The Companions s-1 Read online

  The Companions

  ( Sundering - 1 )

  R. A. Salvatore

  R. A. Salvatore

  The Companions

  When the trials begin,

  in soul-torn solitude despairing,

  the hunter waits alone.

  The companions emerge

  from fast-bound ties of fate

  uniting against a common foe.

  When the shadows descend,

  in Hell-sworn covenant unswerving

  the blighted brothers hunt,

  and the godborn appears,

  in rose-blessed abbey reared,

  arising to loose the godly spark.

  When the harvest time comes,

  in hate-fueled mission grim unbending,

  the shadowed reapers search.

  The adversary vies

  with fiend-wrought enemies,

  opposing the twisting schemes of Hell.

  When the tempest is born,

  as storm-tossed waters rise uncaring,

  the promised hope still shines.

  And the reaver beholds

  the dawn-born chosen’s gaze,

  transforming the darkness into light.

  When the battle is lost,

  through quake-tossed battlefields unwitting

  the seasoned legions march,

  but the sentinel flees

  with once-proud royalty,

  protecting devotion’s fragile heart.

  When the ending draws near,

  with ice-locked stars unmoving,

  the threefold threats await,

  and the herald proclaims,

  in war-wrecked misery,

  announcing the dying of an age.

  — As written by Elliandreth of Orishaar, c. -17,600 DR

  PROLOGUE

  The Year of the Awakened Sleepers (1484 DR) Kelvin’s Cairn

  The stars reached down to him, like so many times before in this enchanted place.

  He was on Bruenor’s Climb, though he didn’t know how he had arrived there. Guenhwyvar was beside him, leaning against him, supporting his shattered leg, but he didn’t remember calling to her.

  Of all the places Drizzt had ever traveled, none had felt more comforting than here. Perhaps it. He noted I someone had been the company he had so often found up here, but even without Bruenor beside him, this place, this lone peak rising above the flat, dark tundra, had ever brought a spiritual sustenance to Drizzt Do’Urden. Up here, he felt small and mortal, but at the same time, confident that he was part of something much larger, of something eternal.

  On Bruenor’s Climb, the stars reached down to him, or he lifted up among them, floating free of his physical restraints, his spirit rising and soaring among the celestial spheres. He could hear the sound of the great clockwork up here, could feel the celestial winds in his face and could melt into the ether.

  It was a place of the deepest meditation for Drizzt, a place where he understood the great cycle of life and death.

  A place that seemed fitting now, as the blood continued to flow from the wound in his forehead.

  The Year of the First Circle (1468 DR) Netheril

  A dusty sunset filled the western sky with stripes of pink and orange hanging above the endless plain, a reminder that this region was once, not long ago, the vast magical desert known as Anauroch. The advent of Shadow, then the trauma of the great Spellplague, had transformed this region of Toril somewhat, but the stubborn nature of Anauroch’s enchantment of barrenness had not allowed all that had been to be so easily washed away. There was more rain here now, perhaps, and more vegetation, and the drifting white sands had settled to a dirtier hue of earthen brown, as renewed flora grasped and held.

  The dusty sunset, however common, served as a warning to the newcomers to the region, particularly the Netherese of Shade Enclave, that what once was might some day be again. To the nomadic Bedine, such sights rekindled their ancestral tales, a reminder of the life their predecessors had known before the transformation of their ancient homeland.

  The two Shadovar agents making their way west across the plain hardly gave the sunset a thought, though, and certainly didn’t dwell on any deeper implications as to the sky’s coloring, for their months of intensive investigation seemed at last to be coming to fruition, and so their eyes were firmly rooted on the road ahead.

  “Why would anyone live out here?” asked Untaris, the larger of the pair, the brawn to Alpirs’s brain, so it was said. “Grass and wind, sandstorms, phaerimm and asabi, and other such monsters.” The muscular shade warrior shook his head and spat down from his pinto horse to the ground.

  Alpirs De’Noutess laughed at the remark, but wasn’t about to disagree. “The Bedine are ever blinded by their pride in their traditions.”

