Troy Denning: The Sentinel

The red-haired woman appeared an instant later, her green eyes going wide at the sight of so many bodies cut into so many pieces. Absent her cloak, she was wearing a silk tunic belted over leather trousers. Her right hand carried a slender short sword. Despite her practical attire, she was lovelier than any woman Kleef had ever seen, and when she glanced over at him, he felt the same sense of warmth and familiarity that the urchin had described.

Kleef pointed up the lane in the direction her manservant had fled, then silently mouthed the word, “Go.”

She responded with a smile that made Kleef go even warmer inside, and he began to wonder just what he had gotten himself into.

Then the agate on Watcher’s crossguard began to glow more intensely, and Kleef glimpsed a blur of motion across Rover’s Way. He turned to find another shade emerging from the same dark doorway as the first three warriors. To Kleef, it seemed the dark figure was not just stepping out of the shadows-he was dividing from them.

The woman’s face grew pale, but she flicked a hand in the enemy’s direction. A trio of white darts appeared at her fingertips and streaked across the lane. Her target dropped to one knee, crouching behind his arm and raising a shield of swirling shadow.

The first dart hit the shield and sizzled out of existence. The second vanished in a crackling flash that also took down the shield. The third sank into the warrior’s ribs, buckling him forward. He sprawled in the lane, writhing in pain and bleeding shadowstuff onto the cobblestones.

By then, the woman was five paces up Rover’s Way, and Kleef was leaping across the lane. He beheaded the fallen shade with a single swipe, then stepped into the doorway from which the warrior had emerged. A blazing blue radiance shone from Helm’s Eye, dispelling the darkness within. He found himself looking at a small foyer, in which a ropy, half-formed silhouette was being pushed into the far corner by the light of his sword. Kleef glimpsed a gray, grimacing face, then the dark figure melted into the last remnants of shadow and vanished.

Kleef had been warned that Shadovar warriors could sometimes move through shadows, but with Jang’s slender sword singing in the lane behind him, he had no time to consider what he had just seen. He whirled out of the doorway with Watcher still aglow and found Jang dancing around in front of him, his slender sword chopping and slashing in a shadow-cleaving blur. Already, a pair of gray limbs lay oozing darkness onto the street, and the warrior who had lost them had dropped to his knees. Jang’s blade whistled back around and sent the shade’s head flying.

A piercing hiss sounded from the black mouth of the alley. Jang stumbled backward, his sword arm falling limp and his katana flying free.

Kleef leaped forward, snatching the katana on the fly. “Jang, with me!”

He retreated a few paces down Rover’s Way, away from the woman, then turned to Jang. Part of the Shou’s breastplate had shattered, and his right shoulder and breast were exposed, revealing a patch of flesh that look bruised, black, and icy. His right arm hung useless, but at least he was keeping up. Kleef held the katana out and was relieved to see Jang take the weapon with his left hand.

“Time for you to withdraw,” Kleef said, nodding his friend down the lane. “Report to the King’s Tower.”

Three more shades spilled from the alley’s mouth. The first two turned away, continuing after the woman and her manservant. The last one stepped into the middle of the street and turned to face the two watchmen, studying them with the bright, steel-blue eyes that had first caught Kleef’s attention.

“Go.” Kleef pushed Jang behind him, back toward the entrance to Rover’s Way. “Tell the lord marshall we have Shadovar assassins in the city.”

“And leave you behind?” Jang gasped. “Never.”

“It’s not a suggestion, Jang. Someone needs to report.” As Kleef spoke, he continued to watch the last shade-who was merely watching him , not yet advancing. “Tell the lord marshall it looks like they’ll end up in the Canal District. Have him send reinforcements down High Bridge Road.”

“And that is where we’ll meet?” Jang asked, his voice still reluctant. “High Bridge Road?”

Kleef nodded. “I’m going to keep an eye on the chase,” he said. “But I’ll look for you there.”

As Kleef spoke the words, the agate on Watcher’s crossguard glowed brighter-this time, casting its blue beam a dozen paces down the lane. Kleef adjusted his stance so the light fell directly on the steel-eyed warrior.

The Shadovar merely grinned, showing a pair of white fangs as long as fingers. Then he raised his arm and vanished behind a shield of darkness.

With the residents of Marsember fleeing the city by any means possible, every noble in town should have been out in the streets, bolstering the courage of the people and inspiring them to take arms against the coming invasion. Instead, Lady Arietta Seasilver-a Chosen of Siamorphe, the patron goddess of nobility-was trapped on her own balcony, a virtual prisoner in her own rooms. Forty feet below, the family servants were scurrying back and forth to House Seasilver’s private quay, loading her father’s galleass with coin chests and serving silver, ceremonial armor, bejeweled weapons … even crate after crate of fine wine.

The sight set Arietta’s teeth to grinding. When she looked north across Deepwater Canal, she could see over the city rooftops far into the northern plain, where churning clouds of dust marked Netheril’s push into Cormyr. When she leaned over her balustrade and looked to the northeast, she could see a curtain of gray smoke on the horizon-the shadow fiends of Wheloon, burning all they passed on their march to Marsember. If ever the realm had needed every sword it could raise, that time was now.

But instead of rallying the people to the city’s defense, her father was fleeing to Elversult with all his prized possessions. Clearly, it was not for nothing that Grand Duke Farnig Seasilver was known in local taverns as “Farnig the Feckless.” With Myth Drannor under siege and the eladrin doomed, could he truly be fool enough to think he would escape the Shadovar by simply sailing across the Dragonmere? Cormyr was all that remained to stop the Army of Night, and if the kingdom fell, the Netherese would claim all of Faerûn-perhaps all of Toril.

The clack of a turning lock echoed from the interior of Arietta’s chambers. She asked Siamorphe for the strength to be patient and the courage to be direct, then returned to her sitting room. As she had anticipated, a statuesque noblewoman with high cheekbones and a blade-straight nose was arriving from the anteroom. Beyond her, still closing the heavy oak door to the suite, were two burly soldiers in white tabards with wyvern sigils-the same two men who had been standing outside Arietta’s door every day for nearly a month.

Arietta flashed the woman a practiced but joyless smile, then went to greet her.

“Mother, what a pleasant surprise.” She intercepted the Grand Duchess Elira in the center of room and kissed both cheeks, then motioned to one of the ornate armchairs flanking the fireplace. “Please, sit.”

As they settled opposite each other, Arietta’s lady-in-waiting, Odelia, hurried in from the dressing room.

“Your Grace,” said the girl, curtsying to Arietta’s mother. “Please forgive me for not being at the door to welcome you.” Rosy-cheeked and doe-eyed, she had a joyful beauty, and Elira often complained that the servant drew too many eyes away from Arietta. “I was packing gowns and did not hear you arrive.”

Considering the arrival had not been announced by the guards or preceded by a knock, it was little wonder.