The Clash of Shadows

epilogue

"Fading, falling, lost in forever
Will I find a way to keep it together?
Am I strong enough to last through the weather in the hurricane of my life?
Can it be a conscious decision?
That I look for ways to alter my vision?
Am I speeding towards another collision in the alleyways of my life?"

( "Pain Redefined", Disturbed)

XXX

The Port of Shadows buzzed as a beehive in the aftermath of the failed attack. Denizens of both the Night Above and Below crowded the streets even more then usual; the mercenaries and the opportunists were reluctant to leave the place that offered such a wide selection of opportunities to spend their coin.

Those less satisfied with the weight of their purses had ample chances to pocket more – The amount of corpses left in the wake of the attack was more then enough to satisfy any scavenger's needs. Three weeks later, the outtunnels were still crowded with roaming bands of goblins harvesting corpses to be turned into zombies and sold to the local labor facilities. Squabbles over the corpse-loot left behind were as common as darghazar dung; squabbles over the survivors even more so: with more then plenty slaver bands operating within the city, the demand still outnumbered the supply. Many a hopeful surfacer who came down to defend the Port for glory or gold woke up to its less pleasant sites after several drinks too many.

The word about the spoils to be had in Skullport spread like a fire, resulting in even more ships and caravans cluttering the city gates. For once, the Lords of Waterdeep did not interfere with the trade and even the Promenade soldiers were lying low. Both had more than enough wounds to lick and casualties to count to bother with the city that had, after all, been the last line of defense against the combined Hordes of the Underdark.

XXX

Sitting in an office near the warehouses, the leaders of the Dark Daggers and Bregan D'Aerthe were once again measuring each other up.

Lith My'athar. It was the prize they were both after. Zorvak'mur, the illihtid enclave, was gone, destroyed by the Promenade soldiers and their allies, and with it, an important trading crossroad was destroyed as well. But Lith My'athar still stood. And with its central position in the region - not that far from where the trading hub of Zorvak'mur had been - and a direct connection to Skullport via the Dark River…

The ancestral outpost of House Maeviir was a perfect candidate for a new trade center to replace Zorvak'mur. And supplied with inside information about it from both the Maeviir survivors and the psionic himself, the Dark Daggers and Bregan D'aerthe would easily take over the remains of Lith My'athar and claim it as their own. A safe place for both groups to conduct trade and gain information, monitor the caravans that passed through and get the first pick of goods headed for, or out of, the Port of Shadows.

And should a push come to shove, a place where both parties could easily stab one another's back in any number of creative ways they cared to devise.

Malakuth leaned back in his chair. "Will you be returning here or leave straight for Menzoberranzan?" The psionic wished to oversee the initial takeover himself.

Kimmuriel rose. "I will return. There are still a few things I need to do here before I head back home."

XXX

The half-breed stirred listlessly under the sheets. Aside from the shallow, irregular breaths, it was the only sign of life her body cared to give in the past few weeks. Tathrak harbored doubts that his charge would wake up at all.

The idea annoyed him - A mess of shattered bones and burnt flesh, it was only his quick wits that had saved her hide. …Such as it was. The spell he had used, the first that came to his mind, was the one usually used to preserve corpses and should have had no effect on the still-living bodies. In this case, though, it worked like a charm.

Now she at least looked like something belonging to the world of the living. With several priests working hard over her battered form for over a week, most of her internal organs were eventually repaired and placed back into their respective cavities, hopefully in the approximately proper positions. In the end, even her eye was restored and back in its socket, although it would be a while before she regained the full use of it. She had been lucky with that – there was barely enough eye tissue left to even try the spells on.

Tathrak made a grimace and left the room. With all the time he and his fellow priests had wasted on her, the damned little iblith better come to.

XXX

Relon looked around. The chapel wasn't as big as the ones he was used to seeing. And certainly, not dedicated to the same deity he was thought to worship his whole life. It felt… weird, to say the least, and not a little bit wrong to be there, in the place sacred to the Shadow and sacrilegious to the Spider. Shadows curled deceptively in the corners of the room, lazily stretched across the floor and, occasionally, grew thicker around the central altar upon which rested a variety of offerings the sight of which made his palms sweaty with exaltation and fear all at once.

