Zelia's eyes widened in mock surprise. "Kill you?" She tilted her head. "Oh, no. I never waste anything I can still use."
Swaying into a crouch, she brushed a hand against his cheek. A shiver rushed through Arvin's body and a thin sheen of ectoplasm blossomed on his skin, forcing its way into the folds of fused flesh. His arms and legs sprang apart and his eyelid fluttered open. He rose, shaking, to his feet. Blood still dripped from his lips, his ears, and his left hand. He stared down at the latter, and saw that the little finger and the
one next to it were sliced open along their lengths. He picked up one of the scraps of cloth that remained from his shirt and wrapped the fingers together, debating whether or not he should attack Zelia. He glanced at his backpack. It was within reach, but the net had probably rooted itself back into the leather again.
Zelia saw his glance and bared her fangs: a warning not to try anything. She held up Karrell's ring. "You think she's dead, don't you?"
Arvin stared at the floor. "The demon drew her into the Abyss. Nobody can survive there."
"It drew her into Smaragd, you mean."
Arvin glanced up. "What are you talking about?"
"Smaragd is a layer of Abyss, the layer where Sseth dwells. That's where Karrell would have wound up."
"How do you know that?"
"Mariliths range throughout the Abyss, but this one was summoned by a servant of Sseth. It's the most likely place for the demon to have come from, and its banishment would have returned it there."
Arvin pressed his damaged lips together. The sting of cut flesh helped blot out the ache in his heart. "Even if she did get dragged into… there, she's still-"
"Dead?" Zelia gave a hiss of derisive laughter. "You humans know so little. Smaragd is dangerous but not completely inhospitable to mortals, especially if the mortal is yuan-ti. Your precious Karrell may still be alive."
Arvin felt a surge of hope. Karrell-alive? Zelia knew more about the Abyss than he did. Maybe she was right about this Smaragd layer being survivable, except that Karrell's god, Ubtao, was an enemy of Sseth. The serpent god would have immediately killed any cleric of Ubtao's that showed up in his
realm. Zelia was toying with him, tempting him
with the one possibility that she knew-now that
she'd raped his memories-would most torment him.
He walked over to the fountain and splashed water- onto his face, washing away the blood. "Quit lying to me," he told her, "and let's get this over with. Tell me what you want." He turned to her, his face dripping. "Why am I so 'useful?' Because I have something that can kill Sibyl?"
Zelia laughed. "That too," she said, her eyes glinting, "but also because you have eyes in Smaragd."
"Eyes?" Arvin echoed. He'd expected Zelia to send him on his way, to either order him back into the temple to make another attempt on Sibyl or to chase after Pakal and retrieve the Circled Serpent-perhaps after seeding him first, though he was starting to suspect she might have used her last power stone when she seeded Naneth.
"Eyes," Zelia repeated. "Karrell's eyes."
"She's dead." Arvin touched the lapis lazuli embedded in his forehead under a layer of scar tissue. "I tried sending to her, every day for more than a month."
"You kept my stone? How touching," she mocked. Her voice grew serious again. "A sending doesn't always penetrate to another plane. Smaragd lies deep in the Abyss-more than seventy layers shield it from this plane. There is another power, however, which can be used to view a mortal on another plane, even one as remote as Smaragd. And by viewing that mortal, to get a glimpse of what is happening on that layer of the Abyss."
Arvin's head came up. His breath caught as hope blossomed a second time in his chest. "You really do think Karrell's alive, don't you?"
Zelia gave a slow serpent nod.
Arvin hesitated, wondering if she'd just tricked
him somehow. "What… is it, exactly, that you hope to see? Sseth?"
Zelia smiled. "Aren't you the smart little monkey?" She passed Arvin back his dagger then sank down, cross-legged, and patted the floor next to her. "Sit."
Arvin sheathed the dagger, hesitated, then did as she'd ordered. Aside from tatters of his clothing he was naked, and the stone floor felt cool against his skin. The only sound was that of water tinkling into the fountain. He glanced across the city's rooftops, glowing green against the night sky. He couldn't believe that he was sitting in that rooftop garden, talking to the woman he most feared. It was as if he'd stepped back in time to the night when Zelia taught him to master his psionic powers. But if there was a chance that Karrell was alive-even a small chance-he wanted to hear what Zelia had to say.
"For some time now-more than a decade-Sseth has been… strangely muted." she began. "His clerics are still granted spells, and the god still answers their prayers, but the voice of Sseth has changed in subtle ways. They say it has deepened, become somehow drier, more whispery
"Drier?" Arvin asked.
Zelia shrugged. "I am not a cleric." She toyed with the ring in her hands. "But I do serve House Extaminos, and that noble House controls the Cathedral of Emerald Scales. Anything that is of concern to its clerics disturbs Lady Dediana, and that, in turn, disturbs me."
"The clerics think something's happened to Sseth?" Arvin asked.
Zelia nodded. "A little over two years ago, I had a troubling dream, a dream of a larger serpent swallowing a smaller serpent, tail first. As the smaller serpent started to disappear into the larger one's jaws,
it twisted and took the larger serpent's tail in its own mouth, and started consuming it in turn. Each serpent choked the other down, until both disappeared."
She paused to flick away the venom that had beaded on her fangs with a blue forked tongue. "I wasn't the only one to have this dream," she continued. "Dozens of other yuan-ti shared it-or one similar to it." She nodded at the ring. "Karrell was one of them. She told me of her dream when we spoke in Ormpetarr. She was one of the few to recognize the snakes in the dream for what they were: the two halves of the Circled Serpent."
Zelia obviously expected a startled reaction. Arvin didn't grant her one.
"Go on," he said.
"That same winter, a restlessness gripped the yuan-ti. Dmetrio Extaminos began his restoration of the ancient city, and Sibyl arrived in Hlondeth. Lady Dediana, deep in winter torpor, didn't recognize the danger Sibyl posed at first, not until Sibyl had killed her cousin Urshas and lured half of the cathedral's clergy away by claiming to be Sseth's avatar. By then it was almost too late."
"What's this got to do with… Smaragd?" Arvin asked, stumbling over the unfamiliar word. "And with Karrell?"
"That's what I hope to find out," Zelia said. "Why has Sseth not struck down an imposter? Does he condone what Sibyl is doing? Or is he merely… keeping silent?"
Arvin frowned. "You hope to find that out just by looking at Karrell? Why not look in on Sseth himself, or ask him?"
"Because I can't," Zelia hissed. "No one can-not even his clerics. Something is preventing it, but that same something may not prevent us from viewing a mortal in Sseth's realm. Your Karrell
may be the crack in the wall that will allow us a glimpse into Smaragd."
"Why do you need me?" Arvin asked.
"If I tried to contact her, Karrell would resist, but she won't resist you. She trusts you."
"Why should I trust you? Given the way your mind seeds scheme behind your back, it looks as though you can't even trust yourself."
Zelia's lip twitched, revealing the tips of her fangs. Arvin's taunt had struck home. He knew, thanks to the dreams he'd had while seeded, that at least one of Zelia's seeds-a dwarf-had turned on her. He wondered how many others had betrayed her over the years.