Vanity's brood hos-3

by Lisa Smedman

  imbue them with the ability to discharge electricity or do extra damage with a chilling or fiery touch-but the constructs he created could punch and stomp. The one he manifested then did just that, pummelling the cobra with massive fists and feet. The cobra's iron body rang with each blow, and several of the metal bands that made up its body were dented. The astral construct gave it a final kick, and the iron cobra's metal head snapped back, its neck bent at a sharp angle. It clattered to the ground.

  The ropes of ectoplasm faded then disappeared. Still the iron cobra didn't move. Arvin hovered just in front of it, waiting. Even given that invitation, it didn't attack, and the tickling sensation in Arvin's forehead was gone. Satisfied, he let his astral construct fade.

  He climbed into the air. He rose above the treetops and began winging his way above the road to the distant temple. It lay higher up Mount Ugruth, on a bare area with burned trees to either side. Higher still, the peak of the volcano smoldered, a dim red glow that rivaled the setting sun.

  Arvin flew toward it, hoping that Pakal still waited for him.

  It was was middark by the time Arvin reached the temple. He spotted it by the red glow in its central courtyard. The building had been built in a square surrounding a deep fissure in the ground, one that plunged like a knife wound all the way down to Mount Ugruth's molten heart. The white marble tiles surrounding the fissure were splattered with glossy black stone: lava that had cooled and hardened. Heat hazed the air above the crack, carrying with it the smell of sulfur. The inside wall of the building surrounding the courtyard had a wide portico supported by massive pillars that glowed

  a dusky red, like tree trunks in a burning forest. The rest of the building lay in shadow.

  Farther up the mountain, Arvin spotted movement. He flew in that direction and saw a large group of people-about a hundred or so-climbing a narrow path that led toward the peak. Arvin swooped down lower and saw that they were Talos worshipers following a cleric-one who walked with a swaying gait. Suspicious, Arvin dipped into the cleric's thoughts.

  The cleric-another yuan-ti in disguise-was leading an even larger group of worshipers to their deaths.

  Not too much farther up the mountain was a large fissure, one that vented ash and poisonous fumes. The worshipers would be told to walk to its lip and breathe deeply. By breathing the fumes, they would "embrace" Talos and prove themselves worthy of him. If any of them dared to question their cleric's orders or realized what was happening and tried to run away, the wand would take care of them, just as it had taken care of the lower-ranked clerics. One way or another, they would die.

  Arvin skimmed the thoughts of the worshipers closest to the cleric, hoping to find some spark of resistance. There was none. What their god had instructed them to do, they would do, no matter how odd his command seemed. Their thoughts were sluggish, as if they had been drugged.

  The cleric glanced up at Arvin. Strange, he thought. I didn't know Thessania kept a pet.

  Arvin broke contact. He wheeled back in the direction of the temple, searching for Pakal along the way. There was no sign of the dwarf, just as there had been no sign of him on the road leading to the temple. Nor did Arvin see anyone else. The temple seemed to be abandoned.

  No, not quite. As Arvin circled over its roof, he spotted a solitary figure standing between two

  columns of the portico. Bohind him was an arch that must have been the temple's main entrance. He was a tall man, his hair and beard as black as his clerical robes. Arvin might not have noticed him save for the javelin the man held. Its point, jagged as a lightning bolt, gave off a faint shimmer of electrical energy that illuminated his face. He leaned on the weapon, using it like a staff, staring into the courtyard with an unfocused gaze.

  Arvin circled overhead, once again manifesting the power that allowed him to read minds, wondering if he'd discovered another yuan-ti. He was surprised to find nothing serpentlike at all about the man's thoughts. They were very human-and very troubled. The man wondered if he'd done the right thing. Did Talos truly demand more sacrifices? Already the clergy were gone, and they were forced to use lay worshipers from distant cities. The signs were all there, it was true-the smoke that rose from Mount Ugruth's peak, the lava that had bubbled up into the courtyard, the fire that had broken out on the hillside after the lighting strike-but was sacrifice what was truly required? And of the entire flock? Talos only seemed to be getting angrier with each passing day, yet if the high stormherald himself had sent word that sacrifice was necessary, it must be so.