Other drow milled about, none giving the new face among them more than a cursory glance: whoever was allowed into the hidden chapel beneath Malakuth's mansion had the right to be there. Relon found the mild curiosity and lack of hostility strange nonetheless. An involuntary shudder ran down his spine as he glanced at the altar once more. The newest offering – a huge spider with a bloated belly full of little spiderlings that would never be was still twitching. Relon had to fight the decades of dogma driven into his very bones to not leap for the throat of the one who placed it there.

"Old habits die hard," said a voice behind him. Relon spun about, startled. The blue-eyed priest watched him calmly.

"I am not reading your thoughts, if that's what you're wondering. Though if you plan to take the psionic up on his offer, you might as well start getting used to the idea."

Relon narrowed his eyes. He shouldn't have been surprised that the priest knew about his meeting with Kimmuriel earlier that day – the group he belonged to had its eyes and ears positioned everywhere in the city.

"Of course we watched you," Tathrak said plainly, which only increased the rider's suspicions about being mind-scanned even further. "We would be fools not to, before letting you enter this place." He gave the rider a meaningful look through the slits of his mask.

The rider scowled. Up until recently, he had been as devout to the Spider Queen as any drow male was; it wasn't necessarily true devotion, it was just the way things were. But now…? Suddenly, things weren't what they were before and he found himself without allegiance, without connections and without a first clue of what to do next. Coming to Vhaeraun's shrine seemed as good an idea as any at the time. But joining Bregan D'Aerthe was a much better one.

"You are so curious about my actions. Should I be gratified? Or just wary?"

Tathrak shrugged. "That is up to you. Though I'd say neither. Kimmuriel cares for the efficiency of his troops, not their religion. And we care to remain in the shadows." He looked the rider in the eye. "Personally, I enjoy stabbing the spiders. It's just that I'd rather not have to do it in here."

He held the rider's gaze for a while longer, waiting for his words to sink in. Far as Tathrak was concerned, the male was free to do whatever he pleased as long as his actions didn't put the Dark Daggers in danger. Of course there were always numerous ways for things to go wrong, but that was the risk he had taken before and was willing to take it again. As long as there was no downright betrayal, everything else could be handled as it came along.

Eventually, the rider nodded. Tathrak motioned to the door.

"Come then. They're leaving for Lith My'athar in less then an hour."

With a resigned grunt, Relon followed him out.

XXX

Faint light flickered for a few moments before it seared upwards in an arch. The bluish glow in its center spread gradually towards the edges, thinning as it went along until its surface became glassily transparent, offering glimpses into the tunnel on the portal's far end.

Kimmuriel was aware of the wary looks some of the gathered drow had been giving him as he willed the magical gateway to life with his mind. He smirked inwardly at the stolen glances. He didn't have to be a psionic to guess at their thoughts and, more pointedly, the fears they'd been harboring: had he indeed opened a portal to their desired destination or had he just tricked them into a trap? His new allies distrusted him at least as much as he distrusted them, and for good reasons, too.

The news from Menzoberranzan was as bad as he had expected it to be. The aftermath of the Mephistopheles fiasco left the ruling caste of the city in chaos and disarray much greater than usual. That, coupled with the Spider Queen's continued absence meant that a myriad of possible scenarios was equally likely to unfold in the following months, and even Kimmuriel couldn't make an educated guess as to which was the most likely one. That meant he had to keep his band poised for every eventuality – a task made that more difficult by the same set of circumstances that were the reason for such heightened alertness in the first place. The last thing he needed right then was to have any links whatsoever between his band and the Shadow's followers.

And yet here he was, opening a portal into the tunnels not far from Lith My'athar for a mixed party of Bregan D'Aerthe and Dark Daggers forces to pass through. But for all they knew, it might as well have been a portal leading them straight into Menzoberranzan's out-patrols' clutches instead. If he were to gain any upper hand in whatever events were to come next, he would do well to get an early start in winning favors with the Matrons back home, and what greater act of good will then handing them a score of masked heretics, gift-wrapped and all?

He had considered the possibility many times over on his way here but in the end, decided against it. Dark Daggers would have much more value to him as allies than enemies. They were already fully entrenched in a city his band had yet to set proper foot in, they had contacts all over the place and they'd managed to avoid capture thus far. It was enough to recommend them, the psionic had decided, and the joint venture of their combined forces could yet turn into a veritable gold mine as well as provide both parties with further opportunities for both alliance and treachery.

