Adrian: Baldur's Gate

By the time they got back, Edwin was possitively hobbling. Even with healing spells he'd be no use the next day. Adrian, Besheridan, and Kirya all agreed that they didn't want to stay in the mercenary village (too many eyes) and Adrian knew full well he needed time to plan. This was no bandit camp with easy prey, and a handy troupe of commandable undead nearby. This was a small army in it's own right.

So they spent the next day camped in the tall grass en route to the foothills, Edwin resting, Adrian brooding. He was thinking long, and hard. This would be the most formidable strategy he had to come up with to date.

Xzar sat in the tall grass, reading out of a black necromatnic tome Kiriya had leant her. She was not far away, talking with Edwin, shop talk.

He sighed. Kirya had always managed to work well with others in a way he could not. It was good to see her again. They had not been together since before Montaron's death....some time before that, actually. Xzar's scattered mind didn't always focus on the past as well as it should, but he knew it had been too long. Not that she showed it, of course. She always seemed too well-grounded. Of course, compared to him, she was.

What no one else save Kirya (and the late Montaron) knew was that, when Xzar was in one of his more lucid moments, as he was now, he was actually aware of his own madness. He couldn't do anything about it, but on his better days he could focus through it, and make it work for him. The way Adrian did with his father's dark essence.

Xzar giggled a little, thinking about that. He had been a fool to ever try to plot with Edwin to control Adrian. More than madness, it was outright stupidity. What had they been thinking?

The answer, of course, was that they hadn't been thinking. They had only wanted power, and never mind the consequences. They were lucky that Adrian hadn't killed them.

Sighing, he returned to his tome.

After talking magic for some time, Edwin and Kirya turned to other subjects.

"What is it that you see in him? I am honestly curious," said Edwin. "No wish to rouse your ire, but--"

Kirya smiled sadly. "He wasn't always like this. And even know he has a brilliance to him you do not appreciate."

Edwin shrugged. "I'll take your word for it. What happened to him?"

Kirya's eyes grew distant. "It wasn't any one thing. It was a number of things. But the last blow fell in the jungles of Maztica."

Edwin's eyebrows shot up. "The wild lands of the new continent? You were there?"

"Aye, once. But I will not speak more of it now."

Edwin was intrigued, but held his silence.

"What of your leader, the Bhaalspawn?"

"He is....hard to define. The power of the father is within him, but he has a self-mastery that is almost frightening. This Gorion taught him well."

"That isn't what I meant; that much I knew myself already. But what manner of man is he?"

Edwin thought on this for a long moment, then said, "He is a man of iron will."

Besheridan and Rakal sparred and dueled in the tall grass. Flail against axe, axe against shield, with speed and increasing violence.

Besheridan was a capable leader in his own right, of course, but truth be known he was a soldier first and foremost. A trooper, not an officer. He was quiet happy to follow Adrian's lead, only offering the occasional tactical advice. His own plans on how to deal with the Throne base would require an almost equal number of Zhentarim warriors to challenge them.

Rakal, for his part, focused mostly on the sparring, and didn't think much beyond it. He joyed in battle and threw away his gold on beer and women, it was true. But there was more to it then that. He liked fighting, but not in the way an unreasoning Bhaalspawn like Sarevok did. He liked the weaponry, the different styles of fighting, the artistry of it. The art of war. To Rakal, battle provided a little world unto itself, a full spectrum of life.

Now, for instance, Besheridan was using his shield and flail combination against him with speed and cunning. But Rakal was the stronger, with his fast and furious, if inexact, twin weapon attack.

Clash, clang, clash! Besheridan tried a high strike with the flail, which Rakal countered, then cut low with the axe, only to have it spark off Besheridan's black shield.

They went on this way for perhaps twenty minutes, neither one finding an opening, both tiring slowly.

Until, that was, Besheridan grew weary of the game, lifted his leg, and kicked Rakal in the chest, knocking him flat.

Rakal got up, showing no evidence of shame, and they began again.

Viconia was curled around Adrian, but making no attempt to seduce him. She knew he was brooding over this battle.

"Dividing them, perhaps?" she suggested.

"Aye," he said distantly, "But how...."

Viconia reflected that Adrian had changed since their sea-trip with Zavrian. He was more focused, more controlled, more certain. Less prone to outbursts of rage. More the tactical planner he saw himself as.

And what of herself? She had hardly tried to dominate him once he had become her male. Why? Was surface life affecting her thinking? Was she becoming secondary to him? Rediculous. But she was letting him decide far too many things without at least trying to influence him. Something to mind in future.

Adrian's eyes cleared, and he snapped his fingers. "Xzar, Edwin, Kirya," he called.

The three mages came slowly, Edwin still limping a little.

"You have a plan?" Kirya asked.

"The beginnings of one," said Adrian. "I need you three to memorize some particular spells, to be used in a particular order."

"Should I write this down?" Edwin sneered.

"No need. You'll see the pattern soon enough. First, Xzar, Stinking Cloud. Then Edwin...."