But he did feel a pull, clearly so, and he turned and walked out of the grove, letting the skull guide him.
Soon he stood in the remains of an ancient, forgotten cemetery. A couple of stones might have been markers, or perhaps they were not, but Jarlaxle knew with certainty that it was a cemetery, where any other wanderer who happened upon the place might not guess..
Jarlaxle felt the long-buried corpses, buried in neat rows. They were calling to him, he thought…
No, he realized, and he opened his eyes wide and looked down at the skull. They weren't calling to him, they were waiting for him to call to them.
The drow took a deep and steadying breath. He noted the remains of a dwarf and a halfling, but when he concentrated on them, he understood that they were not connected in any way but by the ground in which they rested and were connected in no way to the dark elf.
This skull was focused in its power. It held strength over humans—alive and dead, so it would seem.
"Interesting," Jarlaxle whispered to the chilly night air, and he subconsciously glanced back in the direction of Ilnezhara's tower. Jarlaxle held the glowing item up before his twinkling eyes.
"If I had initially found the tome and had enacted the creation power with my life-force, would the skull that grew within the pages have been that of a drow?" he asked. "Could a dragon have made a skull that would find its connection to long-dead dragons? "
He shook his head as he spoke the words aloud, for they just didn't sound correct to him. The disposition of the skull predated the construction of the tower and had been embedded within the book before the foolish human Herminicle had found it. The book was predetermined to that end result, he believed.
Yes, that sounded better to the aged and magically-literate dark elf. Zhengyi held great power over humans and had also commanded an army of the dead, so the tales said. The skull was surely one of his artifacts to affect that end. Jarlaxle glanced back again in the direction of the distant tower.
It was no secret that Zhengyi had also commanded flights of dragons—disparate wyrms, somehow brought together under a singular purpose and under his control.
The drow's smile widened and he realized that a journey to Vaasa was indeed in his future.
Happily so.
CHAPTER NINE
THE WIND ON THE ROAD
We'll keep close to the foothills," Ellery said to Jarlaxle, pulling her horse up beside the bouncing wagon. "There have been many reports of monsters in the region and Mariabronne has confirmed that they're about. We'll stay in the shadows away from the open plain."
"Might our enemies not be hiding in wait in those same shadows?" Jarlaxle asked.
"Mariabronne is with us," Ellery remarked. "We will not be caught by surprise." She smiled with easy confidence and turned her horse aside.
Jarlaxle set his doubting expression upon Entreri.
"Yes," the assassin assured him, "almost everyone I've killed uttered similar last words."
"Then I am glad once again that you are on my side."
"They've often said that, too."
Jarlaxle laughed aloud.
Entreri didn't.
The going was slower on the more uneven ground under the shadows of the Galenas, but Ellery insisted and she was, after all, in command. As the sun began its lazy slide down the western sky, the commander ordered the wagons up into a sheltered lea between mounds of tumbled stones and delegated the various duties of setting the camp and defenses. Predictably, Mariabronne went out to scout and the pair of soldiers set watch-points—though curiously, Entreri thought, under the guidance of the dwarf with the twin morning stars. Even more curious, the thin sage sat in contemplation off to the side of the main encampment, his legs crossed before him, his hands resting on his knees. It was more than simple meditation, Entreri knew. The man was preparing spells they might need for nighttime defense.
Similarly, the other dwarf, who had introduced himself as Pratcus Bristlebeard, built a small altar to Moradin and began calling upon his god for blessing. Ellery had covered both the arcane and the divine.
And probably a little of both with Jarlaxle, Entreri thought with a wry grin.
The assassin went out from the main camp soon after, climbing higher into the foothills and finally settling on a wide boulder that afforded him a superb view of the Vaasan lowlands stretching out to the west.
He sat quietly and stared at the setting sun, long rays slanting across the great muddy bog, bright lines of wetness shining brilliantly. Dazzling distortions turned the light into shimmering pools of brilliance, demanding his attention and drawing him into a deeper state of contemplation. Hardly aware of the movement, Entreri reached to his belt and drew forth a small, rather ordinary-looking flute, a gift of the dragon sisters Ilnezhara and Tazmikella.
He glanced around quickly, ensuring that he was alone, then lifted the flute to his lips and blew a simple note. He let that whistle hang in the air then blew again, holding it a little longer. His delicate but strong fingers worked over the instrument's holes and he played a simple song, one he had taught himself or one the flute had taught to him; he couldn't be certain of which. He continued for a short while, letting the sound gather in the air around him, bidding it to take his thoughts far, far away.
The flute had done that to him before. Perhaps it was magic or perhaps just the simple pleasure of perfect timbre, but under the spell of his playing, Artemis Entreri had several times managed to clear his thoughts of all the normal clutter.
A short while later, the sun much lower in the sky, the assassin lowered the flute and stared at it. Somehow, the instrument didn't sound as fine as on those other occasions he'd tested it, nor did he find himself being drawn into the flute as he had before.
"Perhaps the wind is countering the puff of your foul breath," Jarlaxle said from behind him.
The drow couldn't see the scowl that crossed Entreri's face—was there ever to be a time when he could be away from that pestering dark elf?
Entreri laid the flute across his lap and stared off to the west and the lowering sun, the bottom rim just touching the distant horizon and setting off a line of fires across the dark teeth of the distant hills. Above the sun, a row of clouds took on a fiery orange hue.
"It promises to be a beautiful sunset," Jarlaxle remarked, easily scaling the boulder and taking a seat close beside the assassin.
Entreri glanced at him as if he hardly cared.
"Perhaps it is because of my background," the drow continued. "I have gone centuries, my friend, without ever witnessing the cycles of the sun. Perhaps the absence of this daily event only heightens my appreciation for it now."
Entreri still showed no hint of any response.
"Perhaps after a few decades on the surface I will become as bored with it as you seem to be."
"Did I say that?"
"Do you ever say anything?" Jarlaxle replied. "Or does it amuse you to let all of those around you simply extrapolate your words from your continuing scowls and grimaces?"
Entreri chortled and looked back to the west. The sun was lower still, half of it gone. Above the remaining semicircle of fire, the clouds glowed even more fiercely, like a line of fire churning in the deepening blue of the sky.
"Do you ever dream, my friend?" Jarlaxle asked.