Richard Baker - Prince of Ravens

“Wait!” A sudden notion struck Jack, and he stretched his arm through the bars of his cell. “Listen, Balathorp, I know that I am finished. You’ll have your revenge upon me, and more; the drow will see to that. But if you agree to see Seila Norwood to freedom, I will give you all that remains to me-this enchanted silver ring.” He held up the ring of negation.

The slaver snorted. “I will do as I please with Seila anyway, Ravenwild. That little bauble makes no difference to me.”

Jack reached through the bars, extending the ring. “Take it from my hand,” he begged. “I throw myself on your mercy.”

Balathorp hesitated, and for a moment Jack’s hopes soared … but at that moment a contingent of drow guards appeared. The slaver stepped back, inclining his head to the dark elves; the drow warriors marched past Jack’s cell to where Seila was held. “I am sure the Lady Dresimil will think of a fitting end for you,” he said to Jack. “Console yourself with the thought that I will take good care of Seila Norwood. Farewell, Ravenwild.”

Jack searched for some clever riposte, some appeal that might reach the man, but nothing came to mind. Balathorp turned and followed the dark elves down the corridor to Seila’s cell. Jack heard the rattle of keys in the iron lock, the jingle of chains, Seila’s voice raised in protest … and then Balathorp and the drow jailors returned back along the corridor, ushering Seila along with her arms bound behind her back. She struggled, to no avail, and had time to cry out, “Jack!” as she was swept past him. Jack reached out after her, his fingertips brushing her dress, and then she was gone.

He caught one more brief glimpse of her in the guardroom at the entrance to the row of cells; Balathorp handed her to a pair of hobgoblin slavers. “Take her to the caravan and lock her up with the rest of the merchandise,” he told the fierce creatures. They responded in Goblin, asking some question or another; the slaver shook his head and said, “No, the east tunnel, it looks like we won’t be able to slip out to the north.” Then the dark elves shut the dungeon door, and Jack could hear or see nothing more except the empty cells around his own.

He gave the bars of his cell an angry shake; they did not move much at all. Then he commenced pacing and worrying at the numerous things that seemed to be out of his control at the moment. He’d succeeded in finding Seila, only to watch her carried away again by the vile Cailek Balathorp while he was very much powerless to prevent it. “Perhaps I should have come up with some more cautious plan than leaping through the portal after Seila,” he muttered. He’d assumed that with his magic and native cleverness it would not be difficult to escape the dark elves if they captured him, but now he was much less confident of that. And every moment he remained trapped in this cold, cheerless cell, Balathorp was dragging Seila farther away from him!

He sighed and stretched himself out on a cold stone ledge that served as a bed. Where would Balathorp take Seila? He was certainly through in Raven’s Bluff after Jack had exposed him in front of everybody at the Lord Mayor’s Revel, and Balathorp’s part in the attack had cemented his place as an enemy of the city. It seemed that Balathorp intended to quit Chumavhraele at his earliest convenience, so presumably the tunnel or tunnels to the east led to the surface. And were Jelan and Norwood still fighting their way down to the drow realm, or had Dresimil already sprung her trap? Did Raven’s Bluff even have sufficient forces to defeat the dark elves if they had control over the wild mythal? Jack glanced toward the left-hand wall of his cell and realized that he was looking in the direction of the mythal stone on the lakeshore a mile distant. He could feel the magic of the device through the castle walls, much as one could feel the direction and strength of the sun even with eyes closed. It was much stronger, more focused, than it had been the last time he was in Chumavhraele.

Jack frowned as he considered the subtle tug and play of unseen forces around him. “What are Jaeren and Jezzryd up to?” he wondered. He felt a certain protective impulse toward the wild mythal; after all, he was fairly certain the goddess Mystra had once asked him to look after it, although it was possible that was only a dream. It was a strange fate that had bound up his magic with the work of drow archmages ten thousand years before his birth, he reflected. The mythal’s touch had rested on him long before he’d been encysted within it for a century; he knew now that it was the source of his magic. He likely wouldn’t have been a sorcerer at all if he had been born in some less magical city.

He was roused from his reflections by a sudden clamor of battle not far from his cell. Steel rang against steel just outside the dungeon in which he was imprisoned, followed by the thundering detonations of powerful battle-magic. Even within his cell he could feel the wash of heat and smell the acrid brimstone of flames washing through the chambers outside. Drow shouted to one another, rallying to meet the threat. “Norwood’s armsmen!” he decided, scrambling to his feet. His freedom might be at hand … assuming the soldiers discovered the guardroom. He hurried over to the bars of the cell, peering toward the door leading to the guardroom and waiting for it to open.

There was a clatter of swordplay from the other side of the door and a quick rattle of heavy keys-and then a dark elf warrior threw open the door and rushed over to Jack’s cell. The drow glanced up and down the hallway, then raised his crossbow and aimed it at Jack. “You are coming with me,” he snarled. “Stand back from the door.”

“So much for the notion of rescue,” Jack muttered. He stepped back from the cell door under the threat of the dark elf’s weapon. It seemed likely that the guard was under orders not to kill him, but he would certainly lose any opportunity of slipping away if he were drugged with sleep-venom again. The dark elf reached for the keys at his belt and took a step toward the cell, but at that moment he heard something behind him and spun to face it-only to catch a thrown dagger in his breast. The dark elf staggered back to the bars, his face gray, and started to raise his crossbow at Jack before collapsing to the floor.

Jack stared at the dead drow in astonishment before he glanced up at the guardroom door. The half-orc swordsman Narm stood there, straightening up from his throw, and beside him stood Myrkyssa Jelan. “Elana! Narm!” he exclaimed. “This is a welcome turn of events. I feared I was being summoned to my execution.”

“It’s still a possibility,” Narm grunted. “There is a whole castle full of drow around us-the rest of our troops are tied up in the tunnels.” He hurried forward to take the keyring from the fallen guard’s belt and began working at the cell door.

Jelan took a moment to examine the cell, then positioned herself to keep an eye on the doorway behind them. “Hello, Jack,” she said. “Somehow I knew that sooner or later I would see you behind bars. There is a certain ironic satisfaction to this moment.”

“How did you find me?”

“I guessed that you would be held in the castle, and led a small company around the tunnel fighting to see if we could spirit you and Seila away while Dresimil was busy with Norwood’s troops. We found our way in through the kitchens.” Jelan looked at the empty cells, and frowned. “By the way, where is Seila?”

“Balathorp has her. He and his slavers are leaving this place-in fact, they may already be gone.”

“That is unfortunate, because Lord Norwood is very anxious to get her back safe and unharmed.”

“As am I,” Jack replied. He met Jelan’s eyes. “Thank you for coming to our aid.”