Finder's Bane

by Kate Novak

  Joel turned away from the book with a shudder and hurried after his newly pledged ally.

  Walinda led the bard down the corridor opposite the one he’d arrived by. She turned down the third side passage on the left, a route Joel might have avoided. The tunnel was deteriorated and difficult to traverse. They were forced to climb over rockfalls, crawl under low ceilings, and balance on thin ledges in places where most of the tunnel floor had collapsed into deep, dark chasms. Oily water seeped from the wall and ceiling and made the floor slick. Despite all the difficulties, Walinda didn’t seem the least bit uncertain, not even when they reached a dead end.

  “Here,” she said, touching a section of the wall. “Push here,” she ordered Joel.

  Joel put his shoulder to the wall and shoved hard. The seam became a crack, but something within the wall squealed alarmingly.

  “Wait!” Walinda whispered urgently. She stepped up beside Joel and set her hands on the center of the door where it pivoted. She murmured words Joel did not recognize. Then she stepped back and said, “Try it now.”

  Joel pushed again. In his bones, he could feel the grating of rust and iron, but no noise came from the shifting wall.

  The door opened into an all-purpose storage room, lit with bright magical light. Cuts of meat hung from the ceiling. Rope, wood, hides, jugs, and other items were stacked all about. Walinda led Joel past a pair of butchering tables to a firepit, which seemed to serve as a makeshift smithy. The ashes within were cold at the moment. On the wall beyond the smithy hung all manner of weapons, most of which were in poor shape, rusted or broken, but some appeared quite serviceable.

  “We must arm ourselves,” the priestess explained, “before we rescue your companion.”

  Joel took a short sword and a dagger for himself. Choosing a weapon for Holly was more difficult. There was nothing on the wall like the curved blade that had been her father’s. The bard picked out two different swords for the paladin, so she could select whichever was more comfortable. He also snagged her a crossbow and a quiver of bolts.

  Walinda selected a mace and a thick-headed metal club. She grinned at his weapon-bedecked figure. “You are the very image of a holy warrior, Poppin,” she teased. “Come. Your companion should be in a prison cell nearby. We will make better time if we move through the main hall, but we must be very quiet.”

  Walinda made for the storeroom’s regular door and opened it just enough to peer out. She waved him forward and slipped through the doorway. Joel padded after her.

  The bard had barely cleared the archway when he slammed into Walinda, who was backing up swiftly.

  The priestess turned and forced him back into the storeroom. She pressed him against the wall just inside the doorway, whispering, “Hush! Don’t move. Don’t even breathe.” She opened her long black cape and wrapped it around the pair of them.

  Joel froze as Walinda pressed herself up against him. He could have sworn he felt her heart pounding even through her breastplate. Joel was wondering what could possibly have frightened the icy priestess when he saw it.

  Floating toward the storeroom in complete eerie silence was a great sphere, bristling with eyestalks that swayed like snakes. It drooled yellow ichor from a fanged mouth at the center of its spherical body.

  Joel hoped the cloak had some magical property that hid them, for they stood not in the shadows, but out in the open in a lighted room. He offered up a short, silent prayer to Finder in case it did not. As he remained still and breathless, he became uncomfortably aware of the rose scent of Walinda’s hair and the sensation of her hands clenching his shoulders.

  The many-eyed creature drifted just outside the doorway and began muttering to itself in some unknown language. It was too big around to squeeze through the doorway. A minute later it drifted away.

  Walinda relaxed her grip on Joel’s shoulders and backed away. Her cloak fell from him, but her scent lingered. She brushed back a stray wisp of hair and readjusted her cloak.

  “What was that?” Joel whispered.

  “An eye tyrant,” Walinda replied softly. “Some call it a beholder. The beast cultists are so debased they worship it. Bane warned me of its presence here, that it was the greatest danger I could face.”

  “Great,” Joel whispered sarcastically. “I don’t suppose Bane happened to mention how you were supposed to get down to the ground.”

  “Lord Bane is all-wise and all-powerful,” the priestess retorted. “He told me I would find you, Poppin, and that you would find a way to escape from here.”

