"A woman is like a tea bag; you never know how strong it is until it's in hot water."

- Eleanor Roosevelt

Let your plans be dark and impenetrable as night, and when you move, fall like a thunderbolt.

- Sun Tzu

~*~
Chapter 45: Hot Water
~*~

"Shiny!" The harpy's wings strained as she lifted her prize and carried it. "Mine!"

Deekin squirmed in her grasp. "Hey!" he screeched. "Deekin be a free kobold, you know! He not be propert-" The harpy's claws tightened. The kobold's eyes bulged a little. "Erk!"

My head snapped around as the harpy flew over my head. "Oh, hell no!" I yelled at the top of my lungs. I realized I was still holding Enserric. "Shit." I couldn't risk dropping him, especially not with all that lava around. "How sharp are you?"

Enserric flickered. "Magnificently sharp, thank you very m-"

"Great." I raised the sword high, then drove it point-down into the ground. It went right through a bed of moss and into the rock. "Stay there. I'll be right back."

Enserric sparkled with indignation. "Why, I never-"

I ignored him and ran back to the cliff's edge. I drew in a breath and pulled up power. The wind flowed into my, lungs and limbs and heart, speeding me up and slowing down the world.

I ran. The edge of the cliff came up unnaturally fast.

The harpy swooped over it and then down, wings outspread.

I reached the edge a few seconds after her. I didn't fly. I leapt, and thought of smoke.

My leap carried me into a smooth arc, up and out and over the yawning pit, and at the apex of my arc, my body flew apart – into particles, then molecules, then atoms, more dispersed than usual but somehow still cohesive, somehow still me.

I boiled upwards, weightless, churning in the churning air. I'd lost sight of the harpy. Where is she? Where is she taking him?

There. Another thought-presence slid through mine like a sliver of ice, and all at once, my vision shifted – moving to somewhere else, like I'd just switched to a different camera, and taking on a crystalline, shadowy overlay, as if I was viewing the world through a cage of glass. Do you see her? Enserric asked me, and I saw her then in his sight, rising up on the thermals, heading towards one of the high nest-holes in the cliffside, a tasty kobold morsel struggling in her grasp.

I had no idea how I was seeing through Enserric's eyes, or whatever it was that he saw with, but right then I didn't care. I set off after the harpy. I used the thermals just like she did, only I was a cloud and close to weightless, so I was faster, shooting upwards in a swirl of air and vapor.

The harpy got bigger, then bigger still, then loomed in my vision right before I fountained over her and she got smaller again.

I looked straight down at her as I passed. She hadn't seen me, or if she had, she had taken me for nothing more than a puff of steam.

I thought of heavy things, like Valen's flail hitting her right in the teeth.

Air whooshed together, solidified into blood and bone and flesh and metal.

I hit the harpy's back. For a sickening moment, she lost her lift and a few feet of altitude. Then she righted herself, her wings straining against my weight. "Go away!" she screeched.

I got an arm around her neck and tightened my legs around her waist. Wings buffeted me. I grabbed a fistful of filthy harpy hair and yanked. "Give him back!" I yelled in her ear.

The harpy's head arched back, showing me her snarl in profile and the tendons standing out in her neck. "No!" Her claws tightened around Deekin, eliciting a yowl. "Mine! Bitch!"

That pained yowl went straight to the set of switches in my head marked 'mindless rage' and flipped every single one of them. "You want 'bitch'?" I roared. I hooked my arm around her neck and dug my fingers into her throat. My vision shifted again, this time into shades of blood. "I'll show you 'bitch'!" Then I reached into her with a hurricane howl of power and snapped her neck.

In an instant, the harpy's body went limp, yielding to the twin forces of death and gravity. Her raptor's legs went limp, too, and yielded up their kobold burden.

I caught a glimpse of Deekin's face, wide-eyed with shock, and then the kobold and the harpy fell out from beneath me – the harpy in silence, and Deekin with a long, wailed, "Boo-ooss!"

Reflexes took over. I grabbed for him, but the harpy was falling between us and all I got for my efforts was a handful of feathers and the sight of Deekin's terrified face as he fell.

