slashed it at the bed. A wave of thunder streaked forth, sending the bed shattering against the wall. Her pack burst open in a rain of colorful garments. She blasted one out of the air with a conjured arrow of force, sending scraps of fabric sailing in all directions, then whirled and sent forth a burst of flame to consume a fluttering white shift. The destruction was petty but it relieved her.

She turned her wand toward another garment, then stopped. The slinky red dress hung where it had caught on a broken bedpost, swinging like a hapless doll. Somehow, this image got the better of Myrin and she dropped her wand. More tears came. She didn’t fight them.

“Lady Darkdance.” Sithe stood at the door, dressed in her ruined fighting clothes. She spoke in words that barely rose above a whisper. “You are well?”

“Yes.” Embarrassment seized Myrin and she wiped her nose. “Yes, I’m well.”

Sithe hesitated on the threshold. Myrin wondered if she’d ever actually shared more than a dozen words with the genasi at any one time.

“You do battle?” The dark woman glanced around Myrin’s ruined room.

“Only against myself, I suppose,” Myrin said. “Please—come in, if you like.”

Slouched and shivering, Sithe entered. The swarm demon’s assault had torn her clothes to little more than ribbons. The tatters hid little enough that Myrin blushed to look at her. Lilten’s song had healed her wounds, but Myrin knew the genasi had been grievously hurt in the battle.

“That can’t be warm enough,” Myrin said. “Let me find you something else.”

Sithe adjusted her cloak self-consciously. “No need.”

“Please,” Myrin said. “I must have something you can wear. Here”—she pulled down the red dress from where it hung—“it’s not much, but—what?”

Sithe stared blankly at the dress.

“You think it won’t fit? We’re of a size, you and I—mostly.” The genasi was a bit broader than Myrin, but not by much. Amazing, how so much warrior fit into so little body.

“I—” Sithe said. “I cannot wear that.”

“Why not?” Myrin asked. “The color doesn’t flatter your inner darkness?”

From the way Sithe stared at her, she’d not taken the jest.

“Very well—I’ll get the blanket. Sorry about it being blasted in half.”

Myrin fumbled for the covering, which she wrapped around Sithe’s frail body. The genasi seemed so thin and weak. She had not brought her axe to Myrin’s room. Before she had been a force of death, but in that moment, Sithe seemed suddenly a woman. They sat on the floor together.

“Why, um,” Myrin said. “Why are you here? Don’t misunderstand—I don’t mind. But I never got the sense you even noticed me, much less—”

“I attempted to defeat you and was defeated,” Sithe said. “My life is yours.”

“Oh. That makes sense,” Myrin said. “It really isn’t necessary, you know. I appreciate your honor, but I’d much rather your life be your own. Mine’s complicated enough as it is.”

Sithe offered her a studious look with no reaction one way or the other. “You make war against yourself,” the genasi said, gesturing around the room. “You wish to forget?”

Myrin shook her head. “The opposite, in fact,” she said. “My whole life, I—I cannot remember the slightest moment of it. Only bits and pieces I take from other minds when I touch them. I take their memories for my own.”

“When you touch them,” Sithe said. “As you did with me.”

Myrin remembered then—the night Toytere had betrayed them, Sithe had gone mad. She’d only stopped when Myrin stole her powers. What had happened to the genasi in that moment?

“Yes,” Myrin said finally. “When I touch them.”

The genasi extended one torn and swollen hand—an offer.

“No, it—Sithe, it only works if you’ve met me before,” she said.

The hand withdrew and the genasi looked haunted.

“I’m sorry,” Myrin said. “Here I want to remember … and you want to forget.”

“No fear.” Sithe shook her head. “Only the weak fear to remember what is past. Only the guilty are ashamed of it. I am neither.”

“It is not weakness to run from a memory that is painful,” Myrin said. “And it is not shame to let yourself hurt.”

“So you say,” Sithe said.

Determined, Myrin reached out and took the genasi’s hands. Sithe flinched away, but Myrin held them securely. She needed no magic to feel the woman’s pain.

“You don’t have to be empty to be strong,” Myrin said.

The genasi, her black eyes wide and staring, nodded slowly. The lines of power along her skin grew darker—their blackness deepening in intensity—almost like a human might flush. As Myrin watched, the darkness blurred in her eyes, swelling around the bottom, then it abruptly leaked down her cheeks. Tears.

