Swords Against the Shadowland

Soft light, cook smells, and the sounds of voices spilled out. With widening eyes the Mouser stepped beyond the barrier into a vast chamber filled with slender white columns, each lit with a torch or lantern, and scores of people.

Unlacing her cloak with one hand, Jesane smiled as she greeted a gnarly old man whose only garment was a dirty loincloth. Bowing, obviously pleased to see her, he took her crossbow and held out his other hand for the black garment.

A small throng quickly gathered around them, but farther into the chamber more hung back, watching uncertainly. Men and women of varying ages, small children—most bore the marks and trappings of poverty and deprivation. Their faces were gaunt, and rags made their clothing. Some reclining on pallets strained weakly to rise up and see who had come from the tunnels. Others continued disinterestedly at small tasks.

Standing near the Mouser, Mish covered his mouth with a hand and suddenly coughed. Somewhere in the chamber, someone echoed him. A low moan followed that. In the farthest corner, a child wept softly while a woman's weary voice cooed a quiet lullaby.

The Mouser caught Nuulpha's arm and gripped it, struck by the horror he saw before him. "Are they all sick?"

With stiffened jaw and clenched teeth, Nuulpha nodded. "This is Malygris's legacy."

The throng parted to reveal the new speaker, an old man with dark, glittering eyes under white, bushy brows, with a snowy, unkempt beard that covered his chin. Torchlight gleamed on his pale, shirtless torso, on blue-veined skin thin as parchment. He extended a hand; the fingers, gnarled and brittle as dead twigs, trembled.

Before him, the Mouser realized, stood the leader of this troubled band. Gently, he shook the offered hand as he stared into those dark eyes to see the power and wisdom they contained. "I think I have you to thank for my rescue," he said with a short bow.

The old man laughed. "Oh no!" he said. "You owe the corporal for that."

"Over drinks," Nuulpha reminded, grinning. "You promised me a great ballad if I ever hauled your fat out of Rokkarsh's dungeon. So when word spread through the garrison that a little man dressed all in gray had broken into and burned one of the Forbidden Towers, I saw my chance to be immortalized in song."

The Mouser grew suddenly glum. Fafhrd, not he, was the singer and composer of songs. Fafhrd would write a ballad worthy of Nuulpha. Of course, he'd make Jesane the centerpiece of it—that was Fafhrd. But it would be a song to make an audience laugh and applaud. The Mouser, himself, had no bardic skill, certainly none to match that of his northern companion.

"Where is your companion?" the old man asked suddenly, his gaze fixed steadfastly on the Mouser's face.

The Mouser glared sharply at the old man. Those dark, glittering eyes locked with his; a vague sense of vertigo washed over him, and for a moment, he felt as if he might fall. They were wells, those eyes, deep yawning wells. The Mouser blinked and backed half a step.

"Who are you?" he murmured suspiciously.

The old man did not bow, but lowered his eyes politely. "I am called Demptha Negatarth," he answered.

"The jeweler on Temple Street?" the Mouser rubbed his chin. "I have heard of you and that you also dabble in sorcery."

Demptha Negatarth forced a tight smile as he held up his brittle, nearly fleshless fingers. "And so, like most others here, I have fallen victim to Malygris's legacy." Lowering one hand, he beckoned with the other for the Mouser to follow. "But you regard me suspiciously, wondering how I know of your friend. I could confess that Nuulpha told me, but in truth I think we have been expecting both of you for some time."

Jesane took his arm, and with feeble steps he led the way to the far side of the chamber, weaving carefully among the pallets, greeting the sick with small, reassuring nods. The Mouser stared at them, feeling a growing weakness in his stomach. Some were covered with sores and strange black patches. Many appeared wasted, starved. A man too weak to hold up his own head coughed bits of sputum and mucus while a tearful woman tried to soothe him.

Blackened samovars perched over pots of hot coals poured pungent, herb-flavored steam into the air.

"Parents," Demptha Negatarth whispered to the Mouser as he nodded toward an elderly couple who knelt laving water over a sweating younger man. He nodded to a man who smeared salve over a young woman’s sores. "Relatives," he said. He paused to lay a sympathetic hand on the shoulder of a woman who merely sat holding another woman's hand. "Lovers," he whispered.

But the Mouser barely heard. A numbing cold shivered through him. Wrapped in a tiny blanket, a beautiful little girl-child slept fitfully, her skin pale in the lamplight, her brow beaded with droplets. A strand of blond hair clung wetly to one cheek. Tucked neatly in the crook of one arm, she held a familiar straw dolly.