Medala's lips drew back, and her teeth flashed. "You've guessed, haven't you, Ekhaas duur'kala? It was everywhere. It was nowhere. It was the place where madmen go when they have the power to tear holes in the fabric of s.p.a.ce. I have been where Dah'mir would give his tongue to go-oh, if he knew what his twisted experiments had wrought!" She looked at them both, and her pupils were once again tiny black dots in her eyes. "I've seen the brine pools where the elder brains of the illithids dream. I've seen empty palaces that wait for their daelkyr masters to return. I've been to Xoriat!"

CHAPTER.

9.

Natrac knew it was late morning or early afternoon only by the complaint of his empty stomach, though even that wasn't strictly reliable-he had woken with a sour taste in his mouth and a vague memory of having vomited in the night. There was no other way to judge the pa.s.sage of time.

There was no hint of daylight in the small room where he'd been dumped or in the larger chamber visible through the barred window set in the room's door. Many centuries before, the chamber had likely been some fine lady's bedroom and the smaller room, a large closet. Or maybe a nursery or a maid's room. Many, many centuries before, when Malleon's Gate had been the wealthy heart of Sharn and the great towers had been mere saplings. Since then, the rooms-the entire grand house-had seen a hundred different uses, a hundred refashionings, probably a dozen blockings and unblockings of the window that had once let light into the chamber.

For the last twenty years or so, the smaller room had been a cell, the larger chamber an ... interview room. Natrac remembered the day when the conversion had been made very clearly. He'd had the window blocked up again specifically so prisoners would have no clue to the pa.s.sage of day or night.

And for the fifteenth time since he'd woken, he muttered, "My own d.a.m.n cell. The Keeper take you, Biish!"

Not that the possibility he might one day need to escape from his own cell had ever slipped pa.s.sed him. Once the throbbing that the hobgoblin's club had left in his head had eased, Natrac had crawled over to the door and pulled himself up to the barred window, surveying the chamber beyond and blessing the orc blood that let him see in the dark. The chamber was empty except for a rough table and two chairs. His knife-hand, stripped from the stump of his right wrist, lay on the table, well out of reach.

He'd gone to a corner of the cell and counted four bricks in and eighteen high. The cleverly fitted false brick he'd installed in secret had still been there. Unfortunately, the hollow behind where he'd hidden a knife and a few tools had been empty. Someone had cleaned it out. The brick hadn't been as secret as he thought.

After that there hadn't been much to do but wait. Natrac pa.s.sed the time alternately cursing Biish, the idiot changelings of the Broken Mirror, the treacherous old goblin bartender, and himself. A return not just to Sharn but to Malleon's Gate-what had he been thinking? Had surviving his adventures with Geth, Singe, and Dandra really given him that much of a sense of invulnerability? Had he been this stupid when he'd been young? Lords of the Host, he thought, it was a miracle he'd lived this long.

Worst of all, his misguided attempt at locating word of Dah'mir through Sharn's underworld meant that Dandra and Singe would not just have one less ally on which to rely, but that they would almost certainly start using time they needed to locate the dragon on finding him instead. He'd told Dandra he'd be back by dawn. She might already have started worrying about him. He had become a liability. He had to find a way out of this.

He knew Biish, though. Getting out of the hobgoblin's hands wasn't going to be easy.

He looked up as the door in the outer chamber opened and several people, to judge by the sound of footsteps, entered. They brought a dim light with them, lighting up the square of the barred window in the cell door. That was interesting, he thought. It meant that not all of Biish's gang were goblinoids. Someone in the other chamber needed light to see. He rose to his feet.

The large and hairy face of the bugbear from the tavern appeared at the barred window. Natrac glared at him. "Awake," the creature grunted in Goblin and moved back.

Biish took his place and gave Natrac a leer that showed all of his oversized teeth. "I never thought I'd see you back in Sharn, Natrac," he said. "What are you doing here?"

"Asking myself the same thing." Natrac met his gaze without flinching. "How have you been, Biter?"

Biish's skin was a deep orange color that turned deeper when he flushed. His ears lay back flat. "No one calls me Biter now, taat!"

From the utter silence that fell among those who had accompanied Biish into the outer chamber, Natrac guessed that the hobgoblin might actually be right. He held his voice steady, not allowing himself to show any sign of fear, and pushed himself up to the bars on the window. "I guess the chib can have people call him whatever he wants," he said. "Have you been taking care of my affairs, Biish?"

That got a bark of mocking laughter out of him. "They haven't been your affairs for a long time, Natrac."

