Promise of the Witch-King Read online

  He managed to watch the continued descent of the ball, thumping down along the edges, but was quickly distracted by a more ominous creaking from above.

  Entreri scrambled, hands working to free up and drop the rope below him. He started his slide with all speed, hand-running down the rope. He felt a sudden jerk, then another as the decorated crystal chandelier pulled free of the ceiling.

  Then he was falling.

  The door stood slightly ajar. Given the trap he’d set off, there was no reason for the “innkeeper” to believe any of the intruders would be able to get up to it. Still, the drow drew out a wand and expended a bit of its magic. The door and the jamb glowed a solid and unbroken light blue, revealing no traps, magical or mechanical.

  Jarlaxle moved up and gingerly pushed through.

  The room, the top floor of the tower, was mostly bare. The gray stone walls were unadorned, sweeping in a semi-circle behind a singular large, wide-backed chair of polished wood. Before that seat lay a book, opened atop a pedestal.

  No, not a pedestal, Jarlaxle realized as he crept in closer. The book was suspended on a pair of thick tendrils that reached down to the floor of the room and right into the stone.

  The drow grinned, knowing that he had found the heart of the construction, the magical architect of the tower itself. He moved in and around the book, giving it a wide berth, then came up on it beside the chair. He glanced at the writing from afar and recognized a few magical runes there. A quick recital of a simple spell brought those runes into better focus and clarity.

  He moved closer, drawn in by the power of the tome. He noted then that there were images of runes in the air above it, spinning and dipping to the pages below. He scanned a few lines then dared to flip back to the beginning.

  “A book of creation,” he mumbled, recognizing some of the early passages as common phrases for such dweomers.

  He clasped the book and tried to pull it free, but it would not budge.

  So he went back to reading, skimming really, looking for some hint, for some clue as to the secrets of the tower and its undead proprietor.

  “You will find not my name in there,” came a high-pitched voice that seemed on the verge of keening, a voice held tenuously, like a high note, ready to crack apart into a shivering screech.

  Jarlaxle silently cursed himself for getting so drawn in to the book. He regarded the lich, who stood at the open door.

  “Your name?” he asked, suppressing his honest desire to scream out in terror. “Why would I desire to know your name, O rotting one?”

  “Rot implies death,” said the lich. “Nothing could be farther from the truth.”

  Jarlaxle slowly moved back behind the chair, wanting to put as much distance and as many obstacles between himself and that awful creature as possible.

  “You are not Zhengyi,” the drow remarked, “yet the book was his.”

  “One of his, of course.”

  Jarlaxle offered a tip of his hat.

  “You think of Zhengyi as a creature,” the lich explained through its ever-grinning, lipless teeth, “as a singular entity. That is your error.”

  “I know nothing of Zhengyi.”

  “That much is obvious, or never would you have been foolish enough to come in here!” The lich ended with a sudden upswing in volume and intensity, and it pointed its bony fingers.

  Greenish bolts of energy erupted from those digits, one from each, flying through the air, weaving and spinning around the book, the tentacle pedestal, and the chair to explode into the drow.

  That was the intent, at least, but each magical bolt, as it approached, swirled to a specific spot on the drow’s cloak, just below his throat and to the side, over his collarbone, where a large brooch clasped his cloak. That brooch swallowed the missiles, all ten, without a sound, without a trace.

  “Well played,” the lich congratulated. “How many can you contain?”

  As the undead creature finished speaking, it sent forth another volley.

  Jarlaxle was moving then, spinning away from the chair, straight back. The magic missiles swarmed at his back like so many bees, but again, as they neared him, they veered and swooped around him to be swallowed by the brooch.

  The drow cut to the side, and as he turned halfway toward his enemy, his arm pumped feverishly. With each retraction, his magical bracer fed another dagger into his hand, which he promptly sent spinning through the air at the lich. So furious was his stream that the fourth dagger was in the air before the first ever struck home.

