Finder's bane h-15 Read online

  Nine

  The Essence Of Bane

  Joel could have easily predicted what happened next, but he just wasn't quick enough to prevent it. Jas leapt high into the air. Then, with her sword in front of her, she dived toward the priestess of Bane.

  Walinda, as cool as ice, raised her hand and commanded, "Fall!"

  The winged woman's body jackknifed in midair, and she plummeted downward. She landed hard, all in a heap, on the deck of her former ship.

  Holly cried out and made a move to rush forward, but Jedidiah had the presence of mind to grab the paladin and hold her back.

  "Let me go," Holly cried. "She's hurt!" "She'll keep," the older priest said brusquely. "You can't help her if you're hurt, too," he warned. To Joel, he said, "I take it this is the infamous Walinda of Bane."

  The younger priest nodded. "She cast a command spell. Do you think it was some trick?" he asked in a whisper.

  Jedidiah motioned uncertainty with his hands. "Introduce us," he said calmly. Joel looked surprised for a moment, then nodded. If there was one thing Jedidiah knew, it was how to set the tone.

  "Jedidiah," the young man said, "allow me to present to you Walinda of Bane. Walinda, this is Jedidiah of Finder."

  Walinda bowed before the old priest. It hadn't been lost on her that Joel had presented her first, implying Jedidiah's rank was higher than hers. On the deck beside Walinda, Jas was recovering from her fall. She'd managed to sit up, but it was clear from the unnatural angle of her right leg that she wouldn't be able to stand.

  Jedidiah bowed back at the priestess, even lower and more gracefully. "A very smooth extraction," he complimented Walinda, indicating with a nod of his head the stolen finder's stone in the priestess's hand. "I don't think I've encountered a lighter touch since the halfling Olive Ruskettle picked my pipe from my pocket. Done a lot of training with a thief's guild, have you?"

  Walinda glared at the old priest. "You are very glib for a man who's just lost a holy relic of his god," she noted.

  "Well, glibness is a thing we priests of Finder are especially good at," Jedidiah retorted. "Like priests of Bane excelling in sarcasm. You didn't steal my stone and then make this appearance just to impress us with your flair for drama. What do you want, Walinda of Bane?"

  "I have a deal for you, priest of Finder. Won't you come aboard so we might discuss it more comfortably? promise you and your party safe passage-providing," she added with a glance at the winged woman who lay on the deck, moaning, "you can keep your pets in line."

  "I need a moment, please, to discuss your offer with my colleagues," Jedidiah replied politely, smiling up at the priestess.

  Walinda nodded graciously.

  Jedidiah turned about and pulled Joel and Holly close.

  "You can't go aboard that vessel," Holly insisted.

  "Young lady, I have no choice," Jedidiah answered. "I must have the finder's stone back."

  "It's some sort of trick,'-' Holly said. "There's something else aboard that ship, something profoundly evil. The worst evil I have ever felt in my life. It's so strong it's painful to sense it."

  "Is there, now?" Jedidiah asked. "How interesting. It doesn't change anything, however. The finder's stone is a relic of my god."

  "Is it worth your life?" Holly argued. "Your soul?"

  Jedidiah sighed. "Just before we were attacked, I put a large share of my own power into the finder's stone so that the Xvimists' dark stalker could no longer sense me from a distance. Finder needs my powers. I cannot just let Walinda fly off with the stone without trying to barter for it."

  "When you barter with evil, evil grows stronger," Holly said through clenched teeth. "If that's not enough, you must know that you cannot trust her."

  Jedidiah looked to Joel for support.

  The young bard could sympathize completely with the old priest. Arguing with the paladin was an uphill battle. Remembering how weakened the old priest had been when he finished siphoning his power into the stone, Joel had no qualms about helping him to regain it. He attacked Holly's arguments with an appeal to her emotions that he knew she could not reject.

  "Holly, Walinda has Jas," Joel pointed out quietly but firmly. "If we tell Walinda to leave without bartering, what do you think she'll do with Jas-hand her back to us unharmed, or keep her to torture her some more?"

  The blood drained from Holly's face, and she lowered her head.

