The Killing Song

CHAPTER 25

Dandra released her hold on the kesh. “They’re ready.”

Singe looked at her. “Are you ready?”

She drew a deep breath and glanced up at Dah’mir. The dragon still clung high on the wall of the cavern, his eyes on Medala. The gaunt kalashtar-or katalarash or whatever she wanted to call herself-still stood with the captives from Sharn behind. Dandra tightened her grip on her spear and nodded.

“Good,” said Singe. “Then let’s hope we don’t have to wait too long.”

She could feel her heart beating. It seemed loud in the cavern, even with the soft murmur of the killing song-ready to swell again in an instant-and the excited buzz of the Master of Silence’s creatures as they pressed close to their side of the lens, eager for another flurry of strikes between Dah’mir and Medala. She wondered where the daelkyr’s throne room really was. Before the lens had formed in the seal, the tunnel beyond had looked empty and long. The throne room could be deep, deep below them, far down in the dark reaches of Khyber. Batul had assured her it didn’t matter, that what Singe had proposed would work.

At least in theory, and theory was better than nothing.

She drew another breath, holding herself ready.

Geth burst from cover with a bound and a shout, tearing across the cavern floor. The shifter ran a weaving pattern, back and forth. Dandra saw Medala’s face turn to follow him and prayed that she wasn’t ready with a psionic power to throw against him. It was tempting to look up and see what Dah’mir’s reaction was, but she didn’t dare. She kept her attention fixed on the lens and on the Master of Silence. The daelkyr’s eyes, at least, followed Geth.

“Good,” Singe breathed. “Good. That’s far enough …”

The moment Geth reached the midway point of the cavern floor, Batul and the Gatekeepers stood up on the ledge where they had been hiding, and their old voices rose in a chant. Their faces were intent, and the words they spoke so low that even knowing what they were doing, Dandra could barely hear them. Medala’s head didn’t turn. The Master of Silence’s eyes didn’t leave Geth. There was a cry from above though. Dah’mir had seen the druids! Dandra’s teeth clenched down. Eyes on the daelkyr, she told herself, eyes on the daelkyr!

Dah’mir’s cry turned both Medala and the Master of Silence toward the Gatekeepers. Batul’s face grew taut. He thrust out his hunda stick and the chant broke into a shout. Geth dived for shelter. Dandra held her breath and gathered her will.

A shimmer passed over the lens in the seal. The black lightning that crawled across it pulled suddenly to the edges and stayed there.

And one of the dolgrims who must have been especially close to the other side of the lens stumbled and fell through into the cavern with a dazed yelp.

“It’s open!” shouted Singe. “Now, Dandra!”

The seal would only be open for an instant. The druids couldn’t-wouldn’t-leave it open any longer. Their voices were already strained. An instant, though, was long enough. Singe tossed the binding stone into the air. Dandra focused her will on it, caught it with vayhatana-and flung it straight at the Master of Silence’s stunned face.

The blue-black dragonshard flew as hard and true as a stone flung from a sling, flying through the lens and the open seal with barely a ripple. The druid’s voices fell silent and they stumbled back. The lens flickered again as the seal closed once more.

But the Master of Silence’s eyes flicked as well. The binding stone came to a stop an armslength before him.

“Light of il-Yannah,” Dandra whispered. Singe’s expression fell in shock. On the cavern wall, Dah’mir laughed. His roar shook the cavern.

“Who would stand against the Master of Silence?”

Beyond the lens, the creatures in the daelkyr’s throne room had drawn back from their lord and from the binding stone. Dandra was certain that even if they didn’t know what it was, they could sense just as she could what it would do to any psionic creature who touched it. The Master of Silence, however, leaned forward slightly, studying the stone. Dandra saw it flash darkly as some power like vayhatana rotated it so the daelkyr could see all sides. After a moment, he sat back.

One of the stones of Taruuzh. I remember the night that the Gatekeepers rained these down upon my armies at the Battle of Moths. He looked out through the lens, and his eyes settled on Dandra. A sensation of great presence, similar to what she felt when she faced Dah’mir but even more intense, washed over her, held back only by the protection of Ashi’s dragonmark. Not an attack, Dandra realized, but only the unnatural effect of the Master of Silence’s simple attention. She forced herself to stand straight, to meet the daelkyr’s gaze.

A touch of amusement entered his voice. Frail creations, as fragile as the moths that carried them. Taruuzh knew better. He never tried to turn his creation against me.

The Master of Silence stretched out an open hand. The binding stone dropped, and he closed his fingers around it.

Nothing happened. Dandra heard one of the Gatekeepers cry out in dismay.

