Sacrifice of the Widow: The Lady Penitent, Book I (37 page)

He would not faint from the pain. He could not. Forcing his body into a spin, he whirled, whipping the priestess’s face with his braid. At the same time he furiously whispered a prayer. He thrust his wounded hand out, reaching for Selvetarm, but no healing came.

Worried, he tried another spell—one that would cover his body in venomous blades, turning it into a living weapon. Ducking and weaving all the while to avoid the priestess’s furious but not quite coordinated slashes, he cried his deity’s name.

“Selvetarm!” he shouted. “Make me your weapon!”

Nothing happened. The demigod refused to answer.

Nervous sweat prickled Dhairn’s skin. Something had happened. Something terrible. Had Selvetarm turned his back on Dhairn and his followers—abandoned those who sought to worship Selvetarm as a deity unto himself? Had
Lolth
ordered her Champion to do it?

What … was …
wrong?

Utterly unnerved by the sudden absence of his deity, Dhairn backed away from the high priestess, who pursued him with fury in her eyes. Behind him, he heard another of Eilistraee’s priestesses hurrying down the stairs, shouting something about the Selvetargtlin being defeated.
He only realized how close to the exit he was when her blade skewered his back. He stared, uncomprehending, at the sword point that had mysteriously emerged from his chest. As the cavern began to vanish into a gray mist, he croaked out one final plea.

“Selvetarm,” he gasped through lips suddenly gone ice-cold. “I commend … my soul … to …”

But the demigod was no longer there to claim it.

M
alvag reeled as the gate closed with a thunderclap that rattled the crystals in the cavern. It was several moments before the ringing in his ears subsided. When it did, he turned to Valdar and Q’arlynd, his body quivering with excitement. “Vhaeraun be praised! We did it!”

The slender Valdar wove back and forth where he stood, exhausted. Q’arlynd looked equally drained, his face an ashen gray. Both males nodded weakly.

The wizard turned and lifted his bound hands. “If you wouldn’t mind….”

Malvag hesitated—but only for a heartbeat. Old habits. In the moment of communion their spellcasting had provided, he’d glimpsed Q’arlynd’s soul. The wizard wasn’t going to turn on him.

Malvag stepped forward and untwisted the wire, releasing the wizard’s hands. Then, for good measure, he slipped the slave ring off Q’arlynd’s finger and took the master ring off his own. He tucked both rings into a pocket of the wizard’s
piwafwi
.

Q’arlynd’s fingers were gray and puffy, with deep indentations from the wires. He rubbed them stiffly together, wincing.

“I can’t feel them,” he said. He extended his hands slightly. “Could you—”

“Of course.”

Malvag took the wizard’s hands in his own and whispered a prayer. He felt the rush of power that was the Masked Lord’s reply course through him as the fingers healed. When he released Q’arlynd’s hands, silver-white motes danced upon the wizard’s dark skin.

Malvag jerked his hands away. What
was
that?

Valdar stared at the wizard’s hands. “Moonfire,” he gasped.

The wizard, sensing the knife-edge in Valdar’s tone, held his hands perfectly still as the sparkles slowly faded.

“If this
is
moonfire, it’s not my doing,” he said. “I’m a wizard, not a cleric.”

Valdar stood just to Malvag’s left, tense as a cocked wristbow. He glanced sidelong at Malvag. One hand was behind his back, where the wizard wouldn’t see it.

Has he turned back to Eilistraee? Should we kill him?

Malvag took a deep breath. By Vhaeraun’s holy mask, was it really going to unravel so quickly? “No,” he said aloud. He turned. “You touched his mind, Valdar, and you know he’s no traitor. He’s one of us, now.”

“There’s a simple explanation for what just happened, Valdar,” the wizard added. “We just opened a gate to Eilistraee’s domain. There’s certain to be lingering effects from that.”

Valdar relaxed. Slightly.

The wizard smiled and spread his hands. “What’s more, I could easily have teleported away just now—which would be the logical thing for me to do, if I
was
a traitor—but I’m still here with you.” He shook his head, an exasperated expression on his face. “We just cast
high magic
. Drow, casting high magic, perhaps for the first time. Do you honestly think I’d turn my back on that kind of power?”