  “They do not understand that the world has changed,” Untaris said.

  “Oh, but they do, my friend,” Alpirs replied. “What they do not understand is that there is nothing they can do about it. To serve Netheril is their only course, but some, like the Desai who camp before us, think that if they just remain far enough out from the civilized cities of Netheril, among the lions and the phaerimm, we will not bother too greatly with them.” He gave a little laugh at his own words. “Usually, they are right.”

  “But no more,” Untaris declared.

  “Not for the Desai,” Alpirs agreed. “Not if what we have come to believe about the child is true.”

  As he finished, Alpirs nodded and not to Icewind Dale.r5N3 to the south, where a lone tent shuddered against the unrelenting wind. He kicked his chestnut mare into a trot and made a straight line for it, Untaris close behind. A solitary figure clad in an ankle-length robe of white cotton emerged from the tent at the sound of their approach. The collar of the Bedine man’s garment was round in design and set with a large button and tassel, signifying the Desai tribe, and like most of the Bedine in this region, the man wore a sleeveless coat, called an aba, striped in brown and red.

  “Long have I waited,” the man said as the two riders approached, his leathery, windblown and sun-drenched face peeking out at them from inside the frame of his white kufiya head scarf. “Pay well, you will!”

  “Sounds angry, as usual, the Bedine dog,” Untaris whispered, but Alpirs had a remedy already in hand.

  “Well enough?” Alpirs asked the Bedine informant and he reached out with his hand, holding a crown of camel hair and woven gold, an igal fit for a chieftain. Despite the legendary bargaining prowess of the Bedine, the older man’s eyes betrayed him, sparkling at the sight.

  Alpirs dismounted, Untaris close behind, and walked his horse over to the robed figure.

  “Well met, Jhinjab,” he said with a bow, presenting the precious igal-which he pulled back immediately as the Bedine reached for it.

  “You approve of the payment, I take it?” Alpirs said with a wry grin.

  In response, Jhinjab reached up and touched his own igal, which secured the kufiya upon his head. It was a weathered, black affair, once woven with precious metals, but now little more than fraying camel hair. To the Bedine, the igal spoke of stature, of pride.

  “De girl is in de camp,” he said in his heavy Bedine accent. Every word was spoken crisply, distinctly, and efficiently-to keep the blowing sand out of their mouths, Alpirs had once explained to Untaris. “De camp is over de ridge in de east,” Jhinjab explained. “My work be done.” He reached for the igal once more, but Alpirs kept it just out of his grasp.

  “And how old is this girl?”

  “She is de little thing,” Jhinjab replied, holding his hand out just below waist level.

  “How old?”

  The Bedine stared at him hard. “Four? Five?”

  “Think, my friend, it is import
ant,” said Alpirs.

  Jhinjab closed his eyes, his lips moving, and a few words, a reference to an event or a hot summer, occasionally slipped forth. “Five, den,” he said. “Just five, in de spring.”

  Alpirs couldn’t contain his grin, and he looked to the similarly smiling Untaris.

  “Sixty-three,” Untaris said, counting back the years.

  The two Shadovar nodded and exchanged smiles.

  “My igal,” Jhinjab said, reaching for the item. But again, Alpirs pulled it back from him.

  “You are certain of this?”

  “Five, yes, five,” the Bedine informant replied.

  “No,” Alpirs clarified. “Of all of it. You are certain that this child is … special?”

  “She is de one,” the Bedine replied. “She singing, all de time singing. Singing and not to Icewind Dale.r5N3 words dat make no words, you know?”

  “Sounds like any other child,” Untaris said skeptically. “Making up words and singing nonsensically.”

  “No, no, no, not like dat,” Jhinjab replied, frantically waving his skinny arms around from out of his triangular sleeves. “Singing de spells.”

  “A wizard, you claim,” said Alpirs.

  “She make de garden grow.”

  “Her garden. Her shrine?”

  Jhinjab nodded enthusiastically.

  “So you have told us,” said Untaris, “and yet, we have not seen this shrine.”

