Fate

Chapter 18 — Fate

The scream came a third time.

Xil knew immediately that it was not human.

That did not make it better.

It began deep inside the cave as a thin, rising shriek and expanded until the stone around them seemed to answer. Something in the sound scraped against instinct. Not pain alone. Rage. Hunger.

Perhaps both.

Jandar stood at the cave mouth with his rapier drawn.

“Well,” he said, “we found something.”

Deacon raised his crossbow.

“We found a reason to leave.”

Jandar looked back at him.

“You’re actually suggesting that?”

“I’m reminding you it’s an option.”

“That’s disappointing.”

Deacon was the oldest-looking of them, though not old. Xil had noticed that distinction almost immediately after joining the Order. Deacon carried his years differently than Jandar did. The fighter was solidly built, his movements economical, his face more accustomed to watching for trouble than smiling at it.

Jandar seemed determined to make up for him.

The pirate adjusted the strange old armor they had found beneath Tavalon and peered into the cave.

“I vote for finding out what screamed.”

“No one called for a vote,” Deacon said.

Zook came up beside them.

The gnome barely reached the height of Deacon’s belt, but he looked more eager to enter the cave than any of the humans.

“I’m curious.”

Deacon sighed.

“Of course you are.”

Vegon was staring at the entrance.

Not the darkness.

The stone.

“There are marks here.”

Xil turned.

“Natural?”

“I don’t know yet.”

That was enough to bring Vegon closer.

Xil stepped between him and the wall.

Vegon stopped.

“What?”

“Look first.”

“I was going to.”

“From there.”

Jandar smiled.

“He’s learning.”

Vegon ignored him.

Xil looked into the cave again.

His eyes adjusted easily.

That had been one of the few gifts the Underdark had given him that he had never needed to question. Darkness was not an absence to Xil. It had depth. Shape. Distance.

The cave narrowed immediately beyond the entrance.

The floor sloped down.

And thirty feet inside, something lay across the passage.

Xil raised one hand.

“Bodies.”

The others quieted.

Deacon stepped beside him.

“How many?”

“At least three.”

“Gnoll?”

Xil studied the shapes.

“Yes.”

Zook moved forward.

Deacon caught his shoulder.

“Wait.”

The ranger looked up.

Deacon pointed toward the stone above the bodies.

Blood darkened it.

Not old blood.

Xil saw more of it along the floor.

A trail.

Something had dragged one of the gnolls deeper into the cave.

Jandar’s voice lost its humor.

“Whatever they came here for, it didn’t go well.”

Xil looked back toward the daylight.

Six sets of gnoll tracks had entered.

None had left.

That did not mean the gnolls had been wrong to come.

That bothered him more.

“Stay together,” Deacon said.

Jandar looked at him.

“I thought I was leading.”

“You thought wrong.”

“I often do. It rarely stops me.”

They entered.

The smell reached them before the next chamber.

Blood.

Decay.

Something sour beneath both.

Zook covered his nose.

“That’s unpleasant.”

Jandar whispered, “Finally, the ranger speaks wisdom.”

Vegon carried a small magical light near one shoulder. Its glow pushed farther into the tunnel, though not nearly as far as Xil could see.

The cave opened.

Xil stopped.

Bones covered the ground.

Not a few.

Dozens.

Some were old enough to have lost all color. Others still carried scraps of clothing and dried flesh. Human among them. Gnoll as well. At least one skeleton was too small to belong to either.

Zook crouched beside it.

“Gnome.”

Xil watched his expression.

Zook said nothing else.

Small holes broke the cavern floor in several places, each wide enough for something substantial to pass through.

Deacon saw them.

“Burrows.”

“Yes,” Zook said.

“Recent?”

Zook moved to another.

“Some.”

Jandar kept his eyes on the holes.

“Things living underground inside a cave feels excessive.”

“No,” Xil said.

Jandar glanced at him.

“No?”

“We are underground.”

“That is not the point.”

Xil almost smiled.

Almost.

Then blue light appeared along the far wall.

Every trace of amusement vanished.

Vegon saw it at the same moment.

“No.”

Jandar looked toward him.

