Zendikar_ In The Teeth Of Akoum Part 22

"Let me not mislead you. I would break my teeth off before I helped the Eldrazi in any way whatsoever," he said, a snarl in the back of his throat. "And I would never enslave my own people. Never. I am as much a beast a beast as those weaklings with the null. More so." With that Anowon turned and stomped away. He stopped for a second to look up at the plants hanging off the cooling magma ball, then stooped under it and began walking to the smoke fires of Affa. as those weaklings with the null. More so." With that Anowon turned and stomped away. He stopped for a second to look up at the plants hanging off the cooling magma ball, then stooped under it and began walking to the smoke fires of Affa.

Anowon pa.s.sed Mudheel, who was relieving himself as he gazed at Affa, moving his body to make glyphs in the powdery soil. Smara was sitting on the ground to the side of Mudheel, stroking her crystal in her lap.

"Why does he stomp away so?" Mudheel yelled over his shoulder.

Nissa watched Anowon go. If he was not the Mortifier, then that left ... She turned to where Sorin was tending his hair with his comb, still intact after their many encounters. He carefully swept his long, white hair back and tied a piece of leather around it. He did not have the vestigial horns at his shoulders and elbows. A vampire? A vampire? she thought. Sorin was too tall. He had no tattoos. she thought. Sorin was too tall. He had no tattoos. When does he feed? When does he feed? His hair was not black, like the hair of every other vampire she had ever seen. His hair was not black, like the hair of every other vampire she had ever seen. A vampire? A vampire? Nissa felt like drawing her stem sword and trying to strike Sorin down where he stood. Nissa felt like drawing her stem sword and trying to strike Sorin down where he stood. A vampire? A vampire? But instead she turned and walked toward Affa as she considered her best course of action. But instead she turned and walked toward Affa as she considered her best course of action.

Affa lay in the distance. They walked without stopping until the tents of the herders and smalltime relic seekers began to appear. The tents of the stonecutters-those that eked out a living selling shards and chips from hedron stones-were the shabbiest, amounting to little more than hides stretched over the ribs of undra stompers. The goblins among the stonecutters preferred to sleep in burrows with hides thrown over the entry hole.

Anowon disappeared shortly after encountering the outlying tents. Nissa knew what the vampire was looking for, but she tried not to think about it. Luckily it was past dark when they straggled past the first bonfire, so Nissa doubted Anowon would be detected as he hunted.

Nissa watched Sorin as they walked. At first he appeared to be unaffected by the presence of edible creatures. But soon they pa.s.sed the tents of the cutters and relic seekers and entered Affa proper, and the amount of life increased. Soon there were humans, merfolk, goblins, elves, and even other vampires moving around the cookfires in the dark. Nissa thought she could hear Sorin's breathing quicken. If he was as hungry for blood as she was for a drink of water, then she had best take the others and leave him to his unutterable desires.

The center of Affa was more built up than Nissa would have guessed. More than just a tent city, it had permanent stone-and-mortar buildings with steep roofs of slate and weathervanes of wrought dragons. The streets were cobbled with intricate designs. The steep mountain peaks stood out in stark contrast against the light brown clay shingles. A small, turreted keep hunched in the middle of town, surrounded by semi-permanent stalls built of wood and manned by merchants selling all manner of wares. Where did they get the wood? Where did they get the wood? Nissa wondered. She had not seen a forest in leagues. Nissa wondered. She had not seen a forest in leagues.

Braziers burned on the street corners, and when Nissa exhaled she was surprised to see her breath outlined in the chilly mountain air.

Nissa turned to Sorin, only to find him gone. Only the shadows around the various braziers remained. Smara muttered behind her as they walked. Nissa turned and caught the goblin Mudheel looking at her in a curious way. Even the goblin knew about Sorin Even the goblin knew about Sorin, she thought.

Had Sorin been sneaking off the whole time? she wondered. She had spent so much time watching Anowon for the slightest glimmer of aggression directed at her that Sorin could have supped on her blood twenty times over, if he had had the interest. she wondered. She had spent so much time watching Anowon for the slightest glimmer of aggression directed at her that Sorin could have supped on her blood twenty times over, if he had had the interest.

Smara's muttering behind became louder as they walked.

"May I ask how long we will be walking tonight?" Mudheel said with more than a bit of acid in his voice.

Nissa turned. The goblin was carrying Smara over his shoulders, and she struggled on the goblin's back. As Nissa watched, the kor kicked her legs out and generally writhed.

The goblin fought to gain control of the kor's flailing body. After struggling for some moments, a grumbling Mudheel switched his hold, moving Smara from his shoulder so he was cradling her forward across his arms. Nissa was never more impressed to see a goblin's strength as she was at that instant. Mudheel bent its snout close to Smara's ear and hummed the kor a low song. It was a moment so strangely touching that Nissa had to look away. When she turned back, Smara was singing to herself, stroking the smoky, dagger-length crystal she clutched at all times.

