Sands of the Soul (34 page)

The eyeless elf stood and turned from Fannah to Steorf. Even though his dried, leathery face wore no expression, Steorf couldn’t help but feel the elf was beseeching him somehow, asking for something.

Steorf ran his tongue over his cracked lower lip and finaljy said, “Maybe I can save him. Maybe there’s some way to reunite his soul with his body.”

He wracked his brains for a spell that might accomplish

it.

“Ciredor would know,” he realized.

Fannah stopped him with one word. “No,” she said.

At the sound of her denial, the mummified elf lunged for Fannah. She dropped both the dagger and the torch and accepted what was to come.

Steorf screamed at her to move as he sprang at the elf. The young mage’s massive size compared to Ebeian’s lifeless shell was enough to bowl the mummy over the railing of the

parapet. Steorf leaned over the wall with one hand extended, as though to catch his friend, and he watched as the elf fluttered like a dead leaf to the sands below. He hit the ground with a hollow thud, and Steorf could see by the blue light of the sphere that Ebeian had crumbled to dust.

“No,” he whispered, and hunched over his shoulders.

Fannah came up behind him and placed both her hands on his back. He turned at her touch and caught her slim hands in his. When he spoke, his voice was choked with emotion.

“Why didn’t you let me save him?”

She freed one hand and stroked his cheek.

VDon’t you see?” she told him gently. “You did free him.”

€>Ś ŚŠŚ

“There is no one to save you now, little Tazi,” Ciredor told her sweetly.

Tazi blinked hard. The blow she had taken left her dazed. Ciredor squatted beside her, grabbed her hair in his hand, and yanked her head up to stare into her sunken, green eyes. She could feel her terror rising, and once again felt like the battered woman in his cellar two years ago.

“I did so prefer you with the longer locks,” he said. “You are fortunate and don’t even recognize it. Women with black hair are favored by Shar. They wear their hair long and free to honor her. You should do the same and count yourself lucky.”

He released his grip on her and she slumped down.

“Never mind,” he told her, turning away. “I’ll take care of the details later. You’ll be a good girl and just lie there, won’t you? I really can’t afford for you to disturb my plans this late into the evening.”

He turned back to stare at her crumpled form.

“And you’re the one who’s going to stop me? Did you really think my goddess would allow someone like you to ruin my

r

plans?” he asked, and kicked her in the side.

Tazi curled up protectively and clutched her ribcage. Ciredor laughed and walked back to his stone.

Through a haze of pain, Tazi could see Ciredor reach out a trembling hand and stroke the jewel.

“It’s almost time, and with every sign you send me, beloved Shar, I know that you shine your dark favor on me. I know it,” he finished fiercely, then started his low chanting again.

Unknowingly, Ciredor had helped Tazi. When he first flung her into the wall, she had been fighting to stay conscious. With the injury to her side, that was no longer a problem. As best she could guess, Ciredor had broken at least one rib, and every breath was like a knife twist in her side. However, that the pain gave her something to focus on.

Coughing up blood, Tazi placed her hands flat on the ground and pushed herself upright. The room swayed, but she forced herself to focus on Ciredor.

As she struggled to her feet, she heard him whisper, “The time is at hand____”

He clutched the stone to his chest and marched past Tazi. Without so much as a backward glance he started to climb slowly up the stairs.

Tazi seized her fallen sword and staggered after him on shaky legs. She found Ciredor on the stairs and charged up behind him. With a scream of rage, she tried desperately to slash at his back, her pain making her foolish and reckless. Ciredor ducked and whirled to face her. With the glowing gem clasped to his heart, he backhanded her with his right hand.

Tazi’s blade flew out of her hand and knocked one of Ciredor’s small statues from its niche. She lost her footing and tumbled over the stairwell, hanging over the thirty-foot drop by one hand. Ciredor hummed the rest of the way up the stairs.

Tazi watched the statue fall, as though in slow motion, and

smash to pieces on the main floor. The sense of deja vu was overwhelming; suddenly she was dangling between the rooftops of Selgaunt, watching her crystal prize smash to bits in the driving rain.

The prize I lost, she thought sadly.