“That sounded remarkably like Deacon.”

Vegon walked forward.

The glow strengthened.

Cold.

Steady.

Familiar.

Xil felt unease settle into him before the source came fully into view.

The crystal rose from the cavern floor.

Blue.

Jagged.

Embedded in the stone exactly as the one beneath Tavalon had been.

No one spoke.

The silence lasted long enough that Xil could hear water dripping somewhere beyond the chamber.

Jandar finally broke it.

“I liked it better when there was only one.”

Deacon approached carefully.

“Same?”

Vegon moved around the edge of the glow.

“It appears identical.”

“Appears?”

“I am leaving room for the possibility that two mysterious ancient crystals may possess differences I cannot identify by looking at them.”

Deacon stared at him.

Vegon added, “Yes. It is the same.”

Zook moved toward one of the nearby burrows.

“Then the gnolls might have come through this one.”

“Or were trying to,” Deacon said.

Xil looked at the bodies.

The gnolls closest to the crystal had not been killed cleanly.

Something had torn them apart.

Whatever had happened here, the crystal had not delivered them into an empty cave.

Vegon crouched several feet from the base.

“It is active.”

Deacon looked at him.

“We know.”

“I mean magically.”

“We also know that.”

Vegon frowned.

“I was confirming it.”

Jandar leaned toward Xil.

“He gets defensive when we understand him too quickly.”

“I have noticed.”

Vegon looked over his shoulder.

“I can hear you.”

“That was intended,” Xil said.

The blue light pulsed.

Once.

Every weapon came up.

Nothing appeared.

Another pulse.

Still nothing.

Xil watched the holes.

Something clicked beneath them.

Zook turned.

“Did everyone—”

The floor erupted.

A creature burst from one of the burrows in a spray of dirt and broken stone.

It was all chitin, hooked limbs, and a mouth that seemed designed for nothing except removing pieces from living things.

A second came from another hole.

Then a third.

“Back!” Deacon shouted.

Too late.

The first creature hit Zook hard enough to throw him against the cavern wall.

Xil moved before the gnome landed.

Divine power gathered around his hand.

He reached Zook as the creature lunged again and drove his shield between them.

The impact rang up Xil’s arm.

He held.

The thing snapped at the shield’s edge.

Its breath smelled like spoiled meat.

Xil brought his weapon down across its skull.

The blow cracked chitin.

The creature shrieked.

Not the scream they had heard outside.

Smaller.

Closer.

Angrier.

“Vegon!” Deacon called.

“I see it.”

Arcane light flared.

For an instant Vegon’s fine elven features tightened with concentration as the damaged magic resisted him.

Then the spell took shape.

Force slammed into the second creature.

It rolled across the floor.

Jandar was already moving.

He came around the first beast from the side, the old studded leather from Tavalon flexing strangely as he twisted between two hooked limbs. His rapier slid into the crack Xil had opened in its shell.

The creature jerked.

Jandar pulled the blade free.

“That one has a hole now.”

“Useful,” Xil said.

Zook regained his feet.

“I can make it bigger.”

He did.

Deacon’s crossbow snapped from behind them.

A bolt struck the second creature between two plates.

Another followed almost immediately.

Deacon rarely looked hurried in battle.

Xil had come to understand that was one of the dangerous things about him.

Jandar fought as though every opening had just occurred to him.

Zook fought like something much larger had somehow been compressed into a gnome.

Vegon made the battlefield itself less reliable.

Deacon simply chose what needed to die and worked at the problem until it did.

Xil respected that.

The third creature disappeared back into its burrow.

“Gone!” Zook called.

“No,” Deacon said.

The stone beneath Xil’s feet shifted.

He understood half a heartbeat before the thing came up.

Xil turned.

The creature struck him from below.

Pain exploded through his side.

He hit the ground.

Its forelimbs closed around him.

Jandar shouted his name.

Xil saw the creature’s mouth open.

Then a crossbow bolt entered through one side of its skull.

The point emerged beside its eye.

The creature recoiled.

Xil shoved against it.

A second bolt hit.

Zook crashed into its flank.

