A. hot, grassy meadow stretched out around Slanya, an illusion of peace in this landscape of unpredictability and turmoil. Beyond the edge of the meadow-mote, she knew the Plaguewrought Land boiled with the rising blue fire.
Still, the smell of flowers and the warm tranquility of the meadow in the hot sun lulled her. The peace of the here and now was a pleasant anomaly. A vision of how life could be, how life should be despite the larger landscape of danger and chaos. It was too easy to forget the world beyondthe world that would rapidly intrude without warning.
“It’s going to be calm for a little while, I think,” Duvan said, shading his eyes from the last rays of sunlight slicing down through the clouds and the constellation of smaller motes above them.
Looking over at Duvan, so confident and reassured amid the surrounding hysteria and flux, Slanya thanked Kelemvor for Duvan’s presence. The man could be infuriating and pig-headed, but he was proving strong and knowledgeable. Indispensable. Slanya would be dead without him. Right now he was staring into the distance, his brow knitted in consternation.
Duvan’s black eyes sparkled in the light. His broad nose and boyish face were at odds with the three-day beard and straggly mane of hair. When he turned to look at her, his gaze was gentle. “Gather up as much as you can while we have time,” he said. “I’ll try to figure out how to get us off this rock and out of here.”
Slanya tried to quiet her mind, but in the recesses of her consciousness a little girl couldn’t stop screaming. She needed the quiet seclusion of the temple to order her mind and regain control over her body. Or perhaps she just needed to surrender to the fire. Maybe she could let chaos overtake her, move inside her.
How good would it feel to give in and let all her control go? Could she abandon her hold on order and still survive? She had no real idea, but the temptation to lose control surged up inside her like never before.
Focusing On the ground in front of her, Slanya knelt down into the dewy grass. Her knees dampened from the moisture, and the heavy smell of grass and earth filled her nostrils.
Grab. Pull. Bag.
The long, translucent, yellow stalks came easily out of the ground, roots and all. Rich dirt clung to the rhizomes as Slanya shoved the grass into the magic bag of holding that Gregor had given her for carrying it. The bag would hold all the plaguegrass they’d need for a long while.
“How much time do we have?” she asked.
Duvan stood and looked out past the edge of the mote the rim of which dropped off to the shifting ground far, far below. “Not sure,” he said. “The good news is that we seem to be in an eddy of spellplague for the moment. It’s not too strong or too fast.” “And the bad news?”
“We’re heading away from the border and into the most intense blue fire I’ve ever seen.”
Slanya let that sink in. She fought against the dread welling up inside her. Stronger changelands. Wilder and more chaoticpulling them toward madness. Slanya was not afraid of death, but she did fear insanity. Accept what comes, she told herself, but the words rang hollow.
Grab. Pull. Bag.
The plaguegrass gave off a sweet smell when the stalks broke, reminding her of the herb garden back at the monastery. She used the smell and the manual labor as an anchor. Focus on the here and now, she reminded herself.
The last rays of the sun dimmed to darkness, and the blanket of night stretched over the sky above them. The high clouds overhead were thickening. Their gray bellies glowed blue and red, flickering with the reflection of the turmoil of the fires below.
Grab. Pull. Bag.
The repetition was calming. Slanya lost herself to the act of harvesting the plaguegrass. There was plenty of light to continue to work, and she was happy to lose herself in the rhythm of the task.
“I need food,” Duvan said suddenly. “Need to figure out a way off this mote.”
The edge in his voice was less than reassuring, but eating was a good idea. They needed energy to keep going.
Grab. Pull. Bag.
As she worked, Duvan gathered up what looked like dried wood and piled it up at the inner edge of the meadow. She wondered at first what he was doing, but it soon became clear that he was building a fire. What do we need a fire for? she wondered. None of the food they’d brought with them needed to be cooked. A campfire was unnecessarya waste of energy.
After about a half hour, she was finished filling the sack, her knees were soaked through, and her hands were numb and icy cold, covered with tiny scrapes from the sharp edges of the grass. Duvan’s fire didn’t seem so wasteful anymore.
Slanya stood up and brushed dirt and dry grass from her legs. She felt centered and focused for the first time since they’d entered the Plaguewrought Land. And famished.
“Come and eat something,” Duvan said.
“Thank you,” she said, walking over to the fire. She warmed her hands, relishing the tingle as the flames nudged away the chill from her fingers and palms. When they were sufficiently warmed, Slanya helped herself to the dried rations and fruit they’d brought and sat down on the ground across the small blaze from to Duvan. “I think we have enough plaguegrass.”