  Or tried to strike home, for the lich was not unprotected. Its defensive wards stopped the daggers just short of the mark and let them fall to the ground with a clang.

  The lich cackled, and the drow enveloped it in a globe of complete and utter darkness.

  A ray of green energy burst from the globe and Jarlaxle was glad indeed that he had moved fast. He watched the ray burrow through the tower wall, disintegrating the stone as it went.

  Entreri tucked his feet in tight and angled them to the side so that when he hit, he spun over sidelong. He drew his head in tight and tucked his shoulder, allowing himself to roll over again and again, absorbing the energy of the fifteen foot drop.

  He continued to roll, putting as much distance as possible between himself and the point of the chandelier’s impact, where glass and crystal shattered and flew everywhere.

  When he finally came up to his feet, Entreri stumbled and winced. One ankle threw sharp pains up his leg. He had avoided serious injury but had not escaped unscathed.

  Nor had he actually “escaped,” he realized a moment later.

  He was in the foyer of the tower, a wide, circular room. To the side, high above, the stone ball continued its rumbling roll. Before him, beyond the shattered chandelier and just past the bottom of those perimeter stairs, sat the sealed doorway through which he and Jarlaxle had entered the magical construction. To one side stood the great iron statue the pair had noted when first they had entered, a construct Jarlaxle had quickly identified as a golem.

  They had to take care, Jarlaxle had told Entreri, not to set off any triggers that would animate the dangerous iron sentry.

  Entreri learned now that they had apparently done just that.

  Metal creaked and groaned as the golem came to life, red fires appearing in its hollow eyes. It took a great stride forward, crunching crystal and flattening the twisted metal of the fallen chandelier. It carried no weapon, but Entreri realized that it needed none, for it stood more than twice his height and weighed in at several thousand pounds.

  “How do I hurt that?” the assassin whispered and drew forth his blades.

  The golem strode closer and breathed forth a cloud of noxious, poisonous fumes.

  Far too nimble to be caught by that, Entreri whirled aside. He saw an opening on the lumbering creature and knew that he could get in fast and strike hard.

  But he ran instead, making all speed for the sealed doorway.

  The golem’s iron legs groaned in protest as it turned to pursue.

  Entreri hit the door with his shoulder, though he knew it wouldn’t open. He exaggerated the impact, though, and moved as if in terrified fury to break through.

  On came the golem, focusing solely on him. He waited until the last second and darted along the wall to the left as the golem smashed in hard against the unyielding door. The sentry turned and pursued, iron arms reaching out for the assassin.

  Entreri held his ground—for a few moments, at least—and he launched a barrage of swings and stabs that had the golem confused and standing in place for just …

  … long enough.

  The assassin bolted out to his left, out toward the center of the room.

  The rolling metal sphere thundered down the last expanse of stairs and crashed hard against the back of the unwitting iron golem, driving the construct forward and to the floor, then bouncing across it, denting and twisting the iron. The ball continued rolling on its way, but most of its momentum had been played out
on the unfortunate construct.

  In the middle of the room, Entreri watched the twitching golem. It tried to rise, but its legs were crushed to uselessness, and it could do no more than lift its upper torso on one arm.

  Entreri started to put his weapons away but paused at a sound from above.

  He looked up to see many of the ceiling decorations, gargoyle-like statues, flexing their wings.

  He sighed.

  His darkness globe blinked out and Jarlaxle found himself once again facing the awful undead creature. He looked from the lich to the book and back again.

  “You were alive just a few short tendays ago,” the dark elf reasoned.

  “I am still alive.”

  “Your existence might stretch the meaning of the word.”

  “You will soon enough know what it does and does not mean,” the lich promised and it raised its bony hands to begin casting another spell.

  “Do you miss the feel of the wind upon your living skin?” the drow asked, trying hard to sound truly curious and not condescending. “Will you miss the touch of a woman or the smell of springtime flowers?”

