Текст книги "Prophet of the Dead"

Автор книги: Richard Lee Byers

Соавторы: Richard Lee Byers
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Текущая страница: 14 (всего у книги 20 страниц)

7

Over the course of her long life, Yhelbruna had listened to countless messengers standing outside Witches’ Hall to request that she and her sisters attend the Iron Lord. Such callers were always respectful, but in subtle ways, their manner varied.

Generally, the messengers were extremely deferential, conveying that their master understood the hathrans would come if and when they pleased. But if a matter was urgent, and particularly if it pertained to the Iron Lord’s primary role as warlord, then his emissaries communicated that urgency. While still asking for assistance with all the rhetorical flourishes protocol required, they nonetheless made it clear that the Iron Lord expectedrepresentatives of the Wychlaran to attend him without delay.

The messenger that had arrived this afternoon had been of the latter variety. Still, Yhelbruna had expected to find Mangan Uruk inside the castle. Instead, he stood in the courtyard amid scurrying, shouting warriors, some of them his own personal retainers, others carrying shields painted with stags, snow tigers, and other totems of Immilmar’s berserker lodges.

Spying the half dozen hathrans entering through the gate, he waved to them. “Over here!”

The hathrans advanced, the warriors made way for them, and, when they reached him, Mangan bowed.

“What is all this?” Yhelbruna asked.

“I’ll let him tell you,” Mangan said. He held out his arm, and, its little brown-feathered body translucent in the winter sunlight, a wren fluttered down to light on his wrist.

Yhelbruna felt a pang of dismay. Despite all the distracting commotion, she ought to have sensed the presence of a spirit animal. It was one more indication that her mystical strength was waning.

“I am Rosesong!” chirped the wren. “I live in Belvata!”

“Yes,” Mangan said. “Please, tell the learned sisters what you told me.”

“I am Rosesong! I live in Belvata! Dead things came in the night! They killed men and women! They killed chickens and pigs! Hathran Yulzel sent me to fetch help! I am Rosesong! I live in Belvata!”

“Thank you, friend,” Mangan said. The phantom bird leaped off his wrist and fluttered up toward the battlements.

The Iron Lord then gave Yhelbruna a wry smile. “So you see, hathran, you were right. Whatever may have happened in the North Country, the threat from the ghouls and wraiths is notover, and I have to go end it once and for all. I’ll need witches to help me, and naturally, I’d like the aid of wise Yhelbruna most of all.”

She took another look around the crowded courtyard with its men tying bundles on braying donkeys; whining, sparking grinding wheels sharpening blades; and all the rest of its bustling, noisy preparations. “It looks like you’re taking every warrior you can lay your hands on.”

“As I said, we’re going to put an end to this menace as fast as possible, and the way to do that is to bring all our strength to bear.”

“I see the logic. But Belvata is a small village.” To be precise, it was a hamlet on the far side of the River Rasha a hundred miles to the south. “If a great host of undead raided it, how likely is it that anyone would have survived to send word?”

For a moment, a hint of something less cordial, a flicker of impatience, perhaps, showed through Mangan’s smile. “You listened to Rosesong. He’s a brave, loyal creature, but I doubt he has the wits to give us a more detailed explanation of what happened. Maybe only a few undead, scouts or foragers or whatever, turned up in Belvata. The fact remains that of late, no one has sighted any of the vile things anywhere else. Accordingly, I have to assume they’ve all moved south.”

Yhelbruna frowned. “That’s notas logical. What if-”

“Curse it!” Mangan exploded. “Enough of this!”

Startled for a moment, Yhelbruna could only stare, and in that instant, the Iron Lord appeared to realize he’d overstepped. He bowed a second time and far more deeply.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I revere the Wychlaran. I’ve spent my life serving you to the best of my ability. You know that.”

The apology, offered to placate an anger Yhelbruna hadn’t actually experienced, made her feel tired and lonely. Still, she replied with the austere composure Rashemen expected of her.

“But? You’ve already made it plain you have a grievance. You might as well go on and tell me what it is.”

Mangan took a breath. “As you wish. Before, I praised your wisdom. That was flattery, meant to quell any hard feelings that may have risen between us. The truth is, lately, you’ve been wrong at least as often as you’ve been right.”

“Tell me how.”