Duvan nodded. He swallowed his bite, then said, “Good. Unfortunately, I don’t see how we can get off this rock any time soon. Perhaps you should’ve hired a wizard instead of me.”
Laughing, Slanya said, “No, I can see now that you were the clear choice. Despite your inability to magic us back.”
“Well,” he said, his dark eyes soft in the firelight, “we could be stuck on this mote for a long time.”
Sitting there talking to him, the fire a warm glow next to them, Slanya felt herself relax. The searing screech of the heavens and the earth below faded to background, and all that mattered was the here and now. Her mind could contain this moment and make sense of it.
“Do you always assume the worst will happen?” Slanya asked.
Duvan smiled. “Yes, I suppose I do. In my experience the worst is more likely to happen than the best, and it’s far better to be prepared for the worst.”
So cynical, she thought. But there was practicality in that way of thinking.
“For me, being stuck doing nothing is worse than death,” he said.
“There’s not much we can do right now.”
“True, but if we’re stuck up here for hours or days…” Duvan let the idea linger in the air.
There were scars on this man’s soul, Slanya could see that in sharp relief now. But what had happened to him? He kept his past bottled up inside. How could he have turned out so bitter and jaded?
“The clerics and monks of my order sometimes spend tend ays doing nothing more than meditation and training,” she said. “Learning how to master oneself.”
“I’m no cleric.”
Slanya laughed. “Clearly,” she said. “But my point was that perhaps you could learn something from me just as I have learned from you.”
“As far as I can tell, 1 have taught you nothing.”
“Well, you many not think so,” Slanya said, “but your calm has helped me cope with the randomness of the changelands. While you may be a tempest in the city, you’re like a rock in this stormy sea. Just being in here has helped me understand more about chaosand fear it far morethan I ever have.”
Duvan looked her, the lines of his face bunched in puzzlement. His eyes reflected the fire as the sky continued to darken overhead.
“I am intensely uncomfortable with so much chaos,” Slanya continued. “But with your guidance, I have been able to stay sane in the midst of it. I consider that a gift.”
Duvan seemed to absorb her words, but his face was impassive. His blank expression was neither questioning nor dismissive, as though he merely accepted what she had said, but had no opinion of it. At least not yet.
Slanya stared at this enigmatic man, his strong, dark features limned in the orange glow of the fire. She wanted to heal him if she could, help him heal himself.
“All right,” he said. “Although it feels like a stretch to me. Now, what would you teach me?”
Slanya smiled. “Simple things at firstbreathing and meditation. But with those will come mind balance and perhaps the discipline to confront your demons. The ultimate goal is peace with yourself.”
Duvan frowned. “From where I stand, I don’t see the benefit of inner peace.”
She laughed. “Well, it’s liberating. Healing your scars and wounds will help you resolve your past. You are a remarkable person, Duvan, capable of so much. But you are held back by… I’m not sure whatguilt or regret, perhaps? Discipline can emancipate you from that, by resolving issues instead of burying them.”
Duvan’s eyes narrowed. “And why do you care so much?”
It was an appropriate question and one that had already occurred to Slanya. “Balance,” she said. “Because you’ve helped me.”
Duvan seemed to accept that, nodding.
Looking across the fire, its temptation dulled at the moment, Slanya watched Duvan’s dark shape. He was gazing into the glowing orange coals, his expression melancholy.
And of course he had saved her life. She had trusted him, and he had lived up to that trust. He had proved himself worthy. That too was a gift.
“What happened to make you so cynical?” she said.
Duvan remained quiet, but his expression in the firelight grew soft, pensive. And beneath, Slanya thought she detected some vulnerability, which was immediately endearing.
“By telling someone,” she said, “by sharing your story with another soul who will not judge you but will simply listen and validate what has happened to you… by doing that you take the first step to resolving it.”
“It can’t be resolved away,” Duvan said.
Slanya nodded, but she wasn’t ready to back down just yet. “Maybe not, but talking about it can let someone else share the burden.” She stared directly into his eyes.
He held her gaze for a moment then shook his head. “I can’t lose it,” he said. “And you don’t want to share this burden. You have no idea what you’re asking.”
“Lose it?”
“This cannot be washed away,” he said. “Like you’ve done with your past.”
Slanya bristled at that. “I have not washed away anything,” she said, then admitted, “Although it is possible that my memory of what happened isn’t accurate. But then yours might not be either.”
Duvan snorted. “And how would you know?”
“Exactly,” Slanya said. “It’s what we remember and the lessons we draw from those memories that are important.”
“No disagreement there,” he said.
