Paul Kemp - Twilight Falling

The fire in the great hearth crackled angrily, mirroring Vraggen's mood. In his barely controlled rage, shadows clotted around his head and fingertips. His pulse thumped in his temples. He had expected to be on his way to the Dragon Coast.

He took a few moments before speaking, to get his anger under control.

On the other side of the reception room Azriim reclined on a velvet upholstered divan. For their base of operations, the half-drow had leased a luxurious villa on the north side of Selgaunt. The noble family who owned it had decided to remove to the country early that year. Either that or Azriim had murdered them. Vraggen didn't care which, though he would have been just as happy with an inconspicuous flat in the warehouse district. Azriim, of course, would have none of that. The half-drow required his luxuries.

Already Azriim had changed out of the clothing that had been ruined in the fighting outside the Black Stag. He wore a pale green silk overcoat, fitted breeches, and polished black boots. He seemed only passingly upset at the team's failure in Stormweather Towers. His calm drove Vraggen to still greater heights of anger.

Azriim caught Vraggen looking at him and gave his infuriating grin.

"I cannot tell enough from only half the globe, Vraggen. There are too many variables."

Vraggen didn't need the half-drow to tell him that. Half was useless!

"I know that," he snapped, and instantly regretted the outburst. Azriim had been goading him.

He paced about the far end of the great room, glaring at each of the team in turn-Dolgan, Elura, Serrin. None of them would look at him.

"I require an explanation," he said to no one in particular, with as much calm as he could manage.

No one spoke. Elura, seated in a chair near the hearth, stared into the fire. Serrin ran his thumb along the edge of his razor-sharp magical falchion and did not look up. Dolgan, who had fairly collapsed on the floor in the middle of the room, breathed noisily through his broken nose but otherwise said nothing.

"I said that I require an explanation!"

Vraggen strode across the room to where the big man sat. As Vraggen approached, Dolgan clambered to his feet, though he looked as though he would not stay upright for long. The front of his jerkin was soaked in blood-his own.

Vraggen had no sympathy for his injuries. Dolgan had failed. The whole team had failed. When they had returned with only half the globe-half! — Vraggen had almost killed all three of them.

He stared into Dolgan's broken face, which grew paler with every passing moment, daring the big man with his eyes to say something insolent. He did not; he just stood there and bled. Vraggen figured he would bleed out before much longer. He toyed with the idea of letting Dolgan die, as a lesson to the others. But no. Though Dolgan was the most easily replaced of his team, the big man had his uses.

He stared into Dolgan's swollen face and said, "You brought back only half of the globe. Explain."

The big man looked back at him with glassy eyes. Incongruously, the dolt smiled-he had lost a couple teeth-then he began to chuckle. When he did, his shattered nose made gurgling sounds. Vraggen thought the Cormyrean must have gone mad.

"There's a funny story there-"

"Half the globe," Vraggen interrupted, glancing at the hemisphere Dolgan still clutched in his ham fist. "You were instructed to bring back the globe. The entire globe." He looked over his shoulder to Elura. "As were you, Elura."

"I'm aware of the instructions I received, Vraggen," Elura snapped. "I followed them. And I still expect to be paid. This dolt's mistake is his own."

She sat in a chair near the stone hearth with her legs crossed. The firelight made her pale skin look translucent, which contrasted markedly with her raven black hair. Even Vraggen, normally without a weakness for women, had to acknowledge that her features were striking. Azriim had recruited Elura to lead Dolgan and Serrin into Stormweather Towers while he and the half-drow dealt with Riven and Cale. Azriim had assured him that she was an experienced infiltrator but Vraggen had his doubts. Still, he had to rely on Azriim for elite manpower. Vraggen's attempts to recruit Zhents had brought in a fair number of operators, but he didn't want to use them until after his return from the Fane of Shadows. At that point, he would be ready to declare open war on the Banite Zhents.

Dolgan's broken face twisted into a look of confusion and he asked, "Is she calling me a dolt?"

Vraggen ignored the question and put a finger on Dolgan's chest.

"Did you understand your instructions?" Vraggen asked.

"Of course I did," replied Dolgan, but instead of looking contrite, he looked past Vraggen to Azriim and laughed. "I was that close to dead," he said to the half-drow, holding two fingers only slightly apart. "It felt wonderful! You should-"

Vraggen snapped his fingers in front of Dolgan's doughy face and shouted, "Half the globe is useless to us! Idiot! Did you hear your friend? Do you hear me?"

Dolgan kept smiling, kept bleeding, and said, "I hear you. It's useless then."

With an exaggerated gesture meant to irritate, Dolgan dropped the half-globe to the carpeted floor.

That bit of insubordination freed Vraggen's anger from the cage of his control. He hissed the words to a spell and black energy flew from his hand, blasting Dolgan in the chest. The enervating ray blew the big man from his feet. He hit the ground like a toppling tree, groaning. He lay there, only semi-conscious, with his breath coming shallow through his thick lips and broken nose.

"Impressive," said Azriim from behind, and he applauded softly. "You've knocked down a man who could barely stand."

"You could be next," Vraggen said over his shoulder, and he meant it.

Azriim took the point. He ceased his applause.

Vraggen straightened his robes and looked around the room.

"I will not abide insubordination," he said, "from anyone. Is that understood?"

No one replied and Vraggen took the silence for acquiescence. He knew he would get no better. In truth, he rarely took issue with the subtle acts of defiance endemic to his crew. It came with the territory. He had taken care to recruit and ally himself with highly competent professional killers and infiltrators. Men and women like that came with a price-they were not lackeys, and he had to give them space to be who and what they were. But only up to a point.

Vraggen kneeled and picked up the half-globe. He whispered the words to a cantrip to clean it of Dolgan's blood. To his magically attuned senses, it pulsed with the Shadow magic used by the priests of Shar in its making. He examined the break-a clean shear exactly down the middle, perfect. None of the tiny, symbolic gems within it had been disturbed, except that the emerald of Toril in the center had been split. If he could recover the other half of the globe, Azriim could still use it to determine how to find the Fane of Shadows.

He looked to Elura and said, "Tell me exactly what happened, woman. And tell me where the other half of the globe is."

Her eyes met his and there was no fear in them.

"As I told you before," she said, "I'm not certain what happened. Cale appeared and alerted the house guards. You and Azriim were to eliminate him, were you not?"

Vraggen could do nothing but endure that little rebuke.

"He escaped us," Vraggen said.

"Obviously. But we were able to escape him … and the guards. When I teleported out, Dolgan had the globe, as you had instructed. And it was intact. If you had trusted me to keep it in my possession, you'd have it now. I don't know what happened after I got out."

Vraggen digested that.

"Perhaps the lumbering one can tell us himself," Azriim said from his couch.