“I told you from the start that I could destroy the undead. It’s the Iron Lord’s responsibility, and the Wychlaran handed me the office, so your sisterhood must believe I can handle it. But you, hathran, insisted the spirits wanted me to sit by the fire while others, outlanders, mostly, fought my battles for me. And how did that work out? Folcoerr Dulsaer and his Aglarondans died. So, apparently, have Vandar Cherlinka and the Griffon Lodge, Aoth Fezim and his companions, and Dai Shan. The filthy Halruaans ended up trying to murder you and did kill others as they fled the city. Meanwhile, the undead are still roaming free, butchering folk who look to the Huhrong’s Citadel for protection!”

Yhelbruna didn’t know how to answer. It was an unaccustomed feeling and one she disliked. “I can’t deny the truth of any of that.”

“Then please, give me your blessing to go fight for Rashemen in the way I think best! Better still, come along and help!”

Well, why not?

As she’d just confessed, Mangan’s indictment of her was fair. Her plan for destroying the undead had failed. Indeed, now that none of her supposed champions remained, her scheme seemed not just wrongheaded but preposterous.

Perhaps the spirits no longer guided her decisions. Maybe she was simply imagining their promptings as she finally slipped into senescence, her mind and magic failing together.

But she didn’t feelsenile. And no one could deny that the wild griffons and their golden telthor leader were a miracle, a gift from the Three intended for a special purpose, and she and Vandar were the ones who’d brought them down from the High Country.

Besides, Mangan’s decision to take every available warrior and rush south just felt rash and reckless. Unfortunately, Yhelbruna could see she had no hope of talking him out of it and knew she’d reached the point where she could no longer command him. Her judgment in this matter was no longer credible, and other witches, maybe the very hathrans at her back, would speak up to countermand her orders.

The only thing Yhelbruna could control was her own actions. “I’m sure many of my sisters will march with you,” she said. “But I have other matters to which I must attend.”

Mangan sighed, and she sensed his mingled disappointment and disgust. “I understand, and I certainly wouldn’t want to take you away from anything important.” He shifted his gaze to the witches behind her. “Learned sisters, if any of youintend to come south and help the brave men who fight in your name, I could use your advice and magic starting right now.”

Yhelbruna had in effect been dismissed. That feeling too, was both unfamiliar and unwelcome, but circumstances obliged her to tolerate the disrespect. Rebuking the Iron Lord when he was in the midst of readying his troops for war would only make her look petty and petulant, childish in the erratic, snappish way of an addled old woman.

Afterward, restless, she wandered the snowy streets of Immilmar. Even with all the warriors at the citadel, and the excited little boys peering in the gate to observe as much of the muster as they could, no one could honestly say the rest of the town seemed deserted. A dog barked, the smell of baking bread wafted from a kitchen window, and, his hammer tapping, a carpenter replaced a plank on one of the bridges. Still, under the surface, Yhelbruna’s surroundings felt strange, desolate, or even ominous for no reason she could define.

Is it really all just me, she wondered, then scowled and doggedly told herself it wasn’t. She turned back toward the Witches’ Hall to attempt what she already sensed would prove to be yet another opaque if not nonsensical divination.

Cera stumbled along in a blur of misery, chiefly aware of the ragged, slimy touch of the dead men supporting her and the even filthier feeling of contamination inside her.

Then, however, she felt a release, like someone had lifted a crushing weight off her or removed strangling hands from her neck. The relief was only partial if not marginal, but it sufficed to quicken her thoughts.

Not wanting her captors to realize she had in any measure recovered, she glanced around through half-lowered eyelids. By the feeble greenish luminosity of a phantom floating along ahead of her, she discerned that the endless profusion of tombs and sarcophagi had given way to a more normal sort of tunnel.

Combined with the feeling of relief, the change in her surroundings revealed that she and her captors had just emerged from the deathways! And even through all the stone and earth that still separated her from its light, she could faintly sense the Yellow Sun above her. She felt like laughing and weeping at the same time and clenched herself lest she do either.

In due course, her captors marched her up to what she recognized as the entrance hall of the primary keep of the Fortress of the Half-Demon. The sooty opening where Jhesrhi had burned away the doors was unmistakable. So were the hacked and blasted bodies.

Some of the undead were outside in the courtyard amid a litter of those frozen corpses. Lod and Dai Shan were looking out the doorway and conversing, and Cera strained to eavesdrop on their conversation.

“How much of a problem are they likely to be?” the bone naga asked.