Standing opposite Kimmuriel, Tathrak silently wove a spell aimed to confirm that the destination beyond the shimmering screen was indeed the correct one. Satisfied with what he saw, the priest turned from the portal and gave a slight nod. A score of Dark Dagger members approached and begun passing through. Mixed in among them, a number of Bregan D'Aerthe soldiers followed suit.

Kimmuriel watched in silence as the troops passed him by, his eyes watching no one in particular, but his mind focused on the muscular drow who lingered somewhat behind. The lizard beside him snorted and made an attempt to snap at a passing soldier, but the rider held its bridle firmly in hand. Outwardly, the rider appeared to be in full control of both himself and the beast he handled, but inside his mind, the psionic could feel the undercurrents of uneasiness at odds with his disciplined demeanor. Lith My'athar was clearly not on the top-ten list of places he wanted to revisit, now or ever.

Lizard riders were scarce in Bregan D'Aerthe. Having this one join up, the psionic reasoned, would be a welcome addition to his ranks. After he had scanned his mind for potential treachery, of course.

It wasn't difficult to convince the renegade male of the benefits of throwing his hand in with the band and this little trip to Lith My'athar would be a good test of his abilities, loyalties and, given his earlier experiences in the city, mental stability as well.

He turned to find the Vhaerunite priest's attention had the same focus as his. He raised an eyebrow inquiringly. The priest merely shrugged:

"We're allies now, it would seem. We might as well learn to share."

XXX

Staying at The Promenade was more than he could stand; Valen realized that the moment he laid his eyes on it. What had once been a place of new hope and a fresh start turned into a walkway of painful memories and crumbled dreams. Even prowling the city aimlessly for days on end seemed a better option then lingering there for a moment longer.

A chair scraped the stone floor as it got drawn back. The tiefling didn't bother to so much as lift his gaze as another estranged Promenader joined him at the table. While the Eillistraeeans did indeed try to persuade Valen to stay among them, they weren't, on the whole, all that reluctant to let the demon-breed go. They were far less willing to let one of their more capable commanders do the same, but that hardly stopped Imloth from spending most of his time accompanying the tiefling anyway. The two would meet up, wander about, often share a drink but rarely a word… Neither man really knew what to do with himself, but at least they could be clueless together.

The shuffling of papers and screeching of a pen became a constant background noise for the pair soon enough. Barred from entering the private quarters of Malakuth's mansion and thus, deprived of the chance to keep vigil over the comatose dancer housed therein, Deekin took to tailing the quiet duo in all but silence. Neither man minded his presence – the kobold and his incessant chatter had been a fixture in their lives long enough for them not to be bothered by it now.

"Have you decided yet?" Imloth asked as he signaled for the bartender to bring him his usual.

The tiefling shook his head. "And you?"

"No."

The two exchanged glances. Both were hoping the other would spare him the decision of where to go next by making one first. So far, neither had. Perhaps tomorrow…

XXX

She squinted at a relief of red carved into the dark of her skin. Rough and darkening at the edges, burning red and almost… liquid at the center, as if the flesh beneath was still smoldering. She could make no sense of the sight – a thick fog seemed to envelop her mind and dowse her thoughts.

A prickling sensation, somewhere between itch and pain, ran the length of her arm, down across the right side of her torso and fading away at the tip of her hipbone. Upwards, the throbbing extended at her armpit, the back of her shoulder, skipped most of the collar bone, picked up a line at her throat, and then spread again over the jawbone and across the right half of her face.

She touched her cheek. The skin felt both tender and rutted under her fingers. She touched her arm next. It felt the same. That meant, she reasoned, it probably looked the same as well. She thought it good to have that sorted out.

The dim light of a lone glowing stone danced winding patterns across her body. The flickering reminded her of something, but she didn't know what. She squinted again in an attempt to understand. There should be… a sound, accompanying the lights. A loud sort of sound. Loud and flashy, exhilarating and incredibly… painful all at once. Like a…

…Like an explosion.

XXX

"That's the last of them," a scout signaled with one hand while whipping his forehead with another. Tarnash nodded, the feeble light of the glowing fungi nearby playing yet another game of shadows across his face.

