by Lisa Smedman
The demon halted at the edge of the dais. Lazily regarding him through slit eyes, it coiled its scaly tail under itself. "Little morsel," it hissed. "Come down from there."
"Make me," he said, staring defiantly into its eyes. The demon bared its teeth, hissing. Its incisors were long and curved, like a snake's. Arvin wondered if they held venom.
Footsteps sounded in the hallway: Marasa? The demon's head started to turn.
One palm still pressed tight to the gauntlet, Arvin plunged his other hand into his pocket and found the monkey's fist. "Here," he said to the demon, hurling the knot of twine. "Catch."
Even as the monkey's fist unknotted, the demon raised its swords. Six blades flashed through the air, chopping the magical twine to pieces. The frayed remains fell at its feet. The demon cocked its head then frowned. "I grow weary of this."
"So do I," Arvin said in a loud voice, hoping to cover the sound of footsteps in the hall. Marasa would have a better chance if she was able to surprise the demon. She could banish it before it got a chance to teleport out of the spell's path.
"But I've got one more trick up my sleeve," Arvin bluffed. "One that's bound to-"
He faltered as he saw who was coming down the hall. Not Marasa, as he had desperately hoped, but Karrell.
"Arvin!" she called. "What is happening? Are you-" She jerked to a halt just inside the room as she saw the demon. Her eyes widened.
The demon turned.
Karrell immediately began to cast a spell, but even as she raised her hands, the demon lashed out with one of its swords. Karrell twisted out of its path, but the blade caught her raised right hand. Blood sprayed and fingers flew to the floor. Karrell gasped and clutched her wounded hand.
The demon snaked its tail across the doorway, blocking it, and prodded Karrell with one of its swords. "Go ahead," it hissed with malicious delight. "Try to flee."
Arvin tried to manifest a distraction, but though a loud droning filled the air, the demon's eyes remained locked on Karrell. He leaned out from the dais and kicked the demon in the back. A shock of weakness flowed up his leg as his foot struck one of the black tendrils that coiled around the demon's body. Ignoring the numbness it caused, he shouted at the demon's back and kicked it a second time. "Hey, scale-face! Behind you!"
Almost absent-mindedly, the demon turned its head and slashed backhanded at him with one of its swords. Arvin flinched as the blade came to a jerking halt a palm's width from his head, halted by the magic of the gauntlet. A heartbeat later, a whirling circle of blades appeared, this time surrounding the gauntlet and trapping Arvin inside. Cursing, he shrank back from them, his sweaty palms still on the statue. A moment ago, the gauntlet had provided sanctuary. The demon had turned it into a prison.
The momentary distraction, however, gave Karrell the time she needed. The far end of the chapel was suddenly plunged into darkness, hiding her from sight.
The demon frowned then twisted, whipping its tail through the patch of darkness. Arvin heard Karrell gasp-and the tail yanked her back into the light. Caught within the demon's coils, Karrell fought to free herself, her wounded hand leaving smears of blood on the demon's scaly tail. The demon lapped at the blood with its long black tongue then smiled. "A yuan-ti?" it said. "You must be the one I'm supposed to kill." It tail squeezed-and Karrell exhaled in pain. Arvin heard a dull crack that sounded like a rib breaking.
Footsteps sounded in the hallway-more than one person, and running this time-and a woman's voice was shouting orders: Marasa?
Arvin looked wildly around the chapel. He was weaponless, and the monkey's fist-the last of his ensorcelled items-was lying on the floor in tatters. If he let go of the gauntlet, he'd be cut down before he took a single step. But Marasa was at last on her way. He and Karrell only needed to survive for a few moments more.
"Helm," he croaked. "Help us now. Do something."
The skies outside lightened. Dusk-red sunlight slanted in through the chapel's stained-glass windows, turning the blue eyes at their centers an eerie purple. The light beamed in, limning the image of Helm's eye on the chapel floor.
