Whisper of Venom botg-2 Read online

  Aoth sprang up out of the seat and whirled. He kicked the chair into Nicos’s legs.

  It stung and made Nicos stagger back a step, but that was all. He started to rush Aoth, but by that time the Thayan was rattling off a charm. On the final syllable he snapped his fingers, and a pearly glow, dazzling in the gloomy chamber, appeared in the air between him and his attacker.

  Squinting, Nicos instinctively balked, then realized the light was harmless. At the same instant vicious blows hammered him in the kidney and the jaw in quick succession. A foot sweep jerked one leg out from under him. Aoth slammed him down hard on the floor, then drew a dagger from one of his voluminous sleeves.

  “Are you going to be sensible?” the sellsword asked. “Or do I have to hold the blade to your throat and go through the rest of the routine?”

  Aching and breathless, half stunned, Nicos managed, “I’ll be sensible.”

  “Good.” Aoth offered a hand and pulled him to his feet. “This time, you sit and I’ll fetch a bottle.”

  Nicos collapsed into a chair. “How did you know? Another vision?”

  “No. It’s just that I’ve spent the better part of a hundred years reading the faces and stances of men who were about to try to kill me.”

  “It was an impulse. I didn’t mean-”

  “Don’t apologize. I’m glad you panicked. I didn’t really have enough to go running to Tchazzar. I was bluffing. But I have it now.”

  “Yes. I suppose you do.”

  Aoth pulled the stopper from a decanter of brandy. The liquor gurgled into goblets, its scent filled the air, and, craving it, Nicos shivered.

  Aoth gave him one of the cups, set the bottle on the low table between the chairs, then sat down opposite him. “Now,” he said, “talk.”

  Nicos took a long drink first, and felt the brandy warm his belly. “I guess there’s no way to say this except straight out. For a number of years, I’ve secretly provided certain services to a green wyrm named Skuthosiin.”

  Aoth’s lambent blue eyes bored into him. “You’re telling me,” he said, his voice flat, “that the man who brought the Brotherhood to Chessenta, the man to whom our fortunes are still tied, is a spy and a traitor?”

  “No! It’s not like that. Skuthosiin never asked me to do anything that was clearly a disservice to the realm. And I wouldn’t have. It’s just that he was willing to reward me for … information and various favors.”

  “Wait. Is this the same Skuthosiin who used to live in Unther?” Aoth asked.

  “So he says,” Nicos said.

  “How did he survive the Spellplague, and Tymanther more or less falling out of the sky on top of his country?” Aoth asked.

  “I don’t know,” Nicos said. “He boasts that the Dark Lady favors him. Maybe she protected him.”

  “Where is he now?” Aoth asked. “Chessenta, Tymanther, or someplace else?”

  “I don’t know where he spends his time,” Nicos said. “He taught me a spell to talk to him from far away. That’s why I burn the gum.”

  Aoth grunted. “I’ve done a little studying since Tchazzar returned. Supposedly he and Skuthosiin were allies in the old days. So I take it you ordered me to look for him because your secret master wanted him found.”

  “Yes, but there’s more to it. From the start he wanted you and your sellswords in Chessenta, and he somehow knew in advance that your company would meet with defeat and disgrace in Impiltur and need a new employer. That’s how my messenger reached you at just the right time.”

  Aoth’s eyes seemed to burn brighter. “ ‘Somehow knew in advance’ is the mush-mouthed way of saying, ‘Made it happen.’ That’s why that whoreson Kremphras and his company didn’t show up to support us, and why there were dragonlike creatures helping the demon-worshipers. They were all working for Skuthosiin, just like you.”

  “I don’t know that for a fact,” said Nicos, “but I think it’s likely.”

  “How many agents does he have, anyway?” Aoth asked. “Over how wide an area?”

  “I don’t know,” said Nicos.

  Aoth drew breath to make a reply-an angry one, to judge from his scowl-then caught himself and paused to take a drink. “Well, what else do you know? There had better be something.”

  “Looking back, I can at least speculate,” Nicos said. “Skuthosiin somehow knows about your eyes. He initially wanted you here because he thought they might enable you to unmask the Green Hand killer.”

