Vows And Honor Book 1: The Oathbound

by The Oathbound [lit]

  shut down on me—just like you're doing now."

  And she had turned on her heel and led the way

  into the inn's common room, ignoring the fact that

  Tarma looked as if the sorceress had just slapped

  her.

  The voice of the little priest penetrated her

  musing.

  "Nay," he said. "Nay, I cannot agree. Our teach-

  ing is that evil is not a thing of itself; it is simply

  good that has not been brought to see the truth. We

  hold that even a demon can be redeemed—that

  even the most vile of such creatures could become a

  blessed spirit if someone with time and patience

  were to give him the proper redirection."

  "Always supposing your proselytizer managed to

  keep from being devoured or ripped to shreds be-

  fore he got a single word out," Tarma croaked wryly,

  draping herself more comfortably over the edge of

  the worn wooden table. "He'd better be either agile

  or one damned powerful mage! No, I can't agree

  with you, my friend. Aside from what Magister

  Tenavril has to say about them, I've dealt with a

  few demons up close and on a quite personal basis.

  I have to side with the Twin Suns school; the

  demonic beings must have been created purely of

  evil forces. It isn't just the Abyssal dwellers that

  are bad clear through, either; I've known a few

  humans who could pass for demons. Evil is real

  and a reality in and of itself. It likes being that way.

  It wouldn't choose to be anything else. And it has

  to be destroyed whenever a body gets the chance,

  or it'll spread. Evil is easier to follow than good,

  and we humans like the easy path."

  "I cannot agree. Those who are evil simply don't

  know what good is."

  "Oh, they know, all right; and they reject it to

  follow pure selfishness."

  "I—" the little priest blinked in the candlelight.

  "Can you give me even one instance of great evil

  turned to good once good has been pointed out to

  it?"

  "Uh—" he thought hard for a moment, then

  smiled triumphantly. "The Great Demon-Wolf of

  Hastandell!"

  "Oh, that's too easy. Warrl!"

  A shadow in a corner of the hearth uncoiled

  itself, and proved to be no shadow at all, but the

  kyree, whose shoulder came nearly as high as Tarma's

  waist. Closer inspection would reveal that Warrl's

  body was more like that of one of the great hunting-

  cats of the plains than a lupine, built for climbing

  and short bursts of high speed, not the endurance

  of a true wolf. But the fur and head and tail were

  sufficiently wolflike that this was how Tarma gen-

  erally thought of him.

  He padded over to the table and benches shared

  by the ill-assorted trio. The conversation of all the

  other occupants of the inn died for a moment as he

  moved, but soon picked back up again. After three

  days, the patrons of the inn were growing a little

  more accustomed to the monster beast in their midst.

  Tarma had helped that along by coaxing him to

  demean himself with a few tricks to entertain them

  the first night of their stay. Now, while the sight of

  him still unsettled a few of them, they had come to

  regard him as harmless. They had no notion of his

  true nature; Tarma and Kethry had tactfully re-

  frained from revealing that he was just as intelli-

  gent as any of them—and quite probably could beat

  any one of them at chess.

  "Here's your Demon-Wolf—one of his kin, rather."

  Tarma cocked her head to one side, her eyes far

  away as if she was listening. "Kyree is what they

  call themselves; they come from the Pelagir Hills.

  Warrl says to tell you that he knows that story—

  that Ourra didn't know the sheep he'd been feed-

  ing on belonged to anyone; when he prowled the

  village at night he was just being curious. Warrl

  says Ourra had never seen humans before that lot

  moved in and settled; he thought they were just

  odd beasts and that the houses were some kind of

  dead growths—believe me, I have seen some of what

  grows naturally in the Pelagirs—it isn't stretching

  the imagination to think that huts could grow of

  themselves once you've seen some of the bushes

  and trees. Well, Warrl wants you to know that

  when the priestess went out and gave Ourra a royal

  tongue-lashing for eating the stock, Ourra was quite

  embarrassed. Without there being someone like me

  or Kethry, with the kind of mind that he could talk

  to, there wasn't much he could do by way of apol-

  ogy, but he did his best to make it up to the village.

  His people have a very high sense of honor. Sorry,

  little man—Qurra is disqualified."

  "He talks to you?" the little priest said, momen-

  tarily diverted. "That creature truly talks? I thought

  him just a well-trained beast!"

  "Oh, after all our conversation, I figured you to

  be open-minded enough to let in on the 'secret.'

