Neverwinter - By R.A. Salvatore Page 0,24

she wishes to couple with you, do so,” Sylora added.

Jestry swallowed harder, and tried not to nod too eagerly.

“Do you understand?”

“I do …” he started to say, but he couldn’t quite get past the words and wound up shaking his head and admitting, “No.”

Sylora laughed and reached up to gently stroke his face. “My poor, innocent warrior,” she said. “Do you fear that such an act with the likes of Arunika would make me jealous?”

Jestry thought he should say no, and thought he should say he feared to do exactly that, and thought he should blurt out that Arunika was nowhere near as beautiful as Sylora, of course, and that he could only truly love Sylora.

He thought a lot of things.

He said nothing.

She danced away from him then, to the edge of the balcony, where she leaped over, her magical cloak transforming her into the likeness of a giant crow, and she glided down to the courtyard on widespread wings.

Jestry found himself drawn to the railing, watching the woman alight, watching her transform again into the woman he had come to adore.

This was not going well. Evidently Barrabus had underestimated the scouting network of the Neverwinter enclave.

“I have friends in the region,” Barrabus said.

“Shadovar?” Jelvus Grinch asked.

Barrabus smiled innocently. He knew the question to be rhetorical. “My friends are enemies of the zealots who have infiltrated Neverwinter Wood. Is that not enough for you?”

Around him, the crowd stirred.

“We have reason to believe that these zealots, who facilitated the cataclysm that destroyed this fair city, are now building the most awful of necromantic facilities not far from your intended city. They’ve raised an army of the dead culled from the bodies of that cataclysm, and will send them to the”—he paused and glanced around at the rebuilding efforts—“inadequate walls you have constructed.”

“We’re not simple farmers,” one woman protested. “All here can raise a weapon and raise it well!”

That brought a cheer from all around, and Jelvus Grinch, widely considered the first citizen of Neverwinter, couldn’t help but puff out his chest a bit.

But if Barrabus was impressed, he didn’t show it.

“You will be overrun,” he stated flatly. “And even if some of you manage to escape, or somehow hold out, those who are killed will return as zombies to battle from the ranks of your enemies.”

That stole some of their bluster, to be sure.

“And you offer your services?” Jelvus Grinch said, and Barrabus nodded. “And those of the Shadovar, your kinfolk?”

“I’m no Shadovar.”

“But you’re allied—”

“For the time, perhaps. That’s none of your affair.”

“We have no love for the Empire of Netheril!”

“And they care not for you, or for your city,” Barrabus answered. “They have no designs here that concern you.”

“The Netherese were known prominently in Neverwinter before the cataclysm,” Jelvus argued. “Some have said that a Netherese noble dominated the Lord of Neverwinter in the waning days—”

“That was a long time ago.”

“And now they don’t care?” the woman in the crowd yelled.

“It’s only been ten years!” Jelvus Grinch added.

“Have you seen any Netherese within your walls?” asked Barrabus. “Have they made any advances against any of your citizens?”

“Then why are you here?” asked Jelvus. “If your allies have no designs on Neverwinter, then why do they care at all?”

“My allies battle the zealots—you know this. If the zealots overrun Neverwinter”—he turned to speak to all of the gathering—“if you are all slain that you might join the zealots’ undead army, then the struggle of the Shadovar in Neverwinter Wood becomes all the more difficult.”

“Allies of necessity, then?” Jelvus Grinch reasoned when the murmurs had died away.

Barrabus shrugged noncommittally. “If allies at all,” he said, again with little conviction. “I am here to warn you of the possibility of an assault. I offer my services as scout, and my blades in the battle should it come, nothing more, nothing less.”

“Can ye fight, then?” one man called from behind.

Barrabus’s smile was anything but innocent. It was a look he had perfected as a child in Calimport, an expression of confidence unshakable and unnerving. There was no boast, no answer, because there needed to be none.

Jelvus Grinch surely knew the truth, simply in looking at Barrabus’s face.

“I cannot condone an alliance with the Shadovar,” he said.

“But you won’t discourage it,” Barrabus reasoned from his tone. “And I am not Shadovar.”

“Your help would be … appreciated.”

Barrabus nodded and Jelvus broke up the gathering with a call for all to get to work shoring up the meager walls surrounding their rebuilding efforts.

“You really think the undead

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