She thought back to the fire in her aunt’s house. There was more to the story than what she had revealed to Duvan, but even beyond that, some of her recollection of it was fuzzy, the details indistinct. That bothered her.
“To be honest,” she said, “I don’t remember everything about the night of the fireabout my Aunt Ewesia’s death.”
Duvan’s dark eyes glimmered in the firelight. “I sometimes wish I didn’t remember, but I can’t help it.”
Slanya shivered and moved a little closer to the fire. “What happened?”
“I don’t want talk about it,” he said.
“I will trust with you with my story,” she said, “if you trust me with yours.”
Duvan chuckled. “Convenient,” he said, “since you don’t even know your complete story.”
Slanya smiled. “I will try to remember what really happened, but in any case, I never claimed the deal was fair.”
Duvan’s dark, grinning face reflected firelight for a moment before growing somber. And then, against the backdrop of the approaching stormthe sound and the fury of which surpassed every other phenomenon of Slanya’s experiencehe surprised her when he began telling his story first.
“Until I was ten, I lived in a small farming village with my father and my sister, Talfani. My mother had died giving birth to us. I never knew her. Talfani and I were inseparable.”
Standing, Duvan brushed the dust from his leathers and walked around the fire. The sky had darkened to a midnight blue, laced with threads of vibrant purple and punctuated by occasional explosions of blue. He noticed that the mote had stopped rising, which was good because the air was already cold enough up this far. But they were still floating toward the ‘plague storm, caught like a leaf in a whirlpool. And soon they would be in the midst of a spellplague storm as nasty as Duvan had ever encountered.
He knew well that the mote could descend any time so the best option was to wait.
For the moment.
“We lived in a small house on the edge of the village, next to our fields and the olive orchard we tended. Talfani and I shared a room and the chores, helping Papa with the fields.”
The mote had found an island of calm in the turbulent sea of chaos. Over the edge, Duvan could see boiling destruction.
Explosions of molten rock and flickers of crisp blue magic punctuated the swirling plaguestorm. Pinpoints of light far, far below what could be ground level shone like stars in an upside down world. Perhaps he was seeing down into the Underdark.
“I was awakened one night by a lighta glimmer of the palest blue. There was the overwhelming stench of the plaguestorm, although I didn’t know what it was at the time.” Duvan turned to look at Slanya, “Do you know that smell the rotten oranges and corpse odorthat only comes in late summer and fall?”
“Yes,” Slanya said.
“I remember the smell vividly. I remember that it was the end of summer and the harvest had gone into full swing. Everyone was happy. Harvesttime was a good time for the village.”
Slanya remained silent, listening attentively from across the waning fire. Her pale skin reflected red in the light of the campfire, and her fine features seemed frail against the violence of the storm. Slanya sat crosslegged with her hands resting in her lap, her sideknot hanging delicately by her ear with the end just touching her shoulder.
Duvan had wanted to tell someone this story-the true events of what had happenedfor years. And he had tried a few times, but people never understood. People never wanted to understand.
Slanya seemed different in that regard. And perhaps his story could help her to realize that cynicism and mistrust was the only way to make it through life. She was far too trusting, especially of Gregor, who Duvan thought was vastly overestimating the efficacy of his precious elixir. Gregor was playing with Slanya’s life and lying about it.
Duvan shook his head. There was nothing for it but to leap into the telling. Duvan had to just take the plunge if he was going to go there at all.
And with a deep, bracing breath, he did.
“I woke up Talfanishe could sleep through anything.” Duvan gave a weak laugh, remembering. “Papa came in and told us to stay put until he returned for us. And if I had known that he would never come back, that I’d never see him again, I would’ve hugged him and begged him to stay with us.
“We waited for over a day for our father to return, waited until we were so hungry we had to have food. He had left me in charge. I was the elder, you see, by just a quarter hour. Talfani hated that. So I slipped out when she was asleep to go find food.” Duvan paused. The fear and loss threatened to pour over him. He took a deep breath.
“Everything was destroyed,” he went on. “Everyone was dead or had disappeared. The entire village brought down to rubble, except for the part of our house that was the bedroom I shared with Talfani. Deep ruts cut into the ground from where the blue fire had plowed under buildings and bodies. Nobody else had survived. All that I’d known was gone.
“I found food and returned to find”
Duvan’s voice broke, and he fought back the tide of emotion. He took a breath.
“Talfani had grown pale and sickly. She died over the next few days. I had a chance to say good-bye to her, but her slow, lingering death was agony for both of us. And when she passed, I had nothing left for myself. I just lay down next to her and hoped death would also come for me.”
