33. Witch Way

"The witch at last!" Edwin spat down at the indigo-robed woman in the pit.

"Dynaheir!" Minsc cried down at his witch.

"Hello, Jade," Onyx looked across the edge of the pit at his scarlet-haired sister.

"Hello, Onyx," Jade looked across the edge of the pit at her brunette brother.

Edwin turned to face Jade, while pointing down at Dynaheir. "Why do you stay the killing blow? Slay her! We had a deal!"

The dark-skinned woman looked up at the Thayvian. "Thou hast followed me all the way from thy homeland? Thou art in need of a hobby!"

"Do it yourself, Eddie!" Montaron grinned evilly as he scuttled up beside him, "It always be more fun! How about arts and crafts? Making an ashtray from her skull."

"Nooo!!!" Minsc growled, staring at the Red Wizard and the halfling. "Dynaheir!! We will resuce you now!"

"Precisely," Onyx nodded, glaring sternly at his sister and her wizard. "M'lady?" he looked down at Dynaheir, "I assume you'd prefer to come with us?"

"Thy decency is refreshing," she smiled up at him coolly, with the poise of self-possessed royalty, not a malnourished prisoner who was nearly food themselves, "...when so many we meet are...lacking." She glared back at the Thayvian.

"I will end this!" Edwin cried, and raised his arms to cast, looking down into the pit.

Onyx had notched an arrow and stared down it at the conjurer. "I will not allow this murder, Red Wizard of Thay."

"You'll make the murder yours, big boy," Montaron licked his lips and leveled his crossbow at Onyx.

"Little man is Big Evil!" Minsc cried, aiming his own longbow at the halfling.

"Big man will become dead man," Jade hissed, drawing her bow at the ranger.

"I was sworn to protect both of you," Jaheira came up beside Onyx, and held her hand out menacingly to Jade, glowing a faint ethereal green, "But by Silvanus, I won't allow this!"

"Go hug a tree," Kagain growled from beside Montaron, holding a throwing axe ready to hurl at the druid.

"D-d-don't you d-d-d-dare threaten my wife!!" Khalid grimaced, pointing his drawn bow across the pit at the dwarf.

"Oooo, can't we all just get along, harpster? I guess not," Xzar cooed silkily, appearing beside Jade and pointing his lightning-bolt wand at the half-elf.

"No, cuz you're a weirdo and a meanie, Xzar!" Imoen stuck out her tongue and her magic missile wand at the wizard. "Once a bully always a bully!" she sniffled into a sneer.

"I will show you the way of the warrior, mewling girl," Branwen held out sturdy arms, a hold spell on the top of her tongue.

" Lil Arurl , heretic," Viconia smiled at the Tempusian and held out her slender fingers for her own cast.

"Your course is as hopeless as mine, dark elf," Xan kept his hands low.

"Once more into the breach, dear friends..." Garrick sang half-heartedly, staring over his crossbow at Xan.

Beads of sweat appeared on the temples of all fourteen adventurers as they looked down their hands or weapons at their targets, and saw the same pointed at them. Only Dynaheir remained calm.

"We got here first," Onyx called to Jade after the tense silence.

"Did not," she called back.

"Did too."

"Did not."

"Did too!"

"Did not!"

"Did too!"

"Did not!"

"Some things never change, brother."

"You're right. I love you, sister." He pulled his gaze from Edwin to her, and didn't let go of her eyes, his starting to water.

Jade's fingers slackened on her bow, her gaze magnetically locked on her brother, a thick lip quivering. "I love you too."

They and the rest stood in silence for a moment. Onyx inhaled, and stared more intensely at Jade. "Look sis, this just isn't right. Have you even asked Mister Red what this is about?"

"I don't need or want to know," Jade stated, "We have our arrangement."

"I can't allow that."

"Then I guess we'll just have to kill each other."

Xan moaned, "We're all doomed." For once, everyone around him nodded in acquiescense.

Various snarls, whimpers, and shrieks bounced around the fifteen adventurers. Montaron and Garrick caressed their triggers, Onyx, Minsc, Khalid, and Jade held the tension on their bowstrings shafts, Kagain stiffened his throwing arms, Edwin, Xan, Jaheira, Branwen, and Viconia stroked the air with their fingers and their lips, Xzar and Imoen squeezed their wands, and in the middle of the array of adventurers, down in the pit, with no weapons or memorized spells, Dynaheir stood unfazed.

"Stand down, Jade," Onyx called.

"How else do you propose we resolve this, Onyx?" she smiled.

"You deal is off," he called, "Tell the Red Wizard too bad. Or we can all maybe die."

