The Killing Song Part 3

"I didn't say that exactly ..."

Batul shook his head. "But you said it nearly enough, didn't you? Geth, you're impulsive, but I know you think more than that."

Something flickered in the back of Geth's mind, the fleeting shadow of curiosity. He looked at the old druid sharply. "What are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about being aware of what you do. Have you felt the excitement in the camp?"

Geth nodded and Batul smiled. "Incredible, isn't it? Warriors arrive in the camp and fall into the horde as if they've been sharing a fire for days. The council is nearly ready to make a decision and getting a dozen Gatekeepers to agree on dinner usually takes weeks of debate. We'll march soon, I think." His good eye flickered in the firelight. "If I were you," he added, "I wouldn't let anyone else know how much Wrath lets you understand."

Batul's soft tones vanished before Geth could even nod again. "Here," he announced and stopped.

They stood before a large tent. Unlike the others in the horde camp, it stood on its own, separated from its nearest neighbors by five paces of open ground on all sides. Two guards whose stony faces clearly indicated that they wanted to be somewhere else stood guard at the tent flap. Their presence, however, wasn't the only protection for the tent. Two birds-one a hawk, the other a crow, both probably bound to druids of the council-perched on the roof pole. The outside of the tent had been painted with symbols, and the ring of empty ground planted with carved poles bearing strings of bones, stones, and feathers. Some of the symbols on the tent and poles were similar to those on the stones of his collar. Symbols to repel or contain the power of the Gatekeepers' enemies.

Unlike other tents and huts in the camp, a lamp burned inside the painted tent, casting a glow on the walls. Whoever was inside needed light to see.

Batul pa.s.sed by the guards and lifted the tent flap. "I'm sorry to disturb you," he said through the gap, "but there are people you must see." He gestured for Geth to enter. The shifter ducked past the flap-and cursed, tearing Wrath free of its sheath and trying to fling himself back so fast he stumbled into Ekhaas.

Seated on a low sleeping platform, a kalashtar woman looked up at him with empty eyes. Her face was worn and thin, its angles as sharp as an over ground knife blade. Her hair, shot through with gray, was bound back and she wore an orc's rough clothes. The last time Geth had seen her, she had been wearing the filthy remains of a fine dress and her hair been matted and wild-and she had been wracking him with pain using nothing more than the power of her mind.

"Medala!" he snarled. He pulled himself away from Ekhaas and dropped into a defensive crouch, Wrath pointed at Dah'mir's mad servant. His heart was thundering in his chest. He heard Orshok cry out as well and managed to find words in a dry throat. "This isn't possible. You're dead."

"I wish I were," Medala said. Her voice, though grating and hoa.r.s.e, was as empty as her eyes.

Batul put a hand on Geth's shoulder. "She's the one who warned us about the Master of Silence. A little less than a month ago, hunters from Fat Tusk found her wandering the marshes, starving. They brought her to me."

"She's dangerous, Batul! She almost killed both of us."

"The symbols around the tent hold what's left of her power in check, Geth," Batul said calmly.

Medala gave a bitter laugh. "Be at ease, shifter. I could no more touch your mind now than I could touch the Ring of Siberys."

She rose. Geth tensed, but she made no further move. Medala had been a tall woman, but her frame had become gaunt and hunched. "When Dandra unleashed Virikhad's mad mind against me, he and I fought for control of my body the only way we could." She touched her forehead. "With our wills and our psionic powers. You saw us vanish and thought us dead, but that was Virikhad's doing. He had powers over s.p.a.ce and he flung us ... elsewhere."

A shudder shook her body, but she smiled grimly. "My powers are over the mind. I was stronger. I was returned to the place where I had been-the Bonetree mound, though your battle with Dah'mir was long over. My battle with Virikhad, however, had broken Dah'mir's hold over me. I fled with one thought in my shattered mind: revenge on Dah'mir and his master." She was trembling and her voice rose. "Would you deny me that, Geth? I know from Dandra's mind that revenge was what you sought when you came to the Shadow Marches. Will you not let me take my revenge on the evil that broke me?"

Geth stared at her trembling form in shock. Batul touched his shoulder, pushing him toward the flap and out of the tent. "Sit," the old orc said to Medala. "Be at ease. You'll have your revenge. The Master of Silence will be stopped."