"Lets get back," he signaled to the rest of his squad. Several drow detached themselves from the walls and roughly hoisted the prisoners back to their feet. Tarnash watched them with satisfaction. The haul consisted of at least eight able-bodied humans and twice as much in goblins and orcs. They should catch a good price. Malakuth would pay them well. Life had never been better.

Nor was it dull, he decided later that day upon hearing the latest news from Vhaeraun's chapel. Not that he was surprised – shambling butt-naked into the chapel wearing only a stiletto arm bracer and saying not a word was exactly the sort of thing he came to expect from the dancer: spend a full month in a coma, wake up and, barely able to stand upright, wander into a roomful of drow without so much as a warning. And not get killed somehow. Apparently, the world can turn upside down three times over, but some things will never change.

XXX

It would have been easy to kill her; in the end, it was just easier not to. Though no one would mourn her passing and quite a few would even cheer, Malaktuh still wasn't certain there wouldn't be some who would not be so satisfied with her death. Tracking them down, then tracking down their connections as well, and then taking care of them all was simply too much of a bother. Easier to just let the female live. And perhaps somehow profit from her continued existence. After all, wasn't it the Masked God himself who demanded she be saved in the first place? There must be, he reasoned, something about her that the god found worthy, or at least useful. And on a side note, he'd lie if he said he wasn't interested in seeing Izzlyn's offspring himself.

Not that she was much to look at right now. A month in bed left her dizzy and weak; not much flesh to begin with, she was now all but bone and sinew, with partially burnt skin stretched tightly over the two. By the way she devoured every last scrap of food in front of her, Malakuth got the impression she was attempting to make up for her weight loss all in one go.

She lifted her gaze only when she cleared her plate clean. The sole resemblance she bore to her sire were the eyes, but that was in colour alone. Izzlyn was as alive a creature as Malakuth had known; the look the half-breed was giving him was everything but. He could have sworn he had seen illihtids with more expression than hers.

She moved her lips soundlessly a few times before speaking, as if she had forgotten how to. When she finally did speak, Malakuth found he had to prick his ears to make out the words.

"…What do I owe you?"

He was prepared for something like that. Doubtless, the mercenary and the loner that she reputedly was, she'd want to settle any potential debts as soon as possible. "A lot," he answered laconically.

Her expression didn't change in the slightest. "How much is 'a lot'…?"

"Nothing you can't afford, I am certain..."

XXX

Many thought Kimmuriel incapable of emotions, even by the low standards of the drow. Kimmuriel never cared to dissuade the assumptions; the emotionless façade had served him well. But he could feel all right, and what he felt right now was agitation. It was just as well that none of it showed on his face for either Malakuth or the dancer to see.

A part of him was still surprised at his own willingness to see the deal he had made through. At that time, he had been fully expecting the dancer to die and was only hoping she would not do so before fulfilling her end of the bargain. However, not only did she survive disposing of Sinvyl, but also a head-on collision with the arch devil later on – something that, to Kimmuriel's mind, no one had the right to do, especially a non-drow.

But survive it she did, if just barely, and was later revived by none other than his new allies here. Kimmuriel still wasn't sure what to make of that, but he did set out to make the best out of the situation at hand. This early in their tentative partnership, it paid to show his band made good on their deals. Viewed like that, fifty thousand golds and a magic item of choice weren't too high a price to pay for establishing the new partnership more firmly.

Just as leaving one kobold alive and at large wasn't too high a price to pay for sparing Malakuth a small-scale reprise of Mephistopheles-like explosion in his own living room, which was a likely scenario should the dancer learn a single scale was missing from the insufferable creature's hide. As an added bonus, he could use his role in the kobold's continued welfare as a bargaining leverage: its life for the scrying Mirror would surely be a fair trade in the dancer's eyes, no?

Bringing up the kobold was to serve yet another purpose to Kimmuriel. This was the only certain soft spot that he knew of in the dancer; mentioning it wouldn't fail to bring her mental armor down for a few moments – long enough for Kimmuriel to sneak in a probing mind tendril beneath her skull without alerting her to it.

That, however, didn't go down as he had planned.

He didn't attempt the scan for any definite purpose – he did it partly out of habit, partly out of curiosity. But while mentioning the beast did indeed work as intended, when Kimmuriel reached out, he met with an unexpected resistance. A shield of sorts was enveloping her mind, preventing his probe from reaching inside. The protection wasn't strong - nothing Kimmuriel couldn't pierce through with ease - but such an intrusion would not pass unnoticed.

