Live or die-it was all up to him.
Ashok opened his arms, caught the wind, and jumped.
The towers sped past him, impossibly fast. The slope of the canyon wall leveled out to a sheer surface, sucking away the darkness and lantern shadows like a spell. He could see the bridges rushing up to meet him, Vedoran’s form coming closer.
It was over far too quickly. Ashok’s boots hit stone, and he fell into a crouch to absorb the impact. Dust and rock scattered in his wake, the debris falling into space. With his arms spread, Ashok found balance on the edge of nothingness. Invisible hands held him up; one step backward or forward, and he was gone. But that breath in between was a century. That space was the only space that existed for him.
He looked up and met Vedoran’s half-crazed eyes. Ashok smiled. He couldn’t help it.
Vedoran laughed. The emotion seemed to steal his breath. His chest rose and fell as if he’d been running for miles. “You … You’re alive, after all,” Vedoran said. “I thought you were made of stone.”
Ashok sat down, his legs straddling the bridge. He put his hands on the curved stone tusks rising up around him. The bridge was so narrow. Navigating it with any kind of burden would be an adventure in itself.
Vedoran seemed to read his thoughts. “Only the shadar-kai use these paths,” he said. “The other races are afraid.”
“Has anyone ever fallen?” Ashok asked.
“Yes,” Vedoran said.
Ashok nodded. He lay on his back on the bridge, his arms outstretched in the constant wind. The force of the upswells was almost enough to bear their weight. He stared up at the cavern’s ceiling. Between the distant stalactites were shadows even the city’s lights couldn’t chase away, making him think of the tiefling woman with the staff.
“This city …” He didn’t know how to say it.
In Ashok’s peripheral vision, Vedoran sat with an arm across his knee, the other propped behind him, holding his weight.
“Say it,” he said.
“Is it yours?” Ashok asked. “It feels … old. Did the shadar-kai build it?”
“No one knows who built it,” Vedoran said. “The lore I’ve heard claims the shadar-kai who settled the city were led here by their gods-Tempus, as you can imagine. You’ve seen the carvings on the towers.”
“The winged folk,” Ashok said.
“The clerics say they’re Angels of Battle, Tempus’s emissaries,” Vedoran said.
Ashok caught a tone in Vedoran’s voice, something like the vocal shadow of his lazy smile. “You don’t believe them,” he said.
“Skagi calls me arrogant,” Vedoran said. “And so I am. But I’m not so full of hubris that I think any god would prepare a city just for my folk.” He nodded at the buildings below. “I’ve seen the black scars. Someone burned the angels-if that’s what they were-out of their city. Probably it was the Spellplague, but we’ll never know.”
The Spellplague. Ashok knew it only in stories: the Blue Fire that had raged across the mirror world of Faerun, its tendrils reaching even to the Shadowfell. A force powerful enough to rip apart entire cities-he could well imagine such a thing to have scarred Ikemmu. But to consume an entire people … Ashok shuddered at the thought of extinction through the blue flame.
Above Ashok, a shadow fell from the clouds, spread dark wings, and descended toward the bridge.
Ashok and Vedoran came to their feet at almost the same instant, weapons in their hands. Vedoran pointed. “Cloaker,” he said, as the thing angled toward them.
“Are you sure?” Ashok said.
“Oh yes,” Vedoran said. “The witches say that the cloakers were here when the shadar-kai first came to Ikemmu. They called it Sphur Upra, the Gloaming Home. If you want to know how the city came to be, ask a cloaker.” Vedoran chuckled darkly. “If you can keep it from killing you.”
Ashok braced his feet so he wouldn’t succumb to the vertigo of standing on the near-invisible bridge. He twirled his chain, waiting to see if the cloaker would attack.
It drifted down like its namesake, bone claws curled at the edges of the false fabric. Ashok kept the chain moving, swinging it above their heads and in front of his body. Still the thing floated, falling at a leisurely pace, coasting on the air currents.
“It’s going to pass,” Vedoran said.
“No it’s not,” Ashok said, and just in that breath, the cloaker tucked into itself. In the sudden absence of wind, it plummeted straight at them.
“Duck,” Ashok said, and released one end of the chain. It sailed over Vedoran’s head and snapped taut inches from the cloaker’s flesh.
Quickly, Ashok jerked the chain back and grabbed the other handgrip out of the air. Vedoran took out a small belt dagger, threw it, and missed. The cloaker angled out of reach beneath the bridge.
“Which way is it coming up?” Ashok demanded.
“I don’t know. Stop looking down,” Vedoran told him. “You’ll get dizzy.”
He was right. Ashok swayed on his feet. He stepped back and felt his heel go off the edge. Jerking in a breath, he righted himself. So close to the edge, but he kept his balance. He was in control. Ashok’s heart raced in exhilaration.
The cloaker appeared again from the opposite side of the bridge, spread its wings, and covered Vedoran like a curtain. To his great credit, the shadar-kai didn’t struggle. Such an action would have certainly sent him off the bridge. Instead, he dropped to his knees, then to his stomach, pinning the cloaker under his weight. Surprised by the move, the creature came loose, its flesh folds hanging over the side of the bridge.
Vedoran skidded back, his boots kicking the thing away as it tried to grab for him. The cloaker folded in on itself and dropped over the side of the bridge before Ashok could get to it.
“Are you all right?” Ashok called to Vedoran. They were over twenty feet apart on the bridge.
Vedoran jerked a nod. “This isn’t done,” he said. “It’ll come back for another pass.”
Judging by his expression, Ashok knew retreat wasn’t an option for Vedoran either. He held his chain, thinking.
“Can you hold my weight?” he said finally, coming forward.
Vedoran looked him over. Ashok knew what he saw: an underfed body, wiry muscle, and bone. But he was tall, and the tension would be incredible.
“I can,” Vedoran said. “Do you trust me?”
Ashok smiled and shook his head.
Vedoran held out a hand. “Do it,” he said.
Ashok threw the chain.
The cloaker unfolded beneath them, caught an updraft, and flew straight at Vedoran. When he saw it coming, Ashok sprinted across the bridge, closed the distance between himself and Vedoran, and jumped over the side just before he would have plowed into the shadar-kai.
His momentum carried him headfirst over the cloaker’s body, out of reach of its bony claws. He held the other end of the chain in both hands as the inertia pulled him down.
The cloaker, its attention fixed on Ashok’s plummeting form, didn’t notice the chain unfurling above it.
Ashok angled his body, trying to turn his fall into a swing to lessen the impact. It didn’t help. When the chain jerked taut, the jarring pain traveled up his arms and into his shoulders. He heard the crack as his left shoulder dislocated, and felt the brilliant explosion of agony. He ground his teeth, absorbed the pain, and concentrated on his grip. Above him, Vedoran grunted, his boots skidding across stone. But he’d been right-he was strong enough to hold Ashok.
The cloaker was not so fortunate. Barbed spikes descended, tore flesh, and trapped the struggling monster against the bridge with the chain. Vedoran pulled his end toward himself, and together with Ashok’s weight, the barbs cut the cloaker in half.
Two pieces of ichor-dripping mass fell past where Ashok hung. They landed on an invisible platform fifteen feet below: the second bridge.