Pool of Radiance Read online

  Kestrel felt her face grow warm. She'd not only been drunk but also obvious about it. No doubt the wizard had taken advantage of her compromised state to coerce her into this volunteer duty. She thought of the conversation she'd overhead as she arrived in the cavern earlier. "Elminster seems to tell you a lot of things."

  "I am one of his apprentices. When he left this morn to investigate tidings from Shadowdale, he asked me to keep an eye on events here in Phi—"

  A crackle of energy suddenly rent the air. Not ten paces away, a floating, glowing ball of white light appeared. It expanded, forming a window in its center as sounds of ringing steel and battle cries filled the air.

  "A gate!" Ghleanna exclaimed.

  Corran and Durwyn rushed over. "To where?" Corran asked.

  The window elongated to the size of a door, allowing brief glimpses of the combatants. A besieged fighter stumbled into view, overwhelmed by an unseen opponent. "By all that's holy, help us!" he cried.

  "That's Athan—one of the adventurers Elminster sent to Myth Drannor." Ghleanna cried. "They must be in trouble!"

  The border of the gate flashed and hissed, like a flame being extinguished. The window winked. When their view returned, Athan could no longer be seen. The sounds of battle continued, mixed with cries of the dying. Just out­side visual range, a terrible moaning commenced.

  "We must aid them!" Corran started toward the gate.

  "Are you out of your mind?" Kestrel asked. No way was she stepping into some sort of magical portal. If the sor­cery didn't swallow them up forever, they'd only be spit out into the middle of whatever was happening on the other end.

  "We're not supposed to leave our post." Durwyn said.

  "This is more important," Ghleanna answered. "If Athan's band fails, all Faerûn could be lost! Make up your own minds, but I am going." She stepped into the gate. It flashed violet light, obscuring both the mage and the Myth Drannor scene from view.

  "She's crazy," Kestrel declared.

  "No—she's honorable and committed to a greater good," Corran retorted. "Something a rogue wouldn't know any­thing about."

  She glared at Corran. "So follow her, then!"

  The gate hissed and sputtered, its light turning pale blue, then a sickly green. The window began to shrink.

  "I will—and so will you!" So quickly she couldn't react, Corran grabbed her by the arm and dragged her into the gate.

  She shouted her objection, but the sound was swal­lowed up by a vacuum. She found herself surrounded by black nothingness, the extradimensional space seeming to stretch to eternity. Corran still held her arm in an iron grip. Involuntarily, she grabbed his elbow just to have something solid to hold onto. They floated, propelled only by the momentum with which they'd entered. Far in the distance, she could see the battle scene in Myth Drannor taking place through a window.

  A window that was closing.

  They were going to be trapped in here! A frightful rum­bling surrounded them as the window ahead wavered. Suddenly, the space didn't seem so vast anymore. In fact, it felt close. Her chest tightened as she gasped for air. The rumbling repeated, accented by flashing golden light from either end of the portal.

  Corran turned toward her, mouthing words she could not hear. She didn't need to hear them—they were the same words running through her own mind.

  The gate was collapsing.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Helpless, Kestrel and Corran bobbed along, unable to speed their progress toward the shrinking exit. They were near enough now that they could see the broken cobblestones of the street where Athan's band fought, but at this rate they'd never reach it before the window closed.

  Kestrel's mind raced. They needed some­thing, some fixed object, off which to push.

  Or pull.

  It was a long shot, but it just might work. She shrugged out of her backpack and brought it around so that she could dig through it with her free hand. In the wan light coming from the exit, she groped through the contents until her fingers brushed against a metal claw.

  Corran saw her withdraw the grappling hook and nod­ded in understanding. He maneuvered her ahead of him to give her a clear shot at the window, then shifted his grip to her waist to free both her arms.

  She'd never made such a long throw before, but they were running out of time. She cast the hook. Unencum­bered by air resistance, it sailed through the exit and caught hold of an upturned cobblestone. Thank the gods!

