Sword of the Gods

by Bruce R Cordell

  Chant cleared his throat.

  “Sorry to bother you so late,” he said. “But we actually wanted to talk to you about something.”

  “What about?” The silverstar looked at the pawnbroker suspiciously.

  “I know you don’t know us, and this is probably an imposition, but it’s very important—”

  Riltana put a hand on Chant’s arm. “Let me.”

  She looked Carmenere in the face. “Something shady is going on with the Firestorm Cabal. And my friends might have some insight into what that is. We need an audience with your aunt—Queen Arathane.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  AIRSPUR

  THE YEAR OF THE AGELESS ONE (1479 DR)

  MURMUR SWIVELED ITS HEAD AROUND THE TINY CELL.

  The arms of its host were bound to a wall. A cell wall. A cell that was one of several Murmur had ordered constructed beneath the Motherhouse, using the stolen authority of the body it inhabited when its owner fell asleep.

  The demonic entity considered a moment. Its servitor had apparently decided to take Murmur’s last instructions literally, and made certain its wayward host didn’t wander off. But where was the servitor to free Murmur now that it had reasserted control?

  No matter; the chains and bars were only an inconvenience.

  Three other fleshy mortals were bound in the cell with Murmur. Murmur stretched the lips of its flesh costume to reveal its teeth. The bruised man with a ragged beard hanging closest blanched; Murmur’s attempt at a smile had apparently gone wrong.

  Then the demon dreamed its talent into the man’s mind.

  The mortal’s consciousness was an amorphous swirl of emotion that sat atop his subconscious like a hat on a boulder. It was the same with all these so-called “self-aware” creatures; far more lurked beneath their minds then they knew. Murmur formed its talent into a silvery hook, plunged it into that inchoate swirl, and wrenched free a wriggling nightmare. The diaphanous protocreature streamed from the man’s eyes, nose, and screaming mouth.

  The half-formed thing quickly lost its insubstantiality. Under Murmur’s psychic regard, its limbs filled out one by one, gaining color, heft, and depth. Each one was an engine of rending. The head formed last. The thing didn’t have a mouth; the man’s nightmare gave it a row of blinking scarlet crystal eyes where that orifice would normally be expected.

  “Release me from these chains,” Murmur commanded the entity.

  The thing bobbed its head in acknowledgment. It reached with a malformed claw and snapped the iron links holding Murmur’s host body.

  Murmur next pointed at the door.

  The nightmare put its shoulder down and charged. The iron barrier was jerked off its hinges.

  Murmur exited the cell with its stiff-legged stride. The nightmare lay on the ground, panting and clearly damaged by its effort. Not one of Murmur’s smartest creations.

  The beasts of subconscious fear were drawn to Murmur. They couldn’t help it. Calling them from fields of night terrors and giving them semireal flesh was Murmur’s craft.

  “I name you Portalbreaker,” intoned Murmur to the creature.

  The thing’s naturally destructive rage was suppressed in Murmur’s presence. “I swear you now to a power greater than both of us. If you do not take this pledge, I shall revert you back to nothingness. But if you swear on the name I reveal, you will serve me without question, lest an even greater punishment than dissolution find you.”

  The thing blinked its many eyes. Murmur took it as assent and said, “You are hereby and forever pledged to that entity that transcends my own power as a mountain overshadows a pebble. I swear you to the Elder Elemental Eye who watches, forever, all those pledged to His name. He knows if those sworn to Him remain true.”

  More blinks. Murmur touched the creature with its talent, and saw the words were having their expected effect. The thing possessed a naturally rebellious demonic nature that urged it to tear free from all compulsions. But freshly clothed, and in the presence of its midwife, it was uniquely vulnerable to suggestion. Expectation and belief were every bit as powerful as binding magic, when conditions were right.

  Murmur hated that it was reduced to calling upon the power of the Elder Elemental Eye. But its prospects were diminished in this new world where it had fetched up. Murmur was hardly a shadow of what it and its siblings had originally intended.

