Master of Chains Read online

  The darkness he fights is matched only by the darkness he holds inside.

  The taskmaster swung the cleaver through the musky air. Ryder watched as the blade glistened in the lanternlight. This scarred, shirtless creature seemed to be enjoying himself. He had a whip in one hand, a cleaver in the other, and was swinging them both like a child might wave its toys. It made Ryder’s stomach turn. What sort of man would revel in such torment? What sort of life could have led a man to stoop to such a place? He was barely more than an animal.

  Ryder stared down at the chains on his arms and legs. They were trying to turn him into an animal as well. He looked back at the taskmaster. He was still flailing around with his whip and cleaver. The taskmaster’s chest and forehead were beginning to shine from sweat. That would be Ryder’s challenge here. He could never let himself become like this man, never let them take from him the only thing he had left: his humanity.

  Jess Lebow tells a thrilling tale of honor, betrayal, and vengeance, filled with the unbroken spirit found only in the souls of

  Master of Chains

  Jess Lebow

  Son of Thunder

  Murray J. D. Leeder

  Ghostwalker

  Erik Scott de Bie

  Bladesinger

  Keith Francis Strohm

  Also by Jess Lebow

  Magic: The Gathering®

  The Darksteel Eye

  Legend of the Five Rings

  Wind of War

  Dungeons & Dragons®

  Return of the Damned

  MASTER OF CHAINS

  The Fighters: Book 1

  ©2005 Wizards of the Coast, LLC.

  All characters in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  This book is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. Any reproduction or unauthorized use of the material or artwork contained herein is prohibited without the express written permission of Wizards of the Coast LLC.

  Published by Wizards of the Coast LLC. Hasbro SA, represented by Hasbro Europe, Stockley Park, UB11 1AZ. UK.

  FORGOTTEN REALMS, Wizards of the Coast, D&D, Magic: The Gathering, and their respective logos are trademarks of Wizards of the Coast LLC in the U.S.A. and other countries. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

  All Wizards of the Coast characters and their distinctive likenesses are property of Wizards of the Coast LLC.

  Cover art by: Raymond Swanland

  eISBN: 978-0-7869-6402-4

  640A2910000001 EN

  For customer service, contact:

  U.S., Canada, Asia Pacific, & Latin America: Wizards of the Coast LLC, P.O. Box 707, Renton, WA 98057-0707, +1-800-324-6496, www.wizards.com/customerservice

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  Visit our websites at www.wizards.com

  www.DungeonsandDragons.com

  v3.1

  Dedication

  To SC. Hi, and hi. The best I’ve written for the best I’ve ever known. You make me happy. For being the princess.

  Contents

  Cover

  Other Books by This Author

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  Prelude: 1359DR

  Chapter 1: 1369 DR

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Acknowledgements

  Above all, thanks must go to my editor, Susan Morris. Your hard work and insights were a tremendous help, and this wouldn’t have been half the book without you. I’d also like to thank:

  Connie Beetlestone for tirelessly reading the rough draft but mostly for her enthusiasm. (You helped me get through the rough spots.)

  Jay Adams for being a great sounding board for ideas.

  Philip Athans, just because he’s so cool.

  Steve Whitman, for being brilliant.

  Phil Tasca, for also being brilliant.

  And last but not least, the baristas at the 1st and Pike SBC, for putting up with me while I wrote the whole dang thing.

  PRELUDE: 1359DR

  Young Lord Purdun stepped around a ruined tombstone and pulled his sword from its sheath.

  “Quiet now,” Purdun said.

  “What is this place?” asked Menrick.

  “From the looks of it, I’d say it’s the entrance to a family tomb.” Purdun pushed aside the dried, thorny vines covering the façade of the stone building with the tip of his blade. The dark, dead plants made a light grinding noise as they slid across the decrepit, withered stone.

  “Well, well,” said Lord Purdun. “What do we have here?”

  Unlike the rest of the tomb, cracked and worn smooth from hundreds of years of rain and the elements, the stone underneath the hanging vines was a slick, polished black that shone like a mirror. Carved into its surface were hundreds of tiny figures. Each of them had been crafted down to the most minute detail.

  “Help me clear away the vines so we can get a better look.”

  Menrick stepped up beside the young lord, and the two of them together cut down the dead vegetation.

  A rectangular slab of jet black stone covered most of the front of the tomb. At the center of the wall an archway cut the slab in two. It looked to be outlining what must have been the entrance to the tomb, but the one-time doorway was now bricked up.

  Menrick bent close to the stone, examining the carvings. “It appears to be obsidian.”

  Lord Purdun ran his hands across the smooth, black stone. “This is remarkable. It looks to have been carved within the last tenday.” He took a step back and scanned the path leading up to the tomb. “But there isn’t so much as a single footprint or chip of stone. No one has visited this place for years.”

  “My lord, the stone is likely enchanted,” said Menrick. “Judging from these carvings, whoever rests here left behind a lot of mourners.”

