Arvin landed outside the temple's entrance and allowed his metamorphosis to end. His tail sprang apart and became two legs again, and his body grew as it took on human form. He flexed his muscles, getting reacquainted with the feeling of arms and legs, then used his psionics to alter his appearance slightly, creating the illusion of deep red scratches in each of his cheeks. The stormlord would be more willing to listen to a warning if it came from one of his own followers.
Arvin strode through the entrance into the courtyard, he formed a cross with his arms against his chest as he'd seen the Talus worshipers do.
"Stormlord," he said, bowing, "I bring urgent news. May I speak with you?"
The brooding man turned. Close up, Arvin could see more details of his appearance. The stormlord's nose was long and sharp, his forehead creased with deep lines. Heavy black eyebrows were drawn together in what looked like a perpetual scowl. The right side of his face was puckered with white scar tissue and his hairline on that side was slightly higher. It looked as though he'd suffered a burn some time in the past. A wide metal bracer embossed with silver lightning bolts encircled each forearm.
"Approach," he said, "and speak."
Arvin rose from his bow and stepped closer. He had no idea what the protocol was for a lay worshiper addressing a cleric of this faith. He was taking a big chance. If he angered the stormlord, the man might strike him down with a lighting bolt. But he couldn't just let those people die-not when there was someone who might be able to do something about it.
"Stormlord," Arvin said, "I've just come from Hlondeth. I learned something there-something terrible.
The cleric who just left the temple…Siskin. He isn't human. He's a yuan-ti."
"Nonsense," the stormlord said. "Siskin has been touched by Talos. I saw the burn mark myself."
Arvin was about to counter that the burn had probably been an illusion when he realized something. The stormlord's breath had a sweet odor to it. He'd been drinking wine.
Wine that smelled like Thessania's perfume.
Arvin had been certain, back at the quarry, that the black liquid was poison, but he started to wonder. Perhaps it was something else, something more insidious. Something that would bend a person's thoughts along paths they wouldn't ordinarily follow, until even the most horrific suggestions sounded perfectly reasonable.
"Siskin served you wine earlier tonight, didn't he?" Arvin asked. "And he insisted that all of your flock drink, as well."
The stormlord nodded. The furrow in his brow deepened. "What of it?"
"Did the wine taste unusual?"
"It was sweeter. Flavored. It came from the east, he said."
"After drinking the wine, you talked," Arvin said. "Siskin suggested that the lay worshipers be sacrificed. Tonight. It sounded reasonable at the time, but less reasonable now that you've had a chance to think about it."
The stormlord started to nod, but just then, the ground trembled. Deep in the fissure that split the courtyard, something rumbled. Arvin heard a wet splat as lava shot out of the crack. He could feel its heat through his shirt.
The stormlord stared at the cooling rock, which was already losing its glow. "It is… necessary," he said. "Talos demands a sacrifice. Without it, he will level
Mount Ugruth. Thousands will die. Hlondeth itself may be wiped out. We cannot allow that to happen. The sacrifice is… necessary."
Arvin blinked. For a moment, the stormlord had sounded like Karrell. He'd sounded as though he cared about Hlondeth and its people. Arvin, like most folks in Hlondeth, had been taught that the clerics of Talos reveled in destruction and death, but the stormlord's comments gave him cause for thought.
"You don't want the mountain to erupt?" Arvin asked.
The stormlord glared at him. "You're not one of us," he rumbled.
"No," Arvin admitted. "I'm not. Nor is Siskin. I'll bet that when he arrived here, he was as much a stranger to you as I am." He spread his hands, entreating the cleric to listen. "Think about it-of the two strangers, who gives you more cause for concern? The one who is asking you to listen to your own doubts before it's too late-or a "cleric' who got you drunk on a strange-tasting wine, then suggested you kill off all of your worshipers?"
The stormlord blinked and blinked again. A shudder ran through him. He shook his head like a man trying to throw off a dream. When he looked at Arvin again, his eyes were clear and hard. "Thank you-friend-for the warning. May Talos's fist never strike you."
Then he wheeled, javelin in hand, and ran through the temple, out into the night.
Arvin activated his lapis lazuli. It was time to find Pakal. He imagined the dwarf's faoe, but though he could picture it clearly-dark, tattooed skin framed by ropy hair-Pakal refused to come into focus. Arvin, worried, wondered if Pakal had decided not to wait for him. Even if the dwarf had moved on from
the temple, a sending still should have been able to reach him.
Unless…
A terrible thought occurred to Arvin. Maybe the dog-man had caught up to Pakal, killed him, and taken the Circled Serpent.
Then again, Arvin realized, Pakal could just be in another form, as he had been in Sibyl's temple, cloaked in an illusion that fooled the sending-an illusion, for example, that would help him blend in at Talos's temple.
"Pakal!" Arvin shouted. "Are you here? Pakal!"
Arvin heard what he expected-silence. He could guess where Pakal was: on the footpath above the temple, somewhere among the hundred or so others who were walking to their deaths.
He bolted in the direction the stormlord had gone.
The path up the mountain was a steep one, made treacherous by loose volcanic rock that skittered away with each step. Arvin slipped repeatedly, scraping his hands and knees. The night was overcast, and Mount Ugruth lent an ugly red glow to the clouds above. Smoke and ash rose into the sky from its peak. Perhaps the mountain really was about to erupt. Arvin ran until his lungs ached, but instead of stopping to catch his breath, he pressed on.
The air was hotter than it had been below. Here and there beside the path, heat waves danced in the night air over a crack in the ground. Glancing down into one of them, Arvin saw glowing lava. It bubbled out onto the trunk of a dead tree. The bark smoldered, then burst into flame. A thin stream of molten rock oozed out of the hole and flowed downhill, cutting across the path.
From above, past a point where the path rounded a knoll that hid what lay above from view, came confused shouts then screams.
As Arvin reached the knoll, a bolt of lightning lanced out of the sky, then forked horizontally just before striking the ground, as if it had been deflected by something. One bolt hit a rocky outcropping just a few paces away from Arvin. He threw up his hand to shield his face as splinters of rock rained down on him. He scrambled up the path, manifesting the power that would allow him to see through illusions as he ran. Sparkles flashed into the night in front of his forehead then were gone.
As he rounded the knoll, he saw the stormlord locked in magical combat with the yuan-ti-and it didn't look good for the stormlord. The yuan-ti menaced the worshipers with bared fangs, using his magical fear to drive them toward a stream of flowing lava. The stormlord was several paces hack, caught in a dead tree that had wrapped it branches around him like a magical entangling rope. One of the cleric's hands was free, and he swept it up and down as he shouted a prayer. A pillar of lava burst from the flow, arced toward the yuan-ti in a streak of red, then plunged down.
The yuan-ti raised a hand above his head, magically deflecting the molten rock. It shot back toward the stormlord then veered aside and splashed onto the ground in front of him, splattering the worshipers. At least a dozen were badly burned, and they fell to the ground screaming.