Malvag answered, before Valdar could, “Of course not.”

Abruptly, the wizard turned and strode to where Urz lay. He touched the fallen Nightshadow and spoke a word. “There. I’ve just turned Urz back to flesh and blood. He is, however, unconscious. Looks like he took a nasty hit on the head when he fell—but I’m sure your healing magic can deal with it.” His lips quirked slightly. “Just be sure, when he wakes up again, to let him know I’m on your side. No hard feelings, I hope.”

Malvag nodded at Urz’s body. “Do it,” he told Valdar.

The pink-eyed drow cocked an eyebrow. “Very well.” He kneeled beside Urz, put a hand to the dead male’s chest, and began a prayer. His other hand was raised to his mouth, hiding it.

Malvag, watching, reflected on how odd it was to see a fellow cleric casting magic bare-faced. He resisted the urge to cover his own mouth with a hand. Even in the company of other clerics, going without a mask felt like being naked.

A low groan came from Urz’s lips as Valdar completed his prayer. Urz stirred—and his body was limned in a haze of silver-white light. Valdar reeled.

“More moonfire! The wizard
is
doing it!” He raised his wrist-crossbow.

“Valdar, stop!” Malvag shouted.

The crossbow thrummed. The wizard jumped back but not quickly enough. The bolt sliced a bright red line through the flesh of his cheek. He returned Valdar’s attack with a flick of his fingers, sending a bolt of magical energy back
at the slender male. Valdar grunted as it bored into his chest and began a prayer, one that would summon enough darkfire to incinerate the wizard on the spot.

“Stop it!” Malvag cried. “Both of you. There’s got to be another explanation!”

Urz sat up, holding his head. The silver-white glow had faded from his skin.

Darkfire raced from Valdar’s hand across the cavern, but instead of burning the wizard, it swirled harmlessly around him. Within the dark flames were flecks of white. More moonfire. Valdar gaped at his hand, a shocked look on his face.

“How did he …?”

Malvag stared at Q’arlynd and Valdar, worried. That
was
moonfire,
within
the darkfire—something that should have been impossible. And it hadn’t just appeared when the spell had struck Q’arlynd, it had come straight out of Valdar’s hand at the same time the darkfire did. Had opening a gate to Eilistraee’s domain somehow corrupted their magic?

The wizard had halted in mid-casting, magical energy crackling between his extended fingers. His lips parted, as if he were about to say something. Then he seemed to think better of it. Slowly, the magic faded from his hand.

Urz gave a howl of anguish, startling all three of them. “He’s dead,” he cried. Eyes closed, mouth a grimace, he pounded with his hands against the crystal floor until his hands were bloody. “He’s …
dead!”

“Who’s dead, you idiot?” Valdar snapped.

Malvag, however, didn’t have to ask. A chill slid into his gut like an ice-cold blade. He said a hurried prayer, seeking communion with his god.

“Vhaeraun?” he whispered, his mouth dry. “Are you there?”

Valdar stared at him, tense.

Urz continued to wail and beat the floor. “Dead!”

The answer came to Malvag at last, a strangely double-timbered voice, as if a male and female were speaking at once.

“I … am …
here,” it said, the voices blending into one by the final word.

Malvag felt his face pale. His legs no longer seemed willing to support him. He sagged, felt the points of crystals jab into his knees as the enormity of what he’d just done came down on his shoulders like a collapsing tunnel. That was Eilistraee who’d just spoken, not Vhaeraun. Instead of the Masked Lord absorbing her power into himself, the opposite had happened. Eilistraee was posing as Vhaeraun and answering his clerics’ prayers, tainting them with moonfire, and there was only one way she could have done that.

By killing Vhaeraun.

Malvag tried to convey that to Valdar, but all that would come out was a dry croak. “Eilistraee … No use … Vhaeraun is … gone. We can’t …” He gestured weakly at Q’arlynd. They could hurl all the spells they liked at the wizard, but he was under Eilistraee’s protection—even if he didn’t know it himself.