The harpy fell like a ragdoll. Deekin fell in a much livelier way, clawing and fighting the air, but he was still falling.

I fell, too, but a lot more slowly. I could feel the air dragging at me, like a million hands reaching out from every side to slow my fall. Since the wind obviously wanted to be helpful, I called it, casting it ahead of me like a net and hurling it behind me to propel myself forward like a rocket.

Deekin's, "OOF!" was audible from a distance of about twenty feet. I felt the tug when he hit my net of air, and my heart almost stopped when I saw him bounce and tumble, clutching wildly at nothing, before he came to a bug-eyed, panting stop.

I settled down lightly next to Deekin, then immediately dropped to my knees and flung my arms around him. "Gotcha," I said breathessly. "Don't worry. You're okay. Are you okay?"

The kobold still looked a little wild-eyed. He looked down. "Ummmmmm. Deekin be confused. Is he flying, or is he floating?"

Inane questions were probably a good sign. "Try not to think about it too hard, sweetie."

"Deekin be trying, but it not be so easy." He swallowed hard. Then, moving with enormous care, the little guy reached up and patted my arm. "Thanks, Boss."

"No problem." I tried to smile. "You saved my ass from Aghaaz. Figured it was my turn to save yours."

The bard tittered. "Deekin gotta shoot more golems, then." He looked up. "Ummm. So how do we gets out of here?

"Dunno." I looked up, too, guesstimating the distance between us and the cliff's edge. It was pretty far, and I could hear the sounds of fighting and see harpies circling. I thought of Valen and felt a moment's fear. We'd wasted too much time. We had to get up there, fast, and when I remembered how slow and strenuous it had been to carry Tomi a couple hundred feet across thin air, I knew I needed to do something different now. "Hold still, Deeks. I'm going to try something."

Deekin made the mistake of looking down, which set off another fit of nervous tremors. "Uh. Okay. W-what?"

I put a hand on his shoulder and poured every thought of fog I had into him. "This," I said, and as I said it, I saw the little bard start to dissolve and come apart, and heard my own voice fading.

The thermals buoyed me up. I looked around and saw a vaguely kobold-shaped wisp. "Holy shit, I can't believe that actually worked," I said without a voice.

The kobold-shaped wisp darted around like a hummingbird. "COOL!" I heard-not-heard it say. "Look at Deekin! He be a little fluffy cloud!"

A faint ripple of relief ran through me. "Only you, Deeks."

"Only Deekin what?"

"Only you could be freaking out one second and having the time of your life the next." I thought of Valen, and my relief was replaced by distant worry, muted by my misty state but still there. "Come on. You can play later," I told the swooping little cloud. "Let's go help the others."

The kobold-cloud swirled. "Right-o, Boss." Then it streamed upwards.

I followed, rising above the cliff's edge into cooler air, to see how the fight was going.

It could, I reflected, have been worse. Valen had found cover under a mushroom tree and was using it to keep harpies from sneaking up behind him or dropping on his head, although he was still beset and was mostly on defense. Now and again Quarra's crossbow sang out, although I couldn't see her.

I tried to take a quick enemy head count, but the damn things were swooping around so fast and high that it was impossible to keep track of them. This reminded me of the time our camp down in Chult had gotten buzzed by a bunch of goddamn pterodactyls – and that gave me an idea. "Deeks!" I called out. "Give 'em something to chase!" I thought for a second, then added, "As long as it's not you!"

"On it, Boss!" Cloud-Deekin streaked across the ground and swirled under the bole of a mushroom tree, hesitating. "Uh. How does Deekin, you know, stop beings a cloud and start beings a kobold again?"

I considered explaining, decided it would take too much time, and settled on the easiest, most Deekin-friendly instructions that came to mind. "Think of Tymofarrar after a big meal."

"Ooh, yeah, old Boss get real fat and slow when he-" An instant later, Deekin re-materialized and plopped to the ground, staggering a little. "Hey, that worked! Thanks, Boss!" His beady eyes sought and found the harpies. "A-ha! One distraction, comin' up!" His cymbals shone as he unhooked them from his pack and started banging them arrhythmically. "Huzzah!" he shrieked, and with a final clash, a bunch of Deekins popped into existence.