“I doubt the griffon can fly very far,” Dai Shan answered, “which means they won’t make it out of this wasteland quickly. Still, if the sagacious champion of the undead can see a way to complete his conquest expeditiously, it might be well to do so.”

“I can,” Lod replied, swaying. “The strategy Uramar devised is clever, and I came to Rashemen because I can move it along even faster. The Codex of Arauntcontains magic germane to the purpose.”

“But has anyone set the scheme in motion in the first place?” With a slight wave of his hand, Dai Shan indicated the bodies sprawled in the snow outside. “The learned prophet sees that circumstances here are as I reported. Your enemies took the Fortress of the Half-Demon, and it may be that Uramar and all his lieutenants lie among the slain.”

“I doubt it,” Lod said, “considering they had the option to retreat into the deathways when it became necessary. My judgment and instincts alike tell me we’ll find Uramar at Beacon Cairn.”

“I fervently hope so. Shall we go there, then?”

Cera realized that to “go there” would mean a return to the deathways, and in her brittle state, the prospect nearly maddened her. She struggled against the urge to try to yank away from the zombies and run.

“Yes,” said Lod, “but not quite yet. My folk fought a hard battle before we encountered you, and though we don’t suffer fatigue or pain exactly as mortals do, a period of recovery is still advisable. We’ll move on at midnight.”

“And-if the mighty and honorable naga lord will forgive me for seeking absolute clarity on the point-if I continue making myself useful, when the Eminence of Araunt rules Rashemen, I can take the wild griffons and depart in peace?”

“Of course,” said Lod, “I promise.”

With that, the undead began to make themselves at home, although they didn’t all simply flop down and rest. Lod slithered forth with half a dozen followers to explore the castle, scavenge equipment, and see if he did recognize any of the mangled corpses littering the battleground. Ghouls set about lighting a fire in a cold hearth and dragging goblin bodies close to it to thaw.

At which point, Cera’s guards hauled her away through the keep until they found what they evidently considered a suitable chamber. There, they dumped her on the cold, hard, grimy floor and withdrew, pulling the door shut behind them.

She told herself that where securing prisoners was concerned, the mute, dull-witted things could have learned a precaution or two from Halonya’s wyrmkeepers. But when she struggled and failed to clamber to her feet, she realized weakness was likely to hold her every bit as well as locks and iron bars.

But she couldn’t let it. Her desperate plan hadgotten Jhesrhi and her out of the deathways even if it had done so in about the most unfortunate way imaginable. Now they had to finish their escape.

On the far wall, stout shutters sealed windows scarcely wider than arrow loops. At a couple of points, lines of pale light showed where the ironbound wooden panels fit imperfectly against the stone.

Cera crawled forward. The trailing scraps of her torn mail scraped against the floor.

She couldn’t see precisely where the light shone down. There wasn’t enough of it to make a brighter spot amid the gloom. But she felt it when it touched her.

The sensation, however, was not what she’d anticipated. Ever since she was a little girl, even before she realized her calling, she’d loved the warm caress of sunlight. Now it stung, and she-or rather the pollution inside her-wanted to flinch from it like a parasitic grub squirming away from a healer’s forceps.

But she didn’t flinch. She stayed where she was and fixed her eyes on the luminous cracks, keeping them there even when her head began to throb.

I accept the pain, she thought. It’s like a cauterizing iron searing infection out of me. And while it does, I pray for my god to reveal himself.

The discomfort faded, and the gloom and the massive structure around her faded with it, until she was floating in a sky of flawless blue, gazing into the heart of the Yellow Sun. All around her, though she couldn’t actually see them, she had a sense of wheels meshing and turning one another with utter smoothness and regularity. It was like the world’s most accomplished dwarf artisans had assembled to build the largest, most intricate, and most finely crafted mill in all creation.

Gradually, Amaunator’s radiance warmed and cleansed her, and her perception of the perfect order that was as intrinsic to his nature as the daylight soothed her with the promise that all things, no matter how seemingly discordant, resolved themselves into harmony in the end. Her communion with him was so blissful that a part of her could have basked in it forevermore. But Jhesrhi needed her, and so, after a time, she mustered the will to abandon the rapture of pure contemplation for more practical concerns.

“I have to go back,” she breathed, “to bring more of your grace to the world, and for that, I need my magic. Please, help me.”

She felt a pulse of reassurance that, now that she was out of the dark maze and purged of the taint of incipient vampirism as well, she could channel the god’s power as readily as ever. Then she was back on the floor.