There were ways of bypassing such protections without raising alarm, but whatever lurked inside that disturbed skull probably wasn't worth the bother. What the protection itself meant was another thing entirely. Had the Dark Daggers found suitable safeguards from mind powers already? And if so, did they have that many to spare to grant one even to an iblith female?

No… He dismissed the idea on the grounds of implausibility. Protections such as these were anything but common – there would never be that many to go around. He filed the issue away for later as Malakuth called their little meeting to an end.

The two males walked out on the street together. As far as Malakuth was concerned, everything had worked out nicely in the end: Lith My'athar was retaken and neither band lost too many soldiers while doing so. Business in Skullport was flourishing. House Tanor'Thal was that close to being entirely eliminated from competition. The band of ex-Maeviirs were proving themselves to be every bit as useful additions to the Dark Daggers as he had hoped they'd be. And he even managed to come to a vague agreement with the dancer concerning their possible future dealings. But while he could understand his own interest in keeping on good terms with a potential agent and an offspring of one of his own, he was curious about Kimmuriel's motives to apparently do the same.

"Kimmuriel…", he called after the psionic as they were about to part ways, "You could have just walked away with that Mirror with none the wiser. Why did you let that winged beast live?"

Kimmuriel considered for a moment. In the end, he merely half-shrugged and flashed Malakuth one of his rare smiles: "The kobold was easy to dispose of. It was just easier not to."

Malakuth laughed.

XXX

It's been another few days before she regained enough strength to at least stand up and walk on her own; weeks of fighting, sleep deprivation, malnutrition and a month worth of coma was enough to put a limit on what even her stubborn body was capable of standing. In contrast, there was seemingly nothing now that could put a limit to her final detachment from the world around her.

Well, perhaps a kobold…

"Boss!" Deekin squeaked happily and rushed up to her as she exited Malakuth's mansion through the back door. However, he stopped short of ramming into her and giving her – or at least her knees – a great, big hug. Instead, he looked her up and down and continued in the same happy voice:

"You nots angry Deekin not gives you a hug rights now, Boss. If Deekin did, Deekin topples you over."

Shi'van reeled back just the same; his mere voice was enough – a whiff of life, dispersing, for a spell, the deathly staleness she had turned into. She knelt down beside him, her knees turning wobbly in an instant, and clutched his wing with an outstretched hand so hard her knuckles turned white.

Oblivious to the grip on his appendage, the kobold went on with his blue streak. "Deekin topples you over with Deekin's new book instead. Deekin topples everyone over with his new book! It be even bigger hit than the previous one! And Boss gets the first signed copy!" The kobold stopped for a moment, considering something. "Of course… Boss can always sell her copy later if she likes; Deekin not minds…" Cheerful as his voice was, it was nonetheless clear he'd be crestfallen if she did. "It be worths a fortune some day…"

If it were at all possible, the grip on his wing tightened further. She blinked at him. For a moment, a fleeting shadow of emotion crossed her features.

"I won't sell it," she croaked.

The kobold's face lit up at the proclamation. He was just about to start yammering again when a heavy footstep fell beside him.

Shi'van lifted her head and blinked at the tiefling. A bit behind and to his left, Imloth watched Valen and the dancer lock gazes in silence, an unspoken understanding passing briefly between them. There was a time, he recalled, when he had had to keep stepping between them on almost daily bases just to keep them from tearing each other's throats out. But those two people were long dead.

The dancer rose to her feet. Her eyes broke off the tiefling's face and settled on the drow. Imloth compared Valen's chipped horn to the burnmarks across her face. It wasn't that hard to determine who ended up worse for wear.

"You look like a postcard from Hells," he offered. She blinked at him. And then shrugged. For a female, she was criminally unconcerned about her looks.

"What will you do now?" Valen asked quietly.

When standing up, her eyes were level with the tiefling's chest. Barely. She didn't bother lifting her eyes to look him in the face. She eventually addressed his torso and the stone wall off to his right instead.

"Durnan's…" she said. "…get my money," she clarified. She was clearly twice as out of touch as both men combined; but not enough to forget about her own prime directive. A mercenary to the very end, and a mercenary well beyond it. Imloth almost chuckled.