"I heard you closed the arena."

"You could have sold it to me when I asked, and you would have made money," Biish said with a cold smile. "You could have joined your gang with mine, and you might still be in power today instead of stuck in a cell you built yourself. The Longtooth is one of the most powerful gangs in Malleon's Gate these days."

Biish always had loved to gloat. Natrac let the hobgoblin boast while he looked past him to the band of thugs he had brought into the room. The bugbear, of course. Another hobgoblin. Two goblins, one of which looked very familiar and who glanced away when Natrac's eyes met his. Natrac remembered him-a street rat with such a talent for picking pockets that he'd brought him into his gang personally. Not everyone had stood up against Biish's control, it seemed. Natrac's jaw tightened in anger, but he forced his gaze past the little traitor.

The final person in the room was the one holding the dim light-source, a small lamp. The only non-goblinoid-and the only woman-she was a half-elf, young but with hard and cunning eyes. Her hair was blond with a hint of red and bound into a knot at the back of her head. Her clothes were worn leather, and the only visible weapon she carried was a dagger at her hip, but Natrac had a feeling that wasn't the only weapon on her. Somehow she didn't look out of place among Biish's guard. Instead, they looked out of place in her presence.

And she was watching him.

Natrac wrenched his gaze from her and back to Biish as he finally ran out of words. "If you're so powerful," he said to the hobgoblin, "then you have nothing to worry about from me. I'm out of this game. You know it."

"Are you asking me to let you go?" Biish's wolf ears rose. "For one, I don't think you are out of the game. I know you wouldn't have dared to come back to Sharn and Malleon's Gate unless you had some important reason. For another, there's the matter of why I'm using your fine old headquarters instead of mine." A flush crept back into his face. "They still talk about the explosion in some taverns."

Natrac looked him straight in the eyes. "As long as you were running me out of Sharn, I wanted to be sure you had something to remember me by."

Biish's teeth snapped together-but any response he might have made was lost as the door of the outer chamber burst open and another goblin stumbled through. "Biish!" the little creature said. "Lord Storm is back. He's waiting for you in the meeting room."

Natrac thought Biish looked like he was going to explode. If the hobgoblin had been able to tear himself in two-one to stay and hara.s.s Natrac, the other to go and meet this "Lord Storm"-he probably would have. After a moment, though, Biish leaned close to the bars of the cell.

"Don't go anywhere, Natrac," he growled. "We have a lot of catching up to do. Maybe you'll tell me how you lost your hand-and maybe I'll finish what someone else started." He whirled away and stomped out the chamber door. "Dabrak, sharpen your axes! Benti, come with me."

The bugbear stood up straight with an eager expression on his face. The half-elf just nodded. They and the rest of Biish's retinue followed the head of the Longtooth gang out of the chamber. The door slammed shut and darkness fell over the room once more. Natrac sagged in relief.

"Gray-haired Olladra," he prayed with desperate piety, "see me out of this, and I'll build a shrine to you in Zarash'ak."

And may the Sovereign Host bless the arrival of Lord Storm, he added silently. Presumably he was some a.s.sociate of Biish's and a major one if he took precedence over Biish's revenge. Natrac couldn't complain. He had a reprieve, and he needed to make the most of it. He stood upright and rattled the door of the cell with his hand. Or tried to rattle it. The door was as solid as the day he'd watched it installed. He stepped back and cursed. He wasn't getting out that way!

But maybe there was something else he could do. He glanced down at the floor.

When he had the small room converted into a cell, he also had the floor reinforced with heavy planks. He didn't want anyone escaping by ripping up the floorboards. While the carpenter was laying the new planks though, he'd discovered something: hidden beneath a loose board was a cavity and at the bottom of the cavity was a fine screen that looked into the room below. From the lower room, the screen was all but invisible, hidden by shadow and a panel of carved wood.

Magical scrying could be foiled, but there was little that could be done to counter simple eavesdropping. Natrac had the carpenter construct a new access to the hidden cavity, paid him handsomely, and moved him and his family out of Sharn to make sure it stayed a secret. He began holding his meetings in the lower room, and those left in the room to speak in private began to wonder how he learned of their conversations.

If Biish had been using his cell all these years, maybe he was using his meeting room too. Eavesdropping was a small thing to build an escape on, but it was a start.

At the base of one wall, Natrac pressed his hand against a section of plank and pushed it forward, then to the left. An old catch released, and the section rose just enough that he could get his fingernails into a fine groove and turn it on a hidden pivot.

