R.A. Salvatore - Maestro

Lady Avelyere continued to stare for only a short while, then smiled and held up her hands. “I am glad that you accepted my invitation, Ruqi-Catti-brie,” she said.

“Then I am, too,” Catti-brie replied. “There are too many questions along too many hallways. But I know in my heart that I bear you no ill will. Believe it or not, good Lady Avelyere, but I am truly glad that you are alive, that you survived the catastrophe that befell Shade Enclave.”

“I believe you, Ruqiah,” the older woman, who was not really older, replied. “And forgive me, but that name still brings joy to me. We watched you, you know.”

“When I was here?” a confused Catti-brie asked.

“When you left. We found you in Longsaddle, or rather, when you were leaving Longsaddle. I watched you climb the lone mountain in Icewind Dale, and reunite with Drizzt Do’Urden. Our lives became complicated, and war came to our door, but still I found time to look in on you from afar during your struggles in the Silver Marches.”

“We saw your victory over the drow and the orcs,” said another voice, a man’s voice. A well-groomed, smartly-dressed man with a beautifully-kempt gray beard and piercing eyes entered the room.

“This is the man you came to speak with,” Lady Avelyere explained.

“Through a scrying mirror, we watched the light emanate from Drizzt Do’Urden, destroying the roiling blackness the drow had placed over the Silver Marches,” Lord Parise Ulfbinder explained. “We witnessed the victory of Mielikki over Lolth, and it was a grand display indeed.”

“Should I feel violated?” Catti-brie asked as she rose and offered the lord her hand. He took it gently and kissed it.

“Lovely lady, we watched only from afar. How could we not, knowing that two goddesses were waging a proxy war through you?”

Catti-brie stepped back and took her seat, lifting the wine for another sip as she tried to figure out what was going on here.

“Did you witness my fight with the woman named Dahlia?” she asked at length.

The two looked at each other, then back at her, and she knew they had not.

“That, I expect, was the truest battle, waged between myself and the troubled elf named Dahlia, with me serving as proxy for Mielikki, and Dahlia championing Lolth, though I doubt the poor woman even understood her role.”

“Will you tell us?” Lord Parise asked, his eagerness not hard to discern.

“An entertaining tale,” Catti-brie promised. “Unless, of course, Lady Avelyere has poisoned my wine here and I will fall dead before I can complete it.”

“Oh, do not be foolish,” Avelyere protested with a sarcastic sigh.

She looked Avelyere right in the eye and remarked, “You never brought pain to my parents.”

“There was a war,” Parise said from the side, where he gathered up a chair and a glass of wine for himself. At the table, Lady Avelyere didn’t let go of Catti-brie’s stare.

“I do not take pleasure in inflicting pain,” Avelyere replied.

“I know, and that is why I was indeed very glad to learn that you had survived the troubles that happened here, in this fallen city, and in the war. I am not your enemy, nor have I ever been.”

“And I did not poison the wine.”

With that, Catti-brie lifted her glass in toast, and Lady Avelyere tapped it with her own.

“It is so good to be among people who understand that life is more complex than darkness and light,” Lord Parise remarked.

In both her lives combined, few words had Catti-brie ever heard that brought a truer sense of comfort. Lord Parise had spoken a simple truth, and a sad one.

Would that more people understood.

Again Catti-brie told her tale of the fight in Gauntlgrym, and the return to Gauntlgrym, where Bruenor was now king. She used that last battle to segue into the issues at hand, the rebuilding of the Hosttower of the Arcane, and at that point, she handed the Jarlaxle’s missive to Lord Parise.

“Wonderful,” he remarked repeatedly as he read the parchment, and when he finished and handed it to Lady Avelyere, he added, “What an amazing opportunity!”

“You will join our efforts, then?”

“I would be forever angry if you did not allow me to do so!” Lord Parise said. He glanced at Avelyere. “Perhaps in this, Ruqiah can be the teacher.”

“The invitation is for you,” Avelyere replied.

“It is a request, not an invitation,” said Catti-brie. “I do not know the level of magic that will be needed on every piece of the Hosttower as we reconstruct it, but we are not afforded the luxury of turning away powerful spellcasters.” She paused and reached across the table to squeeze Avelyere’s hand. “Particularly if they are trustworthy.”

“I would like to join in this quest, then,” Avelyere said. “And I have a few students who might prove useful.”

“This could take years,” Lord Parise warned.

“Perhaps decades,” said Catti-brie. “The work on the Hosttower might continue long after we are all dead.”

“Still, it is the journey of life that matters, and not the goal,” said Lord Parise. “And this journey will prove exhilarating, I expect. To converse with the Archmage of Menzoberranzan! And dragons! Jarlaxle’s missive speaks of dragons!”

“Tazmikella and Ilnezhara,” Catti-brie explained. “Copper dragons, and sisters, and both very powerful in the ways of the Art. A very unusual duo.”

“Splendid!” Lord Parise said, and clapped his hands together. “What wondrous things we might learn.”

Lady Avelyere nodded, but then put on a curious expression as she regarded Catti-brie. “What of your Desai parents?”

Catti-brie wasn’t sure how to take that.

“You do not know? They are capable wizards, both.”

“There are many capable wizards,” Catti-brie replied. “They have a child, a young child.”

“You do not wish them in the midst of a city controlled by the drow,” Lord Parise suggested.

“Reconsider, then,” said Lady Avelyere. “The practices of the Desai spellcasters, who spent decades hiding their talents, are a bit different from those I taught at the Coven, as, I’m sure you discovered, mine are different from those of the Harpells of Longsaddle, and those are different from those of this Archmage Gromph.”

“To truly recognize the old and lost magic that originally built the Hosttower, we may have to look at it from many different perspectives, and so from people skilled in the Art who have trained and honed their skills differently,” Lord Parise added. “This is why Jarlaxle has brought in Archmage Gromph and the dragons, and why he sent you to fetch me. Do not discount the potential contributions of the tribal casters, who employ different vocalizations and movements, even different spell components, in enacting their magical spells than wizards of other areas and schools.”

“I will consider it,” she replied, in a tone that ended that line of discussion. “Time is short.”

“And Jarlaxle is waiting,” said Lord Parise.

“No,” Catti-brie said, and the other two looked at her curiously. “Jarlaxle is away on a most important mission.”

“Another tale!” Lord Parise said happily. He finished his glass and turned back to the bottle.

But that, too, Catti-brie denied. “We must be on the road, immediately.”

“I will find someone to teleport us.”

“There is a place I must go first,” Catti-brie said. “A place not far.”

They left the Netherese enclave soon after, Catti-brie astride Andahar, and her companions upon magically summoned mounts. They rode hard to the south and soon came in sight of the Desai tents.

“Better that we wait here,” Lord Parise said, tipping his chin to Lady Avelyere.