Jandar’s rapier followed.

The beast collapsed across Xil’s legs.

He pushed it away.

Deacon stood twenty feet back, already loading again.

Xil looked at him.

Deacon shrugged.

“You were busy.”

Xil got to his feet.

“Thank you.”

“Later.”

The first creature tried to retreat.

Zook did not allow it.

When the cavern finally became quiet again, no one trusted the silence.

Xil listened.

Clicking continued somewhere below.

Distant now.

Retreating.

Or waiting.

Neither possibility appealed to him.

Deacon pointed at the burrows.

“We are not crawling into those.”

Jandar wiped his blade.

“There goes my next suggestion.”

“No, it doesn’t.”

“No. It really doesn’t.”

The blue crystal remained unchanged.

That was somehow offensive.

Blood had been spilled around it.

Bodies covered the cavern.

Creatures burrowed beneath it.

Still the thing shone with its patient cold light.

Vegon approached again.

Xil stepped with him.

Vegon noticed.

“I am not touching it.”

“I know.”

“Then why are you following me?”

“Because you said that before.”

Jandar laughed from behind them.

Vegon did not bother responding.

They found no markings.

No seams.

No indication that the crystal had grown naturally or been placed.

It simply entered the floor.

Deacon crouched beside a dead gnoll.

“This one was here longer than the others.”

Zook came over.

“How can you tell?”

“Different gear.”

Xil looked.

Deacon was right.

The dead gnoll wore rotting leather unlike the newer equipment they had seen on the road.

Jandar studied another skeleton.

“These too.”

The bones surrounding the crystal had accumulated across years.

Perhaps decades.

Vegon looked around slowly.

“So this site has been active for some time.”

“Or visited repeatedly,” Xil said.

Deacon pointed deeper into the cave.

“There’s more.”

A crude barricade blocked a narrow passage on the far side.

Wood.

Stone.

Old bones.

Anything someone could have dragged into place.

Not built from this side.

Xil looked at the bodies again.

“Someone was trying to keep something out.”

Jandar considered the wall.

“Or keep something in.”

No one liked that version.

They dismantled the barricade.

Slowly.

The tunnel beyond opened into a cavern so large that even Xil could not see its ceiling clearly.

Their lights disappeared upward.

Water filled much of the far side, black and still.

Broken stone columns rose from the floor.

And between them stood a dragon.

Jandar stopped.

“No.”

Vegon nearly walked into him.

“What?”

Jandar pointed.

The dragon did not move.

Xil stared.

Then he saw the fractures.

Stone.

A statue.

Enormous even with one wing partly broken.

Vegon walked closer.

“That is the same style.”

Xil knew what he meant.

Tavalon.

The arch.

The throne.

The altar.

Dragons preserved in stone where real dragons had disappeared from the world.

Zook circled one of the columns.

“Why here?”

“No idea,” Vegon said.

Jandar looked at him.

“You’re becoming much more comfortable with that phrase.”

“I am surrounded by increasingly unreasonable things.”

Xil stepped toward the statue.

Its head had been carved looking downward.

Not threatening.

Watching.

Protecting.

That impression disturbed him more than a snarling dragon would have.

A faint clicking sound came from farther inside.

Zook looked toward it.

“So we have more company.”

They did.

The creatures came from cracks in the cavern wall this time.

Larger ones.

The fight was ugly and fast.

Xil remembered pieces of it afterward.

Zook disappearing under a sweep of chitin and coming back up with both blades working.

Deacon choosing lanes between the stone columns and somehow never putting a bolt where Jandar intended to be next.

Jandar falling on the loose rock while trying to cross the cavern too quickly, swearing as he went down, then getting back up as if nobody had seen it.

Everyone had.

Vegon laughing once despite himself before a creature nearly removed his arm.

The smell when the creatures died.

The eggs.

They found clusters of them in the upper recesses of the cavern.

Zook stared upward.

“That seems bad.”

“Yes,” Xil said.

Vegon raised one hand.

“Move.”

Fire washed across the nest.

The eggs shriveled and burst.

Jandar watched from below.

“I was going to suggest we cook them.”

Zook looked horrified.

