Though he still didn’t care. Not really. All that mattered was spiriting Tammith away from this nightmarish place before her captors could alter her.
He refused to entertain the notion that perhaps they already had until he found his way to a platform overlooking a crypt housing dozens of listless, skinny, ragged folk with the whip scars and unshorn hair of thralls. Bareris scrutinized them all in turn, then peered into every empty shadow and corner, and none of the prisoners was Tammith.
His nerves taut, he marched onward, striding faster, no longer concerned that his boots would make too much noise on the planking beneath them or that haste would make him appear suspicious to anyone looking up from below. He gazed down into chamber after chamber and felt grateful the catacombs were so extensive. Until he ran out of spaces to check, he could still hope. But at the same time, he hated that the warren was big and labyrinthine enough to so delay his determination of the truth.
He passed through yet another newly cut doorway then at last he saw her, lying on her back on the floor of an otherwise empty room with a scatter of earth around and beneath her. Sleeping, surely, for she displayed no marks to prove otherwise. No wounds, and none of the bloat or lividity of a corpse.
“Tammith!” he called, trying to make his voice loud enough to wake her but not so loud as to be overheard outside the chamber.
She didn’t stir. He called again, louder, and still she didn’t respond.
He trembled and swallowed, refusing to believe someone had killed her with a poison or spell that didn’t leave a mark, recently enough that her body hadn’t yet started to deteriorate. It simply couldn’t be so.
Except that he knew it very well could.
There were no stairs in this particular room. He swung himself over the guardrail and dropped, as, in what had come to seem a different life and a brighter world, he’d once leaped from the deck of a ship onto a dock in Bezantur.
The landing jarred but didn’t injure him. He rushed to Tammith, knelt, and touched her cheek. Her skin was as cool as he’d feared it would be. His voice breaking, he spoke her name once more.
Her eyes flew open. He felt an incredulous, overpowering joy, and then she reached up and seized him by the throat.
In one respect at least, the temple of Kossuth in Escalant was like most other human households: Nearly everyone slept away the time just before dawn. That was why Hezass Nymia, tharchion of Lapendrar and Eternal Flame of the god’s house, chose that time to lead his four golems on a circuit of the principal altars. Carved of deep brown Thayan oak to resemble men-at-arms, the glow of the myriad sacred fires reflecting from their polished surfaces, the automata had been fashioned first and foremost to fight as archers, and their longbows were a part of their bodies. Hezass had them carrying sacks in their free hands.
Lifeless and mindless, the golems were tireless as well. Yawning, Hezass envied them that and wondered if this surreptitious transit was truly necessary. He was, after all, the high priest of the pyramidal temple and so entitled to his pick of the offerings the faithful gave to the Firelord.
It was the accepted custom, but custom likewise decreed that the hierophant should exercise restraint. One could argue that such self-control was particularly desirable if the previous Eternal Flame, proving not so eternal after all, had fallen to his death under mysterious circumstances, and the current one had somehow managed to secure his appointment even though several other priests were further advanced in the mysteries of the faith.
Yes, all in all, it was best to avoid the appearance of greed, Hezass thought with a wry smile, but the truth was, he had little hope of avoiding the reality. He coveted as much as he coveted, and he meant to have it. Better then to do some of his skimming when no censorious eyes were watching.
The golems’ wooden feet clacking faintly on the marble floor, the little procession arrived at another altar, where women often prayed to conceive, or if they had, for an easy delivery and a healthy baby. Hezass picked up a string of pearls, scrutinized it, and put it back. He liked to think he had as good an eye as any jeweler, and he could see the necklace was second-rate. The delicate platinum tiara, on the other hand, was exquisite.
Responsive to his unspoken will, one of the golems proffered its sack, but since it only had the one functional hand, Hezass had to pull open the mouth of the bag and drop the headdress in himself. As porters, the constructs had their limitations, but their inability to speak made up for them.
“That is a nice piece,” drawled a masculine voice.
