D&D - Mystara - Penhaligon Trilogy 02

by The Dragon's Tomb - Heinrich, D. J (v1. 1)

  Johauna looked up at the sheer rock and ice surfaces of the mountains surrounding her. “And I thought the Wulfholdes were rugged,” she murmured to herself. She had never seen mountains before. She let Carsig have his head so that he could snuffle the ground for something edible, and Jo jumped off to stretch her legs.

  The few harsh grasses that could survive this arid land had not yet turned green with spring growth. Carsig and the other animals contented themselves with the dried blades, snorting puffs of frosty air as they nibbled the mountain grass. Every now and then a horse or mule would find a tasty, succulent snow crocus or other early blooming flower.

  Jo joined her comrades. Braddoc was smiling to himself, and Jo realized the dwarf felt at home in these mountains. Karleah snorted and sat on a nearby, flat rock. She drank from her waterskin, oblivious to the walls of ice and rock surrounding her. Only Dayin’s expression remained one of wonder and disbelief as he stared at the cliff faces.

  “Have you seen any more sign of the guards’ passage?” Karleah asked testily. The crone clutched the tattered remnant of a gray silk shawl around her bony shoulders. Dayin came and stood next to her.

  Both Jo and Braddoc shook their heads. Braddoc said, “Not since this morning, Karleah. Johauna stopped us at a good point. There re two ravines ahead that could be the paths the guards took. I’ll scout ahead and see if I can find any more tracks.”

  “It’s hard with all the rock and ice,” Jo said. “But maybe they’ll have gone through a snowdrift or two, and we’ll get lucky.” Johauna went to Fernlover and pulled out a loaf of bread and a chunk of dried venison. She returned to her friends and, using her knife, began slicing and handing out the food.

  Karleah grunted her thanks, bit a huge bite from her food with her strong white teeth, and said, “Give me a minute to—heh, heh—‘wolf’ my food, and then I’ll check out the passages. Maybe I can scent something.” Karleah smiled, her canines gleaming in the bright light of the midday sun that shone overhead. An eagle, attracted perhaps by the travelers, circled above. Its piercing cry echoed off the mountainsides.

  “Can I go with you, Karleah?” Dayin asked. He began to eat his food quickly, too. “Maybe I can scent something you might miss,” he said through a mouthful of bread.

  The wizardess shook her head. “No, son. You’d only slow me down and be a cause for worry,” Karleah said. She pointed a thin finger up at the circling eagle. “She’d have you in her talons before I’d even hear her dive to the ground. Out here I can’t protect you like I could in my woods. There everyone knows not to touch my young rabbit.” The old woman took another bite. She chewed her mouthful and said at the same time, “Why you chose to be a cottontail is beyond me.”

  “Karleah shapechanges into a wolf and you into a rabbit?” Johauna asked. She sliced another strip of venison and handed it to Karleah. At Braddoc’s nod, the squire sliced him a strip as well.

  “Why a rabbit?” Braddoc asked. “And why can you change into only one animal? That doesn’t seem very useful.” He gestured at the bird flying above. “If you could turn into an eagle, I’ll bet you could spot the guards carrying the abaton. Then we’d know for sure which way to go—and could even cut them off, if possible.” The dwarf chewed his food slowly.

  Dayin shrugged, his shoulders lost beneath the thick fur vest that Flinn had given him. “I like rabbits, and I wanted to be one,” the boy said. “They’re lots smarter than people give them credit for. Besides, they’re small and can wiggle into places most other creatures couldn’t. They’re fast, too.” Dayin smiled widely at the old wizardess. “I’ve given Karleah quite a run in the woods.”

  The crone snorted, then turned to Braddoc. “To answer your question, dwarf, there are mages who can learn to shapechange into more than one creature, but they take on merely the animal form and not the animal spirit. When I am the wolf, I am that animal. I wanted Dayin to experience that same sensation, and he does.” She nodded her head toward the boy. “Gather up the animals, will you? It wouldn’t do to have them panic and desert us in these mountains.” Dayin agreed and left the others to their meal.

  “But as a rabbit?” Braddoc asked again. Dayin frowned at the dwarf, ending the conversation.