For a moment, she lay relaxed and almost mindlessly serene in the afterglow of her meditation. Then she realized the light leaking through the cracks was dimmer than before.

She didn’t know how long her trance had lasted, but obviously, long enough for the westering sun to travel some distance across the sky. It would be dark soon, and once it was, the undead would be more active and alert.

She tried to rise, and as before, found herself clumsy and feeble. Her communion with the Keeper had revitalized her spiritually but hadn’t restored the physical vigor exsanguination had cost her.

Because, she supposed, she could attend to that herself. She murmured a prayer and felt a warm tingling as light poured into the core of her and made her body glow from within. Inside the blood-spotted rents in her mail and the padding beneath, the fang marks dwindled and disappeared.

She tried again to stand and did so without difficulty. She crept to the door, pressed her ear against the panel, listened, and heard nothing. Unfortunately, that was no guarantee of safety. The undead were notoriously quiet. She took a breath, gripped the handle, and jerked the door open.

As she’d feared, one of the zombies that had tossed her into the room was still standing and staring at nothing just outside. She supposed she was lucky it wasn’t both of them, although she would have felt luckier still if she had a weapon, a shield, and intact armor, or, as long as she was wishing, Aoth and twenty stalwart Brothers of the Griffon surrounding her.

Because she didn’t, she hopped back as the dead man lurched around to face her and slashed with his sword. The cut fell short, and she swept her hand in an arc that evoked the sun’s path from horizon to horizon. “The Keeper grant you peace,” she said.

Golden light shone through the air, and the living corpse crumbled into dust. A bit of it wafted into Cera’s nose and made her want to sneeze. The creature’s blade clanked on the floor, and its brigandine thumped down with it.

Well, Cera thought, that worked out. Especially if no other creature had noticed the holy light flashing out the doorway or the noise the falling sword and leather armor had made.

Deeming it better than nothing even though her clerical training had only encompassed the use of a mace, she picked up the blade. Then she peeked out the door. To her relief, no other undead horror was shambling or floating in her direction. Not yet, anyway.

Now, where was Jhesrhi? Was it possible Lod’s followers had taken the same casual approach to imprisoning the mage that they had to containing Cera?

Perhaps. They’d apparently assumed Cera’s vampire bites rendered her helpless, and from listening to them talk, she knew they’d beaten Jhesrhi senseless after Dai Shan exposed her deception. They’d also placed the wizard in some sort of restraints. They might well believe she was helpless too.

If so, Jhesrhi might be nearby. The undead might not have felt the need to haul her back down to the dungeons and lock her up properly either.

Cera stepped out into the corridor and headed in the opposite direction from the spaces near the primary entrance where many of the undead were taking their ease. To her relief, most of the doors she came to were open, which made checking the various rooms easier, and the traces of light leaking in from outdoors at various points alleviated the gloom just enough for her to grope her way along.

But the feeble illumination didn’t reveal everything, and it was a sunlady’s instincts, not Cera’s eyes, that abruptly gave her a sense of insatiable hunger and boundless hatred rushing out of the dark.

She jumped back and said, “Amaunator!” The Keeper’s power flowed into the core of her, then streamed down her arm to set her stolen sword aglow.

The brightness revealed a ragged shadow with a twisted smudge of a face. The Keeper’s light balked it, but Cera suspected the magic would hold it back for only an instant. Then it would either come back on the attack or raise the alarm.

She hurriedly recited a prayer and tapped the shining sword against the floor. Some of the holy light leaped from the steel to the stone, surging outward from the point of contact to form first a circle and then rays emanating from it.

In an instant, the rays shot out far enough that the wraith was floating just above them. Assailed by the sun symbol’s power, the phantom convulsed and frayed away to nothing.

All right, Cera thought, panting, I had a guard outside my cell. Let’s see if the ghost was lurking here because it was keeping an eye on Jhesrhi.

She cautiously opened a closed door. Gagged with a metal contraption bolted around her head, her hands shackled behind her, the wizard lay on the floor.

Cera smiled with a jubilation that immediately gave way to concern when Jhesrhi failed to react to her appearance. The priestess hurried over to her friend and knelt down beside her.

Thanks be to the Keeper and all the kindly powers, Jhesrhi was still breathing, but that was about all that could be said. She was too profoundly unconscious to stir even when Cera spoke to her, and when the priestess gently lifted the lids of her amber eyes, the pupils were different sizes. Blood matted her hair, and her tawny skin was a patchwork of bruises, scrapes, and scratches. One leg bent between the knee and ankle, and, not content merely to shackle a mage’s wonder-working hands, the undead had broken every one of her fingers.

