Windwalker - Elaine Cunningham [74]
"Your sword," the drow said, his eyes moving pointedly to the jeweled hilt.
Sharlarra glanced down. The gems had been pried from the hilt and pommel, leaving empty sockets. Her opponent opened one palm to show the small, glittering hoard-including the sapphire she had placed on the ground.
"Impressive," she said and meant it.
"To you, perhaps. I could remove your lungs and liver without leaving a scar."
The gleam in the drow's eyes revealed how eager he was to begin this new project, but as he spoke, he shifted his forearm slightly, a subtle movement that nonetheless drew the eye. Sharlarra noted the faint raised line that traced a path from elbow to wrist-a mark that the drow was obviously eager to keep from view.
"No scar?" she said, gazing pointedly at his arm. "Too bad your former opponent didn't have your skill."
Fury twisted the dark face, and Sharlarra knew she had struck the right chord. She would die-there was no help for that-but a least her fate would be swifter and kinder than that suffered by the half-slaughtered lizard.
The drow lunged and caught Sharlarra's now-unbalanced sword with his weapon's cross guard. A deft twist disarmed the elf, and another quick stroke slapped aside her attempt to pull a dagger. The drow leaped and spun, lashing out high and hard with his elbow, slamming into Sharlarra's face and following with a smash from his pommel.
There was a bright burst of pain, followed by the quick flow of blood. Sharlarra dashed it away as best she could, but her eyes stung and swam. Blinded, she was helpless to block or dodge the repeated blows from the flat of the dark elf's sword, the taunting, stinging cuts from its edge.
Dimly, as if from a great distance, the elf became aware of a great light dawning somewhere beyond the cavern. She felt herself falling and did not care.
A sense of peace came over her, an easing of pain that had little to do with the abuse meted out by a vengeful drow. Despite all she had done, all the mistakes she'd crammed into her life, a place of light awaited. Sharlarra had never dreamed that such a thing was possible.
So it was that when at last the darkness came, the elf went into it with a smile on her face.
Khelben Arunsun crouched in a deserted cavern a few leagues from Skullport, backlit by the fading remnants of his blinding light spell. He carefully split his attention between the battered elf female on the cavern floor and the silent tunnels beyond. The drow band had scattered like cockroaches before a suddenly lit lamp, but where dark elves were concerned, not even an archmage could afford a moment's incaution.
Sharlarra groaned and stirred. The wizard pinched her jaws open and poured another healing potion into her mouth, grimly vowing to make the apprentice work off the cost of all three of them. He mentally listed the most odious chores and invented a few more for good measure.
The elf's eyes flickered open and slowly took focus. For just a moment, their green depths held all the bleakness of a northland winter.
Khelben did not have to ask what that meant. There had been times when he, too, had been less than pleased to awake and find himself still among the living.
He banished these thoughts from his face and arranged his features in a fearsome scowl. "Stupid girl. What I have told you about fighting drow?"
Sharlarra struggled up, propping herself on one elbow and gingerly pressed the fingertips of her other hand against the large knot on her forehead.
"Don't?" she ventured.
"That, too." The wizard sighed and settled back on his heels. "Lady Sharlarra Vindreth-if that is indeed your name-have you any idea what you've done?"
"I thought I was helping two companions on their way."
"You didn't think at all! Liriel Baenre is not just any drow, although Mystra knows that would be bad enough. She opened herself to Lolth's power in a way few mortals ever have. She was, albeit briefly, an avatar