The Demon Spirit - Book 2 of the Demon Wars series

by R. A. Salvatore

  Perhaps that is why the demon dactyl found him and embraced him.

  What a pity, Uncle Mather. What a waste of potential.

  In my years as a ranger, and even before that in the battle for Dundalis, I have killed many creatures—goblins, powries, giants—yet I shed no tears for them. I considered this fact long and hard in light of my feelings toward the death of Quintall. Were my tears for him nothing more than an elevation of my own race above all others, and if so, is that not the worst kind of pride?

  No, and I say that with some confidence, for surely I would cry if cruel fate ever drove my sword against one of the Touel'alfar. Surely I would consider the death of a fallen elf as piteous and tragic as the death of a fallen man.

  What then is the difference?

  It comes down to a matter of conscience, I believe, for as in humans, perhaps even more so, the Touel'alfar possess the ability, indeed the inclination, to choose a goodly path. Not so with goblins, and certainly not with the vile powries. I am not so sure about the giants—it may be that they are simply too stupid to even understand the suffering their warlike actions bring. In either case, I'll shed no tears and feel no remorse for any of these monsters that falls prey to Tempest's cut or to Hawkwing's bite. By their own evilness do they bring their deaths. They are the creatures of the dactyl, evil incarnate, slaughtering humans—and often each other—for no better reason than the pleasure of the act.

  I have had this discussion with Pony, and she posed an interesting scenario. She wondered whether a goblin babe, raised among humans, or among the Touel'alfar in the beauty of Andur'Blough Inninness, would be as vile as its wild kin. Is the evil of such beings a blackness within, ingrained and everlasting, or is it a matter of nurturing?

  My friend, your friend, Belli'mar Juraviel, had the answer for her, for indeed his people had long ago taken a goblin child into their enchanted land and raised the creature as if it were kin. As it matured, the goblin was no less vicious and hateful, and no less dangerous than its kin raised in the dark holes of distant mountains. The elves, ever curious, tried the same thing with a powrie child, and the results were even more disastrous.

  So I'll cry not for goblins and powries and giants, Uncle Mather. I shed no tears for creatures of the dactyl. But I do cry for Quintall, who fell into evil ways. I cry for the potential that was lost, for the one terrible choice that pushed him to blackness.

  And I think, Uncle Mather, that in crying for Quintall, or for any other human or elf that cruel fate may force me to slay, I am preserving my own humanity.

  This is the scar of battle, I fear, that will prove to be the most everlasting.

  —elbryan the nightbird

  CHAPTER 18

  Enemies of the Church

  The only magic they carried was a garnet, for detecting the use of the enchanted gemstones, and a sunstone, the antimagic stone. In truth, neither of the pair was very proficient with gemstones, having spent the bulk of their short years in St.-Mere-Abelle in rig­orous physical training and in the mental incapacitation necessary for one to truly claim the title of Brother Justice.

  The caravan had gone back to the east that morning, while the two monks, changing out of their robes to appear as common peas­ants, had gone south, to the Palmaris ferry, catching the first of its three daily journeys across the Masur Delaval at the break of dawn. They were in the city by mid-afternoon, and wasted no time in going out to the north, over the wall and not through the gate. By the time the sun was low on the western horizon, Youseff and Dan­delion had spotted their first prey, a band of four monsters—three powries and a goblin—setting camp amidst a tumble of boulders less than ten miles from Palmaris. It quickly became obvious to the monks that the goblin was the slave here, for it was doing most of the work, and whenever it slowed in its movements, one of the powries would give it a sharp slap on the back of the head, spurring it to motion. Even more important, the monks noted that the goblin had a rope, a leash, tied about its ankle.

  Youseff turned to Dandelion and nodded; they would be able to take advantage of this arrangement.

  As the sun was slipping below the horizon, the goblin exited the camp, followed closely by a powrie holding the other end of the rope. In the forest, the goblin began foraging for firewood, while the powrie stood quietly nearby. Youseff and Dandelion, silent as the lengthening shadows, moved into position, the slender monk going up a tree, the heavier Dandelion slipping from trunk to trunk, to close ground on the powrie.