  Its very first host body in this continuum had been a true devotee of the Elder Elemental Eye. That one and his fellow cultists had long prepared to meet their lord. In the end, all they’d done was open themselves as hosts for Nualin, Murmur, Scour and all the others released from the fossil universe …

  But before they could embark on cosmic obliteration, and to the Hells with the bound, powerless Elder Elemental Eye—disaster struck.

  They failed.

  Murmur lost all its siblings, except for Scour. Murmur saw Scour fall, preceding Murmur to what it assumed would be their final obliteration.

  It had known nothing for a long time. Until a blackened, burned portion of Murmur was discovered by Firestorm Cabal salvagers and brought to the Motherhouse.

  Murmur blinked the eyelids of the flesh it wore. Crusts broke and rubbed like gravel against the lids. Murmur understood it had stared too long without blinking, absorbed in thought. Its host’s sight-giving orbs had dried and everything was blurry.

  What a nuisance. It rubbed at its eyes, moving with measured spasms so as not to poke the soft spheres completely out of its host’s head. Its fine control was improving, but the body’s strength was increasing in equal measure, which meant Murmur had to pay attention lest it damage itself. Overall, it was a good sign.

  The molting was imminent. It needed to suffer through just a few more insensible periods while its host’s mind was awake. After that, Murmur would be complete, and its host would be gone forever, subsumed in the change.

  It would be stronger after the molting, and that strength couldn’t come soon enough. In this new world, separated from its siblings, Murmur’s abilities were diminished. At first, it could barely call forth alarming shadows.

  Feral instinct allowed Murmur to enhance its enervated strength.

  It sniffed out sites that echoed with thaumaturgic history, where magic cast long ago had left an imprint. Better yet, it discovered locations where spiritual energy still waxed and waned, where reality’s fabric was stretched. In such places, the rules were constantly in flux. In such places, Murmur found its powers magnified, allowing it to summon fiends of the subconscious into the world almost as potent as those it had once birthed, despite occasional accidents from which none returned save itself.

  Murmur had known frustration, which was nearly more than a demonic entity such as itself could bear. Despite its slow progress, the fact remained that while it remained alone, it could never reclaim all it should be. Its chances at achieving anything like the grandeur of the original vision shared by Murmur and its siblings had seemed unlikely.

  Then Murmur had recalled the Elder Elemental Eye. Murmur’s original host had revered that entity so fully and without question that he and his fellows had blithely given themselves to Murmur and the other plague demons.

  There was power to be had in that kind of unthinking devotion.

  Thus Murmur resurrected the Cult of the Elder Elemental Eye in Toril.

  In return for power and cultists, Murmur promised to devise a plan to free the Elder Elemental Eye and release it on the continent of Faerûn.

  So it swore each of its mortal servitors and birthed nightmares to the Elder Elemental Eye. It presented itself as the Eye’s incredibly capable cult leader, from whom all the great one’s commandments would flow.

  And its strength had swelled thereby …

  Murmur plodded through the vault beneath the shattered Motherhouse, until it reached a great subterranean space. Cells lined the roughly circular space.

  Quiet sobs, whispered prayers, desperate oaths, and even a few titters of insane laughter
issued from behind the rusty iron bars, but that was difficult to hear over the underlying buzzing, clicking drone.

  The cells were arranged so all of them had a bird’s-eye view of the chamber’s center, which held the pit.

  The constant, hungry drone emanated from the central cavity.

  The pit was Murmur’s second chance.

  The demon dream lumbered to the seething edge of the crater and recalled how, not long after beginning its “cult” project, it had sensed a faint stirring. A familiar presence, away south of Airspur. As if a gift from the Elder Elemental Eye itself for initiating worship of the banned deity!

  Murmur recognized signs that could only be from one of its siblings. Murmur sent pledged nightmares to collect its brother. What Murmur’s cadre found over many months was deposited into the pit.