  He couldn't help but wonder, however, if he shouldn't have communed with Talos himself, just to be sure. If only his furies hadn't insisted on being the first to die, he might have consulted with them. Perhaps he should go after Siskin, ask the newly arrived cleric to wait until…

  Arvin withdrew from the man's thoughts. The cleric-the stormlord of the temple, Arvin guessed- had been duped by the yuan-ti, but his mind was still his own. If Arvin could convince him to listen, perhaps the slaughter that was about to happen on

  the hillside above could be stopped. The worshipers would surely listen to their stormlord.

  Arvin landed outside the temple's entrance and allowed his metamorphosis to end. His tail sprang apart and became two legs again, and his body grew as it took on human form. He flexed his muscles, getting reacquainted with the feeling of arms and legs, then used his psionics to alter his appearance slightly, creating the illusion of deep red scratches in each of his cheeks. The stormlord would be more willing to listen to a warning if it came from one of his own followers.

  Arvin strode through the entrance into the courtyard, he formed a cross with his arms against his chest as he'd seen the Talus worshipers do.

  "Stormlord," he said, bowing, "I bring urgent news. May I speak with you?"

  The brooding man turned. Close up, Arvin could see more details of his appearance. The stormlord's nose was long and sharp, his forehead creased with deep lines. Heavy black eyebrows were drawn together in what looked like a perpetual scowl. The right side of his face was puckered with white scar tissue and his hairline on that side was slightly higher. It looked as though he'd suffered a burn some time in the past. A wide metal bracer embossed with silver lightning bolts encircled each forearm.

  "Approach," he said, "and speak."

  Arvin rose from his bow and stepped closer. He had no idea what the protocol was for a lay worshiper addressing a cleric of this faith. He was taking a big chance. If he angered the stormlord, the man might strike him down with a lighting bolt. But he couldn't just let those people die-not when there was someone who might be able to do something about it.

  "Stormlord," Arvin said, "I've just come from Hlondeth. I learned something there-something terrible.

  The cleric who just left the temple…Siskin. He isn't human. He's a yuan-ti."

  "Nonsense," the stormlord said. "Siskin has been touched by Talos. I saw the burn mark myself."

  Arvin was about to counter that the burn had probably been an illusion when he realized something. The stormlord's breath had a sweet odor to it. He'd been drinking wine.

  Wine that smelled like Thessania's perfume.

  Arvin had been certain, back at the quarry, that the black liquid was poison, but he started to wonder. Perhaps it was something else, something more insidious. Something that would bend a person's thoughts along paths they wouldn't ordinarily follow, until even the most horrific suggestions sounded perfectly reasonable.

  "Siskin served you wine earlier tonight, didn't he?" Arvin asked. "And he insisted that all of your flock drink, as well."

  The stormlord nodded. The furrow in his brow deepened. "What of it?"

  "Did the wine taste unusual?"

  "It was sweeter. Flavored. It came from the east, he said."

  "After drinking the wine, you talked," Arvin said. "Siskin suggested that the lay worshipers be sacrificed. Tonight. It sounded reasonable at the time, but less reasonable now that you've had a chance to think about it."


  The stormlord started to nod, but just then, the ground trembled. Deep in the fissure that split the courtyard, something rumbled. Arvin heard a wet splat as lava shot out of the crack. He could feel its heat through his shirt.

  The stormlord stared at the cooling rock, which was already losing its glow. "It is… necessary," he said. "Talos demands a sacrifice. Without it, he will level

  Mount Ugruth. Thousands will die. Hlondeth itself may be wiped out. We cannot allow that to happen. The sacrifice is… necessary."

  Arvin blinked. For a moment, the stormlord had sounded like Karrell. He'd sounded as though he cared about Hlondeth and its people. Arvin, like most folks in Hlondeth, had been taught that the clerics of Talos reveled in destruction and death, but the stormlord's comments gave him cause for thought.

  "You don't want the mountain to erupt?" Arvin asked.

  The stormlord glared at him. "You're not one of us," he rumbled.

  "No," Arvin admitted. "I'm not. Nor is Siskin. I'll bet that when he arrived here, he was as much a stranger to you as I am." He spread his hands, entreating the cleric to listen. "Think about it-of the two strangers, who gives you more cause for concern? The one who is asking you to listen to your own doubts before it's too late-or a "cleric' who got you drunk on a strange-tasting wine, then suggested you kill off all of your worshipers?"

