The illithid slid back into the fog, disappearing within moments.
Jedidiah stood staring after it wordlessly, the blood draining from his face. His expression was one of extreme sadness.
"Jedidiah," Joel whispered. "Are you all right?"
The older man nodded, but he appeared distracted.
"What was that all about?" Joel asked.
Jedidiah sighed. He turned to Joel with a wan smile. "Remember in Shishi's garden, when I thought I remembered that I had a plan? I did. I gave Ilsensine a recursive song, a tuneful little ditty in which the last verse leads directly back into the first, forming a closed loop. Ilsensine couldn't get the tune out of his head and with his powerful brain, he couldn't stop thinking about it. Then, his mind power being what it is, it spread to his priests."
Joel thought of the times when he'd been unable to stop humming some silly ditty for days, sometimes weeks at a time. It had interfered with everything else he had tried to do. The younger bard chuckled. It would be a long time before Ilsensine poked around in a god's mind again. Then he remembered the other mystery. "What about the questions?" he asked. "What were your questions? You looked disappointed by the answers."
Jedidiah was silent for a moment, then said "They only confirmed what I already knew in my heart. We'd better hurry back to the shop in case there's someone else searching for the hand."
The older priest pushed on into the fog. Joel hurried after him before the gloom could separate them.
Sixteen
Bits ushered them back into his shop with an air of expectancy. "Well?" he asked Joel.
"Holly's all right," Joel explained. "Her friend Bors found her. She's resting. Walinda has stayed behind to help tend to her." "Walinda?" the bariaur queried with some surprise. "The unpleasant one?"
Joel picked up the sledgehammer Walinda had dropped on the floor of the shop. "Probably just trying to get out of the heavy work," he said, giving Dits a wink. He and Jedidiah made their way into the basement. Dits stood on the top step and watched them. Jedidiah pulled out the light stone and set it on a high step of the stairs so it shone down over their heads.
"Would you care to do the honors?" Jedidiah asked. Joel grinned. He took a firm grip on the handle of the sledgehammer and slammed it into the wall. "Whoa! That's hard," Joel said, his hands smarting. A chip of red had come off a brick, but there was no sign of cracking in the walls. "It feels like it's a lot thicker than it looks," the Rebel
Bard explained.
"Whack at it some more," Jedidiah said.
Joel complied, pounding on the brick wall several times before he noted a small crack forming in the mortar.
Jedidiah went at the crack with the pickax. Together they managed to pull a brick away.
There was a second brick wall behind the first. Mortar filled the space between the two walls.
"You don't think they filled the whole passage in with mortar and brick, do you?" Joel asked, worried that they might be banging on the walls for days, or even weeks.
Jedidiah shook his head. "Three walls maybe. That's the rule in Sigil, I've been told. Three of everything. Isn't that right, Mr. Dits?"
"Aye," the bariaur replied. "If three of something can't handle the job, it wasn't meant to be handled. If you'll excuse me, I'm going back to keep an eye on my shop."
They broke away the first wall completely, tossing the bricks into a corner of the basement. Joel noticed that the older man was pale and wheezing. "We'd better take a break," the younger man said, knowing Jedidiah would not do so unless Joel joined him. They sat on the stairs, breathing heavily, wiping sweat from their brows.
"Are you all right?" the young priest asked.
"It's just the air. And being old. I hope," Jedidiah said.
"What do you mean, you hope?" Joel asked in alarm.
Jedidiah grinned. "Just a feeling I have that this city knows I'm really a god, and it wants to get rid of me."
After a few minutes Joel got up and began smashing away at the second wall. There was indeed a third wall behind it. Joel began smashing through the third wall before he'd finished dismantling the second.
A single brick fell backward out of the third wall, into darkness.
A cold draft surged out of the hole, stirring up the dust on the basement floor.
"I think we're through," Joel said.
Jedidiah picked up the light stone and went to Joel's side. He peered through the hole with the light stone held up beside his eye.
"Looks like a passage leading down," the older man said. "Let's make sure we clear away enough stone so we can make a hasty exit should it be required."
They finished clearing away the second wall, then smashed at the third. The sound of the falling bricks echoed back at them, indicating a large room lay somewhere beyond. When they had cleared away the last of the bricks, a stone staircase of black granite yawned before them. Joel pulled out the finder's stone. The beacon pointed down the staircase.
"This is it," Jedidiah said, setting aside the pickax.
Joel leaned the sledgehammer against the wall.
Together the two men drew their swords and descended into the darkness below. Jedidiah held the light stone, Joel the finder's stone. They pushed aside the bricks that had fallen onto the steps. The stairs led to an arched passageway, which ran straight back toward a red glow.
They walked along the passageway side by side. Shiny black tiles covered the passage wall. Their surface appeared bubbly, like tar, but closer inspection revealed that each tile was a bas-relief carving depicting a different human face, each face screaming in silent, eternal pain.
"A motif only a Banite could love," Jedidiah muttered.
After thirty paces, the passageway opened into a huge circular room, its ceiling vaulted, its floor shaped like a bowl. Around the edges of the room, six braziers glowed with red light. Joel examined the two nearest the entry. They were filled with magically glowing light stones covered with a red oil. In the center of the room was an altar and a statue carved out of black granite. Both were polished to a high luster, which reflected back the red light.
The statue, a human-shaped creature, sat cross-legged on the altar. Its open mouth was filled with sharp teeth, and great horns protruded over its pointed ears. Two black gems sparkled in its earlobes, while another glittered from its forehead. A fourth, even larger, gem shone from a pendant on the statue's chest. Its hands were positioned in ritual signs Joel did not recognize. The face was smooth and youthful, and the flesh well muscled. It wore nothing but a loincloth.
"Is that Bane?" the Rebel Bard asked in a whisper. His voice echoed about the room.
"Probably some avatar he sent to some culture outside the Realms," Jedidiah said. "Handsome, but not the suave, sophisticated Bane we're used to, is he?"
Lying on the altar in front of the seated idol was a clawed hand the size of an ogre's paw, carved from obsidian. The hand's ebony fingers curled upwards. Its fingernails were carved from red garnets. Someone, as an afterthought to the artist's rendition, had studded the hand with diamonds. They gave the hand an odd look, as if it had the pox.
Jedidiah dropped to his knees to look under the hand to ascertain that it wasn't resting on a trap or a hidden device. He and Joel exchanged looks. Jedidiah took a deep breath, then picked up the hand.
Nothing happened. No thunderbolts crashed through the vaulted ceiling. No secret traps caused the floor to swing open. No monsters leapt from hidden alcoves. Jedidiah nodded at Joel and exhaled.
Then the hand began to steam.
A thick white fog enveloped the carving and slithered away from the hand like a snake, wrapping around the intruders and the altar. The vapors carried the stench of decaying flesh. Hastily Jedidiah covered his mouth and nose and tossed the hand back onto the top of the altar. The fog continued to pour from the hand and began to fill the bottom of the bowl-shaped room.