She felt her fingers slip as Ciredor’s voice drifted down.

“Where are you, my darling Fannah?”

Tazi’s head fell back, and she screamed in rage and defiance.

“I will not let you kill her,” she spat.

Somewhere deep within her she found the strength to swing her leg up and hook onto the railing. She dragged herself up onto her stomach, and the pain of her broken rib flashed through her like a white heat. Panting on the landing, her knees bloody and her hands raw, Tazi had another recollection.

This time she was back in the cellar in Selgaunt, battered by Ciredor and in pain from her ring of protection as she foiled his attack. What she felt at that moment was the absolute determination and courage to defeat him. She felt it then and reclaimed that feeling now, the one memory she couldn’t own during her ritual with Fannah. She rose to her feet and ran up the stairs screaming the mage’s name.

Tazi burst into the lookout chamber in time to see Ciredor toss his beloved jewel into the flames. It hung there, suspended, and pulsed like a beating heart. The room was awash in a purple light. Fannah and Steorf rushed in from the parapet, too late to stop the dark necromancer. Ciredor stood, transfixed, in the glow of the gem, and finished his heinous chant. When he was done, there was an electric charge in the air. Everyone was riveted.

The pulsing grew, and a single black tendril squirmed from the gem. It was absolute in its blackness, but purple scintillated along the edges. It writhed toward Fannah. Tazi watched as the distance closed between her and the fell manifestation. Fannah looked at Tazi with her ice-white eyes and grabbed

the black strand.

The tendril pulled her soul into the gem, and Fannah’s body collapsed backward.

Tazi screamed in pain. Steorf was a picture of unbridled rage as the poison in his system burned away the last veneer of rationality. He ran to Fannah’s side, and with one look Tazi knew she had lost her Calishite friend.

While Steorf howled in anger, Tazi screamed, “No more! The death has to stop here!”

She turned to face Ciredor.

The dark mage was a sight to behold. Bathed in the amethyst glow, his face was almost beatific. Tazi could see that he was caught up in a rapture of desire and hope. The word resounded in her mind over and over.

He hopes, he hopes, he hopes…

“Now you’ll come for me,” Ciredor whispered. “You’ve taken my last gift, my crown, and now you’ll take me.

“It is no less than I deserve,” he finished, lost to his own desires. “I am ready to serve you, my queen.”

Something snapped within Tazi. Even as Steorf struggled to get to his feet, his fury making him blind to everything else, Tazi moved into action. Before either man knew what she was planning, Tazi shoved the enthralled necromancer toward his precious rock.

“I’m certain Shar will take you with open arms!” Tazi shouted. “After all, you carry with you the only gift she could ever refuse: your bright and shining hope.”

The necromancer stumbled toward the gem but twisted to face Tazi just before touching the flames. Dozens of inky tendrils shot out of the stone. Each one latched onto Ciredor like a leech, claiming a different part of his body, and whatever he was about to say to her was lost.

One by one the tendrils started to pull back into the gem with a piece of the necromancer’s flesh in its grasp. His screams were deafening. Blood poured out of every orifice, and Ciredor fell to his knees, weeping bloody tears. As the

sated tendrils melted into the gem, new ones snaked out to demand another piece of the fallen mage. Before his consciousness faded away, Ciredor locked eyes with Tazi, and she was certain that the last thing to flicker within his black orbs was fear.

When there was no more of the mage left to feast on, and the last of his blood was lapped up, the tendrils retreated into the stone—but that was not the end of it.

Tazi was certain she could see one purple eye regard her from within the soul gem. She stood her ground, and two new onyx strands slipped from the stone. She could see one move to Steorf and the other came for her, but unlike what they did to Fannah and Ciredor, these strands of black were gentle and hesitant. Tazi flinched as the one moved to her forehead, but its touch was light and almost caressing. She could vaguely see that the other tendril approached Steorf in the same fashion then she saw no more.

She was engulfed in utter darkness. Everything about her was cold, her skin no longer ached with its horrible burns, and she no longer noticed the stab in her ribs. Though she seemed to be alone, Tazi could sense a fell awareness in the dark with her. Then she felt rather than heard a manifestation of the goddess Shar.