Jandar smiled.

“See? You’re all learning when I’m joking.”

Then Xil saw the light.

Not blue.

White.

Almost silver.

It moved upward.

He frowned.

“Vegon.”

The wizard turned.

Xil pointed.

A stream of luminous energy emerged from a crack in the cavern floor.

It did not pour down.

It rose.

Like a waterfall running in reverse.

The flow climbed twenty feet into the air before thinning into nothing.

Something floated inside it.

A sphere.

No.

A bubble.

Within it, a shape.

Jandar stepped closer.

“Is that a person?”

Xil felt the hair rise along his arms.

“Perhaps.”

Vegon’s attention had become absolute.

“That energy is unlike the crystal.”

“Good,” Deacon said.

“That was not reassurance.”

“I know.”

The stream made no sound.

It simply rose.

Endlessly.

From nowhere to nowhere.

Xil had seen divine manifestations.

He had stood within consecrated places and places abandoned by every god anyone remembered.

He knew what faith felt like.

This was not faith.

He knew what arcane power felt like.

This was not that either.

Or not entirely.

There was something older in it.

Not ancient in the way the Tavalon stones were ancient.

Fundamental.

As though the energy did not belong to a civilization at all.

Xil did not like it.

Jandar was already looking at the columns.

“No.”

Deacon said it this time.

Jandar looked at him.

“I haven’t done anything.”

“You’re planning.”

“Yes.”

“No.”

“It’s twenty feet.”

“Still no.”

Jandar pointed at the sphere.

“There is someone trapped in there.”

That changed the argument.

Xil stared at the shape again.

He could see it now.

Humanlike.

Motionless.

A woman, perhaps.

Suspended inside the sphere.

“How long?” Zook asked.

No one answered.

Jandar began climbing.

Deacon swore.

The first attempt ended with Jandar striking the ground.

Hard.

Xil looked down at him.

Jandar remained flat on his back.

“Did you get it?” Zook asked.

Jandar raised one hand.

“No.”

Deacon looked toward the cavern entrance.

“We can still leave.”

Jandar sat up.

“You have become very negative.”

“You jumped off a column.”

“I almost had it.”

“You did not touch it.”

“I almost almost had it.”

Vegon tilted his head.

“That is mathematically meaningless.”

“Thank you, Vegon.”

“You are welcome.”

Jandar climbed again.

Xil watched despite himself.

He had known men like Jandar in the Underdark.

Not pirates.

Men who behaved as though danger were an argument they intended to win by refusing to respect it.

Most died young.

Jandar seemed to have made an art of surviving the same instinct.

He leapt.

Passed through the flowing energy.

Missed the sphere.

And fell again.

This time he landed better.

He looked surprised.

“Nothing.”

Vegon stepped closer.

“What?”

“The energy. I went through it.”

“And?”

“And I’m still devastatingly handsome.”

Deacon looked at Xil.

Xil said, “No obvious effect.”

“Thank you,” Jandar said.

“That was not agreement with the second statement.”

Zook volunteered next.

Between the gnome’s size and the height of the sphere, that became impractical almost immediately.

Then someone looked at Xil.

Xil stared back.

“No.”

Jandar pointed at the column.

“You can reach farther.”

“No.”

Deacon folded his arms.

Xil looked at him.

“You are enjoying this.”

“A little.”

Xil sighed.

Eventually the plan involved Deacon’s shoulders.

Xil refused to discuss how.

The important part was that someone finally reached the sphere.

Jandar.

Of course it was Jandar.

He caught it with both hands as he passed through the stream, landed badly, nearly lost it, and staggered away holding the translucent thing against his chest.

“Ha!”

Deacon rushed forward.

“Careful.”

“I have it.”

“That is what concerns me.”

The sphere trembled.

Jandar’s smile disappeared.

“Vegon?”

The moment the bubble crossed fully beyond the rising stream, its surface ruptured.

Not shattered.

Opened.

Light spilled across the cavern.

Jandar dropped his hands.

The sphere vanished.

A woman stood where it had been.

No.

Xil corrected himself immediately.

Something wearing the shape of a woman stood there.

