The Shadowmask Page 15

  “Let him go,” Joen said, stepping in front of me, her daggers drawn.

  “Let him go,” Asbeel repeated in a mocking high-pitched voice.

  With a snarl, Joen leaped at him, ignoring the heat of the fiery walls, ignoring that wicked sword, long and curved and jagged and ablaze with demonic red fire.

  In a blink, Asbeel’s sword was swinging, and Joen was falling away.

  My trance broken, I charged at Asbeel with my sword drawn.

  Red and blue flame crashed against each other again and again, each contact hissing and throwing off a burst of steam.

  Asbeel gave ground willingly, retreating directly toward one of the fire walls. The heat grew as we approached the sheet of flame, and though Asbeel seemed entirely unaffected, I had to halt my advance and fall back.

  “Come on then,” I snarled, settling into a defensive stance.

  “Yeah, bring it, eh?” Joen said, gathering herself up from the ground. I looked at her, stunned. Asbeel’s swing had struck her, I was sure of it. But there she was, standing up unhurt, with only a slight tear in her leather tunic.

  She saw my look and threw me a wink—all the answer I would get, as the demon was advancing again.

  Joen dropped into a low crouch and moved to her right. I moved to the left. Asbeel shadowed me, moving slowly and deliberately, never exposing more than his side to Joen. He reached out with his sword, a surprisingly tentative strike for such a typically cocky foe. I parried solidly, pushing his sword away.

  Again he lunged out lazily, and again I parried. He followed with a quick, shortened horizontal swipe that probably would not have reached me anyway. Still, I tapped the top of his sword with my own and drove the blade down.

  I realized my mistake as soon as steel hit steel. He let his blade drop, pulled it down even, and rushed forward. With no resistance, my parry had gone farther than I wanted, and I could not bring my blade to bear. Neither could he, but he had other weapons at his disposal—foremost among them, his own weight.

  I tried to step back, but the demon pushed against me, pressing me backward, driving me toward the second wall of fire.

  Joen came in hard on his flank, her left dagger up defensively, her right jabbing hard. The demon tried to dodge, but I used my position to my advantage, locking my leg against his, preventing him from taking a step.

  Joen’s dagger drove into the demon’s side. He howled in pain, shoved off me hard, throwing me backward. In a flash, his sword was back in his hand, and he was whipping around. His inhuman strength was on clear display, his sword pummeling through Joen’s defenses, sending her tumbling.

  My heart dropped, but only for a second. Somehow she came to her feet, apparently unhurt and still holding both daggers.

  Asbeel’s position had suddenly worsened dramatically. He no longer had a wall of fire to his back; instead he had the two of us on opposite sides, both unhurt.

  I moved in, cautiously executing a simple attack routine. Asbeel’s sword was there to block each attack, but as Joen moved in from the other side, he had to whip his sword around. Again his strength served him well, and he had the sword around in time, but only just. Joen ducked under his wild swing and fell back.

  Which left him defenseless from my side. I lunged in, aiming for a killing blow.

  But Asbeel jumped, beating his great black wings once. He was above us, floating over us.

  He lashed out with his foot, aiming for my head, but I ducked under the blow.

  Joen leaped at him, digging her dagger into his ankle. The demon howled in pain, and kicked out at her. She tumbled away. I couldn’t tell whether she had been hit, or had let go on her own. Either way, she landed gracefully, rolling to her feet, her daggers at the ready once more.

  The demon beat his wings again, floating over Joen’s head, and dropped to the ground.

  Joen and I met him in coordinated attack. Each time I attacked, Joen followed suit, her movements a perfect complement to my own. It felt as though I were leading her in a slow dance.

  I swept in from Asbeel’s right, swinging high; Joen came in from his left, crouched low, her daggers jabbing in unison.

  Asbeel ducked under my swing and brought his sword across to defeat Joen’s attack. But as I retracted, Asbeel continued his motion, sweeping his and Joen’s blades out to the side, bringing around the hilt of his sword.

  The hilt: that wicked mass of twisted metal, that same vicious weapon that had struck Perrault months before, that had caused the wound that had killed him.

  And it leaped for Joen.

  When Perrault was wounded, I had stood behind him, afraid or unable to fight. I would not let that happen again. I would not watch the demon kill another who fought with me, who fought for me.

  I screamed as I lunged, throwing my off-balance body not at Asbeel, but at his arm.

  My aim was true, my sword diving straight for the sinewy forearm. But the demon’s arm arm was not there—he had released the grip on his sword; his whole move had been a feint. His hand found my throat. Asbeel spread his wings and jumped, letting the gale lift us.

  Joen fell to her back, not hurt, but too far away to strike.

  Then a silvery glint caught my eye, speeding up toward us from her prone form. It was one of her daggers, cutting through the wind toward its target.

  I felt the impact as the dagger drove into Asbeel’s back. I heard his anguished scream. Then suddenly I was falling.

