The Last Threshold
Page 36

It wasn’t hard for him to guess where Dahlia was going each morning, and he followed her movements closely, movements that almost always put her back near Artemis Entreri.
Curiously, he didn’t note her retreating to Entreri’s room again, as on that first night. Usually they sat together at the table that Entreri had taken as his own in the common room (even ejecting, with a few well-chosen words, anyone who might be there whenever he arrived), huddled over a bottle of Feywine.
On one such occasion, the second night after he had learned of Minnow Skipper’s intended roundabout voyage, Effron took a great chance, casting his wraithform enchantment and melting into the inn’s wall, then traveling the seams in the wood very near to Entreri’s table to eavesdrop on the pair.
They said little as the night passed, and Effron realized that he couldn’t stay much longer, that his enchantment would wear away. With a mental sigh, he started off, but just then he heard Dahlia whisper to Entreri, “You can’t imagine the pain.”
“I thought I could,” he replied. “Isn’t that why you’re here?”
“I think it’s different,” she replied. “The violation—”
“Don’t begin to suggest that,” the man said, each word sounding sharp-edged.
“The pregnancy, I mean,” Dahlia clarified.
There was something about the timbre of her voice that had Effron off his guard. The Dahlia he knew was brash and angry, and even with Drizzt there was always a hunger in her voice, crude and abrasive. But not now. Now there was a deep sobriety, though she had drained a bottle and more of Feywine, and a profound sense of humility ran about the edges of her tone.
And of course, the word “pregnancy” had Effron riveted.
“Every day reminded me,” Dahlia said. “Every day, knowing that he would return to me, probably to kill me now that I had done my part to bear him a child.”
She was certainly talking about Herzgo Alegni, Effron thought.
Entreri lifted his glass and tipped it slightly to show his deference.
“I hated it and hated him,” Dahlia spat. “And hated the baby most of all.”
“Murderously so,” Entreri remarked, and Dahlia winced, and Effron, though he could only barely see her from his wooden perch, thought he noted a bit of moisture in her eyes, and indeed, a tear rolled down Dahlia’s cheek.
“No,” she said, then quickly admitted, “Yes,” and the tremor in her voice rang clearly. “And I did it, or thought I had.”
“The only regret that I have ever known is that I regret when I regret,” Entreri said, rather callously, Effron thought. “You cannot change what has happened.”
“But you can move forward to make amends.”
Entreri scoffed at that remark.
“Isn’t that what you’re doing right now?” Dahlia accused. “Isn’t that why you traveled to Port Llast with us?”
“I wanted my dagger back.”
“No,” Dahlia said, shaking her head and now smiling, and now, too, that the conversation had shifted back to Entreri’s issues, Effron had to take his leave. He slipped out of the building into the alleyway and returned to his corporeal form, then immediately fell back against the building, needing the support of the solid wall to keep him upright.
He tried to make sense of the conversation he had overheard, but the mere fact that it was a reference to him, and to that murderous act, had him overwhelmed, and only added to his already mounting sense of desperation.
He needed to hear that conversation again, but not between Dahlia and someone else. He needed to hear her admit her crime to him, openly, so that he could pay her back violently.
But she was going to sail away, for months, and on a journey that might well drop her at any port along the way, particularly considering the explosion he foresaw between Dahlia and Drizzt. Drizzt would return to Baldur’s Gate, unless Dahlia and Entreri killed him, but Dahlia and Entreri might not. There was nothing for them in the north, any more than elsewhere, for they were clearly not possessed of Drizzt’s sense of duty regarding Port Llast.
He was going to lose her, perhaps never to regain the trail.
And he was so close!
And so it was decided for him, then and there. He rushed down to the docks, a purse of gold in his hand. Then, his task complete, he hustled for a particular alleyway, a dead end corridor he had meticulously scouted along the route Dahlia would surely take on her return to Drizzt.
There were a few people on the main boulevard despite the late hour. Effron grew nervous watching them, and began stepping from foot to foot. Would they intervene and stifle his well-laid plans? What was he doing here? Even if he got away, Draygo Quick would be waiting for him on the other end of his shadowstep, and the old wretch would not be amused.
He almost abandoned his plans. Almost, but then he told himself that it was now or perhaps never, and then, before he could argue in the other direction, she appeared at the end of the lane.
She walked past the street lamps, seeming distracted—likely, she had just come from Artemis Entreri’s bed, Effron surmised, and that unsettling notion only made him hate her even more.
Effron fought hard to get out of his own thoughts. He had almost missed the cue, he realized. He had timed this perfectly, count by count, step by step, and if he wanted to catch one as dangerous as Dahlia, he had to be perfect.
He counted the street lamps, then again, measuring her pace, holding himself back until the very moment she reached the appointed spot. Then he held his steps in proper cadence, and didn’t run into her path as his heart screamed at him to do.
He crossed to the far side of the main avenue, directly in line with Dahlia’s sight, at just the right time.
