“Yet you might be able to usurp the throne, you know.”
“Begging your pardon, majesty, I know nothing of the sort, nor do I care to discover if there is truth in your assertion. Once more, I offer the opal to your lordship, asking only the two small favors I require in return.”
“You are worthy, Gord,” Shadowking laughed, leaning his long spine deeply into the ebon plush of his chair and tilting his pale face back in order to allow the sound to roll forth unhindered. “Without certainty as to strength, potential, or foes, you decide upon a course and walk that line thereafter. Perhaps you do speak truly… I find no guile in your words, nor do the manifold dweomers which cloak this Vault of Veils indicate aught but honesty.” The Shadowlord tilted back his massive seat and looked at Gord along his aquiline nose, black eyes deep and unfathomable. “Am I to accept you as both peer and honest petitioner, then?”
“For the nonce, your majesty… Who amongst us can claim equality and forthrightness for longer?”
Again, Shadowking laughed. “I begin to actually like you, master Gord. You rule naught but yourself, and only that betimes, I think. Still, you are clever and amusing and speak openly. I accept that. Now I shall do the same. Many who dwell within My Realm, the Plane of Shadows, are not indigenous. These Outlanders come here by choice to continue their chosen ways, and such ones are at odds with me, inimical, as it were…”
“The creatures known as gloams?” Gord asked uncertainly.
“Exactly, young prince, but not restricted to that narrow lot by any means. They are once-humans, you know. The murklings were once gnomes and dwarves; the fuligi, curiously enough, elvish sorts. These migrants, along with evil-natured natives of this plane-shadowkin and others too-have combined to oppose My rule and curry mischief and rebellion. I can no longer trust my adumbrates, for instance, due to the machinations of Imprimus and his ilk. Only the phantoms are basically loyal, and, too, certain other of the lesser creatures of Shadowrealm. This split, the division of my subjects, affects me, of course.”
“Disloyalty is always painful, majesty,” Gord said to fill the silence, for the lean monarch had fallen into a reverie.
“You misunderstand. It is natural, for you are not one subject to such conditions. When one’s realm becomes fractious, then the lord tied thereto suffers accordingly. I, Master Gord, am a dangerous schizophrenic. It is a malady not of my own choosing, nor born of any mental frailty I possess. I am shadow, and as It is torn by factiousness, so too am I. Alternately I am the good, the ill, and the indifferent within the bounds of the plane. Should there develop yet another great division within Shadowrealm, then I fear that I, its monarch, would suffer yet another splintering of my already disjointed personality.”
Aghast, Gord leaped to his feet. “Then I must now offer my sword and my service to you, majesty, in order to restore matters to their rightful state or, failing, lose my life.”
“Pretty sentiments, no doubt nobly voiced. Why, then, your refusal to give unto Me what is Mine? Restoration of the opal orb will do much to mend my torn psyche.”
“What of mine own dilemma, majesty?”
Shadowking looked annoyed. “You are consigned to this plane by means supernatural. Some mighty servant of an evil deity sought your death, or perhaps It was the vile deity personally-no matter! Ere you expired, you sought the power of Shadowfire. It cheated the one who slew you, carrying you here instead of to the kingdom where your slayer sought to consign you. Perhaps even another entity had a hand in that… I can but hazard guesses there.”
“Is there aught which will return me to my own place?”
“This place is your own now. Once I might have been able to change the course of things to your benefit. Not now.”
“Shadowflre?”
“Restorative, longed for. but insufficient.” The lean lord of the shadows slumped gloomily, resigned to his fate.
Gord bowed, placing one knee upon the gray-veined black marble of the chamber’s floor. “Majesty,” he said softly, drawing his sword and holding its chill blade gingerly in gauntleted hands so as to avoid its enervation, “I offer my self and my sword in your service. Will you accept?”
“Yes, for all it may matter to either of us. I have but scant hope.”
“In that event. Lord of Shadows, I gladly give over Shadowfire into your hand,” the young adventurer said with firm resolution ringing in his voice. “No vile sect should ever abridge any sovereign lord in his own domain!”
The master of gloom stretched forth his hand, touching the hilt of the sword in token of his acceptance of Gord’s pledge. In a twinkling, the young man slipped the blade back into its sheath and brought forth the strange stone so sought after by all who knew of it. As if unbelieving still, Shadowking himself now arose and reached out for the opal. “Long and long have I sought Shadowfire,” he murmured.
“It is yours, majesty,” Gord said, firmly placing the glowing sphere within the pale palm of the lord of shadows. “May it never be parted from its rightful owner again.”
The tall being gazed at the precious orb for long moments, unspeaking, unable to speak. Then the Shadowking smiled slightly. “Arise, Gord,” he said in stately tones, “for I now create you a Lord and Knight of Shadowrealm. Stand before me, Count of Twilight, Knight of Chiaroscuro. I charge you with aiding Me during My times of need, of giving service to the Realm of Shadow, and with faithfulness in all your dealings until such time as you may return once more to the place which is rightfully your own.”
These words were sufficient to bring a trickling of recollection back to him. It took a few moments for the surge of memories to emerge, wash over his mind, then sink again into their proper channels. “Dyvers! The black sapphires!”
“That is where you were slain. The gems you seek are here in Shadowrealm.”
“But if-”
The Shadowking raised his pearly-palmed hand. “The forces which split this plane now impinge upon Me most sorely. Before long I shall be as malign as the duskdrake. The gloams now work to undo the weal wrought by your gift, Prince Gord. I resist their evil now only through the renewed force granted by the power of Shadowfire. Leave Me now, for I must fight off the attack alone. When there comes an interlude in the assault, I will summon you again, for there is urgent need of your office in this matter. More I cannot say, now, for who can tell what will occur soon?”
With that the lord of the murky plane seated himself with determination stamped on his features. The Shadowking was about to fight a battle, and in it he had to stand alone.
Chapter 21
Snuffdark, the blackness after twilight, lay upon Shadowrealm as a lightless mantle of oppression. Even the folk of shadow were subject to the totality. Its strongest were near-blind, weak with the inky darkness that oppressed the plane.
In this grim midnight Gord walked alone over a landscape that moved sluggishly and with convulsive writhings. Snuffdark’s black wind howled as a dirge, and even the fearsome beasts of Shadowrealm cowered in their dens, seeking solace in deep lair or high, awaiting the return of dusk to their somber world.
Not so the black-clad young adventurer now named Count of Twilight. He strode through the pitch dark with sureness of step and firm purpose, a short-bladed sword clenched fast in his right hand. Upon the pommel of this weapon was a phosphorescent jewel, a fire opal with a strange, greenish glow in its core. By its power Gord saw, and the magical sight was clear and strong. Shadowking himself had given him the talisman, for the lord of shadows no longer had need of the gem. He had the tenfold might of Shadowfire.