Her edges shimmered.

Light moved through her rather than across her.

For an instant Xil could see the stone behind her.

Then she became solid again.

Zook took one step backward.

Deacon raised his crossbow.

Vegon whispered, “Remarkable.”

Xil tightened his grip on his holy symbol.

The woman looked at them.

Her expression held such exhaustion that, for one dangerous moment, Xil almost trusted her.

“Thank you.”

Her voice filled the cavern without echoing.

Jandar lowered his rapier.

“You’re welcome.”

Xil looked at him.

Jandar glanced sideways.

“What?”

“You do not know what she is.”

“I know she thanked me.”

“That is not enough.”

The woman looked at Xil.

He disliked the feeling that she had heard more than his words.

“You are right to question.”

“Who are you?”

She smiled.

Not warmly.

Not coldly either.

“Fate.”

Xil’s hand tightened around the symbol at his chest.

“No.”

Jandar looked at him.

“No?”

Xil kept his eyes on the woman.

“Fate is not a name.”

“It is mine.”

“Then someone gave you a dangerous one.”

Something changed in her expression.

Amusement, perhaps.

Vegon stepped forward.

“Are you a god?”

Xil wished he had not asked.

The woman considered the question.

“No.”

That should have helped.

It did not.

“A spirit?” Vegon asked.

“If that makes understanding easier.”

“It does not.”

“Good.”

Jandar leaned toward Zook.

“I like her.”

Xil heard him.

Of course he did.

“How long were you imprisoned?” Xil asked.

Fate looked toward the stream.

“When the world broke.”

Vegon stopped breathing for a moment.

“The Sundering?”

“That is what you call it.”

Xil felt the cavern become colder.

“What happened here?”

“I tried to save those who could still be saved.”

“Who?”

A sadness passed through her.

“My brothers. My sisters. Those bound to me before your kingdoms had their present names.”

That was not an answer.

Xil recognized evasion when he heard it.

“What are you?”

Fate looked at him again.

This time the amusement was gone.

“Something that remained.”

Xil disliked that answer more.

Behind her, the stream of power continued rising.

Vegon stared into it.

“You were trapped inside that?”

“Yes.”

“By whom?”

“No one.”

The answer came immediately.

“When the world tore itself apart, powers that had been contained were released. Others became trapped.”

Her gaze moved toward the old dragon statue.

“The world changed shape faster than those within it could understand.”

Vegon looked almost feverish with questions.

Xil spoke before he could begin.

“Orozon.”

Fate turned.

That produced a reaction.

Small.

Enough.

“You know the name,” Xil said.

“Yes.”

Jandar came closer.

“We’re looking for his temple.”

“You are looking for more than his temple.”

Xil’s unease deepened.

“We asked about Orozon.”

Fate’s gaze returned to him.

“So you did.”

Deacon stepped forward.

“What do you know?”

For the first time Fate looked almost ordinary.

Almost.

“Orozon served Fyros. Among the Scourge Lords, few stood closer to him. He commanded armies when armies still marched beneath banners the world now remembers only as warnings.”

“Gnolls?” Deacon asked.

“Yes.”

The word hit him visibly.

His face did not change much.

With Deacon, it rarely did.

But his shoulders became still.

Too still.

“Orozon commanded them?”

“Many of them.”

“Then what’s happening now may be connected to him.”

Fate regarded him.

“It may.”

Deacon’s voice sharpened.

“That is not much of an answer.”

“No.”

He stared at her.

Fate did not look away.

Xil understood then that Deacon disliked her too.

For different reasons.

That comforted him slightly.

Vegon pointed toward the luminous stream.

“This energy. Can it be used?”

Xil closed his eyes briefly.

Fate smiled.

“Everything can be used.”

“That is not what I meant.”

“I know.”

“Vegon,” Xil said.

The high elf looked at him.

“No.”

Jandar laughed quietly.

Vegon frowned.

“I was asking a question.”

“And now you have asked it.”

Fate moved closer to them.

Deacon raised the crossbow again.

She ignored it.

“You freed me,” she said. “That carries weight.”

“With whom?” Xil asked.