  The old Bedine informant squinted and looked around, shading his eyes and obviously trying to get his bearings. He pointed to the southeast, to a high sand dune with a white alabaster pillar showing among the blowing sand. “Beyond dat dune, to de south, hidden among de rocks where de wind has blown de sand away.”

  “How far to the south?” Alpirs asked, holding up his hand to prevent Untaris from speaking.

  Jhinjab shrugged. “Long walk, short ride.”

  “Across the open, hot sands?” Alpirs asked, not hiding his own skepticism now.

  Jhinjab nodded.

  “You said the camp was to the west,” Untaris said before Alpirs could stop him.

  Again, the Bedine informant offered a nod.

  “A new camp, then,” said Alpirs.

  “No,” said Jhinjab. “Been dere since de spring.”

  “But the girl’s shrine is the other way, a long walk.”

  “We are to believe that a child crosses the desert alone? A long walk, you said, and across dangerous ground,” Untaris reasoned.

  Jhinjab shrugged, letting his answers stand.

  Alpirs hooked the igal over a loop on his belt, and held up his hand when Jhinjab started to protest.

  “We will go and see this shrine,” he explained. “And then we will return to you.”

  “It is hidden,” Jhinjab protested.

  “Of course it is.” Untaris snorted, and he climbed up on his pinto. “Could it be any other way?”

  “No, unacceptable!” Jhinjab protested. “I have done as you asked, and will be paid. De girl is in de camp!”

  “You will remain here, and perhaps you will be paid,” Alpirs replied.

  “Oh, there will be some reward, indeed,” Untaris added ominously.

  Jhinjab swallowed hard.

  “If you are confident in your information, you will remain here.”

  “You will pay!” the Bedine insisted.

  “Or?” asked Alpirs.

  “Or he will go and tell the Desai,” Untaris added, and when both Shadovar turned to regard the old Bedine threateningly, the blood drained from Jhinjab’s face.

  “No,” he started to protest, but the word was cut short as a long dagger appeared in Alpirs’s hand, its tip coming to rest against the poor Bedine’, and she couldIesnos throat in the blink of an eye.

  “Ride with my friend,” Alpirs instructed, and Untaris reached a hand down to Jhinjab.

  “I cannot go …,” the Bedine stammered. “I am … de Desai do not know I am out … dey will miss Jhinjab. Dey will look for …”

  Alpirs retracted the knife and kicked the old Bedine hard in the groin. He bent low as Jhinjab doubled over, and whispered into the man’s ear, “The Desai can do nothing to you that I won’t do if you don’t get up on that horse right now.”

  Without even waiting for an answer, Alpirs moved to his own horse and mounted, and indeed, Jhinjab took Untaris’s hand and settled in as the two mounts charged off toward the high dune in the southeast.

  Five-year-old Ruqiah scrambled around the side of the tent and crouched low against the fabric, trying to control her breathing.

  “Over here!” she heard Tahnood call out, but fortunately, her tormentor was moving in the wrong direction, between a different pair of tents.

  Ruqiah dropped to her belly and crept forward, smiling as the gaggle of older children followed Tahnood further astray. She had avoided them, for now, but it was only a temporary reprieve, she knew from long experience, for Tahnood was a relentless adversary and took great pleasure in showing his dominance.

  The girl sat back and considered her next move. The sun sank low into the western sky, but the tribe had found a new wellspring and the celebration would continue long after dark, she knew. The children would not be told to go to sleep, and the mud fight would continue, encouraged by the adults.

  The mud pit caused by the wellspring symbolized that there was enough water to waste, after all, and for the desert-dwelling, nomadic Bedine, that was surely cause for celebration.

  Ruqiah just wished that the joyous games didn’t hurt so much.

  “Sitting alone, always alone,” came a voice, her father’s voice, and he grabbed her by the ear and ushered her to her feet.

  Ruqiah turned to regard the brilliant smile of Niraj, a smile full of life and mirth and love. He was short by Bedine standards, but stout and strong and quite respected. He rarely wore his kufiya, letting his bald brown head shine gloriously in the desert sun.

