The Killing Song Part 26

Ekhaas's song ended. The katalarash sang alone.

"No," breathed Dandra. She spun around. "No! Ekhaas!"

"Geth! Now!"

It was the signal he'd been waiting for. Geth let out all of the fear and fury he'd held back and forced it into a roar as he leaped at Dah'mir.

Dah'mir swung around to meet him with ma.s.sive teeth exposed-and a part of Geth wondered just what he thought he was doing. Even if the power poured into him by the Master of Silence had been leeched away, Dah'mir was still a dragon.

Too late for doubts. The day he thought before charging into something would probably be the day he died. Geth threw himself right at the dragon's muzzle and swung Wrath hard.

It was a bad blow. The byeshk blade tore a line along the spined frill below Dah'mir's chin, cutting skin without doing real damage. That didn't matter. Dah'mir bellowed and his head jerked up in reaction to the injury. Geth dived in underneath the dragon's body, aiming for his real target: the Khyber dragonshard embedded in Dah'mir's chest. A lucky blow had shattered the shard there once before and forced Dah'mir to flee.

Geth gritted his teeth, wrapped both hands around Wrath's hilt, and swung.

But Dah'mir hadn't forgotten his vulnerability either. With an angry hiss, the dragon reared up away from the attacker under his chest. Geth's swing swept through air. Dah'mir's claw, sweeping in from the side, didn't.

The ma.s.sive talons found his gauntlet before they found his body. They raked across the magewrought steel with a terrible sc.r.a.ping sound, but caught only the fabric of Geth's clothing. The blow was still powerful enough to lift him up and hurl him back. He hit the wall of the cavern just beside the stones and glittering mortar of the ancient Gatekeeper seal. Pain broke through his shifting-dull across his back, sharp in his gauntleted arm, very sharp in his side. Every breath stabbed him.

He blinked back the bright haze of agony. Across the cavern, Dandra was closing on Medala. In the other direction, Ekhaas still sang, matching the song of the katalarash though she kept one eye on Dah'mir. Unfortunately, it seemed that Geth had all of the dragon's attention. Dah'mir crouched back down. "Why am I cursed with you?" he howled at Geth.

The shifter spat-blood hit the stone of the cavern floor-and thrust himself upright with a snarl. "We get the enemies we deserve." He lifted his voice. "I could use some help!"

From the far side of the cavern, arcane words hissed on the air. Fire burst over Dah'mir's back in a spray of orange flame. The dragon roared and twisted around. Past him, Geth saw Singe, wisps of magic still rising from his fingers. The wizard's face seemed strangely distorted, not least by cold anger. "Keeper take you, Dah'mir!" he shouted.

The dragon's head whipped between the two of them as if deciding who to vent his rage at first-then the decision was taken away from him. Up on the ledge where the Gatekeepers had taken shelter, a white-haired figure leaning heavily on a hunda stick rose. The hand that Batul held out trembled, but his voice was strong. "Nature rejects you, servant of madness! Your time is at an end." His hand rose higher and he spoke a word that swirled in the air.

The swirl grew into a sudden howl of wind. It lifted small rocks and dust from the cavern floor and whirled them around Dah'mir, battering and tearing at him. The dragon fell back, eyes clenched shut against the storm, his ma.s.sive head shaking like a dog's. Singe loosed his spell, and another bolt of flame forced Dah'mir further around.

Up on the ledge, Batul turned and looked down at Geth. "Your sword!" he shouted. "Strike now!"

Geth looked down at Wrath. The purple-black byeshk of the Dhakaani weapon had begun to glow with a twilight radiance, like an ember fanned by the wind of Batul's magic. Dhakaani weapons and Gatekeeper magic had together won the ancient Daelkyr War, the old druid had told him. And Ekhaas had once said that Wrath had been forged to be wielded by the heroes of Dhakaan fighting alongside Gatekeepers.

He remembered the same radiance glowing in the blade when he'd driven it into Dah'mir before. Clenching his teeth against the pain of his injuries, Geth pushed himself away from the wall and sprinted for the dragon.

Dah'mir heard him coming. His acid-green eyes opened against the wrath of Batul's spell and he snapped at Geth, neck stretching out. Geth dropped and slid under the clashing jaws. Batul's spell tore at him as well, scouring shifting-toughened skin, but he ignored it as he ignored the pain in his side. Dah'mir tried to rear up the way he had before- He was too slow. Geth rolled to his feet and, in one smooth motion that had all of his strength and weight behind it, swung Wrath against the shard in the dragon's chest.

The glowing sword bit through scales and cut deep into flesh. Dark, hot blood burst out, sizzling on Wrath and spraying across Geth's face. The Dhakaani blade hit the dragonshard-and shattered it.