"You're bluffing," she smiled. "You'll do anything to avoid a bloodbath, noble brother. Your dogma is your weakness."

Edwin peered analytically at Onyx, whose drawn arrowhead was staring him in the face while his fingers pointed down at Dynaheir. "I disagree. Paladins are that stupid."

"Try me," Onyx called. "You can lose the Red Wizard - who I'm sure will keep whatever promises he's made and has no ulterior motives that might be contrary to your own - or things can get bloody."

"You can lose the Wychalarn, or things will get bloody."

"But there's a difference. You would kill the Wychalarn, I have no designs for Red Wizard. And besides - it's immoral. You may not care, but I do. So I will go further. My faith is my strength."

"Don't test him," Viconia laughed out from his side. "He's a pure fanatic! He'd have us all dead sooner than let you get away with this deed!"

"You're bluffing, dark elf," Jade smiled, "I know him far, far better than you."

Viconia narrowed her eyes. I, naïve little girl whose life is but a blink of my beautifl eyes, am Drow Female. I can observe more in two days, nay, two minutes than you do in two decades. You, for example, care far less for keeping this wizard among your three than for the principle of pride. Against your more authority-friendly brother whose ostensibly identical childhood was much happier than yours. Jade, for her part, read these beautiful eyes.

Onyx smiled, capitalizing on Viconia's interjection and breaking into, "Your actions are base and immoral and I will not stand for this evil in my presence! I shall fight to the last!"

"You're a terrible actor, brother," Jade laughed.

"But you do know I won't just let you do this. Tell me Thayvian, what is your story?"

"It is not your concern, and far beyond you, barbarian!" Edwin hissed. "(Actually, it just might be precisely your concern. But I'm hardly revealing that here and now.)"

From the pit, Dynaheir offered, "Minsc has doubtless told thee of his dejemma to the west, and I come on a similar rite of passage. I know not why this pathetic, perverted Thayvian hounds our steps."

"Tell me Jade," Onyx looked at his sister, "How much do you know about any of your companions? Long time no see, Xzar. How're the Zhents treating you?"

"What!?!?" the necromancer shrieked, holding his hands over his body as if his robes and undergarments had just been summoned away in some inconvenient miscasting. Montaron cursed, but then noticed something and smiled.

Jade's eyes flicked to her two companions mistrustfully. Viconia snickered.

"Hey, K-k-k-halid!" Montaron laughed evilly across the pit at the half-elf. "How are the Harpers t-t-t-treating you, old boy?" Xzar giggled hysterically and Montaron feigned nervous twitches.

Khalid whimpereed, and Jahiera snarled.

Onyx's eyes flicked to his guardians, flaring with indignation. Edwin snickered.

"If we stand here all day," Onyx yelled, "The gnolls will come back. Then we'll have a bloodbath with two losers"

"All bloodbaths have two losers…" Imoen whispered under her breath, and her gaze at her twin childhood best friends grew more distant.

"How do you propose we resolve this stalemate, brother?" Jade called with a smirk.

"You and I. A joust of some sort. No one suffers."

"You can't trust him!" Edwin snapped to Jade. "He's a paladin! Like the sniveling self-righteous hypocrite is he, he'd fight to the last in the name of so-called Good! (And besides, the point is that someone is supposed to suffer. Namely, the Wychalarn. And at this point, I could also find great entertainment involving her lobotomized berseker, this barely-pubescent knight, and Father's racks.)"

"You can't trust her," Jaheira whispered to Onyx. "Your sister she may be, but she turned from the path your father wanted. She keeps Zhentarim and Red Wizard company now."

Onyx and Jade turned their sapphire and emerald eyes to each other. "We can."

"The terms," Onyx began, "You win, you keep your Red Wizard, and he may have the Wychalarn. I win, I keep the Wychalarn, and she gets the Red Wizard."

"Nonsense!" Edwin snapped. "The Wychalarn has no claim over me!"

"You have no claim over the Wychalarn."

"She has prisoner status! There is no such symmetry! (Not that I'd expect your primitive brain to understand such a concept!)"

"We just freed her. That status is terminated. You'll get no arbitrage from me. You must gamble for the Wychalarn's life with your own. You and Dynaheir are dueling for your lives, except that Jade and I will do it for you. And Jade will be indifferent as to your fate if she loses. You see, if she loses, then she doesn't retain your services, so she cares not what happens to you. As you can see, Red Wizard, your own nature comes back to haunt you."

Jade smiled at Edwin, happily 'conceding' her brother the point. "He's right. Why should I care?"