Underneath, the cavity and its screen remained just as he remembered. Natrac cursed silently and wondered if he should have hidden his escape kit beneath the plank.

Light was coming up from the room beneath, though-light and Biish's voice. Moving carefully, Natrac lay flat on the floor and peered down into the cavity. The view was restricted, but he could see Biish sitting down on one side of a table. The half-elf woman, Benti, stood behind him. Someone else, just a moving shadow and quick footsteps, paced back and forth on the other side of the room. It sounded like Biish was in the middle of offering his visitor an apology.

"... didn't expect that you would turn up so late last night, Storm." Biish had left off speaking Goblin, and Natrac guessed that Lord Storm didn't understand the language. "I had business to attend to."

"I know what your business was. Charging around Malleon's Gate hunting for some changelings! Are they paying you? No!"

Lord Storm's voice was loud and unrestrained-and the sound of it brought Natrac's eyes open wide. He jammed two knuckles of his fist into his mouth and bit down to keep himself from crying out. A moment later, Storm stopped pacing and stepped up to the table. Natrac bit down harder as anger and fear beyond even what he felt for Biish surged in his belly.

Lord Storm was Vennet d'Lyrandar!

As Biish's orange skin turned red with outrage, Natrac studied Vennet. The last time he had seen him in Taruuzh Kraat, the half-elf had been spattered with old blood, his clothes torn, his hair matted, and his eyes filled with madness. He'd cleaned up since then, with new clothes and clean hair. He could probably have pa.s.sed among strangers without rousing suspicion, but Natrac had known him for years, had sailed with him from Zarash'ak to the remote port of Yrlag and back many times before Vennet had turned on him. The intensity of madness was still in his eyes. Since he'd devoted himself to Dah'mir, something had happened to crack Vennet's mind. Not that he'd been entirely sane before. Natrac's right arm tingled with phantom pain. In service to the cults of the Dragon Below, Vennet had been the one who'd hacked off his hand, leaving it as bait to lure Dandra into a trap.

What was he doing here?

Then a new fear cut into Natrac as Biish opened his mouth to respond to Vennet's scorn. If the hobgoblin told Vennet who he had imprisoned upstairs, there would be no point in trying to escape. Vennet-and Dah'mir-would know he, Dandra, and the others had escaped Taruuzh Kraat. He squeezed his eyes shut, afraid to watch what unfolded.

Biish's rage saved him. Natrac's eyes popped open again as Biish unleashed a blistering storm of furious curses and roared out, "Your gold buys you and your freakish birds a hiding place and my services, you lunatic dog! If you think it puts me at you beck and call, then the Keeper take your soul and I'll send it to him myself!"

The hobgoblin was on his feet, but Vennet just leaned into his bellows as if leaning into a sea wind. There was even a beatific half-smile on his face. As Biish ran out of breath, Vennet straightened up and said calmly, "You're afraid of me."

Biish made a strangled noise and might have leaped across the table at Vennet if Benti hadn't held him back. Vennet just pulled out a chair and sat down. He looked up Biish. "Sit," he said. "We have things to discuss. Are your preparations ready?"

Breathing hard, his fists curling and uncurling, Biish stared at him and slowly eased himself into his chair. His ears, though, were still flat to his head. "Mazo," he said. "We're ready. The plans are drawn up. We have two possible targets for the first part of the operation. One is preferred, but if we can't get it, we'll get the other."

Vennet pressed his fingers together in front of his face and sat back. His gaze was on Benti. "There is the matter of someone to take the helm."

"You're looking at her," Biish said, jerking his head at the woman. "This is Benti Morren."

Vennet's eyes glittered. "Show me," he said.

Natrac watched as Benti unfastened a wide leather bracer on her right arm and held her arm out for Vennet's inspection. The bright colors of a dragonmark traced the pale skin on the inside of her forearm. The half-orc stared at it. Half-elves could only bear one of two dragonmarks-and he'd never heard of a bearer of the Mark of Detection standing at a helm.

But half-elves also manifested the Mark of Storm, the mark of House Lyrandar.

The same mark that Vennet bore. Natrac frowned. If Benti carried the Mark of Storm, but not the name of Lyrandar, she might be a renegade from the house. But so was Vennet. Why did he need someone else with the mark? Why was he concealing his own power?

Vennet's lips twitched, a look of pity and disdain flitting across his face. "A poor thing, but it will do," he said, sitting back. Natrac saw Vennet's shoulders, where his own dragonmark was located, shift in discomfort. Vennet reached up to scratch himself as if unaware he was doing so. From above, Natrac caught a glimpse down the back of his shirt.