  She began to pull herself forward. Corran released her and also grabbed the rope. As the portal rumbled and flashed orange light, they desperately pulled themselves hand over hand, the rope trailing behind them as they reached the exit. They tumbled through. Kestrel rolled to an abrupt stop, striking a solid object

  A body.

  She sat up, quickly assessing the scene. Three more bodies—all of them motionless—lay sprawled in the street. A band of five orcs scavenged two of the corpses.

  They'd arrived too late.

  "Get your filthy claws off them!'' Ghleanna shouted from behind her. She turned in time to see the mage lift her hands and send three bursts of magical energy speed­ing toward the snouted humanoids.

  The orcs dove to the ground, but the missiles corrected their course and hit three of the creatures. One orc, struck in the head, died instantly. The other two suffered chest wounds but managed to climb back to their feet, axes in hand. With a cry of retribution, all four remaining orcs now rushed Ghleanna.

  Kestrel rolled out of their path, yanked a dagger from her boot and threw it. The weapon caught one of the orcs in the neck. Her victim sank to its knees, but with a series of inhuman grunts, it struggled to its feet. Tightly gripping its short sword, the beast staggered toward Kestrel. Its eyes held the expression of a mad animal.

  Kestrel bent to reach her second dagger. A second hit would finish off the humanoid. Before she withdrew the blade, however, the orc collapsed.

  She glanced around to see whether any of the remain­ing orcs approached. Corran, who'd landed several yards away when he tumbled out of the gate, had engaged two of the beasts. The skill with which he deflected the orcs' blows bespoke the superior training of a nobleman. He fought with controlled, precise strokes that countered his opponents' brute swings.

  A thunderclap boomed so loud that it shook the street. Kestrel spun to discover the sound came from the gate, which now wavered violently and glowed flaming red. The rope attached to her grappling hook still trailed inside. What would happen to her tool if the portal shut with the rope still inside? The gods only knew when they might need it next

  A quick glance toward Ghleanna, who was releasing another volley of sorcerous missiles, indicated that the mage held her own for the moment. Kestrel grasped the rope and tugged.

  It was stuck.

  She pulled harder. The rope remained taut, but she could feel vibrations along it coming from within the gate. What was going on inside?

  A moment later, a familiar figure tumbled through and landed at her feet Kestrel yanked the rope out of the por­tal. Within seconds, the gate shuddered and imploded, disappearing from sight. At the same time, the sounds of combat ceased.

  She offered Durwyn a hand. "I thought you weren't going to leave your post?"

  He grasped her arm and rose. "I got lonely."

  She looked toward Ghleanna and Corran, who had dispatched the last of the orcs. "I can think of many places I'd rather seek company than here," Kestrel said, turning back to Durwyn. "We're lucky we even made it."

  He nodded toward her grappling hook. "I saw you and Corran ahead of me and grabbed the rope as soon as I could. That was quick thinking on your part. I never would have made it out in time."

  "None of us would have." She harbored a bellyful of resentment toward Corran. How dare he force her into that malfunctioning magical gate, nearly killing them both? She shuddered to think of her fate had she been trapped inside during the final implosion.

  Durwyn joined Corran and Ghleanna, who were check­ing the f
allen adventurers for signs of life. Kestrel hung back. As she coiled her rope, she thought about how much she wanted to wrap it around Corran's neck. Instead she stowed it and the grappling hook in her pack. She retrieved her dagger, noting her surroundings as she cleaned it

  They'd arrived on a street lined with buildings in vari­ous states of destruction. Even in its ruined condition Kestrel could see that Myth Drannor had once been a city of incredible beauty. The wood, stone, and glass buildings of the former elven capital had been constructed as exten­sions of the very trees that sheltered them, wondrous feats of architecture that enhanced nature even as they altered it. Spires soared toward the sky, prompting Kestrel to raise her eyes. In doing so, she discovered a network of bridges that spanned the trees.

  Now many of the bridges were destroyed, and the build­ings below looked like an earthquake had violently shaken them. Broken spires lay in fragments on the ground, their jagged stumps rising no higher toward the stars than did human constructions. Collapsed walls exposed the rooms they had been meant to protect, inviting creatures mun­dane and malicious to make their homes within. Statues of exquisite elven maidens lacked limbs or heads and stood watch over dry fountains choked with moss and debris. Weeds and thorns overtook the gardens. Rubble littered the streets.