Eyes focused on nothing visible, Medala nodded and folded back down onto the sleeping platform. Geth didn't look away from her until Batul had herded Orshok and Ekhaas out of the tent as well and pulled the tent flap closed after himself-then Geth swallowed. "She's still mad, isn't she?"

Batul gestured for them to follow him away from the tent. "I don't think she could ever be sane again," he said, "but when she told me about the Master of Silence, how could I ignore her? I summoned other Gatekeepers to council, and the horde was called." The druid spread his hands. "And now you bring news to confirm what she says."

"Do you trust her?" asked Ekhaas.

Batul turned to the hobgoblin. "No more than I have to," he said. "But she's powerless. The daelkyr are the Gatekeepers' ultimate enemy. If Medala can help us ensure that one remains sealed in his prison, then she is our ally." He glanced from Ekhaas to Geth. "What about you?" he asked. "You've delivered your message. Are you going to stay for the fight?"

Geth looked at the tent. He could see Medala's silhouette-broken by the protective symbols painted on the tent wall-against the glow of her lamp. Once again, a nagging doubt flickered in his mind. He wished Dandra were there. She knew Medala, and he was certain she would have been able to tell if her l.u.s.t for revenge was real. It certainly seemed to have the ring of truth to him.

But Batul was right. The Gatekeepers' ancient duty took priority over lingering suspicion. If Adolan had been there, Geth knew what he would have done-and he knew he couldn't do any less. The shifter drew a deep breath. "We'll stay," he said. He bared his teeth. "We'll fight!"

A broad smile spread across Batul's wrinkled face. "I knew you would."

He turned away and flung up his arms, shouting something in Orc. All around them, warriors let out a cheer and crowded around. Mugs of ale and gaeth'ad were thrust forward. Hands slapped at their shoulders and backs. Ekhaas looked startled. Orshok looked ecstatic. Geth grabbed Wrath, trying to catch the end of Batul's cries.

"The hero of the raid on the Bonetree fights with us!"

The roar that erupted was deafening. A rushing excitement, an antic.i.p.ation that he hadn't felt in a long time filled Geth. He drew Wrath and raised it high. The roar of the horde redoubled, and he let himself fall into it.

CHAPTER.

5.

The door to the apartment was locked, of course, but Tetkashtai had a trick of unlocking it with a thread of vayhatana. Dandra knew the trick too. She concentrated, spun out the invisible force with her mind just so, and the lock responded with a click. The door swung open. Dandra clenched her jaw and stepped across the threshold. Entering the apartment she had only ever seen previously as a psicrystal around Tetkashtai's neck was even stranger than walking the streets of Sharn. The familiar surroundings seemed smaller, out of proportion. Dim, naturally. She raised the shade of the everbright lantern that was on the table. A musty odor hung in the air and it took her a moment to decide-because there had been no sense of smell as a psicrystal-that it didn't belong there. She crossed the room and pushed open the windows. Fresh air and the scent of rain blew in.

The others entered behind her, Natrac shaking off his cowl, Ashi sputtering as she stripped off the wet scarf that clung to her face. "I don't understand," she said. "What happened out there? Why did it seem like they didn't want us to know what was wrong with Erimelk?"

Singe was the last one through the door, and he closed it quickly behind himself before Ashi's voice could carry. "I think it seemed like they didn't want us to know because they really didn't want us to know." Water dripped from his hair and pulled his beard down into a point. "Who is this Nevchaned, Dandra?" His lips twitched. "Or should I call you Tetkashtai?"

The name made her flinch. "No, you shouldn't," she said. "Light of il-Yannah, I knew as soon as the words were out my mouth that it was a bad idea. It just seemed so easy at the time."

"It was a good idea," said Natrac. "They know Tetkashtai. If these people are as insular as you say, maybe they'll say things around her they won't say around us."

"So we're going to start out by lying to people we want to be our allies? Il-Yannah, I lied about Medala and Virikhad too." Dandra tried to cover her frustration at herself by going to the cupboard where Tetkashtai and the other kalashtar had kept some towels. Like the apartment, they were musty, but at least they were dry. She pa.s.sed them around.

"Nevchaned is a weaponsmith," said Dandra. "He made her ... my spear." She touched the weapon strapped across her back. "He's also one of the kalashtar elders."

The wizard's eyes widened slightly. "Ah," he said. "So maybe not one of the best people to start off lying to."