Duvan stopped pacing and stared into the red depths of the fire. “And I might’ve had the opportunity to meet your death god if a group of Wildhome elves who often came to trade with us hadn’t been wandering near. They found me, cleaned me up, and took me to their settlement in southern Chondalwood.
“You’d think that living with elves would be wonderful, full of merriment and joy. The wood elves are remarkable and noble, fair and fey. But they are also extremely secretive and insular. For years, after I recovered from the physical trauma of what had happened, my life was good.
“I had everything I could want except my father and sister back. The elves took me in, not as one of their own, but as a guest outsidern Tel’Quessir. I participated in their customs and rituals. I learned their ways, but I was teased mercilessly by my peers. There were things I couldn’t do. But it was a life of luxury compared to my previous one. I often felt guilty for having survived encountering spellplague and ending up in an easier lifestyle.
“They taught me a great deal. How to climb. How to hide in shadows. How to move quickly through the forest and leave almost no trace. How to fight. I was not automatically adept at any of these things, but I wanted to fit, so I learned the skills as best I could, until I felt I had succeeded.”
Slanya’s gaze was riveted on Duvan as he spoke. Her face was somber in the firelight, as she waited for him to continue.
“If I had been paying attention to such things,” Duvan went on, “I would have noticed that I was never allowed to go on any trips outside of Wildhome, except on the rare circumstance that the chieftain went abroad. And even though I was a ward of the clerics of Silvanus, I was required to go with the chieftain whenever he traveled.
“I was not at all sure why at the time, but they considered me good luck.”
Duvan looked away from the fire. Their mote was still caught in a tightening spiral, moving toward a hurricane of spellplague. They were closing in on the storm’s outer arms. Perhaps their path would miss the center completely. Perhaps they’d veer wide and slingshot back around. Only time would reveal that. Duvan predicted he’d know the answer in less than an hour.
“So when I was thirteen,” he said, looking back to the fire, “the elven clerics of Silvanus, with the consent of the chieftain agreed that I would be invited to become a full adult member of their society. This was something I had been hoping for. I immediately accepted and was prepared for the flame-etch ceremony.
“The clerics created the symbol of a tree on my chestnature and harmony with the trees and all that representing Silvanus. They used metallic inks, blended with some materials that were supposed to attract the blue fire on the edges of the Plaguewrought Land, to etch the symbol on my chest.
“They spent days teaching me how to approach the spellplague pockets. I needed to get close for the etching to work, but not so close that the spellplague would kill me.
“On the morning of the ceremony, I walked naked to the Plaguewrought Land border, searching for the white gauze. I found it easily and danced toward it, eager to have my scar and join the Wildhome elves as one of their ownor as close to one of their own as a n Tel’Quessir could ever be.
“But the edge of the changelands wouldn’t reach out and burn the symbol of Silvanus into my chest as it should have. So 1 pressed in a little farther, toward bluer fire. And just then, a wave of intense spellplague pulsed along the border veil as it sometimes did.”
Duvan took a breath, remembering the event like it had happened yesterday. “They screamed at me to run out. To dodge and flee. But I wanted to join them so badly. I couldn’t figure out what had gone wrong, why my etching hadn’t activated. All I could feel was my gut grown heavy and liquid.
“And then the surging wave of blue fire washed over me and blotted out the world. And in its wake…”
Duvan remembered the young elves and the elders yelling at him to run away. The fire would kill him or change him into a monster. He remembered feeling…
“Nothing,” he said. “Nothing had changed. My gut slowly returned to normal. My chest etching remained untouched by the spellplague, and I emerged unharmed.
“After that my life took a completely different course. A more treacherous and sinister course.”
Slanya stared silently into the fire. Her own history of chaos flickered on the edges of her memory. Elusive.
She looked up, watching Duvan carefully as he paused in telling his story. He had packed and repacked their backpacks, had organized the firewood, and he kept looking out over the edge of the mote at the swirling vortex ahead. Now he paced, having nothing more to occupy his attention while he considered how to continue.
After a minute, Duvan went on, “They were surprised that I emerged from the Plaguewrought Land whole and untouched. And soon after, it became apparent that some of the elves were afraid of me. I was already a social outcast because of my race, but now I was alien.
“Boys and girls died during the fire-etching rituals. Not all, of course, but a goodly number. The rest were marked by the changelandsetched. Nobody came away untouched. It had never happened before.
“I found myself shunned. Friends I had worked so hard to make avoided me. Everyone whispered about me as I passed. They didn’t know what to do with me. And then Rhiazzshar came to me and made everything right. She was a young priestess of Silvanusvery beautiful, very kind. She befriended me and held me while I cried in her arms. I was desperate for some affection, and she was very comforting.
