He nodded to his brother, offering a look of appreciation-and one that was only half-feigned. Jarlaxle loved his magical toys and knew that he had a powerful one in hand with Khazid’hea.
“Where is the half-drow girl?” Jarlaxle asked, sliding the sword into his belt loop. “The daughter of Tos’un Armgo?”
“Why do you care?”
Jarlaxle shrugged. “Perhaps I do not, not excessively at least. It is my curiosity, nothing more.”
“I honestly do not know,” said Gromph. “Freezing to death on a cold mountainside. . somewhere. The Spine of the World, I expect, and likely somewhere near to the lair of Arauthator. Why do you wish to know? Do you intend to fetch her?”
Again Jarlaxle shrugged. “She might prove useful at some point.”
“If I ever lay eyes on that halfiblith, half-Armgo creature again, I will transform her into a jelly and serve her at the next feast I attend,” Gromph said, and there wasn’t the slightest hint in his tone to suggest that he was exaggerating.
“Fortunately, I am in the possession of many things you will never see, then,” Jarlaxle replied with a tip of his great-brimmed hat. He turned to Kimmuriel. “To Luskan,” he instructed. “I have no desire to be discovered by the matron mother here in the city.”
“But the streets need cleaning, brother,” Gromph said.
“That is why the gods gave us magic, brother,” Jarlaxle replied in the same smug tone. “To perform the mundane tasks of life.”
Wisely, Kimmuriel didn’t hesitate, and a moment later, he and Jarlaxle stepped into the Bregan D’aerthe audience hall in Illusk, the undercity of Luskan.
She lifted her wet face, trying to regain her wits and strength after the spinning, flying ride through the archmage’s rough portal. She didn’t note the cold at first, not until she managed to pull open her eyes to realize that she was facedown in deep snow.
Doum’wielle knew the season, knew that the snows had not yet started to fall anywhere but in the high mountains.
She propped herself up on straight arms and slowly swiveled her head about, taking in the grandeur of the scene in front of her. Mountains, huge and tall, with dark rocky spurs prodding forth from the thick blanket of snow, loomed before her-she realized from her posture that her head was higher up the mountain than her feet.
To the left and right, the mountains went on beyond her sight. The Spine of the World, she realized. Though she didn’t recognize any specific peaks from this different perspective, she knew of no other mountain ranges in Faerûn of this magnitude and majesty.
She lay in the snow, the cold beginning to creep in.
The weight of her troubles only then began to creep in with it.
Doum’wielle looked around. She slapped at the snow desperately, shoving it aside, throwing it far from her. She jabbed her hands down through it, grabbing, grasping, looking for something to catch onto, and only after she began to tire did she take a heartbeat and remember that for which she was searching.
Her movements slowed then, and she was relieved to know that she still had all of her fingers, for if she had plunged her hand through the snow to strike against the impossibly sharp blade of Khazid’hea, then surely she would have left some fingers behind.
She pulled herself up to a kneeling position and took a different tack, calling out telepathically for her missing sword, pleading with Khazid’hea to guide her search.
She heard nothing.
Panic swept over her. She cried out audibly now, screaming “Cutter!” repeatedly. She forced herself to her feet and staggered about.
“Cutter!”
Her cries echoed back to her from the mountainsides, and those echoes brought her desperate, pathetic tone to her ears and mocked her. The vastness of the Spine of the World laughed at Little Doe.
The sun shined brilliantly upon her, bright in the snow, but the air was cold up here in the vast white sheets.
Doum’wielle had not often been in the mountains. Where could she go? How could she protect herself from the cold and the wet?
And the prowling monsters? Yes, she knew enough of the environment to realize that the cold might be the least of her problems.
Khazid’ hea! Doum’wielle’s thoughts cried out once more, one last time.
The sword was lost.
She was lost.
“When you are of the mind to taunt the archmage, I would prefer you do so after a proper warning to me, that I can be far away,” Kimmuriel scolded his dangerous companion.
Jarlaxle drew out Khazid’hea and turned it over to examine the pommel. “An impressive feat,” he asked as much as stated.
“More so than you understand,” Kimmuriel replied. “The sword tried to dominate him. A sewer rat would have a better chance at ordering about the matron mother.”
Jarlaxle nodded and stared at the mushroom-shaped and speckled pommel, muttering, “Impressive,” and he was talking more about Gromph in general than about this particular feat of willpower.
Khazid’hea was no minor magic item, after all. It was possessed of its own sentience and a great ego. The sword had dominated powerful warriors in the past, even Catti-brie, and even, albeit only for a very short time and only until he had properly understood the threat, Artemis Entreri.
The mercenary considered Gromph’s words when he had given Jarlaxle the prize. He was reminding Jarlaxle of his heritage, and openly, in front of Kimmuriel. Jarlaxle began to nod, sorting it out. Despite the insulting look of the pommel, this sword wasn’t a gift for Jarlaxle as much as an offer. Gromph knew that he was walking on dangerous ground back in Menzoberranzan. It didn’t take one of Jarlaxle’s perception to recognize the archmage’s outrage over Lolth’s loss of the Weave, and worse, over her continuing disrespect to the male wizards, even to Gromph, when all believed that she would come to include the Web of Magic in her domain and should respect its users.
Gromph had given Jarlaxle the sword to buy an out for himself, should that necessity come to pass.
The-former-Archmage of Menzoberranzan as a member of Bregan D’aerthe? Jarlaxle’s eyes widened at the possibilities.
Possibilities that Jarlaxle subsequently dismissed, for in that circumstance, did he really believe that Gromph Baenre would serve him and Kimmuriel? More likely, he knew, Gromph would demand servitude of them.
Gromph Baenre did not make offers that one could refuse.
Kimmuriel walked off to see to some other matters, and Jarlaxle wasted no time. He removed his eye patch to better communicate with the sword, then nodded as the pommel went fully black and became feline in form-a panther. For a moment, Jarlaxle almost abandoned his course and thought to make it look like Guenhwyvar-perhaps he could use it as a gift back to Drizzt. But no, he decided, and said, “It is a Baenre blade.”
A pair of tentacles sprouted from the panther’s shoulders, transforming the figure from that of a great cat of the World Above to an Underdark displacer beast, a formidable foe indeed, and a symbol worthy of a blade hanging in the belt loop of Jarlaxle.
Those tentacles seemed to come to life for just a moment, magically wrapping around Jarlaxle’s hand, securing his grip.
In his mind, Jarlaxle could feel Khazid’hea’s appreciation.
Yes, they would get along splendidly.
CHAPTER 17
Bruenor flung himself through the opened doorway and nearly pitched headlong to the floor in surprise, realizing that he had caught up to Guenhwyvar. The great panther stood there in the room in front of him, staring at the wall-and what a curious sight that was.