Something was happening within it. Not within the tunnel, but within the ring formed by the seal. The air stretched and shimmered, then seemed to contract. Something rushed to fill the space, as if unseen hands were focusing a vast and powerful spyglass and the ring of the seal was its lens.
A lens that snapped into focus, leaving Geth staring into a throne room where mind flayers took the place of lords and ministers, their dead white eyes inscrutable, their writhing tentacles hiding unspeakable secrets. Dolgaunts took the place of guards, and dolgrims of the court mastiffs. Tiny creatures resembling eyeless monkeys perched where tame birds or lapdogs might have, and elf-like women with thick tendrils growing among their hair and down their backs stood as if they were concubines.
At the center of the terrible assembly was a glittering black throne and on it, looking out through the lens, sat a pale and beautiful man in rich robes.
In the ghostly fortress of Jhegesh Dol, Geth had fought the phantom of the daelkyr who had ruled the fortress in ancient times. The figure on the throne had exactly the same face as that phantom lord, except that his eyes were acid-green instead of lavender-and he had no mouth. Between nose and chin, the man on the throne had nothing but smooth skin.
He was no man, Geth knew. He was a daelkyr. He was the Master of Silence.
And he spoke.
A vast voice filled Geth’s head, like Dandra’s power of kesh but with none of sense of unity that kesh carried with it. The voice of the Master of Silence forced itself onto him, violating every corner of his mind, the words it spoke so vast that they threatened to wipe him away from himself.
But there was something between him and it, gentle but powerful like a warm breeze. The power of the amulet of Vvaraak muffled the enormous voice. The Master of Silence’s words were still deafening. They still made Geth feel like blood was trickling from his ears, but he could understand them.
My servants stand before me. My ancient enemies know fear. There was pleasure in the daelkyr’s tone.
Somewhere on the ledges above, people were screaming, overwhelmed by the voice. It wasn’t the kalashtar-Geth could see them and they stood still as statues. It couldn’t have been the Gatekeepers or Ekhaas-Batul had invoked the power of the amulet over them as well. His gut knotted. Singe and Dandra, Ashi and the young kalashtar. What protected them from the terrible voice?
Do something, Batul, he prayed silently. Wolf and Tiger, do something!
The screams went on and on.
Dah’mir didn’t seem to notice. His great body folded, his forelegs lowering and his neck dipping down to brush the ground. “Master!” he said. His voice was thick with adoration-and with anger. “Master, you have new servants because of me! I brought them here, not her.” His head twisted toward Medala. “Not … that.”
Medala hadn’t moved. She stood straight, facing the Master of Silence without obeisance or fear. The daelkyr’s eyes moved to her. You are not what you were the last time you stood in this place.
“No,” said Medala, two voices speaking the word.
The creatures gathered in the throne room beyond the lens hissed and shifted at this disrespect. Dah’mir reared upright with a roar. The Master of Silence stilled them all with a thought, a single command so powerful that even Geth felt the urge to obey it. Hush. The throne room fell silent. So did Dah’mir. So did the screams from above. The cavern was utterly quiet. The Master of Silence’s gaze on Medala didn’t waver. I was told you were dead.
“We were gone from this world.”
Interest stirred in the daelkyr’s voice. There is a familiar touch upon you.
Medala smiled. “We have been where you can no longer go, imprisoned lord,” she acknowledged. “We have been to Xoriat. We saw many things there-learned many things. We saw Dah’mir’s plans in Sharn.”
The hair on the back of Geth’s neck and on his arms rose. She’d told him and Ekhaas the truth-or at least part of it. He thought he could guess at the second voice that rolled behind Medala’s now. Had she ever told them what had become of Virikhad? No. They’d guessed. They’d assumed. They’d been wrong.
Was Batul hearing this? What were the Gatekeepers doing? Fear struck Geth. Would they have fled? Could they have abandoned him?
Dah’mir let out another bellow. “Master, she confirms it herself! She knew my plans! She stole the kalashtar from me! I brought your servants to-”
“You succeeded in Sharn only because we made certain you succeeded!” Medala said. “What will be born here today belongs to us. You don’t understand what you have created!”
As if the gaunt woman’s shriek had brought him down, one of the kalashtar slumped suddenly, then straightened again. He lifted his head and Geth saw the fever of madness in his dark eyes.
“They awaken!” said Dah’mir.
“They are reborn!” said Medala. “You still don’t understand.”
I feel him. The Master of Silence’s eyes were shining. I feel the touch of Xoriat upon him. And upon her! Another kalashtar, an old woman, shook her head and looked around herself as if seeing the world for the first time. And upon him!
A third kalashtar blinked, then a fourth stirred and a fifth. Then it seemed as if all of the kalashtar were shifting and waking. A murmur of amazement swept through the throne room beyond the lens of the seal. Geth’s gut tightened in horror. The very thing that they had tried so hard to prevent had come to pass.
The Master of Silence had his new servants.
Dah’mir just stared and shook his head. “This isn’t right!” he said. He spoke to himself, as if stunned by what was happening before him. “They awaken too quickly. Something is wrong.”
“How do you know that something’s wrong?” asked Medala. “How often have you seen this happen? Once? With us?”
The dragon’s head snapped around and he glared at her. “For decades, I studied! I researched! For centuries-”
“What have you studied, Dah’mir?” Medala shouted at him. “The forces of Xoriat. Legends of the true binding stones used in the Battle of Moths. The single pitiful imitation stone created by an apprentice. But did you study kalashtar? Did you understand the potential you unleashed when you turned your device upon us?”
Enough! The Master of Silence sat forward. I understand. I see servants able to walk abroad with no fear of the Gatekeepers. I see dreams and madness united. I see kalashtar who will serve the masters of Xoriat-
Medala turned on him. “You see wrong, daelkyr!”
The cavern was instantly quiet. Geth felt like he’d been slapped. The Master of Silence sat back. You go too far, he said softly.
There was no warning, no second chance as a human lord might have given. The lens between throne room and cavern bulged like the sail of a ship running before a storm as a sickly darkness reached through to strike at the woman who had defied a daelkyr.
It never reached her.
Geth couldn’t have said which of the kalashtar began the song or even if they all really joined in perfect unison as he imagined. The song was simply there, rising in a weird, dissonant chorus like tumbling crystals, louder and more pure than he had ever heard it before, pouring not so much from the kalashtar’s mouths as directly from their minds.
AAHYI-KSIKSIKSI-KLADAKLA-YAHAAHYI-KSIKSIKSI-KLA-
The force of it rocked him backward, bursting through the magic that had protected him from the daelkyr’s voice. Dah’mir staggered back like a startled child. Before the song, the sickly darkness that had pierced the seal writhed like something alive-and unraveled. The bulging lens shimmered and shrank, snapping back into place.