“Rhiazzshar told me that the others were afraid of me, that they didn’t understand why the changelands had had no effect. She wanted to know if I knew. But of course I had no idea. She said that we had to find out why so that we could convince the others that I was no threat. Then I would be accepted, perhaps even regarded as a hero.
“I asked her how I could do that, and she suggested I start by seeing what my limits were. How long can I resist the Plaguewrought Land? Is it just avoiding me, or am I impervious to it?
“I considered what she said, but I was afraid to try any of that. She held me and said it was all right.”
The emotion in Duvan’s voice tore at Slanya’s heart. Rhiazzshar had clearly meant something to him. She also realized that Duvan was revealing a great secret about himself. His ability to avoid the effects of the changelands wasn’t luck at all, and it was only partially rooted in knowledge. If what he had told her was true, Duvan was resistant to spellplague.
Around them, the sound of the storm had growna keening, scratchy wail, like an orchestra of sand rubbed on tin, punctuated by the booms of earth cracking apart and smashing together. It was close now, and Slanya needed to not think about it. So far, this mote had been drifting through a patch of calm, but it felt like it could pass into the storm at any moment.
“I fell in love with Rhiazzshar. She was my coming-of-age, really. After my failed fire-etching ceremony, she and I spent all our free time together, mostly isolated from the others. And the elders allowed it, which I suppose should have given me warning signs. But I was blissfully in love.
“Finally, one day, lying in bed after making love together, she convinced me to go back through the border veil. To be fair, I wanted to know what the limits of my ability were. But I wouldn’t have gone without her encouragement.
“At first I just went in for a minute, and then it was two, then five, until I was remaining inside the border of the changelands for an hour or longer, just coming out when
I got so tired I couldn’t see clearly. And while the blue fire didn’t seem to be able to touch me, exposure to it made me exhausted.
“Every time when I would come out of the Plaguewrought Land, Rhiazzshar would hold me, caress me, and make love with me. We got into a cycle, and eventually I started to suspect she was manipulating me. I didn’t see it for such a long time. A woman like that can blind a man. Plus she was my only friend, and if she wasn’t really my friend, then I had no one. That prospect was too terrible to believe.
“I had to know for sure. So I decided to stop going in. I hadn’t tested the full limits of my spellplague resistance, but I knew enough to be content for a while. Rhiazzshar wasn’t happy with that decision. At first she tried to persuade me to keep learning more about my abilities, and when I refused, she tried harder. Her methods of persuasion were very enjoyable.” Duvan laughed wryly. “But when it became clear to her that I wasn’t going to keep testing myself, she changed. She told me that she wished it hadn’t come to this, that our pleasant fantasy could have continued indefinitely. But the safety of Wildhome and the Chondalwood was paramount. They needed to understand my ability fully. They needed to make sure I was no threat, and to find out how they could use me to protect them.
“At first I was hurt. Betrayed. But I didn’t fully comprehend the extent of the betrayal until later. My life changed completely yet again. Rhiazzshar kept coming to see me, but we were no longer lovers. I learned that she had been keeping a record of my excursions in the changelandsa log of my exposure.
“The experiments continued every tenday or so. They put me in a cage and pushed it across the border then left it therelonger and longer each time, until I was inside the cage swallowed by the Plaguewrought Land for three days.”
Duvan gritted his teeth in firelight. “Rhiazzshar said she was sorry. She said she still loved me, but that she loved her people more. She came to me several times. And at first I just wanted company, I needed caring, and so I accepted her. But over time, I hardened and grew jaded, cynical, and solitary. She never offered again.
“About a year later, I think, a burst of blue fire destroyed part of the cage. I had learned how to control my ability, just a little. Some things near me are protected, and with practice I had learned how to extend or shrink the area within limits. I shrank it as much as I could and huddled in a corner of the cage, and when the wave of spellplague came near me, it vaporized the opposite side of the cage.
“I walked out and into the heart of the Plaguewrought Land, straight into the hell that you’ve now seen with your own eyes.” He gestured toward the center of the storm vortex that they drifted toward.
Slanya wiped away a tear and felt the urge to reach out to him, to offer some comfort, but she didn’t know how. The fire had died down, but Duvan stoked it with more wood. Slanya was glad; the air was chilly this far up.
“That journey across the changelands was a nightmare. I was alone. I was weak. I was confronted with an unknown chaos. Once again, I didn’t care if I lived or died. Quite frankly, I expected to perish.”
