“He’s a kender, my lord,” Rhys said desperately.
At that unfortunate moment Nightshade shouted, “Hey, Rhys, I’ve come to deal with that Mina-person!” His voice and his footfalls echoed through the grotto. “Atta, not so fast!”
“Deal with Mina?” Chemosh repeated. “He does not sound so innocent. It seems now I will have two souls to question.…”
“Nightshade!” Rhys shouted. “Don’t come in here! Run! Take Atta and—”
“Silence, monk,” ordered Chemosh, and he clamped his hand over Rhys’s mouth.
The chill of death permeated Rhys’s limbs. The terrible cold was like shards of ice in his blood stream. Cold, searing pain wracked his body. He groaned and struggled.
The Lord of Death kept fast hold on him, his cruel touch freezing the blood. Rhys sank to his knees.
Atta dashed into the chamber. She saw her master on his knees, obviously in distress and a man bending over him. Atta didn’t like this man. There was something fell about him, something that frightened her. The man had no scent, for one thing. Every living thing, every dead thing has an odor, some pleasant, others not so much, but not this man, and that frightened her. The man was, in this, like that loud and obnoxious woman from the sea, and like the monk who had just laid gentle hands on her. None of them had a smell to them, and the dog found that uncanny and terrifying.
Atta was scared. Her simple heart trembled. Instinct urged her to turn tail and run, but this strange man was hurting her master, and that could not be allowed. Her heart swelled in fury, and she leaped to the attack. She did not go for the throat, for the man had his back to her, bending over Rhys. She sought instead to cripple her enemy. Wisdom handed down to her by her ancient ancestor, the wolf, told her how to bring down a larger foe—go for the leg. Break the bone or sever a tendon.
Atta sank her teeth into Chemosh’s ankle.
The aspect of a god is formed of the god’s essence spun into an image that appears mortal to the minds of men. The aspect is visible to the mortal eye, sensible to the mortal touch. The god’s aspect can speak to mortals, hear them and react to them. Since the aspect is made of immortal essence, the aspect feels no pain or pleasurable sensations of the flesh. The god will often pretend to do so, in order to appear more lifelike to mortals. In the case of Chemosh and his love for Mina, the god can even sometimes persuade himself into believing the lie.
Chemosh could not possibly have felt Atta’s sharp teeth freezing onto his leg, but he did. In truth, the teeth Chemosh felt were not those of the dog. They were the teeth of Majere’s wrath. Thus it was that Huma’s dragonlance, blessed by all the gods of good, struck Takhisis’s aspect a blow that she felt and forced her to withdraw, spitting and snarling defiance, from the world. The gods have the power to inflict pain upon each other, though they are loath to do so, for each god knows the dire consequences that might result from such action. The gods resort to such drastic measures only when it is clear to them the balance is about to be overthrown, for Chaos lies just beyond, waiting eagerly for war to break out in the heavens. When that happens, the gods will destroy each other and give Chaos his long-sought victory—the end of all things.
A god will rarely attack another god directly but will act only through mortals. The attack is limited in scope and not likely to cause the aspect severe harm—just enough to let the other god know that he or she has transgressed, gone too far, crossed the line.
Majere’s anger bit into Chemosh’s ankle with Atta’s teeth, and the Lord of Death roared in fury. He turned from Rhys, kicked out his leg and flung Atta off him. Lifting his foot over her body, Chemosh was going to show Majere what he thought of him by stomping this mutt to death.
Rhys still held the splinter of the staff in his bloody hand. It was his only weapon and he jabbed it with all his strength into the god’s back. Majere’s rage drove the splinter deep into the Lord of Death. Chemosh gasped. His kick went wild. Atta leaped to her feet and positioned her body in front of Rhys. Teeth bared, she defiantly faced the god.
At that moment, Nightshade came running into the grotto, his fists clenched.
“Rhys, I’m here—” The kender stopped, stared. “Who are you? Wait! I think I know you! You seem very familiar to me … Oh, gods!” Nightshade began to shake all over. “I do know you! You’re Death!”
“I am your death, at least,” Chemosh said coldly, and he reached out his hand to throttle the kender.
