The only problem was, he suspected Anusha no longer sailed safely on the Sea of Fallen Stars. If evil had befallen her despite all his efforts to preserve her safety … He inhaled sharply.
If she had come to permanent harm, all these thoughts would crumple into so much dross. His heart would cease beating, he was sure; he’d die. He couldn’t bear thinking that it could be true.
No. Anusha was safe back in Faerun. Nothing else would do.
“We’re getting close,” said Dayereth.
Japheth turned, welcoming the wizard’s distraction for once. “How close?” he asked.
“Well, hard to know exactly. No one now alive has pushed this far into the void before. We know the Citadel of the Outer Void lies this way from related lore. But out here, distance is relative, as is time. The farther we go, the more hours and days shall pass us by in the world, and even along Forever’s Edge.”
“Right, time is slower the closer we get to the Citadel. Does it stop dead in the Citadel’s main hall?”
“Doubtful-It’s merely slower there than here. If time halted before the Far Manifold, then nothing done there could ever affect the world. By the time any gate opened to a place outside the cosmos, the universe could be born, grow, mature, and die away over long ages. I wish that was the case, because then we would have nothing to worry about.”
“Good point.”
Silence fell on the chariot again. Japheth gazed at the mighty wings of the white griffon that paced them, watching the muscles move beneath its hoarfrost feathers.
“The creatures of the void gather behind us,” said Raidon, pulling Japheth from what had almost become a waking trance.
Japheth glanced back. At first he couldn’t discern what the monk meant. The surviving knights and chariots continued to follow the fading path. The darkness seemed to stretch on beyond them forever.
Then he noticed glints of dirty purple and green in that all-consuming blackness. Each one by itself seemed innocuous. But when he unfocused his eyes and concentrated on the tiny glimmers as a whole, he frowned.
“Those ‘tiny’ lights I’m seeing out there; they must be fairly big if I can see them from here,” Japheth said.
“Some are,” said Raidon. “The Cerulean Sign senses thousands, most of which do not produce any light of their own. You’re only seeing the few that produce their own fell glow. Every one of the beasts of this void capable of directing its own trajectory is turning our way. They will follow us all the way back to their origin.”
“Will they catch us?” asked Dayereth.
“I expect so,” said the monk.
Japheth watched the darkness. The dim flickers drew closer together, as if they were condensing to form a vast hand. A hand closing around them, right before it squeezed.
A fluttering, winged shape briefly appeared in the distance, far behind the light of the last knight. It had neither the golden glow of the crystalline lances, nor the purplish radiance of some of the gathering aberrant host. It sort of looked like a bat.
“By the Nine!” Japheth exclaimed. There was no possible way Neifion was following them. Right? Fresh dread pulled at his stomach.
The griffon pulling their chariot screeched. Dayereth yelled something incoherent as the chariot lurched. The wizard nearly pitched out of the conveyance, but Raidon caught him. Had the idiot eladrin removed his tether?
Japheth opened his mouth to ask, then pale light bloomed across the sky.
Everything was different. “What happened?” the warlock asked.
At least he couldn’t see the damned bat anymore.
Instead, he saw a vista of churning mists. Aberrations wheeled around a glaring spot of nothingness in the sky. From it, the remnant of the armada from Forever’s Edge issued, one by one.
Pursuing monsters poured out of the discontinuity behind the knights. The creatures joined forces with those already fluttering around the portal in the sky. The last several knights to emerge from the gate flew straight into the claws of clutching, roaring, many-mouthed beasts.
“Dive!” yelled Raidon. “Below the mist line!”
The draft griffon tucked its wings, and the chariot dropped like a stone. Their companion griffon followed suit. A moment before the fog obscured his vision, Japheth gasped. He glimpsed the Eldest, wrapped in half-petrified majesty across the top of Xxiphu, not more than twenty stone throws away!
Then they were below the coiling fog.
Instead of blindness, Japheth glimpsed a vapor-shrouded tableau. The sheer sides of Xxiphu descended to a mottled plain. The city had landed, and had become a fell tower.
Strange music trembled on the edge of making sense. The air itself was … invigorating. He breathed in, and caught a scent that reminded him of the moment he had first picked up the Dreamheart. Promises were made him then, of power and strength enough to best nearly any threat.
His eyes fastened on an object far below, not far from where Xxiphu had grounded. It almost looked like-
“Land next to that!” Japheth yelled, pointing.
“Land?” said Dayereth. “An army of abominations follows us!”
“Most won’t venture beneath the mist,” said Raidon. “At least, not immediately. I don’t quite understand it-despite this place being a source of aberrations, it is also somehow inimical to them.”
“That hardly makes sense,” said Dayereth.
“Yet there is a reason,” Raidon replied. “But my Cerulean Sign doesn’t make it clear.” The monk raised one hand to his blazing spellscar.
The oppressive bulk of Xxiphu’s exterior seemed to press upon them as they descended, but the warlock had eyes only for the pile of timbers at the city’s foot.
Japheth called on his cloak to translate him across the intervening distance when they were close enough.
It was the wreck of Green Siren, as he’d feared.
“Anusha!” he cried.
From the shipwreck, no answer came, and no movement.
“Captain Thoster? Anusha!” Japheth called again. He was able to tell the front of the ship by the scaled figurehead that lay broken there. Which meant the forecastle had been about … there!
He began heaving pieces of board, sailcloth, rope, and other wreckage away.
“Careful,” came Raidon’s voice.
The chariot had landed. Japheth didn’t take the breath to answer. If Anusha was inside …
The monk continued. “The keel is broken,” he said. “I doubt that deck will support your weight for long.”
“Help me!” Japheth yelled. “She might still be in her travel case in her cabin!”
The warlock scrabbled at the loose boards, until he found one that didn’t want to budge. Voices penetrated his single-minded intensity. They mumbled in conversation, and were produced by more throats than just the people on his own chariot could account for.
He looked up. Several knights on griffons had all righted next to the ship. “Why won’t you help me?” he yelled.
Suddenly Raidon was beside him on the deck. “I’ll help,” the monk said.
He grabbed the other side of a beam Japheth was struggling with. Together, they lifted it away.
“Thank you, Raidon,” the warlock said.
A few more knights climbed up onto the uncertain deck to lend their aid. It didn’t take long to unbury the cabin with so many hands. Japheth’s heart leaped when he identified the shattered travel chest.
“Oh, gods,” he whispered.
With shaking hands, he pried open the crumpled top.
Nothing was inside but splinters and extra clothes.
“She’s not here,” he said dumbly.
“Come,” Raidon said, and pulled him. “We need to get off Green Siren before it collapses. The ship has been abandoned.”
Japheth’s brain felt numb. How many highs and lows could he withstand? Anusha was here, somewhere. She had survived the crash. But where in this alien wasteland was she? Worry pricked at his mind like needles.