Shadowstorm by Kemp Paul S Page B

at bay. It was too damp for a fire, so they huddled near the bole and stared at one another through the darkness.
    Magadon and Riven waited for Cale to speak. Cale framed his thoughts and spoke in a low tone.
    He told them of his encounter with Mask in an alley in Selgaunt, of the god’s ominous warnings regarding Sembia and the Cycle of Shadows. He told them of how he had attacked his own god and gotten tossed about like a child’s doll for his pains. He told them of his promise to take from Kesson Rel the divinity that Kesson Rel had stolen from Mask long ago. They knew that he had promised the same thing to Mephistopheles as ransom for Magadon’s soul. He told them of the book he had taken from the Fane of Shadows, how it had erased itself and begun rewriting itself back to front. He told them, finally, of how Mephistopheles had taken it from him. When he finished, no one spoke for a time.
    “Well?” he asked them.
    Riven shook his head. “Dark, Cale. Dark and empty.”
    Cale said, “Agreed.” He looked each of them in the eye. “Now is the time to walk away. I chose this path. Kesson Rel, Mask, and Mephistopheles are my problems. The promises are mine to keep. If you’re not—”
    “Nobody iswalking away, Cale,” Riven said.
    Magadon nodded. “I’ve got nowhere to go.” He cleared his throat and eyed Cale and Riven. The rain slicked his black hair. His horns glistened. “What now, then?”
    Cale answered, “The gate in Elgrin Fau.”
    Riven and Magadon eyed him. Magadon said, “The gate is guarded.”
    “And we had a go at it before,” Riven said. Cale nodded at both of them.
    A darkweaver guarded the gate, together with an army of wraiths—the dead of Elgrin Fau.
    “We barely kept our skins last time,” Riven said.
    “Matters stood differently then,” Cale answered.
    When they had faced the darkweaver and wraiths the first time, Cale had not known how to control the powers granted him by the shadowstuff. Neither had Riven. Both of them did now.
    “True enough,” Riven said. He rummaged in a belt pouch for his pipe, found it, and started to fill it.
    “We do not know where the gate leads,” Magadon said.
    Cale acknowledged the point. “No, we don’t.”
    Riven struck a tindertwig on his boot, shielded its small flame from the rain, and lit the pipe. Around the stem, he asked, “You think it leads to Kesson Rel?”
    Cale nodded his head. “I do, but there’s only one way to be sure.”
    Riven blew out a cloud of smoke. “What about Selgaunt? You leave the Uskevren boy to that Shadovar and he will suffer.” Cale knew. But Tamlin had made his choice. And Cale had
    made his. Cale’s duty was to Magadon, and to his god. Not to Tamlin, not to Sembia.
    “Korvikoum,” he softly said, invoking his favorite concept from dwarven philosophy. Choices and consequences, the dwarves taught. Cale had learned the lesson well. Tamlin soon would, too.
    He looked his friends in the face.
    “Get some rest. We are as safe here as anywhere. We will take a few days to recover some strength.” He looked meaningfully at Magadon, who looked as if he had not eaten a decent meal in months. “Then we go at Elgrin Fau.”
    ŚŠŚŚŠ• <§>Ś ŚŠŚ
    The rain stops after a few hours. I sit in the darkness under the strange trees, feeling nothing for them. My bond with the world is broken. I am separate from it, alien.
    I hesitate to seek my mental focus. I know I must do so—if I am to be of any use to my companions, and to myself, I must be able to call upon my mental abilities—but I fear what I will find, or not find.
    I finally work up the strength, close my eyes, and sink into my consciousness. For a time I swim in thoughts, memories, and ideas. I sharpen my concentration and feel around tentatively.
    Immediately I confirm that I am less than I was. A scarred hole in my center evidences what my father took, what he yet holds. What’s left of me swirls around the hole like a maelstrom. I see my desire for the