The Druid Queen tdt-3

by Douglas Niles

  Such a loss could possibly be repaired, but only by means of a powerful spell of the priesthood, the enchantment of regeneration. Bakar was one of but two or three clerics within several hundred miles capable of performing such magic. Besides that, he had tutored the High Queen during the years she had devoted to Chauntea. Bakar had developed a special relationship, of trust and faith and humor, with Robyn and Tristan Kendrick. It seemed only natural that they should turn to him now in this hour of need.

  Bakar passed under an arched gate of roses as he entered the orchard for his evening meditations. The sacred fruit trees-apples, pears, even oranges-sheltered and protected him, surrounding the priest with soothing ambience.

  But then, in a telltale instant, Bakar realized that something was wrong. The trees, even the carefully mowed grass under his feet, shuddered under the force of a nameless apprehension. Nothing looked any different. The rays of the setting sun cast the last of their warmth over the treetops, with their many spots of ripening fruit.

  Then, in a flash, he understood. The orchard knew fear.

  The hair at the back of his neck, where it grew in its encircling fringe beneath his shaved scalp, prickled and stood on end. What menace could cause even the plants to dread?

  An immensely powerful man, both physically and in the arcane might of his faith, the patriarch nevertheless stepped nervously backward, casting his eyes about for some sign of danger as he retreated from the orchard. Another step, and after a third, he sensed that he neared the gate.

  Suddenly ground ripped open directly beneath his feet, with a sound like the splintering of wet wood. Bakar screamed as he toppled into space. Desperately he reached for the edges, but the wet dirt came away in his fingers, tumbling with him into the crevasse. Slipping down the steep side, aware of the moist, living earth around him, he finally caught himself on a stout root, tangled with dirt and extending from the side of the split

  Earthquake! He sensed the might rending his grove, knowing that this was no act of nature. Power sizzled around him-magical, clerical power! Pulling himself upward, the high priest tried to kick a leg over the root, hoping to gain a foothold. Around him, the ground continued to tremble. The deep rumbling seemed to rattle the marrow in his bones, and clumps of dirt showered downward, stinging his eyes and filling his mouth.

  Just when he thought he would make it, Bakar looked upward and saw the man standing at the edge of the crevasse, his lips split by an incongruously pleasant smile.

  "You!" gasped the struggling priest, kicking frantically, knowing he had mere seconds in which to save himself. The other man said nothing but merely raised a hand and pointed at the doomed figure writhing below.

  Immediately the walls of earth moved together, rumbling and grinding with unspeakable force. Bakar kicked out frantically at the opposite wall. He braced his feet, trying to scramble upward, but now the root entangled his robe, tying him effectively in place.

  In another moment, the walls of earth came together with crushing pressure. Bakar's scream vanished in the thunderous volume of noise as the two surfaces of sod pressed so tightly that no seam was visible in the grass. The other man, the murderer, stood on the ground, hands clasped before his stomach in a posture of reflection, lips still pursed in that slight, enigmatic smile.

  The teleport spell carried Keane, in the blink of an instant, from his room at the Eagle's Nest to the vicinity of the shrine some fifty miles inland. However, as a precaution, he employed a unique protection against the threat of striking a solid object on the unknown terrain: He arrived at a place nearly a thousand feet above the sweeping landscape.

  At the exact moment the spell concluded, Keane felt himself falling, plunging through cool, evening air in steadily increasing speed. The ground below, a soft carpet of forest broken by the occasional patchwork of fields, villages, and great manors, rushed upward at a dizzying speed.

  Then the featherfall spell changed that sensation with the speaking of a single word, and the wizard floated gently toward the ground, which now appeared properly motionless. Drifting easily, he took time to study the lush landscape spreading below. The central feature of the River Highway was a plain track of dusty tan slicing a nearly perfect east-west line into the horizon to either direction.

  The sun had already set, but enough light remained for him to identify the marble-walled enclosure, with its long ridge of vineyards to the north. He congratulated himself on his accuracy, for the shrine was less than a mile away.

