Azure Bonds Read online

  “Akabar?” she said softly, but the figure did not respond. “Akabar? What’s going on? Cut me out of this stuff.”

  “I’m afraid I must inform you,” the lean figure began in the roundabout speech of the South, “that I am not your Akabar.” He broke rank from the two soldiers and knelt beside her head.

  He was Akabar. He had Akabar’s face, marked with the three blue scholar-circles on his forehead, and Akabar’s square-shovel beard, and the same sapphire earring which marked him as a married man. His dark eyes, though, were completely fogged over in gray and patches of listless white swirled through them. The thing Alias had mistaken for a helmet was a cap of vines that pressed suckers against the mage’s forehead and into his ears. Dried blood flaked around the suckers.

  Her breath came in short gasps as a scream tried to claw its way up her throat. She found the strength to ask, “Who are you?”

  “I am Moander,” said the thing that was Akabar, “the most important being in your world.”

  In a smooth, gentle motion he lowered his body into a cross-legged sitting position and waited for his prisoner to stop squirming. Having exhausted herself in a futile effort to pull away from the mound of garbage, Alias finally lay still. She turned her head away from Akabar’s body and kept her eyes squeezed tight. “Oh, gods,” she moaned.

  “Just a god, singular,” Moander replied. “The only one that matters. Hold on, you have something stuck to your chin. Let me get it.”

  Akabar used the sleeve of his robe to dab at a fleck of garbage near Alias’s mouth. He used too much pressure and pushed her head backward into the spongy bed of compost. It was as though he were unaware of his own strength.

  “There. Much better. Now we can talk.”

  “You’re not Akabar,” Alias whispered, still trying to convince herself, but not wanting to believe it.

  “Not really, no, but I’m all the Akabar you’re going to get for a while. Might as well make the best of him. By rights, he should have died of fear, being the first human in this millennium to behold my godliness. How he survived I’ll never know. But that kind of luck shouldn’t be tampered with, so I left his body in better shape than the others. Look.”

  Alias felt shambling footsteps through the boggy ground and looked past Akabar’s body at his companions. One’s neck was ripped open, and his face was pale and ghostly without its lifeblood. The other had no face at all, only a slab of pummeled, bloody meat. Both had tendrils rigged around their bodies, moving them like puppets.

  Alias felt her stomach heave and twist, but it was overridden by a chill, clammy terror. Her body trembled and she began to hyperventilate.

  “There, there,” Moander said, using Akabar’s hand to smooth her hair. “I just brought them as an example of what I could have done to your friend. I’ll send them away now.”

  Moander gave no verbal command and made no physical gesture, but the shambling corpses retreated around the side of the hill of garbage. Alias stared at the passing plains. After a few moments, she grew calmer. “Who are you really?” she asked.

  “As I said before, I am Moander. Though that is a lot like calling a newborn prince the king.”

  Alias swung her head and stared at the stranger in Akabar’s body. He imitated the mage almost perfectly, his pose, his gestures, the tone and cadence of his voice. But the smile was wrong. It was an exaggerated, forced smile—as if someone had pinned the corners of his mouth.

  “Are you … I mean, is he …”

  “Dead? Not really. He’s gone, for all intents and purposes, but his soul and mind are still around, locked away in some corner. Rather like a man poisoned by a Jit snake, who lies in fever dreams, not waking, for weeks. You still have Jit snakes around here?” He paused, tilting his head as if listening to an unheard speaker. “No, I guess you don’t anymore.”

  He rested his milky gray eyes on Alias and sat quietly, as if waiting for her to ask him another question.

  Alias only stared at the passing scenery, so Moander continued. “In this case, if I were to let the mage go, he would awaken. But he cannot break my control, and I will control him until he is no longer useful. And this one is so incredibly useful. I needed his mouth and mind to talk to you. Of course, I could have linked up with you, but you are far too valuable to risk that. Besides, he is so very amusing.”

  Moander giggled. “I can’t begin to tell you all I’m finding in his mind. It’s like being in a great mansion, with new surprises behind every door. Here are memories of his wives, and here is you calling him a greengrocer, and here is a good piece of history of the South. Gods below, so much has happened. I’ve been out of touch for too long!”

  “Out of touch?” Alias taunted. “I thought gods were omniscient.”

  “Well, normally that would be true. Gods stretch through a number of different planes, with different levels of power in each. This part of me—” Akabar’s hand motioned to the pile of garbage which towered over them—“you might call the Minion or Abomination of Moander. More than a thousand years ago, back when Myth Drannor was a major power, the cursed elves banned my spirit from this world by imprisoning this part of me in my own temple.”

  A weakness crept over Alias’s spirit. This vast garbage heap was her enemy, and not only did it hold her prisoner, but it waved her friend before her eyes like a puppet.

  “Soon, when this part of me arrives at the new temple my worshipers have prepared, and I gather even more worshipers to my fold, I will grow strong enough in this world to command the powers that gods are endowed with. Had I been in full control of my powers when my spirit was finally able to return to the Abomination, I would have left a pit where Yulash stood and ascended into the heavens to mete out punishment to those who banished me.”

  “But in the meantime, you’re pretty weak. Relatively, I mean.”