  The pit seethed with insects. Trapjaw ants, jumping spiders, cockroaches of every color, fleas, moths, and more swarmed the hole. Many of the specimens were outsize, and several moths had wingspans reaching two hands in width, and stinging proboscises that could uncurl to reach several feet. Pale radiance pulsed from the fat abdomens of flitting lightning bugs, so bright even Murmur had to squint.

  “Greetings, Scour,” Murmur addressed the pit. “Can you hear me?”

  The insects continued their mad scurrying. Because they were only bugs. But in sum, they contained a seed of Murmur’s sibling.

  The infestation represented months of patient collecting. Nor was it complete; many of Murmur’s nightmares and secretly pledged Cabal cultists remained bent to the task south of Airspur, combing the twisted lands of Akanûl for colonies that harbored some fragment of Scour’s essential essence.

  “Be patient, my brother,” said Murmur. “You shall soon wake again, as I have, when you’ve eaten enough. Are you hungry?”

  Murmur turned and pointed at one of the cells.

  “No!” came a hoarse cry from behind the bars.

  The nightmare at Murmur’s heels understood. Portalbreaker danced across the uneven rock floor to the cell.

  “Open the door, don’t break it,” Murmur said.

  Too late; the cell door was already off its hinges, and the cell occupants were screaming their lungs out. Murmur wondered if it shouldn’t release its binding on this particular nightmare and try again …

  Portalbreaker entered, bent over a woman with blonde hair shorn close, and snapped the manacle chains restraining her.

  She tried to run, but Portalbreaker snatched her up like she was a wayward two-year-old.

  Murmur pointed to the pit. The woman struggled so desperately she almost managed to break the nightmare’s hold. Almost.

  Portalbreaker went to the cavity and held the woman high over the edge. Her screams reached a crescendo pitch. It grated on the ears of Murmur’s host body.

  “Toss her in!”

  Portalbreaker released the woman.

  The mass of scuttling insects broke her fall. Then they swarmed over her. They covered her like a second skin of carapaces, chitinous legs, and mandibles. Her cries became desperate gasps as they burst from the pit’s funneled walls and echoed around the chamber.

  The other captives called out in sympathy, in fear, in terror; each knew their own fate was the same, even if they didn’t know why. Their understanding wasn’t important. What was important was that with each life fed to the pit, Scour grew stronger. One day soon, enough captives would be sacrificed to catalyze Scour’s mind.

  Then Murmur would have one of its siblings back. Then they could start anew in a fresh continuum.

  The demon dream laughed as it imagined the glorious future they would fashion together. A future of crumbling, burning, screaming ruin!

  A future in which the Elder Elemental Eye watched as they consumed Toril from the inside out.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  AIRSPUR

  THE YEAR OF THE AGELESS ONE (1479 DR)

  MORNING’S PALE FINGERS REACHED THROUGH THE WINDOW blinds and nudged Demascus awake.

  He lay on the guest bed Carmenere had shown him last night. The coverlets were soft and smelled slightly of gardenias. That reminded him of an emotion. A sensation. Something far from here, having to do with a high crystal spire, a fragrant sunrise that smelled of spring flowers, and a fleet …

  He couldn’t place it. All that remained as he breathed in the scent and thought about it was a hollow place in his chest.

  Demascus supposed he’d get used to such disconnects. In time. For the moment though, he felt like some kind of invalid, stumbling toward recovery. What if he never got his memories back? Then his life would be just glimpses and half-remembered dreams, and nagging feelings of loss.

  But after what had happened with Inakin …

  After Demascus found himself used as a body shield, he’d blacked out for an instant. The next thing he knew, he was behind Inakin with his scarf around the genasi’s neck. A thrill of mastery, of power, of … glee rushed through his sinews and tingled across his skin. He reveled in the strength and skill of his body and craft and—

  And then he’d come back to himself, with Chant’s pleas in his ears.

  After that, he’d felt nothing but shame.

  Demascus had suspected that he might not much like the person he used to be. Now he was beginning to fear that it was worse than that. He knew he’d been a killer, but he’d supposed he’d only killed for the highest moral reasons, at the behest of divine beings.

  What if he’d enjoyed it?