  Something about that ridge caught his eye, and he blinked, certain that the twilight played tricks with his eyes. But when he looked again, he saw beyond doubt that the ground there was moving! He saw men there, at least two of them, before the tiny figures vanished amid the tumult.

  Trees swayed back and forth, and the hilltop pitched up and down, grass rolling like a rug that a housekeeper shakes above the floor. He saw dark brown tendrils spreading across the ground, and he realized that these were cracks in the turf. In fact, the hilltop was splitting apart right before his eyes!

  Alarm jangled in Keane's nerves. The localized nature of the disturbance meant it was almost certainly magical, and the destruction indicated it was not likely done by the one who tended the orchard! By this time, Keane neared the ground, quickly drifting behind the treetops of the grove and losing sight of the turmoil.

  Canceling the spell with a snap of his fingers, he dropped the last ten feet and broke into a run, sprinting between the widely spaced trees of the precise orchard. Reaching the crest of the hill, he felt the strain of his breathing begin to burn in his lungs.

  Breaking around a row of trees, he saw a man silhouetted against the glow in the west. The fellow stood as if in great reverence, his hands clasped over an ample belly. There was an aspect both cruel and mocking in his posture. The wizard saw something that must have been illusionary-little sparkles of light gleamed around the man's shape, like fireflies pinned to his tunic.

  Then, before Keane could shout or reach him, the fellow raised a bottle to his lips, took a quick swallow, and disappeared.

  "Wait!" cried the magic-user, knowing the word was wasted as the blocky form vanished into the pale dusk.

  In another moment, the magic-user reached the scene of the earthquake. Fruit littered the ground, though the lush grass showed no sign of its tumult. The cracks that Keane had seen from the air were gone, the sod sewn whole as tightly as any tailor's seam.

  What had happened? A warning voice amplified the alarm he had sensed before.

  Keane heard voices then, coming up the hill behind him. It occurred to him that if a foul deed had occurred, it might not be good for him to be discovered here. A swiftly murmured incantation rendered him invisible, and he stepped close to the trunk of a tree where he could remain out of the way.

  "Patriarch? Patriarch Dalsoritan?" called a reedy voice, emerging tremulously from the shadows below the knoll. Several young men dressed in plain robes came into sight, tentatively approaching the scene. These must be the shrine's apprentices, Keane deduced.

  "What happened?" asked one of the young fellows trailing to the rear of the group.

  "The patriarch came up here for his evening meditation, just like always," said the first and apparently boldest of the apprentices, pressing onto the hilltop as his companions hesitated. "Patriarch?" he called again, more loudly this time.

  "He's gone!" said another in an awestruck whisper.

  "But that commotion! Something was wrong up here!" suggested an apprentice.

  "Very much," said the first one, walking carefully around the hilltop. He came very near to Keane, but the invisible wizard remained completely silent, and the fellow, continuing his inspection, moved past

  "Our master has met with some kind of disaster," the acolyte finally concluded, his voice nearly breaking in despair. "There's no sign of him anywhere!"

  "Perhaps we should go back to the shrine," suggested one, to the murmured assent of his fellows. "We can pray for enlightenment, an
d perhaps the patriarch will return in his own good time."

  "No!" insisted the leader. "Spread out and comb the ground. See if you can find something, anything, to tell us what happened here!"

  Keane remained silent and observant as the acolytes searched. Finally, fearful and unsuccessful, they started back down the hill, declaring their intention to return when the sun had risen and they could fully inspect the grounds. Keane, in the meantime, had formed his own conclusion: To wit, Bakar Dalsoritan had been murdered.

  Turning away in anger, the mage tried to collect his thoughts. What was the reason for the killing? Of course, rival factions exist in any hierarchy, and churches were no exception. Such brutality was an excessive tactic, yet it had happened before and would doubtless happen again: A wary official desires the offices and power of a rival and destroys him to open the path. Or perhaps, he considered, an entrenched ruler might have feared the devout followers and steady advance of a younger rival. Bakar could have fit into either of these categories so far as Keane knew.

  But was either role enough to cause him to be killed?

