Paul Kemp - Dawn of Night

Riven walked past him, past the prone slaad, and retrieved the silver seed. Sabers still bare and bloody, he walked back to stand over the slaad. Two saber tips pointed at Azriim's heart.

"My mind is open," Riven said to the slaad. "Read it."

Azriim's mismatched eyes narrowed and Cale sensed the flow of mental energy. A fanged grin spread across the slaad's face.

"I come with you, and participate in what's to come," Riven simultaneously asked and ordered.

Azriim nodded. Riven sheathed a saber and extended a hand to help the slaad up. Azriim took it and climbed slowly to his feet. His regeneration had returned the use of his legs.

"Give me the seed," Azriim said.

Riven ignored him, and Cale could imagine but not see the assassin's sneer.

Still holding the seed, Riven turned to Cale. He knelt down on his haunches so that he and Cale could see into each other's faces. Riven's eye was cold, the hole in his other socket black and deep. Cale thought back to an alley in Selgaunt, when Riven had been helpless before him. He should have killed him then.

"I side with the winner, Cale," Riven said. "You don't see it, you never saw it, but you've already lost." He stood, spat a glob of saliva onto Cale's cheek, and added, "And I've been Second long enough."

Cale tried to grab his boot, failed, coughed up blood, but managed to groan, "You'll always ... be Second . . . to me, Zhent."

Riven stood still for a moment, and Cale waited for the finishing saber cut. It did not come, and when the assassin spoke, Cale could hear the sneer in his voice.

"It doesn't appear so now."

Together, Riven and Azriim walked to the huge crystal in the center of the room. They stood for a moment before the crystal and looked at the orange beam, the beam that powered the Skulls, that kept Skullport from collapsing.

Without ceremony, Riven handed the seed to Azriim. The slaad appeared startled by the gesture, but took the seed.

Azriim looked at Cale and said to Riven, "If he lives, he'll come looking for you."

Riven eyed Cale coldly and replied, "I hope he does."

"We need to get you some new clothes," Azriim said with a smile, then he slipped the seed into the beam.

The moment the silver seed touched the orange light, it disintegrated into a million glowing particles, all of them streaking upward like a swarm of fireflies, spreading along the net of power. The orange glow darkened, turned crimson. The air changed. Cale's ears popped. A low, vibratory hum sounded, growing louder and louder. The entirety of the chamber bucked, shook. The tower rattled. The huge crystal cracked and a million fine lines manifested along its facets.

Cale turned his head and saw that outside the cupola, stalactites detached from the ceiling, fell gracefully through the air, and crashed thunderously amongst the ruins. Clouds of dust went up from the point of impact. It was raining stone.

It was at that moment that Cale realized that the bleeding in his back had stopped. His flesh closed the wound. Though still weak, he reached into his cloak pocket and found his holy symbol. The feel of its soft velvet in his hand comforted him.

I'm the First, he thought. I'm the First.

He searched his mind for a spell, something to stop Riven and Azriim. He found one, tried to utter the words, but was unable to maintain his concentration. He could only watch them, could only bear witness to his failure.

Azriim, grinning like a lunatic, took out his teleportation rod. Riven grabbed the slaad by the arm.

"I'm coming with you," he said.

Still wearing that stupid grin, Azriim nodded and said, "I wouldn't have it any other way."

The slaad began to manipulate the rod.

From behind him, Cale heard a voice-Jak's voice-exclaim, "Riven! I knew it, you black-hearted whoreson!"

Azriim and Riven looked up in surprise.

Cale turned his head to see Jak and Magadon standing in the cupola's archway. Both looked to Cale. He tried to indicate to them that he was all right, that he would live, but managed only to blink at them.

Jak's mouth went hard.

"Bastard," he said to Riven.

As fast as a lightning strike, the halfling pulled two throwing daggers from his chest bandolier and whipped them across the chamber.

Cale heard one sink into flesh. Riven grunted, and Cale turned to see one of the blades buried to the hilt in the assassin's shoulder.

"I'd kill you for that, little man," Riven said, grimacing as he pulled the dagger free. "Except that you're already dead. And I'm leaving."

The assassin had something in his hand. He hurled it back at Jak. The halfling couldn't dodge it, and the small wooden object thumped into Jak's chest, doing no damage, and fell to the floor.

Jak's pipe.

"Be thankful it's not steel, Fleet," Riven growled.

"You've wanted this," Jak said, and started to advance across the chamber. "Now you've got it. Come on, Zhent!"

Magadon walked beside him, blade bare.

"You won't get away, Riven," the guide said.

"I already have, tiefling," Riven replied with a sneer.

Azriim continued to twist the teleportation rod. Cale tried to shout at Magadon to connect psionically to Riven, but he could not say the words.

Riven looked past Jak and Magadon and toward the cupola's archway.

"They don't look happy," the assassin said, and he and Azriim winked out.

"Coward!" Jak shouted at the empty air.

Cale followed the assassin's gaze and saw six of the Skulls streaming into the cavern. Though they were still far away, Cale could see that their mouths were open, and he heard the howls of rage and dismay that went before them. Lines of energy crackled around the guardians like lightning.

The chamber continued to shake. Stalactites fell in increasing numbers. The net of power formerly visible along the ceiling crackled and sparked, its power failing. It felt to Cale as though the entire chamber was in danger of imminent collapse.

Jak and Magadon rushed to his side and sat him up. Cale hissed with pain as he rose slowly to his feet.

Jak said, "Cale, are you-Trickster's toes! You're soaked in blood."

Leaning on his friends, Cale said, "I'll be all right."

His shadow-infused flesh continued to work its miracle.

A lightning bolt exploded through one of the cupola's archways and blew them across the floor. They all fell face down on the stone. The hairs on Cale's arms stood straight up.

The Skulls are coming, he thought. And they're angry.

"Come on," Cale said, slowly clambering to his feet.

Jak and Magadon at his side, he limped across the chamber to the opposite archway. They stood there on the edge of the tower, looking down on the ruins far below. Soon the lost city would be covered in rock, the chamber forever lost to history.

Above them, the ceiling of the cavern was aglow in intermittent flashes of crimson lightning and showers of sparks. Cale saw some of the Skulls wheeling frenetically around the cavern, preventing what destruction they could, and patching the net of power where possible.

But two others were coming for the tower. Keening, aglow with power, rage, and despair, they blazed toward the comrades.

The tower shook under Cale's feet, nearly knocking him off the side. The world shook above them.

Still bleary-eyed from his wounds, Cale said, "Hold on to me and get ready to jump."

Magadon and Jak went wide eyed.

"What?" Jak asked.

Cale gathered what darkness he could around him. He needed more. It was too bright at the top of the tower.

"Jump, little man," he said. "Together."

Still they hesitated.

Two Skulls streaked into the cupola.

"Your transgression shall result in your slow flaying and prolonged torture, you-"

"Now, godsdamnit," Cale ordered.

Beams of energy fired from the Skulls' eyes.