With a hiss, the demon thrust its sword at the nearest window, smashing a hole through the eye. Glass exploded outward. The skies outside darkened again as the sun continued its descent.
As a loose pane of glass fell from the broken window to shatter on the floor, Arvin realized there was a weapon he could use, after all. He reached out with his mind, sending a thread-thin line of glowing silver toward the broken window. With it, he seized one of the panes of glass and threw it at the demon's face. The demon batted it away with a sword, smashing it into bright blue shards, but Arvin hurled another pane of glass at it, and another, keeping up the distraction.
Four of the baron's soldiers-three men and a woman-charged into the chapel, swords in hand. The woman shouted a command, and Arvin's heart sank as he realized it hadn't been Marasa's voice he'd heard, after all. The soldiers leaped forward, engaging the demon.
The demon, however, needed only four swords to meet their attack. One of the men went down even before he'd managed to close with it, his throat slashed. With its fifth sword, the demon continued to knock away the panes of glass Arvin hurled at it. That left one more sword. This one it thrust at Karrell; it thunked into the wooden floor beside her head as she desperately twisted aside.
Karrell's face was purple now and her movements were jerky. The demon-still fighting the soldiers with three of its arms-yanked the sword free and flexed its tail, dragging Karrell across the floor.
The female soldier pressed the demon, shouting Helm's name. The demon thrust a sword through her stomach, spitting her, then flicked her limp body away. One of the two remaining soldiers turned to run; with a flash of steel, the demon lopped off his head. The other grimly continued to attack but met the same end.
Its opponents dead, the demon glanced down at Karrell, tongue flickering through its hissing smile.
Karrell's fear-filled eyes sought Arvin's. He could see that she realized she was about to die. Her lips tried to form a word, but there was no breath left in her body.
Arvin ended his manifestation; the pane of glass he'd been about to throw fell to the floor and shattered. Reaching deep inside himself, he manifested a different power-one whose secondary display filled the air with the scents of saffron and ginger. Then, for a heartbeat, he hesitated. He didn't want to make the same mistake he'd made with Tanglemane. If the demon died…
It was a gamble he had to take. Spells and steel hadn't defeated the demon; he doubted anything would. And if he didn't manifest his power, Karrell would die.
Guiding the energies with his mind, he coiled one loop around the demon, another around Karrell. Then he tied them together and yanked the knot tight.
"Demon!" he shouted. "I've just bound your fate to the yuan-ti woman. Kill her, and you'll die!"
It was a desperate lie. Karrell's death would mean little to the demon. She might cause it a slight wound, but no more.
Ignoring Arvin, the demon slashed at Karrell with its sword. This time, Karrell's reaction was slower; the sword sliced a line down her cheek as she wrenched her head aside. The demon grunted-then hissed and touched its own cheek with the back of a hand. The hand came away slick with green blood.
The demon turned to face Arvin and tried to speak, but no words came from its mouth. It seemed to be having trouble breathing. It frowned down at Karrell, who lay gasping on the floor, then uncoiled its tail from her. Then it stared, its eyes slit with malevolence, at Arvin. "Unbind me, sorcerer," it commanded.
Relief washed through Arvin. He glanced at Karrell.
Her lips formed silent words: "Thank you."
Arvin gave her a grim smile. Just a few moments more, and Marasa would surely appear and banish the demon. He stared back at it through the whirling blades that still surrounded the dais. "No," he told the demon. "You will remain bound."
The demon flicked a hand, and the blades disappeared. It cocked its head to t
he side and considered Arvin. "Mortal," it hissed. "Surely you can be persuaded." Its hand opened, revealing a glitter of gems. The demon tipped its hand, letting them spill from its palm onto the floor. "The yuan-ti means nothing to me; she may go. Unbind me from her, and these are yours."
Arvin smiled grimly. "A rogue tried to entice me with a similar offer a few days ago," he said. "He's dead now."