  A feeling of sadness, unfamiliar but genuine, washed over Kestrel. Something more than a city had been lost here.

  At last she approached the others.

  "You certainly took your time coming over," Corran said. He gestured toward the adventurers. "They're all dead—if you care."

  "Good thing we almost killed ourselves getting here, then," she responded. "You had no right to force me into that portal."

  "You would stand idly by while others suffered?"

  "This isn't my problem."

  "You did volunteer," Durwyn piped up.

  Was he ganging up on her too, now? She fixed him with a withering gaze that caused the burly man to step back a pace. "My commitment began and ended in Phlan," she said.

  Corran shook his head in disgust. "Don't you have the least concern for anyone besides yourself?"

  "I saved your arse in that damn gate, didn't I?"

  "Enough!" Ghleanna, her expression strained, stepped between them. "Corran, she's right—you shouldn't have forced her to come. Kestrel, now that we are here, can we at least search for clues to what happened?"

  "Sure," Kestrel responded, her gaze remaining locked on Corran. She'd settle this later.

  The adventurers appeared to have been dead for hours. Ghleanna hypothesized that time had become distorted in the malfunctioning gate, suspending the travelers in limbo much longer than the few seconds usually required to journey through one. The party also looked to have suf­fered wounds the orcs could not have inflicted.

  "I believe their opponents wielded magic," Ghleanna said. "Look at those deep burns on Allyril, the party's sor­ceress. Ordinary fire doesn't burn skin quite that way—I suspect lightning bolts. The cleric over there seems to have had the life drained right out of him, as does Loren. Athan is missing. I—I fear he was disintegrated alto­gether." She cleared her throat and looked away.

  Corran uttered the opening words of a prayer for the ill-fated band's souls. Kestrel, never one to take much inter­est in religious observances, rolled her eyes but remained silent during the invocation. As she waited, paying little attention to the words, she noticed a smooth rectangular bulge under the cloak of the man Ghleanna had called Loren. When the paladin finished his prayer, she bent over the body to investigate.

  "Have you no respect?" Corran hissed.

  "What? I thought you were done."

  "You would steal from the corpses of fallen comrades?"

  She clenched her jaw, fresh ire rising within her. If Ghleanna or Durwyn had reached for that object, he wouldn't have said a word. "I thought we were investigating what happened here." Pointedly turning her back on him, she unclasped Loren's cloak, slipped her hand into its inside pocket, and withdrew a slim book. She opened its leaves, quickly skimming the pages. "It's a journal."

  Corran reached for it. "Let me see."

  Kestrel snatched the volume out of his grasp. "I can read." She flipped to the end, hoping the last few entries would prove the most informative.

  Elminster was right, the last page read. A new Pool of Radiance exists somewhere in Myth Drannor. The pool's cre­ators know our mission and already send agents to stop us, even though we have not yet learned who's behind the plan. Fortunately, we still have the Gauntlets of Moander, and once we find the pool we shall use them to destroy it. Mystra— and Fate—willing.

  Kestrel read the passage aloud. When she finished, Ghleanna turned to Corran.

  "I saw no gauntlets when we examined the adventur­ers," the mage said, a note of panic in her voice. "Did you?"

  "No, but we weren't looking for them, either," he said. "Let's check again."

  Their search yielded several vials of bluish liquid, a plain, battered silver ring sized for a woman's hand, an assortment of weapons, and numerous other provisions— but no Gauntlets of Moander.

  "Well, we will just have to tell Elminster what happened and let him worry about it," Kestrel said. She turned to Ghleanna. "So go ahead and do your thing."

  The mage regarded her quizzically. "My thing?"

  "You know," she prompted. "Conjure up one of those gate things so we can get out of here." As much as she hated the thought of trusting another magical portal, twi­light approached, and she was even less enamored with the idea of spending the night in this haunted city overrun with the minions of some unknown foe.

