“You had to pick this tower?” Corran swung Pathfinder at the dragonlike creature swooping toward him. Instead of dodging the sword, the monster grabbed at it. Corran’s quick stroke, however, left the creature clawing the air.
Kestrel dropped and rolled to avoid the clutches of another beast. “How was I to know there’d be a nest of these things in here?”
The party had tumbled into the open tower to discover the castle’s former throne room. It was a large, cone-shaped chamber with a wide assembly area at its base. A long crystal staircase spiraled its circumference, leading to an observation platform. Once-elegant appointments—silk wall coverings, plush chairs and settees, and of course the coronal’s golden seat itself—indicated that in times past the whole Elven Court might have joined the king in this room to enjoy its commanding view of the city. Now the sole occupants left to appreciate the panorama were the dozen or so winged beasts roosting within.
Kestrel had never seen creatures like these before. They had the horned heads, reptilian claws, and leathery wings of dragons, but the torsos and legs of humans. Red scales covered their bodies and snakelike tails. Their white eyes burned with malevolence.
Immediately, the creatures had taken flight, swooping down at the party. They launched an organized defense of their lair, communicating in a tongue that sounded like a series of hisses. While some attacked, others circled above, awaiting their chance.
Another beast swooped at Kestrel, targeting her weapon hand. A quick upward stroke gave the monster what it was after—Loren’s Blade—but through the flesh of its underbelly. Its claws raked Kestrel’s arm in retaliation but couldn’t pierce the new armor Harldain had provided.
“Anyone know what these things are?” Durwyn launched an arrow. The shaft caught one monster in the side, eliciting a hiss.
“They’re dragon-kin.” Athan landed another strike on his nearest foe, rending a great tear in the creature’s wing. “Allies of the cult. Be warned—they covet magical items.”
Two dragon-kin swarmed Ghleanna. Or, more accurately, her spellstaff. She hit one of them with the staff, but the other beast reached out and grabbed the weapon in its razor-sharp talons. “That’s mine, fiend!” she cried. The sorceress clung to the staff, digging her heels into the floor and entering a tug-of-war with the monster. She was no match for its brute strength, however, and the staff slid out of her grasp.
The creature darted off with the weapon. Ghleanna sent a sharp gesture and a command word after the beast. It spun around to look at her with wide eyes before dropping the staff and flying out of the tower. Three more dragon-kin in the vicinity joined the retreat.
“Ghleanna, whatever that spell was, keep ’em coming!” Kestrel called as another dragon-kin approached. Dark gray smoke puffed from its nostrils, stinging her eyes. She met its red-rimmed gaze and flashed Loren’s Blade at the beast. “This what you want? Magic?” The creature lunged for the weapon. “Here!” She hurled it at the dragon-kin. The dagger struck true, then sailed back into Kestrel’s hand. As the stunned beast stared at the oozing hole in its belly, Kestrel threw the blade again.
This toss caught the beast in its right eye. Black blood spurted from the socket and streamed down the creature’s snout. The dragon-kin shrieked in pain and fury as it tried to swoop at her once more. With no depth perception, the creature crashed into the floor. Kestrel used the dagger for a third, final, strike in the back.
Free of opponents for the time being, she darted to the room’s only exit. If the double doors were open—or secured with easily defeated locks—perhaps they could simply retreat from the remaining dragon-kin and reserve their strength for the more important battles ahead. She grasped the gold latch and tugged but could not even rattle the doors in their frame. Worse, the doors featured no ordinary lock. Magic had sealed them, and only magic could release them.
A battle cry from Durwyn drew her attention back to the action. The warrior fought two creatures on the dais that held the coronal’s throne. Before Kestrel could reach him to lend a hand, Faeril moved in. The dragon-kin took to the air and circled.
While the cleric stood poised to strike with her flame blade as soon as one of the beasts swooped close enough, she reached out her hand to touch Durwyn’s shoulder. “Mystra, I beseech you—strengthen the warrior Durwyn to better serve you.” Just as she completed her prayer-spell, the dragon-kin attacked.
Durwyn swung his axe with such force that he lopped both claws off one of his opponents. The creature shrieked and soared out of range. Blood streaming from its severed limbs, it flew out of the tower and disappeared from view.
The second dragon-kin dived at the fighter in retaliation. Durwyn struck that creature as well, slicing off a wing. The beast crashed to the floor. It lay only a moment before it tried to rise, but the loss of its wing impaired its balance and the stone floor was slick with dragon-kin blood. The wounded creature slipped and slid in the slime. Durwyn picked it up and threw it into the throne.
The heavy dragon-kin landed so hard it dislodged the throne from its centuries-old resting place. As the great seat slid aside, it revealed a tunnel below.
Kestrel ran toward the passage, eager to investigate, but three dragon-kin also flocked toward the discovery. Another spell from Ghleanna disbanded them. They fled in fear, leaving only a few wounded comrades still engaged in combat. Durwyn made quick work of his grounded foe, then helped finish off the remaining creatures.
At last they were free to explore the surprise passage. “Nice work, Durwyn,” Corran said as they all approached the dais. “Looks like you’ve discovered the king’s emergency escape route.”
The corridor was actually a narrow, spiraling staircase. At a word from Faeril, magical light illuminated the windowless stairwell. It continued down as far as their eyes could see, apparently untouched by either time or the castle’s unsavory squatters.
“Well, either we give this passage a try or see if Ghleanna can magically unseal the double doors,” Kestrel said. “I bet we’ll encounter fewer cultists this way.”
The party descended. They reached the bottom of the stairs to find a solitary door that offered no choice of direction. Kestrel pressed her ear to the wood. Beyond, she heard the sound of wings and the hiss-language of more dragon-kin.
Even worse, above it rose a horrible, mournful wailing. Thousands of voices joined in an unholy canticle of despair that howled like a wind storm.
The chorus of the damned.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The Vessel of Souls radiated evil.
It was a thing of black magic, of life-taking, of soul-stealing. It looked every inch the accursed instrument it was. The vessel resembled a crystal chalice with a stem but no base. Images of tormented, eyeless faces adorned the sides of the cup, their black outlines standing out in high relief from the crystal.
Yet more horrifying than these representations of lost souls were the thousands of real spirits crying out for release.
The shadowy souls swirled in a red mist, their eyes blank, their mouths agape with their song of hopelessness. They rose above the rim of the cup in a great surge of spirit matter, only to be driven back down by the unseen force that held them captive. Their endless gyrations lent haunting rhythm to their wails.
The vessel hung suspended in the air, supported by three twisted steel beams as thick as Kestrel’s waist. They formed a pyramid in the center of the round room, distributing the weight of the enormous urn to the edges of the chamber where the floor was made of stone. Directly beneath the vessel, a large circle of multifaceted glass lay inset in the floor. The glass caught the torchlight of the wall sconces and projected it up to the urn. As a result, eerie, undulating light bathed the chalice in a continuous profane baptism.