Robert Salvatore: The Ghost King

“But only if you come back to me. To defeat a mighty foe, a warrior must want to defeat a mighty foe. What is the point, my love, if I am alone once more?”

He exhaled and sat there, staring at her, but she didn’t blink, didn’t react at all. She hadn’t heard him. He might pretend differently for the sake of his own sanity, but Drizzt knew in his heart that Catti-brie wasn’t lurking there, just beneath the damaged surface, taking it all in.

Drizzt wiped a tear from his lavender eyes, and as the moistness went away, it was replaced by that same look that had at once shaken and encouraged Bruenor, the promise of the Hunter, the determination, the simmering rage.

Drizzt leaned forward and kissed Catti-brie on the forehead and told himself that it had all been wrought by the Ghost King, that the dracolich was the source of all that had gone so very wrong in the world, not a result of some larger disaster.

No more tears for Drizzt Do’Urden. He meant to destroy the beast.

They knew their enemy would return, and they knew where they wanted to fight it, but when it happened, as expected as it was, sturdy Athrogate and Thibbledorf Pwent gasped more profoundly than they cried out.

The Ghost King came back to the material world of Toril in exactly the same place that it had departed, appearing first and briefly in its translucent blue-white glow. Quickly it was whole again, on the courtyard outside the cathedral, and even as Pwent and Athrogate shouted out, their bellows echoing through the deserted hallways, the great beast leaped into the air and took wing, flying high into the night sky.

“It’s up there! It’s up there, me king!” Pwent cried, hopping up and down and pointing skyward. Bruenor, Drizzt, and the others arrived in the room adjacent to the balcony from which the two dwarves had been keeping watch.

“The dracolich appeared in the same place?” Cadderly asked, clearly interpreting some importance in that fact.

“Just like ye guessed,” Athrogate answered. “Glowin’ and all, then it jumped away.”

“It’s up there, me king!” Pwent shouted again.

Drizzt, Cadderly, Bruenor, and Jarlaxle exchanged determined nods. “It doesn’t get away from us this time,” said Bruenor.

All eyes went to Cadderly at that proclamation, and the priest’s nod was one of confidence.

“Inside,” Cadderly ordered them all. “The beast will return with fury and fire. Spirit Soaring will protect us.”

Danica took a deep breath and grabbed at a nearby tree trunk to steady herself when she heard the awful, otherworldly shriek of the dracolich taking flight. She couldn’t help but glance back toward Spirit Soaring, already miles behind her, and she had to remind herself that Cadderly was surrounded by powerful allies, and that Deneir, or some other divine entity, miraculously heard his pleas.

“They will prevail,” Danica said softly—very softly, for she knew that the forest about her was full of monsters. She had watched groups of crawlers scratch by on the road and had felt the thunderous steps of some gigantic black behemoth, the likes of which she had never before known.

She was halfway to Carradoon and had hoped to be there already, but the going had been slow and cautious. As much as she wanted a fight, Danica could ill afford one. Her focus was Carradoon and Carradoon alone, to find her children, while Cadderly and the others dealt with the Ghost King at Spirit Soaring.

That was the plan—they knew the undead dragon would return—and Danica had to steel herself against any second-guessing. She had to trust Cadderly. She couldn’t turn back.

“My children,” she whispered. “Temberle and Rorick, and Hana, my Hana … I will find you.”

Behind her, high in the sky, the Ghost King’s shriek split the night as profoundly as a bolt of lightning and the roar of thunder.

Danica ignored it and focused on the trees before her, picking her careful and swift way through the haunted woods.

“Kill him, Cadderly,” she said under her breath, over and over again.

Without the cautionary interference of Yharaskrik, the Ghost King reveled in its flight, knowing that its vulnerable target lay below, knowing that soon enough it would destroy Spirit Soaring and the fools who had remained within.

The sweet taste of impending revenge filled Hephaestus’s dead throat, and the dragon wanted nothing more than to dive at the building at full speed and tear it to kindling. But surprisingly to both entities that made up the Ghost King, recklessness was tempered by the pain of their recent defeat. The Ghost King still felt the blinding sting of Cadderly’s fires, and the weight of Drizzt’s scimitar. Though confident that its second assault would be different, the Ghost King meant to take no unnecessary chances.

And so from on high, up among the clouds, the beast called upon its minions once more, summoning them from the forests around Spirit Soaring, compelling them to soften the ground.

“They will not kill Cadderly,” the beast said into the high winds. “But they will reveal him!”

The Ghost King folded its wings and dived, then opened them wide and rode the momentum and the currents in a spiraling pattern above the building, its magically enhanced eyesight scouring the land below.

Already the forest was alive with movement as crawlers and nightwings, huddled wraiths, and even a giant nightwalker swarmed toward Spirit Soaring.

The Ghost King’s laugh rumbled like distant thunder.

They heard the break of glass, one of the few panes left intact from the previous assault, but the building did not shudder. “By the gods,” Cadderly cursed. “Damned crawlers!” Bruenor agreed.

They were in the widest audience hall on the first story of the building, a windowless affair with only a few connecting corridors. Pwent and Athrogate stood at the rail on the northern balcony with their tied-off logs, some twenty-five feet above the others. Bruenor, Cadderly, and the rest stood on the raised dais where Cadderly usually held audience, across from the double doors and the main corridor that led to the cathedral’s foyer. Drizzt stood at the open doorway of a small, secure anteroom, where lay Catti-brie.

Drizzt bent low to tuck a blanket more tightly around his wife, and whispered, “He won’t get you. On my life, my love, I will kill that beast. I will find a way back to you, or a way to lead you back to us.”

Catti-brie didn’t react, but lay staring into the distance.

Drizzt leaned in and kissed her on the cheek. “I promise,” he whispered. “I love you.”

Not far from them, Drizzt heard wood splintering. He stood up straight and moved out of the small anteroom, securing the door behind him.

Cadderly shivered as he felt the unclean beasts crawling into the broken windows of Spirit Soaring.

“Clear the place?” Athrogate yelled down.

“No, hold your positions!” Cadderly ordered, and even as he spoke, the door on the balcony nearest the two dwarves began to rattle and bang. Cadderly fell within himself, trying to join with the magic that strengthened Spirit Soaring, begging the cathedral, begging Deneir, to hold strong.

“Come on, then,” Cadderly whispered to the Ghost King. “Lead the way.”

“He learned from his loss,” Jarlaxle remarked as Drizzt rejoined them. “He’s sending in the fodder. He’s not to be trapped alone as before.”

Cadderly flashed an alarmed look at Drizzt and Bruenor.

“I’ll bring him in,” Drizzt promised, and he charged across the room to the double doors, the other three close behind.