She was close enough to see him, but not close enough to catch him.
Dahlia’s eyes went wide, and she staggered a bit, clearly overwhelmed.
Effron purposely did not look directly at her, and shifted past, into the alleyway. He broke into a run, suppressing his fears that she would not follow, refusing to allow the doubting words into his mind: Had he so shocked her with his presence that she might just run off?
The end of the alley turned to the right, around the back of one building. From that corner, he peeked back toward the street, and his heart leaped when Dahlia, walking cautiously, turning into the alleyway. With the backlighting of the street lamps, he could see her, but she couldn’t see him. He knew that fact from his meticulous scouting, but despite his intellectual confidence, his emotions almost broke him again.
Effron mentally scolded himself and began his quiet spellcasting. With a last glance toward Dahlia, who was now several strides into the alleyway, he released his dweomers, his three dimensional form becoming that of a wraith once more.
He walked into the seams of the stone building—he had wraith-walked this route many, many times, determining it exactly—and slithered along the course of the alleyway, passing Dahlia, who did not notice. Now beyond her, nearer the street, he waited, and that was the hardest part of all!
Dahlia reached the corner and peered around, now in a low crouch, weapon in hand. Yes, weapon in hand, Effron thought, for she meant to do that which she had failed to do on the day of his birth.
Effron slid out from the wall and resumed his normal form. He wanted to shout out at Dahlia, but couldn’t actually find his voice in that moment. He took out a jar and dumped its contents on the cobblestones. The tiny undead umber hulk began stomping toward its prey even before the miniaturization dweomer had worn away, like a large bug skittering down the alley. Just a few tiny strides from Effron, it began to grow, and its footsteps began to resound with a thunderous report.
Dahlia leaped around, her eyes going wide, to Effron’s satisfaction.
The umber hulk charged in, fully grown now, twice a man’s height and thrice a man’s girth, with huge clacking mandibles snapping at the air, and waving menacingly giant hooked hands that could dig through stone, let alone tender flesh.
With trembling fingers, Effron brought forth the scroll tube. Dare he try? Or should he just kill her and be done with it?
A lumbering swing of his pet never got near to hitting the quick elf, and she countered with a solid stab of her long staff right between the mandibles—and retracted the weapon far too quickly for those hooked weapons to snap shut on it.
This was not an umber hulk, Effron reminded himself. It was a zombie, gigantic and imposing, but not nearly as clever, quick, or overpowering as it had been in life.
And Dahlia, apparently, was already figuring that out. She struck and struck again with her powerful weapon, and another lumbering swing from the behemoth missed badly. The beast ducked low to snap at her, only to have her smash it several times atop the head. Effron could see her confidence growing. She had started with her long staff, no doubt to keep the powerful creature somewhat at bay, but now, obviously confident that this monster wouldn’t get close to hitting her, she broke Kozah’s Needle down to the twin flails and went into a spinning dance, using every step in the tight alleyway to buy her enough room to strike and retreat.
For many heartbeats, Effron just watched the magnificence of this elf woman at her craft. She actually leaped to stand atop the monster’s thick arm on one low swing, rattled off a barrage of strikes with her weapons, and back-flipped away before the umber hulk zombie could respond.
The young warlock heard his breath coming in gasps, and the shock of that, the shock of realizing that he was wasting time, that his moment was slipping quickly away, jolted him into action. He popped the end off the tube and slid out and unrolled the spell, and immediately fell into casting. The dweomer was far beyond his understanding, of course, and the probability was that he would waste the scroll to no effect, or worse, destroy himself in the futile attempt.
But Effron didn’t let those doubts deter him, focusing instead on the situation before him, fast deteriorating.
He was losing her!
Again, Dahlia would get away, or would get to him and be rid of him, as she had tried once before.
Anger drove him. Outrage drove him. He began the incantation, every symbol on the scroll crystallizing before him, every syllable he spoke a distinct denial that Dahlia would again escape him.
He lost himself in that focus. Nothing mattered except the next word, the proper cadence, of the dweomer. Nothing else could matter, or all would be lost.
He was halfway through, but he didn’t know it.
Down the alleyway, Dahlia scored a solid hit and heightened it with a tremendous blast of lightning energy form Kozah’s Needle that threw the behemoth backward, to tumble to its back, but Effron didn’t know it.
He pressed on. He got to the last line, the critical release, and as he spoke the last word, he peered over the top of the scroll.
There stood Dahlia, staring back at him, staring back at her broken son, her arms limp at her sides, her jaw hanging open, her face a mask of shock, as if she couldn’t bear to look at him.
A metal plate appeared in the air and swung down to slam against the woman. A second appeared on the other side, knocking her back the way she had come. A third and a fourth showed, all swinging as if on a puppet master’s string. Dahlia tried to block, but they were too heavy and tossed her about with ease. She tried to dodge away, but there were too many, and the magic too coordinated.