  Kyree have a lot of talents—they're as bright as you

  or me. Brighter, maybe—I have no doubt he could

  give you a good battle at taroc, and that's one game

  I have no gift for. As for talking—Warrior's Oath—

  sometimes I wish I could get him to stop! Oh, yes,

  he talks to me all right—gives me no few pieces of

  unsolicited advice and criticism, and usually with

  an 'I told you so' appended." She ruffled the great

  beast's fur affectionately as he grinned a toothy,

  tongue-lolling grin. Kethry tossed him one of the

  bones left from their dinner; he caught it neatly on

  the fly, and settled down beside her to enjoy it.

  Behind them, the hum of voices continued.

  "Now I'll give you one—evil that served only

  itself. Thalhkarsh. We had firsthand experience of

  that one. He had plenty of opportunity to see

  good—it wasn't just the trollops he had stolen for

  his rites. Or are you not familiar with that tale?"

  "Not the whole of it. Certainly not from one of

  the participants!"

  "Right enough then—this is a long and thirsty

  story. Oskar?" Tarma signaled the host, a plump,

  shortsighted man who hurried to answer her sum-

  mons. "Another round—no, make it a pitcher, this

  may take a while. Here—" she tossed him a coin, as

  it was her turn to pay; the innkeeper trotted off

  and returned with a brimming ear then vessel. Kethry

  was amused to see that he did not return to his

  station behind the counter after placing it on the

  table between Tarma and the priest. Instead he

  hovered just within earshot, polishing the tables

  next to them with studious care. Well, she didn't

  blame him, this was a tale Tarma didn't tell often,

  and it wasn't likely anyone in Oberdorn had ever

  heard a firsthand account of it. Oskar would be

  attracting folk to his tables for months after they'd

  gone with repetitions of
the story.

  "From all we could put together afterward,

  Thalhkarsh was a demon that had been summoned

  purely by mistake. It was a mistake the mage who

  called him paid for—well, that's usually the case

  when something like that happens. This time though,

  things were evidently a little different," she nod-

  ded at Kethry, who took up the thread of the story

  while Tarma took a sip of wine.

  "Thalhkarsh had ambition. He didn't want to

  live in his own Abyssal Planes anymore, he wanted

  to escape them. More than that, he wanted far

  more power than he had already; he wanted to

  become a god, or a godling, at least. He knew that

  the quickest ways of gaining power are by worship,

  pain, and death. The second two he already had a

  taste of, and he craved more. The first—well, he

  calculated that he knew ways of gaining that, too.

  He transformed himself into a very potently sexual

  and pleasing shape, built himself a temple with a

  human pawn as his High Priest, and set up a

  religion."

  "It was a religion tailored to his peculiar tastes.

  From what I know most of the demonic types

  wouldn't think of copulating with a human any-

  more than you or I would with a dog; Thalhkarsh

  thought otherwise." Tarma grimaced. "Of course a

  part of that is simply because of the amount of pain

  he could cause while engaging in his recreations—

  but it may be he also discovered that sex is another

  very potent way of raising power. Whatever the

  reason, that was what the whole religion was

  founded on. The rituals always culminated with

  Thalhkarsh taking a half-dozen women, torturing

  and killing them when he'd done with them, in the

  full view of his worshipers. There's a kind of mind

  that finds that stimulating; before too long, he had

  a full congregation and was well on his way to

  achieving his purpose. That was where we came

  in."

  "You know our reputation for helping women?"

  Kethry put in.

  "You have a geas?" ventured the little priest.

  "Something like that. Well, since Thalhkarsh's

  chosen victims were almost exclusively female, we

  found ourselves involved. We slipped into the tem-

  ple in disguise and went for the High Priest—

  figuring if he was the one in charge, that might

  solve the problem. We didn't know he was a pup-

  pet, though I had guessed he might be, and then

  dismissed the idea." Kethry sighed. "Then we found

  our troubles had only begun. He had used this as a

  kind of impromptu test of the mettle of his servant;

  when the servant failed, he offered me the position.

  I was tempted with anything I might want; nearly

  unlimited power, beauty, wealth—and him. He was

  incredibly seductive, I can't begin to tell you how

  much. To try and give you a notion of his power,

  every one of his victims ran to him willingly when

  he called her, even though they knew what their

  fate would be. Well, I guess I resisted him a little

  too long; he became impatient with me and knocked

  me into a wall—unconscious, or so he thought."