It seemed to Geth that a final spark of black lightning escaped from the shattered shard and darted away past the great seal, like some last remnant of the Master of Silence's power returning to him. Dah'mir let out a choking cough. His forelegs curled toward Geth as if to sc.r.a.pe him away. The shifter leaned against Wrath and rocked the sword back and forth, forcing the forked tip deeper into the dragon's flesh. On one of Dah'mir's forelegs, a red Eberron shard embedded in the scales flared as if burning from the inside out-just as Wrath cut into something deep in Dah'mir's body.

The flare in the burning red dragonshard turned dark as ash. Wrath leaped in Geth's grasp, momentarily caught by the pulsing of a powerful muscle. Geth tightened his grip and wrenched the sword free in another shower of blood and fragments of blue-black crystal.

Dah'mir staggered once, and toppled over just below the ledge where Batul and the other Gatekeepers stood. Ekhaas cried out and leaped for safety. Geth just watched as Dah'mir's head bounced on the stones of the cavern floor, his dead eyes staring through the Gatekeeper seal and into the throne room of the master who had abandoned him.

"No! Ekhaas! Keep singing! Keep singing!"

Dandra's shout dragged Geth around, and for a moment, he just stared at the katalarash as she leaped to join them on the cavern floor. Her hands were stained with blood and Medala's corpse lay impaled where she had- Then his mind grasped what his ears were already telling him.

Ekhaas's countersong had stopped. The katalarash sang alone. His gut leaped. He raised his sword and forced his gauntleted arm up in spite of the pain within it. Not that they would do him much good. There were sixteen katalarash up there. Sixteen heirs to the madness and power of Medala and Virikhad. "Ekhaas!" he called over his shoulder.

It was too late. The song of the katalarash was falling apart. They raised their heads, individuals once more, and looked around. One by one, their eyes found Medala's body and Dandra's spear transfixing her. Geth thought he could guess what they were thinking. The woman who had controlled them was gone. The dragon who had kidnapped them was gone. The daelkyr who had brought about their creation was, if not gone, then at least forced back into his prison.

The katalarash were free to do whatever they wanted.

The old woman who had been the second katalarash to awaken-to be reborn-lifted her head from Medala's corpse and her gaze settled on Ekhaas.

"It's quiet," she said.

Her body crumpled to the floor All of the other katalarash crumpled with her. For a long moment, Geth didn't dare to breathe and no one dared to move. Finally, Dandra rose from the ground and slid cautiously forward, reaching out to touch the old woman.

"Dead," she said in amazement.

"No," said a voice from above. Geth turned toward it. The young kalashtar man who had appeared with Singe and Dandra was on his feet, unsteady but supported by Ashi. Their right and left hands were bound together, the amulet of Vvaraak dangling from them. Ashi's face was pale. The young man's eyes looked like he had seen something terrible. His mouth twitched. "Free."

CHAPTER.

26.

Then Dah'mir was actually right?" Geth asked. "Something was wrong and they did wake too quickly?"

Dandra shook her head, her black hair shimmering in the pale light of one of the Gatekeepers' reed torches. "I don't know. Maybe there was something in Medala and Virikhad's control that brought the kalashtar minds back before they had the strength to hold onto them. Maybe Ekhaas's countersong eased their madness to the point that when the song ended, they were able to let themselves die. Maybe Dah'mir simply didn't understand how the bracers would interact with Taruuzh's binding stones."

"Dah'mir knew what he was doing," Singe said grimly. "We should be thankful Medala and Virikhad tried to take control. The bracers worked." His jaw tightened. "I felt them work."

Dandra's hand reached over and took Singe's hand as they walked. She didn't say anything and neither did the wizard.

Geth looked away from them and up the tunnel ahead. Beyond the darkness, there was a patch of brightness-the mouth of the mound and the gray light that came before dawn. He felt an urge to race ahead and throw himself out into clean air beneath open skies.

They'd stayed in the seal cavern no longer than they had to, but they'd still been there longer than he would have liked. Batul had reclaimed the amulet of Vvaraak and the weary Gatekeepers had done what they'd entered the mound to do: reinforce the magic that bound the Master of Silence. No one had asked if Singe's trick with the binding stone had destroyed the daelkyr. Geth was certain that if the Master of Silence was dead, they'd know.

The binding stones that had been in the bracers worn by the kidnapped kalashtar had been crushed and mixed into new mortar for the seal, just as the ancient druids had crushed Taruuzh's stones after the long ago Battle of Moths. Singe had stripped the kalashtar's psicrystals out of the bracers. Moon carried them now in a pouch that he bore with silent solemnity. There had been some debate over what to do with the remains of the kalashtar and of the Gatekeepers who had fallen under Medala's attack. No one wanted to leave them in a place tainted by Xoriat, but no one had the strength to carry them back to the surface.

