"What in the Nine Hells…" he coughed, "… are you apprentices…" he coughed again, "… doing?"
Piri crouched, holding a rod that extended into a hole he was busy burning in the stone beside the door. Heat waves danced above the rod. But for his demon-skinned hands, Piri's skin would have blistered away. Smoke billowed past him, out of the blackened hole.
Zarifar stood next to him, twiddling his index fingers, directing the smoke away down the corridor Q'arlynd had just teleported to. He stared dreamily at the fierce horizontal tornados his spell had turned the smoke into.
Baltak and Alexa stood next to a pile of gear. Bedrolls had been spread out on the floor. Alexa hurried forward to help Eldrinn, who'd doubled over in a coughing fit. Baltak remained where he was, hands on his hips. He'd abandoned his owlbear accoutrements for something new. His muscular body bore a layer of coin-sized, ice-white scales. The dragons carved into the door's surface had probably inspired his latest shapeshift.
"About time you two got back," he bellowed, his voice reverberating in his chest. "We're almost through."
"Let's see if you're right." Piri eased the rod out of the hole, hand over hand. Metal scraped against stone. A spent stonefire bomb pot was attached to the end of the rod, and the metal just below it was white-hot. The light of it lent a garish sheen to Piri's oily, green-tinted skin.
"How was Sschindylryn?" Alexa asked.
Eldrinn straightened. "Huh?"
"Knee-deep in travelers, as usual," Q'arlynd quickly answered.
"And the trade mission?" Baltak asked.
"It's drawing to a successful conclusion, even as we speak," Q'arlynd said, catching Eldrinn's eye.
"That's right," Eldrinn said. "Successful. No need for us there, any more. The negotiations were going so well we were able to leave early."
Q'arlynd hid his wince behind a nod and a smile. The boy's fumbling words sounded suspicious. But at least Eldrinn had stopped protesting. The boy had taken some convincing, but he'd eventually come around to Q'arlynd's way of thinking.
Neither of them, Q'arlynd had explained to Eldrinn before they'd teleported, knew a spell that would channel positive energy. They would be unable to help destroy the voidstone. Once Q'arlynd teleported the priestesses to the Acropolis, their part in the expedition would be at an end.
In the meantime, there was Kraanfhaor's Door to worry about. The staff had to be used before the Faerzress grew so intense that it blocked divinations altogether. Had Q'arlynd and Eldrinn remained at the Acropolis and waited for the priestesses to finish their work, it might have been days before they could return to Kraanfhaor's Door. By then, it might have been too late.
Thanks to Q'arlynd's teleport, the priestesses had sprung a surprise attack on the Acropolis. Even then, those singing swords of theirs would be making short work of the Crones. And Leliana and her priestesses would deal with the voidstone. All according to plan.
Q'arlynd had no reason to feel guilty.
None at all.
Piri let the rod clatter to the floor and waved his hands back and forth, cooling them. He could feel heat, even if it didn't harm him. "I hear Sschindylryn is having problems with their Faerzress." He nodded at the walls. "It's getting worse here, too."
Q'arlynd gave a noncommittal grunt and walked over to the door. Smoke curled from the hole beside it, though not in the dark billows it had before. Zarifar was still playing with the wind he'd conjured up, so it was hard to hear what anyone said above its roaring.
Q'arlynd caught his arm. "Stop that."
Zarifar lowered his hands and blinked. "Oh, hello, Q'arlynd. Where did you come from?"
Q'arlynd crouched and peered into the hole. Though the stonefire bomb had blackened and melted the stone next to it, the door itself was unblemished. Not so much as a streak of soot marked it. The hole was about ten paces deep, the length of the rod Piri had just hauled out of it. Kraanfhaor's Door, Q'arlynd saw, was just as thick.
He touched the front of the door. The stone under his fingers was cooler by far than the hot air that filled the corridor.
Q'arlynd nodded down at the stonefire bomb. "That isn't going to work."
"That's what I told them," Baltak boomed.
"We've proved one thing, at least," Piri said. "The stone that makes up that door exists in some sort of extradimensional space. Each time the stonefire started to reveal the far side of the door, it extended farther."
Alexa picked up a wooden tray and began sorting through the glass vials it held. "I tried several different acids on the door itself, but none made even the slightest mark."
"Frost won't crack it, either," Baltak boomed. He slapped a hand against the door. His fingers ended in claws, clear and glistening as ice. They scritched against the door as he drew them across it. "The stone can't even be scratched."
"There are patterns," Zarifar said. "I tried to identify them, but I can't quite…" His fingers traced lines in the air. "They seem so familiar, and yet…" he shrugged and let his hand fall, "they elude me."
"Excellent!" Q'arlynd announced.
The others stared at him blankly.
"Listen to you-you're working together. Well done."
His students glanced sidelong at one another when he said that-wary that he'd been talking between the lines. Had they let down their guard, shown some vulnerability, done something wrong?
Q'arlynd chuckled. "Well done," he repeated. "And I mean just what I say."
It was the truth. Leaving his apprentices on their own had been the best move he could have made. Had he remained there, he would have directed their experiments, led them along by the nose like rothe. Instead they'd tried to come up with solutions on their own. Fruitless attempts, but attempts just the same. Their initial decision to work together might have been motivated by a desire to keep an eye on each other, but that didn't matter. They'd become a team.
And since Q'arlynd knew how to open the door, they'd reap the rewards.
The anticipation nearly made Q'arlynd giddy.
He realized he was smiling. He set his face in a more serious expression. A smile could be an unnerving thing, to a drow. It usually preceded some sort of painful punishment.
"Eldrinn," Q'arlynd said, "your staff. It's time to open this door."
"You really think the staff is the solution?"
"We'll know that soon enough."
"I can't believe it!" Baltak shouted. "Q'arlynd knew how to open it, all along."
"Why didn't you tell us?" Piri asked, his voice thick with suspicion.
"It was a test," Q'arlynd answered, "of your willingness to work together. You passed."
He took the staff from Eldrinn. As the others crowded around, he closed his eyes. It took a moment to block out the rustles of their clothing, and their rapid, anxious breaths, but soon he achieved full concentration. He drew the staff toward himself and touched his forehead to the crystal at the center of it, just as Daffir had done.
"Show me the past," he whispered. "Show me how the Miyeritari opened this door."
Despite Q'arlynd's concentration, he heard Alexa's surprised murmur, "It can do that?"
Q'arlynd waited several moments, but nothing happened. No visions popped into his mind, no voices whispered in his ear. He tried for several moments more, with his eyes open. Nothing.
Heat prickled his cheeks. Daffir had never uttered a word when using the staff, but perhaps there was some silent mental command that was required. Eldrinn had assured Q'arlynd there wasn't, but knowledge of the command may have been stripped from the boy's mind by the feeblewit spell.