Startled, Hezass nearly whirled around but caught himself in time. Better to move in a leisurely fashion, with a dignity befitting an Eternal Flame and tharchion, like a man who hadn’t gotten caught doing anything illicit. He turned to meet the dark-eyed, sardonic gaze of a gaunt figure whose capacious scarlet sleeves currently concealed his withered fingers.
Hezass dropped to his knees. “Your Omnipotence.”
“It looks Impilturan,” Szass Tam continued. “Brides from wealthy families often wear such ornaments on their wedding days. Please, stand up.”
Hezass did so, meanwhile wondering what this unexpected intrusion portended. “I haven’t had the honor of meeting with Your Omnipotence in some time.”
“We’ve both been busy,” said the lich, sauntering closer, the hem of his red robe whispering along the floor, “but you’re awake, I’m always awake, most of the rest of the world is asleep, so this seems a convenient moment for us to talk.”
Hezass wondered how Szass Tam had known he was awake and precisely where to find him. “I’m at your service, of course.”
“Thank you.” The necromancer casually pulled a crystal-pointed enchanted arrow from a golem’s quiver, examined it, and dropped it back in. “I admit, it concerns me a little to find you out of bed. If you’re suffering from insomnia, I know a potion that will help.”
“I’m fine,” said Hezass. “I’m just getting a head start on my duties.”
The wizard nodded. “I can see that, though technically, it’s arguable whether pilfering from the offerings constitutes a duty.”
Hezass forced a smile. “Your Omnipotence always did have a keen sense of humor. You know, surely, that I’m entitled to my share.”
“Oh, absolutely, but if you start claiming it while the coins and other valuables still lie on display atop the altars, before the clerks make their tally, doesn’t that mean you underreport the take to the Flaming Brazier and send Eltabbar less than its fair share? If so, isn’t that the equivalent of robbing the Firelord himself? I’m afraid Iphegor Nath would think so. He might try to punish you even if you are a tharchion, and who’s to say he wouldn’t succeed? He’s made a considerable contribution to the campaign against the undead horde in the east, and we zulkirs are accordingly grateful.”
Hezass drew a long, steadying breath. “Master, you know that even if there’s anything … irregular about my conduct as Eternal Flame, it’s no worse than the way other folk in authority behave every day across the length and breadth of the realm. You also knew what sort of man I am when you helped me rise in the church and later gave me Lapendrar to govern.”
“That’s true,” said Szass Tam, “and I’ll tell you a secret: It doesn’t bother me if you dare to rob a god. Do the gods deal with us so kindly or even justly as to merit abject devotion?” He waved his hand at the offerings on the altar. “Look at all this—not the gold and gems that usually catch your eye, but the copper, bread, and fruit. Needy women have given what they could ill afford, perhaps all they possessed, to bribe your god, yet he won’t answer all their prayers. Some petitioners will remain barren or perish in childbirth even so. Why is that, and what’s the sense of a world where it’s possible for women to miscarry and infants to die in their cribs in the first place?”
Hezass had no idea what the necromancer was talking about or how to respond. “Master, you understand I share a true bond with Kossuth even if I do pocket a few too many of the trinkets the faithful offer him.
He forgives me my foibles, I believe. Anyway, the world is what it is. Isn’t it?”
Szass Tam smiled. His expression had a hint of wistfulness about it, the look, just conceivably, of someone who’d briefly hoped to find a kindred spirit and been disappointed. “Indeed it is, and I didn’t mean to cast aspersions on your creed or bore you with philosophy either. Let’s focus on practical concerns.”
“With respect, Your Omnipotence, your ‘practical concern’ seems to be to blackmail me, but why? I have no choice but to do whatever a zulkir commands, and beyond that, I’m grateful for everything you’ve done for me. I’m happy to aid you in return.”