  Six

  THE WINGED WOMAN

  Holly kept an eye on the woman sleeping on the straw in the corner. The cultists had shoved the paladin into the same cell as the winged woman the priestess of Bane had offered the Xvimists. The woman had not stirred upon the paladin’s arrival or since then. Holly waited patiently, knowing rest was a crucial part of healing, not to mention a temporary escape from cares. Like any Daggerdale girl worth her keep, she’d learned something of the healer’s art long before she’d accepted the calling to paladinhood. That knowledge added immensely to her success when calling on healing powers from her god. She sat beside the woman, visually examining her injuries, mentally preparing a list of things she would need to do to restore her to health.

  For the most part, the wounds on the woman’s flesh, while undoubtedly painful, were minor, the work of a skilled torturer intent on keeping the victim alive a long time. It was the damage to the woman’s wings that worried Holly more. They dangled at odd angles. The ulna and radius of both wings had been broken, one snapped, the other crushed. The humerus of the right wing had been dislocated from the woman’s back. Several of the primary and secondary feathers had been plucked away. The covert feathers on one wing were scorched and curled, probably by a hot iron poker.

  Holly could imagine how the torture had gone, but she pushed that thought aside. It wasn’t until the woman began to thrash and cry out in her sleep that Holly decided waking her might be more merciful than letting her sleep. She reached out and shook the woman’s shoulder gently but firmly, saying, “Wake up. It’s all right. You’re only dreaming.”

  The woman’s eyes opened, and she glared at Holly for several moments before she seemed to get her bearings. “Who in the nine hells are you?” she demanded.

  “Holly Harrowslough,” the girl replied. “I’m a prisoner like yourself.”

  “That’s too bad,” the woman muttered. She sat up; her face contorted in agonizing pain as the bones in her wings twisted about. “I’m Jas,” she said between clenched teeth. “Short for Jasmine. Just call me Jas.”

  “I can heal your wings,” Holly said.

  Jas’s eyes narrowed, reappraising the girl before her. “What are you, some priest acolyte?” she asked.

  “I’m a paladin of the Order of the Aster, Protectors of Lathander’s church,” Holly explained.

  “A paladin. No tour of Toril would be complete without one,” the winged woman muttered sarcastically. “Try curing that nasty bruise on your face,” Jas said, pointing to the mark left by the Zhentilar’s gauntlet. “I might be a little more than you can handle.”

  “I’m not hurt as badly as you,” Holly argued. “And I have healed wings before—the wings of birds, that is. I know how crucial it is to arrange the bones correctly. A wing healed crooked doesn’t fly.”

  “A paladin healing broken birdie wings. It fits somehow,” Jas said.

  “Not just any birds,” Holly explained patiently. “Pigeons and hawks. My people use them as messenger birds in our fight against the Zhentarim.”

  “What difference does it make?” Jas snarled. “They’re going to kill us anyway.”

  “Well, I was working on the assumption that we would escape once you were healed,” Holly snapped, “but if you would rather try to escape in that condition … Unless, of course, you aren’t interested in escaping.”

  Jas shrugged and grimaced at the pain it caused her.

  “I realize it seems
hopeless, but that could just be the pain overcoming your will,” Holly argued. “Please, let me try.”

  Jas sighed. “Go ahead, kiddo, if it’ll make you happy.”

  Holly knelt behind Jas. She removed the tattered remnants of the cape that hung between Jas’s wings and set it aside. As gently as she could, she raised the woman’s right wing and aligned the broken bones. The bones were as light as a bird’s, the feathers soft and warm.

  Jas whimpered, despite her tough manner, and her eyes welled with tears. Quickly Holly whispered a prayer to Lathander. The rosy dawn-colored light about her hands buried themselves in the pink feathers, and the cracked bones knit together in a perfectly straight line. With great pleasure, Holly watched pinfeathers grow at a magical rate, filling in the spaces left by the plucked primary and secondary feathers. Without pause, the paladin proceeded to work on the left wing.

  The crushed bones were harder to manipulate into place. Jas grunted. Her teeth were clenched so tightly together the muscles in her jawline were twitching from the strain. As soon as she’d healed this set of bones with a second prayer to her god, Holly twisted the wing, gave it a sharp tug, and pushed it back into the socket in Jas’s back. A final prayer healed the swelling about the joint.