Cera recited a healing prayer, reached out to Amaunator for all the power she could draw, laid her hand on Jhesrhi’s shoulder, and sent the pure essence of life and health streaming into her stricken comrade’s body. A few of Jhesrhi’s contusions faded, and her leg shifted and clicked as it sought to mend the break. But the wizard didn’t wake.

Cera prayed a second time. Cuts closed and, with a soft but wince-inducing grinding, the fingers of Jhesrhi’s left hand straightened. But she still didn’t rouse.

Like every practitioner of the healing arts, Cera had learned early in her career that some hurts were beyond remedy, but by the Yellow Sun, these hurts were not going to be among them! She took several deep, slow breaths to center herself.

Then Dai Shan said, “I admire both the sunlady’s resilience and her devotion to her friend.”

Cera jerked around. The little Shou was standing in the doorway.

“Nonetheless,” he continued, “I must regretfully request that she distance herself from Lady Sir Jhesrhi and the sword as well.”

Instead, Cera snatched up the blade and scrambled to her feet. “Stay back,” she said.

“I wish I could, but such forbearance would be contrary to my interests. It’s beneficial for the sapient prophet of the dead to hear from others that I was of service, but it can only enhance his gratitude to observe my diligence on behalf of his cause firsthand. That’s why I came to check on you, and I trust he’ll be happy I did.”

“He won’t be grateful no matter what you do.”

Dai Shan slightly inclined his head. “That sad possibility has occurred to me. Still, at the moment, the mighty king of serpents represents the only possible path to the wild griffons. What can a sensible man do but walk it, at least until a better course reveals itself?”

Cera shook her head. “But you’ve seen the undead up close. You’ve felt how they poison the world just by being in it. How can you bring yourself to side with them?”

“The virtuous sunlady deems them wicked and unnatural, and who could refute her assessment? Yet dividing all things into good or evil, salubrious or abominable, is but one way of considering the world. Iclassify things according to whether they aid or hinder the interests of the House of Shan and my advancement within it.”

“On the inside, you’re like an undead yourself.”

“Whereas on the outside, the brave priestess is gripping her sole weapon in a way that bespeaks a lack of experience in its use. I promise that if you let it fall, I won’t hurt you any further, and neither, I think, will Lod, provided you freely answer his questions. He’s curious to learn all that a priestess of Faerun can-”

Cera threw the sword.

Dai Shan likely didn’t expect her to use it in such an unconventional fashion, but he had no difficulty contending with the inept attack. He flicked his hand and knocked the blade tumbling to the side.

In the instant that required, though, Cera called out to Amaunator, drew down more of his might, and stamped her foot. Another sun symbol flowered beneath it, the rays stabbing out across the floor. Dai Shan gasped and stiffened.

She rattled off a second spell, mimed the act of striking with a weapon, and as the sun symbol faded, a mace made of yellow glow burst into being. With a thought, she sent it flying at Dai Shan.

But as she did, she saw he was reciting too. Then the room went black, darkness smothering even the luminescence of her conjured weapon. She made the mace swing anyway, but it didn’t connect.

Dai Shan had dodged it, and suddenly, instinct screamed that, blind though she now was, Cera needed to change position. She stepped back and to the left, and something, the Shou’s fist or foot, no doubt, slammed into her side.

The impact hurt, sent the breath whooshing out of her, and knocked her stumbling. If it had caught her squarely, or landed on a spot her torn mail didn’t cover anymore, it likely would have crippled her or worse.

She brought her conjured mace streaking back across the room for another blind attack. As it missed, she heard Dai Shan murmur two words in a language she didn’t recognize, a Shadow tongue, perhaps, and then sensed it when he snatched the magical weapon out of the air and snapped it like a twig.

Once again, though, at least the product of one spell had occupied him long enough for her to gasp out another. Light glowed from her right hand to counter the darkness he’d summoned and restore her sight.

Unfortunately, she could discern little cause for hope in what vision revealed. She was certain the power of the sun symbol had in some measure hurt Dai Shan, but no one could tell it from the smooth, subtle way he eased closer. Meanwhile, her side was throbbing, and when she twisted the wrong way, an even fiercer pain ripped through her.