Duvan paced at the edge of the halo of firelight. “But an unexpected thing started to happen; I started to feel the faintest stirrings of hope. I had escaped my long captivity. Perhaps I could remain free. Perhaps I could reinvent myself. I had no idea how I would accomplish that, and it seemed so distant, so remote, that it was nigh impossible. But that dim ray was still there and growing stronger each day I survived.
“Several times I nearly fell through the perforated fabric of the world and into the Underdark. Ultimately, however, I made it across. I was scraped up from a number of falls, and bruised from many a battle with the changelands, but otherwise whole.”
Duvan gave a wry laugh. “After I passed out of the Plaguewrought Land, I was starving and weak, so parched that I nearly died of thirst. And ironically, it was a group of feral elves who found me. They gave me food and water. They had been searching for me, so they could take me back to Wildhome.”
“Oh, no!” Slanya blurted out. Her chest hurt in sympathy for him. “I’m so sorry.” It had been a long time ago, but she understood that level of futility. She understood. She’d spent a long time planning to escape from her aunt, only to be caught again once she did, returned home, and punished with beatings.
Duvan stopped his pacing and glanced at her. “Thank you,” he said. “When I realized who had found me, I lost all hope. And frankly, I started looking for opportunities to end my life.” He began pacing again, like a caged beast, at the edge of the firelight.
Slanya was silent, staring at the deep orange-red glow of the coals, watching the occasional spark fly on the waves of heat up into the sky. Suicide was not anathema to her. Kelemvor wasn’t unambiguously opposed to it. Under the right conditions, a life could be ended voluntarily and by choice. Still, in her philosophy those circumstances were very narrow.
“The elf group camped on the edge of the Chondalwood for several days, waiting for me to recover a little before taking me back to the forest city.” Duvan’s voice seemed to drift out of the darkness. “However, early on the second evening someone came with a group of armed fightersTyrangal and her Copper Guard.
“Tyrangal had gotten news, she told me later, of a human who was resistant to the plagueland’s effects. She had spies in Wildhome apparently. And while she hadn’t been prepared to take on the entire elven city, she was perfectly willing to go up against a small reconnaissance group. The elves were charmed by her golden tongue. They were also afraid of her, so they eventually left without me.
“Tyrangal took me back to her mansion and offered me a place of distinction in her organization. She offered to continue my training: weaponry, woodcraft, mastering my spellscar. She helped me in so many ways. I had never met anyone like her.
“I stayed for several months before testing out my freedom. Tyrangal had told me that I could come and go as I wished, but she had also made the argument that she could protect me more effectively if I stayed close. Eventually I needed to make sure I really was able to leave.”
Duvan approached the fire with some more sticks. He started breaking them and setting them on the dying fire. “She let me go,” he said. “I wandered for months, mostly thieving to make my way. But I was on my own! I was anonymous and not bound to anyone. I traveled north from port to port for the better part of a half-year.
“Eventually I returned on my own, and Tyrangal welcomed me back. She said that she had a job for me, that it would be challenging and lucrative. Would I take it? Obviously, I accepted. IVe been with her for a few years now, but I am free to make my own choices, and the benefits have been quite substantial.”
Duvan stood in silence for a while, staring into the fire, his story seemingly at an end.
Duvan’s tale had brought back cascades of memories for Slanya. Her own childhood had been filled with manipulation and horror. Aunt Ewesia had not only been strict, she used to change the rules arbitrarily and punish Slanya when she broke them.
Slanya understood what it was like to never be able to win. She had never known When she was doing something that would get her the strap or the paddle or the hot iron on the backs of her thighs. Slanya shuddered with the remembrance. How could she have forgotten about that?
“Thank you for sharing your story with me,” she said.
He gave her a solemn nod.
“Now, I can help you share your burden.”
Duvan glanced up at her. “What?”
“What you’ve been through was horrific,” Slanya said. “But you don’t have to be alone with your pain.”
“Exactly how can you help share my burden?”
Slanya sensed danger in his tone but felt she should explain. “I can sympathize with what you went through.”
The keening of the storm suddenly grew louder, and wind gusted around them. Blue The gauze of clouds above flickered blue. The storm was closing in on them.
Duvan seemed unfazed. “You think you understand what I went through by hearing me tell it?”
“No, I don’t fully understand,” Slanya said. “But I do know you better. And I feel confident that if you’d met different people after the attack on your village-if you’d met people who had nurtured you instead of exploiting youyou would have been able to trust them and they would have taken care of you.”
“And what? Losing my twin sister to a spellplague storm would’ve been easier for me? Finding out my true love was using me would have been all fine?”