  The lich paused.

  “Is undeath worth it?” Jarlaxle went on. “And if it is, can you show me the path?”

  Few expressions could show on the mostly skeletal face of the lich, of course, but Jarlaxle knew incredulity when he saw it. He kept his eyes locked with the creature’s but angled his feet quietly to get him in line for a charge at the book.

  “You speak of minor inconveniences against the power I have found,” the lich roared at him.

  Even as the creature howled, the drow sprang forward, a dagger appearing in one of his hands. He half-turned a page, laughed at the lich, and tore it out, confident that he had found the secret.

  A new tear appeared in the lich’s ragged cloak.

  Jarlaxle’s eyes widened and he began to work furiously, tearing page after page, driving his knife into the other half of the tome.

  The lich howled and trembled. Pieces of its robe fell away and chips appeared in its bones.

  But it wasn’t enough, the drow realized, and he knew his error when the torn pages revealed something hidden within the book: a tiny, glowing violet gem in the shape of a skull. That was the secret, he realized, the tie between the lich and the tower. That skull was the key to the whole construction, to the unnatural remnant of Zhengyi, the Witch-King.

  The drow reached for it, but his hand blistered and was thrown aside. The drow stabbed at it, but the dagger splintered and flew away.

  The lich laughed at him. “We are one! You cannot defeat the tower of Zhengyi nor the caretaker he has appointed.”

  Jarlaxle shrugged and said, “You could be right.”

  Then he dropped another globe of darkness over the again-casting lich. The drow slipped on a ring that stored spells as he went. Considering the unearthliness of his foe, he thought to himself, hot or cold? then quickly chose.

  He chose correctly. The spell he loosed from the ring covered his body in a shield of warm flames just as the lich blasted forth a conical spray of magical cold so intense that it would have frozen him solid in mid-stride.

  Jarlaxle had won the moment, but only the moment, he knew, and in the three choices that loomed before him—counter with offensive magic, leap forth and physically strike, or flee—only one made any practical sense.

  He pulled the great feather from his cap and dropped it with a command word that summoned from it a gigantic, flightless bird, an eight-foot avian creature with a thick neck and a deadly and powerful hooked beak. With a thought, the drow sent his summoned diatryma into battle, and he followed its course but broke off its wake as it barreled into the darkness globe.

  Jarlaxle prayed that he had angled himself correctly and prayed again that the lich hadn’t shut the door. He breathed a lot easier when he came out of the darkness to find himself in the corridor once more, running free.

  And running fast.

  Oily liquid, the blood of gargoyles, dripped out from the channel along the red blade of Charon’s Claw. One winged creature flopped about on the floor, mortally wounded but refusing to stop its futile thrashing. Another dived for Entreri’s head as he sprinted across the floor. He ducked low, then lower, then threw himself forward in a roll, fast approaching another of the creatures as it set down on the floor before him.

  He came up at full speed, launching himself forward, sword leading.

  The gargoyle’s stonelike hand swept across, parrying the thrust, and Entreri lowered his shoulder and barreled in hard. The powerful creature hardly moved, and Entreri grunted when he took the brunt of the damage from the collision himself. The assassin’s dagger flashed hard into the gargoyle’s gut. Entreri growled and leaped back, tearing his hand up as he did and opening a long gash. He started to strike with Charon’s Claw again but at the last moment leaped off to the side.

  A swooping gargoyle went right past him, slamming headlong into its wounded companion.

  Entreri slashed back behind the flying creature, drawing Charon’s Claw hard across the passing gargoyle’s back. The creature shrieked, and its gutted companion grunted and stumbled backward. Entreri couldn’t pursue the tangled creatures, however, for another gargoyle came down fast at him, forcing him back.

  He threw himself into a sidelong roll, going right under a table and hard into the base of a long rectangular box standing upright against the wall. He came up with the table above him, lifting it and hoisting it away.