  Karleah reached for Jo. The younger woman held out her hand, thinking the older one needed support. The wizardess’s dry, bony fingers touched Jo’s palm, and then Karleah withdrew her hand. Jo looked down at her palm.

  “This . . . this is a crystal from a real abelaat?” Jo asked. She held up the eight-sided crystal. It was fully twice as large as Jo’s other crystals. The sunlight flickering through it shed prisms of color into the young woman’s eyes, and she was dazzled by its beauty. She heard Brisbois gasp and move closer to her.

  Karleah nodded. She said, “Yes, that’s what Keeper Grainger gave me. Her people have been the keepers not only of the history of the abelaats but also of their crystals. This is the last true abelaat crystal—a crystal made from Aeltic s own spittle.” Brushing her hands and sniffing the wind, Karleah said. “Its time for me to change.”

  Braddoc and Jo stared at Karleah as the old woman began her transformation. Her lanky gray hair shortened and then spread over her body while her face lengthened and ears grew. Karleah pulled off the last of her clothing as the rest of the shapechange occurred.

  “How long will you be gone?” Jo asked the wolf-woman.

  “Not long,” Karleah said in painful half-growl. “Take . . . care of. . . the crystal,” she continued. “It is my . . . only protection . . . from the abaton.” Her black eyes turned golden, and her pink tongue lengthened and fell out of her not-quite-changed jaw. The woman flexed her fingers as the digits shortened and claws grew. Karleah’s arms and legs grew leaner, the muscles rippling beneath her black fur. Finally, her torso changed shape and a tail grew. The old she-wolf yelped once and leaped away from Johauna and Braddoc.

  Jo enviously watched Karleah’s sure pace carry her into the mountain passes. She said to Braddoc, “I wish I could shapechange. I think it would be wonderful to transform into a wolf like Karleah and roam the land, at one with it in a way humans never are.”

  Braddoc shrugged noncommittally. “She’ll be back soon. I want to check the pack on the mule. I think it needs rearranging.” The dwarf stood.

  “I’ll come with you,” Jo said. “I packed Fernlover a little quickly myself.” Dayin accompanied them to the animals. Brisbois, who had said nothing since discovering the original sign of the passing guards, moved solicitously out of the way. With a confused glance at the man, Jo began checking the bundles on her mule. Silent moments passed, then Jo said, “What are you looking at?”

  Brisbois smiled slightly and shrugged. “What would you do if Verdilith attacked you right now, in these mountains?” he asked.

  Braddoc stared up at Brisbois. Jo once again stood in silence for a moment. “What kind of question is that?”

  “A legitimate one, I should think,” the man replied. “You’re so vulnerable out here, on an open mountain range, with no way to fight, nowhere to run.”

  “You’re as vulnerable as we,” Braddoc interjected. Brisbois shrugged, “More so, I bet you think. After all, I don’t carry Wyrmblight, scourge of the Great Green, do I?” The man moved with reptilian grace toward Jo, his hand reaching out to the blade harnessed to her back.

  Jo backed away, watching the yellowish steam rise from Brisbois’s nose. “What’s gotten into you?”

  Brisbois withdrew to a nonthreatening distance and said, “You have a lot of faith in that sword. Too much faith, if you ask me.”

  “I didn’t ask you,” Jo shot, checking the straps on Fernlover.

  “You think that sword will save you,” Brisbois pressed, a gleaming grin on his mouth, “but it didn’t save Flinn.”

  Jo whirled, wrenching Wyrmblight from its harness and leveling it before Brisbois s heart. “You mention Flinn one more time, and I’ll cut your heart out with this.”

  “Jo,” Braddoc said, wi
th a warning glare.

  Brisbois smiled and waved the dwarf off with a bandaged hand, “She doesn’t mean it. That sword is everything to her. She holds on to it and thinks she’s holding on to Flinn. But Flinn failed her, and so will the sword.”

  Jo lunged forward, a snarl of rage on her lips. The tip of Wyrmblight sliced through the dishonored knight’s tabard, punctured his breastplate, and slammed the chain mail into his sternum. With a slight gasp, Brisbois slipped and fell to the ground.

  Jo stepped up, setting the blade back on the gash and towering over him. Braddoc clutched her arm, trying to pull her back, but Jo gritted her teeth and began to lean onto the blade.