  “Which arguably hurt Chessenta more than it helped. So, if Skuthosiin knew what we’d find, maybe he’s no friend to your country,” Aoth said.

  “If he knew,” Nicos said, “there were easier ways to steer the city guards in the right direction.”

  “Well, possibly,” Aoth said. “You truly have no idea why he wants what he wants? What his ultimate purpose is?”

  “No.”

  “Or if he’s even let Tchazzar know he’s still alive?”

  “No. Are you going to denounce me?”

  Aoth scratched his chin, and his fingertips rasped in the beard stubble. Nicos had the wholly irrelevant thought that he would have heard the exact same little sound if the Thayan had scratched his shaved scalp.

  “I don’t especially want to,” Aoth said after a moment. “You didn’t cause the debacle in Impiltur, and I haven’t known many lords who weren’t involved in secret dirty dealings of one kind or another. I’d rather stay your friend and do what you and the Crown are paying me to do. But it’s not going to be that easy unless I find Cera. And nothing you’ve said so far points me in the right direction.”

  “I told you, I don’t know what happened to her!”

  “But you’re the damned spy and the damned courtier too. You keep track of everything that happens in the War College and the city at large. Think of something.”

  Nicos did. He thought that if he called for help, the servants might respond quickly. And if they all attacked Aoth together, they might conceivably overwhelm him.

  But when he took another look at the man on the other side of the low little table, the hopeful fantasy withered. At the moment the Thayan might not have his enchanted spear or his griffon either, but even so it was impossible to doubt that he could handle anything his unwilling host could throw at him.

  Then a more useful thought occurred to Nicos. He sat up straighter, and Aoth said, “What?”

  “The Church of Tchazzar,” Nicos said.

  “What about it?”

  “Tchazzar promised Halonya that a priesthood would form around her, and it did with remarkable speed. You’d think it would be mostly the same commoners who marched with her in the streets, seeking to rise along with her. But quite a few of them aren’t. Before the coronation she’d never even seen them before, and they seem at home in their new roles. Like educated men accustomed to ritual and protocol.”

  “And Halonya doesn’t think it odd that these strangers came out of nowhere to attend her?”

  “Halonya is a half-mad pauper moving through a dream of pomp and glory. Everything that’s happening seems miraculous, and so nothing seems peculiar. But here’s my point. At one time Tchazzar was widely regarded as Tiamat’s champion or even her avatar. So, if trained priests have come to officiate at his altar, who do you think they might be?”

  “Wyrmkeepers,” said Aoth. “And there are wyrmkeepers all through this tangle. Gaedynn and Jhesrhi ran into them in Mourktar, and another tried to murder me in Soolabax.”

  “If Cera Eurthos knew that, and if she made the same guess we just made, then that’s where she might have gone for answers.”

  Oraxes had the urge to pace. Instead he and his fellow mages were expected to stand still and at least pretend to listen while Gaedynn Ulraes ran over their instructions-Oraxes refused to think of them as orders-another time.

  The archer’s coppery hair was gray under the night sky, and he’d traded his usual bright, foppish attire for a black brigandine and clothes to match. “I know it will be difficult to cast a veil
over so many,” he said. “But you only have to hide the skirmishers. We’re moving up in advance of the rest. And the dark should help.”

  Meralaine-a diminutive, snub-nosed girl whose pixielike appearance belied a considerable talent for the sinister art of necromancy-nodded and said, “It will. And we’re good at concealment spells. The way Luthcheq treated us, we had to be.”

  “When I give the word,” Gaedynn continued, “you’ll light up the enemy and keep them lit. The rest of us can kill them if we can see them.”

  “Right,” said Meralaine. It seemed like she was trying to impress Gaedynn, maybe because she hoped to replace Oraxes as interim leader of the mages. Not, of course, that he cared one way or the other.

  “As soon as you can,” Gaedynn said, “get behind men with shields and stay there. There’s no target so important that it’s worth one of our only four wizards taking unnecessary chances to strike at it.”

  “We understand!” Oraxes snapped. “We understood the first time. You’d do better giving us a moment of peace to clear our heads.”

  Gaedynn studied him for a moment, then grinned. “Don’t go out of your way to remind anybody, but I’ve never done this before either. Led a whole army, I mean.”