The ground gave a sudden, violent lurch that knocked Chemosh off his feet. The cavern walls shuddered and cracked. Bits of rock and dirt rained down on them and then, with a small shiver, the earth settled and was quiet.
God and mortals stared at each other. Chemosh was on his hands and knees. Atta crouched on her belly, whimpering.
The Lord of Death picked himself up off the floor. Ignoring the mortals, he stared up into the darkness.
“Which of you shakes the world?” he cried, fists clenched. “You, Sargonnas? Zeboim? You, Majere?”
If there was an answer, the mortals could not hear it. Rhys was barely conscious, consumed by pain, hardly aware of what was going on. Nightshade had his eyes closed, and he was hoping the next time the ground shook it would open up and suck him down inside. Better that than have Death’s cold gaze fall upon him again.
“We will meet in the Abyss, monk,” Chemosh promised and disappeared.
“Whoo, boy,” Nightshade said, shuddering. “I’m glad he’s gone. He could have left us some light, though. It’s dark as a goblin’s innards in here. Rhys …”
The earth shook again.
Nightshade threw himself flat on the ground, one arm clutching Atta and the other arm covering his head.
The cracks in the grotto’s walls widened. Rocks and pebbles, clods of dirt, and a few dislodged beetles rained down on top of him. Then there was a horrendous crashing and grinding sound, and Nightshade shut his eyes tight and waited for the end.
Once more, everything was still. The ground ceased its wild gyrations. Nightshade didn’t trust it, however, and he kept his eyes shut. Atta started to wriggle and squirm beneath his clutching grasp. He let her go, and she scooted out from underneath him. Then he felt one of the beetles crawling in his hair, and that made him open his eyes. He grabbed hold of the beetle and threw it off.
Atta began to bark sharply. Nightshade wiped the grit out of his eyelids and looked around to find that whether his eyes were open or shut didn’t make much difference. It was dark either way.
Atta kept barking.
Nightshade was afraid to stand up for fear he might bash into something, so he crawled on his hands, feeling his way, following the sounds of Atta’s frantic yelps.
“Atta?” He reached out his hand and felt her furry body. She was pawing at something and continuing to bark.
Nightshade groped about with his hands and felt lots of sharp rocks and then something warm and soft.
“Rhys!” Nightshade breathed thankfully.
He felt about and found his friend’s nose and eyes—the eyes were closed. Rhys’s forehead was warm. He was breathing, but he must be unconscious. Nightshade’s hand touched Rhys’s head, and felt something warm and sticky running down the back of Rhys’s neck.
Atta ceased pawing at Rhys and began to lick his cheek.
“I don’t think dog slobber’s going to do him much good, Atta,” said Nightshade, pushing her away. “We have to get him out of here.”
He could still smell salt-tinged air, and he hoped this meant the grotto’s entrance had not collapsed. Nightshade gripped Rhys by the shoulders, gave him an experimental tug, and was heartened to feel his friend’s body slide across the floor. He had been worried that Rhys might have been half-buried in rubble.
Nightshade pulled again, and Rhys came along with him, and the kender was just starting to think they might make it out of here alive when he heard a sound that nearly buried him in despair.
The clank of chains.
Nightshade groaned. He’d f
orgotten all about the fact that Rhys was chained to the wall.
“Maybe the rock slide dislodged the iron rings,” Nightshade said hopefully.
Finding the manacle around Rhys’s wrist, Nightshade groped his way along the length of chain back to where it was attached to the iron ring, which was still attached—quite firmly—to the wall.
Nightshade said a bad word and then he remembered. He was blessed by a god!
“Maybe he’s given me the strength of ten dragons!” Nightshade said excitedly, and gripped the chain and winced at the pain of his cut hands. Feeling that one with dragon-strength shouldn’t be put off by jabbing pain, he dug in his heels and shooed Atta out of the way, then pulled on the chain with all his might.
The chain slid through Nightshade’s hands, and the kender sat down on his bottom.
He repeated the bad word. Standing up, he tried again and this time he kept hold of the chain.
The iron ring didn’t budge.