  “Mercy,” Brisbois cried out with mock fear. “I beg you mercy on this battlefield, squire of the mighty Flinn. Will you kill me, though I beg mercy of you?”

  A confused frown crossed Jos face and she colored. Her pressure on the sword relented as Braddoc pulled her away from the knight. As Brisbois painfully rose to his feet, the dwarf led Jo back to the mules and locked the gaze of his good eye with hers.

  “You lost that one, Jo. Don’t let him manipulate you like that,” the dwarf said evenly. “Everybody already knows he’s an idiot. Don’t let him make an idiot out of you”

  Something half-human and half-wolf suddenly streaked toward them. Karleah had returned from her search. Braddoc turned his head away politely as the wolf-thing transformed back into a naked old woman. The wizardess pulled on her clothing. She said with some asperity, “I’m sure a woman’s body is nothing new to you, Braddoc. Seen one, you’ve seen them all.”

  “Not one as withered as yours, old hag,” Braddoc quipped, apparently to lighten the tension. He threw the crone a smile to soften the words.

  Karleah responded with only a “Harrumph!” then said, “I found their trail. They’ve taken the western pass.” The old woman shook her head. “They’ve got a good day, day and a half, on us. They aren’t in any hurry, but I doubt we can gain much ground on them.”

  “You know it’s cracked, don’t you?” Brisbois murmured to Jo as he wandered stiffly to his horse.

  “What?” Jo cried, rounding on him with fiery eyes.

  Brisbois busied himself with the straps and buckles of his mount. “A hairline crack. I saw it in the sunlight when I was on the ground.”

  Jo held Wyrmblight up in front of her, studying the blade with anxiety. Looking up, her blush deepened in hue and she snorted. “I don’t see anything.”

  The defamed knight shrugged casually and swung up into the saddle in one motion. “Let’s be off,” he said. “We re burning daylight!”

  Braddoc’s hand gripped Jo’s trembling arm and he said, “Let it go, Johauna. Let it go.” He took Wyrmblight from her hands and began to snap it into the harness on her back. As he did so, his eyes scanned worriedly along the blade s white steel.

  Chapter XIV

  Karleah held up her hand, and the three riders behind her halted their mounts immediately. They were near Armstead, the wizardess knew, and they did not dare come upon the village unprepared. Through the leather of the pouch around her neck, Karleah could feel the heat radiating from the abelaat crystal as it grew closer to the abaton. She only hoped she was right in supposing that the crystal would prevent the abaton from draining her powers a second time. Karleah took heart in the fact that she had begun to regain her powers faster since the crystal had come into her possession.

  The wizardess gingerly dismounted from her gray mare. “I’m too old for this,” she mumbled. “Far too old. I want to go back to my valley”

  “What’s that, Karleah?” Jo asked curiously.

  Karleah turned to face the squire. She thought that the trip had done the young woman good; the despair and anger that had consumed Jo at Flinn’s death were still there, but were under slightly better control. Karleah hoped it wouldn’t be too much longer before Jo was able to put those emotions behind her. The old woman shook her head.

  “Nothing, Jo,” Karleah said. She cocked her head northward. “I think Armsteads just beyond that bend. At least I think the abaton s there, according to this crystal.” Karleah touched the crystals pouch. “I suggest you and Braddoc lead the way, in case we run into the guards. Dayin and I’ll bring up the rear—and hopefully not be engulfed by the abaton.”

  “That box wouldn’t open up and ‘swallow’ you like it did the charm in Threshold, would it, Karleah?” Braddoc asked.

  “Why, is that concern I detect?” Karleah cackled suddenly to hide how touched she was at the dwarfs words. She tapped Braddoc with her oaken staff. “Seriously, friend dwarf, I think being swallowed by the box might be one of the nicer things the abaton could do to me.”

  Riding, Jo led the way north, with Braddoc right behind her. Each led one of the two pack mules. Karleah gestured for Brisbois and Dayin to go before her, then she joined the group as they filed forward through the last of the Black Peaks.