Slanya knew the question was a trap, but by Kelemvor she was right in this. “No, but living with those losses and betrayals would have been less traumatic.”
Duvan’s sadness had grown into full anger now. “You think everything can be solved by order and a society based on trust, but it can’t. Some things can’t be solved.”
Slanya was about to say something but a loud crack from the plaguestorm filled the air. There was a brilliant flash and when her eyes adjusted to the light, Duvan was gone.
No, there he was, walking away. She watched as he strode out of the light cast by the fire and passed into darkness.
Into the storm.
The air rang like a thousand tiny bells around Duvan. He didn’t know where he was going and he didn’t care. He just needed to get away for a moment. He needed to escape Slanya and her persistent prodding, her false compassion.
He needed to escape his memories.
There was a reason he’d never told anyone the full story. He couldn’t bear to remember it. He felt guilty for surviving the attack on his village. And he hated himself for succumbing to Rhiazzshar’s manipulation.
Talfani’s face, ashen and hollow, filled his mind. Her green eyes dull from fever and milky from the burns. That, was how he remembered herhow she haunted him.
Where did you go, ‘Fani? Duvan had hoped for years that she had gone to a good place in her next life, but the more he saw of the hardships that the gods allowed to happen, orif some were to be believedeven caused to happen, Duvan was more and more convinced that there was no hope of anything better after life. Nothing but the end of living. Death was perhaps not a door at all, but an end.
Duvan fought the urge to run. He wanted to flee straight into the storm, until the storm grew so intense that it took him finally, or until he fell off the edge of the mote. Death, whether it was nothingness or something brand new, would be a welcome relief from this agony.
At least perhaps he wouldn’t know what he had lost then. Oblivion would be an improvement.
But he did not run. He did not flee. He couldn’t get too far from Slanya. Even now, as he circled the camp, hiding in the shadows, he made sure that he was still close enough to shield her from the blue fire.
A gossamer blade of spellplague sliced up the ground right in his path, approaching like a fiery scythe harvesting the sick earth. Duvan ducked his head and clutched his roiling gut. His stomach grew heavy and seemed to melt as the wall of blue fire passed over him.
He felt nothing in its wake.
The night swirled around hima maelstrom of power and light, underwritten with a cacophony of violent grunts and belches as the land itself groaned with pain. The wild magic was angry tonight, and the universe protested.
Duvan tripped and fell forward. He instinctively tucked and rolled, coming back to his feet. He took a moment to steady himself and regain his balance on the undulating stone. Part of the mote had fallen away here, and he now stood at the very edge.
Far below him, the blackness of the Underdark yawned. The land was perforated by hundreds of holes, the spaces created by a haphazard lattice of solid land and drifting motes the size of cities.
Spellplague tore the universe in twain here at the center of the changelands. For that was where they were, certainly. Duvan had never been here before, to the place where it was said that the gods themselves could not come without fear, and that pantheons of darkness battled those of light.
Duvan didn’t know what to believe. He knew with certainty, however, that were he to take one more step and hurl himself into the abyss that he would die and would bid farewell to the pain of living.
But so too would Slanya die. Almost certainly, she would not make it back out of the changelands alive without his protection. And Duvan had made a vowa promise to guide her and protect her if he could. He had told Tyrangal he would do his utmost to keep Slanya safe.
Slanya had gotten to him, he realized suddenly. She had cared and had offered to hear his woes. And he had trusted her, just for a moment, and that moment had felt wonderful. That moment had dissolved in a flash, but he was happy to have had it.
Duvan took one long, slow breath.
And yet, Slanya was no Rhiazzshar. She could not really understand him. Her assertion that she could sympathize was too dangerous to entertain. But she wasn’t malicious. She wasn’t manipulative.
He exhaled.
Slanya was being a friend.
Duvan knew then that he couldn’t abandon Slanya. That she cared for him was part of it, but more than that, he felt connected to her. She didn’t understand him half as well as she thought she did, but despite their short time together, she knew him better than anyone else in all of Faerun. She knew him, and she still wanted to help him.
Duvan carefully took a step back away from the edge of chaos. He turned and looked back toward the campfire, at Slanya’s silhouette huddled by the flames looking around, no doubt for him.
He knew he should get back, but he needed a few more moments alone. Just a little longer. To calm himself.
Abruptly, a wave of nausea washed over Duvan. His stomach lurched and grew heavy. Suddenly blue flames lit up the ground and air, stirring both like a titanic, prowling beast, waiting to strike.
Duvan saw Slanya glance around her, frantic, like frightened prey. She didn’t deserve this. He had to make sure she was safe.