  Straight for one of the walls of fire.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Waves of heat radiated from the wall as I fell toward it. I grasped at Perrault’s cloak, trying in vain to wrap it around me, hoping it would protect me as it had always done. But I could not hold it in the gale.

  I closed my eyes. I smelled my hair singeing. I felt my flesh burning. Somewhere I heard Joen scream.

  Then the heat was gone. The pain was gone. The scream was gone.

  All I heard was the crash of the waves and the howl of the wind.

  I opened my eyes and lifted my head from the sand, to find someone standing over me.

  “Not satisfied with just a dragon, huh?” Robillard said sarcastically.

  “Took you long enough,” I heard Joen say, but her words ended in a groan. Asbeel held her aloft, his strong hand around her wrists. Her daggers lay on the ground, both bloody but both useless.

  “Release her,” Robillard said.

  Asbeel laughed. “Come get her.”

  Robillard said a quick chant and pointed a hand at Asbeel, all five fingers pointing at him. A bolt of red energy leaped from each, darting through the air to burn into Asbeel’s flesh.

  The demon grimaced briefly, then started laughing again. “The great wizard comes to the rescue, and that’s all he can manage?” he said. “What is it, wizard? Are you afraid to harm the girl, or are you just … spent?”

  Another five bolts leaped at the demon, but again he just laughed.

  Overhead, nine ravens circled, descending slowly. Sea Sprite drifted away from shore, her sails still furled, waiting for us.

  “I think I’ve worn out my welcome,” Asbeel said. “Pity, I was growing quite fond of the worthless rock. Ah, well, I suppose I’ll have to take something to remember it by.” He beat his wings, catching the wind—which was blowing directly out from the island— and lifted off, still holding Joen by the wrists. “Perhaps you’ll come visit me some time, boy?” he chided.

  Without thinking, I sprinted down the beach toward him. Loose sand sucked at my feet, yet my pace was ever so fast. I felt a stone beneath my foot, a solid point to push off from.

  And I leaped.

  An impossible leap, twenty feet into the air, thirty, my sword leading the whole way. Propelled by my magical boots, I caught the demon mid-flight, drove my sword into his flesh just above the hip, into and through. His scream rent the air. He twisted away from me, wrenching Perrault’s sword from my grasp.

  Down I fell. Joen fell after me, plummeting into the surf thirty feet b
elow.

  I plunged into the sea, then emerged choking.

  The waves grabbed me, threatening to pull me out to sea, but I paddled furiously and looked up.

  Off Asbeel flew, his wings beating awkwardly once, twice, and again. Lightning flashed, and the wings missed a beat. His black form hung in the air for just a moment, then dropped from the sky into the raging seas.

  With hardly a sound, my great tormenter disappeared beneath the waves. But it was not without a pang of sadness that I saw him go.

  After all, the sword still stuck in his side had served me well.

  But then, that sword had only ever had one true mission: to avenge Perrault, its true master. With that accomplished, I supposed, the sword deserved its rest.

  A wave washed me up on the shore, depositing me face-first into the sand.

  “Nice one, eh,” Joen said, spitting seawater and pulling herself up beside me. “Thanks a bunch.”

  “There’ll be time for that later,” Robillard said, jogging down the beach to meet us then right out into the surf. “We’ve got a ship to catch.” He held out a hand to each of us. As I took his hand, I shot up to the surface of the water, feeling it hold me as if it were firm ground.

  We reached Sea Sprite a few minutes later. The storm still raged, but the wind was pushing us away from the island, not trapping us there.

  That would be Elbeth’s doing, I knew, and I offered a quick thank you to the wind.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Sea Sprite cut through the storm-tossed waters with graceful ease, her tattered sails full of wind, her repaired mast straining but holding fast. For an hour she sailed, putting miles between us and the island, between us and the Circle, and the dragon, and Asbeel.

  Joen and I sat huddled in the crow’s nest together. It felt an odd sort of homecoming. That place had been so important the first time I’d met her. The gull’s nest, she’d called it. But today there were no gulls; the birds we watched for were ravens. And they did not show their faces. Or beaks, as it were.

  The sun had not reached halfway into the sky when we broke clear of the storm. Beyond the edge of the storm, the day was bright and clear.

  A broad smile stretched across Joen’s face. She could not stay seated. She gripped the mast in both hands, letting her weight fall left, then right, a graceful swinging motion. Her arms were bare to the shoulder, revealing several cuts and a few ugly bruises. I sighed deeply and stared at my hands.

  “Do you think they’ll follow us? Any of them?” she asked, for the fourth time.

  “Hope not,” I said, resting my head against the side of the crow’s nest.

  “Me too, eh? Wouldn’t be so good to get caught out here, eh?”

  “Not good, nope.”

  “Oi, what is it, then?” she said harshly.

  “What is what?”

  “This doom and gloom thing you’re doing. Didn’t you notice, we won?”

  “Yeah. Sorry.”

  “So why so down, eh?”

  I looked at her for a long time, studying her face, her forgiving eyes, the smile that had not faded from her features. “I lost my sword, and my cloak is broken,” I said.