Edwin was in a quandary. If he promised his services under either outcome of the duel, under the condition that he not be given to the paladin or the Wychalarn, then Jade would have no incentive not to lose a duel, except perhaps pride and pure sibling rivalry. Either way, she had his services. In fact, as she and her brother sought the same larger objectives, she would have an interest in letting him gain another ally. Rationally, assuming pride didn't outweight that, she would thus throw the duel. He could demand to magically duel the Wychalarn himself, and was certain he was the superior wizard, but he feared exposing himself to a probability of failure and annihilation.

"Very well, simian!" he snapped at Jade. "The Wychalarn shall be only banished from the west should her new would-be champion lose!"

Jade smiled. "If I win, the Wychalarn goes home. If you win, brother, the Red Wizard goes home. Across the river that runs down to this stronghold, there is a large log where we camped. Upon this log we will duel, with quarterstaves. Whoever stays dry, wins."

"I accept," Onyx stated, and he and his sister exchanged a glance. Unstringing and lowering their bows in their left hands, the twins strode around the edge of the pit, and shook with their right. A collective heaving sigh of relief rebounded around the parties as weapons, wands, and hands dropped.

Minsc nodded. He, of course, would follow his witch anywhere. It was strange but probably good, his companions had noticed, that the boisterous berserker had remained so quiet during this exchange where his witch's life was haggled over like a Calimshani rug. But, wild and simple though he was, he understood that this parlay was better than an immediate battle between the two comparable-looking parties. He would defend his witch to the death beyond any deal that was made, though, he was a very noble warrior but not the sort to put an oath before her life, or his own – and in truth, the Othlor who had paired him with her apprentince, months ago and a thousand leagues east, had seen this in him. The Red Wizards were known for their wry tongues, and such an encounter as the one today, had not been altogether unanticipated by the witches, even though they could not have known for sure what, if anything, the Zulkirs knew. Even in their ostensibly external schemes, the Othlori and the Zulkirs tended to keep each other in suspicion. Such was the cloak-and-dagger politics of the Unapproachable East.

But Minsc, now, was happy with the deal. His witch would not be harmed. And this witch, very much attentive as to this parlay from the pit below, was content too, even though her wellbeing was not the end of her goals. For, though she had not even really 'met' the brother and sister above, she had observed enough, to understand what they were really thinking, and smiled.

Edwin was more than content. If his girl lost, he still had his ways. Whether the witch stood in her brother's company or began a trek home, he would get to her, steal her, torture her, and learn what he needed.

The stronghold was no place for a duel, festering and reeking with dead bodies in the hot midday sun, and surely to be revisted by gnolls who had survived the first attack, or were ignorantly returning from patrols and hunting. The two parties marched down the stairways and through the front gate of the stronghold, a rickety affair adorned with decomposed human bodies, and down the rock path to the bridge leading off the island. Onyx and Jade marched in front, side by side, oddly enough clasping hands. Edwin strode beside Jade, and Minsc beside Onyx, with a starved and weak Dynaheir in his arms. The Wychalarn did have the energy to exchange an unending string of vile curses with the Thayvian, and Onyx and Jade grimaced. Behind them, their two parties walked abreast, probably not a wise thing. Khalid and Jaheira beside Montaron and Xzar were exchanging every imaginable slanderous epithet upon Zhentarim and Harpers. Next in line, Kagain seemed to hate drow even worse than moon elves, and Viconia was apparently none too fond of the stouter subterranean folk. Behind the earthy pair, Branwen was declaring Imoen a simpering, weak child and an insult to women, and Imoen was likening the Tempusian to an ugly, mean, and bloated stick-in-the-mud. In the rear, the ever-morose Xan and the ever-chipper Garrick were exchanging antipolar bleak or rosy opinions on every subject imaginable, from the events of the day to others thousands of years ago, each deciding the other was an over-optimistic, romantic buffoon or a over-pessimistic, cynical wretch.

"Certainly I shall die of exhaustion before I fall on the battlefield!" the enchanter moaned feebly.

"Shut your trap, moon elf!" Kagain and Viconia yelled together from ahead, and promptly returned to their drow-dwarf bickering.

As it had grown dark, the duel would certainly have to wait until morning, but they parties trudged on through the night, up the river that separated the environs of the gnoll stronghold from the rest of the continent, to where Jade's party had camped the previous night. There now two parties camped, each uneasily, and a fair distance apart. Each mistrusted the other, and set a watch as vigilant as ever. It was a cruel irony, for a fifteen-strong band of adventurers would be a foolhardy target for bandits or wild monsters, yet to each of these fifteen, the presence of the other party only heightened the sense of danger.