“It’s well.” Myrin scooted forward and put her arms around Sithe, pressing her head into the woman’s shoulder. “It’s all well. You’re safe now.”

The genasi at first sat rigidly, then returned the embrace fully. Her silent tears became sobs and she let Myrin hold her as her body shook.

“I heard their voices,” Sithe said. “I heard them, in the darkness, as they chewed my flesh—as they drank of my soul. They said ‘come with us, Sister—feast with us.’ ”

“That’s not right,” Myrin said. “You are not like them.”

“Am I not?” Sithe glared into Myrin’s face. “My father was a demon who raped my mother and left her for dead. I was born with darkness in my soul. How can you say I am not one of them?” She clasped her hands to her stomach. “Every one of them was a little bit of me—every one bore the same inner void, the same awful hunger.” She shivered. “I can feel them now, in my head. Their hunger is inside of me. Their rage.”

“You are not like them,” Myrin repeated.

“Look!” Sithe threw off the blanket and tore free the tatters of her bodice. “See!”

Myrin’s eyes widened. Bites rose on Sithe’s chest, angry and red. And—Myrin saw with dawning horror—they bore traces of crimson crystal.

“The Fury,” Myrin said. “You carry it.”

The genasi nodded. She looked past Myrin at the red dress that lay on the broken bed. Myrin thought she saw longing in that look.

“You will keep my secret?” Sithe stood.

“If you wish,” Myrin said.

“When the time comes”—the genasi tightened the blanket around her body—“I will ask Kalen Shadowbane to kill me.”

Myrin opened her mouth to protest, then nodded solemnly. “Why him?” Myrin asked. “Why did you spend all that time teaching him?”

Sithe met her gaze levelly. “Because he can be better than he is.”

“Are you”—Myrin clenched her hands very tight—“are you in love with him?”

Sithe looked past her, at the red dress, and her gaze seemed nostalgic and a little sad. It was, Myrin thought, as though the genasi mourned—in that moment—for a life she had never had. Sithe shook her head.

“That is why you love him, is it not?” Sithe asked. “Because he can be better?”

Myrin wanted to deny that—both parts of it—but the words wouldn’t come. She nodded slightly, her eyes damp.

“He is who and what he is,” Sithe said. “But he is a better man than you think.”

“No,” Myrin said. “No, that—that isn’t possible.”

Sithe nodded in silent understanding.

Myrin sniffed, wiped her nose, and stood. “Shall we see if the menfolk have decided anything?” She paused. “Well, after we get you some clothes.”

“Scour.” The image that flashed into Kalen’s mind was of dust borne upon a wind. Dust that whipped so hard it tore the flesh from bones, turning it to red mist. “It fits.”

“Indeed,” Lilten replied. “Scour is the consciousness that drives the hordes of Luskan, but it is no black wizard or mortal villain. Scour is a demon—a source of evil so powerful I, for one, have rarely seen its match.”

“Is that impressive?” Kalen asked. “Do you know evil well?”

Lilten smirked. “I do not believe Scour thinks the way you might understand thoughts, but it causes chaos the way you or I might breathe. It follows no set pattern, killing by instinct where it will cause terror. This goes on, folk disappear, tempers grow, violence flourishes, and the demon gets what it wants. Or”—Lilten waved his glass—“it infects its victims with the Fury and forces them to fight in their madness.”

“So where does it come from?” Kalen asked.

Lilten shrugged. “That knowledge would go no small way to defeating it, but alas, I do not know,” he said. “I had hoped you would find more on the derelict, but now it rests in burnt cinders at the bottom of the bay.”

“It was you,” Kalen said. “You were the man without his own face, who sent Myrin and Rhett to the ghost ship.”

“Without his own face—I rather like that.” Lilten raised his glass. “All I know of Scour encompasses what it is and the fact that it is very powerful. Oh”—he waved his finger to indicate a point—“and I have some sense of where it lairs.”

“Where it lairs,” Kalen said. “You could take me there?”

“I suppose,” Lilten said. “Not that I have any suggestions about what to do once you find it. You’re the hero here.” He drained the last of his wine.

“We fight it,” Kalen said.

“Well, you fight it.” Lilten tapped the starburst-shaped hilt of his rapier. “I have a few tricks of my own, but again, you’re the warrior, not I.”

