“Prophet!” a voice called in a warm, raspy bass. “The Power has answered my petitions! I’ve longed to see you, and it’s none too soon! Sit!”
Tahli-Damen was puzzled. “Who’s he talking to?” he mumbled to Pelmen.
“I’m talking to the Prophet of Lamath,” Erri said. “The one who accompanied you from Dragonsgate.”
“That’s not me, Erri,” Pelmen grumbled. “I threw that mantle on you.”
“And the Power keeps shoving it back toward you! I’d be delighted if you could get that through your skull and accept the responsibility!”
“Then—Pelmen is the Prophet of—” Tahli-Damen began.
“Pelmen is not the Prophet of Lamath anymore,” Pelmen snapped. “He’s not the prophet of anything. This is the Prophet of Lamath, the former Erri the sailor!”
“Let’s not confuse the man, Pelmen,” Erri muttered, acquiescing to the title. “Sit. Please.”
Pelmen finally looked around the room. “Chairs? At last?” He smiled at his short, wiry friend.
Erri hung his head. “While I was in Chaomonous marrying Bronwynn to Rosha the brothers came in and took away my straw. Burned it. When I got back, these were here. They said they did it to ease my aches and pains, but I think they were just tired of sitting on the floor.”
“Good for them.” Pelmen nodded, his eyes sparkling. Then they softened, and he looked over at his traveling companion, who was gingerly lowering himself into a seat. “And this is Tahli-Damen—lately a merchant of Uda, now a bluefaither.”
“Oh, I know him.” Erri shrugged.
Tahli-Damen’s forehead creased. “Have we met? Since I can’t see your face, I—”
“Only in dreams, my friend. Vague visions. I saw you coming.”
“And I… heard myself called…”
“Which may serve as some reassurance that you’re in the right place.” Erri’s voice conveyed many things, among them being warmth, honesty, and a confident authority that could both inspire and challenge.
“It… does,” Tahli-Damen replied. He’d imagined this meeting over and over in the past few days. In each version he’d made a wise, prudent speech before presenting the object. But the humility in Erri’s manner pointed out to him his own pride. He said no more, but just thrust his hands into his robe and pulled out the velvet bag that had hung around his neck for days. He drew its golden braid over the top of his head and held the object out before him. “I was sent to bring you this.”
Erri got up from his stool and walked over to accept it, his sandals slapping on the stone floor. As it left his hands, Tahli-Damen’s shoulders slumped. He’d rid himself of a great burden. He’d also forfeited the purpose that had kept him going.
Erri sat the bag on the table, opened it, and disclosed its contents. “So this is one of the precious pyramids.” The crystal glowed with an azure iridescence.
“Don’t stare into it,” Pelmen warned. “I’ve told Bronwynn not to handle the one she has, but she’s a queen now, and can be trusted to follow her own counsel alone. Should she and Flayh happen to be examining their pyramids at this moment, you could find yourself locked in a most unpleasant confrontation.”
Tahli-Damen shivered at that. He’d viewed such a confrontation through this very crystal. That had been the last thing he’d ever witnessed.
Erri bagged the object with a look of distaste. “I’ve no stomach for that. I’m confronted with problems enough already.”
“The rebirth of the Dragonfaith?”
“You’ve seen their reopened shrines?”
“Only one—in a small village to the south—” Pelmen stopped. Erri had laid a hand on his arm to still him, and now turned to the merchant again.
“Forgive us, my brother Tahli-Damen. We are old friends, with much to discuss that probably will not interest you. A meal, a bath, and a bed may be far more to your liking and these can be provided.” Erri clapped his hands, and a pair of initiates popped their heads inside the room. Erri tugged on the former merchant’s arm, bringing him to his feet. Strolling with him to the door, Erri told him, “These two brothers will tend to your needs. Tahli-Damen—”
“Yes?” the blind man asked earnestly, turning his head toward Erri’s voice.
“We can also provide you with other things here. Healing for your eyes is available. So, too, is a new purpose. But it seems, at present, not both.”
Tahli-Damen listened intently, and then nodded. He didn’t reply.
“You’re a wise young man, Tahli-Damen. Think it over well.” Then the blind man left Erri’s small, bare cell and was led away to more comfortable rooms on the upper floors of the old palace. Erri looked at Pelmen, and raised an eyebrow. “What about a walk on the wharf? I’m tired of these walls!”
Pelmen wrapped an arm around his short friend’s shoulders and they walked out under the darkening sky.
CHAPTER TWO
Murmurings in the Mar
Thunder grumbled in a sky turned sullen. Pelmen and Erri walked along the band of the gray-green river, pulling their cloaks tight against the cold. Pelmen cast occasional glances at the threatening sky, but his short companion ignored the mumbled warnings. The somber clouds wrestling silently above them matched his mood. “This Dragonfaith,” Erri said. “Can it be killed? I thought it dead, but now I hear daily reports of chapels being reopened and new initiates donning its dark blue habit.” Erri abruptly stopped, and sternly fixed his small, dark eyes on Pelmen’s face, “do you know the whereabouts of Serphimera?”
Pelmen sighed and turned away. A cool drizzle began, and he watched the river drink it in. They heard the roar then and both danced nimbly under an awning as the curtain of rain swept over and around them.
The wind tore at the canvas momentarily, then raced onward, leaving behind a thick, murky downpour.
The awning sheltered a tackle shop that had been shuttered up. There was no one around to overhear their conversation as they shouted to one another over the rooftop roar. “I did know! Up until last month we were together!”
“Where?” Erri shouted back, shivering in his cloak. “In Chaomonous, near the Great South Fir.” Erri nodded. “What happened?”
“She disappeared!”
Erri frowned, and nodded again. “I’ve heard from the north-west, from the Lakelands. A Unionist monastery just reopened there. Worse,” he added, “there’ve been reported sightings of the dragon.”
“I wouldn’t doubt it,” Pelmen grunted, and Erri jerked around to stare at him. “I’ve seen it too.”
“Then it’s true?” Erri gasped. Their ears had grown accustomed to the backdrop of the rain’s din and filtered it out. Enclosed within a dry box in the midst of a torrent, they forgot their surroundings completely to concentrate on the exchange of information.
“It is, and it isn’t. It’s true that the dragon has appeared again. But though it wears the form of the dead serpent, it’s not the same beast.”
“Another twi-beast?”
“No. There was only one Vicia-Heinox and we must beg the Power to keep it so. There is a clever imitation, however. The monster is being impersonated by an immensely powerful wizard.”
“Flayh?”
Pelmen nodded. “The man has stumbled upon an incredible book of spells. It’s given him a control over the powers unmatched by any present-day powershaper.”
“Not even by yourself?”
“Perhaps not even by all the best of us combined.” Erri’s bushy eyebrows laced themselves together over the bridge of his hooked nose. “Then you mean he’s somehow changed his altershape to the image of the dragon?”