  The stormlord blinked and blinked again. A shudder ran through him. He shook his head like a man trying to throw off a dream. When he looked at Arvin again, his eyes were clear and hard. "Thank you-friend-for the warning. May Talos's fist never strike you."

  Then he wheeled, javelin in hand, and ran through the temple, out into the night.

  Arvin activated his lapis lazuli. It was time to find Pakal. He imagined the dwarf's faoe, but though he could picture it clearly-dark, tattooed skin framed by ropy hair-Pakal refused to come into focus. Arvin, worried, wondered if Pakal had decided not to wait for him. Even if the dwarf had moved on from

  the temple, a sending still should have been able to reach him.

  Unless…

  A terrible thought occurred to Arvin. Maybe the dog-man had caught up to Pakal, killed him, and taken the Circled Serpent.

  Then again, Arvin realized, Pakal could just be in another form, as he had been in Sibyl's temple, cloaked in an illusion that fooled the sending-an illusion, for example, that would help him blend in at Talos's temple.

  "Pakal!" Arvin shouted. "Are you here? Pakal!"

  Arvin heard what he expected-silence. He could guess where Pakal was: on the footpath above the temple, somewhere among the hundred or so others who were walking to their deaths.

  He bolted in the direction the stormlord had gone.

  The path up the mountain was a steep one, made treacherous by loose volcanic rock that skittered away with each step. Arvin slipped repeatedly, scraping his hands and knees. The night was overcast, and Mount Ugruth lent an ugly red glow to the clouds above. Smoke and ash rose into the sky from its peak. Perhaps the mountain really was about to erupt. Arvin ran until his lungs ached, but instead of stopping to catch his breath, he pressed on.

  The air was hotter than it had been below. Here and there beside the path, heat waves danced in the night air over a crack in the ground. Glancing down into one of them, Arvin saw glowing lava. It bubbled out onto the trunk of a dead tree. The bark smoldered, then burst into flame. A thin stream of molten rock oozed out of the hole and flowed downhill, cutting across the path.

  From above, past a point where the path rounded a knoll that hid what lay above from view, came confused shouts then screams.

  As Arvin reached the knoll, a bolt of lightning lanced out of the sky, then forked horizontally just before striking the ground, as if it had been deflected by something. One bolt hit a rocky outcropping just a few paces away from Arvin. He threw up his hand to shield his face as splinters of rock rained down on him. He scrambled up the path, manifesting the power that would allow him to see through illusions as he ran. Sparkles flashed into the night in front of his forehead then were gone.

  As he rounded the knoll, he saw the stormlord locked in magical combat with the yuan-ti-and it didn't look good for the stormlord. The yuan-ti menaced the worshipers with bared fangs, using his magical fear to drive them toward a stream of flowing lava. The stormlord was several paces hack, caught in a dead tree that had wrapped it branches around him like a magical entangling rope. One of the cleric's hands was free, and he swept it up and down as he shouted a prayer. A pillar of lava burst from the flow, arced toward the yuan-ti in a streak of red, then plunged down.

  The yuan-ti raised a hand above his head, magically deflecting the molten rock. It shot back toward the stormlord then veered aside and splashed onto the ground in front of him, splattering the worshipers. At least a dozen were badly burned, and they fell to the ground screaming.

  The yuan-ti retaliated with a flick of his hand that engulfed the stormlord in a cloud of magical darkness. Then he turned his attention back to the remaining worshipers with an angry hiss. They recoiled and stumbled backward, screaming and weeping. At least a dozen ran blindly into the lava and were killed, their hair and clothes bursting into flame and their flesh sizzling as it roasted from their bones. One or two managed to resist the fear and tried to run back

  down the hill past the yuan-ti, but the false cleric was faster. Whipping a wand out of his belt, he pointed it at them. A pea-sized mote of fire burst from the wand, growing as it streaked through the night. It struck the back of one of the worshipers and exploded into an enormous ball of white-hot flame. In the blink of an eye, all that remained of those who had fled were twisted, blackened corpses.