He spat his fingers out of his mouth in disgust and horror. At Tzaryan Keep a month before, it had seemed as if the skin around Vennet's dragonmark was reddened and irritated with scabs in spots. Now it was utterly raw, the colors of the mark marred with big patches of crusted blood and yellow-white infection.

If Biish or Benti could see it, they gave no sign. Benti seemed more put-off by his dismissal of her dragonmark. "It will have to do," she said, fastening the bracer around her arm once more. "You don't have anyone but me."

Her voice was smooth but with an edge to it, like a purring cat or a fine knife. Vennet just gave her a fleeting smile. "As you say," he said. "And the second part of the operation?"

Biish's ears twitched and stood up. "Leave," he said with a glance at Benti. She nodded once and walked out of Natrac's field of vision. A moment later, the door of the meeting room opened and closed. From a pouch at his belt, Biish produced a piece of folded paper and smoothed it out. "There are a lot of them," he said.

Vennet's expression darkened. "If you tell me that you can't handle it, I'm not going to be happy. It won't be any more difficult than the other three."

"I'm not saying I can't do it. It's just going to take longer." Heavy fingers sketched on the tabletop. "If we start with a few at various locations, the rest will gather at a central spot to defend themselves and once they're there ..." He looked at Vennet intently. "We'll need to adjust the timing. We'll have your help as before?"

"Of course. You don't even need to take all of the targets on the list as long as you get most of them. We need seventeen." Vennet raised an eyebrow. "You're certain it will work?"

Biish bared his teeth. "I've had some experience at this. Humans and goblins usually run around in confusion during a raid. Halflings go to ground. Hobgoblins and dwarves move to a perimeter." His ears stood up. "Kalashtar cl.u.s.ter together."

Vennet laughed. "Storm at dawn! After tonight, Biish, your name will be known far beyond Malleon's Gate!"

It felt to Natrac as if the air in his lungs had turned to sand. He didn't dare even to breathe. Kalashtar? Tonight? Dol Arrah's mercy, he thought, what is Dah'mir up to?

Biish only grunted, but his ears bent forward, betraying his excitement. Vennet rose to his feet. "Your people have been scouting Overlook over the last few days, Biish? They all know the district? We only have one chance at this. Nothing can go wrong." He leaned across the table and the madness in his eyes found its way to his voice. "Nothing."

But Biish rose as well. "Nothing will go wrong," he snarled.

"Let's be sure of that," said Vennet. "Let's you and I go up to Overlook together and have a last look around. Whatever you were busy doing when I arrived, I'm sure it can wait."

Biish said something in Goblin that Natrac didn't recognize. He couldn't tell if Vennet did or not. The half-elf simply stood up, utterly calm and stepped away from the table and out of sight for a moment. When he reappeared, he wore a wide-brimmed hat that hid his face entirely from Natrac's view. "If you don't want to go together then, I want a report before it all begins. When you're ready, come and see me. You know where to find me."

Whether it was some expression on Vennet's hidden face or merely his words, Natrac couldn't tell, but Biish's ears lay back in unease. He hesitated for a moment. "We'll go to the upper city together."

Vennet chuckled. "I thought you'd find that a more attractive idea." He adjusted his hat like a dandy. "Here's to an evening that will reward both of us, Biish."

He stepped past the hobgoblin, heading for the unseen door of the room. Biish followed him and a moment later the door closed behind both men. Natrac heard Biish bellowing for Dabrak the bugbear.

And finally he could breathe again, though the air burned in his throat. Slowly, he closed the cavity so that the section of plank that hid it blended seamlessly with the floor once more, and pushed himself upright. His joints ached from lying motionless and tense for so long. Vennet and Biish were moving to kidnap kalashtar from Overlook that very night. The Dark Six only knew what would happen to them afterward. Vennet hadn't mentioned Dah'mir's name, but Natrac had heard the dragon in his voice as surely as if he'd been in the room.

The danger that he, Singe, Dandra, and Ashi had come all the way to Sharn to warn the kalashtar about was ready to break like a storm-and he was stuck in a cell, unable to do anything about it! He put his hand across his forehead and groaned. "Kuv shek, kuv shek, kuv shek!"

Not that there'd been any doubt about it before, but there was even less now: he had to get out. There had to be some way. He rose and turned to examine the door once more.

Benti stood at the barred window, watching him in silence.

The shock of her unexpected presence and the urgency of what he had discovered ground together inside him. He choked and fought for speech. She beat him to it. "So Biish didn't know all your secrets after all."