"I thought we should sleep at the side of the camp that faces the mountains," Nissa said. She lowered her voice a bit. "So we can leave undetected."

The goblin nodded. "I have not seen sign on the ground of brood lineage for many days," he said.

"Neither have I," Nissa said, looking out of the corners of her eyes at the outlines moving around the fires. "But it is not the brood I am worried about just now."

The goblin kept walking, holding Smara in his arms as one might a child. "Lady elf, we will need supplies if we are to ascend into the Teeth, you know?"

"I know." Nissa said. She was still getting used to the goblin speaking and thinking as well as he did. Mudheel could surely be the leader of a whole goblin nation if he wasn't bound to Smara as he was. As kor to goblin.

"Where will we find the coin for this?" Mudheel said, snapping her from her thoughts.

"We will steal it," Nissa said, looking straight ahead. After her talk with Anowon about Sorin and the Eldrazi, her opinion about the importance of the expedition had changed significantly. "We will steal and acquire what is needed to climb to the Eye of Ugin and save Zendikar."

The goblin looked at her a moment longer than normal, blinking.

Nissa continued. "How many days can we expect to climb to the Eye?"

"From Affa, two perhaps three days," the goblin said.

"And what will happen then?" Nissa said. "What are your and your mistress's reasons for traveling there in the first place? I suppose I never asked."

Mudheel looked down at the face of Smara, who looked up at the pocked, mole-covered face of the goblin. "She feels drawn by the spirit in her crystal."

"There is a spirit in that?"

"A most fabulous one," the goblin said. The words were barely out of his mouth when Smara began struggling again. She bucked her body up and snapped her legs out. Mudheel struggled to hold her. When Smara's struggling became more violent, Mudheel gently put her down on the ground.

"The gift is in the loam," Smara screamed, suddenly. She kept screaming it.

"Should we both carry her?" Nissa said.

The goblin nodded. Nissa took the kor's ankles and Mudheel her wrists, and they hoisted Smara and began walking with her, struggling, toward the edge of the settlement. She stopped screaming.

Nissa waited a couple of beats before speaking again. "What ails your mistress?" she asked.

Nissa could not see the goblin's face as it walked ahead, but she imagined a wince.

"It started after she heard you and the vampire speaking yesterday."

"You heard that?" Nissa asked.

"I did not," Mudheel said. "She did."

"But how do you know she heard it ..."

"She speaks to me," the goblin said as he stopped walking for a moment. "In my head."

"What did she hear?" asked Nissa.

"She was bothered by the Sorin vampire's plan."

"Was she?"

"Her ghost tells her to release the Eldrazi," Mudheel said. "He tells her to kill you all. He tells her to burn things."

The hairs on the back of Nissa's neck stood. "Really?"

"Yes," the goblin said. "Kill you in the fire of the Eye of Ugin."

"I see."

"The gift in the loam must be released."

"You want to free them?" them?"

"It is not I," the goblin said. "It is the desire of my mistress's ghost."

"And who is this ghost?"

"The knower of all things," the goblin said. "The predictor of everything."

"And it says free the Eldrazi?"

From the back, Nissa saw the goblin look left and right at the mention of the word Eldrazi Eldrazi. "It says: free those who shall not be named." free those who shall not be named."

Once again the hairs on the back of Nissa's neck went up. Smara began to thrash violently and to scream words Nissa did not know. Nissa watched the goblin wrestling with the kor. The kor had been cast out of her tribe and given to the wilderness and somehow lived. She had grown up apart from her people through no fault of her own, and after all that ... a crystal that spoke to her, telling her to burn things and free the Eldrazi.

Smara kept screaming. She thrashed out of the goblin's arms and staggered around as Mudheel spoke in a low voice trying to calm her. The inhabitants of Affa turned and watched the kor. Soon a small crowd had formed outside of a small dry-stack stone building with a flagon of wine painted above the door. Mudheel began shoving Smara none too gently down the lane, and soon they were out of the center of the settlement and hurrying between the tents.

The tents and rough stone shacks started to thin as they reached the far side of the settlement and the boulders started. The huge rocks had been in the settlement, of course-people had leaned wood and bones against them as a roofs. One could not hope to move boulders of that size without true magical talent, and from what she saw in the camps as they walked, there was not a great deal of that to go around. The inhabitants were mostly petty peril seekers.

The real power seekers would be excavating other locations like Tal Terig, the tower they had pa.s.sed that lay under brood siege, or the Hagra Cistern. A real adventurer would not be hovering around at the base of the Teeth of Akoum like an eeka bird. Affa was a place where goblins brought the small relics and Eldrazi charms they had found and could not make work.

As she walked, a form appeared out of the deep shadows that lay far from the fires. Smara kept screaming as hard as her lungs could.

"What is that lovely sound?" Sorin said. "Oh, it is the kor, of course."