"No," Dandra agreed. She shook her head. "I've fought Dah'mir, Tzaryan Rrac, Hruucan, dolgaunts, dolgrims, and Bonetree hunters-why does facing my own people feel more terrifying than any of them?"

Singe gave her wan smile. "Remind me to tell you about my family some day."

"The idea of facing House Deneith scares me," said Ashi. Dandra twisted her head to look at the hunter. "I used to be worried that they wouldn't accept a hunter of Shadow Marches, or that they would find that I had no Deneith blood at all and I would be left without a clan. Now I worry what will happen when the time comes that they find out about this." Ashi traced a finger down one cheek and along the line of her jaw, following the vibrant pattern of her dragonmark.

"If you don't like the way Deneith treats you, you'll always have a place with us," said Dandra.

Ashi raised an eyebrow. "Then why do you worry what the kalashtar will think of you?" she asked. "You have a place here too. Aren't we your people?"

Dandra stared at her. Aren't we your people? She had Tetkashtai's memories of the kalashtar of Sharn, of Medalashana as her best friend and Virikhad as her lover-but she felt closer by far to the men and women who had stood by her side over the last months than she did to any kalashtar. Her mouth twitched and a smile escaped her. "You're always surprising me when I least suspect it, Ashi. Thank you."

"The broshamas of the Bonetree held the wisdom of the clan," Ashi said, answering her smile, "but I would have been huntmaster if I hadn't turned against Dah'mir, and a huntmaster needs her own wisdom to see what's in the hearts of the clan."

Singe stepped back from Dandra and shook his head. "Ashi, I think I'll almost pity House Deneith if they try to tame you. They aren't going to know what they're getting."

Dandra's smile turned into a laugh, and she struck out at the wizard with a cry of mock outrage. He caught her blow on his arm, but let out a hiss of very real pain. He twisted his arm, and Dandra winced as she saw the pink of rain-diluted blood on his wet sleeve. "Sorry."

"It's where Erimelk grabbed me." Singe loosened the laces at the cuffs of his shirt and pulled back the sleeve. "Twelve moons! Look at that!"

His skin was marked by two red handprints, the skin bruised and broken in innumerable fine p.r.i.c.ks, as if someone had beaten him with a bristles of a stiff brush. Singe looked at her. "Was that some kind of psionic power?"

She nodded. "I've seen something similar. It's a little bit like the long step, but used as a weapon-under the psion's touch, tiny portions of matter or flesh are displaced in s.p.a.ce. It's a weak power, but it can do a lot of damage."

"It hurt a lot," Singe complained. He wiped at the red marks with a towel, but the rain had washed away all but a tint of blood. There wasn't even an open wound. Singe cursed again. "Why would a scribe have a power like that?"

Dandra frowned. "I didn't know he did. When Tetkashtai knew him, he was more interested in his work than in developing the power of his mind."

"I'll bet he wasn't insane and attacking people in the street, either," said Natrac. "What do you think was wrong with him, and why was Nevchaned covering it up?" He looked up. "Do you think it could have something to do with Dah'mir?"

No one said anything for a long moment. Dandra suspected that she knew what they were all thinking, even if no one wanted to be the first to say it. Erimelk was clearly mad. Dah'mir wanted to drive kalashtar mad. It was too much of a coincidence to be dismissed, but it also meant that the dragon had already started his move against the community.

On the one hand, that might make it easier to present their belated warning to the kalashtar elders. On the other, maybe there was a reason the elders were trying to keep Erimelk's madness quiet. Dah'mir intended his mad kalashtar as servants for the Master of Silence. He wouldn't want them roaming free. If that was the case, maybe Nevchaned-and the other elders-were working with Dah'mir. The idea chilled her.

"I think," she said, "we need to know more about what's happening here before we approach the elders with our warning, so we know we're talking to the right people."

Singe, scratching his whiskers in thought, nodded agreement, but Ashi frowned. "How do we do that?" she asked.

An idea took form in Dandra's head. An idea that didn't particularly please her. "We don't," she said. "I do." Singe's hand paused on his chin, and he looked at her sharply, but she shook her head and continued. "Natrac was right. Kalashtar will say things around another kalashtar they won't say around strangers. Especially if they think it's a kalashtar they already know." She touched a hand to her chest. "Like Tetkashtai."

Singe's fingers fell, but he didn't dismiss the idea. Dandra could see him turning it in his mind, and when he spoke, she noticed it wasn't the plan that he questioned. "Can you do it?" he asked. "You'll be facing your people on your own."