“Your loyalty shames me,” the lich replied, and if he was speaking ironically, neither his voice nor his lean, intellectual features betrayed it. “If only everyone were as faithful, but ‘the world is what it is,’ and with the council of zulkirs divided against itself, even I sometimes find it expedient to make it clear to folk that, just as I reward those who cooperate with me, so too do I have ways of rebuking those who refuse.”
Hezass smiled. “You’ve covered the rebuking part. Now I’d like to hear about the reward.”
The dead man laughed. A whiff of decay escaped his open mouth, and Hezass made sure his features didn’t twist in repugnance.
“As one of your peers recently reminded me,” Szass Tam said, “the miners dig prodigious quantities of gold out of the mountains of High Thay.”
“So I understand,” Hezass said.
“At present, most of it comes down to the Plateau via the road that runs east. That’s natural, since it’s really the only highway worthy of the name, but I see no fundamental reason why more gold couldn’t move west and south, following the courses of the rivers, perhaps with magical aid to see the caravans safely over the difficult patches, and obviously, if it does, it will descend into Lapendrar. You can tax it as it passes from hand to hand and turn a nice profit thereby.”
“A nice profit” was an understatement. Hezass suspected that over the course of several years, he might amass a fortune to rival Samas Kul’s. “You truly could arrange it?”
“Why not? Pyras Autorian is my friend, no less than you.”
More, actually, Hezass thought. He was Szass Tam’s confederate, or to be honest about it, his underling. Pyras Autorian was purely and simply the lich’s puppet, a docile dunce who did exactly and only what his master told him to do, which suddenly seemed like quite an admirable quality, since it meant there was no doubt Szass Tam could deliver on his offer.
“What must I do,” Hezass asked, “to start all this gold cascading down from the heights?”
“Quite possibly nothing, but here’s what I’ll require if it turns out I need anything at all …”
Tammith’s fingers dug into Bareris’s neck as if she’d acquired an ogre’s strength. Her mouth opened to reveal canine teeth lengthening into fangs. She started to drag him down.
He tried to plead with her, but her fingers cut off his wind and denied him his voice. He punched her in the face, but the blow just made her snarl. It didn’t stun her or loosen her grip on him.
At last he recalled a trick one of his former comrades, a warrior monk of Ilmater and an expert wrestler, had taught him. Supposedly a man could use it to break free of any stranglehold, no matter how strong his opponent.
He swept his arm in the requisite circular motion and just managed to knock her hand away, though a flash of pain told him it had taken some of his skin along with it, lodged beneath her nails. She immediately grabbed for him again, but he threw himself back beyond her reach.
He scrambled to his feet and so did she. “Don’t you know me?” he wheezed. “It’s Bareris.”
She glided forward, but not straight toward him. She was maneuvering to interpose herself between him and the door.
He drew his sword. “Stop. I don’t want to hurt you, but you have to keep away.”
Rather to his surprise, she did stop. A master sword smith had forged and enchanted the blade, giving it the ability to cut foes largely impervious to common weapons, and perhaps the creature Tammith had become could sense the threat of the magic bound in the steel.
“That’s good,” Bareris said. “Now look at me. I know you recognize me. You and I—”
Her body exploded into smaller, darker shapes. Astonished, he froze for an instant as the bats hurtled at him.
His fear screamed at him to cut at the flying creatures. He yanked off his cloak and flailed at them with it instead, fighting to fend them off while he sang.
Something jabbed his arm and then the top of his head. Bats were lighting on him and biting him despite his efforts to keep them away. He struggled to ignore the pain and horror of it lest they disrupt the precise articulation the spell required.
The bats abruptly spun away from him as if a whirlwind had caught them. In fact, they were suffering the effects of the same charm that had repelled the enormous fleas. It was supposed to work on any sort of vermin, and apparently even creatures like these were susceptible.
The bats swirled together and became Tammith once more. Her fangs shortened into normal-looking teeth, and her face twisted in anguish. “I’m sorry!” she whispered. “I’m sorry.”
