Running a hand across the crown of his head?his close-cropped hair had almost grown out and would soon need to be shaved back again?he trudged onward, eyes constantly flicking down to search the ground for Halisstra's trail. After a few paces, however, he stopped. There, some distance ahead of him in the direction Halisstra had been heading?was that someone moving?
Not someone?something. The figure was definitely drow-shaped but seemed to be lacking its lower half. Ryld could clearly see a head, shoulders, and arms silhouetted against the spot on the horizon where the moon was rising behind the clouds, but below the waist there was nothing but a trail of dark fog, twisting in the wind like smoke from an extinguished candle. He didn't need to see its legs, however, to determine which direction the thing was moving in. It sped briskly along, stopping every now and then to stoop down low over the earth. With a shudder, Ryld realized it too was following Halisstra.
He drew Splitter from the sheath on his back and sprinted forward. The ground beneath his feet blurred as his magical boots propelled him along at several times his normal running speed. To attempt stealth on the featureless plain was futile. All Ryld could count on to tip the balance in his favor was speed. That, nd the magic of the greatsword in his hand.
Within moments he was close enough to the creature to see it clearly. The thing had once been human. It wore a soldier's surcoat over chain mail?the surcoat emblazoned with a stylized tree?and an ornate silver helmet topped with a plume of white hair that spilled over the creature's shoulders, marking the soldier as an officer. The helmet shone in the cloud-shrouded moonlight, and the links of the officer's chain mail still clinked. At least part of the creature was corporeal, then, though Ryld was doubtful it could be wounded by a normal weapon. Ryld was thankful he had Splitter; its enchantments would help even the odds.
Ryld was still two dozen paces away?and closing the distance swifter than a charging rothe?when he heard the low muttering. He couldn't make out the words, but the emotion attached to them made him stagger. It was as if he'd run into a pool of chest-high water. Waves of disappointment, sorrow, and loss crashed one by one into his chest, slowing him to a stumbling walk.
The undead officer stopped, then slowly turned. It was a human male, with a dark mustache that framed a drooping mouth, and eyes creased with sorrow. Every aspect of the apparition cried out despair, from its drooping shoulders to the listless way it held its dagger.
A dagger that was thrust, hilt-deep, into its own chest.
As the eyes of the undead officer met Ryld's, the tide of emotions rose above the weapons master's head, drowning him in despair. With it came a voice?a telepathic voice, for the officer was still muttering, and the movements of the ghost's mouth bore no relation to the words that pounded into Ryld's mind.
It is finished, the voice moaned. Our army is defeated. It was our duty to die in defense of Lord Velar, yet we few did not fall. We cannot return to him in disgrace. Only one course remains open to us?one path that leads to honor. We must take our place beside those who have already fallen. Like them, we must die.
The words echoed in Ryld's mind.
Die. . die. . die. We must die. We must take our place beside the others, it is your duty. You must die. .
Rooted to the spot by the intensity of the command, Ryld tried to obey. He turned Splitter, holding it by the blade and placing the hilt on the ground between his feet. All he had to do was lean forward, and his agony would be at an end. His honor, hanging in tatters like the banners of his fallen army, would be restored.
Letting his head droop, Ryld stared down at his hands?and the point of the blade he held between them. He leaned forward until the magically keen blade punched through his breastplate to prick his chest, and felt the eyes of his commanding officer watching him approvingly. All he had to do was allow his weight to fall forward, and the defeat of the army of Lord Velar would be …
Ryld's eye was caught by a ring on the finger of his own left hand. Shaped like a small, twisting dragon, it was obviously an insignia of some sort. The army of Lord Velar had been laid low by dragons?what was a ring shaped like one of those foul creatures doing on his finger? It was just plain wrong. .
No. . the ring was the only thing that was right. It marked Ryld as a Master of Melee-Magthere and triggered in him a realization.
He was not an officer in some army that was defeated centuries before he was born. He was Ryld Argith, Weapons Master of Melee-Magthere, citizen of Menzoberranzan.
Shaking his head violently, Ryld threw off the last of the magcal compulsion. He let Splitter fall from his hands and drew his shortsword?a weapon that had been enchanted with just such a foe as this in mind. The weapons master leaped forward, plunging it into the undead officer's chest.
His blade met resistance, just as if it had been thrusting into solid chain mail and living flesh, and the thrust did the job. Glancing down at the sword that was buried in its heart?beside its own dagger?the undead officer let out a groan. Ryld yanked his short sword free and danced back out of range.
A wisp of dark mist spurted from the puncture the sword had made in the undead officer's chest. The smokelike substance that was its lower body began to swirl. Within the space of a few heartbeats its stomach, chest, arms, and neck dissolved into dark mist.
The head was the last thing to disappear. As it did, the undead officer's lips curled into a smile, and its eyes brightened.
Thank you, it whispered.
A heartbeat later, it was gone.
Shuddering at his close escape, Ryld stared at the sword in his hands. The blade was unblemished; its plunge into the undead officer didn't seem to have tarnished it. He peered carefully in each direction to make sure there were no more of the foul creatures. Seeing none, he returned his short sword to its sheath, then picked up Splitter and sheathed it as well. He resumed his journey, following Halisstra's trail.
The sooner she finds this sword she's looking for and leaves the Cold Field, the weapons master thought, the better.
Halisstra sank, exhausted, into a crouch, feet crunching the dusting of snow that had fallen just after the moon rose. She'd been searching for a night and a day?and on into a second night?without pausing for rest. She'd tried to cast the spell that would help her to locate the Crescent Blade several times, but though she was certain she'd committed the words of the song to memory correctly, she might have confused the melody slightly. Either that, or the darksong was still beyond her limited reach. She'd felt none of the tingling certainty that should have led the way to the object she was seeking. The only thing she'd felt was the incessant cold wind sweeping across the desolate plain.
She sat in the darkness, peering through the gloom at the object she'd just pulled from the breast pocket of her piwafwi: her House medallion. When she converted to Eilistraee's faith, she'd decided to set it aside with the rest of her past, but something had made her hesitate. The brooch was magical, after all, and gave her the ability to levitate?but there was more to it than that. She sensed that it was not only a link with her past but with her future as well.
Setting the brooch beside her on the snowy ground, she drew Seyll's songsword from its sheath and raised the hilt of the weapon to her lips. How did that melody go again? It seemed strange to be playing a song from the bae'qeshel tradition on an instrument forged for a priestess of the Lady of the Dance … or did it? Wasn't the raising of the skills and talents of the Underdark to the World Above the very end for which Eilistraee strove?
For a time, Halisstra concentrated on her fingering, trying the melody in different keys and pausing, from time to time, to warm her fingers by blowing on them. Though she tried to concentrate, her mind kept drifting, and her eyelids felt heavy. After more than a cycle and a half of constant searching, she was desperately in need of the release that Reverie could give. She longed to let it claim her, to drift among her memories until they soothed her, but she couldn't give up her search. Exhausted though she was, she would master the spell before she rested. But the bitterly cold wind seemed to snatch away the notes and fling them into the night, scattering her efforts like dead leaves in a wind.