  Too agitated to be aware of his fatigue, Keane made his way down to the highway and started walking toward Baldur's Gate. Like any other spell, his teleportation enchantment had been used up when he traveled to the shrine. He wouldn't be able to employ it again until he had studied his spellbook. Still, he uttered no complaints about the mundane travel. If anything, it gave him time to think about the confusing questions whirling through his mind.

  He slept in a ditch for a few hours, and then in the morning was fortunate enough to catch a ride from a carter hauling a load of fabric to the markets in Baldur's Gate.

  Keane tipped the driver well, for his silence as much as the ride. The mage climbed into the back and rested on the rolls of silk and cotton while he pondered the mystery-who had killed the cleric, and why?

  Indeed, the murder of a powerful patriarch was no easy task to accomplish. Whoever would attempt such a thing must have considerable resources at his own disposal, be willing to take great risks in the accomplishment of his evil deed.

  Keane's speculations didn't answer why the murder had been committed, but they helped him to accept its truth and its implications to his own mission. By the time the carter reached Baldur's Gate, it was nearing sunset. Thanking the man for the ride, he returned to the Eagle's Nest Inn, finally having decided on a course of action.

  For once, the mage didn't feel like hiding out in his room. Instead, he entered the common room and sat down at the bar. Confusion and questions gnawed at him, but he found it pointless-and deeply frustrating-to worry about issues he couldn't address with any accuracy. Instead, he focused on practicality. Namely, what should he do now? The notion of returning to his king with a report of complete failure had absolutely no appeal. Instead, he'd have to think of something else.

  The innkeeper, Miles, waddled up to him on the raised platform behind the bar. Miles had installed the walkway so that the bar remained waist-high to humans on the one side, and at a proportional height to the halflings on the other. Most of his barmaids and cooks, Keane knew, came from the ranks of the Small Folk.

  "You look like a farmer who just planted his beans in the wrong field," observed Miles wryly. "What'll it be?"

  "Make it an ale," Keane said, feeling the truth of the halfling's words. Yet even in his disappointment, his mind had begun to move forward. His original mission remained: to find a cleric who could heal his king. If he couldn't gain the services of his original target, he would have to go about finding somebody else.

  "On the house," replied Miles. "Sophtie tells me you're all right, though we wouldn't know that down here, as much as you've kept to yourself."

  Sophtie, Keane knew, was the young barmaid who had kept him supplied with tea. He was suddenly glad that he had tipped her well for each trip up and down the flights of stairs.

  "Your rooms are just too comfortable," Keane gibed, gratefully accepting a tall, foaming mug. "But tonight perhaps I can share the pleasure of your company."

  Miles looked around. The rest of the bar was quiet, the few customers readily handled by two diminutive barmaids. "I'm yours until the dinner rush," noted the halfling, drawing himself a small glass and settling across the bar from Keane.

  "Tell me," asked the mage, "what are the major temples in Baldur's Gate?"

  Miles sipped at his ale, wiping the foam from his lip while he thought. "Well, there's two big shrines-temples, really-to Oghma and Helm. Right in the center of the Upper City, they are, across the square from each other. Lots of little shrines, too. Seems that just about every god this side of the Trackless Sea has a few followers in Baldur's Gate."

  "Oghma and Helm, eh?" Keane knew of both gods-the former, patron of bards, lover of music and knowledge; the latter, hailed as an alert guardian and stern arbiter of justice.

  Both of them valued the forces of virtue over evil, and thus a cleric of either faith might fulfill the minimum requirements of Keane's mission.

  "Does either have a patriarch-a high priest or priestess?" he inquired.

  Here Miles shook his head sympathetically. "None so mighty as Bakar Dalsoritan. Weren't you trying to get in touch with him?"

  A tingle of alarm alerted Keane. "How did you know that?" he inquired, trying to keep his voice level.

  If Miles thought anything was out of the ordinary, he didn't display it in his manner. "Everyone did," he said with a shrug. "Three nights ago, after you hired that fellow Gapsar to ride out to the shrine, he came in here to spend some of his advance payment. Didn't leave until the morning, you know. From what I understand, he visited half the taverns in the Lower City. Made no secret about your generosity, either. I'd think you'd be flattered."

