The Veiled Prophet

VI

Serenthia felt the uneasiness strike her with all the suddenness of a lightning bolt. Something had gone wrong with Uldyssian’s plan. She was certain of it.

Yet the fact that she had not been very pleased with his idea in the first place gave her pause. She had no right to supersede his commands based merely on her suspicions, no right at all. It was only a feeling, nothing more…

But, then again, she was an edyrem, and such feelings had a way of presaging actual disaster.

She sought out Mendeln, certain that he, of all people, would be able to look over her concerns with a proper analytical train of thought. He was where she could generally find him, at the remotest part of the encampment, speaking to three edyrem—a male Parthan and two lowlanders, one of them female—about something called the Balance and how death was merely a step to another level. On the one hand, Serenthia liked the thought of her father and mother still existing and even possibly watching over her. She also thanked whatever power Mendeln had drawn upon to bring Achilios back to her, albeit not quite as she would have preferred.

But there were other aspects concerning his newfound path that continued to unnerve her, especially his delving into matters concerning corpses and graves. There was also Mendeln’s passing comment that he was never alone even when he was alone. From what Serenthia gathered, ghosts of the most recent dead were drawn to him, not an appetizing aspect to her.

He looked up at Serenthia before she had the opportunity to call out. He solemnly dismissed his equally solemn pupils. They silently ushered past her, and as they did, she noticed that they had taken to wearing black clothing such as Uldyssian’s brother wore.

“They come to ask me questions,” Mendeln said to her. “I but merely try to answer them…but that is not why you come, I know.”

“Uldyssian—”

He cut her off, his expression darkening. “Uldyssian has been taken.”

Cyrus’s daughter was startled. “Did you feel something, too? How do you know? What exactly do you mean?”

“Calm yourself. Here is what I know. The caravan was attacked by foul magic. All were slain but him. He was the one sought by the spellcaster.”

The news was even more terrible than she could have imagined. “When did you find all of this out?” Serenthia repeated. “I only just felt danger now!”

With a shrug, Mendeln replied, “Master Fahin told me.”

The chill that she sometimes got around the younger brother returned. “Master—Master Fahin, too?”

“All…all save Uldyssian.”

“And he? Is it the mage clans who have him?”

He drew himself up, a sign that he was not comfortable with what he knew. “One of them, at least. There were also men who perished who nominally served the spellcaster.”

This brought some slight pleasure to Serenthia. “So, not all the scoundrels escaped retribution.”

“They, too, were slaughtered by Uldyssian’s captor.”

“But that makes no sense!”

Mendeln shook his head. “Unfortunately, it does make sense, which is why I was just about to dismiss the others, anyway, and seek you out.”

She tried to think. Something had to be done and done quickly. “Do you know where Uldyssian was taken?”

“He is in the city. The mage is an individual of some high ability who calls himself Zorun Tzin. That is all I was able to find out. The spirits know nothing more, for they came immediately to me.”

“Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why do they keep coming to you?” Serenthia asked with mounting frustration.

“Because it is so,” Mendeln returned with another shrug.

Serenthia surrendered. All that actually mattered now was rescuing Uldyssian…if it was not already too late. “He’s been taken to the capital, you say.”

“Yes, likely to the abode of this Zorun Tzin, whose location even the shades of the guards do not know.”

She had expected that. Serenthia also knew that they could not very well go and request that the mage clans return their leader. Somehow the merchant’s daughter felt certain that Uldyssian would “vanish” to somewhere even more impossible to find.

“We have to go to the city,” Serenthia determined. “That much I know.”

“Yes, but may I point out that if we depart, the others are surely going to follow?” Mendeln gestured toward the rest of the encampment. “Even now, I suspect some of them, such as Saron, are beginning to feel the same uneasiness you did.”

“Good! We’ll tell them what you told me, and then we’ll all march on Kehjan. Make the mage clans or whoever else is in charge find him, or else. All Uldyssian wanted to do was speak with them, and this is how they treat him!”

“They will see such numbers as a threat to the capital, Serenthia. They will see it as an attack.”

