Joel turned and hurried back to his companions. He embraced Holly. "Be careful," he warned the paladin. Remembering the incident with the barghests, he reminded her, "Make sure you keep the little harp Finder gave each of us handy."
"You make sure you do, too," Holly replied. Leaving the paladin behind in the camp of tanar'ri, Jas, Joel, and Emilo made their way up the canyon's slope. Just before they reached the crest, they turned and waved good-bye one last time.
Holly waved back.
The bar-lgura who'd accompanied them up the slope suddenly disappeared. They'd become invisible, no doubt planning on following the bard and the winged woman as long as they could.
The three adventurers made their way up to a high point on the ridge to skirt around the lava flow between the canyon ridge and the Bastion of Hate. It was the first time they'd traveled by foot in Gehenna, and it was far more difficult than Joel had imagined. It took them nearly an hour to get down to the ledge where Xvim's fortress was located.
They regrouped behind a boulder that shielded them from view. Joel handed Emilo the fake gems and explained Walinda's suggestion to leave them lying about where they might cause discord among the yugoloths. After a moment's thought, he also gave the kender the finder's stone. If the tyrannar had him searched, the high priest might demand the stone to give to Iyachtu Xvim. In addition, the kender could use it to find Joel and Jas should they become separated. Jas gave the kender the lucky sword Winnie had given her. Since Joel was supposedly bringing her in as a prisoner, she had to be disarmed. With a short length of rope from Winnie's backpack, Joel bound Jas's hands in front of her so she looked like prisoner. Then he tied a lead rope to the bindings.
Before the three adventurers could continue, Emilo said, "I don't get it. If Iyachtu Xvim is like the other gods, he can sense what's going on with nearby followers, right? Then he must sense us. He must sense Walinda. You don't suppose this is all a trap, do you?"
"I've thought about that," Joel admitted. "I have another theory. If Xvim is stealing Tymora's luck and Beshaba's misfortune, he has more than enough power to seize some other realm, perhaps in some less unpleasant place. He could have already abandoned his fortress here and is only leaving it operating as a distraction for us." "I don't know which would be worse," Jas muttered. They marched in near silence to the gate of Iyachtu Xvim's fortress. The Bastion of Hate towered over them. Its walls were encased in plates of iron as thick as Joel's thumb. The air shimmered with heat around the iron plates, and the rivets joining the plates together glowed like coal. Horn-shaped iron spikes decorated the parapets. The closed gate was an iron grid, bristling with spikes meant to keep visitors away.
Joel could see no signs of life. He shouted out, "Hello the gate!"
A voice from the wall called down, "Who goes there?"
"My name is Marin the Red," Joel shouted. "I've come to collect the bounty on Jasmine the Dark Stalker-that is, if Tyrannar Neri still wants her. Otherwise I have another buyer."
They waited several minutes, but there was no reply. Joel glanced over at Jas. Black feathers had regrown about her neck. The dark stalker's presence was growing more and more prominent. It helped their story, but it was unsettling nonetheless.
Joel moved close to Jas and whispered, "We can still flee."
Jas shook her head sharply, but Joel could see she was trembling. As long as she could keep it under control for a few more hours, the bard thought, everything would be fine.
From somewhere overhead came the squeak of wheels, and the portcullis gate raised up just enough for them to enter the fortress. For show, he tugged on the rope that bound Jas until she drew up beside him. Emilo slipped in alongside Joel.
They stood in a dark gatehouse, illuminated by a single smoky torch. A second spiked portcullis blocked their way. The portcullis behind them slammed back down to the ground. They were trapped inside the Bastion of Hate.
Jas whirled about and hissed. Joel breathed in sharply, trying to hide his shock and fear.
Feathers now completely covered Jas's face and hands. Her hands had transformed into talons. She yanked the lead rope from Joel's hands and flew at the closed gate with the frenzy of a wild bird. An inhuman screech came from her throat. It sounded to Joel like the cry of a snared hawk.
From two side doors streamed twelve yugoloth guards armed with pikes. The guards were several inches taller than Joel and resembled horned crickets, their chitinous armor the color of dirty ivory. Without Holly to explain, the bard had no idea what breed of yugoloths they were.
The guards separated Joel from his "bounty" and surrounded Jas. The inner portcullis opened. A human priest of Iyachtu Xvim stood on the other side. He was a small man, with a shaved head and an iron ring in his pierced lip. He looked younger than Joel.
"I am Hatemaster Morr. If you will follow me, Marin the Red, I will arrange for you to meet with Tyrannar Neri."
Joel looked back at Jas. Her owl-like eyes were devoid of expression, but Joel sensed that Jas felt betrayed. The winged woman screeched once more as the yugoloths led her away through a side door. She spoke no words; the sounds she made were those of an enraged animal. A sinking feeling took hold of Joel. Perhaps he'd been wrong to bring Jas here. Perhaps here, in the Bastion of Hate, the dark stalker had finally destroyed her humanity.
ACT THREE SCENE 4
In the empty stone chamber in the gate wall where Hatemaster Morr had instructed him to wait, Joel paced restlessly from wall to wall. The bard couldn't get out of his head Jas's screeches as she was dragged away. His only comfort was knowing that Emilo had followed Jas. The kender would find a way to calm her down.
Ordinarily the bard would have used the time to sing or compose something on his birdpipes. He was certain he was being observed, however, and a practiced musician was not the image he wanted to project. He tried to guess what sort of thing a tiefling bounty hunter would do while he waited. He thought of practicing drills with his sword, but that might give away just how meager his skill with a weapon was. So he paced… and worried.
After what seemed an eternity, Hatemaster Morr returned. "Follow me," he ordered.
Joel shouldered both Winnie's backpack and his own and fell into step beside the priest of Xvim. The hate-master escorted the bard past several yugoloth guards, beyond the bastion's inner wall, into the courtyard of Xvim's fortress.
The courtyard was illuminated with lines of torches. To the right, a rectangular temple of black marble squatted atop a low hill. A great staircase, littered with human bones and skulls, climbed up to the temple.
Yugoloths surrounded the temple, rank upon rank of the giant horned crickets. Drilling these cricket yugoloths in marching in formation were several shorter yugoloths who resembled red lobsters with chicken feet. Joel did not spot any of the yellow froglike hydroloths.
Across the courtyard from the temple stood a great tower, which rose several stories taller than the fortress walls. It was guarded by more hordes of the cricket creatures.
At first Joel presumed the torches were lit for the benefit of Xvim's human followers until he spied some of the small lobsterlike yugoloths carrying torches. Then Joel realized that at least some of the yugoloths were not gifted, as were the tanar'ri hi Walinda's camp, with the ability to see in the dark.
Hatemaster Morr led Joel through the courtyard toward the temple. Joel followed the priest up the staircase and into the great marble building. There were no yugoloths within the temple. A few human priests scurried from rooms on one side of the hall to rooms on the other.
Joel and the hatemaster walked the length of the great hall; at the other end, they passed into an audience chamber. There were no yugoloths in here either, only humans. Some twenty of these, armored in plate mail and armed with morningstars, served as guards. Over their armor they wore green stoles embroidered with Xvim's symbol, green eyes set in the palm of a black hand. From the relative plainness of their stoles, Joel guessed they were low-ranking priests. Six other priests in robes of gray silk trimmed with green, serving as scribes and advisers, attended the tyrannar. Only two of the priests were women; both were serving as guards.