  The mountains had brought two days of misery to Karleah’s ancient frame. The cold, biting wind of late winter whistled through the Black Peaks. Despite a fire, nothing could warm their stony beds at night. To make matters worse, the moon had turned full, and Karleah had felt the call more than once to turn to wolf form. Someday soon, she mused now, I will stay that way forever. I shall roam the hills and live and die as an old she-wolf. Some days, I am so weary of my human form. But the old wizardess hadn’t dared to give in to her desires so near the abaton.

  The group wound steadily through the last of the Black Peaks, the icy obsidian trail gnawing through even Karleah s thick boots. The ground was treacherous afoot, and the crone wished she were back on her mare. The obsidian chips blended so well with the patches of ice that it was often difficult to distinguish which was which. The midafternoon sun did not light the land either, for it was obstructed by all the towering mountains, which added to the difficulty of the journey.

  Or is something happening to me? Karleah thought suddenly. Surely I shouldn’t be having this much trouble? The others are doing fine. Or am I really, truly growing old at last? A part of her was troubled by the idea, while another part—a most ancient part—savored the idea of nearing the end of her existence. Karleah eyed Jo’s young, lithe form with a twinge of jealousy.

  The old woman quelled those thoughts ruthlessly. “I am not yet ready for the next life,” she muttered to the wind.

  An hour passed before Karleah and her comrades rounded the last bend. By this time, the heat from the abelaat crystal was nearly scorching, and Karleah wondered if she would be able to withstand it any closer to the abaton. “At least it seems to be protecting me,” Karleah murmured to no one. She held out her oaken staff, which had recently served as nothing more than a walking stick. “With this stone, I can sense my powers returning.”

  Up ahead, Jo exclaimed in surprise. The squire stopped walking, her horse and mule halting behind her. Braddoc joined Jo, and Dayin and Brisbois hurried after him. Karleah heard their startled murmurs and prayers and tried to rush forward. She cursed the rocky ground and fought for each unstable step, wishing her staff could clear a path for her, as it had done in her own valley. The wizardess climbed her way to the top of the small crest w'here Jo, Brisbois, Braddoc, and Dayin stood. Shouldering her way between the dwarf and the boy, she looked into the valley beyond. The old woman gasped.

  Armstead lay in ruins.

  Not a single tower had been spared. The area looked as if it had been the center of a great bonfire that had spread in sudden waves out into even the forest beyond. The ground was blackened and striped with coal and ash. The buildings lay in smoldering ruin, walls toppled as though pushed over by a giant’s foot. Even the outer wall, more decorative than anything else, had been flattened to rubble. The stream that had flowed into Armstead was a scorched bed of rock and ash, and piles of uprooted trees and shattered bridges and buildings formed a natural dam that let only a timid finger of water through. A fine haze of charcoal dust filled the air, creating dull and ironic rainbows. Karle
ah accidentally took too deep a breath and was j caught in a fit of choking.

  She stumbled forward, her step uncertain as she hurried down the slope leading to the village. “No, no,” she whispered. “Not Armstead . . Her mind was filled with a red-hot pounding sensation, so much so that she forgot the hot pain radiating from the abelaat crystal.

  The group slowly headed through the broken archway in the outer wall. Karleah stared at the scorched rock. Her eyes fell on the smooth pavement of the road leading into the village, then shifted to the destroyed buildings nearby.

  The tiny village had housed no more than fifty or so mages at any one time. Its one-time buildings—great, soaring structures of incredible creation—-were considered some of the finest pieces of architecture ever created. Its spires formed the famous Mages’ Circle, at the center of which was the amphitheater where all public meetings were held.

  “Karleah!” Jo asked. “Is this the work of the abaton?”

  “Yes,” Karleah muttered. “We didn’t arrive in time. Look at that spire!” The wizardess pointed to the remains of a tower. “Wazel lived there—an old friend of mine. When the time was right, I was going to send Dayin to him for polishing.”

  Braddoc asked, “Karleah, just what was Armstead?”

  The old woman sighed heavily as she started down the main avenue that led to the center of the village. Karleah remembered wonderful, exotic trees lining the way. They had all been snapped in two. “Armstead,” Karleah said heavily, leaning against her staff as she shuffled along, “is— er, was—a place of wizardry. How old the village is— was—is unknown.” She stopped to flip over a large, flat piece of debris.