I have many things to offer you, Thazienne Uskevren. I would have given them to the necromancer but he proved wanting.

Why do you offer them to me? Tazi asked the presence.

Because you know me so well. With you, it is an instinctual understanding. And who better than one from the house of Uskevren to offer my gifts to?

What do you meŤŤ?Tazi questioned.

I feel the anger burning within you, a darkness to rival even the fallen mage, Ciredor. All I ask is that you give in toyour feelings. Let me soothe and nourish your hurts and pains. They are such a part of you and have taught you so very much.

Tazi knew the presence was right. In the last few years, her pains had grown, and there was an ache in her heart

that never left. But she recognized them as parts, not the whole, of herself. Just as the anger burned in her, there were other lights as well. Pain was necessary but not something to simply accept.

thank you, but I have to refuse, she told the entity.p>

Tazi could feel the darkness recede but there was a parting thought.

Very well, Thazienne Uskevren, I go for now. But there will come a day when my touch will not seem so cold. There will come a day when you will welcome my embrace.

Tazi found herself back in the lookout chamber.

The tendril pulled back into the stone. The purple eye was no longer visible.

She turned and saw that Steorf was still caught in the embrace of the other onyx strand. His face was twisted in torment, and Tazi could only imagine what he was suffering to refuse Shar’s gifts.

Finally, the tentacle released its hold on him as well and slithered back into the soul gem. With a final, amethyst pulse, the stone shattered into a thousand pieces. Tazi shielded her eyes from the flying shards.

When she opened them again, she saw that the glow faded both inside and outside the tower, leaving her and Steorf alone in the gathering darkness. ,

EPILOGUE

Tazi walked carefully over to Steorf and hugged him fiercely. It took a moment for him to respond, but when he did, he was just as emotional.

“Easy,” she finally told him and freed herself from his embrace. “I think I might have a broken rib or two.”

She turned from him, though she didn’t let go of his hand. The sandstorm had passed at some point during the battle and starlight now flooded the chamber. Its pure, white light glinted off the shattered remnants of the soul gem, and illuminated the remains of the mummies.

The torn and desiccated bodies had been mended by the destruction of the gem. No longer were their corpses dried and withered. Each of Ciredor’s victims’ bodies had been restored to what they had

looked like in life. Each face bore a peaceful countenance that had formerly been denied to them.

Tazi brought the back of her hand up to her mouth and was finally granted the release she needed. Tears streamed down her face.

“It’s over,” she choked out.

Steorf took hold of her other hand and moved so that she faced him.

“I’ve never seen you cry,” he told her in a hushed tone. He caught one of her tears gently on his fingertip. “So much is lost,” she whispered.

“Fannah …” she started to say, then she squeezed her eyes shut.

She held on to Steorf for a few moments. When she broke from his embrace a second time, she moved to face the chamber of the dead.

“Let me give you a moment alone,” he told her. “Then we should probably start our journey back to Calimport, and eventually, Selgaunt.”

Tazi nodded to him and he stepped out onto the parapet. Tazi looked carefully near the brazier, but Fannah’s body was no longer there.

One of the pieces of the soul gem, no larger than her thumbnail and shaped like a tear, caught Tazi’s attention. She picked up the splinter and moved out onto the parapet to join Steorf.

He was gazing at the night sky, and Tazi was struck by how straight he stood, his back no longer bowed in pain. She reached out her hand and touched his face. It was cool under her fingers, no trace of a fever left.

“You’re all right,” she noted in wonder.

“Must be a parting gift from Shar,” he answered vaguely. “Do you want to bury Fannah?”Tazi was certain he was simply trying to change the subject.

She decided to dwell on that later and dismissed the thought for another day.

“She’s not there,” Tazi informed him, not sure of the meaning behind her friend’s disappearance.

“What?” Steorf asked, clearly surprised. “What do you think it means?”

Tazi leaned against the railing with her elbows and twirled the fragment of the jewel in her hands.

“Perhaps it means only that the world is still full of mystery,” she answered.

“And hope?” Steorf asked slowly.