The demon clenched its fist-causing the swords to reappear-and pointed one of them at Arvin. "Unbind me!" it roared.
Arvin gripped the gauntlet with sweaty hands. "No."
"We seem to have reached an impasse," the demon hissed.
Outside the chapel, just beyond the spot where one of the soldier's bodies lay, Arvin saw a flash of silver: light, glinting off a polished breastplate. Marasa stepped into view in the doorway, her lips moving as she whispered a spell, her left hand-clad in a silver gauntlet whose palm was set with an enormous, glittering sapphire- extended toward the demon.
"Yes," Arvin answered. "It seems we have." He shrugged, a gesture that removed his hands for no more than a fraction of a heartbeat from the gauntlet. It had the desired effect; the demon lashed out with a sword, but before the blade connected, Arvin's hands were back on the gauntlet.
The demon glared at him, oblivious to Karrell, who had risen to her hands and knees and was crawling away, her wounded hand leaving a smear of blood on the floor, and to Marasa, who was casting her spell. Marasa swept her hand down toward the demon, the sapphire in her gauntlet glinting. "By Helm's all-seeing might, I order you, demon, back to the place from whence you came!" she shouted.
The demon rose from the floor, roaring, slashing wildly with its swords. A rent appeared in the air next to it; an angry boil that burst open, emitting a sulfurous stench. Dark shapes writhed inside the tear in the fabric of the planes, howling and thrashing. The demon tumbled toward them.
Karrell fell onto her side-had she slipped on her own blood? As she rose again, blood from her wounded hand streamed toward the hole in a thin red ribbon-a ribbon the demon grabbed in one clawed hand.
Arvin reeled, realizing he'd seen this once before: in the vision at Naneth's home.
Still roaring, the demon disappeared through the gap between the planes. Karrell was yanked after it, screaming.
The gap closed.
For a heartbeat, Arvin stood rooted to the spot, Karrell's scream echoing in his mind. Then he hurled himself across the chapel toward the spot where she'd disappeared. "Karrell!" he cried desperately. Tears streaming down his face, he clutched at empty air. He sagged to the ground and beat his fists against the floor. A fate link wasn't supposed to work that way; it transferred pain, wounds, even fatal injury from one individual to the next, but that was all.
What had gone wrong?
He felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked up and saw Marasa staring down at him. Her face was deeply lined and streaked with tears; her hair seemed even grayer than it had been before. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I didn't realize…"
Arvin looked up at her through tear-blurred eyes. "Karrell was still alive when she went into the Abyss. Is there any way she could still be-"
Marasa shook her head grimly. "No. She would never survive."
Arvin's shoulders slumped.
"She was pregnant," he whispered, "with my child." He shook his head and corrected himself. "With my children. They're all…" His throat caught, preventing him from speaking further.
Marasa nodded but seemed too weary to offer any further comfort. Her hand fell away from his shoulder.
Outside, the skies darkened and a wet snow began to fall. A chill wind blew flakes of white in through the shattered window. A shard of blue-all that remained of Helm's eye-fell to the floor like a tear and broke, tinkling.
Arvin spotted Karrell's ring, lying on the floor in a pool of blood. Two severed fingers lay next to it. He picked the ring up and wiped it clean on his shirt, then stared for a long moment at the turquoise stone. Then he pressed the ring to his lips. "Forgive me," he whispered.
He slipped the ring onto the little finger of his left hand then clenched his hand shut, savoring the pain of his abbreviated little finger.
Karrell was dead.
So was Glisena.
Arvin had failed them both.
But Sibyl was still alive. And if she managed to get her hands on the second half of the Circled Serpent, many more would die.
He stared down at the ring on his finger. "I'll do it," he vowed. "Finish what you started. See to it that Sibyl never gets a chance to use the Circled Serpent."
In the darkening skies outside, thunder rumbled.
