fire pits, buckets, a few sacks, a slashed waterskin, a tent that had been left behind, the snap of its flap in the wind like the crack of a whip.
The front edge of the Shadowstorm, a black shroud darkening the land, was within sight and drawing closer. The wind screamed. Thunder and lightning assaulted Faerûn, more intense than that experienced by Cale and Riven within the storm.
“It’s growing stronger,” Cale said.
Riven nodded.
With his shadesight, Cale watched the storm’s darkness twist and wither the trees it engulfed, brown and curl the grass. A clutch of rabbits burst from their burrows and sprinted away from the storm. Squirrels and raccoons scrambled down trees and fled. To his right Cale saw deer and foxes, even a lumbering bear, bound past in the distance.
Sembia would never be the same. Sembians would never be the same. “Rivalen!” he shouted into the wind.
He and Riven stood side by side, blades out, awaiting the appearance of the Shadovar prince. Shadows leaked from Cale’s flesh, from Weaveshear.
Rivalen emerged from the Shadowstorm, backlit by a flash of lightning. A stride through the shadows brought him to Cale and Riven’s side.
“It is growing stronger and moving faster,” Rivalen said. “We must hurry.”
Odd, Cale thought, that two men could want the same thing but for such different reasons.
“Hurry to where?” he asked.
“We travel to Kesson Rel’s world of Ephyras, where we will find a temple at the edge of nothing. Within is a weapon for a Chosen of Mask.”
“Sounds like we don’t need you, then,” Riven said to Rivalen.
Rivalen showed his fangs. Smile or grimace, Cale could not tell.
“How did you learn all this?” Cale asked Rivalen.
“My secret,” the shade prince said.
“What kind of weapon?” Cale asked.
The shadows around Rivalen churned. “I do not know.”
“Dark and empty,” Riven said, shaking his head and forcing a laugh.
Rivalen stretched out his hands and gathered the shadows to him as fauna streaked over their boots and the wind threw up a blizzard of leaves, twigs, and pebbles. The water of Lake Veladon seethed.
Cale found the shadows Rivalen gathered to himself, shadows shot through with the prince’s power, surprisingly familiar. He caught a gleam in Rivalen’s hand, thought at first it might have been the prince’s holy symbol, but then saw it for what it was—a gold coin, a Sembian fivestar.
He had no time to puzzle over it before the darkness engulfed them all. Before they moved between worlds, Cale reached into his pocket and took his holy symbol, a silken mask, in hand.
Abelar and Regg stood side by side, watching the darkness grow in the night sky. Selûne, if she were not new, was curtained off from Faerûn by the Shadowstorm. The wall of black filled their field of vision, filled their world. It pulsed and lurched like a living thing. The severity of the thunder and lightning elicited a steady stream of gasps from the Lathanderians.
“They will have to return quickly if they are to stop it from reaching us,” Regg said. He put his hand to the holy symbol he wore on a chain at his throat.
“Roen has used his divinations on the storm,” Abelar said. “An intelligence guides it. Kesson Rel, I presume. It grows in power with each hour that passes. He tells me the very air within it will drain a man’s life.”
“We have wands,” Regg said. “We can ward the company.”
“Aye,” Abelar said, “but what else is within that storm?”
“Shar is in that storm,” Regg said softly.
“Aye.”
Regg cleared his throat and said, “If Cale does not return before matters greatly … worsen, I think we will have to march on it, Abelar. If an intelligence guides the storm and the creatures within it, we can perhaps slow its approach by offering resistance.”
Abelar suspected that there would be no returning from such a battle. And he knew Regg thought the same thing.
“Light will battle against darkness,” Regg said. “Lathander’s servants will face Shar’s. It is fitting that we face it so, I think.”
“I do not think it will come to that,” Abelar said.
“If it does,” Regg said. “I say we march.”
Abelar winced inwardly at the word “we.” He could no longer hold his peace. He faced his friend. “If we march, you will have to lead the company.”
Abelar’s words eroded the resolve in Regg’s expression. “What … what do you mean?”
“I cannot leave my son, Regg. Not again. Not even for this.”
Regg studied his face, and Abelar imagined his mind whirling behind the calm facade of his expression. Abelar