  "Yach, hurry it up, ye fool thing!" the powrie scolded, kicking at the leaves and dirt. "Me friends'll eat all the coney, and there'll be nothing but bones for me to gnaw!"

  The goblin, a truly beleaguered creature, glanced back briefly, then scooped another piece of kindling. "Please, master," it whined. "Me arms is full and me back is hurtin' so."

  "Yach, shut yer mouth!" the powrie growled."Ye're thinkin' ye got all ye can carry, but it's not enough for the night fire. Ye're wanting me to come all the way back out here? I'll flog yer skin red, ye smelly wretch!"

  Youseff hit the ground right beside the startled powrie, plopping a heavy bag over its head in the blink of a surprised eye. A moment later Dandelion, in full run, slammed the dwarf from behind, hoisting it in a bear hug and taking it on a fast run, face first into the trunk of the nearest tree.

  Still the tough powrie struggled, throwing back an elbow into Dandelion's throat. The big monk hardly noticed, just pressed all the harder, and then, when he saw his companion's approach, he hooked his arm under the powrie's and lifted the dwarf's arm up high, exposing ribs.

  Youseff's dagger thrust was perfectly aimed, sliding between two ribs to pierce the stubborn dwarf's heart. Dandelion, holding fast the thrashing powrie, managed to free one hand so he could wrap the wound, not wanting too much blood to spill.

  Not here.

  Youseff, meanwhile, turned to the goblin. "Freedom," he whis­pered excitedly, waving his hand for the creature to run away.

  The goblin, on the verge of a scream, looked curiously at the human, then at its armload of wood. Shaking from excitement, it tossed the wood to the ground, slipped the rope from its ankle and sped off into the darkening forest.

  "Dead?" Youseff asked as Dandelion let the limp powrie slump to the ground.

  The big man nodded, then went to tighten the bindings on the wound. It was imperative that no blood would be spilling when the pair returned to Palmaris, and particularly not when they entered St. Precious. Youseff removed the powrie's weapon, a cruel-looking serrated and hooked blade as long and thick as his forearm, and Dandelion put the dwarf in a heavy, lined sack. With a glance about to make sure the other powries had not caught on to the ambush, they went on their way, running south, the load proving hardly a burden to the powerful Dandelion.

  "Should we not have taken the goblin for Connor Bilde­borough?" Dandelion asked as they slowed their pace, nearing the city's north wall.

  Youseff considered the question a moment, trying hard not to laugh at the fact that his dim-witted friend had only mentioned it now, more than an hour after they told the goblin to run away. "We need only one," Youseff assured him. The Father Abbot had made his needs quite clear to Brother Youseff. Any action against Abbot Dobrinion had to either appear as simply an accident or lead suspi­cion in a direction far removed from Markwart; the implications within the Church should St.-Mere-Abelle seem connected in any way, after all, could prove grave. Connor Bildeborough, though, was not such a problem. If his uncle, the Baron of Palmaris, even suspected the Church in Connor's demise, he, in his ignorance of the rivalries between the abbeys, would be as likely to blame St. Precious as St.-Mere-Abelle, and even if he did turn his atten­tion to the abbey on All Saints Bay, there would be little, very little, he could do.

  It was hardly an effort for the skilled assassins to get over the city wall and past the eyes of weary guardsmen. The battlefield had been pushed back, and though rogue bands like the one the monks had encountered were still about, they w
ere not thought to be much of a threat by the garrison entrenched in the city—a garrison strengthened in recent days by a full brigade of Kingsmen from Ursal.

  Now Dandelion and Youseff changed back into their brown robes and, with heads humbly bowed, made their solemn way through the streets. They were bothered only once, by a beggar man, and when he would not leave them alone, even going so far as to threaten them if they would not give him a silver coin, Brother Dandelion calmly tossed him against an alley wall.

  It was long after vespers and St. Precious was quiet and dark, but the monks took little comfort in that fact, understanding that the men of their Order would prove more vigilant than the slothful city guards. Again, though, the Father Abbot had prepared them prop­erly. On the southern wall of the abbey, where the wall was in fact a part of the main building itself, there were no windows and no visible doors.