Valdar glanced at the still-howling Urz, then back at Malvag. “No!” he raged. The slender cleric summoned darkfire to his hand a second time—darkfire tainted with moonfire—then hurled it. Not at the cleric, as Malvag had expected, but at Malvag himself.

It sloughed off Malvag, just as it had the wizard. As the dark glare of it died down, Malvag noticed that Q’arlynd was gone. He must have teleported away. So had Valdar, it seemed, after hurling the darkfire. The cavern was empty save for Urz, who, by the sound of his hoarse cries, had been driven mad by the loss of his patron deity.

Everything Malvag had worked for was in ruin. The bond, strong as adamantine, that had allowed drow to cast high magic was broken. Not that it mattered anymore.

“It’s true,” Malvag said, answering a Valdar who was already gone. “Vhaeraun’s dead. We helped Eilistraee kill him. I was a fool to think she wouldn’t prevail within her own domain.” He lowered his face into his hands—a mask that no longer held any power. Then his hands fell away. One brushed against the dagger that was sheathed at his hip.

Slowly, he drew it. He stared at the poison-coated blade for several long moments. There was no longer any god to claim his soul when it entered the Fugue Plain, but that suited Malvag just fine. The torments of the demons would be nothing compared to what he felt at that moment, and if Eilistraee tried to claim him, he’d spit in her face.

Touching the blade to his arm, he drew it across his wrist.

Q’arlynd staggered through the Promenade looking for a priestess, the mask that had been his disguise clenched in one hand. He was in the cavern where the lay worshipers lived—buildings reared up around him on either side—but the passageways between them were empty. Where
was
everyone? His face throbbed and his limbs felt leaden: the wristbow bolt’s poison doing its work. He wasn’t going to last much longer without a healing spell, but if he died there, Qilué would surely see to it that he was restored to life. She’d have to, in order to learn what had just happened.

Unless, of course, she simply had a necromancer speak with his corpse.

No, Q’arlynd thought. Qilué wouldn’t do that. She’d want details—descriptive nuances the stagnant mind of a corpse couldn’t provide, and even if she used a truth spell on him, Q’arlynd had the perfect excuse for his actions.

He slipped a finger into his pocket, touching the master-and-slave
rings. He could honestly say that he’d been
forced
to open the gate despite the geas, that he’d had no choice in the matter. Well, not until the end—but the high priestess didn’t need to know that. If Q’arlynd chose his words carefully, she never would.

He slipped on something and scrabbled at the stone wall next to him for support. Looking down, he saw a smear of blood on the cavern floor. Someone had been hurt there. Badly hurt. Pushing himself away from the wall, he staggered on, still searching for a priestess. Where had they all gotten to?

Qilué would be angry, of course, when she learned that three priestess’ souls had been consumed by the spell, but Q’arlynd had managed to bring back the “mask” that held the body and soul of the fourth priestess. That had to count for something, and opening the gate had all worked out for the best in the end. Vhaeraun was dead. If Q’arlynd chose his words carefully, perhaps the high priestess might reward him yet, and what a reward it would be. Qilué was, after all, a Chosen of Mystra. She must know spells that would rival high magic. If he could become her cons … her …

His mind stumbled. He couldn’t find the word, nor could he see very well. The edges of his vision blurred and his stomach felt as if he’d swallowed hot coals. He tripped over something. A body. Looking down, he saw a blood-red robe and braided white hair. For one terrifying moment, he thought it was the judicator who had confronted him in the woods. Then he realized it was another Selvetargtlin. A very dead Selvetargtlin.

A pace or two away lay a scatter of bodies: males and females of various races, their bodies hacked to pieces. Lay worshipers from the temple. Kneeling beside them was a priestess. Q’arlynd fell to his knees beside her, shook her shoulder.

“Lady,” he gasped. “Help me. Poison …”

The priestess fell over on her side, revealing a chest soaked in blood. She, too, was dead. Q’arlynd fumbled at the pendant that hung around her neck: the goddess’s holy dagger. If he prayed, then maybe, just maybe …