EPILOGUE
Arvin stood near the stern of the ship, watching the shoreline of Sespech fall away behind. Already the square buildings of Mimph were no more than tiny squares on the horizon, their lights slowly fading. The waters of the Vilhon Reach were as dark as the overcast evening sky above, a perfect counterpoint to his grim mood.
Seven days had passed since Karrell had disappeared into the Abyss. His eyes still teared whenever he thought of her. Her life had entwined with his only briefly, yet he still felt frayed by her loss. He thought back to what she'd told him on the day he'd discovered she was a yuan-ti. After they'd made love, she'd told him more about the beliefs of her religion. Every person's life was a maze, hedged with pain, disappointment, suffering, and self-doubt, she'd said. To find one's way through this jungle, one had to keep one's eyes on the "true path"-the course the gods had cleared for one through the thorny undergrowth.
Arvin had joked that he still hadn't found his true path-that he kept fumbling his way from one near- disaster to the next. Karrell had just smiled and told him he would find it, one day, by following his heart.
Arvin sighed. He had followed his heart-to Karrell-only to lose her.
On the day she disappeared-and every day after that-he'd tried to contact her with his lapis lazuli, but she'd never answered.
She was dead. And it was his fault.
He touched the chunk of crystal at his throat, wishing the gods had taken him instead. "Nine lives," he muttered.
He'd never thought of his continued survival as a curse before.
He watched as Mimph sank from sight, its lights seemingly extinguished by the cold waters of the Vilhon Reach. In distant Ormpetarr, a grieving Foe- smasher would be mourning the loss of his daughter. Marasa had tried to summon Glisena's soul back to her dead body-that was what had taken Marasa so long to reach the chapel-but her attempt to resurrect the baron's daughter had been in vain. Glisena's death had been magical in nature, and irreversible-the contingency that allowed the binding to end and the demon to assume its full size.
At least Foesmasher still had his grandchild. He'd reacted amazingly well to the news that Belinna was carrying it. Instead of denouncing the "serpent," he'd begun to weep. "It's all I have left of her now," he'd moaned. Then, wiping away his tears, he'd summoned Belinna to his council chamber. Belinna, forewarned by Arvin that the child in her womb was not only half yuan-ti, but of royal blood, had responded hesitantly to the summons. That hesitancy had turned to amazement and joy when the baron announced she would be elevated to the position of royal nursemaid. That her child would, from the moment it was born, have everything it needed-as would she and her husband.
Despite his daughter's death, Foesmasher had also been generous to Arvin-very generous. With his coin pouch filled with gems and coins, Arvin would have no difficulty making a new life for himself anywhere he chose. But that could wait. For the moment, there were more pressing matters he had to attend to.
As for Naneth, there had been no sign of the midwife, despite the baron's soldiers having searched every corner of Ormpetarr. Arvin wondered where she was. Or rather, where the mind seed was that, even now, would be taking over her body. The seed would, no doubt, soon be on its way to infiltrate Sibyl's lair. There, Arvin was certain, it would face an unpleasant reception from Sibyl, who must by now have known that her plan to assass
inate Dediana Extaminos had failed.
Nor had the baron's men been able to locate Zelia. Would she follow Dmetrio and the mind seed back to Hlondeth? If so, Arvin would have to tread carefully, starting the moment his ship docked there. Tymora willing, he would spot Zelia before she spotted him.
The ship rose and fell, its rigging creaked, and tie- lines fluttered against the taut canvas above. Arvin could no longer see Mimph; the gloom had swallowed it. "Farewell, Sespech," he said. "I doubt I'll see you again."
Then he turned to stare across the water at the dark line that was the north shore of the Vilhon Reach-at the faint green glow on the horizon that was Hlondeth. Somewhere beneath its streets, Sibyl was laired in an ancient temple, with her half of the Circled Serpent.
Somewhere in the city above, Dmetrio had his half. Somehow, Arvin would have to find one or the other, before the two halves were joined.
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