Shadows of Amn

Irenicus had nearly killed her when she confronted him at the Tree of Life. All around them Suldanessellar was burning, and he just started to pummel her with spells. She fought back with spells of her own, and elves came to her defense, but Irenicus's supply of painful, body-twisting magic seemed endless. He smashed her with lightning, burned her with fire, cut her with blades and glass and thorns, and the bastard laughed the whole time. When she finally fell, he hung her in a web to watch. And watch she did.

She'd watched him suck the life energy out of the greatest source of life energy in the world, if not the entire multiverse.

He drained the Tree of Life and left it so dry the heat of burning Suldanessellar had touched it to flame, and it became an enormous inferno that burned away more than leaves, bark, and branches. Those flames burned away life. They burned away history. They burned away tradition and hope and the brittle dignity of a dying race.

Then Irenicus went willingly down into some hell where Abdel waited—for what? Abdel surely hadn't gone there willingly. They wouldn't embrace there in brotherhood. They'd fight, and even as much as she loved and trusted and was in awe of the Son of Bhaal, Jaheira didn't think he could win. How could he?

How could anyone stand against a man already powerful in his own right but now filled with the essence of the Tree of Life?

"Abdel," she said to the ground around her. "Just run. Get out of there, Abdel. Come back to me. Let him live. Let him live forever in Hell. Come back to me."

She realized she was looking at the point on the ground where Irenicus had sank. She took a step toward that spot, and when her foot touched the forest floor her knee gave out. She fell to the ground and ignored the pain. She tried to get back to her feet but couldn't, so she crawled.

"I'm coming, Abdel," she said.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

"He's dead, you idiot," Irenicus sneered from somewhere in the roaring flames of Hell. "Your father is dead, and you'll get no answers from him."

Abdel gave himself over to the rage and reached out for the source of Irenicus's voice. He found something that felt like flesh and clawed through it. There was the sound of a grunt and the feel of blood, then the sound of laughter.

A hand grabbed Abdel's throat and squeezed. Abdel reached up with a viciously taloned foot and ripped Irenicus's stomach open. Irenicus squeezed, and Abdel's head came off at the neck. His vision tumbled and blurred, and Abdel realized that couldn't actually have happened—not even in Hell.

He came back into his body, and it was his body, human and whole, not a monster, not a demon.

"Idiot human child," Irenicus said. "Waiting for orders, waiting for answers. You don't get any answers, child, in the flea speck of a lifetime you enjoy. You don't get to know. You don't get anything but a bit of wandering around before a painful, empty, ruthless death. You serve me now as you've served me all along. I brought out the Ravager in you and the little bitch, but it was you who brought out the Slayer. Only you—spawn of Bhaal—could have destroyed the Ravager, and only when the Ravager was destroyed could the Slayer take its place."

"Why?" Abdel asked as he ripped a piece of Irenicus's soul from him.

The necromancer laughed, and Abdel felt the piece of soul slip through his fingers.

"Why?" Irenicus asked. "Idiot man-child. Human speck. Only the Slayer could kill Ellesime. By succumbing to the blood of the god of murder and killing this girl you thought was so important to you, you gave me the weapon I needed. Now, Ellesime is dead. Now, you give me your soul, and I use it and the power of that detestable tree to make myself immortal. I get. I take. I have. You disappear."

Abdel reached out again and felt something he couldn't possibly have any words to describe. He took hold of Irenicus's soul.

"Ah," the necromancer breathed, "there you are."

"Ellesime lives," Abdel said, the words traveling not through air or fire or lava, but through the medium of immortal souls.

There was a silence filled by the roaring of the lava flow.

"You're staying here, Irenicus," Abdel said.

"Neither of us are staying here, Abdel Adrian," Irenicus replied. "There isn't really even such a place as here. I'm going back to Faerun an immortal, whether Ellesime lives or not. You're going nowhere. You go to oblivion."

The nail of Jaheira's middle finger snapped off backward, but she didn't notice the pain. She dug, clawing into the unforgiving soil under the burning tree where Irenicus had fallen into Hell. Jaheira threw out handfuls of dirt and had gone maybe a foot down, but of course there was no sign of Hell.

"Mielikki," she said, "Mielikki, help me." She dug some more though she was growing overwhelmed by the simple fact that she could dig with her bare hands forever and not get where she was going. Abdel wasn't in some place underground. He wasn't on this plane of existence. He was someplace so different from the world Jaheira knew there was no real co

"Mielikki," she cried, "help me … tell me …"

She stopped digging and let herself cry into the dry dirt, gave herself over to her goddess as a small, weak, desperate creature.

"Help me," she begged.

The words called to her—sounded in the wind—and Jaheira sobbed at the sound of them: Call to him.

"Mielikki," Jaheira cried, "Lady, thank you."

She pushed her face into the hole she dug and drew in a deep, soil-scented breath.

"Abdel!" she screamed into the ground.

"Abdel!" She breathed again, ignoring the pain in her throat, and screamed, "Abdel!"

Irenicus was wi

Abdel could feel his body had changed back to the monster thing—they'd called it the Ravager.

"That's it," Irenicus said, his voice almost a purr. "That's it."

Abdel felt a piece of his soul bitten away, and he let it go. He didn't care anymore. He'd called to his father—his father. The idea was simply ridiculous. He'd called out to Bhaal and got no answer. Irenicus supplied the only thing that seemed like truth, after all was said and done.

"I'll use it well, Abdel," Irenicus whispered straight into Abdel's disintegrating soul.

Abdel felt his legs pop and twist backward, though he didn't really believe he had a body anymore.

"… del …" a woman's voice echoed from so far away, he was sure it was his imagination. He was struck by the fact that he was in Hell and thought that something as simple as the sound of Jaheira calling his name was imagin—

Jaheira.

"Abdel.." her voice came again, a little louder this time.

Abdel tried to force his twisted, freakish, monster's mouth to form her name. He couldn't.

"That's over now, Abdel," Irenicus said. "She's the past. She couldn't have been yours anyway, could she? A Harper druid and the son of Bhaal? What could come of… ah, well. Not that it matters now, child."

Abdel felt himself nodding, then Jaheira's voice came again.

"Abdel," she called, "please …"

That last word burst through the tattered remains of Abdel's soul like lightning, and he could feel her. Irenicus had stripped so much of him away—eaten it in a very real sense—but he'd left one part behind. He'd left the part inhabited by Jaheira. Maybe every part of his soul was home to her in some way.

Abdel felt human again, and it was a human mouth that screamed, "Jaheira!"