  The winged woman gave a sigh of relief and lay back down on the straw. She was drenched in sweat, but her suffering was greatly alleviated. She turned her head to look up at the paladin.

  “Thanks,” she said.

  “You’re welcome,” Holly said with a weak grin. Worry over the woman’s agony, combined with her own aches and pains, had nearly exhausted the girl. She leaned back against the cell wall and mopped her dark brow with her sleeve.

  Jas sat up again, then stood. Gingerly she began spreading her wings. When no pain manifested itself, the woman flared the wings out to their full span. The pinion feathers grazed the sides of the cell. A breeze ran across the floor and sent straw swirling about the room.

  Holly watched with delight. She thought the wings were beautiful. It wasn’t until Jas lowered them that the girl focused on the woman herself.

  Jas was smaller than Holly and quite slender, but beneath her torn black leather leggings and jerkin, her muscles were as firm as a warrior’s. Her short, dark hair framed a pale pink face. A longer strand of bangs curled between her milky brown eyes.

  Despite their soft color, there was something hard about Jas’s eyes. They reminded Holly of the cold, impassive expressions she’d seen on the faces of the Daggerdale warriors who were tired of fighting but unwilling to do anything else. It was a look that made Holly sad.

  Jas held out her hand. “Pleased to meet you, Holly. You from around these parts?”

  Holly grasped the woman’s wrist in the fashion of dalesfolk, noting the sinewy, tough muscles in her right arm. The winged woman’s arm twitched slightly in surprise, but then she responded by grasping Holly’s wrist.

  “I’m from Daggerdale,” the paladin replied. “That’s just south of here. Joel’s from Berdusk.”

  “Joel?” Jas asked with a raised eyebrow.

  “We were abducted together. He’s a priest of Finder.”

  “Finder? That’s one I’ve never heard of,” Jas said.

  “He’s a new god. He was a bard who destroyed Moander and took the Darkbringer’s power. His people are supposed to be renewing art, encouraging it to grow and change.”

  “Dandy,” Jas said as she examined the cell door. “Drawbolt and crossbar. Simple and effective,” she muttered. She gave the bars of the door an angry shake. “I guess a pickable lock would be too much to expect from groundlings. So who’s this Cynic guy the Banites talked about?” she asked Holly.

  “Cyric,” Holly corrected. “He took Bane’s position when Torm killed Bane. Then Cyric went mad. That’s when Bane’s son Iyachtu Xvim seized Bane’s power. That’s who they’re going to sacrifice us to—Iyachtu Xvim.”

  Jas began sweeping her hands over the rough walls of the cell, giving experimental shoves every few feet. “I leave for a few years and the whole pantheon changes,” she muttered. “Are you sure Bane’s dead? That priestess witch seemed pretty sure of herself. I know she was casting spells. It took plenty of magic to bring down my crew.” Her eyes burned with anger at the memory.

  “It must have been some trick,” Holly insisted. “Everyone knows Bane is dead. What happened to your crew?”

  “They’re all dead. After that Bane bitch stole my ship, she tortured them to death. Johenri, Thordis, Gildstar, and my first mate, Arandes. Arandes lasted for six days. He was a tough old giff. They stripped off his skin and used him for a figurehead until his heart finally let go.” Jas stopped her exploration and leaned her forehead against the wall. Holly could tell from the way her back shook that the winged woman was stifling her sobs.

  “We found your friend’s body,” Holly said softly. “The dalesfolk gave him a proper burial.”

  Jas didn’t reply, but she returned to examining the walls, only now her shoves on the stone were more forceful.

  “So that floating ship was yours?” Holly asked.

  “Floating ship? You mean the nautiloid. It doesn’t just float. It can fly. It can sail the phlogiston between the spheres, something, fortunately, that the groundling thieves who stole it can’t comprehend. Yes, the nautiloid’s mine. I took it from the illithids.”

  “Illithids?” Holly asked.

  “I believe you groundlings call them mind flayers,” Jas said.