Then one of the mind flayers beyond the lens staggered and dropped to its knees. As did another. And another. One of the hairless monkey creatures plunged to the ground, dead. The elf-like women dropped and doubled over, the tentacles on their backs drooping limp as huge dead slugs. Dolgaunts and dolgrims fled. The lone dolgrim who had fallen through the open seal wailed and fled for the darkest corner of the cavern. A look of discomfort crossed the Master of Silence’s face-discomfort that turned swiftly to pain. His other hand clenched the wrist of the one that grasped the binding stone. The black lightning that had played across the lens flickered and contracted to single dark speck as the daelkyr concentrated on fighting the power of the stone.

“Yes!” Singe hissed.

Dah’mir’s laughter turned to panic as he saw the source of his strength cut off. “Master? Master!” He sprang from the wall to the floor, landing in front of the lens. “Master!”

The Master of Silence flung back his head and let loose a howl that made Dandra stagger. The dark speck on the lens gaped wide for an instant, and black lightning leaped from the Khyber shard in Dah’mir’s chest in a short, brilliant arc. Dah’mir’s howl joined his master’s, shaking air as well as minds.

But even that reclaimed energy must not have been enough. The lens flashed and collapsed with a crack like thunder, the vision of the nightmare throne room vanishing along with the daelkyr’s howl. Dah’mir staggered back. When his eyes opened, they were dull, and he stared at the empty seal in disbelief.

Medala’s laugh rose, harsh as slate. “You called for your master? We are here!” She raised her arms and the killing song rose in a powerful chorus-

— that faltered as another song wove around it. From the same niche out of which Geth had emerged, Ekhaas appeared, walking slowly forward. She held her head high, her eyes were intense, and the muscles and tendons of her throat stood out. The song that rolled from her open mouth was … powerful. Primal. Whenever Dandra had heard Ekhaas sing her magic, she could feel the ancient energies that the hobgoblin drew on, but this was something even older. As if Ekhaas were singing the music of creation itself.

The killing song had always sounded somehow incomplete, strangely discordant and barely musical at all. Ekhaas’s song completed it. The notes that she sang slid between the mad syllables of the killing song and lifted them up into something that throbbed with a harsh beauty, like beautiful jewelry hammered out of steel. Dandra almost wished she dared touch one of the katalarash with kesh, just to listen as the magic of the music eased the storm that must fill their minds just as it had filled Erimelk’s. But she could see a softening in the singers’ faces, an easing of the madness behind their eyes.

And now it was Medala’s laughter that turned into a scream. “No!” She thrust a hand toward. Ekhaas, as if to blast her with frost or fire or vayhatana, but the stolen powers were gone, lifted away as the killing song had been lifted. Her gaunt face twisted and two voices wailed in unison from her mouth. “No!”

“Now!” shouted Singe. “Geth! Now!” His left hand pointed at Dah’mir. His right hand pointed at Medala. “Dandra, now!”

Dandra was moving before the words were out of his mouth, thrusting herself away from the ledge and skimming across the cavern floor for Medala. The mighty had fallen. Where both Medala and Dah’mir had been too powerful to even harm each other, with the sources of their power lost they were a match-and maybe, just maybe, they could be brought down. She heard Geth’s roar as he leaped for Dah’mir, caught a glimpse of the dragon’s bared teeth as he turned to meet the shifter, then all of her attention was on her part in the battle.

Medala and Virikhad might have been cut off from the uniting strength of the katalarash, but they still had their own powers. Medala’s eyes focused on Ekhaas, and her face tightened in concentration.

Dandra lashed out with vayhatana, coiling invisible threads around Medala’s legs, and pulled hard. The other woman’s feet came out from under her, and she slammed down, her concentration broken. She squirmed around, and her gaze found Dandra. A hiss of anger broke from her lips.

Dandra was on her before she could do more. She heard a gasp from Singe, the sound of an impact, and a howl from Dah’mir, but she ignored them. Her hands tightened on the shaft of her spear as she plunged the glittering point down.

Squirming like a lizard, Medala threw herself back, and the point grated on rock. Her foot kicked at the grounded spear. The sharp impact knocked it out of Dandra’s hands. Dandra caught it with a thought before it hit the ground, but the distraction gave Medala the moment she needed to fling herself back among the still singing, still motionless katalarash.

“Stop her!” she screamed at them over another roar from Dah’mir. A flash of orange light-magical flame cast by Singe, Dandra knew without looking-threw shadows across her. She twisted around for a moment, and Dandra saw fear as well madness in her eyes.

Medala grabbed the nearest katalarash. It was Shelsatori. She shook the older woman hard. “Stop singing and turn your powers on Dandra!” She clamped a hand over Shelsatori’s jaw, forcing it shut.