She drew herself up. "I thought we'd decided that the people who matter are here."

He smiled at that. "When will you do it?"

"Tonight. There's a place-a kind of meeting hall. The kalashtar will be expecting me to visit after a journey anyway. I'll be able to find answers to rumors there." She gestured around the apartment. "You can stay here if you want."

"I think I'd go crazy just sitting and waiting for you," Singe said. "I've got a better idea. There's a small House Deneith enclave across the city in Deathsgate district I want to visit. It's a Blademarks recruiting hall. I told Geth to send a message there when he got to Zarash'ak. We took long enough getting here ourselves that one might be waiting now." He looked to Ashi. "Do you think you'd like to go? You'd get to see more of the city, and there shouldn't actually be any members of Deneith proper on duty this late-you could get a little more exposure to Deneith without any risk of discovery."

Ashi's grin was so wide the two small bone hoops that pierced her lower lip turned sideways. "Try and keep me from coming!"

"That's why I asked you."

Dandra turned to Natrac. "Are you going to go too, or stay here?"

The half-orc paused in the act of drying himself, then continued. "Neither," he said.

Singe narrowed his eyes. "What are you up to?"

Natrac gave a sigh, stopped, and glanced up. "Let's just say that Dandra's not the only one with places she has to go to alone," he said. "I used to have contacts under street. They might still be around. If they are, they may have heard something. But I can't be sure that they're still around or that they'll be inclined to help us." He looked at them all. "I know you can all handle yourselves in a fight, but the best thing to do in the places I need to go is not to start a fight in the first place."

Dandra exchanged a glance with Singe and nodded. "If you think that's what's best. Can you at least tell us where in the city you're-?"

"No," he said, stopping her. "And don't try telling me that whatever I'm hiding, it doesn't matter to you. This is a part of my life I don't want back. Give me a chance to rest and dry out-I'll go and be back before dawn."

She frowned at him. "Can I wish you good luck?"

Natrac grunted. "I'll take that."

They all changed into dry clothes and lay down to rest, but when they rose, Natrac had already slipped out. There was an extra key to the door hidden inside a crock. Dandra brought it out and gave it to Singe. He embraced her without a word, then he and Ashi departed. Dandra took a brief look around the apartment and left as well.

The rain had stopped, but the streets of Fan Adar were still empty. Dandra walked from the light of one everbright lantern to the next without seeing anyone-or, thankfully, any sign of another one of Dah'mir's herons. The need to watch for them reminded her of the time after her first escape from the Bonetree mound, when she and Tetkashtai had fled across the Shadow Marches, trying to evade the herons, Bonetree hunters, and dolgrims Dah'mir had sent in pursuit.

It was, in fact, too much like her nights on the run. Unease stirred in her. Had the streets always been this quiet, or did they just seem that way because she was-possibly for the first time ever-utterly alone? Singe wasn't there to support her. Tetkashtai, her constant counterpart since the moment she had awakened to consciousness, was only a memory. There was no one.

She wasn't sure that she liked it.

Sound came as she crossed a walkway and descended a broad ramp to a sunken courtyard. The courtyard itself was empty except for a statue of a kalashtar woman, her crystal eyes raised to the skies, but on its far side, a short flight of stairs rose again to the porch of a low building-the community hall called the Gathering Light. Warm light and noise escaped from the building-the light making golden lines around edges of the building's doors, the noise drifting on the air in a haze of half-heard music and speech.

Dandra crossed the courtyard, put a foot on the lowest stair, hesitated for a moment, then pressed her lips together. You can do this, she told herself. What is it compared to what you've already done? She raised her chin, continued up to the porch, and pulled open one of the doors.

In her heart, she'd half-expected all activity in the hall to pause as she walked through the doorway and those gathered within turned to stare at the stranger in their midst. Her entry, however, attracted no more than idle curiosity. A few people looked up to see who had arrived. Even fewer gave her a second look. A very few, friends of Tetkashtai-or of Medalashana or Virikhad-waved in greeting. Dandra waved back but stayed near the door, trying to look as if she were searching the hall for someone while she took stock of the environment and tried to decide what to do next.