  Oraxes sneered. “Then maybe Hasos should be in charge.”

  “Maybe,” Gaedynn said, “but then the garrison would still be bottled up inside Soolabax when Alasklerbanbastos himself shows up to perch his bony arse atop the baron’s keep.”

  “We trust you,” said Meralaine, sycophantic bitch that she was.

  “Why wouldn’t you?” Gaedynn replied. “My talents are plain for all to see. As are yours. I realize that none of you has been in a full-scale battle before, and night fighting’s not the most comfortable way to begin. But keep your heads and you’ll do fine. Now go take your positions.”

  Said positions were at intervals among the vanguard of bowmen, all members of Aoth and Gaedynn’s Brotherhood. Oraxes recited a rhyme, and for a moment the cool night air grew positively frigid. A blur rippled across his portion of the loose formation, and the darkness thickened around it.

  He surveyed his work and felt a twinge of pride. He’d like to see Meralaine’s necromancy do better than that.

  He somehow missed the signal that started his neighbors moving, and had to trot a couple of paces to catch up. As the archers advanced, he wished he could skulk as quietly as they did. He was an accomplished sneak thief, but that was on floors and cobbles. He couldn’t match the sellswords on grass and mud.

  Gaedynn abruptly drew and released. Oraxes hadn’t realized there was anything to shoot at, nor did he see where the arrow flew. He supposed the lanky redhead had shot at a picket and killed him too, because they all kept slinking forward and nobody sounded an alarm.

  The vague black mass that was the enemy camp and the east wall of Soolabax rising behind it swam out of the murk. Gaedynn raised his hand, and, up and down the formation, sergeants did the same. Everybody stopped advancing.

  Gaedynn turned to Oraxes, smiled, and waved his hand at the foe like an elegant host inviting his guests into a feast.

  Oraxes swallowed away a sudden dryness in his mouth. He tried to call the words of a spell to mind. For one horrible moment they wouldn’t come, but then he had them. He whispered the rhyme, building to a crescendo even so, and thrust out his left hand. A spark leaped from his fingertips and streaked over the ground.

  Gaedynn had made it clear that above all, he wanted light. But the trouble with a simple enchantment of illumination was that a sorcerer on the other side could rather easily dispel it. It might be more difficult to extinguish the glow of a burning tent.

  Besides, Oraxes had a yen to show those hardened professional warriors, those Brothers of the Griffon, that he was as dangerous as any of them. And certainly the most dangerous of the spellcasters they’d recruited in Luthcheq. Even if it was the first time he’d ever used magic in such a blatant, savage way.

  The spark exploded into a blast that engulfed and ignited two tents. Silhouetted against the yellow blaze, bodies tumbled and flew to pieces. For a heartbeat the destruction amazed Oraxes, like he hadn’t had anything to do with it. Then he felt sick to his stomach.

  But excited too.

  Off to the right, another blast set fire to a different part of the camp. Less bloodthirsty, creative, or ambitious, the remaining mages contented themselves with conjuring pools of phosphorescence, one amber and one a sickly green.

  “Shoot!” Gaedynn called, drawing and loosing. The skirmishers followed his example.

  The arrows arced high and plummeted down. Men, orcs, and kobolds reeled and collapsed beneath the barrage.

  Aoth Fezim had put together the force from a portion of his own company and various native Chessentan troops stationed along the border. By itself it was still smaller than the army besieging Soolabax. But the hope was that a surprise attack would more than compensate for the numerical disadvantage.

  And it might. But it looked to Oraxes like the Great Bone Wyrm’s warriors wouldn’t remain stunned and disorganized for long. Already there were officers bellowing orders and goblins scrambling to grab their weapons and form up into squads.

  Oraxes abruptly remembered that his part of the fight wasn’t over. In fact, it had scarcely begun. He threw darts of crimson light at something big. An ogre maybe, or some sort of tame troll. The creature staggered but didn’t fall down.

  “What are you still doing here?” Gaedynn barked. Startled, Oraxes jerked around to find the archer right beside him. “I told you to get behind the shields!”

  Oraxes scowled. At himself, because he’d forgotten all about that part of the plan, or even that there were any shields. He turned and saw that the spearmen had moved up unnoticed behind him. As he ran in their direction, an arrow or crossbow bolt whistled past his head.