  As if to emphasize the point, Jas fluttered her wings and tried to stand, then yelped in pain and crashed back to the deck of the ship.

  "Perhaps you should stay here," Jedidiah suggested. "I will deal with this woman myself."

  "No," Joel said. "I'm going with you. You may need my help."

  Holly looked up. "You may need mine as well to help with Jas," she said.

  "If this evil gives you pain-" Jedidiah began.

  "I am not afraid of pain," Holly answered softly. "I will accompany you."

  "Very well," Jedidiah said, respectful of the paladin's courage. He turned around and stepped toward the edge of the bluff. Joel and Holly stood just behind him.

  "We will board your ship to parlay," the old priest announced.

  The ship edged close to the bluff. First Joel, then Holly, leapt across to the railing and jumped down to the deck. Joel turned back to offer Jedidiah a hand, but the old priest made the jump just as easily as a boy.

  Holly hurried to Jas's side. The woman's leg was broken just above the ankle. "When I fix this, you have to lie still," she whispered to the winged woman.

  "Just so Jedidiah can get his stupid rock back?" Jas snarled.

  "Because you are not thinking clearly. That attack was the clumsiest I have ever seen," the paladin murmured. "You cannot let your hatred warp your reason."

  Jas sighed. "Out of the mouths of paladins…" she muttered. "Right. I'll keep my cool until the witch betrays us. Then I'm going for her throat."

  Holly began a healing prayer for the winged woman's broken leg.

  Watching the two women whispering, Walinda said to Jedidiah, "Keep a tether on your pigeon, or I will do more than clip its wings next time."

  "Threats are uncalled for," Jedidiah chided the woman. "You wanted to discuss a deal. I'm listening."

  "Please, make yourselves comfortable," Walinda said. She sat down on the only chair on the deck, a high-backed seat carved from the tusk of some colossal beast.

  If Walinda had hoped to put the old priest in his place

  by making him stand, her plan backfired. Jedidiah removed his cloak with a flourish and lay it on the floor near the priestess's feet. He lowered himself to the deck and lounged there like a desert prince relaxing in a harem. He was near enough to the priestess that he could have reached out and touched her knee. Joel stood behind him, trying to convey the look of someone prepared to defend the old priest against any assaults. Behind Walinda, a dark doorway led to a cabin. Joel watched it warily, remembering Holly's warning of something evil.

  "You are very bold for someone dealing from a position of weakness," Walinda addressed Jedidiah as she held up the finder's stone in the hand farthest from him.

  Joel wondered if it would be worth the risk to simply jump the woman and wrestle the stone from her hand. He looked again at the darkened doorway and decided it would probably be most unwise.

  "You and Poppin are very alike," Walinda said. "I will look forward to subduing Finder's priests if they are all like the two of you. You are really quite remarkable."

  "It's true," Jedidiah said with an arrogant smile. "But you are remarkable as well. The hierarchy of the Black Lord's church was never known for encouraging the ambitions of women, not even talented ones. Yet Joel tells me you are a Dreadmaster. Did you earn your title before or after Torm turned your god into so much dog food?"

  Walinda glowered at Jedidiah, but she didn't react to his goads. "The Black Lord named me to his priesthood himself, before the Time of Troubles," the priestess replied proudly. "After the Black Lord was killed in combat, I remai
ned faithful, knowing that our lord would rise again. The night before the Cyricists began the Banedeath, destroying any true followers of Bane who would not convert to Cyric, a voice spoke to me. The voice warned me of what was to come and decreed what action I should take. I gathered those who were most faithful to Bane and led them away from Zhentil Keep. We traveled until we reached the Spiderhaunt Woods. There, in a cave, my lord's spirit was waiting for his true followers.

  "When his avatar died in the Time of Troubles, Lord Bane's spirit hid in that cave. We fed his spirit with our worship. Two weeks ago, the spirit brought down this ship from the sky, and we took possession of it in Bane's name. The spirit took command of the ship, and we journeyed north to the Temple in the Sky. In the temple, which was once dedicated to Lord Bane, there were buried secrets that Lord Bane would need to regain his former power and glory. The price was high…"

  "Yes. Joel already told me how you paid for it. What secret could be so important that it was worth the lives of all those faithful people?" Jedidiah asked scornfully.