  In truth, there was a single door, carefully concealed, from which the abbey's kitchen workers brought out the scraps from the day's meals. Brother Youseff brought forth the garnet, using it to find the invisible doorway, for the portal, in addition to being magically concealed, was magically sealed against opening from the outside.

  The door was also conventionally locked—or should have been—but before the monks of St.-Mere-Abelle had departed St. Precious, Brother Youseff had gone to the kitchen, ostensibly for supplies, but in truth to destroy the integrity of the portal's binding. Apparently the Father Abbot had recognized that they might need a quiet way into St. Precious, he pondered now, and was indeed im­pressed by his master's foresight.

  Using the sunstone, Youseff defeated the meager magical lock and carefully pushed open the door. Only one person was inside, a young woman singing and scrubbing a pot over a sink of steaming water.

  Youseff was behind her almost immediately. He paused, lis­tening to her carefree song, taking pleasure in the evil irony of that lively tune.

  The woman stopped singing, sensing the presence.

  Youseff basked in her fear for just a moment, then grabbed her by the hair and drove her face into the water. She struggled and thrashed, but to no avail against the efficient assassin. Youseff smiled as she slumped to the floor. He was supposed to be a pas­sionless killer, a mechanical tool for the Father Abbot's will, but in truth the monk found that he enjoyed the killing, enjoyed the victim's fear, enjoyed the absolute power. Looking down at the dead young woman, he only wished he had been granted more time, that he could have savored the preliminary game, the terror leading up to the death.

  Death, by comparison, was such a bland and easy thing.

  St. Precious was quiet that night, as if the whole of the place, the abbey itself, was relaxing after the trials of the Father Abbot's visit. Through the hallways stalked Youseff and Dandelion, the Brothers Justice, with powerful Dandelion carrying the sacked powrie over one shoulder. They saw only one monk, and he didn't see them, all the way to the door of Abbot Dobrinion's private quarters.

  Youseff went down to one knee before the door, a small knife in hand. Though he could easily pick the meager lock, he scraped and scratched at the wood about it, whittling it down, making it appear as if the door had been forced.

  Then they were in, and through another door, this one less sturdy and not locked, to Dobrinion's bedside.

  The abbot awoke with a start. He began to scream out, but fell strangely silent when he considered the pair, when he saw the heavy serrated blade waving tantalizingly inches from his face, its metal gleaming in the soft light of the moon spilling in through the room's lone window.

  "You knew we would come for you," Youseff teased.

  Dobrinion shook his head. "I can speak with the Father Abbot," he pleaded. "A misunderstanding, that is all."

  Youseff held a finger to pursed lips, smiling wickedly behind it, but Dobrinion pressed on.

  "The Chilichunks are criminals—that is obvious," the abbot spouted, and he hated the words as he spoke them, hated himself for his cowardice. Abbot Dobrinion fought a great battle then, his conscience vying against his most basic survival instinct.

  Youseff and Dandelion watched his torment, not understanding the source of it, but with Youseff surely enjoying it.

  Then Dobrinion calmed and stared at Youseff squarely, seeming suddenly unafraid. "Your Markwart is an evil man," he said. "Never was he truly Father Abbot of the Abellican Church. I call on you now, in the name of the solemn vow of our Order—piety, dignity, poverty—to turn against this evil course, to find again the light—"

  His sentence ended as a gurgle, as Youseff, too far lost to even hear such conscience-tugging pleas, ripped the serrated edge across the abbot's throat, opening it wide.

  The pair went to the powrie then, dropping it to the floor. Dande­lion unwrapped and then picked at its wound, removing all sign of scabbing, while Youseff searched about the abbot's quarters. He found at last a small knife, used for cutting seals from letters. Its blade was not as broad as the one of his dagger, but the knife fit fairly snugly into the powrie's mortal wound.

  "Take him from the bed," Youseff instructed Dandelion. As the big man dragged Dobrinion toward the desk, Youseff walked alongside, cutting a series of smaller wounds on Dobrinion's corpse, making it seem as if the abbot had put up a great struggle.