“You called it off.”

“A trick that may or may not work again,” Lilten said. “Would you trust to luck?”

Kalen shrugged. “At this point, what else is there?”

Lilten’s eyes sparkled at that. “What else indeed.”

The sun elf rose and traced his fingers idly across the table. He was deciding something.

“Well,” he said at length. “Come nightfall, we go to the main hive in the sewers.”

Kalen caught his arm. “A considerable coincidence,” he said, “that you appear only when needed. First you steer Myrin to the derelict, then you heal me, and now you would help us against this Scour. Quite fortunate.”

“Isn’t it, though?” Lilten looked down at the hand on his arm, then gave Kalen a broad smile. “I must say, it is indeed very suspicious, and yet, what choices have you?”

In a flash, Kalen drew his dagger and stabbed it into the table between Lilten’s thumb and forefinger.

“Interesting,” the elf said.

“Explain,” Kalen said. “You serve another purpose here. Tell me what it is.”

“Such a suspicious lad.” Lilten drew his hand away from the dagger and inspected his thumb—specifically, the tiny rent Kalen’s blade had left in the glove. He looked Kalen in the eye. “Trust me if you will; do not if you will not. But think of what will happen to your beloved Luskan on the morrow, when the demon hungers again.”

“It is not my city,” Kalen said.

“No? You fight quite hard to save it, King Shadowbane. Or rather”—Lilten glanced over Kalen’s shoulder, toward the stairs—“something in it?”

Footsteps on the stairs drew his attention—Sithe and Myrin descending slowly. When he looked back, Lilten was gone. That also reminded him of someone and this time he did remember. Speaking in riddles, far too beautiful for his—or her—own good? A name floated in his mind, but he dared not voice it.

“What happened to our guest?” Myrin asked.

“He was never staying.” Kalen regarded Sithe, who wore traveling clothes borrowed from Myrin. With her black skin and steady gaze, she looked far more threatening in that attire than Myrin ever could. The two of them exchanged a nod. “Flick,” Kalen called. “Zzar?”

“One bottle left,” the bartender called back. “Cost me forty pieces of gold.”

“Share it with us who are soon to die?”

“Well then.” She reached into a cupboard hidden beneath the bar and took out one of the Dead Rats’ greatest treasures: four glasses—genuine glasses, albeit cracked in two instances, and with one missing a substantial chip from the edge. “Can’t be toasting imminent death with pewter or clay.”

The four of them sat around the table in the middle of the vast, nearly empty common room, as Flick poured glasses of the thick amber liquid into their tankards. The scent of almonds rose as they each touched their glasses, expectant.

“We face certain death tonight,” Kalen said. “We’re to venture into the sewers and destroy that creature in its lair. All on the word of an elf who’s probably playing both sides.”

“Well,” Myrin said. “That definitely sounds like certain death—unless we win.”

“Unless.” Kalen raised his glass. “To almost certain death.”

They raised their glasses and threw back the zzar. Of the four of them, Sithe’s face drew tightest—apparently, heavy drink was not for her. Myrin did quite well.

“You are well?” Kalen asked the genasi.

Sithe drained the rest of her zzar. “Better.”

“Hic!” Myrin beamed. “That’s the best.”

Flick chuckled wetly and poured the last of the bottle into the four glasses. “What of the next queen of Luskan, eh?” she asked. “Eden of the Clearlight?”

Every face turned sour.

“Easy come, easy bleed,” Flick said. “In Luskan, you basically have two choices: live with the blaggard in power or kill him and hope you like the next blaggard better.”

Kalen touched his second glass of zzar, looking at the reflection of his fingers through the amber. “Anyone know how to kill a tide of ten thousand beasts?”

“Ten thousand cuts,” Sithe said.

“If we fought it before and couldn’t kill it,” Kalen said, “how do we kill it now?”

“Point.” Myrin stared at her second glass very seriously. “But we have to try.”

“Fleeing isn’t better?” Flick asked. “The Dead Rats is done, the other gangs of Luskan in disarray. What you got’s worth the fight?”

“Nothing,” Sithe said.

The genasi looked around the table, taking in first Myrin, then Kalen. Understanding flickered across Sithe’s dark visage.

“Something more,” she amended.

Kalen raised his glass to that. “Something more.”