Spellplague struck the ground under him. Like thousands of earthworms, tendrils of blue gauze ate away the earth beneath him. The rock crumbled and fell away.
Duvan fell. Holes opened up in the mote’s foundation. Through them, he could see the air beneath the mote. He dived toward what looked like solid ground to his left.
When he hit the rocky earth, he tucked and rolled, somersaulting back to his feet. Duvan used the momentum to run. Behind him, the blue fire chewed the ground like meat. A short burst of speed, and Duvan found himself on safer ground, at least for the moment.
Panting, Duvan got his bearings. Where was he? Was he actually safe? Yes, seemed to be for the moment. Good.
Where’s Slanya? he thought.
Abruptly, dread filled him. His flight to safe ground had taken him away from the campfire. Slanya was far outside his protection now. With the plaguelands erupting so close, she was sure to be exposed. And that much exposure could easily kill her. He needed to get back.
He needed to get back now.
After Duvan disappeared, Slanya instinctively moved closer to the fire, not for warmth but a needfor protection. She knew that the fire could not protect her from anything in the spellplague storm, but it felt safer.
Spellplague lit up the air around the camp. Like a spiderweb, strands of magic hung glowing in the air. The small cocoon that had been their camp grew smaller and smaller until Slanya felt the universe coming apart around her.
Chaos.
Tiny filaments of shimmering magic sliced through the air and the ground and the haversacks. And Slanya. In their wake they left a vortex of randomness. There was no pain as they cut through her, only the sensation of dissociation between her mind and her body.
The pain only came in the aftermath, in the wake of turbulence caused by the crystals. And when it came, it started smalla pinprick on her shoulder and a tiny burn on her toe. But then there was another and another, each small, but adding to the others until she was besieged with a thousand pinpricks, ten thousand tiny burns.
Duvan would return. She had never seen him so angry, but she felt strongly that he would come back, that he would not leave her alone. Although even with his ability, what could he do against anything this intense? She did not know, but his companionship would be a comfort now.
Slanya had been trained to focus her mind, to use the power of her thoughts against material pain, and she tried to use it now, tried to concentrate to keep the unity of her body and mind. But in the wake of each filament, the onslaught of pain made it impossible to focus, and her mind grew disoriented.
The elixir would protect her. Gregor’s concoction would keep her alive through this. She had to trust him.
She did trust him. Didn’t she?
The last segment of her right pinkie finger spun away like a tiny fleshy mote. She watched it in silent fascination. This time there had been no pain when the churning magic had severed it from her hand. And as she looked down now, she wondered in amusement at the blood.
So unpredictable. So incomprehensible.
Screeching leather on steel filled the air, and Slanya was suddenly upside down, floating. How was it possible? It was as though the storm had picked her up and was examining her like a trapped insect before squashing her. Slanya found herself floating toward the campfire, which had grown to the size of the monastery funeral pyre. Blue mist and white fog burned gauzy sheets across her vision.
Was it her imagination or did she smell burning bodies? An intricate weave of palest blue gauze blanketed the camp, permeating all things. Slanya could not help but breathe it ininhale disease and exhale fire.
The rational, objective part of her mind knew that this was too much exposure. Pilgrims to the changelands tried for the briefest of touchesa kiss of spellplague, an oblique lash of blue fire.
But this… this was like bathing in it. Drawing it in, spellplague permeated her whole being, and she could not run. She could not escape or withdraw. She had to endure, merely endure the choking and the disintegration.
The campfire’s yellow and red flames belched black smoke as they beckoned to her. Give in, they said. Abandon reason.
Slanya listened. Why not? She had lost, so why not embrace the changelands? Twisting in the air as she floated, Slanya danced. Whirling and spinning and throwing herself in writhing, acrobatic circles, Slanya took in the pain and the chaos. It was the true power of nature, and she could not force it to make sense. She felt her mind unhinge, and she did not care.
If Kelemvor meant for this to be her time, then she would celebrate.
Slanya watched, detached, as she reached into the fire with her maimed hand and moved the flames. Her arm lit up and with amusement she waved it around in her dance. The entire camp was ablaze in glorious yellow and red, with constellations of tiny blue electric balls unraveling pale strands throughout Slanya’s personal sky.
Abruptly, her world went dark, and Slanya felt herself falling… falling.
Was death coming?
She wondered if she should be afraid. Most people were afraid of dying.
In fact, Duvan was the only person she’d ever met who did not fear dying. Where had he gotten to?
The truth was that at this moment, Slanya had no fear. for death, and that Kelemvor would have a place for her in the City of Judgment.
Blackness and silence filled her senses until she knew no more.