She was undeterred. “It may very well be one if they don’t return him to us safe and sound! Is that so wrong? Would you do less for him?”

Uldyssian’s brother let out a great sigh. “No, though I wish the options presented to us were different. We will do as you suggest.”

“Good!” Serenthia turned from him. “In that case, we’d better waste no time in alerting the rest.”

She left Mendeln in her wake, at the same time shouting out Saron’s and Jonas’s names. Mendeln watched her for a moment and then, with a shake of his head, reluctantly followed.

“This will not be good,” he muttered under his breath. “This will not be good…”

It was Malic…the same Malic who had callously and horrifically had the lord of Partha and his young son stripped of their flesh so that he and one of his morlu could use the skins for trappings in order to fool Uldyssian. Malic, who served the order of Mefis—in reality, the demon Mephisto. Malic, who had been the right hand of Lucion, the terrifying master of the Triune.

And though Malic had suffered some justice when he had inadvertently attacked Lilith in her guise as Lylia—and thus perished as Ethon and his son had—the high priest had returned as a spirit bound to a bit of bone procured by Mendeln. At the time, Mendeln had utilized it to help them against Lilith, for she was the one thing that Malic hated more than Uldyssian. The spirit had done his task as commanded, guiding Uldyssian through the dangers of the main temple.

However, there had come a point in one corridor when Malic’s specter had commanded Uldyssian to throw the bone fragment. Accepting that there had to be a good reason, he had obeyed. A moment later, the piece had struck hard the forehead of a priest—Durram his name.

Circumstance and Lilith had forced Uldyssian to abandon any attempt to retrieve the bone fragment, and he had assumed it and Malic’s dread shade lost in the collapse of the temple. Now Uldyssian saw that he had been very, tragically, wrong.

And that mistake was going to mean oblivion for him, and his body and powers serving a man who was pure evil.

“We—or, rather, I—will be long gone from here by the time that fool Zorun can dare return. It was easy to sow holes in a story so full of holes already. I have manipulated his thoughts all along since taking this giant’s body, building on his own vanity. That he would imagine his paltry power the reason for capturing you so easily! He was only able to do it because I, who know you so very well, my old friend, provided the true effort. I knew the chinks in your armor and played upon them.” The face of Terul lit up in amusement. “And it all went so well that even I was astounded!”

Uldyssian listened. It was the only thing he could do, and it was his only tool. Malic insisted that time was on his side, but the more his prisoner appeared to pay attention, the more the high priest went on and on, like Zorun Tzin, so very proud of himself.

It was a danger of wielding such powerful skills, Uldyssian knew. He himself had already fallen prey to his ego more than once, and perhaps the fatal journey with the unfortunate Master Fahin was a grim reminder of that. Again, Uldyssian had believed himself infallible, untouchable. He had everything planned perfectly…or so he had thought. It now seemed so audacious, so ridiculous, to have assumed that he could just walk into the capital of the eastern half of the world and demand the right to speak with its leaders without fear of treachery or repercussions.

“Yes, I shall be able to make use of your body much, much better.” Terul—no, Malic—clutched the fragment tight as he stepped toward Uldyssian. The giant’s grin grew exceedingly sinister. “Now, is there anything you might like to confess, my son, before I grant you absolute oblivion?”

Uldyssian struggled to clear his head but feared it was too late. Malic’s alterations of the mage’s spell had done nothing so far to weaken its hold on him. True, that had been a desperate hope at best, but it had also been Uldyssian’s only hope.

“Nothing? Well, we shall begin, then.” Malic touched the piece of crystal to Uldyssian’s chest. The high priest quietly started to chant—

And at that moment, a warmth spread from the stone into Uldyssian. At first, he thought it part of the priest’s spell, but then the haze that prevented him from concentrating began to clear. His strength returned…

But the change in him did not go unnoticed. Malic’s brow furrowed. “What are—?”

The spirit got no farther. Just as he had while in the jungle with Mendeln, Uldyssian let raw emotion take hold. There was no time to do otherwise.

A furious orange glow erupted from his chest where the fragment touched.

