The gate was farther up the Rauvin from the angle of Bok’s chosen path. The golem continued on to the city wall, but didn’t alter its course to bring it to the gate.

It punched a hole in the wall and walked right through.

Entreri paced anxiously in his room at the Inn of the Wayward Sages, near the center of the city. “They should have come by now,” he snapped at Sydney, sitting on the bed and tightening the bonds that held Catti-brie.

Before Sydney could respond, a ball of flame appeared in the center of the room, not a real fire, but the image of flames, illusionary, like something burning in that particular spot on another plane. The fires writhed and transformed into the apparition of a robed man.

“Morkai!” Sydney gasped.

“My greetings,” replied the specter. “And the greetings of Dendybar the Mottled.”

Entreri slipped back into the corner of the room, wary of the thing. Catti-brie, helpless in her bonds, sat very still.

Sydney, versed in the subtleties of conjuring, knew that the otherworldly being was under Dendybar’s control, and she was not afraid. “Why has my master bid you to come here?” she asked boldly.

“I bear news,” replied the specter. “The party you seek was turned into the Evermoors a week ago, to the south of Nesme.”

Sydney bit her lip in anticipation of the specter’s next revelation, but Morkai fell silent and waited as well.

“And where are they now?” Sydney pressed impatiently.

Morkai smiled. “Twice I have been asked, but not yet compelled!” The flames puffed again and the specter was gone.

“The Evermoors,” said Entreri. “That would explain their delay.”

Sydney nodded her agreement absently, for she had other things on her mind. “Not yet compelled,” she whispered to herself, echoing the specter’s parting words. Disturbing questions nagged at her. Why had Dendybar waited a week to send Morkai with the news? And why couldn’t the wizard have forced the specter to reveal more recent activity of the drow’s party? Sydney knew the dangers and limitations of summoning, and understood the tremendous drain of the act on a wizard’s power. Dendybar had conjured Morkai at least three times recently—once when the drow’s party had first entered Luskan, and at least twice since she and her companions had set out in pursuit. Had Dendybar abandoned all caution in his obsession with the Crystal Shard? Sydney sensed that the mottled wizard’s hold over Morkai had lessened greatly, and she hoped that Dendybar would be prudent with any future summonings, at least until he had fully rested.

“Weeks could pass before they arrive!” Entreri spat, considering the news. “If ever they do.”

“You may be right,” agreed Sydney. “They might have fallen in the moors.”

“And if they have?”

“Then we go in after them,” Sydney said without hesitation.

Entreri studied her for a few moments. “The prize you seek must be great indeed,” he said.

“I have my duty, and I shall not fail my master,” she replied sharply. “Bok will find them even if they lay at the bottom of the deepest bog!”

“We must decide our course soon,” Entreri insisted. He turned his evil glare on Catti-brie. “I grow weary of watching this one.”

“Nor do I trust her,” Sydney agreed. “Although she shall prove useful when we meet with the dwarf. Three more days we will wait. After that we go back to Nesme, and into the Evermoors if we must.”

Entreri nodded his reluctant approval of the plan. “Did you hear?” he hissed at Catti-brie. “You have three more days to live, unless your friends arrive. If they are dead in the moors, we have no need of you.”

Catti-brie showed no emotion throughout the entire conversation, determined not to let Entreri gain any advantage by learning of her weakness, or strength. She had faith that her friends were not dead. The likes of Bruenor Battlehammer and Drizzt Do’Urden were not destined to die in an unmarked grave in some desolate fen. And Catti-brie would never accept that Wulfgar was dead until the proof was irrefutable. Holding to her faith, her duty to her friends was to maintain a blank facade. She knew that she was winning her personal battle, that the paralyzing fear Entreri held over her lessened every day. She would be ready to act when the time came. She just had to make certain that Entreri and Sydney didn’t realize it.

She had noted that the labors of the road, and his new companions, were affecting the assassin. Entreri revealed more emotion, more desperation, every day to get this job over and done. Was it possible that he might make a mistake?

“It has come!” echoed a cry from the hallway, and all three started reflexively, then recognized the voice as Jierdan’s, who had been watching the Vault of Sages. A second later, the door burst in and the soldier scrambled into the room, his breathing ragged.

“The dwarf?” Sydney asked, grabbing Jierdan to steady him.

“No!” Jierdan cried. “The golem! Bok has entered Silverymoon! They have it trapped down by the west gate. A wizard was summoned.”

“Damn!” Sydney spat and she started from the room. Entreri moved to follow her, grabbing Jierdan’s arm and yanking him around, bringing them face to face.

“Stay with the girl,” the assassin ordered.

Jierdan glared at him. “She is your problem.”

Entreri easily could have killed the soldier right there, Catti-brie noted, hoping that Jierdan had read the assassin’s deadly look as clearly as she.

“Do as you are told!” Sydney screamed at Jierdan, ending further argument. She and Entreri left, the assassin slamming the door behind them.

“He would have killed you,” Catti-brie told Jierdan when Entreri and Sydney had gone. “You know that.”

“Silence,” Jierdan growled. “I’ve had enough of your vile words!” He approached her threateningly, fists clenched at his sides.

“Strike me, then,” Catti-brie challenged, knowing that even if he did, his code as a soldier would not allow him to continue such an assault on a helpless foe. “Although in truth I be yer only friend on this cursed road!”

Jierdan stopped his advance. “Friend?” he balked.

“As close as ye’ll find out here,” Catti-brie replied. “Ye’re a prisoner here suren as I be.” She recognized the vulnerability of this proud man, who had been reduced to servitude by the arrogance of Sydney and Entreri, and drove her point home hard. “They mean to kill ye, ye know that now, and even if ye escape the blade, yell have nowhere to go. Ye’ve abandoned yer fellows in Luskan, and the wizard in the tower’d put ye to a bad end if ye ever went back there, anyway!”

Jierdan tensed in frustrated rage, but did not lash out.

“Me friends are close by,” Catti-brie continued despite the warning signs. “They be living still, I know, and we’ll be meeting them any day. That’ll be our time, soldier, to live or to die. For meself, I see a chance. Whether me friends win or I be bargained over, me life’ll be me own. But for yerself, the road looks dark indeed! If me friends win, they’ll cut ye down, and if yer mates win…” She let the grim possibilities hang unspoken for a few moments to let Jierdan weigh them fully.

“When they get what they seek, they’ll need ye no more,” she said grimly. She noted his trembling, not of fear, but of rage, and pushed him past the edge of control. “They may let ye live,” she said, snidely. “Might that they be needin’ a lackey!”

He did strike her then, just once, and recoiled.

Catti-brie accepted the blow without complaint, even smiling through the pain, though she was careful to hide her satisfaction. Jierdan’s loss of self-restraint proved to her that the continual disrespect Sydney, and especially Entreri, had shown for him had fueled the flames of discontent to the verge of explosion.

She knew, too, that when Entreri returned and saw the bruise Jierdan had given her, those fires would burn even brighter.