  “Oi, how can you break a cloak?” she said with a laugh.

  “Look at it!”

  “Already seen it. I think it looks prettier now, anyway. Sorry ’bout the sword, though. Did its job, didn’t it, eh?”

  “It’s more than that. The cloak, the sword, they belonged to Perrault.”

  “I know,” she said as she leaned in. “Just because you lost the sword doesn’t mean you lost him. Remember that. He’d be proud of you, don’t you think?”

  “One of the Circle was someone I knew,” I blurted. “Someone I thought was dead.”

  Joen stopped her swinging and sat down, right beside me, her arm brushing against my own. “The one who whispered to me?”

  “Yeah, I think so.”

  “So she’s the one who helped us escape, then? Good thing she was there.” She laughed.

  “Yeah, definitely. But I just wish …” I looked back at my hands. “I don’t know.”

  “Yes you do. You wish she’d gotten off the island with us. That you would’ve had more time with her. Right?”

  I nodded.

  “But aren’t you glad to know she isn’t dead, at least?”

  Again I nodded. I hadn’t thought of it like that before.

  “And you got the stone, right? Wasn’t that the plan?”

  “It’s also the cause. The stone cost me Perrault, and it cost me his sword, and it’s the reason I can’t spend more time with Elbeth. It’s such a small thing, but it costs me so much.”

  “It hasn’t cost you me,” she said, resting her head on my shoulder.

  “Yet.”

  Her head shot back up. “Don’t talk like that, eh?” she said sharply.

  Below us, on the deck, the two crews worked together with remarkable efficiency. The captain stood at the helm, calling out his orders. The crew moved about, the slow waltz of a seasoned crew, not brothers in arms but brothers in the same goal, their grudges laid aside for a common aim, for a journey home. A fog was rising over the water, over the ship, but Deudermont didn’t change course.

  I closed my eyes, letting the rhythm of the ocean wash over me.

  “Feeling better?” Joen asked, her voice a whisper.

  I turned to her, to say yes. But she was so close, too close, not a foot between us. I could feel the heat of her breath, could smell the salt of her hair, could see her half-closed eyes.

  The fog crept up into the crow’s nest. A part of me wished to pull away, but a much greater part would not, could not.

  Her lips were on mine, and all other sensation was gone. All that mattered was the softness of her lips, the—

  “Wait,” she said, pushing me away.

  I blushed. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have—”

  “I know this fog,” she cut in, leaning out of the crow’s nest. “Listen.”

  I shook my head. “Listen? For what?” I perked up my ears, trying to focus past the rolling waves and the breeze.

  And there it was, unmistakable.

  Hoofbeats, familiar hoofbeats, echoed across the water.

  Find out how it all ends.

  Don’t miss the explosive conclusion to the Stone of Tymora Trilogy, coming September 2010.

  About the Authors

  R.A. Salvatore is the author of forty novels and more than a dozen New York Times best sellers, including The Pirate King which debuted at #3 on The New York Times best seller list.

  Geno Salvatore has collaborated on several R.A. Salvatore projects including Fast Forward Games’ R.A. Salvatore’s The DemonWars Campaign Setting and R.A. Salvatore’s The DemonWars Player’s Guide. He co-authored R.A. Salvatore’s DemonWars Prologue, a DemonWars short story that appeared in the comic book published by Devil’s Due Publishing. He is a recent graduate of Boston University and lives in Massachusetts.

  Fly through the air with the greatest of ease— on a silver dragon!

  Jace, a high-wire acrobat in a traveling circus, thought he knew the thrill of adventure. But when he meets Belen, a strange girl with no memory of her past, he soon discovers how much more adventure—and danger—awaits him. Not long after Belen joins the circus, a wizard arrives and stops the show—not by magic, but by accusation. Belen is not human, he says: she is a dragon who destroyed a nearby town. As Jace and Belen set off in a race against time to clear Belen’s name and recover her memory, mysterious forces conspire to throw them off track. Can Jace learn to fly through the air with the greatest of ease on the back of a dragon before time runs out? Find out in:

  The Shadowmask

  ©2009 Wizards of the Coast LLC

  All characters in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

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  Map by Robert Lazzaretti

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Salvatore, R. A., 1959-

  The shadowmask / R.A. & Geno Salvatore.

  p. cm. — (Stone of Tymora; bk. 2)

  “Mirrorstone.”

  Summary: Armed with his late mentor’s cloak and magical sword, Maimon sets out on a dangerous and adventurous journey determined to find the stolen stone of Tymora and avenge the death of his mentor while eluding the evil demon Asbeel, who is also searching for the precious stone.

  eISBN: 978-0-7869-5595-4

  [1. Orphans—Fiction. 2. Adventure and adventurers—Fiction. 3. Fantasy.]

  I. Salvatore, Geno. II. Title.

  PZ7.S15535Sh 2009

  [Fic]—dc22

  2009023094

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  R. A. Salvatore, The Shadowmask

  (Series: Stone of Tymora # 2)