I stared. I'd been expecting a bunch of perfect mirror images, like last time, but Deekin must have been working on his spell, because now the Deekins were all different. One was bright pink and had tiny, translucent butterfly wings. Another was gold, like Ferron. Then there was a bright blue one with feathers, and a red one with spikes on his tail, and a white one with ice on his horns, but if they had anything in common, it was the way they sparkled, as if they'd been sprinkled with faerie dust. "Deekin!" they all screamed, and ran out onto the open field, hooting and hollering while behind them the original Deekin hummed a scratchy tune and vanished.

The first harpy to sight the Deekins did a double-take, swiveling in midair with her wings curling around her. Then she gasped and pointed. "Shiny!" she screamed, and fell into a stoop. "Shiny meat! Sisters! Come!"

Other harpies turned, and they, too, went after the Deekins, converging on the illusionary kobolds like a flock of magpies.

Movement caught my eye, and I looked to see a harpy flash by Valen on her way to the party. His eyes followed her, flaring red for a moment, and all at once he was off, charging after her and shaking his flail loose.

The harpy looked behind her and swerved, cackling. "Catch!" she croaked, and dashed away, staying just high enough to stay out of reach and just low enough to be taunting.

Valen's eyes narrowed, then he pushed himself into an even faster sprint and, with a powerful leap, exploded into the air, whirling his flail over his head like a really big bolas.

The harpy saw him coming and scoffed. "Hah! Stupid m-" She jerked, then stalled in midair, backwinging desperately as she suddenly found a flail wrapped around her leg. She struggled to rise. "No fair!" she complained.

Valen was standing underneath her, holding onto his flail with both hands, keeping her tethered with his weight alone. He looked up, and I couldn't tell whether he was grinning or snarling, but either way it was obvious that the Cager Complaints Department was not open for business today, because his only response to her words was to throw his whole body into a savage heave that slam-dunked his opponent right into the ground.

Bones cracked, but the harpy wasn't out, just down. She gave him a blood-flecked grin, her leg and wing both bent at unnatural angles. "Give us a kiss," she croaked.

Valen stared at her. Then he hauled back and punched her in the face so hard that her head snapped back.

Guess that was a 'no', I mused, and looked on as Valen retrieved his flail and followed up his punch with a big hunk of metal to the kisser.

Then I looked up, and from the scrum of harpies surrounding Deekin's doppelgangers, I saw another harpy peel off and head Valen's way – going for his exposed back. Deekin's distraction had worked, but only long enough for the harpies to tear apart his illusions and find themselves empty-handed.

I couldn't shout a warning, not in this form. That left me with only one option: direct intervention.

I thought of lead. Flesh spun back around me. I hit the ground running. "Shit shit shit," I panted. Enserric came up. I stopped long enough to wrench him out of the rock. A little flash of light came from the blade, a little spark, and he was free.

Where is she? After a too-long heartbeat, I caught sight of her – there! – stooping into a dive. I drew breath and power into my lungs and broke into a sprint. The world slowed and blurred and stretched in a thoroughly unnatural way, as if I'd somehow sidestepped the normal flow of time.

The harpy had folded her wings and fallen into a dive. I saw afterimages of her stretching out into the air, ahead and behind, future and past. I eyed the distance between us and gauged her angle and adjusted mine for an intercept course.

I looked up. She was still high. I need height. A yank and swirl of air made a midair step for me to leap onto, then another, and then I was high enough and close enough to propel myself with a last leap, sword out and swinging, and for a second, Enserric almost looked like a talon, long and black and glittering.

The harpy must have heard me coming, because all of a sudden she slowed down and twisted and looked up, her wingbeats stuttering in surprise.

Mistake, I thought, and fell on her like a bird of prey.

Enserric cleaved her wing off. Blood fountained up and near-blinded me, a hot salt splatter. She hit the ground without a sound.

My boots touched the ground several seconds later. I stumbled and almost fell, caught up in the violent shivers of Enserric's spell, but before I could even start to recover my senses, my vision doubled, taking on that weird crystalline overlay.