Dandra had tapped into the last reserves of her psionic power and called up the droning chorus of whitefire. The bodies of the victims and heroes of Dah'mir's schemes burned in flames so tightly controlled that it hurt to look at the them, but that spread no heat beyond their confines. Ekhaas had stood over them and sung a dirge that soared louder than even the killing song had.

Medala's body and Dah'mir's had received no such respect. They left them where they had fallen, though each of the Gatekeepers had solemnly taken a trophy from Dah'mir's body-a sliver of the Khyber shard that had been in the dragon's chest and that Wrath had shattered. After a moment, Singe had knelt and taken two of the slivers as well, pa.s.sing one to Dandra. She'd accepted it in silence. Ekhaas had taken a sliver too, then Ashi and even Moon.

Geth had been the last to take one of the blue-black fragments. He'd squatted down by Dah'mir's head and looked into the staring, acid-green eyes, but he hadn't even been able to think of anything to say. He just felt ... empty.

The walk back up through the tunnels from the seal cavern had been eerily silent. There was no sign of the dolgrims. Not a claw in the shadows, not a mutter in the darkness. Partway up, words had finally come to Geth, and he'd begun talking to fill the silence. Singe had joined in and soon they were all talking, describing in hushed tones what had happened on the Shadow Marches, in Sharn, through the days since they'd seen one another last. It was a strangely familiar feeling, one Geth remembered from long-ago mercenary days-walking away from a battle, voices low, working through the b.l.o.o.d.y chaos of what had just happened. Sometimes victory took time to sink in.

Sometimes it just needed another person's excitement to tip it over the edge. A form moved against the bright mouth of the mound as they approached it and a shout rang out. Geth heard the words through Wrath, but he would have known the emotion in any language. "They're alive!"

They emerged from the mound to a roar that shook the moons in the sky. Hands seized the Gatekeepers as soon as they emerged and hauled them away into a crowd of jubilant orcs. News of the defeat of Dah'mir, Medala, and the Master of Silence leaped like fire through the horde and another roar rose up.

"Singe! Dandra! Geth!" Orshok and Natrac burst out of the crowd. Natrac looked like he'd shed half his years. Orshok flung himself at Geth and threw both arms around him.

The enthusiastic embrace sent pain lancing through Geth's still injured side and arm, but it was no match for the exhilaration that finally surged in him. Geth howled into Orshok's face and crushed him back.

It took some time before they made it out of the horde and Natrac led them to where the airship floated, a rope ladder dangling over her side and down to the ground. As they approached, two figures rose to meet them. Singe felt his stomach knot at the sight of one of them. Geth, one arm still over Orshok's shoulders, bared his teeth. "Mithas, you slimy toadstool."

The sorcerer stood firm. "I have a debt to collect."

A growl grew out of Geth's throat. "The only thing you're going to collect is bruises. Why don't you just start running for Sharn now?"

"Geth." Ashi put a dragonmarked hand on the shifter's arm. She turned to face Mithas. "It's over. Anyone who could be safe is. You kept your word. I keep mine." She stood straight. "Take me to the lords of Deneith."

Singe groaned. "Ashi ..."

The hunter shook her head. "It's my honor, Singe. And Deneith is my clan." She looked around at the mound and the fading remains of the Bonetree camp and touched the sword at her side. "It's time for me to learn more about them."

The smile of greed that spread across Mithas's face would have shamed a miser. He sneered at Singe and Geth, then grabbed for the rope ladder and climbed up toward the airship.

The half-elf woman who had risen with him waited until he was about halfway up and began casually shaking the ladder. Mithas yelped and cursed as he swayed back and forth, but she didn't relent and he climbed the rest of the way at a timid pace. Natrac gave her a thin smile. "I like you more every time I see you, Benti. That's not something I'd often say about a king's agent."

Singe saw Geth's eyebrows rose high in surprise, but he doubted that it could be any greater than the surprise he felt himself. A king's agent? He looked at Natrac, then at Dandra. "There's something you didn't tell us," he said.

Natrac held out his hand, gesturing in introduction. "Singe, Geth, meet Benti Morren, as she chooses to be known-agent of the King's Citadel of Breland." His smile filled out as Singe and Geth gaped in amazement. "I wondered when she helped me escape from Biish if she was more than she seemed to be. After Dandra saved her, she was a little more open with information."

Benti bent her head in response to their stares. "The Citadel has had its eye on Biish's gang for some time. When word circulated that he was looking for someone with the Mark of Storm, the Citadel used the opportunity to put me in place within the gang." Her lips curved very slightly. "I don't think they expected this. My report should be received with interest."

Singe felt a fury rise within him. "You were at the helm of Dah'mir's airship. You were going to fly off with the kalashtar!"

Benti's expression tightened in response. "No. I found out what was really happening-what I thought was really happening-too late to stop the raid. I was going to take the kalashtar to safety and place Vennet in custody, but when he dragged you onto the deck, I tried to intercede and-" Her voice stopped in her throat as color rushed into her cheeks.