Smara reacted to Sorin's sudden voice in the darkness. She struggled and pulled free from the goblin's hands, turned on Sorin, and let loose a string of words Nissa could not understand. Smara sputtered as she spoke. To Nissa they sounded more like complete sentences than the ravings of a mad person, and Sorin listened with a smirk forming at the corner of his lips.

And then Sorin did something that Nissa could never have predicted. He spoke back to Smara in the same tongue she had been speaking to him. They were talking back and forth, arguing really.

From behind, Nissa detected movement and smelled the dusty smell of Anowon. But the vampire stood still, listening.

The arguing continued, with Smara becoming more and more aggravated. At one point the kor stepped forward and swung at Sorin, who stepped back and let the blow pa.s.s harmlessly in front of his face.

Nissa remembered how long she had gone without food or drink. She suddenly felt too weak to go any further, and she sat down on the ground. The stars were bright, and the fires of Affa were behind them. They had no coin and no hope of finding any. They would need to steal, and after that they would need to flee. She was tired enough at the thought.

The screaming continued until Smara began spitting. Sorin laughed, and Smara turned and wandered away into the darkness with Mudheel trailing after her. They did not see her again.

Nissa forced herself to stand, and they kept walking. Ahead the dark shapes of the long mountains loomed. Nissa walked up behind Anowon.

"We need supplies," she said. "Rope and food and water. We will all all die without water." die without water."

The vampire stopped. "Then you had best get some."

"We still have no coin," Nissa said. "Nothing has changed there."

Sorin stepped up behind her in the dark. "It looks like a bit of theft might be just the thing."

"I do not want to do that," Nissa said. "But I will."

"It just so happens I would like to make a stop," Sorin said. "I will see what is lying around unattended."

When Sorin had left, Nissa caught up to Anowon.

"I should have known Sorin was one of you."

"He is not one of me," Anowon snapped. "He is an outlander-a barong, as you elves say. He is an enslaver, from out there. My people do not enslave their own."

Not so sure of that, Nissa thought, but she swallowed the words. Instead she said, "What was Sorin saying to Smara?"

"They were arguing over what to do at the Eye. Smara wants to free the vile ones and let them live among us, and share their wisdom with us."

That did not sound like a good idea to Nissa, if the Eldrazi t.i.tans were anything like their children, the brood lineage.

"Do they suck the mana from holes in the earth like the brood?" Nissa said.

"The ancient texts say different things. Some say they lived off the blood of their vampires. Others say that they 'drank the land.'"

Nissa sniffed in the cold breeze blowing down out of the mountains. "That does not sound very good," she said. "If they are large I would reason they could drink plenty of land."

Anowon kept walking with Nissa next to him. How long had they been walking? How long had they been walking? Nissa wondered. She had lost count. It felt like months. Every step was slow and heavy. She stopped and plopped down on the ground for a rest. The fires of Affa were well behind them now. Nissa wondered. She had lost count. It felt like months. Every step was slow and heavy. She stopped and plopped down on the ground for a rest. The fires of Affa were well behind them now.

Anowon stopped and turned to look at Nissa sitting on the ground.

"Anyway," Anowon said. "The Eldrazi will not tarry here. The mad kor wishes in vain. They would flee into the sky."

"How do you know?"

"All the texts agree they came from there," Anowon said. "Why stay here?"

"You yourself said they eat mana. Why not stay here and enslave us all?"

"If what you said before is correct, then there are many other places," Anowon said as he raised his hand to the dark mountain. "Out there."

Nissa looked up at the star-strewn sky. She recognized the constellations she had seen her whole life: the scute bug and the vorpal weed, the dragon's claw and the hedron. And there were the other vast planes separated by gray areas in s.p.a.ce. Would the Eldrazi prefer these places to Zendikar?

"Nissa," Anowon said. "We must rid Zendikar of this parasite."

Nissa turned and regarded Anowon. "What did you see at the Eye before the brood took you prisoner?"

The vampire's voice appeared very close suddenly in the dark. "I was there looking at the strange crystal formations and the even stranger writing on some of the crystals. Writing I could not read. Writing that is utterly unknown to Zendikar. I imagine it is writing from Sorin's place, but I was unaware that the Mortifier was more than myth."

Nissa nodded.

"I was studied these unusual writings before I found two strange beings, perhaps one like you and Sorin-not from Zendikar?"

"I am from Zendikar," Nissa said. "I have always been from Zendikar."

"Well, the female had fire for hair. I wanted to feed on them both, to be truthful. But before I could, I was waylaid. By whom, I do not know. She moved on without me, but I met a mind mage on the trail who was pursuing the fire mage. I led him to the Eye of Ugin. I was locked out of the chamber, though. I don't know what happened, or how they released the scourge."

"What is Ugin?"

"Ugin was a dragon," Anowon said. "I do not know what Ugin is now."