Two distinct scenes showed themselves to my befuddled eyes, one on top of the other, and they looked like this:

On camera one: a dead harpy. On camera two: a flying and very much living harpy, coming in fast on my unguarded back.

I blinked and shook my head like a stunned bull, trying and failing to make sense of the conflicting sights. Through the cold and confusion, I barely registered Enserric's shout. "Behind you, wielder!"

Wha? was all I had time to think, and then the mystery resolved itself as I was cannonballed by about a hundred and twenty pounds of seriously pissed-off bird-woman.

I flew backwards. My back hit the ground, forcing the air out of my lungs with a 'whoof!'. Before I could get my wits back, a heavy weight was pressing me down. Claws scrabbled against metal, trying to find a way through my scales to my guts, and when they couldn't get through, they went for my eyes.

Drogan's training kicked in. I raised my forearms in front of my face, crossing them with my armored vambraces facing out. The harpy pushed and grabbed and gouged furiously, seeking a way through my guard, and one talon made it, cutting a stinging scoring track across my temple and yanking out a few strands of hair. Arms shaking from the effort of fending her off, I bucked beneath her, trying to throw her off by some means or another because I knew that as long as she had me down it was only a matter of time before she put me down for good.

Through the mayhem of our little cat fight, a sound came through: running footsteps, coming up fast and hard.

Quickly, so quickly it shocked me, my mind ticked through the possibilities. Can't be a harpy. They fly. Can't be Deekin. Too big. Can't be Quarra. Too loud. That only left one possibility. Oh, thank fuck.

I caught an approaching blur of red and green from the corner of my eye, and I lowered my arms just in time to get a front row seat to the spectacle of a tiefling taking a flying bodytackle at a harpy.

Bodies collided noisily. A split second later, the harpy's weight was gone, the air above me was blessedly empty, and the sounds of complicated violence were happening somewhere close by. Metal rattled. Bone splintered. Cartilage cracked. Someone gurgled for breath through a ruined throat, then fell silent.

I scrambled to my feet, swiping blood out of my eyes with a hand that shook with adrenaline. My eyes fell on Valen. He was straightening from the newly-made corpse, flinging blood and worse from his flail with a practiced snap of his arm. His armor…well, that would probably have to wait until we found a bucket of water, or maybe a fire hose. "How much of that is yours?" I asked.

"What?" The weapon master looked at me, then looked down at himself. "Oh. The blood. No, 'tis all theirs." He looked back up at me and frowned. "You?"

I mopped my forehead. My hand came away bright red. I wiped it on my armor, for lack of any better options. "Just my forehead. Looks worse than it is."

His shoulders relaxed a little. "Good. Deekin?"

"Fine. Hiding." I caught my breath, then added a thoroughly inadequate, "Thanks. I owe you one."

Valen shrugged, though the tense way his eyes searched the sky belied his casual tone. "De nada."

Quick learner. I grinned through a veil of blood. It tasted revolting, but I was coasting so high on the adrenaline rush that I barely noticed.

Then a winged shadow flickered over us, scattering my thoughts and amping my adrenaline high up another level still.

The next thing I knew, Valen and I were standing back-to-back. I didn't even remember which of us had moved first, or maybe we'd just moved in unison, acting on instinct. Nor did I remember whipping a wall of wind all around us, like an invisible shower curtain, but it happened. Above, harpies fought their way through it. They were too big for it to stop them, but at least it was slowing them down. Unfortunately, it seemed like every single harpy in the area was coming our way, wind wall or no wind wall.

Why are they all after us all of the sudden? I looked at Enserric, glittering brightly, then at my armor, patches of polished scales showing through the blood, then craned my head to look at Valen's armor, which was shinier still despite a significant smearing of gore. I looked up. Several harpies had gathered. "Oh, shit."

Armor clinked as Valen looked over his shoulder at me. "What?"

"We're shiny."

There was a pensive pause. Then: "Hellfire. You are right."

"Happens. Try not to act so surprised." I sighted a harpy from the corner of my eye. "To your left!"

I heard the angry heavy metal rattle of Valen's flail, a thud, a scream, and another thud. The tiefling resumed his position at my back. "Thank you."

"No problem. Where's Quarra?"