  “The creatures that devour people’s brains?” Holly asked.

  Jas nodded. “The illithids destroyed the hull of my dragonfly ship, so my crew and I took one of the illithids’ miniature nautiloid hulls as payment. The illithids weren’t keen on making reparations, though, so they fired on us as we were leaving. That’s why the ship’s hull is so busted up. It’s still spaceworthy, though. We landed here to take on supplies.” Having finished examining the walls to no effect, Jas dusted off her hands.

  “We were headed for Shadowdale,” Jas continued, “but just over the Spiderhaunt Woods, something attacked Gildstar while he was at the helm. The ship came crashing down in the trees. That’s when we got into a fight with the Banites. Like I said, that priestess used magic to bring us down. There was also something else with her—something powerful and evil that kept to the shadows.”

  Holly was reminded of the evil she’d sensed in Daggerdale when the nautiloid ship had floated past her.

  “Well, I can’t find a way out of this cell,” Jas announced. “I hope you’ve got some ideas. Otherwise we’re going to be food for this baby god of Bane’s.”

  “Iyachtu Xvim.” Holly supplied the name.

  “Sounds like the noise Arandes made when he was clearing his throat,” Jas commented scornfully, without a trace of humor. “So do you have some way out of here with your dawn-god powers?”

  “I have a plan,” Holly explained, “but if it works, I still have to search for Joel.”

  “All right,” Jas said, “but if it takes too long, I’m blowing this mud ball without you.”

  “Fine,” Holly agreed. Jas, she suspected, would not run from a fight, but she was the sort to get antsy if the search lasted the whole night.

  It took Holly five minutes of shrieking and frantic shaking of the bars before one of the cultists came to the cell door.

  “She’s not moving,” Holly cried hysterically, waving at the cloak-covered figure lying in the straw. “She puked up all this black stuff, and now she’s not moving.”

  The cultist, obviously roused from a solid sleep, stared wordlessly into the cell. The paladin spent another three minutes of desperate weeping and terror-filled shouting before the guard turned and left the cell door. Holly screamed after him until he returned with two more cultists. All three were armed with drawn swords.

  Holly gave an inward sigh of relief. It was unfortunate that the cultist was cautious enough to go for reinforcements, but at least he wasn’t about to risk the displeasure of the Xvimist
by letting their chosen sacrifice die unattended.

  Motioning with his sword, one cultist ordered Holly, “Stay back.”

  The paladin backed into the rear left corner of the cell, trying to appear as unthreatening as possible. The cultists unlocked and opened the barred door. One of them stood in the doorway, yawning, while the other two stepped into the cell. One stepped up to Holly with his sword pointed at her chest. The other approached the pile of straw and poked at the caped figure with his sword. When there was no response, he kicked at the figure.

  “What the—” he growled, reaching down and yanking Jas’s cloak from the straw. “There’s nobody here!” he shouted.

  The cultist guarding Holly turned his head, and in that moment, Holly lunged forward. With both hands, she grabbed at his wrist, forcing his blade out and downward, then slammed her right foot into the inside of his right knee. With a howl, the cultist crashed to the ground.

  The cultist at the door moved into the cell with his sword aimed at Holly, not realizing the threat to him came from above. Jas dropped down from the gargoyle-like perch on the ledge above the door and rammed into his head with both feet, sending him reeling into the opposite wall.

  The cultist beside the straw wheeled about just in time for Jas to smack him in the head with the water bucket. Before he could recover, the winged woman had closed in, jammed the bucket on his head and kneed him hard in the groin. He didn’t put up a struggle as she wrenched the sword from his hand. Jas thrust the blade into his throat, then yanked the weapon back out.

  Holly stomped on the wrist of the cultist lying sprawled out before her and began prying his fingers from his sword’s hilt. With an animal snarl, the man rolled toward the paladin, grabbed her wrist, and sunk his teeth into her arm.

  Holly screamed, but she couldn’t kick at him without losing her balance. Jas whirled about. She slid her blade under his neck and sliced upward. The man released his grip on Holly’s arm to grab at his throat and gasped for air. Holly yanked her arm back and clutched it to her chest.