  Purdun turned his attention back to the carvings. The figures were mostly human, though there were some dwarves, elves, and what appeared to be half-orcs depicted in the scene as well. All of them were looking toward a large ziggurat in the distance with a lone figure standing atop it. The figure was of a woman, wearing a cape with a thick collar. She held over her head a large box. Beams of energy or light radiated from the box, and the woman’s eyes gazed upon it in obvious adoration.

  Carved in the middle of the box was a strange rune. It looked like two entwined threes, twisted and gnarled, reaching toward the ground—a bodiless, headless spider ready to sink its clawed legs into an unsuspecting victim.

  On both sides of the archway, the scene was repeated in exact detail. Same woman, same box, and same strange, twisted rune.

  “Look at this.” Menrick ran his hand over
the edge of the arch. “Oh my.”

  Purdun took a step closer. A jagged, rather chaotic pattern was inscribed around the archway. It reminded Purdun of the golden illumination on the pages of one of his favorite books, back in the manor library.

  “What am I looking at? This pattern?”

  Menrick nodded.

  “Yes, that’s very exciting,” said Purdun, shaking his head. “Whoever crafted this stone had a real flare for decoration.”

  “This isn’t decoration, my lord. It’s an invocation.”

  “A spell?”

  Menrick nodded again, not taking his eyes off the carvings. “The spell that opens this doorway.”

  Purdun squinted his eyes. “Why would a sealed doorway require an invocation to be opened?” The characters were so tiny, he couldn’t discern where one ended and the next began. “I don’t recognize the language.”

  Menrick took a step back and crossed his arms over his chest. “That’s because it’s Infernal.”

  “Infernal?”

  Menrick looked down his long nose at his young master. “Yes, Infernal. And I don’t know why the door would need an invocation to be opened, but if I had to hazard a guess, I’d say it wasn’t a door that was meant to be opened more than once.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “The invocation likely summons a spirit or phantasm,” explained Menrick, “some creature from another realm who can destroy the enchantment that guards this portal.”

  Purdun smiled. “You’re saying this isn’t a tomb—it’s a vault, a treasure trove.”

  Menrick cocked his head, a stern look on his face. “Well, I don’t know, but … I would say it is quite likely. But I do not think it would—”

  Purdun cut him off. “Can you open this door?”

  “My lord, I really must protest—”

  “Can you or can you not open this door?” demanded the young lord.

  Menrick stood silent for a moment, then nodded. “Yes, my lord. I can.”

  Purdun stepped aside. “Then open it.”

  “My lord—”

  “Open it.”

  Menrick bowed his head. “As you wish.”

  The old wizard pushed back the sleeves of his white robe and fished around inside his pack, eventually pulling a handful of scrolls from the cluttered sack. Unrolling them one at a time, he scanned the text until he located the correct passage.

  Menrick cleared his throat then began reading. He spoke softly at first. So softly that Purdun could barely hear him. But slowly his voice rose in volume, until eventually Menrick was shouting. Lord Purdun still didn’t understand the words his manservant spoke, but the sounds he made were familiar. They had the same tenor and pitch as words Purdun himself used every day.

  Menrick fell silent. The runes inscribed so tightly around the edge of the archway began to glow a pale green and the pattern changed shape, transforming from a jumble of lines and curves into recognizable letters and words.

  “Thank you,” said Purdun. Then it was his turn to read.

  Handmaidens of Lolth

  Ghouls of Baphomet

  Harbingers of death and despair

  Bring forth the suffering

  Release the shackles of night

  Bear down the walls of Dis

  Evade the hunters,

  The Bebilith, the Retriever, the Vrock

  Come now from your places of darkness

  As once you were born from good

  Return now to do thy bidding

  Flaming Balor in the bowels of the Abyss

  Accept mine invitation

  From the pit I command of you

  Tanar’ri come forth

  Purdun finished intoning the last word and the ground began to rumble. Rolling waves of earth washed through the ruined cemetery like the wake of a ship slapping up against the shore. Headstones crumbled. Partially collapsed mausoleums moaned under the assault as if the dead themselves were lamenting this intrusion. Trees shook, birds scattered, and both the young lord and his companion were tossed from their feet by the shaking ground.

  A hole opened in the dirt just in front of the old tomb. It was rimmed in the same pale green light as the runes inscribed on the archway. A thick gas spilled out, covering the ground like fog. Then the earth went still. All was quiet except for a scraping noise that grew louder and louder.

  Purdun swallowed hard, unable to take his gaze off the glowing pit.

  The foggy gas swirled, disturbed from the inside. A shadow filled the cloud, nearly blocking out the green glow. And out of the shadow a hideous beast emerged.

  “Glabrezu,” whispered Menrick. His voice sounded far away, strangled, as if he had tried to hold back the foul word, but it had been pulled forcibly from his lips.