Nightshade gave up. Following the chain, he made his way back to where Rhys lay on the ground, and kneeling beside his friend, he smoothed back the blood-gummed hair from the still face. Atta lay down beside him and began, again, to assiduously lick Rhys’s cheek.
“We’re not leaving, Rhys,” Nightshade told him. “Are we, Atta? You see—she says no, we’re not. Not this time.” He tried to strike a cheerful note. “Maybe the next time the ground shakes, the wall will split right open and knock those iron rings loose!”
Of course, Nightshade said to himself, if the wall does split open the ceiling will crash down on top of us and bury us alive, but I won’t mention that.
“I’m here, Rhys.” Nightshade took hold of his friend’s limp hand and held it tight. “And so’s Atta.”
The ground began to shake.
eneath the red-tinged water of the Blood Sea, inside the Tower of High Sorcery, Basalt and Caele were hard at work scrubbing and polishing, making ready for an influx of wizards—the twenty or so chosen Black Robes who were going to be leaving their homes on land to join Nuitari.
The Tower of the Blood Sea was now open and ready for business.
Following the meeting between the cousins, Nuitari realized there was no longer any need to keep his Tower secret. He gave the news to Dalamar, Head of the Black Robes, and told the elven archmage to issue an invitation to any Black Robes who wanted to come study in the new Tower.
The invitation included Dalamar, who had respectfully declined, saying it was necessary for the Black Robes to maintain their representation in Wayreth. Privately Dalamar thought that he would just as soon be shut up in a tomb as buried beneath the sea, away from the wind and the trees, blue skies and bright sunlight. He said as much to Jenna.
As Head of the Conclave, she was not at all happy about the decision made by the gods. She was opposed to separating the Robes again. The same had been done in the days before the Kingpriest, each Robe claiming its own Tower, with tragic results. Jenna made her opposition known to Lunitari, but the goddess of the Red Moon was so inordinately pleased with having the magnificent Tower of Wayreth all to herself that she would not listen. As for Solinari, his chosen, Coryn the White, was already putting together an expedition of White Robes to go forth to recover the accursed Tower that had formerly been in Palanthas and was now inside the heart of the dark land of the undead, Nightlund.
As for Dalamar, his reservations had nothing to do with the Tower itself, just its location. He considered that a Tower for the Black Robes was long overdue. Only Jenna had serious reservations, and she could not really take time to pursue them as she might have done. The Conclave was in the throes of a bitter argument over how to handle the situation with the Beloved—now that the horrible means of destroying them had become known. The Black Robes were all for recruiting armies of children and sending them forth to do battle. Rumor had it some had done just that.
As the news and the fear spread, any person who had the misfortune to be different from his neighbors or had fallen out with the townspeople, or who was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time might be accused of being a Beloved and either arrested or attacked by mobs. Since wizards tended to be mysterious folk who kept to themselves and were generally feared, they became easy targets. Jenna was now hard at work trying to find a magical spell to put a stop to the Beloved, thus far to no avail. A Tower beneath the sea was the least of her worries, so she dropped the argument.
Nuitari had won and he had Chemosh to thank, which the God of the Dark Moon thought extremely ironic.
Inside the Tower, Basalt was making up beds, while Caele mostly stood around watching Basalt. A large pile of mattresses had been hauled up from the storage room. The apprentice mages had to carry each mattress into each room, wrestle it onto the wooden bed frame, then cover it with linens and a blanket.
The two were working in the chambers where the high-ranking Black Robes would reside—each in his or her own private quarters. The mattresses for these beds were made of goose down, the sheets were fine linen, the blankets softest wool. Rooms for lower ranking wizards were smaller and had mattresses of straw. Apprentice wizards shared rooms and in some cases shared mattresses. Thus far, only high-ranking wizards had been invited by the god. They were due to arrive tomorrow morning.
“You’re going to have to help me shift this,” Basalt said. He indicated a mattress on the top of the pile that was out of the reach of the dwarf’s short arms. “I can’t reach it.”
Caele heaved the long-suffering sigh of the overworked and took hold of the ends of the mattress. He gave a half-hearted attempt, then he moaned and clutched his back.