  "No … not really." Keane strained to keep his voice neutral as he silently cursed his own stupidity. He'd been obligated to pay the man an advance, but he could have offered it in the morning, before his departure! Instead, he had given it to him as they closed the deal, just after sunset. Apparently Gapsar had wasted no time in spreading the word of his good fortune.

  "You tell me there's no high priest at either temple. Do you know of any of the smaller shrines that might have a cleric of note in attendance?"

  Miles screwed up his plump face in thought, sipping long and deep from his glass in an apparent attempt to jog his memory. "Nope-but there's one thing, though."

  "What?" asked Keane, trying not to snap in his desperation.

  "I seem to recall there was an Exalted Inquisitor of Helm touring the temples on the Sword Coast, what with the new trade routes opening up-to Maztica and the like. Some of the clerks were arrested-failure to pay import duties to the church or something. I guess they needed a high-ranking churchman to conduct the trial."

  "Yes, yes, of course. When was this 'Exalted Inquisitor' here?"

  "Well, he might still be here-that's the thing. It was midsummer when he arrived, a little more than a month ago. I know, because the Four Dukes held a grand reception for him on his arrival. Never did hear about him moving on."

  "Exalted Inquisitor of Helm?" Keane didn't know the hierarchy of Helm's worship, but the rank sounded impressive. And not every wayfaring holy man was granted a meeting with the Four Dukes of Baldur's Gate!

  "Aye-not a fellow you'd want to be crossing, and that's the truth," continued Miles. "Why, it's said that he had one of his own acolytes whipped-and only for showing a courtesy to a priest of a different faith."

  Keane grimaced. He'd forgotten a fact that Miles had just brought home. The clerics of Helm were notoriously stiff-necked and rigid in their approach to worship. One who did not agree with their tenets was, as often as not, branded as an infidel or a faithless swine. In fact, during the initial invasion of Maztica little more than a decade before, the clerics of Helm had been primarily responsible for the ruthless campaign to wipe out the native religions. Helm was indeed a vigilant and jealous god.

  Yet he didn't see that he had another choic
e-at least, not so long as he remained in Baldur's Gate. And he had no idea where else to go. Waterdeep came to mind, of course, but that was a city of commerce and sorcery, little known for clerical accomplishment. In fact, it seemed that his best hope of finding a cure for the king's injury might be found at the local Temple of Helm.

  "Do you know where the Exalted Inquisitor stayed when he came to Baldur's Gate?" Keane asked.

  "Why, sure I do!" replied Miles enthusiastically. "The temple keeps a great house for luminaries like him. Right across the street from the shrine, it is."

  "Tell me how to get there," Keane requested. He had already decided that he would seek out the inquisitor in the morning.

  An infant squalled in one of the rude caves, until the mother cuffed it into silence with a few sharp blows. Elsewhere a wolfdog barked, the gruff sound fading into a low snarl as one of the elders stared the beast down over a well-chewed sliver of elk bone. Fires smoldered, dank wood sending clouds of gray smoke past the dirty cave mouths. Normally a hearty haunch of meat would have sizzled over at least one hearth, casting its alluring scent through the village of Blackleaf, but now there was no meat to be had.

  Thurgol, self-appointed chief of the village, decided that he would inspect the other cookfires. His own wench, a stooped but sturdy giant-kin named Karloth, had failed to provide him with a single delicacy in several days. The hulking firbolg chieftain, stooped and misshapen kin to the giant races, had thumped her well tonight. Thurgol let her know that such carelessness would not be allowed to continue, for, in the finest traditions of humanoid logic, he conveniently ignored the fact that his club, snares, and rocks had brought them no game for more than a month, though it was past the peak of high summer!

  Scowling from beneath his low-hanging brows, massive hands clamped around the base of a club that was nearly as tall as a full-grown human, the chieftain of Blackleaf stumped around the periphery of his village. Firbolgs and trolls scowled back at him, hungry and afraid. Nowhere did he see food, but Thurgol suspected this was because they all hoarded it for times when their leader was absent.