"Rest! Is that all you think about is rest? If ever Phlan needed you, it's now. Fiends and armies are threatening the city!"
Tarl stopped his pacing and went to her side. He tried to put his arms around his beloved wife.
"Don't even try it, cleric," she snapped, shaking him off. Tarl was a big man, six feet tall and all muscle, but an old mishap with a magical wish had left him shorter than his wife and less muscled. When she didn't want to be touched, she usually got her way.
Shal's purple robes swished about her with a life of their own. Tarl smiled, thinking that something magical probably did give her clothes some animation. His mind wandered as he thought how wonderful it would be to spend some time as her clothing, wrapped around her firm body and feeling her every move. He sighed but was abruptly brought back to reality.
"Tarl, we aren't through arguing about the councilman's position." Shal spoke in her most authoritative voice, waving a finger at him. It was the same finger that had launched purple fireballs and lightning bolts to halt ogres and giants in their tracks.
"Look, Kroegel gave me until the end of the week to give him my answer. Can't we forget about this for a while? Let's enjoy this peaceful interlude while it lasts. We both know an attack could come at any time." Tarl had discovered the poppyseed cake in his basket and now held it up for Shal to see. Taking a bite, he teased her. "Mmm, I'm really hungry!"
Shal saw through his diversion but allowed herself to succumb. She suddenly realized she was ravenously hungry. Striding over to her husband, she broke off a piece of cake and wrapped her arm around his waist. "Don't think you'll get out of this discussion so easily next time," she said softly.
"I know you far better than that. I wouldn't think of it." He kissed her hair, and the couple sat down to dine on the bread, cheese, and apples from Tarl's basket.
Shal grew more and more quiet as they ate. Finally she looked at her husband with wide eyes. "Tarl, I'm scared."
The cleric leaned close and wrapped his arms around the sorceress. "As long as I'm here, there is no force in this world that can hurt you. What's scaring you?"
Shal sighed. "Just being here in this hole is enough to frighten anyone. Not knowing how or why we're here makes it worse. But I've used all the detection spells I know and haven't learned anything. The other wizards in Phlan are in the same predicament. You'd think that we'd be able to figure something out. I know that somewhere out there is a great evil ready to pounce on Phlan, and we're almost powerless to do anything about it."
This worried Tarl. His wife usually showed more confidence. "Come with me," he whispered.
He led Shal through her casting chamber to their favorite balcony. Denlor's Tower was high enough to survey most of the city, and part of the Moonsea, too, had they not been deep in some cavern.
"Shal, what can I do to do to make you feel safe?" He could feel her tension and wished he could just rinse it away with a warm bath and a mug of tea. But this was more serious, and Tarl knew it. "I don't mean the kind of safe the farmers get when they lock the door at night. Or the kind of safe my Aunt Dorinna gets when she puts that disgusting smelling mud all over her face."
His last comment brought a giggle. "Your Uncle Amis really hates that stuff. You don't like it much either, do you? Lately, I've been thinking about trying it. Maybe it'll keep me looking young." Tarl rolled his eyes, but was glad to see some humor coming from his wife. He held her close.
"I want to make you happy-as happy as our lives will allow. It's hard being in the front of battles all the time. Half the time when we're hurling spells and fighting side by side, I'm terrified at the thought of you facing the same blades and awful creatures I face."
Shal's chest heaved. "I'm sorry I'm so upset. This whole mess is getting the better of me. The best we can do is to keep looking for a way to rescue the city."
Tarl stroked his wife's hair and gently led her back inside. "What you need is a good back rub," he whispered. Shal smiled and sat down on the bed. As she tugged on her robe, a voice sounded in the street below.
"The alarm!" Tarl said, disappointed. He and Shal dashed about to gather weapons and prepare for battle. "Sorry, love. I'll have to owe you that back rub."
Shal laughed as they hurried out the door. "Don't worry. I won't let you forget! Now, let's go see if we can't quash our enemies once and for all!"
4
Impenetrable darkness filled the casting chamber at the top of the magical tower. In the cool blackness, a horrid pit fiend basked in the silence. It flapped about the chamber with its twenty-foot bat wings, drooling and slobbering. The room's stale air held the salty-sweet smell of blood that the fiend savored. It inhaled through flared nostrils, drinking in the foul scent. The heinous killer, summoned from the Nine Hells, was thrilled with his new assignment and accommodations. In all his soulless existence, he couldn't remember a better opportunity or one that promised more fun.
Marcus, a Red Wizard from Thay, had foolishly summoned the fiend to the Prime Material Plane to help do the bidding of the god Bane. The fiend and the wizard were to add their personal touches to their god's plan, and if all worked out right, in a few years two new evil demigods would be loose on Toril.
"Aaargh," the fiend groaned in pleasure. "It's good to be back on this plane, regardless of the outcome of the battle. Ah, better wars will come. Latenat!" Green sticky goo dripped from the fiend's foot-long fangs. The acidic slime oozed to the ground and sizzled, making coin-sized pits in the black granite. Similar indentations covered the entire floor.
The massive bulk of the twelve-foot fiend zipped quickly around the room as it cast powerful spells. Its black bat wings glowed red as the beast conjured several unique protection spells. Giant taloned hands evoked detection and communication spells simultaneously, and as the spells activated, each talon became red-hot, the color of molten metal. The creature barely noticed the heat.
The fiend circled the chamber repeatedly, in exactly the same loop every time, but followed no markings a human eye could detect. The creature's bare feet, humanlike despite their three foot length, emitted streams of hot, jet-black sparks. A single spark would have burned right through the flesh of a normal creature, but each fist-sized flare bounced off its crusty, ebony skin.
"Power, that's what it's all about! Now that Marcus the fool has summoned me to this plane, I can accomplish what I have been planning for a thousand years. Latenat!"
The fiend's wings blazed with magic. It summoned more inky darkness and wrapped the blackness around its flesh like a coating of soot. Again the creature savored the scent of blood in the air, inhaling deeply.
"I'll use the power Bane has given me and give him some of the souls he wants. But I will keep the souls I need to grow even more powerful. Nothing can stop me. Nothing! Latenat!"
The horrible creature swung its talons against the nearest wall, punching huge holes into six-foot-thick marble. The stone crumbled to the floor with no effect on its harder-than-steel talons. The fiend sneered at the rubble as it continued gesturing. Suddenly twin spheres of blue energy surrounded each talon-studded fist.
A strain was evident in the fiend's voice as it completed the incantation, but no one was present to hear. No one with the slightest intelligence would have wanted to be near while such a pit fiend tried to communicate with its god. Few people could walk away with their sanity intact after viewing such a spectacle. The spheres of energy on the fiend's fists spread with every magical urging.