Drulissa's Domain

The Valor didn't approach the island. It assaulted it. Captain D'Arbene, a man who understood the sea was not a playground but a weapon, drove the ship into a hidden cove with the violence of a battering ram. The hull groaned, a deep, pained cry of splintering wood, as the bow crunched into a sandbar concealed by the low tide. Before the echo died, two gangplanks slammed down onto the black sand like guillotines. They hit the beach in a storm of spray and splintered timber. This was no landing; it was an ambush. The arrows came without warning, without the tell-tale thrum of a loosened string. One moment, the air was empty. The next was a blizzard of black-fletched death. They swarmed from the treeline, a living cloud of jagged points and barbed shafts, their tips glinting with a sickly, greenish poison. The cultists weren't firing to kill; they were firing to cripple, to maim, to spread their pestilence before a single blade was drawn. The assassins didn't run; they we...

Talianimi lay in her bed with her "sisters", Wildsong and Illastria. The three cuddled close against the bitter Halas cold and the less-than-ideal housing during this assignment. A small, enchanted brazier gave off a meager heat, its coals glowing like angry red eyes in the darkness. The room was sparse, smelling of pine and woodsmoke, and of old stone, a stark contrast to the elegant quarters they were accustomed to in Qeynos. Wildsong lay on her side, her back to Talianimi, her body a tense line of coiled muscle even in sleep, her blue-violet hair a spill of night across the coarse pillow. She was always listening, always aware, a predator who could never truly rest. Illastria, meanwhile, was the picture of languid ease. She was sprawled on her stomach, her chin propped on her hands, her blue-ash skin seeming to absorb the dim light. She traced patterns on the rough wool blanket with a single blue-tipped finger, her crimson eyes fixed on the ceiling, a faint, knowing smile ...

 Lady Alustrae sat in her office aboard her father's Flagship, the Starcrest Valor, the ship swaying gently in the harbor, the rhythmic creak of the wood a soothing counterpoint to the storm raging in her mind. The room was a sanctuary of order, the mahogany desk polished to a high gloss, the legal tomes neatly stacked, the ship's log open on a stand, its pages filled with her elegant script. She looked at the report, her eyes scanning the words, her face a mask of grim determination. The report was from Blaquetail, the Ratonga assassin who had found her at the docks, his words a chilling account of the battle at the lighthouse. A vampire. A vessel for the Plaguebringer. A charade with a phantom Ereon. It was a nightmare. A waking nightmare that threatened to consume Qeynos, to plunge the city into a darkness from which it might never recover. She looked at the map of Norrath spread out on her desk, her fingers tracing the coastline, the cities, the forests, the mountains. She ...

 A wagon full of supplies ambled up the lighthouse road, a shipment that those inside would be expecting. What they would not be expecting were the assassins who had snuck along for the ride. Dragskarr narrowed his eyes and peered out of the tarp. "We approach. Prepare yourselves." Varlkh nodded. "Right, let's make it quick. Tali, do your thing." Talianimi's violet eyes glowed as she focused, lashing out at the minds of the two cloaked men guarding the door. She found their thoughts and ripped them to shreds. The two men stumbled back, their faces contorted in silent agony, their hands clutching at their heads, a torrent of psychic fire tearing through their minds. They collapsed to the ground, their bodies twitching in a final, futile dance of death. Talianimi's goat-like eyes scanned the area. "Guards down. Illastria says there are four inside, two men and the woman. There is a bard there with them, but she cannot tell if it's Ereon." ...

 Zesik moved like a shadow up the gangplank of the ship, silently and without being noticed. Varlikh was right behind him, a phantom in black leather, while Dragskarr brought up the rear, a monolithic figure of black scales and simmering power. Talianimi remained on the dock, her mind a razor-sharp blade, slicing through the fog and into the minds of the men on board. She was a ghost in the machine, a silent observer, her presence a secret known only to her and Varlikh. The ship was a hive of activity, but the fog had turned it into a world of muffled sounds and indistinct shapes. The men were tense, their hands on their weapons, their eyes scanning the darkness for any sign of trouble. Zesik and Varlikh moved with a deadly grace, their steps silent, their movements fluid. They were two sides of the same coin, one a master of stealth and subterfuge, the other a master of death and destruction. Dragskarr was a force of nature, a storm given flesh. He moved with a deliberate, unhurri...

 The bitter cold cut like a blade across the Halas docks, the gray-green ocean whipping foam off the tops of waves, and ice chunks floating in the hostile sea. The sun never rises this time of year, but the days were growing longer, and the eternal twilight of summer would begin soon. The men fanned across the docks, taking places at markets, fishmongers, docked longboats, bait shops, net repair stalls, and other dockside shoppes crammed onto the pier, shuttered lanterns providing just enough light to do business by, legal or otherwise. The black-scaled Iskar walked beside a hooded man as they made their way towards the arranged meeting point. "I don't get it, Dragskarr," the man said from under his hood. "I treated those girls like family, raised them all in a, well, not loving, but a good home where they were spared the rod, and this is what they do to repay me?" "Varlikh," the Iskar growled, "they wish nothing to do with you now, save Kali. She...