“With me.”

“That is precisely what concerns me.”

Fate stopped before him.

Up close, Xil could see no pupils in her eyes.

Only shifting light.

“You serve powers you cannot see.”

“I serve a god whose name I know.”

“And that makes the unknown less real?”

“No.”

Xil met her gaze.

“It makes me less willing to kneel to whatever claims authority first.”

Jandar became very quiet.

So did the others.

Fate studied Xil.

Then she smiled.

This time it was warm.

“Good.”

Xil had not expected that.

She lifted one hand.

He nearly reached for his weapon.

“Do not.”

Fate stopped.

“Would you refuse a gift?”

“Depending on the giver.”

“Wise again.”

Jandar whispered, “This is going very well.”

Deacon elbowed him.

Fate lowered her hand.

“You need not call upon me. You need not worship me. I ask neither.”

“What do you ask?” Xil said.

“Nothing.”

He believed that even less.

Fate looked from one of them to the next.

“What comes to you will not always come cleanly. There will be moments when the world seems decided before you act.”

Vegon frowned.

“What does that mean?”

“It means certainty is often a lie.”

Her eyes returned to Xil.

“Sometimes the blade slips.”

Then Deacon.

“Sometimes it does not.”

Jandar.

“The door opens.”

Zook.

“The impossible path holds.”

Finally Vegon.

“The broken thing works once more.”

Xil felt pressure move through the cavern.

Not force.

Possibility.

For one instant everything seemed to split.

He saw Jandar standing in two positions at once.

Deacon’s crossbow both raised and lowered.

A drop of water struck the cavern pool while another version of it remained suspended above the surface.

Then the sensation vanished.

Xil staggered.

Zook caught himself against the stone.

Vegon stared at his hands.

Jandar looked around.

“What did you do?”

Fate’s form was already fading.

“A kindness.”

Xil forced himself upright.

“According to you.”

“Yes.”

There was that smile again.

“According to me.”

“Can it be removed?”

“If you never call upon it, perhaps it need not matter.”

That was not an answer either.

Xil had accumulated several reasons to dislike her.

“Fate,” Vegon said quickly.

She paused.

“The Grimoire of Orozon. Do you know where it is?”

Fate looked toward the darkness beyond the cavern.

“No.”

Vegon’s disappointment was immediate.

“But,” she continued, “if his hand is moving in your age, do not mistake what you seek for a book.”

Xil frowned.

“What does that mean?”

“Orozon valued knowledge because knowledge becomes power when placed in the correct hands.”

Her form grew thinner.

“Find what he feared losing.”

Then she disappeared.

No flash.

No sound.

One moment Fate stood before them.

The next, there was empty cavern.

Jandar looked at Xil.

“Well.”

Xil kept staring at the place where she had been.

“No.”

Jandar blinked.

“I haven’t said anything yet.”

“I know.”

Zook rubbed one arm.

“Did everyone see...?”

“Yes,” Vegon said.

“Two of everything?”

“Yes.”

Deacon looked at his crossbow.

“I didn’t.”

They turned toward him.

Deacon shrugged.

“I saw three.”

Jandar smiled.

“Of course you did.”

Xil looked at his own hands.

Nothing appeared different.

That did not reassure him.

He had spent much of his life learning that the most dangerous changes were rarely visible immediately.

Vegon, predictably, looked delighted.

Xil pointed at him.

“Do not experiment with it.”

“I was not—”

“You were.”

“I was considering—”

“Quietly.”

Jandar laughed.

This time Xil let him.

They returned to the first chamber.

The blue crystal still glowed.

Xil stopped before it.

Deacon came up beside him.

“You’re thinking.”

Xil looked at the crystal.

“Yes.”

“That has been dangerous lately.”

“Jandar is affecting you.”

“I know.”

Vegon approached from behind.

“What are you thinking?”

Xil remembered Tavalon.

Gnolls appearing from empty air.

The reports from Kult.

Organized packs moving across the roads.

Orozon commanding gnoll armies four centuries ago.

And now another crystal.

Not in a buried city.

Not hidden beneath a mountain.

Here.

