Erik de Bie - Depths of Madness

"From now on," Twilight said, slowly and calmly, "no one wanders away from the others. We stay together. Understood?"

Agreeing silence answered, but the eyes she felt on her back lost no suspicion.

"Down!" Twilight hissed.

Liet fell behind a pile of rubble, landing hard. Gargan ducked with them, hiding Taslin and Davoren around the corner.

Liet rubbed his bottom. "What did-"

Fingers fell on his lips, silencing him. Twilight gestured over the rubble with her eyes. Liet's blood ran cold and he couldn't bring himself to look.

"Tsch," Davoren said from the corner. "Simple primitives, hardly worth a moment." He did not walk into the open, though.

"Agreed," hissed Taslin. She scared Liet-since that morning, her eyes had shone with troubling intensity. "Let us slay the rabble-they block our path." She did not move.

Twilight gestured to Liet to look. He peeked over the stone, as low as he could.

A score of creatures covered in black and red scales ambled about the wide cavern, illuminated by the torches on the walls. Their faces were slack-jawed and they wore simple dark loincloths for clothing, but there, the resemblance to primitives ended.

Adorning the creatures' necks and wrists were necklaces and bracers of silver and gold. They hefted swords of like metal and spears of obsidian. Liet wondered if the lizards had plundered ancient crypts and treasure rooms to secure the precious items. Beneath the finery, some of the lizards' eyes burned with unholy fire and their features twisted and curled wickedly. Small horns marred the crowns of their heads, and tiny limbs that might have been wings sprouted from shoulders.

Liet looked to Twilight for clues as to their next move, but her face was ashen. He understood intuitively, somehow, what she was thinking. Though the creatures had not detected their presence, they stood right in the path. No other tunnel through the sewer led around this central chamber-not unless they backtracked as far as their campsite, quite a distance back, and took a different direction.

Looking at Twilight's nervous face, Liet had the sinking sensation that somehow, the enemy had known exactly where to wait.

"Where's Slip?" Twilight asked.

"Here!" the halfling piped merrily at Liet's side, startling him with such proximity. He shushed her before Twilight could do so, and the elf smiled weakly.

Then one of the fiendish lizards gave a cry. Something big and invisible lifted it and smashed it against the ceiling. The rest scrambled to heft their weapons.

A hulking creature of gray appeared in the middle of the chamber, holding the crushed remains of a lizardthing. It resembled a statue of iron plate armor, twice the height of a man. Without a sound, it dashed two lizards to the ground with one mighty fist. The other dozen beasts fell on their attacker, spears and obsidian swords shattering against its iron carapace.

"What is that?" Liet asked. "What do we do?"

"A golem," Twilight breathed at his shoulder. "Right." She looked to Slip. "You and Gargan keep the others hidden. I will be right back." She moved.

"What?" Liet lost track of her within a heartbeat, as if the shadows had swallowed her whole, devouring her before his eyes.

The battle lasted less than twenty breaths. Methodical, brutal, and completely unemotional, the golem-as Twilight had labeled the iron monstrosity-smashed and trampled the lizards into the ground. They fought with indescribable wildness and inhuman ferocity, but they were as nothing against the golem. Its fists rose and fell with hideous speed and strength, powdering bones and sending webs of cracks through the stone. Every few swings, its helmet breathed out a cloud of vapor that melted skin and set the lizards flailing and gasping.

Finally, when half the fiendish creatures were slain, including two that seemed more demon than lizard, they admitted defeat and fled. All who could move scrambled away and ran down the narrow tunnels.

They went without pursuit. The golem, its work finished, gave the room a long gaze. Liet hunched behind the stone, praying that it wouldn't see him. After the space of a long, agonized breath, it shimmered and vanished. But it didn't seem to leave.

A moment of silence followed. Terrified, Liet looked around, trying vainly to find Twilight. She seemed to have vanished. Was her body amid the dead? He couldn't tell.

Liet rose, shivering. Even if the thing was still there, hidden from view, he felt better revealing himself than not knowing.

Then a hand caught his arm, and Twilight appeared out of the shadows at his side. "Going somewhere," she asked, "without me? I'm crushed."

" 'Light!" the swordsman exclaimed. He longed to throw his arms around her, but he stopped himself. She'd confused him before, and now wasn't the time-not in front of Davoren, and especially not in front of Taslin, with Asson so lately slain.

Then he noticed the body she was dragging.

"Thalea," Gargan mused. Liet reasoned it must be his word for "lizard."

"Uh, Twilight?" he asked. "What-what's that?"

"A present," said Twilight.

It was an unconscious lizardman with black scales and fiendish features. Its body was completely frozen, even its eyes. It wore a rough loincloth and a black sash, upon which was embroidered a sigil of a sickly gray tentacle enwrapping a scimitar.

The only sign the creature lived was the madness in those reddish orbs. If anything, this imprisonment in its own body would drive the lizard even more insane.

"What's wrong with it?" asked Slip. "Is it-dead?"

"Paralyzed," Davoren said softly.

"How do you know?" the halfling asked.

The warlock scowled.

The fiendish lizard's eyes blinked, both sets of lids slicking over soft surfaces. The paralysis was fading, Liet realized. Then the beast recovered the use of its tongue, and it wasted no time using it. The words the creature spat were deep and violent, their texture broken and jagged. And though none but Taslin seemed to understand its words, the tone was clear enough.

"What tongue's that?" Slip asked.

"Infernal, wormling," said Davoren. "So garbled I cannot understand a word."

"That's because it's Abyssal," corrected Twilight.

As Davoren glared, bested, Slip brightened. "How many tongues do you speak?" she asked the elf.

"Irrelevant," the warlock snapped. "What's he saying?"

Twilight looked to Slip first. "Many enough," she said. Then she turned to Davoren. "And it's a she."

The warlock started to retort, but shut his mouth. Liet understood and agreed-he really didn't care to know how Twilight could tell.

"The same words over and over: Takt der shar," Twilight pronounced, her silky voice curling perversely around the fiendish tongue. "The Mad Sharn." Taslin shrugged.

Hearing the words, the fiendish lizard spat at Twilight and said something dark and unfathomably vile. Liet saw his companions fall to the ground, writhing and moaning. Gargan and Twilight sank to one knee. Taslin fell as though dead. Slip blinked, then clasped her hands to her ears and sank to her knees. Only the warlock remained standing, staring hard at Liet, to whom the word was mere profanity.

Why did it not harm him? Was this some inner power, as with the wight?

The fiendish lizard didn't finish the phrase, though, choking off in the middle. It was as though the very words stopped its heart. The creature died with a dry rattle.

"I suppose that solves that problem," was all Davoren said.

Liet ran to Twilight and helped her up. The elf looked at him, uncertain of something. Then her eyes widened. "A sharn," she said. Liet could feel her shiver in his arms.

"Its master, I expect," Davoren said. Leave it to the warlock to know some of the darkest secrets of the Realms. "The madness of demons fits a creature born of chaos."