The giant let out a howl as the fiery force burned away his skin, his sinew, and all beneath. The grotesque face became more so as the ravaging energies tore away Malic’s lips and eyelids. Then the eyes melted to empty sockets, and the jaw fell slack.

Uldyssian’s tormentor fell back in an ungainly heap.

At the same time, the spell holding the son of Diomedes prisoner finally dissipated. Unfortunately, that meant that Uldyssian, worn and beaten by not only his effort but Zorun Tzin’s tortures, dropped hard to the floor. He was unprepared to protect himself, and the simple fall left him battered and, more important, stunned.

What at last stirred him were what seemed to be voices, or maybe just one that echoed over and over in his head. Uldyssian rolled onto his side and was greeted by the stomach-wrenching sight of the scorched corpse. The crisp fingers of one hand twitched, and for a moment, Uldyssian thought Malic yet survived, but then the body fell motionless again.

Not certain if he would be able to repeat what he had done should Zorun Tzin or someone else now came upon him, Uldyssian now had only one desire: to be as far away as he could from the mage’s sanctum. Away…

And so he vanished.

space

Zorun could not understand not only why three of the most senior mages serving the council’s enforcement arm had taken it upon themselves to come to his abode but why they had questioned absolutely everything he said as if they already knew he spoke lies. He sensed no truth spell and knew that, as gifted as they were, this trio—even tall, spindly Nurzani—did not have the power to cast one that he, Zorun Tzin, could not in a moment ferret out.

The three stood before him like reapers, each wearing the orange and brown voluminous cloaks with the narrow, high-peaked hoods of the enforcement order. Kethuus could barely be seen within his hood, his skin nearly as black as shadow. Only his wily eyes were really visible. Amolia, who traced her bloodline to the Ascenian colonists whose descendants now filled much of the northern part of the capital, was in comparison like a ghost. Her skin was as pale as ivory, and Zorun knew that a full day in the sun would not make it different.

“The Merchants Guild is insisting on a full investigation into Master Fahin’s death,” Amolia had smoothly been saying. “And we, naturally, concur.”

Zorun had expected that; some of his counterparts made good use of the merchants’ trade routes and ties to gather items that they needed for their private work. Fahin’s death, while not affecting Zorun, had likely badly set back the spellwork of several of the council.

Still, he had given them answers that should have completely satisfied everyone when first he had informed his employers of his “failure” and Uldyssian’s “bloodthirstiness.” It had been quite simple to think of just what to say at the time, as he had afterward told Terul.

So why now did even Zorun have trouble with his own story?

“I will be happy to provide the facts again, when a hearing should convene,” he replied, knowing that he could say nothing less. By the time a hearing was put together, the loose threads that had begun appearing in his story as if by magic would be dealt with.

“Consider it to be convening now, Zorun Tzin,” Kethuus murmured.

Emaciated Nurzani—whose powers for good reasons Zorun most respected—raised a bony hand. A yellow aura briefly coalesced around Zorun’s front doorway. In a deep and startling baritone, the skeletal mage boomed, “By vote of the council, the mage clans give us right to begin a formal inquest into your actions, second son of Liov Tzin.”

That any of them would invoke the name of his famous father was not a good sign. It was a sign that Nurzani did not worry about offending Zorun by pointing out that he was neither his sire nor his sire’s firstborn.

Caught off-guard, Zorun thought feverishly about what to say next, at the same time wishing that something would distract the trio from this inquest.

And that was when the building shook. Rare vials and other arcane objects that sat in places of honor in his public room—as Kehjani called the elegant chambers that guests to their homes were initially ushered into—came crashing down. Zorun did not need to see the faces of the others to know that they felt the rush of untamed and powerful energies radiating through the floor and walls. Even an utterly untalented street vendor would have sensed them.

But he, unlike Zorun, would have run as far away as he could from the source…not turned and raced toward it.

Yet Zorun had no choice. Something unfathomable had happened below, and his only hope of salvaging anything was to discover the truth before the others could.

“Z-Zorun Tzin!” Amolia called as she sought to keep her balance. “You are not—not given permission to leave!”