Shelsatori blinked and, for an instant, fixed Medala with a glare of such intense hatred that Medala stumbled back. Her hand left Shelsatori’s mouth.

The old woman took up the killing song without a pause. Calm returned to her eyes-and realization filled Dandra.

I will do whatever it takes to make that song stop! Moon had said on board the airship. In Sharn, when Dandra had touched Erimelk’s raving mind with kesh, she’d felt the chaos of it. And Virikhad had driven his victims to kill by offering them a target for the violence whipped up by the song.

By completing the song, Ekhaas had done more than weaken Medala. She’d given the katalarash another escape.

There was a howling like wind in the air. Dandra wanted to look and see what was happening behind her, but she kept her eyes on Medala as the gaunt woman, two minds crying out from her thin body, turned desperately among those she had tried to drag down into her madness. “It’s the song,” Dandra shouted at her over the howling. “You bound them too closely to the song!”

Medala whirled around and leaped at her with a scream. Dandra snapped her spear up.

The impact drove Dandra backward, but her hands clung tight to the spear shaft. She felt the wood tremble as Medala thrust herself along it, fingers arched like claws and still grabbing for her. Dandra went down on one knee, bracing herself and forcing the spear up. Two voices groaned, but Medala kept coming. Silver-white light flaming around it, one of her hands raked down at Dandra’s face-

— raked down, faltered, and fell short. Silver-white light spit and faded. Pin-prick eyes looked down at her. The howling that had been in the air faded just as her red-flecked lips moved.

“We,” Medala and Virikhad said together, “are the masters …”

Blood ran down the spear shaft and over Dandra’s hands in a crimson cascade. She released the weapon. Medala slid to the ground and lay still. Dandra stared at her for a moment, then looked up at the other katalarash, still lost in a song.

A song that broke with a choking cough from Dah’mir, the fall of an enormous body, and an abrupt cry from Ekhaas.

Ekhaas’s song ended. The katalarash sang alone.

“No,” breathed Dandra. She spun around. “No! Ekhaas!”

“Geth! Now!”

It was the signal he’d been waiting for. Geth let out all of the fear and fury he’d held back and forced it into a roar as he leaped at Dah’mir.

Dah’mir swung around to meet him with massive teeth exposed-and a part of Geth wondered just what he thought he was doing. Even if the power poured into him by the Master of Silence had been leeched away, Dah’mir was still a dragon.

Too late for doubts. The day he thought before charging into something would probably be the day he died. Geth threw himself right at the dragon’s muzzle and swung Wrath hard.

It was a bad blow. The byeshk blade tore a line along the spined frill below Dah’mir’s chin, cutting skin without doing real damage. That didn’t matter. Dah’mir bellowed and his head jerked up in reaction to the injury. Geth dived in underneath the dragon’s body, aiming for his real target: the Khyber dragonshard embedded in Dah’mir’s chest. A lucky blow had shattered the shard there once before and forced Dah’mir to flee.

Geth gritted his teeth, wrapped both hands around Wrath’s hilt, and swung.

But Dah’mir hadn’t forgotten his vulnerability either. With an angry hiss, the dragon reared up away from the attacker under his chest. Geth’s swing swept through air. Dah’mir’s claw, sweeping in from the side, didn’t.

The massive talons found his gauntlet before they found his body. They raked across the magewrought steel with a terrible scraping sound, but caught only the fabric of Geth’s clothing. The blow was still powerful enough to lift him up and hurl him back. He hit the wall of the cavern just beside the stones and glittering mortar of the ancient Gatekeeper seal. Pain broke through his shifting-dull across his back, sharp in his gauntleted arm, very sharp in his side. Every breath stabbed him.

He blinked back the bright haze of agony. Across the cavern, Dandra was closing on Medala. In the other direction, Ekhaas still sang, matching the song of the katalarash though she kept one eye on Dah’mir. Unfortunately, it seemed that Geth had all of the dragon’s attention. Dah’mir crouched back down. “Why am I cursed with you?” he howled at Geth.

The shifter spat-blood hit the stone of the cavern floor-and thrust himself upright with a snarl. “We get the enemies we deserve.” He lifted his voice. “I could use some help!”

From the far side of the cavern, arcane words hissed on the air. Fire burst over Dah’mir’s back in a spray of orange flame. The dragon roared and twisted around. Past him, Geth saw Singe, wisps of magic still rising from his fingers. The wizard’s face seemed strangely distorted, not least by cold anger. “Keeper take you, Dah’mir!” he shouted.

The dragon’s head whipped between the two of them as if deciding who to vent his rage at first-then the decision was taken away from him. Up on the ledge where the Gatekeepers had taken shelter, a white-haired figure leaning heavily on a hunda stick rose. The hand that Batul held out trembled, but his voice was strong. “Nature rejects you, servant of madness! Your time is at an end.” His hand rose higher and he spoke a word that swirled in the air.