“All this bending and lifting. I’ve torn a muscle.”
Basalt glowered at him. “How did you tear a muscle? The heaviest thing you’ve lifted thus far is a glass of the Master’s best wine, and don’t think I won’t tell him!”
“I was tasting it to see if it had gone bad,” said Caele sullenly. “You wouldn’t want to serve the archmagi bad wine, now, would you?”
“Just help me lift the damn mattress,” growled Basalt.
Caele raised his hands, and before Basalt could stop him, the elf waved his hands and muttered a few words. The mattress floated up off the pile and hung suspended in the air.
“What are you doing? You’re not supposed to be using magic for housekeeping chores!” Basalt cried, scandalized. “What if the Master should see you? End that spell!”
“Very well,” said Caele, and he withdrew the magic, with the result that the mattress crashed down on top of the dwarf, flattening him.
Caele sniggered. Basalt gave a muffled howl. The dwarf emerged from beneath the mattress with murder in his eye.
“You told me to end the spell.” Caele’s lip curled. “I was merely obeying orders. You are the Caretaker, after all—”
Caele stopped talking. His eyes widened. “What is that?”
Basalt’s eyes were white-rimmed. He shivered at the terrible sound. “I don’t know! I’ve never heard anything like it.”
The low rumbling noise, like enormous boulders all being tumbled about, grinding together, came from far, far below their feet. The noise grew louder and louder, coming nearer and nearer. The stack of mattresses began to jiggle. The floor started to shake. Desks and bed frames began to skitter and dance across the floor. The walls quivered.
The shaking entered Basalt’s feet and went from there into his bones. His teeth clicked together, and he bit his tongue. Caele staggered into the pile of mattresses and stood braced against them.
The shaking ceased.
Basalt gave a gasping croak and pointed.
The floor, which had been perfectly level, was now pitched at a steep angle. A bed frame came sliding slowly down the hall with a desk right behind it. Caele pushed himself off the mattresses.
“Zeboim!” he snarled. “The sea bitch is back!”
Basalt staggered across the canting floor, walking uphill, and entered one of the rooms. All the furniture was piled up in a
heap against the far wall. Basalt ignored the destruction and headed for the crystal window, which provided a spectacular view of the Tower’s underwater kingdom. Caele followed close at the dwarf’s heels.
Both of them stared out into the water that was thick with red silt churned up from the floor. The silt swirled about the Tower like tides of blood.
“I can’t see a thing in this murk,” Caele complained.
“Nor can I,” said Basalt, frustrated.
The Tower started to shake again. This time the floor canted in the other direction.
Caele and Basalt were run down by a cascade of furniture sliding across the floor. Both ended up slammed against the wall, Basalt trapped by a desk and Caele pinned by a bed frame.
The shaking ceased. Basalt had the strangest feeling that whatever was causing this upheaval was resting, catching its breath.
He shoved aside the bed frame, and ignoring Caele’s pleas for help, ran back to the window and looked out.
His nose pressed against the crystal, Basalt could see, amidst the swirling muck and bits of seaweed and frantically darting fish, a coral reef that snaked up from the ocean floor. Basalt had often enjoyed looking at this reef, for it reminded him of the formations of the underground world in which he’d lived for so long and which, on occasion, he still missed.
From this vantage point, he should be gazing directly across at the reef.
Now, instead, he stared down at the reef. It was several hundred feet beneath him. He looked up and saw moonlight and stars.…
“Master,” Basalt breathed, and then he howled, “Master! Nuitari! Save us!”
The Tower began to shake again.
ina stood alone on the battlements of the castle of the Lord of Death. An eerie amber glow lit the sky, the water and the land. She was darkness within its center and none could see her, though they were searching. Gods, mortals, all were searching for the reason the earth trembled.
Mina gazed out upon the water. Her love, her longing, her desire flowed from her and became the water. She willed it to be, and the Blood Sea began to boil and bubble. She willed it to be, and the motion of the water grew erratic. Waves crossed and criss-crossed and were flung back on each other.
Amber and Iron Page 29