  Then the two killers were gone, silent death, two shadows flowing out from St. Precious into the black night.

  * * *

  Word of the abbot's murder spread throughout the city the very next morning, frantic cries sweeping along the fortified walls, teary-eyed soldiers blaming themselves for allowing a powrie to slip past them. Whispers of doom crossed from tavern to tavern, street corner to street corner, each retelling the rumors, embel­lishing the tale. By the time Connor Bildeborough, waking in a bed in the infamous brothel, House Battlebrow, heard the story, an army of powries was reputedly on the outskirts of Palmaris, ready to rush in and slaughter all of the people in their time of grief.

  Half naked, dressing as he went, Connor exited the house and flagged down a carriage, demanding that the driver take him at once to Chasewind Manor, the home of his uncle.

  The gates were closed; a dozen armed soldiers, their weapons drawn, surrounded the carriage as the horse skidded to an abrupt stop, and both Connor and the poor frightened driver felt the eyes of many archers upon them.

  Recognizing Connor, the guards relaxed and helped the noble­man down, then ordered the driver away in no uncertain terms.

  "My uncle is well?" Connor asked desperately as the guards es­corted him through the gate.

  "Unnerved, Master Connor," one man answered. "To think that a powrie could so easily get through our defenses and slay Abbot Dobrinion! And all of this coming right behind the troubles in the abbey! Oh, what dark days are upon us!"

  Connor made no move to reply, but he listened carefully to the man's words, and the unspoken, probably even unrealized, impli­cations behind them. He rushed through the manor house then, down the heavily guarded halls and into his uncle's audience room.

  Fittingly, the soldier standing guard beside Baron Rochefort Bildeborough's desk was the burly man, face heavily bandaged, whose nose had been smashed under a magical assault by none other than Father Abbot Dalebert Markwart himself.

  "My uncle knows of my arrival?" Connor asked the man.

  "He will join us presently," the guard replied, his voice slurred, for his mouth, too, had been battered by the magnetite missile.

  Even as he finished speaking, Connor's uncle entered the room through a side door, his face brightening as he gazed upon his nephew.

  "Thank God himself that you are alive and well," the man said generously. Connor had always been Rochefort Bildeborough's favorite relative, and since the man had no children, it was a common belief in Palmaris that Connor would inherit the title.

  "Should I not be?" Connor asked in his typically casual manner.

  "They got in to kill Abbot Dobrinion," Rochefort replied, taking his seat opposite the desk from Connor.
>
  Connor did not miss the effort his uncle required for the simple action. Rochefort was overweight and suffered from severe pains in the joints. Until the previous summer, the man had ridden his fields every day, rain or shine, but this year he had been out only a couple of times, and never two days in succession. Rochefort's eyes, too, showed the sudden aging. They had always been gray in hue, but they were dull now, filmed over.

  Connor had wanted the title of Baron of Palmaris since he was old enough to understand the prestige and entitlement that came with it, but now, as that moment seemed to be drawing near, he had discovered that he could wait—and many years. He would rather that he kept his present position, and that his dear uncle, the man who had been as a father to him, remained alive and well.

  "How would the monsters even know to look for me?" Connor replied calmly. "The abbot is a clear target for our enemies, but myself?"

  "The abbot and the Baron," Rochefort reminded.

  "And indeed I am glad to see that you have taken all the proper precautions," Connor said quickly. "You may be a target, but not I. To the knowledge of our enemies, I am nothing more than a common tavern-hunter."

  Rochefort nodded, and seemed relieved by the logic of Connor's reasoning. Like a protective father, he didn't fear for himself half as much as he feared for Connor.

  Connor, though, was not really convinced by his own words. The powrie slipping into St. Precious at this tension-filled time, so soon after the horrible Father Abbot's departure, seemed a bit too convenient to him, and he only grew more uneasy as he looked upon the broken face of his uncle's principal guard.

  "I want you to stay at Chasewind Manor," Rochefort said.

  Connor shook his head. "I have business in the city, Uncle," he replied. "And I have been battling powries for months now. Fear not for me." As he finished, he patted Defender, comfortably sheathed at his hip.