He inferred that his magic had done what his punch could not: Shock her out of her predatory frenzy and restore her to something approximating sanity. He sheathed his blade, put his cloak back on, extended his hand, and stepped toward her.
“It’s all right,” he said.
She recoiled. “Stay away! I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Then you won’t.”
“I will. Even though I… fed on poor Yuldra already. Something about who you are, what we are to each other, makes it worse. Don’t you understand what’s happened to me?”
He realized he was reluctant to say the word “vampire,” as if speaking it aloud would seal the curse for eternity. “I have some idea, but what magic can do, it can undo. People say the holiest priests even know rituals to … restore the dead to life. We just have to get you away from here, and then we’ll find the help you need.”
She shook her head. “No one can help me, and even if somebody could, I’m not able to go to him. I’m more of a slave now than I was before Xingax changed me. He chained my mind, bound me to serve the wizards and their cause.”
“Maybe I can at least do something about that. It wouldn’t be the first enchantment I’ve broken with a song.”
“You can’t break this one. Get away from here while you still can.”
“No. I won’t leave without you.”
She glared at him. “Why not? You abandoned me before.”
Her sudden anger shocked him. “That’s not true. I left Bezantur to make us a future.”
“Well, this is the one you made for me.”
“That isn’t so. I’m going to save you. Just trust—”
A voice sounded from overhead: “What are you doing in here?”
Bareris looked up to behold the most grotesque creature he’d ever seen. Riding on the back of what appeared to be a zombie hill giant, the thing looked like a man-sized, festering, and grossly malformed infant or fetus. He surmised that it could only be Xingax, “the whelp.”
Bareris reminded himself that he was still wearing a red robe and still cloaked in an enchantment devised to quell suspicion and inspire good will in others. In addition to that, Xingax was squinting down at him as if the mismatched eyes in his lopsided face didn’t see particularly well. Perhaps this encounter needn’t be disastrous.
The bard lowered his gaze once more. He hoped Xingax would take it for a gesture of respect, or a natural human response to profound ugliness, and not an attempt to keep the creature from getting a better look at an unfamiliar face.
“I was just curious to see what you’d made of the slave.”
“Do I know you?”
A bead of sweat oozed down Bareris’s brow. He wished he knew the proper attitude to assume. Was Xingax a servant, somethin
g a supposed Red Wizard should treat with the same arrogance he showed to most creatures, or did the abomination expect a degree of deference?
“I’m new. So far, I’m just performing routine tasks. Creating zombies and the like.”
“I see. What’s your name?”
“Toriak Kakanos.”
“Well, Toriak, let’s have a decent look at your face, so I’ll know you in the future.”
Bareris reluctantly complied. When his eyes met Xingax’s, a malignant power stabbed into the core of him, searing and shaking him with spasms of debilitating pain. He crumpled to the floor.
“It was a good try,” Xingax said, “but I meet all the wizards as soon as they come through the portal. Is it possible this is … what was the name? … never mind. The bard who tried to rescue you before.”
“Yes,” Tammith groaned.
“Drink from him and try to change him as the ritual changed you. It’s another good test of your new abilities.”
Bareris fought to control his breathing then started singing under his breath.
“Please,” Tammith said, “don’t make me do it.”
“Why not?” Xingax replied. “Don’t you love him? Wouldn’t you rather he continue on still able to think, feel, and remember? Isn’t that better than making him a mindless husk?”
“No!”
The whelp snorted. “I’ll never understand the human perspective. It’s so perverse. Even so, it grieves me to deny my daughter’s request, but the truth of the matter is, if this fellow wields bardic magic, survived a battle with Muthoth, So-Kehur, and their guards, and found his way to our secret home, then, like yours, his courage and talents are too valuable to waste. I must insist you transform him. You’ll thank me later.”
Haltingly, as though still struggling against the compulsion, Tammith advanced on Bareris.
Her resistance gave him time to complete his song, and its power washed the pain and weakness from his body. The question was, what to do next?
Unclean: The Haunted Lands Page 19