He knew, too, that he was ready to die.
Dawn had arrived.
"I am very pleased, indeed, to be summoned to your presence, High Theocrat. It is an honor."
Gaveley bowed deeply as his hoarse voice rasped out the words. His face glowed with pleasure. He glanced around Hederick's receiving room with appreciation. His quick eyes noted and evaluated the frescoes on the walls, the inlaid pattern in the floor tile, and the steel and silver statues of the Seeker gods that graced the corners of the room. "I am very, very pleased," he repeated.
His hand stroked the arm of a marble nymph that might have been the goddess Ferae. Gaveley wasn't exactly sure who was whom among the Seeker gods; there were so many of them.
"Certainly, certainly, my friend Gaveley," Hederick murmured, inwardly vowing to have the statue scrubbed later. By the New Gods, how the infidel dressed-inde shy;cently tight blue leggings and matching boots, orange tunic, and a white hat with a green feather. It was enough to give a godly man like the High Theocrat a headache.
Hederick sipped from his early morning goblet of mead. "You warned me about Tarscenian, and you helped deliver him into my hands. For that I am grateful."
"As am I," Gaveley returned. "I know the Seekers are not prone to admitting those of elven blood to their temples." Gaveley inclined his head, but he couldn't quite keep the bitterness-or the sweet triumph.-out of his voice.
Hederick only smiled. Better that Gaveley not know the humans-only rule was Erolydon's alone. Anyway, the temple would soon be reconsecrated. The stain of Gave-ley's presence would then be wiped away.
"We will make tremendous partners, you and I," Gaveley continued with zest. "With my spies and thieves and your wealth, Hederick.. " He whistled. "You've already got the network set up. You just need someone like me to manage things. Someone with a bent for this kind of business."
The High Theocrat murmured something indistinct, and the half-elf seemed to realize that he'd stumbled across some boundary of etiquette.
"My pardon, please, Your Worship," the thief whis shy;pered smoothly. "The veneration I hold for you, and the excitement of being summoned to your presence, addles my wits a bit, I fear." He bestowed upon Hederick the shining smile that had never failed to disarm Mynx.
Hederick let his lips curve in return. "It's understand shy;able," he said.
"You have business for me, then?" the half-elf asked. "Your messenger led me to believe…"
"Ah, yes," the High Theocrat murmured. "Business. But first we must drink a toast to our-what did you call it, my friend? — our 'partnership.' " Hederick indicated a carafe on a table at Gaveley's elbow. "Please join me." His bulging blue eyes glistened as the half-elf thief poured himself a generous portion of the beverage. Some of the mead slopped over the edge of the glass and stained the table, but still Hederick maintained his pleasant smile.
"A toast," the High Theocrat proclaimed, raising his own full goblet. "To a new association." Then, as Gaveley raised the goblet to his lips, Hederick cried, "Wait! No, we must raise this tribute to the beginning day. It is the Seeker way." He ushered the half-elf to the window and flung open the shutters. "In the name of Sauvay, god of power and vengeance, I bless this mingling of minds." He sipped his mead, then placed the goblet aside as Gaveley quaffed the liquid he'd poured from the carafe.
The half-elf died quickly-quicker than he deserved, Hederick decided.
The High Theocrat caught the thief under the arms and tipped him forward through the window. It was but a short distance to the ground. Yellow Eyes and one of his confederates scurried forward to carry the body away.
Hederick downed his own mead-which, of course, was not poisoned-and watched until the blue and orange of Gaveley's outfit disappeared over the marble wall to the north. "You were too ambitious for my liking, Gaveley, my former friend," he whispered. "Much too ambitious. And no one treats High Theocrat Hederick with that kind of familiarity."
He regarded Gaveley's spilled mead with satisfaction.
"Macaba root," he purred. "It has never failed me."
The centaurs slowed, then halted once more. Mynx's centaur was forced back among the crowd, and she couldn't see ahead. "Kifflewit!" she shouted. "What is delaying us?"
The kender's mount was near the front of the massed pack of centaurs. "Someone is hurt!"
"One of the centaurs? From the battle? I thought we'd treated all the wounded."
"No," the kender supplied, "a child." He looked around. "It sure is foggy all of a sudden."
A child, alone in the forest in the middle of the night? Mynx wondered. And what about this fog? She checked to see whether the Diamond Dragon was still safe on its new thong around her neck. It was.
Then she flung herself off her centaur and pushed her way through the mass of bodies until she saw what had stopped everyone.
A young boy lay before them. He was unconscious, his head flung back, his small red mouth open. A beautiful peasant woman who must have been the child's mother cradled him on her lap. She wept bitterly. Nearby, a wrinkled crone sat upon a fallen tree and moaned, wringing her hands. The old one appeared not to be in her right mind. She mumbled nonstop to herself and occasionally beseeched the night sky, the vallenwoods, and various boulders for assistance.
Swirls of thickening mist glided between Mynx and the trio, and the thief had to squint to see them. Without thinking, she clasped the Diamond Dragon. The fog sud shy;denly cleared.
"Young woman," Phytos said gently to the mother. "What is wrong?"
The child's mother turned huge brown eyes toward the centaur. Her face was stunning in its pale delicacy. "Oh, pray, sir, don't hurt us!" she implored. "Don't send us back there! My sweet boy is dying."
Phytos blinked several times. "Send thee back where, woman? Thou hast escaped from somewhere? Hast thou been a slave?" He looked at Ceci Vakon and the others, but they shook their heads. No, the trio had not been part of the slave train.
"We escaped from Hederick, sir." The woman's gaze returned to her child's bloodless face. She stroked the lad's cheek before she continued. Sudden wrenching sobs made it difficult to understand her.
"We could not pay our taxes. The High Theocrat sought to sell my husband-this old woman's son-into slavery and take me, my child, and my mother-in-law into cus shy;tody. See the poor old lady, sir. She's not been lucid since they dragged my dear husband away."
"So I see." Phytos still appeared nonplussed, however. "Young woman, we are on our way to Solace. I suppose we can carry three more as well, but we must move swiftly…"
The woman sobbed even harder, shaking her head. "Oh, no, kind centaur! My child is far too weak to stand a ride on the back of a horse. See how much blood he has lost!" She drew back slightly from the child, and the cen shy;taurs and slaves gasped in unison.
Only a darkened stump remained of the boy's right arm. The centaurs burst into protests. "By the gods!" "Didst thou see that?" "What monster would do that, and to a child?"
Phytos had to shout to make himself heard. "How did that happen, woman?"
"The boy-such a courageous lad, my Buni-rushed forward to defend his father when the goblins came to take him to the slave yard. One of Hederick's hobgoblins cut him badly. My husband fought them, giving us time to escape with Buni here, but I fear my husband is dead." The woman burst into fresh tears, cradling the child close to her breast, which had the unfortunate effect of making the wound bleed anew. "Oh, my poor, brave, fatherless boy!"
Her tears broke off abruptly. The young woman felt in her pocket and drew out a small gem-muddy yellow and nearly valueless-which she handed over to Phytos. "It's all we have. I will give you this gem in return for safe passage. Please, kind centaur, help us!"