"Lets go, then," he said and immediately headed out without waiting for an answer. Insane or not, it was still a direction in which to head. That was more than he and Valen managed to come up with. So it would do. For now.

XXX

The experience was sobering in a way. Walking around Skullport with burnt skin was one thing - no one paid it any heed and she could pass as unnoticed in the streets as the next freak. But things were different up above. Up on the surface, people stared. She was being noticed. And the dancer did not like being noticed.

Durnan scrutinized the unlikely group currently standing in his basement. When they first arrived, they went straight to the main floor of the inn, but quickly relocated down here again. The sudden appearance of a drow, a hulking demon-breed, a heavily scarred half-elf and a kobold in tow almost caused a small riot on his patrons' part. But even if that weren't so, the sheer brightness of the world above would have chased the group down just as quickly. Too long a time in the lightless world below did that to people's eyes.

And while theirs were still watering, Durnan let his own wander from one person to another while he mulled over his next course of action. The woman wanted her money, she said. And she seemed prepared to stand in his basement until he produced it. Which would have been fine by him, at least for a while, if her request hadn't carried more ramifications with it than there were kobolds in the wilds.

There was no money, for one. Or rather, there was money, but not for this purpose. The Lords of Waterdeep had opened their bags wide to accommodate all the mercenaries they had summoned for the Skullport attack. And with so many opportunists milling around, a significant amount of gold had to be transferred into security structures, too.

"As I already told you, it will be… difficult," he said when the silence dragged on for too long. He received no response. Again. His looked at the drow for support. He knew Imloth as a member of the Promenade and though it was clear he was here personally, and not as a spokesman from his group, his presence still bared significance. Would the Promenade stand by this request, attempt to play an arbiter or claim neutrality? The drow was of no help. He merely shrugged, indicating that Durnan was on his own in this.

He looked at the woman again. He didn't like her. Back when she first came to his inn alongside other hopefuls more than a year ago, he penned her down as possibly dangerous and definitely bratty. A year later, he changed his opinion to definitely dangerous and possibly even more unhinged then she looked. But, he reprimanded himself, she did spend more than a year down below and Underdark did do horrible things to people, and not just physically. He had to temper his otherwise negative disposition with a bit of remorse on that account. And all else aside, she did earn the money she was now asking for. He was certain of that. But most other Lords probably wouldn't want to hear about it.

"The city of Waterdeep..." he tried again.

"…wouldn't like the reputation of a cheating cheapskate," she said quietly."One hundred thousand gold pieces; the mess in the Undermountain; I cleared it; you pay it." It sounded like a recital, and a bad one at that, but had a tone of finality to it. And a very definite threat, too.

Durnan wasn't the only one caught off guard by her abrupt, if ever so quiet words. Both the tiefling and the drow simultaneously gave her a surprised look. Even the kobold looked up from his writings. In light of what the woman just said, suddenly the sight of a bardic pen lingering over an empty sheet of paper became strangely ominous.

Shi'van, however, remained fairly oblivious to her surroundings. She had recited her part, as instructed, and now she was waiting for further developments. Don't give them time to think, Malaktuh had told her, Don't give them time to think of excuses – They might come up with anything. Like how can they know it was really you who freed Halaster? Don't give them time to start digging through their records - Who knows what they may find? A decade old bounties, perhaps? Frankly, she had no idea whether there were any or not, but it did seem a likely option. It was a five year long blank spot in her memory and who knows what she had been doing during that time. She sure didn't, and wasn't particularly interested in finding out, either.

Why? she had asked the Vhaeraunite. Why did the drow find her getting her due payment relevant to his interests? He explained, and his words made sense enough. He had his own operations going in the City of Splendors, and with the Lord's coffers already stretched thin due to recent affairs, having a large sum of money pulled away from the security and from the city's monetary flow all together would play into his hand perfectly. His agents on the surface had already begun working towards that end. All she had to do was to show up and present her waiting palm to the city's officials.

"…tonight," she added before Durnan had a chance to reply. She just wanted him to leave already, get her money and be done with this whole thing once and for all. Even through the piercing pain in her skull caused by the sudden exposure to light, she was still aware of the stares she was receiving up there. She needed to think about that.

