Jaleigh Johnson - Spider and Stone

Her fingers glowed and flames erupted from her hands, shattering her reflection and blocking out the spider’s eyes. The creature recoiled, legs scraping across the stone, tangling in Icelin’s hair. Panic and revulsion rose in her. She had to get out from under the thing before it crushed her.

By the light of her fire spell, Icelin saw Ruen viciously stab the spider’s body, trying to draw it away from her. He danced aside as the monster turned and tried to take a bite out of him. Dropping to his knees, he pitted his weight against the monster and yanked aside one of the spider’s legs. Icelin reached through the gap, and he hauled her out from under the creature.

“Watch out!” Icelin shouted.

A third spider scuttled along the ceiling above their heads. Ruen let her go, ran to the far wall, and using a small stone outcrop as a leaping-off point, propelled himself up the wall, close enough to reach the spider’s bloated body. Before it had the chance to scramble away, Ruen pushed off the wall, ripping the spider off its stone perch. Icelin darted out of the way as he and the monster landed on the passage floor.

Ruen rolled clear just as a backhand swing from the elder dwarf’s axe drove the obsidian horns into the spider’s exposed abdomen. The monster’s legs flexed and clawed the air wildly, but it couldn’t pull itself together for another attack. The deadly axe tore it apart in a mess of gore.

The younger dwarf had thrown the spider off his back. He shouted and hacked at the creature. His axe sliced through the monster’s legs like sticks. He reversed the strike and tore into the spider’s abdomen with the obsidian horns as his father had done.

In its death throes, the spider latched onto the dwarf’s arm and bit deep. Blood and poison drenched the dwarf’s arm. He yelled and bore down with his axe, cutting the spider in half.

Icelin poured more fire into the other spider’s eyes. The room blurred as weakness overcame her. Too fast, she thought, too much. At least the spell hadn’t gone wild.

“Icelin, stop!” Ruen crouched beside her. “The creature’s dead.”

Shaking, Icelin reined in the fire and instinctively grasped her staff. Responding to her touch, red light filled and swirled in its wooden cage. Power, balanced and carefully contained-the symbolism was not lost on her. Focusing her thoughts on the staff, the strength and stability of its magic, Icelin felt a little calmer.

“Are you all right?” Icelin asked, turning to Ruen with a slightly dazed expression.

“You’re asking me that?” Ruen nodded to her hands where she clutched the staff. They trembled still, knuckles white against the wood. “You shouldn’t have spent yourself like that.”

“That’s what my great uncle used to say whenever I did something foolish. I’m sorry, but I’m not fond of spiders,” Icelin said weakly, “especially when they’re bigger than I am.”

The younger dwarf snarled something in his native language as he held a hand against his wound. Black ichor dripped from his axe.

“What did he say?” Ruen asked.

The dwarf’s father nodded at Icelin. “He agrees with her,” he said. He hesitated, then held out a hand to Ruen. “You fight well,” he said grudgingly. “I’m Garn Blackhorn.”

“Ruen Morleth,” Ruen said and clasped the dwarf’s hand briefly. “She is Icelin Tearn.”

“The young one’s my son, Obrin,” Garn said. “Did you get much of the poison?” he asked his son.

The dwarf grunted. He lifted his hand away from his wound. Some of the greenish liquid flowed down his arm. Icelin couldn’t smell the poison anymore, but the pinched look of the dwarf’s face and the pallor of his skin told her he was in pain.

Garn went to his son. He held up a hand and traced a symbol in the air with his index and middle fingers. The short, gnarled digits were anything but graceful, yet that was the only word Icelin thought of when she beheld the glowing orange rune with roots of blue and purple that flowed from the dwarf’s fingertips, hissing in the cold cavern air.

The symbol faded. Garn unfastened Obrin’s gauntlet and rolled up his sleeve to expose the spider bite. A breath later, Obrin’s torn flesh glowed, and the same rune Icelin had seen traced on the air rose up as if from deep within Obrin’s skin.

The delicate shape of the rune fascinated her-two interlocking rings with a horizontal line drawn across both. A symbol impossible to translate, yet its effects lingered in the air long after the rune had faded away completely. Warmth, protection, healing. Be at peace, the magic whispered in a voice without words, strong and firm. The younger dwarf closed his eyes briefly as the rune melted into his flesh, the orange light covering the wound and closing it.

Icelin allowed her eyes to drift closed for a moment. So often she’d only felt the touch of wild magic, but the soothing presence of this kind of stable Art made her breathing slow and washed away the sick feeling in her stomach.

When she opened her eyes, she met the younger dwarf’s curious gaze. Embarrassed, Icelin looked away. “You also fought well, Obrin,” she said. The dwarf shot her an irritated glance and muttered something, again in his own language. “Doesn’t he speak the common tongue?” Icelin asked.

“He speaks it, and he understands everything you’re saying, but he doesn’t speak to outsiders,” Garn said. “It’s beneath his dignity.”

“But not yours,” Ruen observed.

The elder dwarf stroked his beard, his fingers tracing the runes on his cheek in a significant if absentminded gesture. “My son is his own man. He acts as he sees fit, and so do I. You’re both skilled enough in battle, even if you are thieves and plunderers,” he said.

Icelin and Ruen exchanged a glance. “Don’t look at me,” Icelin said wearily. “You’re the thief-and probably the plunderer, too. All I want is Sull.”

“Why did you capture him?” Ruen asked. “If you thought he desecrated your burial grounds, why didn’t you just kill him?”

“Because he told us you’re looking for the Arcane Script Sphere,” Garn said. “That changes things.”

“Do you know of the artifact?” Icelin asked.

A flicker of disdain passed over Garn’s face. “It’s not my place to tell you of it. We’ll take you to your friend, but it’s a long way down, deeper than I think you intended to go.”

“Will you let us come back out again?” Ruen asked.

Garn didn’t answer. He examined his son’s wound one more time and, appearing satisfied, helped him to his feet. “Your lady looks exhausted,” he said, nodding to Icelin. “She can rest once we get to the city. Our king will want to speak to you about the artifact.”

“A city?” Icelin said as Ruen helped her to stand. “And a king? I suppose we were just discussing new adventures, weren’t we?” she said to Ruen. “I really should learn to keep my mouth shut. The gods have a way of listening when I start going on about adventure.”

Ruen picked up the torch. “Lead on,” he told the dwarves.

GUALLIDURTH, THE UNDERDARK

21 UKTAR

The scouts stood before Mistress Mother Fizzri Khaven-Ghell and gave a terse report on their latest forays to the outposts of Iltkazar. Fizzri listened to their account, but her attention kept diverting to the shadowy corners of the room. At any moment, she expected Zollgarza to appear, watching her with that murky red gaze of his. When several more minutes passed and he did not show himself, the mistress mother’s heartbeat quickened.

She imagined her goddess’s hands stroking the back of her neck, Lolth’s words a soft whisper-and a warning-in her ear.