  The yuan-ti turned back toward the remaining worshipers and began swaying toward them, driving them like cattle with its magical fear. Behind him, lightning bolts arced out of the darkness that surrounded the dead tree where the stormlord hung, entangled. None came close to the yuan-ti. One struck a worshiper, blowing the man into the air.

  Arvin searched the crowd, looking for Pakal. It took him a moment, even with his psionically clarified vision, to spot the dwarf under the illusionary human body he'd created for himself. Pakal tried to lift his blowpipe to his lips but kept getting jostled by the worshipers who ran toward the lava, lashed on by the yuan-ti's magical fear. The dwarf also suffered the compulsion's effects. The blowpipe trembled in his hand as he fought against the desperate desire to flee. He took one step back, then another-then someone ran into him, knocking the blowpipe from his hands.

  Arvin needed to do something. Fast. He tried tossing a psionic distraotion at the yuan-ti-only to hear Pakal scream his name from somewhere behind him. Arvin whirled then realized his distraction had bounced back at him. Whatever shield the yuan-ti had thrown up against the stormlord's magic also worked against psionics.

  That must have been why Pakal had been trying to shoot the yuan-ti with a poisoned dart instead of using his spells. The dart lay beside the blowgun,

  useless, while Pakal was driven back toward the bubbling lava by the other worshipers. The man just behind him stumbled, weeping, into the lava. Pakal looked wildly around. His eyes locked on Arvin's. They were desperate, pleading

  Suddenly, Arvin realized he could use his psionics. He drew energy into the third eye in his forehead and sent it whipping forward in a thin, silver thread. He wrapped it around the dart then yanked. The dart flew from the ground and buried itself in the yuan-ti's neck.

  The yuan-ti staggered backward then turned. Unblinking, wrath-filled eyes stared at Arvin and magical fear punched into his gut, making him want to vomit. Then it was gone. The yuan-ti crumpled slowly to the ground, dead.

  The worshipers, freed from the effects of the yuan-ti's fear aura, let out a collective sob of relief. Several started to pray. Others turned to the tree, calling to their stormlord as the darkness seeped away from it into the ground. Arvin ran forward, toward Pakal.

  The dwarf clasped his arms and said something in his own lang
uage. It sounded like a thank you, and possibly an apology. Hearing it, Arvin felt guilty at the wave of relief he'd felt upon seeing the cloth sack Pakal carried-a sack that had something square inside it.

  "Do you still have the Circled Serpent?" Arvin asked.

  Pakal frowned, said something in his own language, then intoned what sounded like a prayer. "What do you ask?" he repeated.

  Arvin repeated his question.

  "I have it." Pakal glanced at the stormlord. Talos's worshipers were breaking off tree branches, freeing him. Other worshipers tore the clerical robes off the

  yuan-ti and pummeled his lifeless body with feet and fists. "We should go," Pakal added, "before my illusion wears off. I would not want them to think that I, too, am an enemy."

  They moved quickly through the crowd, Pakal leading the way. They headed uphill, following the path. Soon the Talassan were well below them.

  "Where are we going?" Arvin asked.

  Pakal gestured at the peak. "Up there. To a portal that leads home."

  "Where's home?"

  "A jungle, far to the south. It is where Ts'ikil dwells."

  "On the Chultan Peninsula?"

  Pakal nodded. He glanced back at Arvin as they climbed. "Is Karrell truly alive? When we met in Sibyl's lair, you told me she was dead."

  "I know," Arvin admitted, "but since then, I've been able to contact her. This time, for whatever reason, my sending worked. That's how I got Ts'ikil's name. From Karrell."

  "Gods be praised," Pakal whispered. There was a catch to his voice; he must have cared deeply about Karrell, as well.

  "Indeed," Arvin agreed, touching the crystal at his neck in silent thanks, "but Karrell's in deep trouble. She's still in the Abyss. In Smaragd."

  "Sseth's domain," Pakal said.

  "Yes." Arvin shuddered, imagining Karrell alone there. Giving birth. Vulnerable. "This Ts'ikil person will know how to get her out, right?"

  The dwarf shook his head. "There is no escape from Smaragd."

  "That's not true," Arvin countered. "I've learned there's a door that leads directly to Smaragd from this plane, a door that can be opened with the Circled Serpent. We can use it to reach Karrell, to rescue