The Fading Dream_ Thorn of Breland - Keith Baker [95]
“No one else?”
No. If you’re thinking of Marudrix, he must have been captured. Or killed, if that’s possible. I suggest you start thinking about escape.
“Escape?” Thorn looked around herself. She could see the wall of bones far away. The towers stretched up toward the night sky, but they had changed while she was inside; they seemed to be formed from raw muscle, glistening wetly in the light of the moons. “Without Drix?”
Yes, well, I suppose you could try to find Drix and rescue him. On your own. Given your spectacular success rate to this point, I think the Citadel would prefer that you admit defeat while you’re still alive and get safely back. If you can even manage that.
“Such confidence,” Thorn said.
Then it all fell into place.
“Of course.” She cursed.
What?
“Don’t you see? It’s only a dream.”
I’m afraid I don’t see at all. And dreams aren’t exactly my area of expertise.
Thorn stood up. Her thoughts were racing, and she felt a renewed surge of energy. “The manticore told us this place was both dream and reality, right?”
Correct. If that’s literally true, it means that we are in some way on the plane of Dal Quor at this moment, that we are physically walking through dreams.
“These things play on fear. When I faced them, every time I doubted myself, every time I thought I might fail, I did. While Drix—”
Succeeded against all odds despite having little more than a sunny disposition and the most unlikely magical weapon I’ve seen.
“Exactly. Aureon’s word, I felt better when he smiled at me. When he finally fell, it was when Shan Doresh confronted him with his fears. Stole that confidence away.”
So do you truly think you can do anything you can imagine in this place?
“I don’t know.” She looked up at the sky. “I’m not flying now, so the answer appears to be no. I think it’s smaller than that. Luck. Not thinking about the ways that I’ll fail.”
This begins to sound like a kalashtar sermon.
“I suppose it does. But it’s worth a try. I believe I can find Drix.”
And how will you do that, exactly?
Thorn sighed. “Always the practical one, aren’t you? Still …” She reached back and ran two fingers over the stone in her neck then shifted to feel the shard in the base of her spine. “Drix could sense the other stones with his crystal heart. He was surprised I couldn’t.”
Which could be because your shards are not, in fact, ancient eladrin relics.
“Yes,” she said. “Or it could be because I don’t believe that they are. I’ve spent this entire mission questioning everything. Perhaps it’s time that I try believing the story and seeing where it takes me.”
If you think that will work, I’d like to see you try.
“Fine,” Thorn said. She slid the dagger back into his sheath and closed her eyes.
It wasn’t so easy for Thorn to concentrate. All of her other senses had returned to their full sensitivity. Even with her eyes closed, she could hear the feet against the stones below, feel the beasts in the air moving overhead, smell the salty tang of tears and blood. She did her best to push it away, to focus on a single sensation: the stone in her neck.
For a long time after Far Passage, the stone had been a source of constant pain. She’d relied on dreamlily and alcohol to dull the agony, weaning herself only when the addiction nearly brought down a mission. She realized that the pain was still there, that she’d just learned to hold it at bay. It wasn’t physical pain at all. It was anger, hatred. She could feel hundreds of voices in the stone, clamoring for release, raging at her. She could faintly sense Daine, doing his best to hold the others at bay and bring her what peace he could. Drulkalatar, filled with feral hatred, was there too. And she sensed another, vast and dark, filled with hunger … Sarmondelaryx herself.
There were more, dozens more, hundreds. She remembered the vision that had come to her in Fallen, walking through the chamber of whispering skulls, and Tira’s words at the Silver Tree. The Preserving Shard holds the spirits of our greatest leaders. She