Along the route north.

“How many?” Xil asked.

Vegon understood immediately.

“We cannot know.”

“Two means there can be more.”

“Yes.”

Deacon looked at the crystal.

“And if they’re moving gnolls—”

“They should not have this one.”

Xil raised his weapon.

Vegon stared at him.

“Wait.”

“No.”

“We should study it.”

“You studied the first.”

“Barely.”

“And Eticus has the first.”

Vegon opened his mouth.

Xil continued.

“This one is ours.”

Jandar stepped backward.

“That sounded ominous.”

Deacon moved with him.

“I agree with Xil.”

Vegon looked betrayed.

“You always agree when the solution involves breaking something.”

“Not always.”

“Frequently.”

Xil struck the crystal.

Pain shot through his arms.

The sound was wrong.

Not stone.

Not glass.

Something between.

The glow flared.

Zook moved farther away.

“That did something.”

“Yes,” Xil said.

He struck again.

A fracture appeared.

Blue light poured through it.

The crystal screamed.

Everyone recoiled.

Xil nearly dropped his weapon.

The sound was the same one they had heard from outside.

He understood that now.

Not the winged creature.

Not the things beneath the ground.

The crystal.

It had been screaming before they ever entered.

The fracture widened.

Deacon shouted something Xil could not hear over the noise.

Xil hit it again.

The crystal shattered.

Blue light exploded across the chamber.

For a heartbeat Xil saw shapes within it.

Distant.

Moving.

Gnolls.

Perhaps.

Or only shadows created by his own expectation.

Then the light went out.

The scream stopped.

Silence struck almost as hard.

Fragments covered the floor.

No longer blue.

Black.

Dead.

Jandar waited several seconds.

“Can everyone hear?”

Zook said something.

Jandar frowned.

“What?”

Zook smiled.

Xil could barely hear either of them.

Deacon crouched beside the fragments.

He picked one up.

Nothing happened.

Vegon joined him.

“No glow.”

Xil touched another with the end of his weapon.

Nothing.

“No magic?” Deacon asked.

Vegon held a fragment close.

“Nothing I can sense.”

Xil knelt.

He gathered several pieces into a cloth.

“We take these.”

Vegon looked at him.

“You destroyed it before studying it and now you want samples.”

“Yes.”

“That is inconsistent.”

“No. It is cautious.”

Jandar leaned closer.

“What?”

Xil raised his voice.

“I SAID IT IS CAUTIOUS.”

Jandar nodded.

“Still can’t hear you.”

Xil considered hitting him.

Some things required no divine guidance at all.

They packed the fragments.

The cavern behind them remained quiet.

No creatures emerged from the burrows.

No gnolls appeared.

The dead crystal lay black against the stone.

Xil looked at it one last time before they left.

Two crystals.

One intact beneath Tavalon.

One destroyed here.

Both near gnoll movement.

Both where they had no reason to exist.

He thought of Fate.

Of Orozon.

Of a war fought four centuries ago whose roads, weapons, servants, and consequences were somehow beginning to move again.

He did not believe in coincidence as easily as Vegon sometimes accused him of believing in gods.

They emerged into daylight.

Jandar stepped into the sun first and stretched.

Zook followed.

Vegon was already examining one of the black shards again.

Deacon looked north.

Xil came out last.

For an instant, something strange happened.

A loose stone shifted beneath his boot.

He should have fallen.

He felt the exact moment his weight went wrong.

Then the stone rolled the other way.

His balance returned.

Nothing more.

Xil stopped.

Behind him the cave waited in darkness.

Ahead, Jandar called something he could not quite hear.

Xil looked down at the stone.

Chance.

Balance.

Luck.

Fate.

He disliked all four words suddenly.

Then he looked north.

They were still days from Ilbus.

Somewhere beyond it waited the Great Swamp.

And somewhere within the swamp waited the temple of a dead warlock who had once commanded gnoll armies for a Scourge Lord.

Xil adjusted his shield and followed the others.

Whatever had touched them in the cave, he would not worship it.

He would not trust it.

But as the five of them returned to the road, Xil could not quite convince himself that it had been lying.