Baylee knelt beside his friend, feeling the tears burn his eyes. He took Aymric's hand and closed it tightly in his. "I should not have left you," he whispered in a hoarse voice.
Aymric showed him a small smile and moved his head back and forth.
"Let me through!" a voice urged. "He may not yet be too far gone!"
Baylee shifted and let Carceus through. The priest's face remained blank as he surveyed his patient. "Gond willing," Carceus said, "I'll not suffer him to die." He pulled up his robe sleeves. "Water, please." He held his hands out.
Karg stood nearby and removed the small flask at his hip. "It's spring water, god-speaker, brought from the airy heights, only one step removed from the heavens themselves."
"Even better. Pour." The giant killer sluiced the water over the priest's hands. Prayer spilled from Carceus's lips, coming so rapidly that Baylee understood only a few of the words.
He added his own prayers to the Lady of the Forest to the priest's. Aymric's hand in his was already growing weaker.
A smoky blue aura glowed around Carceus's hands. He kept his fingers wide-spread. Then he placed his palms against the violent wound in Aymric's midsection.
The elf s body jumped in response, bowing up. Aymric's hand closed around Baylee's tight enough to cut off the blood flow. A keening moan escaped the elf ranger's lips, spitting out blood with it.
The smoky blue aura around the priest's hands spread, covering all of Aymric's stomach and lower chest. Miraculously, the flesh knitted itself back together. Muscle reconnected to bone, then to each other. Long moments passed as the healing continued. Perspiration dappled Carceus's forehead, trickling down through his eyebrows. After a time, the blue glow faded. Even after the work was done and he sat back in exhaustion on his haunches, the priest's prayer to Gond Wonderbringer continued unabated.
Baylee stared at Aymric's face. Once the blue glow had faded, the elf s body had gone into total relaxation, his eyes shut. He didn't appear to be breathing. "Aymric," Baylee called gently.
There was no response.
Fear clawed at Baylee's mind, bristly as the spider's leg had been all those years ago when he'd been tied securely in the web before Golsway had shown up to save him. There were stories from time to time of those who had been healed after having severe wounds who only turned out to be well-preserved corpses. Healing could still be done on the body even though the spirit had departed. His hand trembled, surprising him. "Aymric." He spoke louder, but his voice was lost in the myriad moaning and bits of other conversations circling around the group with the elf.
Serellia placed her fingers against Aymric's throat. "It's all right," she said. "He only sleeps. His heart beats strongly."
Baylee.
Heartened by his friend's survival, the ranger turned to look back at the azmyth bat. The skeleton warrior had gotten closer to the circlet in Xuxa's claws. Men and women surrounded the base of the tree. Even over the distance, Baylee heard the group talking about firing the tree. Someone else told them that firing the tree would do no good, that only magic weapons had any effect on the undead creature.
We have to deal with the skeleton warrior, Xuxa urged. I have but to release the circlet and he will go.
Not yet. Baylee stood and walked toward the tree with the skeleton warrior in it. He knew that the undead creature wasn't mindless. Far from it, skeleton warriors possessed cunning intelligence far above average. But they were bound by the drive to recover the circlets and become one with their souls again. That obsession weakened them once they were no longer in a controller's thrall.
"What is it you're going to do?" Karg growled, joining Baylee. He carried his axe in one huge hand.
"We have no clue where these skeleton warriors came from," Baylee answered. "But they were elves."
"Aye."
"Where is the skeleton warrior you and Serellia fought?"
"Destroyed," the giant killer replied. "It put up a fierce fight for a time. Of course, it helped when I removed one of its arms. Then it erupted into a frenzy that almost caught me unawares. Serellia saved me with as fancy a piece of sword play as I've seen in a long time. We were hard pressed for a time, but it turned its attention back to the drow. Were it a human foe, I would not have attacked it from behind. The blow cut its spine in two and took its legs from it. Still, it tried to battle. Then, of a sudden, it went limp. I wasted no time in cleaving its skull to pieces, I tell you."
"It's dead?" Baylee asked.
"Oh, and it didn't turn to dust, that's true," Karg said, "but it's deader than it has been in a long time."
How long a time it had been originally dead was only one of the questions on Baylee's mind. He'd noted the clothing the skeleton warriors almost wore. Fashion sometimes was very indicative of time period, and the bits he'd seen of the clothing on the skeleton warriors looked near to ancient.
Xuxa, he called. Bring me the circlet.
Are you sure?
Baylee came to a stop forty paces from the tree. He hoped it would be enough. Yes. He glanced at one of the nearby rangers, a young boy who trembled as he tried to stand still under a shuddering pitchblende torch. "Could I borrow your torch?"
The boy gave it without answering, then wrapped his arms around himself.
Xuxa hurled herself from the tree, dragging the heavy circlet after her. The skeleton warrior tracked the band instantly, abandoning the tree. It fell through the branches, plummeting toward the ground. When it hit, it sank into the ground nearly to its knees from the weight and the height of the fall. A normal man's legs would have, shattered.
Instead, the skeleton warrior put a hand against the ground and levered itself from the impromptu grave. An arrow glanced from its head, leaving a trail of silvery sparks behind to show that the arrowhead had possessed magic properties. Thin cracks blossomed in the undead creature's skull.
That creature will kill you to get this, Xuxa warned:
Baylee reached up as the azmyth bat let the circlet tumble from her claws. Gold flashed as it tumbled through the air, fired by the torches and lanterns the rangers brought with them. He caught the circlet, the metal cold under his fingers.
"It's coming," Karg stated.
14
Studying the circlet even with the skeleton warrior bearing down on him, Baylee felt drawn to it. The piece of jewelry was old, hundreds of years old. Sometimes when he touched something, he just knew. Most instances, when challenged to discover which was an actual artifact and which was a cleverly constructed replica, Baylee had picked the artifact every time. It wasn't just knowledge with him, and the aspect had fascinated even Fannt Golsway enough to attempt to find out how his young apprentice could be so accurate. No answers had presented themselves. It was a knack, Golsway had been forced to concur, just a small gift from Mystra, Lady of Mysteries, in fact as Golsway was wont to declare, maybe a small homage to her own title.
He turned the circlet in his free hand, noting the rune work inscribed in the metal. Only some of the characters looked at all familiar.
Baylee!
The ranger knew Xuxa referred to the growing proximity of the skeleton warrior, but he found himself loathe to let go his prize. The band felt heavy, solid, and so, so old. He had to wonder what stories the runes might tell if he could have time to decipher it.
But there was no time. The skeleton warrior ran at him, its great sword drawn back to strike.
'Tell me, Baylee, are we going to fight?" Karg asked.
You can't ask them for any more blood tonight, Xuxa counseled calmly. Not when there is an easy way out.