“Shall I go after them?” Soth asked.
“No. We have more important matters to attend to now,” Kitiara replied. Glancing up at him, she smiled her crooked smile. “The elfwoman would never be yours anyway, not even in death. The gods protect her.”
Soth’s flickering gaze turned to Kitiara. The pale lips curled in derision. “The half-elven man remains your master still.”
“No, I think not,” Kitiara replied. Turning, she looked after Tanis as the door shut behind him. “Sometimes, in the still watches of the night, when he lies in bed beside her, Tanis will find himself thinking of me. He will remember my last words, he will be touched by them. I have given them their happiness. And she must live with the knowledge that I will live always in Tanis’s heart. What love they might find together, I have poisoned. My revenge upon them both is complete. Now, have you brought what I sent you for?”
“I have, Dark Lady,” Lord Soth replied. With a spoken word of magic, he brought forth an object and held it out to her in his skeletal hand. Reverently, he set it at her feet.
Kitiara caught her breath, her eyes gleamed in the darkness nearly as bright as Lord Soth’s. “Excellent! Return to Dargaard Keep. Gather the troops. We will take control of the flying citadel Ariakas sent to Kalaman. Then we will fall back, regroup, and wait.”
The hideous visage of Lord Soth smiled as he gestured to the object that glittered in his fleshless hand. “This is now rightfully yours. Those who opposed you are either dead, as you commanded, or fled before I could reach them.”
“Their doom is simply postponed,” Kitiara said, sheathing her sword. “You have served me well, Lord Soth, and you will be rewarded. There will always be elfmaidens in this world, I suppose.”
“Those you command to die shall die. Those you allow to live,” Soth’s glance flickered to the door "—shall live. Remember this—of all who serve you, Dark Lady, I alone can offer you undying loyalty. This I do now, gladly. My warriors and I will return to Dargaard Keep as you ask. There we will await our summons.”
Bowing to her, he took her hand in his skeletal grasp. “Farewell, Kitiara,” he said, then paused. “How does it feel, my dear, to know that you have brought pleasure to the damned? You have made my dreary realm of death interesting. Would that I had known you as living man!” The pallid visage smiled. “But, my time is eternal. Perhaps I will wait for one who can share my throne—”
Cold fingers caressed Kitiara’s flesh. She shuddered convulsively, seeing unending, sleepless nights yawn chasm-like before her. So vivid and terrifying was the image that Kitiara’s soul shriveled in fear as Lord Soth vanished into the darkness.
She was by herself in the darkness and for a moment she was terrified. The Temple shuddered around her. Kitiara shrank back against the wall, frightened and alone. So alone! Then her foot touched something on the floor of the Temple. Reaching down, her fingers closed around it thankfully. She lifted it in her hands.
This was reality, hard and solid, she thought, breathing in relief.
No torchlight glittered on its golden surface or flared from its red-hued jewels. Kitiara did not need the flare of torches to admire what she held.
For long moments she stood in the crumbling hallway, her fingers running over the rough metal edges of the bloodstained Crown.
Tanis and Laurana ran down the spiral stone stairs to the dungeons below. Pausing beside the jailor’s desk, Tanis glanced at the body of the hobgoblin.
Laurana stared at him. “Come on,” she urged, pointing to the east. Seeing him hesitate, looking north, she shuddered. “You don’t want to go down there! That is where they... took me—” She turned away quickly, her face growing pale as she heard cries and shouts coming from the prison cells.
A harried-looking draconian ran by. Probably a deserter, Tanis guessed, seeing the creature snarl and cringe at the sight of an officer’s armor.
“I was looking for Caramon,” Tanis muttered. “They must have brought him here.”
“Caramon?” exclaimed Laurana in astonishment. “What—”
“He came with me,” Tanis said. “So did Tika and Tas and ... Flint—” He stopped, then shook his head. “Well, if they were here, they’re gone now. Come on.”
Laurana’s face flushed. She glanced back up the stone stairs, then at Tanis again.
“Tanis—” she began, faltering. He placed his hand over her mouth.
“There will be time to talk later. Now we must find our way out!”
As if to emphasize his words, another tremor shook the Temple. This one was sharper and stronger than the others, throwing Laurana up against a wall. Tanis’s face, white with fatigue and pain, grew even paler as he fought to keep his footing.
A loud rumble and a shattering crash came from the northern corridor. All sound in the prison cells ceased abruptly as a great cloud of dust and dirt billowed out into the hallway.
Tanis and Laurana fled. Debris showered down around them as they ran east, stumbling over bodies and piles of jagged broken stone.
Another tremor rocked the Temple. They could not stand. Falling on hands and knees, they could do nothing but watch in terror as the corridor slowly shifted and moved, bending and twisting like a snake.
Crawling under a fallen beam, they huddled together, watching the floor and walls of the corridor leap and heave like waves upon the ocean. Above them, they could hear strange sounds, as of huge stones grinding together—not collapsing so much as shifting position. Then the tremor ceased. All was quiet.
Shakily they got to their feet and began running again, fear driving their aching bodies far beyond endurance. Every few minutes another tremor rocked the Temple’s foundations. But as often as Tanis expected the roof to cave in upon their heads, it remained standing. So strange and terrifying were the inexplicable sounds above them that they both might have welcomed the collapse of the ceiling as a relief.
“Tanis!” cried Laurana suddenly. “Air! Night air!”
Wearily, summoning the last of their strength, the two made their way through the winding corridor until they came to a door swinging open on its hinges. There was a reddish blood stain on the floor and—
“Tas’s pouches!” Tanis murmured. Kneeling down, he sorted through the kender’s treasures that lay scattered all over the floor. Then his heart sank. Grieving, he shook his head.
Laurana knelt beside him, her hand closed over his.
“At least he was here, Tanis. He got this far. Maybe he escaped.”
“He would never have left his treasures,” Tanis said. Sinking down on the shaking floor, the half-elf stared outside into Neraka. “Look,” he said to Laurana harshly, pointing. “This is the end, just as it was the end for the kender. Look!” he demanded angrily, seeing her face settling into its stubborn calm, seeing her refusing to admit defeat.
Laurana looked.
The cool breeze on her face seemed a mockery to her now, for it brought only smells of smoke and blood and the anguished cries of the dying. Orange flames lit the sky where wheeling dragons fought and died as their Highlords sought to escape or strove for mastery. The night air blazed with the crackling of lightning bolts and burned with flame. Draconians roamed the streets, killing anything that moved, slaughtering each other in their frenzy.
“So evil turns upon itself,” Laurana whispered, laying her head on Tanis’s shoulder, watching the terrible spectacle in awe.
“What was that?” he asked wearily.
“Something Elistan used to say,” she replied. The Temple shook around them.
“Elistan!” Tanis laughed bitterly. “Where are his gods now? Watching from their castles among the stars, enjoying the show? The Dark Queen is gone, the Temple destroyed. And here we are—trapped. We wouldn’t live three minutes out there—”
Then his breath caught in his throat. Gently he pushed Laurana away from him as he leaned over, his hand searching through Tasslehoff’s scattered treasures. Hurriedly he swept aside a shining piece of broken blue crystal, a splinter of vallenwood, an emerald, a small white chicken feather, a withered black rose, a dragon’s tooth, and a piece of wood carved with dwarven skill to resemble the kender. Among all of these was a golden object, sparkling in the flaming light of the fire and destruction outside.