XXX

When Durnan finally left, he found things were already set in motion. Rumors, quiet and sporadic, but nonetheless present, were spreading through the city. Waterdeep isn't going to pay, they said, from one mercenary's lips to another's ear. Waterdeep is out of money, the traders whispered amongst each other. Whoever was behind that knew perfectly well what was going on. Imprisoning or even disposing of the mercenary woman, as some Lords readily suggested, was no longer an option. The only way to stop the potential disaster was to cut it in the bud, and the only way to do that was to regrettably pay what was owed after all.

XXXXX

Sigil was going to be a fresh start for her, but that was no longer an option. Living space in the Cage was scarce and hard to come by. The flat she was eyeing had likely already been sold and even if it wasn't, there was no point in starting afresh any more. Fresh starts were for the living creatures, not the ruined wrecks.

No one but the select few knew about her role in Mephistopheles' downfall. Unfortunately, Mephistopheles himself was likely among them. She had asked the avatar for a boon on top of her payment. She asked him to make certain neither Mephistopheles nor his baatezu ilk are to take their vengeance on her. The request implied she considered the vague possibility of surviving after all. The avatar had seemed amused by the sentiment. The boon was probably granted, though how that would work out remained to be seen.

How did her actual payment work out had been seen already. The psionic caught up with her soon after she had left Durnan's place and asked her about it. It made sense that he wanted to know where she had gotten her protection from mind intrusions. She told him, in exchange for the information of how effective it was. Though he hadn't spoken too highly of it, she had decided that it was effective enough.

The half-mask she now wore fit tightly on her face. In the end, she had been persuaded that wearing a mask drew less attention than wearing a faceful of scars. She was also told that, if left untreated, the rutted skin on her torso could eventually impair her movement. Similarly, the rutted skin on her neck and the lower part of her jaw could affect her ability to turn her head around. The blue-eyed priest left her a sufficient supply of ointment for it. She, in turn, left him more than a sufficient amount of money as a payment. She did not wish to owe anything to anybody. And she had enough gold not to.

It appeared that neither Imloth nor Valen knew what to do with themselves. She gave them something to do until they figure it out. Twenty thousand each to keep an eye on Deekin would keep the two supplied for a while, and would most certainly leave them with something to do. She wasn't sure what she really owed those two or why, but she was vaguely aware that there must be something. Perhaps she was wrong, but it didn't matter. Pretty much nothing did anymore.

Another twenty thousand and lodging at Durnan's paid for a year in advance left Deekin with more than enough time to polish his novel to perfection and sufficient means to find a publisher up there. Unlike with the other two, she knew exactly what and how much she owed him. But what he had done for her, what he had been for her for the past few years was over. He could no longer safeguard her sanity for her. She had none left for him to preserve.

She still had no idea why Tarnash spared her life back in the Maeviir compound. She asked him eventually, just in case she owed him something, too. He didn't know either, but didn't seem perturbed by that fact, so she decided she shouldn't be either and that ended her wrapping up of her affairs.

And she was now back where she had started. Ashes of a person. A ghost in living flesh. In the world of one. In a tomb for one. Did she have enough strength to climb out of it once more? Did she have a shred of will or willingness left to even try? She doubted it. But she didn't know. So she had decided to find out.

Even in the shadow in which she stood, sudden rays of sunlight assaulted her eyes as the ship passed through the portal and came out on the open sea. Salty air filled up her nostrils with the smell of water and fish. In a day or two, the heavy smells of spices and harbor garbage and sweat would join the first two as the ship drew closer to the port.

To Calimport.

Where it all began…

- THE END -

---

Author's Note: And there you have it, people - The final part of Shadows. I... can't believe I actually managed to finsh it. Those of you who ahve been following this for a while longer know how much stalling there was between various updates. Those of you who joined up more recently are spared the wait, but I still can't figure oout how did you ever managed to get past the horrors that were the first ten or so chapters to get here (bonus cookies to all of you who didn't run away screaming at the Mary Sue Paragraph o' Doom in chapter 2). I'm glad you didn't, though. ;)

I'll add review replies to the forum and I'll keep replying in the same thread to any that might arrive in the future regardless of the chapter.

Finally, in case you might be intersted, do keep an eye out for a possible sequel. If one does get written, it'll be posted in Forgotten Realms section, but... that's yet to come and we'll see. Just dropping a teaser here, is all. ;)

And once again, thank you, everyone, for reading and commenting and above all else, for helping me to improve my writing.