"I told her to find cover."

"That's a good idea. Why aren't we doing it?"

The accents of the Cage asserted themselves with a vengeance. "Because some barmy priestess took a dice and decided to crash-land a harpy into an open field, that is w-" He broke off. An armored shoulder bumped mine lightly. "To your right."

We both turned. I lifted a hand and sent a surge of air at the oncoming harpy, knocking her off-kilter. Valen's flail knocked her the rest of the way to the ground.

The harpy died, thrashing. Valen and I resumed our positions and our conversation. "Hey, I have an idea."

"Which is?"

"Instead of calling me crazy, why don't you thank me for saving your ass?"

Valen paused. "Point taken. Very well. Thank you."

"You're welcome. Why'd you do that, anyway?"

"Do what?"

"Charge out here to fly a harpy like a goddamn kite, that's what."

A creak of leather and metal hinted at a shrug. "It seemed like a good idea at the time."

I laughed. "They're gonna carve that on our tombstones, aren't they?"

"What is that?"

"'Seemed like a good idea at the time'."

Valen's laugh was a short, sharp bark. "That assumes that there will be enough of us left to bury."

"Why? Do harpies eat corpses?"

"No."

"Oh. So why did you say-"

"They eat their prey alive."

Come to think of it, those ladies up there did look kind of hungry. "You're just full of good news today, aren't you?"

"You did ask."

I couldn't argue with that, even though I really wanted to. "True enough." Winged shadows formed a wide ring around us. Harpies hooted over our heads. I twisted my hands around Enserric's hilt, settling my grip. We'd been lucky so far, but with each harpy that rushed us, our luck ran the risk of running out. "Any bright ideas for how we're gonna get out of this?"

"Yes. Shoot them with lightning until they stop moving."

I gnawed my lower lip. Mushrooms were one thing, but flying targets? "You think I can pull it off?"

Valen's voice was so steady it would have withstood an earthquake. "I know you can."

The bottle of lightning was already in my hands. I didn't remember taking it out, but now I turned it over, looking at the fizzing, dancing sliver of white light inside it. "All right," I said, and blew out an anxious breath. "All right. Here goes."

Valen's voice was all business. "What do you need me to do?"

I dipped down deep into my power and placed my thumb on the cork. "Keep them off me."

The alert tension suddenly coming off of him was almost palpable. "Then they shall not reach you, I promise you that."

I nodded and tried to clear my mind, feeding every distracting thought and emotion into an imaginary green flame, the way Xanos had taught me. It was easier than usual, with Valen standing at my back, warm and solid and rock-steady. If Mister Debbie Downer himself thought I could do this, then maybe I could – and if there was anyone I'd rather have watching my back on a battlefield, right then, I couldn't think of them.

A blank calm fell over me, just for an instant, but it was all I needed. I opened my eyes and thumbed the cork out of the bottle's neck.

Lightning jumped out, and I grabbed it by the throat before it had gone too far. I looked for the nearest harpy, found her, and let slip my hound of electric war.

A bar of white light, irregular and spasming, formed between me and the harpy, instantaneous as thought. She didn't make a sound – that was the weird thing. Maybe it all happened too quick, or maybe it knocked the breath out of her. I felt a moment's sympathy, but then I thought of Deekin being carried away to be made into a harpy's lunch, and my sympathy passed faster than a bowl of five-alarm chili laced with prescription-strength laxatives.

An interesting thing was happening overhead. The first harpy was spasming violently in midair, transfixed by lightning, and the other harpies had been too busy circling and taunting to notice her predicament until they were almost piled on top of her, at which point they all backwinged frantically, their cries of alarm echoing through the cavern.

I looked at the harpies, now clustered nice and close together. Well, isn't that convenient? Then I let the lightning jump from one to the other until they were all joined together by a chain of crackling electricity, like a conga line that had accidentally wandered onto the third rail of a subway track.

Bodies rained down, bucking and sparking, one-two-three-four-five, thud-thud-thud-thud-thud.

The sixth harpy spiraled to the ground next to a cluster of mushroom trees, alive but with smoke streaming from her wings and blisters all over her skin. Her screams were ear-splitting, as if she wanted to hurt my eardrums as bad as I'd hurt her.