  "Then he made me the same offer," Tarma con-

  tinued. "Only with me he demonstrated his power

  rather than just promising things. He totally trans-

  formed me—when he was done kings would have

  paid money for the privilege of laying their crowns

  at my feet. He also came damned close to breaking

  my bond with the Star-Eyed; I swear to you, I was

  within inches of letting him seduce me—except

  that the more he roused my body, the more he

  roused my anger. That was his mistake; I pretended

  to give in when I saw Kethry sneaking up behind

  him. Then I broke his focus just as she stabbed

  him; he lost control over his form and his worship-

  ers' minds. When they saw what he really was,

  they deserted him—that broke his power, and it

  was all over."

  "She' enedra, you were in no danger of breaking;

  your will is too strong, he'd have needed either

  more time to work on you or power to equal the

  Warrior's."

  "Maybe. It was a damn near thing; too near for

  my liking. Well he was absolute evil for the sake of

  it—and I should well know, I had that evil crawling

  around in my mind. Besides that, there were other

  things that came out afterward. We know he took a

  few innocent girls who just had the bad luck to be

  in the wrong place; we think some clerics went in

  to try and exorcise him. It's hard to say for certain

  since they were hedge-priests; wanderers with no

  set temple. We do know they disappeared between

  one night and the next; that they did not leave

  town by the gates, and that they had been talking

  about dealing with Thalhkarsh before they vanished."

  She trailed off, the set of her mouth grim, her

  eyes bleak. "We can only assume they went the

  way of all of his victims, since they were never

  seen or heard from again. So Thalhkarsh had plenty

  of opportunity to see good and the Light—and he

  apparently saw it only as another thing to crush."

  The little priest said nothing; there seemed noth-

  ing appropriate to say. Instead, he took a sip of his

  wine; from the distant look in his eyes he was

  evidently thinking hard.

  "We of Anathei are not fools, Sworn One," he

  said finally, "Even though we may not deal with

  evil as if it were our deadly enemy. No, to throw

  one's life away in the foolish and prideful notion

  that one's own sanctity is enough to protect one

  from everything is something very like a sin. The

  arrow that strikes a friend in battle instead of a foe

  is no less deadly because it is misdirected. Let me

  tell you this; when dealing with the greater evils,

  we do nothing blindly. We study carefully, we take

  no chances; we know everything there is to be

  known about an opponent before we face him to

  show him the Light. And we take very great care

  that he is unable to do us harm in his misguided

  state."

  Tarma's eyes glinted with amusement in the shift-

  ing light. "Then it may well be your folk have the

  right of it—and in any case, you're going about your

  conversions in a practical manner, which is more

  than I can say for many. Once again we will have to

  agree to disagree."

  "With that, lady, I rest content." He bowed to

  her a little, and the bench creaked under his mov-

  ing weight. "But we still have not settled the point

  of contention. Even if I were willing to concede

  that you are right about Thalhkarsh—which I am

  not—he was still a demon. Not a man. And—"

  "Well if you want irredeemable evil in a human,

  we can give you that, too! Kethry, remember that

  bastard Lastel Longknife?"

  "Lady Bright! Now there was an unredeemable

 
; soul if ever there was one!"

  Kethry saw out of the corner of her eye that

  Oskar had not moved since the tale-telling had be-

  gun, and was in a fair way to polish a hole right

  through the table. She wondered, as she smothered

  a smile, if that was the secret behind the scrupu-

  lously clean furniture of his inn.

  "Lastel Longknife?" the priest said curiously.

  "I doubt you'd have heard of that one. He was a

  bandit that had set up a band out in the waste

  between here and—"

  "Wait—I think I do know that story!" the priest

  exclaimed. "Isn't there a song about it? One that

  goes 'Deep into the stony hills, miles from keep or

  hold'?"

  "Lady's Blade, is that nonsense going to follow us

  everywhere?" Tarma grimaced in distaste while

  Kethry gave up on trying to control her giggles.

  "Damned impudent rhymester! I should never have

  agreed to talk to him, never! And if I ever get my

  hands on Leslac again, I'll kill him twice! Bad enough

  he got the tale all backward, but that manure about

  Three things never anger or you will not live for

  long; a wolf with cubs, a man with power and a

  woman's sense of wrong' came damn close to ruin-

  ing business for a while! We weren't geas-pressed

  that time, or being altruistic—we were in it for the

  money, dammit! And—" she turned to scowl at

  Kethry. "What are you laughing about?"

  "Nothing—" One look at Tarma's face set her off

  again.

  "No respect; I don't get it from stupid minstrels,

  I don't get it from my partner, I don't even get it

  from you, Fur-face!"

  Warrl put his head down on his paws and con-

  trived to look innocent.

  "Well, if my partner can contrive to control her-

  self, this is what really happened. Longknife had

  managed to unite all the little bandit groups into