“I’m certain,” said Moon. “And I have to try. I don’t want his song in my head!” He looked at her, then at Singe. “I can take both of you. Maybe someone else too.”
“Me,” said Ashi.
Singe turned around. The hunter, Natrac, and Mithas had gathered around them. Ashi’s dragonmarked face was determined.
Singe nodded, and Mithas let out a cry of protest.
Ashi glared at him. “I said I’d go with you when this was over and everyone was safe. The lords of Deneith can wait!”
“There’s no way to reverse what Dah’mir has already done to the kalashtar,” said Dandra. “The only way for the kalashtar mind to escape the psicrystal is through madness.” She looked from Ashi to Moon. “Whether they’ve already awakened as servants of Xoriat or not, if we want to release them, we’re going to have to kill them.”
Both Ashi and Moon nodded. Dandra’s dark eyes turned to Singe. The wizard’s heart felt like ice. “I’ve already killed them once,” he said. “I owe it to them to do it again.”
CHAPTER 23
Torches made from burning reeds soaked in sweet oils cast a wavering light on the tunnel walls. The illumination wasn’t for the Gatekeepers’ benefit. The orcs and Ekhaas could have navigated the maze beneath the Bonetree mound without any light at all. Nor, Geth knew, was it for his, though he would have been as blind as a human without it. No, the torches, which burned with a greenish glow and gave off a thin smoke that smelled of cut grass, had only one purpose.
They held back the dolgrims.
The vile creatures seemed to be everywhere. As the light that surrounded the procession of druids advanced, they retreated into the darkness ahead. Where the tunnel was wide enough, they clustered in the shadows to the procession’s sides. When the light had passed, they closed in behind. As the Gatekeepers entered a new passage where the ceiling soared high overheard, Geth caught movement above and looked up.
Dolgrims crouched on ledges like spectators in the balcony of an arena. They shifted back from the light, but held their ground. Tiny dark eyes watched the intruders. Four bandy arms fondled sharp knives and spiked maces, even simple stones. Two wide mouths-one in the squat head that rose like a hump on each creature’s shoulders, the other in what should have been its chest-drooled and twitched. The passage, like all of the others beneath the mound, echoed with constant muttering as the dolgrims spoke to one another-and to themselves, each mouth taking sides in an unending conversation.
When the gibbering had first emerged from the shadows, Geth had tried listening to it. He’d been holding Wrath and the ancient sword allowed him to understand the weird tongue spoken by the creatures of Khyber just as it let him understand Orc and Goblin. After only a few moments, however, he’d had to sheathe the weapon, sickened by what he’d heard. The dolgrims spoke only of violence, violation, and depravity.
Ekhaas continued to listen, though it was clear she didn’t understand what they were saying. Her ears twitched with curiosity. “Their language almost sounds like Goblin,” she said.
“They almost look like goblins,” Geth grunted.
“They may have been goblins,” said Batul. “The oldest legends of the Daelkyr War, from the time when the daelkyr first burst from Xoriat to invade Eberron, say that the daelkyr brought creatures like the mind flayers with them, but that they also crafted new creatures from the races they encountered here. Some of the legends hold that the dolgrims were created from goblins.”
“What about dolgaunts?” asked Geth.
The old druid’s mouth closed tight for a moment, and he glanced at Ekhaas, then murmured, “Hobgoblins.”
Ekhaas’s ears pressed back flat against her skull.
A rock clattered somewhere close. One of the other Gatekeepers grunted something in Orc. Batul grimaced. “The dolgrims above are growing bolder. We need to get out of this passage.” He put his hand on the amulet of Vvaraak-it hung around his neck once more-and pointed with his hunda stick. “This way.” he said.
When they’d first entered the mound-the nine most senior Gatekeepers from the horde, Geth, and Ekhaas-the guidance that the amulet provided had hardly been necessary. Closer to the surface, cross-tunnels and side-passages had been uncommon and the floors of the tunnels they had followed had been worn smooth from use. More tunnels appeared the deeper they went, however. The floor became slick-smooth, polished by the passage of countless dolgrim feet over many, many years. Batul had kept them to their path though, the amulet guiding him toward the great seal.
They left the high passage for a tunnel that was low but broad. Dolgrims flowed past them in the shadows to either side, lithe in spite of their deformities. Geth clenched his teeth. “How much farther?” he asked.
“The influence of Xoriat bleeds through into this place,” said Batul. “The great seal is like a torch in the fog: it’s close, but you can’t tell what’s between you and it.”
There was a sudden exclamation from the Gatekeeper who had taken the lead in their procession. Ekhaas’s ears rose. “She says there are no dolgrims ahead of her. They’ve fallen away.”
Geth peered into the shadows once more. The dolgrims had indeed stopped moving. They stood still now, watching the procession move past them. Even their muttering seemed muted. Geth dropped his hand to Wrath. Whispers sprang at him.
“… they enter the dark place.”
“They won’t come back.”
“We could follow.”
“We wouldn’t come back …”
They passed the last of the dolgrims. The walls and ceiling of the tunnel vanished. The green-tinted light of the reed torches was a pool of light moving through darkness. The cavern they had entered was vast. Even at the edges of his vision, Geth could see nothing but the smooth floor stretching into the gloom. He glanced at Ekhaas. “You see anything?” he asked softly.
She shook her head.
“The seal lies ahead,” said Batul. Even his confident voice was dwarfed by the space around them. No one else spoke. They moved in silence.
The deep quiet was even more eerie than the muttering of the dolgrims had been. Around Geth’s neck, the collar of black stones grew icy cold. Geth drew Wrath. The feel of the byeshk sword in his left hand and the weight of his great gauntlet on his right arm were reassuring, solid anchors in a place that felt increasingly as if it were no longer a part of the world.
Then something loomed ahead. It took several more paces before Geth saw what it was: a wall of rock that stretched up and to either side, vanishing into darkness just as the floor of the cavern did. Directly ahead of the procession, a narrow passage pierced the rock.
They all stopped and stared at it. After a long moment, Batul spoke in hushed tones. “Surely we are the first of our kind to walk this path since before the dawn of this age.” He slipped the amulet from around his neck and pressed it to his lips with hands that trembled. “Vvaraak lend us the strength and wisdom to do what must be done,” he prayed. “Shield us from the madness that has waited for nine thousand years.”
In the midst of the dark and silent cavern, the breath of a warm breeze stirred. Geth’s hair drifted back from his face, and his heart seemed to lift. The Gatekeepers murmured a collective invocation to the ancient founder of their sect, and even Ekhaas looked awed by the gentle but powerful force that touched them. Batul lowered the amulet. The procession started forward to the passage into the rock-
— just as silver-white light flashed somewhere on its other side. The glare that burst through the passage and fell upon them was dimmed by distance, but after so long in the tunnels it was still blinding. Geth saw only a bright, jagged line in the darkness, like lightning through a storm. He bit back a cry and twitched his head away, but the light had already printed itself on his eyes in hazy afterimages. He blinked furiously, trying to clear it away.