THE NOOSE AND THE DEAD MEN

Help me! They want to kill me!" the man cried.

He ran to the base of the stone tower, where he began pounding on the ironbound wooden door. Though he wore no robes, the nondescript fellow was known to be a wizard.

"Out of spells and tricks, then?" one of the sentries called down. Beside the sentry, his companion chuckled then elbowed him and nodded for him to look out across the square to the approaching warrior.

"Wouldn't want to be this one," the second sentry said.

The first looked down at the desperate wizard. "Threw a few bolts at that one, did you? I'm thinking I'd rather punch my fist through a wasp nest."

"Let me in, you fools!" the wizard yelled up. "He'll kill me."

"We're not doubting that."

"He is a drow!" the wizard yelled. "Can you not see that? You would side with a dark elf against one of your own race?"

"Aye, a drow by the name of Drizzt Do'Urden," the second sentry shouted back. "And he's working for Captain Deudermont. You wouldn't expect us to go against the master of Sea Sprite, would you?"

The wizard started to protest, but stopped as reality settled in. The guards weren't going to help him. He rolled his back to the door so he could face the approaching drow. Drizzt came across the square, weapons in hand, his expression emotionless.

"Well met, Drizzt Do'Urden," one of the sentries called down as the drow stopped a few steps from the whimpering wizard. "If you're thinking to kill him, then let us turn away so that we can't bear witness against you." The other sentry laughed.

"You are caught, fairly and fully," Drizzt said to the frantic man. "Do you accept that?"

"You have no right!"

"I have my blades, you have no spells remaining. Need I ask you again?"

Perhaps it was the deathly calm of Drizzt's tone, or the laughter of the amused sentries, but the wizard found a moment of strength then, and straightened against the door, squaring his shoulders to his adversary. "I am an overwizard of the Hosttower of..."

"I know who you are, Blaskar Lauthlon," Drizzt replied. "And I witnessed your work. There are dead men back there, by your hand."

"They attacked my position! My companions are dead..."

"You were offered quarter."

"I was bade to surrender, and to one who has no authority."

"Few in Luskan would agree with that, I fear."

"Few in Luskan would suffer a drow to live!"

Drizzt chuckled at that. "And yet, here I am."

"Be gone from this place at once!" Blaskar yelled. "Or feel the sting of Arklem Greeth!"

"I ask only one more time," said Drizzt. "Do you yield?"

Blaskar straightened his shoulders again. He knew his fate, should he surrender.

He spat at Drizzt's feet - feet that moved too quickly to be caught by the spittle, slipping back a step then rushing forward with blinding speed. Blaskar shrieked as the drow's blades came up and closed on him. Above, the guards also cried out in surprise, though their yelps seemed more full of glee than fear.

Drizzt's scimitars hummed in a cross, then a second, one blade stabbing left past Blaskar's head to prod the door, the other cutting the air just above the man's brown hair. The flurry went on for many moments, scimitars spinning, Drizzt spinning, blades slashing at every conceivable angle.

Blaskar yelled a couple of times. He tried to cover up, but really had no way to avoid any of the drow's stunningly swift, sure movements. When the barrage ended, the wizard stood in a slight crouch, arms tight against him and afraid to move, as if expecting that pieces of his extremities would simply fall away.

But he hadn't been touched.

"What?" he said, before realizing that the show had been merely to put Drizzt into just the right position.

The drow, much closer to Blaskar than when the flurry began, punched out, and the pommel of Icingdeath smashed hard into the overwizard's face, slamming him up against the door.

He held his balance for just a moment, shooting an accusatory look and pointing a finger at Drizzt before crumbling to the ground.

"Bet that hurt," said one of the sentries from above.

Drizzt looked up to see that four men, not two, stared down at him, admiring his handiwork.

"I thought you'd cut him to bits," said one, and the others laughed.

"Captain Deudermont will arrive here soon," Drizzt replied. "I expect you will open the door for him."

The sentries all nodded. "Only four of us here," one mentioned, and Drizzt looked at him curiously.

"Most aren't at their posts," another explained. "They're watching over their families as the battles draw near."

"We got no orders to join in for either side," said the third.

"Nor to stay out," the last added.

"Captain Deudermont fights for justice, for all of Luskan," Drizzt said to them. "But I understand that your choice, should you make it, will be based on pragmatism."

"Meaning?" asked the first.

"Meaning that you have no desire to be on the side that loses," Drizzt said with a grin.

"Can't argue that."

"And I cannot blame you for it," said the drow. "But Deudermont will prevail, don't doubt. Too long has the Hosttower cast a dark shadow over Luskan. It was meant to be a shining addition to the beauty of the city, but under the control of the lich Greeth, it has become a tombstone. Join with us, and we'll take the fight to Greeth's door - and through it."

"Do it fast, then," said one of the men, and he motioned out toward the wider city, where fires burned and smoke clouded nearly every street, "before there's nothing left to win."

A woman ran screaming out onto the square, flames biting at her hair and clothing. She tried to drop and roll, but merely dropped and squirmed as the fire consumed her.

