"Where can we find them?" asked Thluna.
"The way cannot be shown," said Duthroan. "The way is secret. But there is another possibility." His great wooden hands reached for a knot on his side and drew forth a number of small leather flasks. "Quaff the dew these contain. It will take your senses and your wits for a time, so we trees can deliver you to their company. Then the choice will be theirs to decide your fate."
"And if we refuse?" asked Thluna.
"Then I will ask you to leave Turlang's Wood and never return." Duthroan's tone carried the unspoken threat of what might happen if they defied his instructions.
Thluna stood silently, weighing his options.
"The Tree Ghosts are noble," said Thanar. "We would not be wise to offend our only likely allies in the whole of the forest."
"And our time may be short," Vell said. "If we must leave Turlang's Wood and seek another route into the deep forest, we could lose months."
"I agree," said Thluna with some reluctance. He turned to Duthroan. "We accept your offer."
Keirkrad moved close to Thluna and spoke directly into his ear. "You cannot listen to this. This creature cannot be trusted—this is a tree that walks. The Tree Ghosts associate with elves and—gods know what else. Dealing with such beings will be at the cost of our souls."
Something cracked in Thluna. Although young and accustomed to deferring to his elders, he turned on Keirkrad.
"Who is chief here?" he demanded. Keirkrad sniffed and shrank away, making claws of his ancient hands.
The treant passed the flasks to the Uthgardt. "One gulp," he said. "No more." One by one, they lapsed into a trance and stood like brainless undead, eyes wide open, until only Vell and Kellin waited to drink. She could scarcely imagine what he was feeling at that moment. Perhaps he felt that his will had been wrested from him already, and he saw this as another incident of the same. Or perhaps he welcomed this oblivion as a rest.
They took their swigs in unison and lapsed away together.
* * * * *
The true chief of the Thunderbeast tribe lay on the floor of his cell, barely conscious from torture. His own rage had been used against him. His torturers had known of the barbarians' anger, capable of making them powerful, reckless, and all but unstoppable. That state stripped emotion and doubt, and replaced it with the purity of thoughtless rage. Clearly, his torturers knew of this and used it to their advantage. Bound to a cold metal table in their dimly lit chamber, Sungar had been allowed to rage and was left untouched. Only when it was over, when the purity of the fight was gone, when Sungar was susceptible to all the doubts and insecurities of his world, would they go to work. No resistance was possible. Unbidden, his mouth would open, and all the secrets of his tribe would flow forth.
Only the occasional comforting words of the dwarf in the next cell kept Sungar tied to reality as his mind threatened to float away on a sea of wrath and shame. Hurd would laugh even though he had been imprisoned for so long, subject to tortures equal to Sungar's. At times Sungar wondered if Hurd was real, for he never saw his face. Was he just another trick of his torturers to keep him from suicide, or—worse yet—a trick of his own mind?
Two guards, swords at their belts, entered Sungar's cell and propped him up. Weak as a kitten, Sungar could do nothing to resist. He expected they were taking him for another session under the cruel glass-studded whip of tusk-faced Kiev, but instead they washed him and put him in clean clothes. Sungar was far too weak to complain, but he croaked, "Why are you doing this?"
"We can't have you smelling like a dumb animal, even if that is what you are," one of them explained through a grin. "You're meeting the mayor."
Now, dressed in silk breeches and a starched white shirt, the finest fashions of Waterdeep, he was marched up a flight of stairs that wound back on itself at each landing. He was delivered into a narrow dining hall. Great decadent paintings decorated the walls, a white cloth covered the table, and cold iron chains bound him to his chair. A strap around his forehead held his head in place against the chains. He felt his feet on a plush carpet. Above his head, a magical light cast unflickering shadows over the walls.
He was left there a long time—he heard a bell sound outside, and later, another. Finally a man entered and took a place opposite him at the table. Somewhat rotund and red-faced, middle-aged with a receding hairline, he was dressed in sleek purple robes. Even if Hurd hadn't mentioned it, Sungar would have known this man was a wizard. Something about him was sluglike; his features were so soft, as if weather had never touched him. This was a man who never used his body for anything. He would be ill-equipped for physical combat, Sungar knew; he could snap the man's neck in an instant, were it not for his deceitful magic.
"Chieftain Sungar," he said with an over-wide smile. "I am pleased to meet you at last. I'm Geildarr Ithym. I'm the mayor here in Llorkh, and you are my guest.
"I regret the necessity of your restraints. I hope that in time I will be able to host you unencumbered. Perhaps you'd like to sample our civilized cuisine—it goes far beyond the berries and roasted joints you're probably accustomed to."
Sungar said nothing.
"You might come to enjoy the pleasures of civilization in time," said Geildarr. "You scowl at the word." Geildarr repeated it, savoring every syllable. "Civilization. The name for everything your people despise. But do you even know what it means?"
Sungar spat onto the table before him. He heard rustling behind him and knew that guards were ready to abuse him if he misbehaved. But Geildarr silenced them with a casual wave of his hand.
"Kiev told me you've been very cooperative in his interrogations," Geildarr went on. "But there's one thing I still don't understand. It concerns the axe you left in the Fallen Lands. The exact reason you thought to get rid of it is of great interest to me." Geildarr's gaze became intense. "The wizard named, according to you, Arklow of Ashabenford, demonstrated the axe was magical, so you threw it away. This seems to me—but admittedly, I'm no expert on Uthgardt honor—like an act so petulant as to befit a three-year-old child, not a mighty barbarian warrior.
"I realize you shun magic in all of its forms. I respect that—even a seasoned wizard like myself starts to hate the stuff every now and again. It grows boring when I use it too much. It loses its wonder. However, using a weapon infused with magic isn't quite the same as commanding magic.
"It was your choice to toss it away, to leave it there in the dust. It might have gone for the rest of eternity without anybody finding it. But through a happy accident, or perhaps divine will, somebody did. Sungar, do you know the name Berun?"
Sungar said nothing, but he knew his reaction gave him away.
"Of course you do. He's an important figure in your legends. Well, one of the tales of him was more than legend. That axe you wielded belonged to him."
Sungar scanned the mayor's face. Clearly he was enjoying himself; he was a torturer of another kind. Was that the whole reason for this show? If so, it told much about Geildarr. A true leader, one secure in his power, would not feel the need to taunt the helpless.
But, Sungar wondered, could Geildarr's words possibly be true? Could the weapon of the chiefs have come from the most ancient figure of their history?
Geildarr smiled. "Better still, it's possible—I can't be entirely sure about this, admittedly—that it was also once wielded by Uthgar himself. If this magical axe was an unholy, corruptive influence, as you seem to think, it certainly must have drawn some of the great ones into its web.
"Perhaps you should re-evaluate your relationship with magic. It seems to have been with your tribe from the very beginning. What do you say to that?"