  Ghleanna was silent a moment "I cannot do that, Kestrel," she said finally. "I have not the power."

  "What do you mean?" A sick feeling spread through her insides. "We're not stuck here, are we?"

  "You're welcome to try to find your way out of the city and walk home," Corran said. "As for me, I choose to take up this party's mission. The cause of good cannot afford the time it would take us to reach Elminster. We must instead pick up where these fallen worthies left off."

  Kestrel stared at him. The paladin really had an over-inflated sense of his own honor. Fallen worthies, indeed. Did anyone actually talk like that?

  "Yes, we must!" Durwyn exclaimed.

  She closed her eyes. Of course Durwyn would follow the knight. He was lost without a commander, and appar­ently he'd settled on Corran as his new one.

  "I'm glad you both agree," Ghleanna said. "I would have taken up this quest alone if I had to."

  Kestrel sighed. Was she alone possessed of sense? "Aren't you all forgetting a few facts?" she asked. "Our foes already defeated the original party—we're fewer in number and less prepared. Even if we do manage to find this new pool, what are we going to do when we get there? Skip stones across it? The bad guys have the gauntlets."

  "But we have the advantage of surprise," Corran said. "They won't be expecting a new party so soon. We can fig­ure out the rest as we go along—we haven't even read the whole journal yet."

  She bowed her head, rubbing her temples. They were insane. All of them. They would end up dead, and they wanted to take her with them.

  Yet would she fare any better trying to make it out of the city, through the forest, and back to civilization alone?

  "Kestrel, you were really smart back there in the por­tal," Durwyn said. "We could sure use your help."

  As if she had a choice. Get killed here or get killed try­ing to leave here. Nonetheless, if she was stuck on this sui­cide mission, there was one thing she wouldn't tolerate. She looked up at Corran. "No more insults from you."

  "Agreed."

  She glanced at Durwyn and Ghleanna. "All right then."

  Ghleanna responded by suddenly raising her palms and hurling a spell at her. Kestrel dived to the ground. "What the—"

  A burst of light appeared about ten paces behind her, followed immediately by an inhuman cry. A hideous crea­ture stumbled out of the shadows, clutchin
g at its eyes. The thing appeared to have once been human but now was a disfigured shell of its former self. Sharp, elongated teeth protruded from its mouth like fangs; the nails on its withered hands had grown into talons. Its dried-out flesh, visible through tattered clothing, hung tight on its bones.

  "A ghoul!" Corran drew his sword and attacked. His first blow severed one of its skeletal arms. Black liquid spewed from the stump. Sightless, thanks to Ghleanna's spell, the ghoul could only blindly lash out with its remain­ing claw in defense.

  Durwyn joined Corran's side and swung his battle axe. He hit the creature in the side. The ghoul moaned and swiped its talons at the guard.

  "Don't let it touch you!" Corran warned. With a mighty swing to the ghoul's neck, the paladin made quick work of the weakened creature. Its head fell to the ground and rolled several feet. Kestrel was glad it stopped at an angle that hid its hideous face.

  "I take it you've faced ghouls before?" Ghleanna asked Corran as he and Durwyn cleaned the ghoul's foul blood off their weapons.

  The paladin nodded. "Several times. They're nasty creatures—their touch can paralyze. If you're killed by a ghoul, you'll become one too, unless it eats all your flesh first. They feed on corpses." He glanced at the dead adven­turers and orcs. "It must have been attracted by the bod­ies. We should bury them before the sun fully sets, when the creatures will probably come out in droves. Where there's one there are sure to be more."

  "Do we have time?" Ghleanna asked. "I'm almost out of spells, and we still need to find shelter for ourselves."

  "I hate to leave them here unprotected," the paladin said. "These heroes died noble deaths—their remains deserve better than to become ghoul fodder."

  Kestrel gestured toward one of the ruined buildings she'd studied earlier. "If we move the adventurers in there and leave the orcs out in the street, perhaps the ghouls will be satisfied with the easy meal." She expected Corran to dismiss the idea simply because she had suggested it. To her surprise, he agreed.

  "We should also keep their equipment for our own use," she added. "It can't help them now."