More screams emanated from the house she'd run from, and flashes of lightning left thundering reports. An upper story window shattered and a man came flying out, waving his arms wildly all the way to the hard ground. He pulled himself up, or tried to, but fell over, grasping at a torn knee and a broken leg.

A wizard appeared at the window from which the man had fallen, and pointed a slender wand down at him, sneering with wicked glee.

A hail of arrows arched above the square from rooftops across the way, and the wizard staggered back into the room, killed by the unexpected barrage.

The battle raged with missiles magical and mundane. A group of warriors charged across the square at the house, only to be driven back by a devastating volley of magical flame and lightning.

A second magical volley rose up just south of the house, aimed at it, and despite all the wards of the Hosttower wizards trapped inside, a corner of the building roared in flames.

From a large palace some distance to the northwest, High Captains Taerl and Suljack watched it all with growing fascination.

"It's the same tale each time," Suljack remarked.

"No less than twenty o' Deudermont's followers dead," Taerl replied, to which Suljack merely shrugged.

"Deudermont will replace archers and swordsmen far more readily than Arklem Greeth will find wizards to throw fireballs at them," Suljack said. "This is to end the same way all of them have, with Deudermont's men drawing out every ounce of magical energy from Greeth's wizards then rushing over them.

"And look out in the harbor," he went on, pointing to the masts of four ships anchored in the waterway between Fang and Harbor Arm Islands, and between Fang Island and Cutlass Island, which housed the Hosttower. "Word is that Kurth's shut the Sea Tower down, so it can't oppose Sea Sprite, or anyone else that tries to put in on southern Cutlass. Deudermont's already got Greeth blocked east, west, and north, and south'll be closed within a short stretch. Arklem Greeth's not long for the world, or not long for Luskan, at least."

"Bah, but ye're not remembering the power o' that one!" Taerl protested. "He's the archmage arcane!"

"Not for long."

"When those boys get close to the Hosttower, you'll see how long," Taerl argued. "Kurth won't let them cross Closeguard, and going at Arklem Greeth by sea alone will fill the harbor with bodies, whether Sea Tower's to oppose them or not. More likely, Greeth's wanting Sea Tower empty so that Deudermont and his boys'll foolishly walk onto Cutlass Island and he can sink their ships behind them."

"Nothing foolish about Captain Deudermont," Suljack reminded his companions, something every living man who ever sailed the Sword Coast knew all too well. "And nothing weak about that dog Robillard who walks beside him. If this was just Brambleberry, I'd be thinking you're right, friend."

A loud cheer went up across the way, and Suljack and Taerl looked across to see Deudermont riding down one of the side streets, the crowd swelling behind him. Both high captains turned to the wizards' safehouse, knowing the fight would be over all too soon.

"He's to win, I tell you," said Suljack. "We should all just throw in with him now and ride the wind that's filling Deudermont's sails."

The stubborn Taerl snorted and turned away, but Suljack grabbed him and turned him right back, pointing to a group of men flanking Deudermont. They wore the garb of city guards, and seemed as enthusiastic as the men Brambleberry had brought along from Waterdeep - more so, even.

"Your boys," Suljack said with a grin.

"Their choice, not me own," the high captain protested.

"But you didn't stop them," Suljack replied. "Some of Baram's boys are down there, too."

Taerl didn't respond to Suljack's knowing grin. The fight for Luskan was going exactly as Kensidan had predicted, to Arklem Greeth's ultimate dismay, no doubt.

"Fires in the east, fires in the north," Valindra said to Arklem Greeth, the two of them looking out from the Hosttower to the same scene as Taerl and Suljack, though from an entirely different direction and an entirely different perspective.

"Anyone of worth to us will have the spells needed to get back to the Hosttower," Greeth replied.

"Only those skilled in such schools," said Valindra. "Unlike Blaskar - we have not heard from him."

"My mistake in appointing him overwizard," said Greeth. "As it was my mistake in ever trusting that Raurym creature. I will see her dead before this is ended, don't you doubt that."

"I don't, but I wonder to what end."

Arklem Greeth turned on her fiercely, but Valindra Shadowmantle didn't back down.

"They press us," she said.

"They will not cross Closeguard and we can fend them off from the rocky shores of Cutlass," Greeth replied. "Station our best invokers and our most clever illusionists to every possible landing point, and guard their positions with every magical fortification you can assemble. Robillard and whatever other wizards Deudermont holds at his disposal are not to be taken lightly, but as they are aboard ship and we're on solid ground, the advantage is ours."

"For how long?"

"For as long as need be!" Arklem Greeth yelled, his undead eyes glowing with inner fires. He calmed quickly, though, and nodded, conceding, "You are correct, of course. Deudermont and Brambleberry will be relentless and patient as long as Luskan accepts them. Perhaps it's time we turn that game back on them."

"You will speak with the high captains?"

Arklem Greeth scoffed before she ever finished the question. "With Kurth, perhaps, or perhaps not. Are you so certain those foolish pirates are not in fact behind this peasant uprising?"

