Matt Forbeck - Marked for Death

Deothen shivered as he recalled how the other vampire had sunk its fangs into Brendis’ neck. If it hadn’t been for the shifter’s bolt, the young man would surely be dead. Despite all the training Deothen had striven to instill in the young knight, he’d been helpless before the evil creature’s overwhelming power.

Those thoughts brought Deothen’s mind to the fate of Gweir. He didn’t know what he could have done to save the knight from that kind of an ambush. How could he have predicted so many warforged would be hiding under those long-dead bodies? The concept was almost unthinkable for the old warrior.

Deothen had already prayed long and hard for the Silver Flame to forgive these inadequacies in himself. He hoped that Gweir’s parents could find it in their heart to do the same. Deothen did not relish bringing them the news of their son’s demise, no matter how heroic it might have been or how noble the cause. He prayed he wouldn’t have to make the same visit to any other parents once this mission was done.

How was he going to be able to find Sallah again after this? Of all his young charges, he trusted her abilities the most. He hoped he would see her again before too long.

It was then that Deothen spotted the two knights as they trotted along the floor of the twisting hollow before him, which was coining to a dead end. The changeling was nowhere to be seen, and Deothen imagined the young men were discussing just how they should proceed. He called out to them.

Brendis and Levritt turned in their saddles to wave back at their commander. As they did, Deothen spotted something on the ridge to the left above them. He thought it might be the changeling, but another silhouetted form joined the first, and then another.

Deothen shouted out a warning to the young knights, but they were unable to hear him. They cupped their hands to their ears as more and more of the forms rose from the ridge. Deothen stabbed his finger into the air behind the two knights, over and over, but they didn’t seem to understand.

Deothen snapped his reins and spurred his mount to a gallop as fast as he could. “Get out of there!” he screamed. “It’s a trap! Move! Now!”

Brendis figured it out first. He glanced over his shoulder to see the creatures standing over them, and he slapped Levritt’s horse on the rump to make it move.

As the youngest knight’s mount leaped forward, a few of the creatures atop the ridge let loose a volley of arrows. Most flew wide of their mark, but one pierced a spot right below Brendis’ left shoulder. The knight was able to kick his steed into action before he slumped down over his reins.

It was suicide, Deothen knew. There was no way that the knights could stand against so many attackers. Their only hope was to outrun them, and here he was racing straight for them.

“Do you get many guests here, my Lady Majeeda?”

The deathless elf looked across the dining table at Kandler, an amused smile swimming across her face. “You are not the first to have supped at my table since the Day of Mourning,” she said. “Is the repast not to your liking?”

Kandler surveyed the wide oak table before him. He sat at the foot of the table with Majeeda across from him at the head. Sallah fidgeted to his right, while to his left Burch perched on the edge of an ornate chair covered with elven carvings. Esprл sat between Burch and the wizard. Kandler had tried to jockey for Esprл to sit near him, but Majeeda seemed to have taken a liking to the girl that was just as strong as her revulsion for the shifter.

The food was wonderful. The tasty roast had just a bit of pink in the middle. The potatoes were creamy and light. The vegetables were fresh and savory. Even the apples were crisp and tart.

“My compliments,” Kandler said.

The wizard laughed again, the sound rattling in Kandler’s ears. “Oh, you are a prize,” she said. “No hands touched this food. I conjured it myself from thin air.”

Burch choked on a piece of meat he’d been chewing. He reached out for a goblet of mead with which to wash it down but stopped and tried to hack it up on his own. When it was clear that wouldn’t work, the shifter snatched up the goblet and threw back the golden liquid so fast that Kandler couldn’t tell if Burch had swallowed it or just opened up his throat and poured it in.

Majeeda wrinkled her nose at the shifter as if someone had brought a half-trained animal to her table. He smiled at her and belched loud and long.

“Good grub,” he said.

The wizard buried her face in a long, spindly hand and shook her head in disgust.

“When did you last entertain?” Sallah asked. “You seem well versed at it.”

Majeeda turned toward the knight and smiled at the compliment. “I have had few guests here since the Day of Mourning, but I do what I can to keep them happy for as long as they are with me.”

She pushed away the plate in front of her. Although it was heaped with food, she had pointedly left it untouched.

“To answer your question,” Majeeda said, her eyes focusing into the distance. “The last party I held here was for a small group of fortune hunters-adventurers, they called themselves-who were wandering through the Mournland in search of treasure. Can you imagine such a thing?”

Kandler and Sallah shook their heads. Burch ignored the question as he turned back to gorging himself on his meal. Esprл flashed a wide smile at the wizard.

Majeeda reached out and patted the girl’s hand before continuing with her tale. “There were five of them, a priest of Dol Dorn and a sorcerer among them. The others were their bodyguards, ready to defend them in case of physical peril. At least that’s what they said. The little one always looked at everything I owned as if it might turn to gold on the spot.”

“How did they get here?” Kandler asked. “I’ll bet more than one set of potential visitors has fallen into your moat.”

Majeeda cackled at that. “Oh, there’s no water in there. Hasn’t been for years. It’s just a sheer drop, fifty feet down.”

Kandler felt an urge to offer the elf a drink for her parched throat, but he was sure that no fluids had passed her lips since before he was born.

“Has anyone ever survived it?” Esprл asked with wide eyes.

“It’s possible, I suppose,” Majeeda said, “but they could never climb out before the oozes that live down there swept the place clean. The poor dears get so little to eat these days. It used to be you could count on a rabbit or even a deer to fall into the place every now and then, but in these dark days that happens so rarely.”

Sallah’s fork clattered to her plate. To Kandler, she looked a little green.

“Please don’t be upset about it,” Majeeda said to the knight, as she wrinkled her thin brow at her. “It’s not a matter of good or evil. It’s just the circle of life.”

Burch looked up for a moment from the bone he was gnawing on to belch a greasy agreement.

“But that’s not how my last visitors got here,” Majeeda said, turning away from the side of the table at which Burch sat. Kandler saw the shifter grin.

“How did they arrive?” asked Sallah.

“They flew here in airship,” the wizard said.

Esprл’s eyes flew wide. “Really?”

The wizard nodded at her. “It’s magical, of course, something along the lines of the lightning rails.”

“The first one I saw was flying over Flamekeep while I was attending the Knights’ Academy,” Sallah said to Esprл. “They’re huge-almost like a galleon, but much sleeker.”

“How do they move?” Esprл asked. Kandler smiled at her eagerness to learn more.

“House Cannith builds them in Fairhaven, up in Aundair. Their dragonmarked shipwrights bind an elemental creature of fire to the vessel. When the ship moves, the elemental appears as a ring of fire that runs around its middle.” Sallah drew a vertical circle in the air in front of her to illustrate.