She retreated, and, still in no hurry, he came after her. She realized he was backing her into a corner.

She raised her hands to face level as though to fend him off. Perhaps they, and the light shining from the right one, would keep him from observing her mouth was moving.

Alas, no. Evidently realizing she was whispering a spell, he lunged, faked a punch to the stomach that drew her guard down, then smashed the true attack into her face. She reeled, and suddenly the whole world seemed to ring like a giant bell, although simultaneously, everything was utterly silent.

Still, she forced out the last word of her incantation. The rays of another sun symbol flared out across the floor.

She discovered she hadn’t lost her hearing after all when Dai Shan stiffened and made a little grunting sound. After that, though, he seized her and tumbled her off her feet. Spinning around behind her, he pressed his forearm into her throat and choked her.

“The valiant sunlady should take pride in her prowess,” he said as she pawed in a futile attempt to break his hold. “Had we begun our contest at opposite ends of a sunlit field, the outcome might have been different. But close quarters and darkness favored me.”

Cera’s head swam, and the chamber grew dimmer. Until Jhesrhi’s body burst into flame, and the willowy mage started to struggle to her feet.

Because Amaunator’s magic was not merely potent but versatile. Channeled in the proper form, like the sun symbols, it could smite foes and revive friends simultaneously, and, to maximize her chances of surviving a fight against a strong and cunning adversary, Cera had so evoked it.

Startled or at least distracted, Dai Shan eased the pressure on Cera’s throat, and she sucked in a breath. The Shou thrust out one arm at Jhesrhi and murmured the first word of an incantation. Dark streaks ran through his outstretched hand as though the bones were in some sense glowing through the skin, but radiating shadow instead of light.

Cera jammed her head backward into his jaw. She was no brawler and felt at once that she hadn’t connected hard or squarely. But the impact sufficed to make him stumble over his recitation, and the shadow power accumulating inside his hand dissipated with the attack uncast.

Jhesrhi finished clambering up, and, with a roar, her halo of flame flared hotter. As Cera cringed, the wizard’s shackles and gag softened and sagged like dough. She stripped away the manacles, then jerked off the cruel-looking device that had cut the corners of her mouth, and finally spit out a stray bit of red-hot metal.

Fortunately, that burst of hotter fire lasted only a moment; Cera doubted she could have endured its searing proximity much longer. As it subsided, Jhesrhi swayed.

Dai Shan sprang up and rushed her. Evidently he was willing to risk punching or kicking through the weaker flame that still shrouded her slender form, if that was what it took to strike her down.

Cera swung her arm backward to trip the merchant as he dodged around her. But he sprang over her out-flung limb and charged onward.

Jhesrhi recited, and fresh blood trickled from her raw mouth. She gestured with swollen, crooked fingers. Meanwhile, she retreated, one step, two, and then her back was against the wall.

Dai Shan plunged into striking distance. His hand leaped, but then a red spark streaked at him as well. A dazzling, booming blast of flame engulfed both him and Jhesrhi.

When the flash faded, Cera, blinking, saw the sellsword was unharmed. Whereas what remained of Dai Shan lay burning on the floor.

Jhesrhi rounded on Cera. She raised her hands as though she meant to cast another spell.

“It’s Cera!” the priestess gasped. “Aoth and I are together! You remember!”

Jhesrhi faltered. “Yes. Sorry!”

“Don’t be.” Sucking in a hissing gasp at a fresh twinge in her side, Cera rose. “You saved us. Well, partly. Let me finish healing you so you can do the rest.”

“You’re all blistered, and your nose is broken.”

Cera wished the wizard hadn’t mentioned any of that, for now she felt those pains too. “It’s not important. Just stifle your halo of flame.”

Now that Jhesrhi was conscious, it wouldn’t do to administer the Keeper’s healing grace via a touch. The sellsword couldn’t bear it. But Cera wanted to get as close as possible.

Jhesrhi frowned as though the request warranted suspicion. But then she gave her head a little shake, and her cloak of flame vanished. She circled around Dai Shan’s still-burning body to meet Cera in the center of the room.

Cera drew down more of Amaunator’s light and, with an arcing gesture of benediction, sent it shining into the wizard’s body. Scratches and bruises faded.

Then zombie warriors appeared in the doorway, while a luminous phantom flowed through the wall beside it. The booms of the fiery blasts Jhesrhi had conjured had no doubt brought them rushing to investigate.