An icy fist gripped Joel's heart, and he recalled Holly's vision. Cursing himself for a fool, he raced back through the brush, shouting for Jedidiah to follow.
The climb up to the bluff in the dark seemed endless to Joel, knowing something threatened his friends. He was puffing by the time he cleared the brush. He pulled the sword from his belt.
Holly must have built up the fire in his absence, for the campsite was illuminated by leaping flames. The paladin and Jas both stood with their backs to the fire, peering out into the darkness. They were both bleeding from small cuts on their arms and faces. Dark shapes lay vanquished at their feet, but many more surrounded them. Joel could see only their silhouettes in the firelight, and he was unable to tell whether the shapes were men or beasts.
The bard gave a shout to distract the creatures. Suddenly a dark form loomed up on his left. Remembering Bear, Joel reacted instinctively, stabbing hard and fast.
His blade sunk deep into the creature's chest. For all the resistance Joel felt, the body might have been an old weathered sack. The blade made a sound like an axe driven into rotten wood. Joel yanked his weapon back, and a taloned hand lashed at his face but missed. Then the creature fell at Joel's feet, nothing more than a collection of ancient, shattered bones encased in sun-dried flesh.
It was a zombie, Joel realized, and the creatures surrounding Holly and Jas were zombies and skeletons. The firelight glinted on blackened bones and yellowish flesh as the undead creatures rallied for another attack. More of the creatures were pulling themselves out of the ground.
Joel remembered Holly's story that Lord Randal's ancestor and his entourage had died here. If the origin of the undead occurred to the paladin, she did not let it affect how she fought. She decapitated one walking corpse with a clean swing, which ended in the chest of a second zombie. She ducked the sluggish blow of a third monster, then reversed the arc of her blade, driving it into her attacker's skull.
Jas was holding her own by half leaping, half flying up, then coming down on the skeletons with a kicking attack. The ancient bones cracked and crumbled to the ground.
Despite their successes, both women had received wounds, and it was obvious they were tiring. Yet the undead continued to rise from the ground.
Joel fought his way toward the fire. A skeletal hand hanging from a tattered muscle tore a gash across his cheek just beneath his eye. It took one blow to send the creature's bones back to the earth, but the cut on his face continued to burn like fire. Another zombie was armed with an ancient, rusty sword, which shattered into a hundred fragments when Joel struck it with his younger blade.
"Where did they come from?" Joel shouted. Such creatures did not just rise from the earth of their own volition.
"I can't tell," Holly replied. "They seem to be trying to drive us off the edge of the bluff. Where's Jedidiah?" "Not far behind me," Joel answered.
"Already here," boomed the voice of the elderly priest from the darkness just beyond the campfire's light. He began a familiar-sounding chant that sounded more like a drumbeat than a song. A reddish haze surrounded him.
The zombies and skeletons turned to face Jedidiah, the remains of their bodies twitching in rhythm with the priest's chant.
Joel's worry that the creatures would do his mentor harm was soon dispelled. One by one, the skeletons saluted the old priest with a raised hand, then crumbled to dust. The closest zombies slumped in place, their animating energy gone. The zombies farthest from the old priest sank back into the earth, pulling rocks and dirt back over their retreating forms.
Jas smashed at a few of these even as they fled. Then she sank to the ground, exhausted.
The radiance about Jedidiah subsided as the last of the undead disappeared. He looked at Joel with surprise. "Why didn't you try quelling the undead with a chant?" he asked.
Joel winced, realizing now that Jedidiah had taught him the same chant in Berdusk. It was a common ritual to protect against the undead, to return them to their graves and eternal sleep. The chant was actually quite basic, Joel remembered, and the results were effective. It wasn't the first time he'd forgotten he possessed priestly skills just when they would have been the most useful.
The Rebel Bard hung his head. "I just started swinging my sword without thinking," he replied.
Jedidiah looked grim. "You are still uncomfortable using the gifts Finder has given you, " he noted. "It's early yet. You'll get used to it. You'll see."
The old man gave the breast pocket of his vest a pat. He patted the pocket again, then reached into it with his hand, an alarmed expression on his face. Jedidiah began patting his other pockets. His brow furrowed, then his expression grew angry.
"What have you lost?" Joel asked.
"That gemstone I had," Jedidiah snapped impatiently. "I had it a moment ago, just before I came up the hill."
Holly moved up beside Joel, her face stricken with worry. "Joel?" she began.
Joel held his hand up, signaling Holly to wait. "You never told me exactly what it was," he said to Jedidiah.
"It's a relic, an artifact," Jedidiah explained hastily, "a tool created by Finder when he was mortal. It's half of the finder's stone. Finder took half with him to the Abyss when he destroyed Moander and left the other half with the saurials in the Lost Vale. It's a faultless locator, and it holds power, as you saw."
"Joel?" Holly tried interrupting again.
"We'll find it," Joel assured Jedidiah, his eyes combing the ground around the fire circle. "We'll start here and work our way back. Maybe one of the undead knocked it loose from your pocket."
"None of them got near me," Jedidiah insisted with irritation. "I had to have dropped it on the way up the hill."
"Joel? Holly snapped.
The Rebel Bard looked back at the paladin. Her eyes were wide with terror.
"What is it, Holly?" Joel snapped.
"It's-it's coming," the girl whispered. "The evil in my vision. There's something familiar about it… something horrible."
Jedidiah swung about with a feral growl.
A red light issued from beneath the edge of the bluff, just like the light in Holly's vision.
Slowly, majestically, bathed in red like the sun, a great wooden vessel rose above the bluff. It was Jas's ship, stolen from the illithids, now a floating shrine to Bane. Joel suddenly realized what, or rather who, had made the undead restless enough to rise from their graves.
Walinda stood at the ship's prow, a pair of lit iron braziers on either side of her. She still wore her shoulder protectors and bracers, but she had removed the rest of her armor. She was dressed now in a long, low-cut black velvet gown that seemed to shimmer red in the reflected fire from the braziers. Her hair hung loose about her shoulders like a maiden's.
"Well met, Poppin," she greeted Joel, giving him a warm smile. Then she turned to face Jedidiah, holding out her hand. In it sat Jedidiah's half of the finder's stone, glowing with brilliant gold light. With a cruel smile, she asked, "Are you looking for this, old man?"
Nine
Joel could have easily predicted what happened next, but he just wasn't quick enough to prevent it. Jas leapt high into the air. Then, with her sword in front of her, she dived toward the priestess of Bane.
Walinda, as cool as ice, raised her hand and commanded, "Fall!"
The winged woman's body jackknifed in midair, and she plummeted downward. She landed hard, all in a heap, on the deck of her former ship.
Holly cried out and made a move to rush forward, but Jedidiah had the presence of mind to grab the paladin and hold her back.
"Let me go," Holly cried. "She's hurt!" "She'll keep," the older priest said brusquely. "You can't help her if you're hurt, too," he warned. To Joel, he said, "I take it this is the infamous Walinda of Bane."