  "The location of the Hand of Bane," Walinda said.

  "The Hand of Bane," Jedidiah repeated.

  "Yes. Its location has been hidden for centuries, yet I was able to find it." Walinda held up the sheets of paper she'd removed from the book in the Temple in the Sky. The edges were scabbed over with dried blood. "So my followers died for a great cause."

  Jedidiah leaned forward. "Why would Bane need you to locate the Hand of Bane?" the old priest asked.

  "You do not know?" Walinda asked. "Allow me to explain. You will find this very interesting, Poppin," she said, smiling up at Joel. "Gods are made of many elements. They have a physical body and mind Torm slew my lord Bane's body, but it still exists. It floats in the astral plane beside the bodies of other long-dead gods. Gods also possess an essence-a personality, a spirit that binds them to their followers. They also possess power-huge amounts of raw energy, beyond the ken of mortals. If a god is destroyed, his followers can perform a complicated ritual to bind together these elements-body, essence, and power-and resurrect the god. Some gods have the wisdom to create a magical artifact that will make the ritual simpler and more efficient, so that its performance does not require a year's time, or hundreds of followers, or the blood sacrifice of a thousand innocent beings."

  "And the Hand of Bane is such an artifact," Joel guessed.

  Walinda nodded. "Your student is very apt," she complimented Jedidiah. "Now you understand my sacrifice. With the Hand of Bane in my possession, I can return my lord to his rightful place as a god of the Realms."

  Jedidiah waved a hand, as if to brush aside Walinda's comments. "You misunderstood my question entirely. I did not ask why Bane would want you to recover the Hand of Bane. I asked why Bane needed you to locate it for him. Didn't the old boy remember where he'd put it? Getting senile in his death, is he?"

  Walinda raised her head proudly. "Bane is not a simple god like your Finder. His plans are subtle and complex. Centuries ago he gave the hand to a loyal priest in the Temple in the Sky to hide where no god, not even Ao, could steal it. The priest was charged to keep the location of the hand a secret. On his deathbed, on Bane's orders, the priest passed the information on to his successor. So it continued for centuries. When the beast cult took over the floating rock, the last priest hid in a secret temple and wrote down all the secrets in his keeping, so that Lord Bane might send me to discover the Hand of Bane when it was needed."

  Jedidiah laughed heartily for a moment. "A good story," he said. "I was beginning to think you had fallen prey to some elaborate ruse of Iyachtu Xvim, but now I realize it must be Cyric behind all this. A lie that good could only be his."

  "It is not a lie!" Walinda snapped, clenching the finder's stone as if she might crush it.

  "Of course, Cyric and Xvim could be in it together," Jedidiah commented. He looked back up at the enraged Walinda and said, 'Think for a moment, woman. Bane is dead. Iyachtu and Cyric both have an interest in seeing that he stays dead for all eternity. They want to be sure the Hand of Bane is destroyed, but first they've got to find it. They need someone who might know where to look. They look around for a likely target, and there you are, stubbornly persevering in your faith in Bane, keeping his faithful from worshiping either the Godson or the mad god. You've been a thorn in their side. They will have vengeance on you for defying them by getting you to give them the hand.

  "Cyric, using Bane's voice, warns you to leave Zhentil Keep. He keeps you on hold for a few years while he launches a few other plans. Then he says it's time to find the Hand of Bane. You've probably heard a rumor of it, or maybe the Godson knew something about his father's faithful in the Temple in the Sky. As an added bonus, Iyachtu gets to eat the souls of your followers. Of course, both gods will keep you in the dark until you've handed them the hand. Then they can tell you that you were the one to betray Lord Bane to them."

  "It is not true," Walinda growled, rising angrily to her feet. "Do you think I would mistake an imposter for my lord's voice? Never! It was Lord Bane who spoke to me." Joel noted how Jedidiah's eyes followed the finder's stone. The priestess now seemed so overwrought that the Rebel Bard had just made up his mind to rush her and try to grab the stone.

  From the darkened doorway of the cabin, a raspy, dark, sepulchral voice spoke. "Cease your whining, fool woman. Can't you see the old priest is only goading you?"