The main chamber of the Gathering Light was long and, for a structure in Sharn, relatively low. Doors to the side opened onto stairs that led up or down to storerooms and private meeting rooms. During the day, the community hall served a variety of purposes, from cultural education to physical training to quiet political and philosophical discussions. With night's fall, however, the hall had come alive in its main purpose as a social hub of the community. Kalashtar and Adaran humans-far more of the latter than the former-mingled through the chamber, falling into cl.u.s.ters to share conversation, gla.s.ses of pale tea, and bits of hot food plucked from pots wrapped in braided straw. Around the outside of the room, they stood. Closer to the middle, they sat. In the very center of the long hall, a low circular stage had been set up. Four musicians sat on it, playing the wind and string instruments of Adar, and anyone who felt like it had joined in with their song. Music and speech clashed and broke over the crowd like waves on a beach.

The scene was familiar enough from Tetkashtai's memories, but as she scanned the crowd, Dandra became aware of an odd tension in the hall. The cl.u.s.ters of people seemed tighter and perhaps less inclusive. Conversation was low and close, less animated than it might have been; yet the people who sang did so with such force and emphasis that it seemed as if they were trying too hard. Singe's comments about a feeling of fear on the street came back to her. The kalashtar and Adarans gathered in the hall might not have seemed afraid, but they were far from being as relaxed as they should have been.

The longer she stood still and silent by the door, the more people were beginning to notice her presence and to stare at her with an ill-concealed wariness. She forced herself to move further into the hall, trying to spot someone to talk to, someone who might be able to tell her what was going on ...

Then the choice of who to talk to was taken out of her hands altogether. "Tetkashtai-" said a voice at her side.

The fear and tension that had stretched tight in Dandra snapped. The voice, so close and so unexpected, was like a blow. She leaped away, psionic power lifting her up to hover a handspan above the ground, ready to dart or glide in any direction. She'd left her spear in the apartment, but she was never defenseless. The humming chorus of whitefire rose around her, and the people closest to her yelped and scrambled away from the sudden display of power. The young kalashtar man who had spoken her name flinched back, his eyes startled. For an instant, he and Dandra stared at each other in mutual alarm.

Dandra could feel her heart hammering in her chest. Now she really was the center of attention in the hall. Song and conversation had ceased. It took an effort to still her pounding heart and release the fiery power that had come so easily to her mind. The people her display had disturbed stared at her with open suspicion. "I'm sorry-" Dandra started to say and then caught herself. Tetkashtai had never apologized for anything. It hadn't been in her nature.

"Sit," she said to the nearest person. "It was nothing."

Conversation resumed. Feeling somewhat less uncomfortable, but now vaguely guilty, Dandra sank back to the floor and faced the young man. He was just barely an adult. His face still had a youthful softness, but at the same time, his appearance was distinctive. Unlike most in the Gathering Light, his black hair had been cut short in the Brelish fashion, and he wore Brelish rather than Adaran clothing, including an open vest dyed a rich sky-blue. The wide leather bracer st.i.tched with copper wire that wrapped around his left forearm was likewise Brelish in design, but it was the smooth black gem-a psicrystal-set into it that brought a twinge of recognition to Dandra's mind.

Not every kalashtar was capable of creating a psicrystal, and she had a dim recollection of a young kalashtar, his hair still long, proudly showing Tetkashtai the black crystal he had fashioned. The name of the newly-formed crystal, Cano, clung to Dandra's memory, but it took a moment longer for her to put a name to the kalashtar. When she did, she blinked. "Munchaned," she said. "You're Nevchaned's son."

"Call me Moon." Munchaned's voice had a self-conscious firmness, as if he were daring her to call him anything else-or as if he were trying to cover his moment of childish fright.

Dandra forced herself to keep a smile from her face. "All right, Moon. What do you want?"

"Nevchaned wants to talk. He sent me to collect you." He jerked his head toward one of the doors that led to the Gathering Light's private rooms.

Dandra's eyebrows rose. "Nevchaned wants to talk to me?" she asked. "How did he know I was here?"

"The elders like to keep track of what's happening around them when they meet. I'm the honored elders' errand boy of the night so I get the privilege of fetching you." He looked at her. "Are you going to come or not?"

He sounded like he would be just as happy if she didn't. The thought was more than tempting to Dandra. Suspicion rose in her. Nevchaned and the kalashtar elders were here, and they wanted to talk to her?

She clenched her jaw and nodded. Moon looked disappointed by the answer but turned to push his way through the crowd to one of the hall's side doors.