And Vennet, Singe knew, had thrown her over the side.

Dandra took his arm. "When we told her what was really happening, she helped us. I told you that she got us the second airship." She tilted her head up toward the vessel. "This just isn't so much stolen as commandeered."

Singe stared at her and then turned his gaze on Benti. His belly twisted-and the twist turned into a sharp laugh. He shook his head in disbelief. "An agent of the Citadel." He sighed. "I imagine you're going to have some explaining to do about the airship."

Benti's nose wrinkled. "Which is why I need to get her back. We should be going." The half-elf turned and put one foot on the ladder, stilling the shivering ropes with an expert touch. She looked at Ashi. "I know you're going back to Sharn. Anyone else?"

Moon stood forward immediately. "Me." Benti nodded.

Singe looked at the others-and they looked at him and one another. After a moment, Natrac said, "If you're going by way of Zarash'ak, I'll take a ride there."

"Not back to Sharn?" Benti asked. "Biish is gone. There will be a vacuum in Malleon's Gate."

Natrac thrust out his tusks. "Host and Six, no. I've had enough with Sharn." His eyes gleamed. "Besides, I think Zarash'ak could use a new arena."

"I'll go with you to Sharn," said Ekhaas. "It's closer to Darguun than the Shadow Marches. The other duur'kala will have a new story to sing."

Singe winced. "Is everyone going to know what we did?"

Ekhaas's ears twitched forward. "Shouldn't they?"

He let his breath out through his teeth and looked at Dandra. "Sharn?" he asked. "You could go back to Fan Adar."

"I could." She met his eyes. "Will you go back to the Blademarks?"

"I could," he said-and smiled. "But I don't think I will, and Sharn's as good a place to make my resignation as any."

Dandra raised her chin. "Settle our affairs and move on from there?"

Singe looked at her and felt his heart burn. "Twelve b.l.o.o.d.y moons, I love you," he said. He turned to Geth. "What about you?"

The shifter shook his head. "Sharn's not for me."

"Back to Bull Hollow?" asked Dandra.

He shook his head again. Orshok spoke up. "You'd be welcome to stay with the Fat Tusk tribe. You're a hero again, Geth."

Geth's face twisted. "Grandfather Rat, enough of that! I know where I'm going." He stepped back and nodded to all of them. "Safe journey," he said and turned away.

Dandra drew breath to call something after him, but Singe caught her before she could. "Let him go," he said.

EPILOGUE.

The harsh light of morning reflected off the snow. There were no shadows; light just made more light-icy blue in the dimples of footsteps, white where it flashed on the ice crystals drifting in the air. Geth could recall a spot, high up on the walls that loomed above, where it had once been possible to stand on such a morning and look out for leagues across clear sky, perfect snow, and frozen forest.

Once, the shifter thought, but not now. He reached up, pulled the furry cap from his head, and bared his teeth. His breath streamed away into the Karrnathi winter.

There was a memorial taking place within the walls of Narath, marking ten years to the day that the town had burned and its people had died. Geth didn't want to be at the memorial. He'd slipped into the town late last night and slipped out again early. The room he'd found had been in an inn he didn't know, but he didn't know most of the buildings in the town-almost all of them had been built within the last ten years. The innkeeper was no one he knew either. Like its buildings, much of Narath's population had been there less than ten years, arriving as the town grew back into itself.

It was hard to avoid signs of the ma.s.sacre, though. The town and its people might seem new, but the people of Karrnath had old memories. Shrines in the town held heaped skulls and walls of stacked bones. Every old building showed charred timbers. Every new building had a bit of burned wood fixed like a talisman above the door. In many places, the scorch marks of a raging fire still stained the town's walls. And there were monuments. Statues. Pillars. Markers. Stone. Rough wood. Dedicated to victims. Dedicated to heroes.

Geth had expected a plaque fixed to the wall. He hadn't expected a whole bronze statue. Raised up on a plinth, a muscular man stood in a pose of heroic defense, his thick hair curling like a lion's mane, his eyes fixed defiantly into the distance. In one hand, he held a heavy sword. With the other, he gripped the severed head of an Aundairian raider.

Had the sculptor known or was it just an ironic coincidence?

Wreaths of flowers had been laid in memorial at the base of the plinth in some earlier ceremony, laid carefully around the dedication plaque to leave it clear.

Coron Balich. Defender of Narath, true son of Karrnath. Betrayed by a coward. Died a hero, Olarune 4, 989 YK. May his sacrifice inspire generations.

Geth dropped to his knees in the snow and closed his eyes. In his memory, Coron leaped forward to meet the charging raiders and was brutally hamstrung. In his memory, one of the raiders grabbed a handful of Coron's black curls, jerked his head back, and raised a heavy knife. In his memory, Geth charged without thinking.