Ignoring her, the bearded mage leapt through an inner doorway, then sealed it magically behind him. That would buy him a few minutes at best, but a few minutes meant all the difference. As he descended the stone steps leading to his true sanctum, Zorun sought in vain a logical reason for the unknown disaster. Terul would have touched nothing. Terul had been beaten enough to know never to touch anything his master did not order him to touch. Yet the spellcaster had to assume that something had gone dreadfully wrong with the pattern that kept the Ascenian at bay and that somehow his manservant had to be at least partially responsible. Otherwise, that meant that the Ascenian had destroyed all the holding spells by himself.

Perhaps the stories he had heard had actually underplayed Uldyssian ul-Diomed’s might? Zorun could not believe that. Still, what other answer could there be?

He burst through the wooden door at the base of the steps, the staff ready for whatever protective spell he needed. Yet within there was no immediate threat, but instead absolute ruin.

The walls of the chamber were blackened, as if a terrible fire had rushed through the room. All the treasures, tools, and other arcane items that Zorun had gathered over his long life had been reduced to ash or melted globs.

But most important, the pattern had been eradicated, and of his captive there was no sign.

Zorun swore. Without Uldyssian, he had nothing with which to bargain with the others. His head was now on the block, a turn of events that he could have never foreseen. He was Zorun Tzin, after all! One against one, there were few his equal.

But against three who represented the power of the mage council…

Already he could sense their approach. They had gotten through the first doorway but would find an invisible barrier halfway down the steps. That gave Zorun a few more moments…but to do just what?

He thought of the crystal fragment, but a survey of the pattern did not reveal it. Naturally, Uldyssian had seen its value and taken it.

Then he cast his bitter gaze down upon the sorry sight of his servant. Zorun almost spat at the corpse, again blaming Terul for certainly playing some part in the mage’s downfall…but then he noticed the fingers of one hand seek to open.

The giant was still alive, if barely, and in his hand, he kept a feeble hold on the crystal.

As impressed with his own good fortune as he was with Terul’s refusal to die, Zorun Tzin closed on the hapless figure. The crystal would balance matters out. How exactly that would happen had not yet occurred to the spellcaster, but it was a straw he was happy to grasp.

Not at all fearing a burnt man’s touch, Zorun sought to pluck the fragment free.

As his fingers wrapped around the fragment…Terul’s ruined ones wrapped around both. Tightly.

Zorun Tzin groaned. The world around him felt as if on fire. Something burst through that fire, a monstrous black shape that lived on pure hatred—hatred for one man, the spellcaster belatedly sensed.

The Ascenian, Uldyssian.

And then that which had been the great Zorun Tzin was engulfed.

The three mages burst into the lower chamber, ready to mete out punishment on the obviously guilty member of their calling…only to find nothing but destruction. The entire underground room had been ravaged by fearsome magical energies, the evidence of its intensity displayed graphically by the corpse of what they knew to be Zorun’s halfwitted servant.

But of the culprit, of Zorun Tzin himself, there was no sign.

Amolia all but floated about the chamber, inspecting shelves and corners with practiced eyes. Nurzani bent to examine the fragments that were all that remained of a pattern recently drawn. Kethuus went to investigate the body and the object next to it, the missing mage’s rune-enchanted staff.

“There is nothing of value left on the shelves, and they themselves do not hide a secret path out of here,” Amolia declared after completing a circle. “The corners and the shadows likewise hide no avenue of escape that my arts can unveil.”

From the pattern, Nurzani boomed, “This was originally designed not only to hold something powerful but also to disrupt its ability to concentrate. But someone has altered the design in a manner not of the mage clans’ teachings.”

“So Zorun attempted something unusual?”

“These few lines here are not from our ways. They remind me…of the Triune.”

Amolia glided closer. She peered down at what Nurzani indicated. “We suspected that Zorun had taken one or two survivors for questioning…” What happened to members of the Triune was of little concern to the mage clans, so long as their fates did not reflect publicly on the spellcasters. “Perhaps one of them escaped.”