  The demon’s skin creaked as it stretched and moved across piles of muscle. Standing almost three times the height of a man, the creature turned its massive bulk, shifting its entire body to look at Purdun and Menrick. Its eyes, glowing with the color of rotting flesh, were little more than withered and wrinkled husks. They seemed ready to fall from the demon’s oversized eye sockets, attached by stretched, desiccated tendons that looked more frail than a thin strip of vellum.

  Its head was like that of a dog’s. Long, sharp, dripping fangs protruded from under a blackened lip that ran the length of its pointed snout. It snarled at the two men, revealing two more jagged rows of teeth behind rotting, pockmarked gums.

  Lord Purdun got to his feet and drew his sword. He took a step forward, but Merrick’s hand on his calf held him back.

  “This is a fight we cannot win,” said the wizard. Menrick pushed his chin in the direction of the demon. “And this creature is bound to us.”

  “Bound to us?” Purdun shook his head. “This is a beast of the Abyss. How is it bound to us?”

  “The invocation,” explained Menrick. “Its words bind the creature as well as summon it.” He looked at the young lord. “This beast is here to open this door. Nothing more.”

  As if the glabrezu heard and understood Menrick’s words, the demon turned toward the mausoleum and placed its four hands—two ending in jagged claws, two in crablike pincers—on the sides of the archway. A spark of green energy jumped from the stone into the creature, and the beast let out a wail. Purdun had to cover his ears against the agonizing sound.

  The carved obsidian wall began to glow yellow-green—all of it except for the lines of power coming out of the box, suspended in the air by the worshiped woman at the top of both carvings. This light was a ghostly blue-white.

  The tiny carved humans, dwarves, and elves in the relief pictures began to shift and move. They raised their hands to the sky, milling around each other as if they were alive. They moved with a purpose, executing some sort of ancient dance or mass summoning ritual. Then, as a group, the entire throng on both sides dropped to their knees, bowing down before the glowing woman at the top of the two daises. The box she held over her head rotated and the lines of energy shooting out of it cast a pale white light over all the worshiping subjects below. Shadows rippled and moved over the collected group as they raised their hands then dropped their foreheads to the ground.

  “May Ilmater protect us,” whispered Purdun.

  Two glowing white boxes, held aloft by two identical carvings of the heavily robed woman, stopped rotating. Their beams of white light lifted off the wall and fell upon the demon. The beast clenched its claws and pincers, crushing handfuls of obsidian in its powerful grip and opening its mouth as if to scream.

  But no sound came out.

  The light danced over its flesh, illuminating parts that had likely not left darkness for thousands of years. The demon, its mouth still agape, its eyes raised to the heavens as if praying to the gods to save it from such torture, began to tremble. Its whole body shook and blue-white light began to pour from cracks in its flesh. The glow grew until it encompassed the creature’s entire body. Then in a flash of brilliant light, the demon exploded.

&nb
sp; Lord Purdun threw his arm over his face, covering his eyes from the intense glare. Despite the shield of skin and bone, the light penetrated Purdun’s flesh. He could see the red blood coursing through his veins, the bones holding his body upright, and the muscles that made him move. A shiver went down his spine.

  The light vanished, and Purdun’s arm went dark. Cautiously uncovering his face, the young lord nudged Menrick with his elbow. “It’s safe.”

  Both men stared in awe at the mausoleum. The carved figures had gone still. The adored woman stood stoically holding her rune-inscribed artifact, unmoving. The glowing lights, the shadowy hole, and the demon were gone. All that was left in their place was a blackened circle on the ground where the glabrezu had stood and an open archway leading into the mausoleum.

  Purdun looked to Menrick. “Shall we?”

  Menrick got to his feet. “This is a bad idea.”

  Ignoring his manservant, Purdun crossed through the archway into the inky darkness. Two steps across the threshold, the hallway burst into light. Purdun dropped into a defensive stance, bearing his blade before him, prepared to fend off any unseen attacks.

  But nothing came.

  Eerie torchlight cast shadows into the cracks in the walls and along the flagstones of the floor. A single torch hung at about head height from a sconce. It did its best to push back the oppressive darkness, illuminating a small circle before the door. It was enough to see by, but little more.

  “Isn’t that nice,” quipped Purdun. “Whoever built this tomb thought of everything.” The young lord straightened himself and pulled the torch from its sconce.

  “My lord,” said Menrick, “I have a bad feeling about this.”

  “Nonsense.” Purdun lifted the torch to extend its reach. “We had to summon a demon just to get in. Nothing and no one has been inside here for hundreds of years. What could happen?”

  “I can think of many things,” replied the wizard.

  “You worry too much.” Purdun pointed the torch down the hall. “Come on.”

  They continued deeper into the mausoleum. With each step the crackling circle of yellow light revealed more of the tomb, one brick at a time. Behind them their footprints were swallowed by the shadows. The hallway continued on for some time, the surroundings changing little. Only the cut of the stones and the accumulation of dust gave any indication that they were making progress. Finally, the floor tilted down, becoming a set of descending stairs.