Valen stepped to my side. "Five harpies are counting worms, and one is wounded, it would seem," he observed.

Behind the screaming harpy, a shadow detached itself from the trees and resolved itself into Quarra. The drow scout had a throwing spear in her hand. She cast it.

The harpy's screaming stopped abruptly. She staggered back and stared down at the spear sticking out of her abdomen, right beneath her ribs, as if surprised to see it there. She probably was, but before she could express her surprise, her eyes glazed over, and she toppled backwards. The abrupt cessation of her screams made my ears ring almost as badly as the screaming had.

Valen raised an eyebrow. "Make that six harpies counting worms." He scanned the sky. "And I think that was all of them."

My adrenaline rush was gone, and the shakes had set in. I sat down heavily. "I can't believe I just did that."

Valen shrugged. "Believe it or do not. The fact remains that you did it."

I laughed shortly. "So I did." I wiped my forehead with the back of a shaking hand. I have lightning again. Relief was making me dizzy, or maybe that was just exhaustion.

Running footsteps intruded. "Boss!" came a screech, and before I knew what was happening, I had my arms full of kobold. "Boss! Are you okay? You be covered in blood! Do you needs a potion? Deekin gots some potions here-"

I put a hand on the bard's skinny wrist, stopping him in mid-reach – for my potions bag, of course, probably because it would have taken him half an hour to find anything in his bag. "I'm fine," I reassured him. I gave him a worried once-over. "The question is, are you? I didn't check. Maybe I should-"

The kobold made a 'pfft' sound of dismissal. "Deekin be fine." Then he looked at me and sniffed and blinked and threw his arms around my neck. "Thanks, Boss," he mumbled into my shoulder. "Deekin got pretty scared there, for a minute."

I patted his back and forced a light-hearted tone past the lump in my throat. "But you're okay now, so that's okay, right?"

Deekin pushed away from me and grinned. "That be true." He brightened even further. "And just waits until Deekin write this all down!" He rubbed his hands together. "This book gonna sell like hot cakes, and Deekin gonna be the richest and most famousest kobold ever."

I didn't answer, but I did stare meditatively into the distance and wonder if it was too late to feed him to a harpy.

Quarra drew near, stopping along the way to yank her spear from a corpse. "Path's blocked," she told Valen. She didn't so much as a glance in my direction. "Either we turn back or go around. I say turn back."

Relief welled up and ran head-on into guilt. Maybe I didn't have to go to Zorvak'mur after all. And I'm a terrible person for thinking that. People were counting on me. I needed to stop looking for a way out. "Isn't there another way to get there?" I made myself ask.

Quarra shrugged. "Yes, but no telling how that shake changed things. Could be the other route's as bad as this. Maybe worse. Could be blocked. Could have unearthed something nasty."

Valen was frowning. "How much longer is the other way?"

"Two cycles, if we live." Quarra's voice was flat. "Forever, if we die."

The two of them kept talking, discussing options and alternatives and fallbacks. I pressed the heels of my hands to my temples, problems clogging my head until it felt close to bursting. Harpies and mindflayers and cave-ins and conspiracies and lava and lions and tigers and bears, oh my. Also, my adrenaline rush was gone and I couldn't seem to stop shaking.

First things first: just breathe. I focused on that. It helped, but I needed more help than a little deep breathing. My hand reached for my holy symbol. Shaundakul, I called, casting the thought out to the ether and into that place in my mind where he resided. I need you.

Almost as soon as the words left my head, the wind picked up. Its far-off howl held a faint question.

I sagged in relief. Thanks for coming. Not that he was ever really far away. So. I'll be quick. You've seen what's happening. What his Windwalkers saw, he saw. What we knew, he knew. You know I don't want to be here, but I'm here and I have to help, because we're the last bastion against the Valsharess, and if we fall, she'll be free to grind the whole damn world under her heel. I don't want that. I didn't want Heurodis to do it, I don't want this bitch to do it, and I know you don't, either.