Natrac just stared at her as he tried to collect himself. There was a faint glow, paler than moonlight and plainly magical, shimmering from a ring on one of her fingers-probably just enough light for her to see in the dark chamber without alerting him. The faint shadows that it cast gave her face a calculating look, as if she was sizing him up and trying to determine how best to use what she had just discovered.

In that moment, two ideas flicked through Natrac's mind. One was insanely desperate: throw himself on Benti's mercy and beg her to warn the kalashtar. Biish had sent her out of the room as he and Vennet had talked. She might not know everything the two men had discussed. She was still, however, one of Biish's people. She almost certainly knew something of what was coming already, and it probably didn't bother her.

The second idea caught and lingered. If she was looking for a way to use what she had seen, maybe he could find a way to use her. He looked at Benti and tried to think like she must have been thinking, like a young and ambitious criminal with a secret her chib didn't know.

It was easy. He'd been there once himself. Natrac thrust his jaw forward to show his tusks and smiled around them. "It's a good spot to listen," he said. "And to watch." He tapped the inside of his right forearm meaningfully. Benti's eyes flickered, and he saw her turn her right arm, the one with the dragonmark, away slightly. He just kept his smile steady, fighting the need for escape, and asked, "Maybe you want to know what they talked about after you left?"

"I can find that out easily enough-although it must have been significant to make Biish leave you." The outer door of the chamber stood very slightly ajar-Benti had probably left it that way so the sounds of its closing wouldn't give her away-and Biish's shouts rumbled through the gap. Benti's gaze remained on Natrac. "I came up here to talk to you before Biish did, but it looks like I didn't need to hurry. Don't worry. I'm sure he'll come back to you eventually. He has a long memory."

"I'm familiar with it," Natrac said. He didn't look away from her, but his mind was racing. She hardly seemed more than intrigued by the hidden compartment. Maybe she was bluffing. Maybe she had some other way of listening in to Biish's private conversations already. The only criminals Natrac had ever encountered who weren't interested in knowing what their bosses were up to were either terrified or stupid, and Benti didn't seem to be either. He changed his tactics. "He's not much more than a thug with luck and a little brain. What brings someone like you to work for him?"

Benti's delicate eyebrows arched. "Motive. Opportunity. The right talent at the right time." Then, to his frustration, she changed the topic. "Did you know that the Sentinel Marshals still have an active warrant for you, Natrac?"

"Do they?" Natrac asked. It was a struggle to keep himself calm. Benti knew he wanted to escape, he was certain of it. He was also certain that she knew she had all of the power in their unspoken negotiations-she was the one on the other side of the door. She was toying with him.

There had to be something she wanted though, especially if she'd come up here so quickly after leaving Biish's side. Natrac stepped right up to the bars. "I suppose you're wondering why an old ganglord who fled both a rival and the Sentinel Marshals would risk coming back to Sharn."

"Actually, I was wondering what you knew about our Lord Storm."

Natrac tried to conceal the surprise that pa.s.sed through him, but Benti smiled at the slight widening of his eyes. "You want out, don't you, Natrac? Help me and maybe I'll help you." She didn't wait for a response. Her voice dropped slightly. "Biish was so excited at getting his old nemesis in his hands that he didn't think to try and find out what you'd been doing in Malleon's Gate. I asked a few questions though. You were busy last night, Natrac. I don't know who this green-eyed human you were asking about is, but the half-elf you were looking for sounds a lot like Storm. If you saw my dragonmark through your peephole, then you saw Storm. Is he the one you're looking for?"

Natrac watched her for a moment, suspicion and mistrust pooling in his belly, then nodded slowly.

Benti's face tightened. "I know he's from House Lyrandar-I would have known even without his joke of an alias-but that's as far as I've gotten. Who is he?"

She was holding something back, he knew. Biish hadn't seemed to care who Lord Storm really was, and Natrac had to admit to himself that if someone using an alias had come to him with enough gold while he'd been in Biish's position, he wouldn't have cared either. And Biish wouldn't be happy if he discovered his captive had escaped, but Benti was still willing to risk it to find out Vennet's ident.i.ty. Natrac ground his teeth together, then thrust his jaw forward. "Why do you want to know?" he asked.

Benti looked into his eyes, her face utterly expressionless, then turned away. The floor seemed to fall out from under Natrac as she walked to the door of the outer chamber.

"No!" he shouted and flung himself at the cell door, clutching at the bars of the window. "Benti! Benti, come back! I'll tell you. Let me out! I need to get out!"

But the chamber door closed behind her and didn't open again.