“Zorun Tzin, whatever we think him, could certainly handle a priest of the Temple,” the gaunt mage replied with a snort.

“Indeed. Kethuus, you are oddly silent.”

The shadowy figure remained bent by the corpse. “This was Terul, of course, but there’s something odd about him. It feels as if he was slain days ago, not mere moments.”

“The halfwit answered the door; he hardly looked dead then.”

Kethuus grinned mirthlessly. “Perhaps his little brain hadn’t yet registered that fact.”

The other two joined him. Amolia prodded the body with her sandaled foot. Part of Terul’s rib cage caved in.

“He suffered far more than the rest of this place. He was the focus of the attack.”

“The giant would be the least of any prisoner’s problems,” the dark mage responded. Then, shrugging, he added, “But I concur that he was the focus.”

Nurzani emitted a disgruntled sound that brought him to the attention of the pair. “And has no one else considered the even more significant clue before our eyes?”

Amolia’s gaze narrowed. “What is that?”

He pointed near the corpse. “Zorun Tzin has left his staff. That staff is a prize to any mage, yet Zorun Tzin has abandoned it. Why?”

Neither other spellcaster could give him an answer…and that bothered all three so very much.

Oris fretted like a mother as she strode past the elegantly carved twin doors for the hundredth time that day. They remained sealed even from the very guards standing just outside them. The Prophet had not been out of his personal chambers in days, something the gray-haired priestess could find no reference to in all the journals kept by herself and her predecessors. He had never gone into such seclusion, and thus she feared the worst.

“You do yourself and him no favor worrying so, dear Oris,” the voice of Gamuel called. The other senior priest strode down the shining marble corridor like a warrior, which he had been until the Prophet had shown him the light. Gamuel was a little younger than Oris and had not held his post quite so long, but he was every bit as devoted as she. “He likely has good reason for what he does, and if he deems us worthy of sharing in that knowledge when he emerges—and he will emerge, Oris—then you’ll see how silly it was to fret.”

“You would think that he might wish us to know how he is so that we can assuage any concerns of the flock,” she returned. Oris did nothing to hide her love—her physical love—for her master. She had been a beautiful woman when she had first come to the Cathedral, and traces of that beauty remained in her oval face even now. However, the Prophet had only seen her as he had all the rest: as one of his children.

Still, Oris had never told even Gamuel a suspicion that she had about their leader, that his heart had once belonged to another female, one who had been unworthy of him. Oris was certain that this was one of the reasons he had not chosen her when she was young. Now that she resembled more his grandmother, there were a thousand other bitter reasons.

But still she loved him, and like wife, mother, and grandmother combined, she tried to take on whatever she imagined his troubles as her own burden.

Gamuel politely took her by the arm so as not to embarrass her before the guards. “As for the flock, some matters have come up that must be discussed immediately.”

The distraction worked. Oris became the veteran that she was. “The peasants’ army? Has it regrouped?”

“Somewhat, but, as you know, they were just a necessary sacrifice to awaken the people to the fanatics’ true nature.”

Both paused to make a momentary prayer to those who had perished futilely attacking Uldyssian ul-Diomed’s followers. The Prophet had explained that the dead would have an honored place in the teachings of the Cathedral.

Finishing her prayer, Oris asked, “Then what is it?”

“We knew that the Ascenian intended to go speak with the mage clans, the guilds, and probably even the prince, but something happened, and he disappeared, leaving many dead in his wake.”

The priestess nodded gravely. “I had thought it the Prophet—”

“And it may be. He’ll tell us if and when he chooses. That’s not important now. What’s important is that the Ascenian’s people now know he’s missing, and his rabble’s only two days from the gates of the capital even as we speak!”

Oris paused in mid-step. She stared into the broad-shouldered man’s face, seeing that he was not exaggerating. That made her immediately look back at the sculpted doors. “He must know of that! He wouldn’t let them march on the city without doing something about it. He must come out now and tell us what to do next!”

They stood there, even Gamuel—caught up by her declaration—expecting the Prophet to fling open the doors and stride out to ease their troubled minds with some great plan.

But the entrance remained sealed.