I paused to reflect on that thought. It was a little strange to think of me and Shaundakul that way, a little new, but it felt right, somehow. I'd never really believed in much, but if I believed in anything at all, it was that people should be free to make their own choices and live their own lives without anybody telling them what to do. They were even free to hurt other people, because free will didn't mean a damn thing without the freedom to make bad decisions. Of course, the flipside of that was that anyone who went around hurting people had best be ready to get a boot up their ass, because there was a special place in Hell for bullies and sadists and tyrants. And I supposed that if I had faith in anything, it was that Shaundakul felt the same as I did, because it was just like he'd said: I was one of his kind.

It was funny. I'd never really thought about things that way, but now that I had, I wondered how I hadn't seen it before. It was so obvious. I know you want me to help these people. So, please, if you think I'm on the right track, give me a hand, and show me a safe way to Zorvak'mur. I thought for a moment, then added, Amen, or whatever.

Then I let go of my holy symbol, folded my hands in my lap, and waited. The shakes were subsiding, thankfully, and I felt almost calm.

Valen and Quarra were still speaking, but after a few moments Valen broke off in mid-sentence and looked at me. He frowned, his eyes darting from side to side as if he'd sensed the change in my demeanor and was looking for the reason. "What is it?"

I shrugged. "I asked Shaundakul to help us."

Valen's expression hardened into skepticism, tinged lightly with disapproval. "And will he?"

Even his attitude barely ruffled the strange tranquility that had fallen over me – although it was one hell of an attitude. "Sure he will. He likes you guys." I smirked. "Shaundakul always bets on the underdog." Then the wind changed again, and with it, there came a sudden sense of presence, as if something – or someone – else was suddenly there with us.

For a split second, the light in the cavern dimmed, like a cloud had just passed in front of the sun, only there was no sun, just glowing lava and subterranean shadow. My smirk widened. "Hi," I said loudly. "Glad you could make it, old man."

Valen had stiffened noticeably, and his head turned this way and that, his eyes searching for something unseen, as if he'd picked up on Shaundakul's presence, too. Maybe his planar spidey senses were acting up. "What-"

I held up a hand. Valen fell silent. I cocked my head, listening. Somewhere up high, something was rustling. A lot of somethings, from the sound of it.

Quarra had heard it, too. Her hand went to her crossbow. "What is that?"

I squinted, trying to see. "Help." Then a smidgeon of doubt crept in, and honesty forced me to add, "Probably."

Then, with the sound like the rustling of hundreds of leathery little wings and a chorus of squeaks so high-pitched they were almost clicks, a cloud detached itself from the ceiling and came down in a living flood.

The cloud whooshed by. I craned my head to watch it go. I caught a glimpse of lots of tiny, furry, leathery-winged bodies. There were hundreds of them, or so it seemed, enough that the wind of their passage made my hair stir. I laughed, delighted.

The bat cloud flew past us, and when it reached an open spot on the riverbank, it stopped and swirled and did some kind of chaotic internal rearrangement that made the whole cloud change its shape into…

Quarra's forehead wrinkled. "Is that a hand?"

I grinned. "Yep." As a matter of fact, the bats hadn't just formed a hand, they'd formed a pointing hand, and the index finger was pointing insistently towards – I checked my internal compass – the west. I touched my holy symbol. Thanks, old man. I'll do my best not to disappoint.

The wind kissed my cheek in a way that felt half affection and half benediction. Then the sense of presence faded, and I was…not alone, because I was never that, but Shaundakul had clearly done what he came for, and I was just as clearly expected to take it from here.

Playtime's over, I guess. I stood up, grinning in spite of the muscle strains that were making themselves known now that they weren't being masked by adrenaline. "Ask, and ye shall receive." I pointed at the cloud. "Follow those bats. They know where to go."

Deekin was scribbling madly. "This is so cool!"

Valen's mouth was hanging open. He shut it with a snap. Then he spoke. "Very well." His voice was even. "We are being guided by bats. I suppose I have seen stranger things." He lowered his voice to a mutter. "Though not by much."

Quarra frowned a few moments longer, then shrugged and heeled her lizard forward. "Maybe you're not completely useless," she told me as she passed.

Coming from her, that was practically a standing ovation. "Thanks so much," I said, and staggered off after the bats.