"Deudermont learned of our complicity in the piracy along the Sword Coast, I'm told."

"And suddenly found a willing ally in Brambleberry, and a willing traitor in Arabeth Raurym? Convenience is often a matter of careful planning, and as soon as I'm finished with the idiot Deudermont, I intend to have a long discussion with each of the high captains. One I doubt any of them will enjoy."

"And until then?"

"Allow that to be my concern," Arklem Greeth told her. "You see to the defense of Cutlass Island. But first pry Overwizard Rimardo from his library in the east tower and bid him go and learn what has happened to Blaskar. And remind our muscular friend that if he is too busy shaking hands, he'll have one less arm available for casting spells."

"Are you sure I shouldn't go find Blaskar while Rimardo prepares the defenses?"

"If Rimardo is too stupid or distracted to do his work correctly, I would rather have the consequences befall him when I'm not standing right behind him," said the lich. He grinned wickedly, taking Valindra's measure with his undressing stare. "Besides, you only wish to go that you might find an opportunity to unearth our dear Arabeth. Nothing would please you more than destroying that one, yes?"

"Guilty as charged, Archmage."

Arklem Greeth lifted a cold hand to cup Valindra's narrow elf chin. "If I were only alive," he said wistfully. "Or perhaps, if you were only dead."

Valindra swallowed hard at that one, and fell back a step, out of Greeth's deathly cold grasp. The archmage arcane cackled his wheezing laugh.

"It's time to punish them," he said. "Arabeth Raurym most of all."

Late that night, Arklem Greeth, a gaseous and insubstantial cloud, slipped out of the Hosttower of the Arcane. He drifted across Closeguard Island and resisted the urge to go into Kurth Tower and disturb the high captain's sleep.

Instead, he went right past the structure and across the bridge to the mainland, to Luskan proper. Just off the bridge, he turned left, north, and entered an overgrown region of brambles, creepers, broken towers, and general disrepair: Illusk, the only remaining ruins of an ancient city. It wasn't more than a couple of acres - at least above ground. There was much more below, including damp old tunnels reaching out to Closeguard Island, and to Cutlass Island beyond that. The place smelled of rotting vegetation, for Illusk also served as a dump for waste from the open market just to the north.

Illusk was entirely unpleasant to the sensibilities of the average man. To the lich, however, there was something special there. It was the place where Arklem Greeth had at last managed the transformation from living man to undead lich. In that ancient place with its ancient graves, the boundary between life and death was a less tangible barrier. It was a place of ghosts and ghouls, and the people of Luskan knew that well. Among the Hosttower's greatest accomplishments, the first real mark the wizards had put upon Luskan during its founding so long ago, was an enchantment of great power that kept the living dead in their place, in Illusk. That was a favor that had, of course, elicited great favor among the people of the City of Sails for the founders of the Hosttower of the Arcane.

Arklem Greeth had studied that dweomer in depth before his transformation, and though he too was an undead thing, the power of the dweomer could not touch him.

He came back to corporeal form in the center of the ruins, and sensed immediately that he was being watched by a hungry ghoul, but the realization only humored him. Few undead creatures would dare approach a lich of his power, and fewer still could refuse to approach him if he so beckoned.

Still grinning wickedly, Arklem Greeth moved to the northwestern tip of the ruins, on the banks of the Mirar. He unfastened a large belt pouch and carefully pulled it open, revealing powdered bone.

Arklem Greeth walked along the bank to the south, chanting softly and sprinkling the bone dust as he went. He took greater care when he came around to the southern edge of the ruins, making certain he wasn't being watched. It took him some time, and a second belt pouch full of bone dust, to pace the entirety of the cordoned area - to set the countering magic in place.

The ghouls and ghosts were free. Greeth knew it, but they didn't.

He went to a mausoleum near the center of the ruins, the very structure in which he'd completed his transformation so long ago. The door was heavily bolted and locked, but the lich rattled off a spell that transformed him once more into a gaseous cloud and he slipped through a seam in the door. He turned corporeal immediately upon entering, wanting to feel the hard, wet stones of the ancient grave beneath his feet.

He padded down the stairs, his undead eyes having no trouble navigating through the pitch dark. On the landing below, he found the second portal, a heavy stone trapdoor. He reached his arm out toward it, enacted a spell of telekinesis, and reached farther with magical fingers, easily lifting the block aside.

Down he went, into the dank tunnel, and there he sent out his magical call, gathered the ghouls and ghosts, and told them of their freedom.

And there, when the monsters had gone, Arklem Greeth placed one of his most prized items, an orb of exceptional power, an artifact he had created to reach into the netherworld and bring forth the residual life energies of long dead individuals.

Cities of men had been situated on that location for centuries, and before the cities, tribes of barbarians had settled there. Each settlement had been built upon the bones of the previous - the bones of the buildings, and the bones of the inhabitants.

Called by the orb of Arklem Greeth, the latter part of the foundation of Luskan began to stir, to awaken, to rise.