Weakness. The very thing the Lady Penitent most despised.
Streea'Valsharess Zauviir would have to be eliminated-sooner, rather than later.
The image in the mirror faded. Guldor at last relaxed. When he closed his eyes, T'lar hummed a melody that shifted her appearance to match what she'd just seen in the mirror, then sprang off the beam. She drew upon her dro'zress an instant before she landed, halting her downward momentum, and landed soundlessly on the floor behind the wizard. She jabbed stiffened fingers into pressure points on Guldor's back, sending him into a spasm. Guldor gasped in pain. His eyes sprang open, and he saw T'lar's reflection in the mirror. "How-?"
Before he could complete the question, she grabbed his hair, yanked his head back, and sliced his throat.
Blood soaked the cushions of the divan and ran in streams onto the floor. T'lar caught some of the warm liquid in a cupped hand and raised it to her lips. "Strength," she whispered. Then she drank. Behind her, the invisible servitor mindlessly continued the task it had been set: massaging its dead master's feet.
T'lar pointed her bloody dagger at the mirror. You're next, she silently vowed. But before she dealt with the high priestess, there was something T'lar wanted to know. Like an itch, her curiosity had to be scratched.
She sang the hymn the Lady Penitent had taught her. She exhaled, and felt her body fold inward on itself and become gaseous. With a thought, she sent herself wafting toward the door Guldor had oh-so-carefully sealed with his magic. She slipped through the crack underneath it and was gone.
Q'arlynd sat on a low, round pillow, his legs crossed, deep in Reverie. He felt the heat from the darkfire hearth on his skin, smelled the remnants of his rothe-and-sporeball stew, and could still taste the last sip of wine he'd taken before settling into his trance. His eyes were open, but his mind was far away.
His thoughts wandered back several decades, to his days as a student in Ched Nasad's Conservatory. He thought of Ilmra, one of the females who had made the rare decision to become a mage, rather than a priestess. She'd been a fine-looking female, one he'd fantasized about more than once during their time together as novices. He'd imagined himself victoriously battling Ched Nasad's enemies beside her, then "surrendering" to a struggle of a very different sort.
During their days at the Conservatory, one of the first things the novices had been taught was a cantrip that revealed magical auras. Q'arlynd had mastered it readily enough. The gesture was a simple flicking of the fingers that mimicked an eye opening, and the trigger was a single word: faerjal. Yet Ilmra had miscast the spell when a magical item was brought out for her to examine, and had failed to identify the item correctly. She'd been strapped as a result-hard enough to fracture a finger. Later that cycle, when her turn came to list the colors of the auras around the items laid out on the table, she'd faltered a second time. Q'arlynd had tried to help her by signing the answers.
Instead of taking his help, she'd pointed out what he was doing to their instructor-even though this meant admitting her own failure. She'd watched, smiling, as he'd been lashed, then submitted to a lashing herself. Later, after Q'arlynd had been sent to his room to meditate on the folly and futility of trying to aid another, she'd slipped into his chamber and taken him. Even now, decades later, he vividly remembered her fingers digging painfully into the hot red welts that crisscrossed his shoulders as she mounted him.
It had been one of the sweetest experiences of his young life.
His forehead warmed: the kiira, absorbing the memory. An image formed in his mind: one of the ancestors who'd worn the lorestone millennia ago. She had white hair, yet her skin was a faded brown, rather than black. You tried to help Ilmra, out of compassion. You followed Eilistraee's dance, even then.
Q'arlynd laughed out loud. "Hardly. I did it because I wanted her to take me. And it worked-just, not the way I'd expected." He lingered in the memory. He wondered if Ilmra had survived the fall of the city. Probably not.
The kiira cooled slightly-a sign of his ancestors' displeasure. Q'arlynd gave a mental shrug. They'd asked him to include memories he thought were instructive. The one he'd just placed in the lorestone was doubly so. It taught the magic-detection cantrip, and at the same time, served as a reminder that all reward came at a price.
He heard a crackling sound: the darkfire flames, flickering. A breeze down the chimney must have disturbed them. He was so deep in Reverie that he paid the noise no heed at first. He was reliving a night in the World Above, when he'd used a spell to spy on Eilistraee's priestesses as they danced with swords in hand around the goddess's sacred stone in the Misty Forest. It had been windy that night, with snow blowing through the trees. Yet the priestesses had danced naked.
He smiled, savoring the memory. He'd watched, half-hoping they'd catch him in his transgression. It had been a long time since a female had taken him…
The darkfire settled down again as the breeze ended. The flames resumed their steady flickering-not that his body needed warming anymore. Remembering the priestesses' dance was-
All at once, he remembered he was in Sshamath. No breezes blew here-except magical ones.
"Luth-"
Something stung the back of his neck. It felt like several needles pressing into his skin at once. Whatever had just pricked him fell to the floor with a thud. As his flesh deadened, he realized whatever had just struck him had been poisoned. His jaw locked, his neck stiffened. He couldn't complete his abjuration. Nor could he turn his head to see his assailant. Then his magical earring drew the venom up his neck, into his left ear, and into itself. All that remained was a bitter taste in his mouth-which told him what the poison was. Made from the excretions of a carrion crawler, it was designed to paralyze, rather than kill.
He sensed movement behind him. His assailant, coming closer. Q'arlynd feigned paralysis. He slowly shifted his left thumb to the fur-wrapped needle of glass that pierced his shirt cuff. As his thumb touched the spell component, he whispered a word under his breath. His finger bones tingled as lightning crackled to life inside his hand. A flick of his fingers would release it.
His assailant stepped into view. He recognized her at once: T'lar Mizz'rynturl, the bae'qeshel bard whose "school" Guldor had tried to nominate. She moved in utter silence; even when she squatted next to him, her clothing didn't rustle. She held a dagger with a spider pommel. Ready for use, but not threatening him with it yet. She stared, pointedly, at his groin. "Thinking of me, were you?" She laughed.
Q'arlynd felt thankful he was already aroused. T'lar was disturbingly close, and the menace she exuded was a powerful aphrodisiac. Yet he wasn't foolish enough to give in to it completely. He held the lightning within his hand, trusting to surprise to give him the edge when the time came to cast his spell. For the moment, he wanted to know what she was up to. Had she come to steal something? He kept utterly still, not even moving his eyes. Soon, however, he'd need to give in to the urge to blink.
You play a dangerous game, Grandson, whispered his ancestors from inside the kiira.
T'lar hummed softly. Q'arlynd felt magic brush his mind, as light as a cobweb. Her spell proved no more durable. It tore to pieces the instant it met the kiira. She didn't seem to realize this, however. Perhaps under the impression her spell had succeeded, she leaned in close and asked a question that was clearly designed to stir up his thoughts.
It wasn't the one he'd expected.
"Why was your sister killed?" she whispered, her breath hot against his ear. "What did she do to anger the Lady Penitent?"
His concentration slipped. A spark crackled from his fingertips. T'lar leaped away from him-so quickly Q'arlynd didn't even see her move. One moment she was squatting next to him; the next, she stood halfway across the room, her dagger poised. Her arm whipped forward, and the dagger flashed through the air. Q'arlynd twisted aside and hurled a lightning bolt at her. She dodged, faster than his eye could follow. The lightning struck the shelf behind her, exploding it apart and setting several scrolls on fire. Q'arlynd frantically searched for his assailant, and felt a sharp pain in his side as he moved. He touched his shirt, and his hand came away bloody. Unlike her, he hadn't dodged quickly enough.