  Whoever had spoken remained hidden in the shadows, but Joel could sense that something very evil and very powerful had come onto the deck. Suddenly the bard completely lost his nerve. A wave of nausea and vertigo swept through him, nearly knocking him down. A cold pang of fear lanced through him, paralyzing him. Then despair settled on his heart, a despair so heavy that tears welled in the young man's eyes.

  Joel looked at the other members of his party to see their reaction to the evil presence. Jas was crouched in a fetal position, her wings covering her body. Holly's face was twisted in fear, and yet the paladin was trying to stand. Her struggle was short and in vain. She fell to her knees, pressing her hands to her temples.

  Jedidiah, however, didn't seem to mind the presence, except to wrinkle his nose as if he'd smelled something unpleasant. He stood tall and straight, like a mast in a storm. Joel took a deep breath and steadied himself. If Jedidiah could stand up to this assault, he wouldn't let the old priest down. The Rebel Bard forced himself to peer into the shadows inside the cabin door.

  A figure stepped out of the shadows. It stood upright, taller than the average man, wearing a chest plate of black armor polished to a mirrorlike finish and engraved with the symbol of Bane in blood-red filigree. The figure's broad shoulders were covered with huge spiked plates, which made the creature seem even more massive. Its arms and legs were covered with black fabric, which in turn was covered with fine scales, as supple as a black dragon's hide. A red cape fluttered behind the figure.

  The body beneath the armor was even more alarming. The creature, Joel realized, had to be some sort of undead thing. Its skin was as creased as a crumpled piece of paper, yellowed with age and so translucent that brown bone showed from beneath the skin. The flesh around its mouth had worn away, leaving tatters of skin about the creature's brown teeth. Its tongue was black. The sagging flesh of each of its cheeks bore a tattoo of a red lightning bolt. Where its eyes should have been were deep wells with a glimmering white ember of undead hatred at the bottom of each. Dry shoots of white hair sprouted from its mostly bald head. Sparkling on its brow was a white diamond as large as a fingernail. "I am the essence of Bane," the creature said, its voice creaking like the iron gate of a crypt. "See me and fear me."

  Joel flinched at the voice, while Holly covered her ears. Beneath her wings, Jas shuddered. Jedidiah bowed and said, "Greetings, Bane. You're not looking so lively, even for an essence. I was wondering if you were going to show yourself."

  The creature gave a sharp, barking laugh and lurched forward. "You aren't looking quite yourself, either, priest of Finder
," it said.

  Jedidiah frowned and his brow furrowed.

  The creature strode forward, and Walinda rose and stepped away from the chair. The creature reached out, and Walinda handed it the finder's stone. All the while, Joel noted, the priestess kept her head bowed and never raised it to look at the creature. The thing that claimed to be the essence of Bane sat down in the chair.

  "I thought," the creature said, "to let my slave handle these negotiations. Once I realized who you were, however, I knew it would require someone with more skill to bargain with you. We will talk as one being of power to another."

  "I'll be prepared to talk," Jedidiah replied, "when you stop painwracking my companions with your petty magic."

  "It has always been my practice to begin my dealing from a position of strength, but if it will put you more at ease…" The creature shrugged.

  Joel felt his fear and despair subside like an ocean tide. Holly was able to rise to her feet. Jas stirred beneath her wings and looked out at the creature with disgust.

  "You've been duped, Walinda of Bane," Jedidiah said. "This isn't the spirit of Bane. It's a banelich, a former High Imperceptor of the church, made undead by Bane-a little gift Bane used to give to his most groveling mortal yes-men. They go a little mad when they realize there is no greater power in death than there was in their pathetic lives. This one obviously has delusions of grandeur."

  Walinda didn't look up at Jedidiah. Instead, she remained beside the creature with her head bowed.

  "You are half right, priest of Finder," the creature said. "Centuries ago I was made a banelich by Lord Bane. Since the Time of Troubles, however, I have been much more. When Torm slew Bane, my god's spirit chose to honor me by housing itself in my form. I hold his personality, his ego, his essence. I can even grant this slave her clerical spells. I am now, for all intents and purposes, Bane."