The swirl grew into a sudden howl of wind. It lifted small rocks and dust from the cavern floor and whirled them around Dah’mir, battering and tearing at him. The dragon fell back, eyes clenched shut against the storm, his massive head shaking like a dog’s. Singe loosed his spell, and another bolt of flame forced Dah’mir further around.

Up on the ledge, Batul turned and looked down at Geth. “Your sword!” he shouted. “Strike now!”

Geth looked down at Wrath. The purple-black byeshk of the Dhakaani weapon had begun to glow with a twilight radiance, like an ember fanned by the wind of Batul’s magic. Dhakaani weapons and Gatekeeper magic had together won the ancient Daelkyr War, the old druid had told him. And Ekhaas had once said that Wrath had been forged to be wielded by the heroes of Dhakaan fighting alongside Gatekeepers.

He remembered the same radiance glowing in the blade when he’d driven it into Dah’mir before. Clenching his teeth against the pain of his injuries, Geth pushed himself away from the wall and sprinted for the dragon.

Dah’mir heard him coming. His acid-green eyes opened against the wrath of Batul’s spell and he snapped at Geth, neck stretching out. Geth dropped and slid under the clashing jaws. Batul’s spell tore at him as well, scouring shifting-toughened skin, but he ignored it as he ignored the pain in his side. Dah’mir tried to rear up the way he had before-

He was too slow. Geth rolled to his feet and, in one smooth motion that had all of his strength and weight behind it, swung Wrath against the shard in the dragon’s chest.

The glowing sword bit through scales and cut deep into flesh. Dark, hot blood burst out, sizzling on Wrath and spraying across Geth’s face. The Dhakaani blade hit the dragonshard-and shattered it.

It seemed to Geth that a final spark of black lightning escaped from the shattered shard and darted away past the great seal, like some last remnant of the Master of Silence’s power returning to him. Dah’mir let out a choking cough. His forelegs curled toward Geth as if to scrape him away. The shifter leaned against Wrath and rocked the sword back and forth, forcing the forked tip deeper into the dragon’s flesh. On one of Dah’mir’s forelegs, a red Eberron shard embedded in the scales flared as if burning from the inside out-just as Wrath cut into something deep in Dah’mir’s body.

The flare in the burning red dragonshard turned dark as ash. Wrath leaped in Geth’s grasp, momentarily caught by the pulsing of a powerful muscle. Geth tightened his grip and wrenched the sword free in another shower of blood and fragments of blue-black crystal.

Dah’mir staggered once, and toppled over just below the ledge where Batul and the other Gatekeepers stood. Ekhaas cried out and leaped for safety. Geth just watched as Dah’mir’s head bounced on the stones of the cavern floor, his dead eyes staring through the Gatekeeper seal and into the throne room of the master who had abandoned him.

“No! Ekhaas! Keep singing! Keep singing!”

Dandra’s shout dragged Geth around, and for a moment, he just stared at the katalarash as she leaped to join them on the cavern floor. Her hands were stained with blood and Medala’s corpse lay impaled where she had-

Then his mind grasped what his ears were already telling him.

Ekhaas’s countersong had stopped. The katalarash sang alone. His gut leaped. He raised his sword and forced his gauntleted arm up in spite of the pain within it. Not that they would do him much good. There were sixteen katalarash up there. Sixteen heirs to the madness and power of Medala and Virikhad. “Ekhaas!” he called over his shoulder.

It was too late. The song of the katalarash was falling apart. They raised their heads, individuals once more, and looked around. One by one, their eyes found Medala’s body and Dandra’s spear transfixing her. Geth thought he could guess what they were thinking. The woman who had controlled them was gone. The dragon who had kidnapped them was gone. The daelkyr who had brought about their creation was, if not gone, then at least forced back into his prison.

The katalarash were free to do whatever they wanted.

The old woman who had been the second katalarash to awaken-to be reborn-lifted her head from Medala’s corpse and her gaze settled on Ekhaas.

“It’s quiet,” she said.

Her body crumpled to the floor

All of the other katalarash crumpled with her. For a long moment, Geth didn’t dare to breathe and no one dared to move. Finally, Dandra rose from the ground and slid cautiously forward, reaching out to touch the old woman.

“Dead,” she said in amazement.

“No,” said a voice from above. Geth turned toward it. The young kalashtar man who had appeared with Singe and Dandra was on his feet, unsteady but supported by Ashi. Their right and left hands were bound together, the amulet of Vvaraak dangling from them. Ashi’s face was pale. The young man’s eyes looked like he had seen something terrible. His mouth twitched. “Free.”