  He felt unwell.

  Demascus heaved himself up and went to the clay washbasin beneath a mirror framed in bronze. He splashed water on his face, and saw Inakin again in the reflection, as he whipped the Veil around the vulnerable neck …

  No. Think about something else, he told himself. Anything!

  Right … After they’d shown up on Carmenere’s patio, she’d proved a gracious host to the two strangers. And to Riltana, who’d clearly wronged the earthsoul. Demascus had the good grace not to inquire what was the matter. It was no business of his. Although based on his own first interaction with Riltana, he could guess well enough.

  He found a washcloth and soap.

  Riltana was probably lucky Carmenere hadn’t thrown the thief out on her ear.

  But the devotee of Selûne wouldn’t hear of them heading back through the city with “Rilta” so recently recovered from her burn, and who knew what other creditors lurking in the streets.

  Which had suited him. By the time they’d finished explaining to Carmenere how they thought the Firestorm Cabal was covering up some sort of cult, the night was well advanced. The more they’d described how and why they believed the Firestorm Cabal was involved in something insidious, the more concerned and distressed Carmenere became, though she hadn’t explained why.

  Whatever her reason, it apparently convinced the earthsoul to help. Even Riltana, who was the reason they’d intruded on the earthsoul in the first place, looked surprised when Carmenere agreed to send a message to her aunt in the morning.

  He dried his hands and face on a towel displaying patterns that reminded him of layered sediments beneath the ground. Then he buckled on his armor and coat.

  He took the pale length of the Veil between his hands. “Do you have any direction for me this morning?” he asked.

  The scarf didn’t so much as flutter.

  He tied it in a knot around his sword hilt, so that two ends fell free, and left his room. He walked the length of a twisting hall.

  At the end of the passage he found Chant, Carmenere, and Riltana gathered around a small table beneath a skylight. He automatically took account of each exit and window, and where every person stood in relation to the next …

  He blinked, and focused on the pawnbroker. Chant, with all his bulk, seemed uncouth and out of place in the room with such fine matching decor. Not that he seemed to care; the man only had eyes for the repast laid out on the table.

  The human had remained visibly upset long after their run-in with t
he rumormonger. That concern seemed washed away by the aroma of breakfast cakes, and the scatter of crumbs around Chant’s plate told the tale of his unsinkable appetite.

  “Eat something,” urged Carmenere. She pointed to a platter of fruit, cheeses, and a pile of steaming flat cakes.

  Demascus grabbed a pale oblong fruit and bit into it. It was unexpectedly sweet and firm. He gobbled the entire thing, except for the stem, in moments.

  Chant smiled, and tossed him a piece of cheese. “Try the cheese. The silverstar has a discriminating palate!”

  Carmenere nodded in thanks at Chant’s compliment.

  Demascus chewed on the cheese. It was smooth, nutty, and certainly better than any cheese he could remember eating. Not that that meant much.

  He said, “Thanks for putting us up, and feeding us.”

  “My pleasure,” the silverstar responded. “If you would like some smoked meat, I have that too. I didn’t put any out because Riltana doesn’t eat meat.”

  “You don’t eat … meat?” said Chant, his tone as incredulous as if Carmenere had just revealed that tomorrow the sun would fall to Faerûn.

  Riltana said, “I don’t.”

  “That can’t be healthy. Are you sick? And, it’s so good!”

  The woman sighed. She said, “I don’t like to preach about my habits. But since you asked, I don’t eat the flesh of beasts because they are living beings just like you and me. They have sorrows, joys, and pangs of loss every bit as strong as we do. To me, it’s like cannibalism, and should be avoided.”

  Chant shook his head and said, “But it’s the way of things; the wolf eats the rabbit, and we eat the wolf.”

  “Oh, for the love of Karshimis—We have a choice; the wolf doesn’t. Except sometimes, the wolf does have a choice. I’ve heard tell of too many talking magical beasts to feel comfortable about biting into a beef sandwich. For all I know, it might be minotaur.”

  The human opened his mouth, then closed it again.