"Murderer." This time several voices accused him-then several hundred, until the air reverberated with the word-"murderer."
"Talaedra!" he shouted-then knew no more.
Marissa's blood froze in her veins when she saw Taenaran fall beneath the wraith's attack. Fear and anger rose within her at the thought that he might be dead. She gripped the Staff of the Red Tree tightly and swung it with all her strength at the stooped form of the feeding wraith. Power flowed through the staff once again as it struck the undead monster, but this time the impact caused the wood of the staff to ignite with a flaring blast of silver energy. Whatever she had done had awakened life from deep within the wood. She could feel the whispering voice in her mind grow stronger, more urgent, until it nearly shouted ancient wisdom and ancient wrath.
Marissa fought it while she could, but the voice overcame her. For a moment, she knew the terrible power held within the still-living branch of the Red Tree, knew how to tap into it and how to unleash it on the world.
A moment was all she needed.
Raising the staff high into the air, she brought its heel down hard on the earth, singing the words to an ancient song in a voice both her own and not her own. The ground trembled. Light exploded from the artifact, as bright as the searing light of noon at High Summer. It filled the road with its blinding rays, and against its elemental force, the wraiths had no defense. In a flash of darkness, they imploded, leaving only the memory of death behind.
Then, as suddenly as it had flared into existence, the light winked out, and darkness descended like a shroud upon the trade road.
Selov was the first to recover.
"By all the gods and the wisdom of the elders," he whispered in obvious amazement. "What have you done?"
Marissa was tired, almost too tired to stand.
"I am not sure," she said wearily, "and right now I don't care." She forced her body to move toward the fallen half-elf. "Is he-?"
"He is alive," Selov said, examining Taen carefully.
"So is Borovazk," called out Roberc.
Relief flooded through her body, giving a lift to her wearied spirit.
"Then we must hurry to the well," Marissa said. "I fear that our friends need help that only the wychlaran can provide."
Or withhold, she thought cynically.
In the distance, a lone wolf sang mournfully to the dying moon.
Chapter 13
The Year of Wild Magic
(1372 DR)
The goblin screamed.
Yulda, wrapped in her hag illusion, smiled at the foul creature's pain-though her eyes held little humor. She watched it beat ineffectually at the incorporeal form of the snow tiger, like a small child denying its mother's discipline. Her smile deepened as Fleshrender batted the hapless creature between its paws, purring loudly while its claws sank through the goblin's skin.
In truth, her mood was fouler than the snowstorms that battered the mountains surrounding her citadel. When word had come to Yulda, through her spy at the Green Chapel, regarding the outsiders and their peculiar journey to Immil Vale, she was incensed. The presence of the Staff of the Red Tree among the outsiders drove her beyond reason. If Durakh had not had the sense to try to calm Yulda down, the witch would have set about destroying the interlopers right at that moment-thereby revealing herself too soon. Instead, she retired to her chamber, cursing the presence of the strangers and her need of Durakh's wisdom, and began planning her next move.
Circumstances made it clear to Yulda that powerful forces were moving against her. She had spent nearly ten winters planting the seeds of her plan and nurturing its growth. A little whispered gossip here, a quiet expression of dissatisfaction there, and the subtle promise of power to those who craved it the way a dragon craves gold had done much to position her for what she was about to do. There was no way that she would let her plan wither on the vine because of some soft outsiders.
She wrestled for a time with the problem before her. It was clear right from the start that she couldn't allow the intruders to meet with the wychlaran. If those meddling telthor from the Red Tree had sent the outsiders to speak with the othlor, then it could only be because they had discovered Yulda's secret and were moving against her. But, she thought bitterly, how could she accomplish the destruction of the outsiders without it being traced back to her? It was then that a plan began to form in her mind.
She had summoned Durakh from her meditations, and immediately they set out for the abandoned crypts lying in the secret places beneath the citadel. There the evil cleric bound several wraiths haunting the forgotten tunnels to her will. Once the strangers had departed the hamlet of Urling, Yulda teleported the undead monsters right in their midst.
It was a sound plan, one that was supposed to rid the witch of the one serious threat to her plans.
And it failed utterly.
Yulda nearly screamed with frustration. Not only had the strangers defeated the undead menace, but they also managed to evade every attempt at locating them through magical scrying. It was as if they had disappeared from the world.
Selov!
She knew that the old fool was somehow behind this. He had ever been a bootlicking lackey of the wychlaran. No doubt he used his knowledge to help the outsiders. Once she ruled Rashemen utterly, Yulda would deal with the doddering idiot herself. Until then, she would just have to try and salve her seething temper and-if she were being honest-her growing fear, in the blood and pain of her servants.
Unfortunately, Fleshrender's current plaything had stopped screaming and simply lay there like a piece of meat. Yulda's assembled minions watched with barely concealed terror. Human and goblin servants huddled in clumps, pointing and whispering at the stiffening corpse, no doubt wondering if they would be next.
The stink of their fear rose up in the vaulted room like sweet perfume. Yulda breathed it in deeply, savoring its pungent aroma. Still, it could not ease the clenching of her stomach, and the witch found herself grinding her teeth in frustration.
A curse on Selov, the blasted wychlaran, and their foolish pawns, she thought acidly.
Yulda turned to face her gathered servants. Their whispered mewling irritated her. With a sharp clap of her hands, she captured their attention.
"Leave us," she shouted at them, "and prepare for your duties!"
At that, they scattered into the shadows of the room, and Yulda drew a small sense of satisfaction from their hasty retreat.
"Not you," she called out to Durakh as the cleric started to walk down the hall to her private chamber. "We have things to discuss."
The half-orc checked her movement and turned back to Yulda.
"As you command," Durakh said in an even tone.
Careful, Yulda thought-though if she meant it as a reminder to herself or as a mental warning to the cleric, she couldn't be sure. Her world had begun to spin out of control with the revelation of the strangers' presence in Rashemen. It wouldn't take much to tear things irrevocably from their moorings, leaving her only with the ruins of a plan and the ire of the wychlaran and vremyonni pursuing her through the darkness. She licked her cracked lips before speaking.
"You know that our plan has failed," she said, more as a statement than a question.
Durakh nodded.
"Yes," Durakh replied. "I felt the wraiths' destruction." Her gray eyes met Yulda's. "It was… unexpected."
Yulda's temper rose at the cleric's equanimity.
"Unexpected," Yulda nearly shouted. "You assured me that your undead servants would destroy them."