  Someone-Shala Karanok, most likely-had found a mansion on the edge of the religious quarter to serve as Tchazzar’s interim temple. As he surveyed the place from the air, Aoth wondered what the former war hero had needed to do to persuade the householder to vacate.

  If I were you, said Jet, speaking mind to mind, I’d worry about what moved in after he did vacate. The last time you broke into a wyrmkeeper’s lair, you nearly got killed. And then it was just one wyrmkeeper.

  Maybe you should be the captain, answered Aoth. You always know just what to say to inspire confidence.

  The griffon gave a rasp of annoyance. My point is that Jhesrhi and Scar are at the War College.

  Where I can’t go unless I want to waste a day explaining why we’re in Luthcheq, and alert the wyrmkeepers to our presence while I’m at it. This way is better.

  Suit yourself. Maybe my next rider will be lighter.

  Jet set down in an alley near the mansion. Aoth reluctantly left his spear secured to the familiar’s saddle. It was too recognizable, too threatening, and impossible to conceal. He’d make do with the short sword hidden under his shabby beggar’s robe. At least it had a little magic stored inside it.

  He scratched Jet’s head, then, shaking a wooden bowl to rattle the coppers inside it, shuffled in the direction of the temple. Behind him, wings rustled and cracked as the griffon took to the air again.

  He was careful to keep his head bowed. The cowl did a good job of shadowing his face, but he couldn’t depend on it alone to mask the light in his eyes. Fortunately, a servile posture jibed well with the other features of his disguise.

  Seen from ground level, the mansion was even more impressive. Reflecting the Chessentan fascination with martial endeavor, it had turrets and battlements like a fortress, and friezes carved with men-at-arms slaughtering one another. It also had rosebushes at the foot of the facade, and even in the dark Aoth’s fire-touched eyes could see that the new buds were crimson, like drops of blood fallen from the carnage overhead.

  A priest with a shaggy black beard sat on a stool beside the door. From his casual air, his mismatched and no doubt improvised red and pin
k vestments, and the jug sitting beside him, Aoth took him for one of Halonya’s longtime followers, not a priest of Tiamat. The newly minted cleric tossed a coin in the begging bowl.

  “Thank you, holy sir,” Aoth mumbled, bobbing his head. “But I want to go inside too. To pray.”

  The bearded man grinned. “And sleep indoors? I know how it is. Go on, then. But if you snore, we’ll have to toss you out.”

  Beyond the door was a hall of considerable size. It smelled of sawdust as well as incense, and it was plain that carpenters had been working hard to turn it into a proper sanctum complete with benches where the rich and nobly born could sit and worship in comfort.

  The chamber was already full of works of art, painted and sculpted depictions of Tchazzar as both dragon and man. Aoth assumed they were left over from the living god’s previous reigns.

  A second priest stood behind the elevated bloodstone altar. Tall, with a long, ascetic face and mottled, sun-damaged skin, he stared intently into the chalice cradled in his hands. The fire flickering up above the rim burned blue, then green, then black. The shifts reminded Aoth of the variously colored candle flames he’d seen in the wyrmkeeper’s lair in Soolabax.

  The priest glanced up when Aoth entered. Then, perhaps deciding that a grubby mendicant wouldn’t comprehend the significance of what he was seeing, he sniffed and returned to his meditations.

  Aoth glanced around, taking note of the other doorways leading out of the room. He didn’t see how he could slip through either of them without the wyrmkeeper spotting him. But maybe he could wait the fellow out. He positioned himself in front of a painting of Tchazzar in wyrm form rearing bloody-jawed over the corpses of a green drake and a blue one. He folded his hands and watched the cleric from the corner of his eye.

  And watched. And watched. While the flames in the cup danced from one color to the next.

  He doesn’t show any signs of leaving, said Jet. Thanks to their psychic link, he could see what Aoth was seeing.

  No, Aoth replied. Maybe someone is always supposed to tend the altar. Or he’s not inclined to leave a beggar alone with valuable carvings and the like. Whatever the problem is, I can’t just stand here until someone gets suspicious of me. So … He whispered an incantation.