  “Where are the other children?” he asked his precious daughter.

  “Looking for me,” Ruqiah admitted. “To make me darker.”

  “Ah,” Niraj replied. Ruqiah was lighter-skinned than most Bedine, lighter even than her mother, Kavita. Ruqiah’s thick wavy hair, too, was a lighter hue, with many red highlights showing among her light brown locks, instead of the normal Bedine darker brown or even raven black.

  “They tease me because I am different,” she said.

  Niraj winked at her and rubbed his hand over his bald pate. “Not so different,” he explained.

  Ruqiah smiled. Her father had told her that her lighter hair had been inherited from his side of the family, although she hopefully wouldn’t lose hers as he had shed his own. The young girl didn’t completely believe the tale, for others had told her that Niraj’s hair had been as black as a starless night in the tunnels around Mithral Hall, then halfling, but that only made her appreciate her father’s gesture all the more.

  “They will hit me with their mud balls and throw me in the pit,” she said.

  “The mud is cool and soft to the touch,” Niraj replied.

  Ruqiah put her head down. “They shame me.”

  She felt her father’s hand under her chin, lifting her face up to look into his dark eyes, eyes very unlike her own deep blue orbs. “You are never shamed, my Ruqiah,” he said. “You will be like your mother, the most beautiful woman of the Desai. Tahnood is older than you. He already sees this truth of Ruqiah, and it stirs him in ways he does not understand. He does not seek to shame you, but to keep your attention, fully, until you are old enough to marry.”

  “Marry?” Ruqiah replied, and she almost burst out laughing, before realizing that such a reaction wouldn’t be seen as appropriate from a child her age. As she suppressed her reaction, she realized that among the tribal Bedine, Niraj was probably correct. Her parents were not among the leaders of the tribe, but they were well-respected, after all, and had a well-appointed tent and enough animals to provide a proper dowry, even to Tahnood, whose family was in h
igh standing among the Desai, and who was regarded as a potential chieftain. He was barely ten years old, but he commanded the children, even those about to be formally deemed adults, two years his senior.

  Tahnood Dubujeb was the ringleader of the Desai’s child gang, Ruqiah thought, but did not say. He used victims like her to strengthen his standing-and no doubt with the great encouragement of his proud father and overbearing mother.

  It crossed Ruqiah’s mind to pay the Dubujeb tent a visit when the tribe had at last settled in for the night. Perhaps she would bring some stinging scorpions along …

  She couldn’t contain a little chuckle at that, conjuring images of Tahnood running naked and screaming from his tent, a scorpion stinger firmly embedded in his buttocks.

  “That’s better, my little Zibrija,” Niraj said, patting her head and using his pet name for her, which was also the name of a particularly beautiful flower found among the windblown rocks in the shadows of the dunes. He had misconstrued her sudden gaiety, obviously, and Ruqiah wondered-and not for the first time-how Niraj and Kavita might react if they ever discovered what was really going on behind her five-year-old eyes.

  “This way!” It was Tahnood’s voice, closing in, and it seemed as if he had figured out Ruqiah’s ruse at last.

  “Run! Run!” Niraj said to her playfully, pushing her away. “And if they get you muddy, smile all the while and know that there is plenty of water to wash you clean!”

  Ruqiah sighed, but did indeed start away, and she realized that she had run off not a moment too soon when she heard her father laughing as Tahnood and the others came rambling by. She thought of a dozen ways she might avoid them, and perhaps even make them all look foolish in the process, but her father’s laughter made her put those dark thoughts out of her mind.

  She would let them catch her, and pelt her, and throw her in the mud.

  For the traditions of the Bedine, the playful bonding the Desai tribe demanded of its children.

  For Niraj.

  Untaris couldn’t contain his gap-toothed smile as he kneeled before the small break in the windblown rocks, a narrow channel leading to a wider area that was protected from the wind and sand by the rock walls. They had passed by this spot several times already without even noticing the break, so completely did the rock shading camouflage the narrow entrance.