  The box creaked open behind him.

  The assassin shook his head and glanced back to see a fleshy humanoid creature peering out at him from inside the box. It was larger than he, larger than any man ought to be.

  Another golem, he knew, but one of stitched flesh rather than sculpted iron.

  The creature reached out and the assassin scrambled away, turning back just long enough to slash Charon’s Claw against one of the golem’s forearms.

  The golem stepped out in pursuit, and behind it, Entreri saw the back of the box, the false bottom, swing wide to reveal a second flesh golem.

  “Lovely,” the assassin said, diving yet again to avoid another swooping gargoyle.

  He glanced up and saw more gargoyles forming, growing across the high ceiling. The tower was coming to life and hatching an army to defend itself.

  Entreri sprinted across the foyer but pulled up short as he saw another form coming down at him. He skipped back a few steps and readied his sword, then he recognized the newest opponent.

  Jarlaxle tipped his hat, all but stopping his rapid descent, and he gently touched down to the floor.

  Entreri spun around and drove his sword again across the outstretched arms of the pursuing flesh golem.

  “Glad you found your way here at last,” the assassin grumbled.

  “But I fear I did not come alone,” Jarlaxle warned, his words turning the assassin back around.

  The dark elf’s gaze led Entreri’s up to the high balcony where the lich ran toward the descending stairs.

  The lich stopped at the top of the steps and began waggling its bony fingers in the air.

  “Stop the beast!” Entreri cried.

  He launched a more forceful routine against the golem, slashing Charon’s Claw across and using its magic to bring forth a cloud of black ash. With that optical barrier hanging in the air, Entreri rushed by the first golem and stabbed the second one hard.

  “We must be leaving,” Jarlaxle called to him, as Entreri dived again to avoid a swooping gargoyle.

  “The door is sealed!” Entreri shouted back.

  “Come, and be quick!” replied the dark elf.

  Entreri turned as he went and watched a series of green bolts soar out from the lich’s fingers, weaving and darting down. Five struck Jarlaxle—or would have except that they were gathered up by the magic of his brooch—while the other five soared unerringly for Entreri.

  The assassin tossed Charon’s Claw into the air and held forth his gauntlete
d hand, absorbing the missiles one after another. He caught his sword and looked back to see Jarlaxle’s slender fingers beckoning to him. Up above, the lich charged down the stairs.

  Entreri ducked at the last moment, barely avoiding a heavy swipe by one of the golems that would have likely torn his head from his shoulders. He growled and ran at the drow, sheathing his sword as he went.

  Jarlaxle grinned, tipped his hat, bent his knees, and leaped straight up.

  Entreri leaped, too, catching Jarlaxle by the belt as the drow’s levitation sped him upward, dragging Entreri along.

  Below, the golems reached and swung futilely at the empty air. From the side came the attack of a gargoyle, the creature clawing hard at Entreri’s legs. The assassin deftly retracted, just ahead of the claws, and kicked the gargoyle hard in the face.

  He did little damage, however, and the gargoyle came back fast and hard—or started to, but then turned upright, wings beating furiously as Entreri reached out with his gauntlet and sent forth the missiles the lich had just thrown his way. The magic darts crackled into the gargoyle’s black skin, making the creature jerk this way and that.

  It started right back at the levitating pair, however, and from above came the shrieks of more gargoyles, already “grown” and ready to swoop down from on high.

  But the companions had reached the railing by then, and Jarlaxle grabbed on and pulled himself over, Entreri coming fast behind.

  “Run back up!” the drow cried. “There is a way!”

  Entreri stared at him for a moment, but with gargoyles coming from above and beyond the railing and the lich reversing and running back up the stairs at them, Jarlaxle’s order seemed fairly self-evident.

  They sprinted back up the sloping corridor, gargoyles flapping at their heels, forcing Entreri to stop with practically every step and fend the creatures off.