Around one party's campfire, in a circle sat Onyx, Imoen, Khalid, Jaheira, Viconia, Minsc, and Dynaheir, who rested wearily against the ranger's shoulder. She had lost only what she personally carried during the moment of the kidnapping; and Minsc of course had kept all else since upon his strong back, as he always did.. She clutched her spellbook now, thankfully, and wore also a spare set of robes, for those she had spent her captivity in were filthy, bloody, and torn to an immodest extent. They were now disposed, and she hoped the horrific memories would go with them.

Garrick stood outside the circle, standing by the riverbank and playing upon his harp a soft, mellow tune. He had been practicing it the past few evenings, to the irritation of some of his companions, and though Viconia and Jaheira might still be reluctant to admit it, he had now polished the low, slow, and subtle dirge, and provided a nice background harmony amidst the crackle of the campfire, the babbling of the river. It was the sort of refrain that one doesn't consciously notice, but it soothed by, particularly after a long day of fighting numerous gnolls, carrior crawlers, xvarts, engaging in a tense standoff with another party, and then marching down mountainous trails for hours on end and well into the night.

Onyx quietly appraised his new companion Dynaheir. "I thank thee, Sir Onyx of Candlekeep. I am Dynaheir of Rasheman," she at last introduced herself to him formally, holding out a chocolate-colored hand and bending it palm downwards, as if expecting him to kiss it. He politely obliged, to the restrained snickering of Jaheira and an unrestrained scoff of Viconia. Dynaheir continued, "'Tis not a title," she continued, in a voice that was soft but regal, unaggressive but self-assured, "'Tis just where I am from. We two are indeed far afield of our home," she nudged against Minsc, "but 'tis a necessary rite of passage. Minsc must make his dejemma by seeking adventure, while I must prove my worth to my...sisters in much the same manner."

"Sisters?" Onyx asked. "The Wychalarn of Rasheman?"

"You are learned. Yes, one of their younger initiates," she smiled at the paladin, as a teacher to a student, and he idly wondered her age, for she acted well beyond the years on her face.

Her exuberant companion bellowed, "And Minsc will take his witch back to her sisters and then he will proudly break open the doors of the Ice Dragon Berserker Lodge and fight evil with his berseker brothers! Right Boo?" A valiant squeak issued from the ranger's shoulder.

Onyx smiled, and looked at Dynaheir again. "Is it usual for a dejemma to take one so far from Rasheman?"

She answered, unhesitantly but cryptically, "'Tis an interesting time for the Realms, with great things foretold for the Sword Coast. 'Tis therefore a likely place to look for what we need."

"And what would that be?" Onyx asked bluntly.

She hesistated, and continued, "My sisters thought events of import might stir in these western landes, and thus here lies my quest, my rite of passage, and we hope that some good may come of it."

"You came to the right place," he grinned at once, and Dynaheir was almost too taken aback by his easy lack of suspicion to politely smile back. Viconia snickered, attuned to this and more, and Jaheira opted to stay quiet. Her charge continued, "A strange economic crises plagues this land, and we suspect foul play. Crime surges in both cities and on highways."

"We're gonna be heroes," Imoen explained giddily, and Dynaheir smiled softly in approval.

Onyx continued, "Of more personal and mysterious concern, my father was recently slain and I now am hunted too."

"Art thou?" Dynaheir's eyelids lifted, and studied the young man. "Yes, mysterious indeed. "

Onyx and Imoen went on to retell their tenday – and their childhoods - in more detail than he had yet; also for the benefit of Viconia (who made her opinion known at every turn), Garrick (who had joined the circle and took notes by firelight, feeling this all made a nice story premise, but had a vague sense of déjà vu), and Minsc (who was delighted by the accounts of victorious duels against assassins, bandits, monsters and a serial-killing Cyricist). Dynaheir listened, on several occasions asking in a physically tired, but alert and patient voice, for expounding on details such as the stories behind their ill-remembered adoptions, or the bearing and demeanor of Gorion's murderer.

"I give you compassion for your young lives' harder turns," she spoke when they finished, "But blessed art you for your wholesome childhoods, which you hast made well of." Onyx smiled thankfully, and Imoen slightly wrinkled her nose at sensing a condescending air. "Your thrusting into the world is not as I wouldst wish, but already your endeavors are valorous, and mayhaps we can all find what we need together. I have no doubt you shalt make...interesting traveling companions." Minsc nodded enthusiastically, and Onyx and Imoen did too. Jaheira and Khalid looked at one another, then nodded to the Rashemani pair in approval. Garrick scribbled furiously, and Viconia's mind raced with dire subconscious efficiency, appraising the human witch's motives and feeling out the shift in group dynamic - and wondering whether it was last, and whether she wished it to.