  Moander cocked Akabar’s head like a hanged man. “Relatively. But I have plenty of stored life-fluid in this form. More than enough to reach my worshipers, pop the heads off a few sacrifices, and make demands on the populace. I’m conserving my strength by traveling this slowly so that I can have enough energy to indulge a whim.”

  Alias stared at the approaching forest, wondering if the sludge mountain that was Moander would break up when it hit the trees or flow around them.

  Moander gestured with Akabar’s hands toward the trees which held Alias’s attention. “My first stop is Myth Drannor. According to your friend’s mind, all the elves have deserted their capital. I’ve got to make sure. If it’s true, at least I can dance on the rubble. From there we’ll continue south until we reach Sembia. I love the way your friend thinks in terms of maps and trade routes. He is so useful.”

  “And once we’ve reached Sembia?”

  “Ah, curiosity, my servant. A good sign. We’ll cut southwest through Sembia toward The Neck, between the Sea of Fallen Stars and the Lake of Dragons, and just hop in the water. Scum, like cream, floats. We shall sail triumphantly to our new home.

  “Which is?” Alias asked. She already had a strong suspicion, but she had to know for sure.

  “Westgate, of course. Where we built you.”

  * * * * *

  The trio of non-humans climbed higher into the sky, keeping well above the range of the catapults of any surviving Keepers or Red Plumes.

  “Why so high?” Olive bellowed in Mist’s ear.

  The dragon let out a puffing grumble, “What?”

  “I said, what are we flying so high for?” The halfling grasped the ropes which Dragonbait had fashioned into an impromptu saddle.

  The dragon rumbled between deep puffs of air. “Can either” (long breath) “fly or talk.” (Long breath.) “Try singing” (long breath) “while you’re running hard.” (Long breath.) “Hang on.”

  The dragon ceased flapping, locked her wings in a gliding position, and began to circle the city, her wings catching the thermals rising from the mound. Olive looked back at the dragon’s great batlike membranes. One wing still show
ed a pink line from the recently healed tear.

  Dragonbait, who sat where the dragon’s wings joined her body, had done the healing. According to Mist, the warrior lizard communicated with his scent glands, so he could not “speak” as they soared through the air. The wind would carry away the perfume of his words. But he made his desires known quite effectively by prodding the great wyrm with his sword.

  “You were saying,” Mist prompted the bard, now that she was able to breathe normally, her labors eased by the helpful warm air.

  “Can’t you fly any lower?” Olive asked.

  “Do you want to catch a ballista-bolt in the crotch?”

  When Olive did not answer immediately, Mist said, “Thought not. Trust me. I know what I’m doing. Besides the danger below, this is the best place to gain altitude. And I need altitude to soar after your lizard’s Abomination. Flying, especially with passengers, isn’t easy.”

  “Looks like they’ve made a ruin of it,” the halfling commented on the city below.

  “Human wars tend to do that,” Mist replied curtly. “When I lived in this area, I heard of Yulash’s destruction five, no, six times. Some group or another is always on a crusade or war of liberation. Merciless killing, cloaked by the niceties of civil tongues. They are a race of lawyers, these humans. I wonder how they survive.”

  “My people wonder the same thing.”

  An idea rose to the surface of the halfling’s brain. “Say, O mighty Mist. I was wondering …” Olive trailed off, leaving the question hang for a moment. Based on what she knew about human and draconian nature, the halfling calculated some odds before continuing.

  The dragon banked and, catching another updraft, began to rise again. “Yesssss?” she prompted.

  “Once you’ve fulfilled your bargain with Dragonbait and freed Alias, you’re going to attack her”

  “Is that a question or a statement?” Mist’s voice was low and guttural.

  Olive glanced over her shoulder at Dragonbait, but the lizard was twenty feet away and couldn’t possibly hear their conversation. His attention was focused on the ground below. “Well,” Olive noted, “you haven’t been very, uh, successful the last two times out of the paddock.”

  “If memory serves, you aided in my defeat both those times.”

  “My point exactly,” Olive said. “And next time you’ll have both Dragonbait and Alias to deal with. Now, if, my services were suddenly available on your side of the dispute …” Again she let her voice trail off.

  For several moments, the only sound was the rush of the wind. Finally, Mist said, “Why the shift in loyalties?”

  The halfling considered how much she wanted the dragon to know. The game I’ve been playing for Phalse has become too dangerous, Olive thought. I’d have no trouble fooling Alias. Dragonbait, however, is not so easily deceived.

  To Mist Olive simply said, “Let’s just say I do not trust our companion. He has misrepresented himself and that makes me uncomfortable. I’m not sure I want to continue traveling with him much longer.”

  “But you still want to rescue the woman.”

  The dragon was no dotard, Olive realized. “Yes,” she admitted. “I want to rescue Alias. You might wish to reconsider which warrior has done the most to earn your vengeance. If you decide on the lizard rather than the woman, you will find yourself with an ally.”

  “I see.”

  “Besides,” the halfling added, “Alias has a lot of enemies. She is bound to get her comeuppance sooner or later.”

  The dragon banked again, then spoke. “I’ll take your suggestion under advisement. Speaking of His Righteousness, turn around and see what he wants.”

  The bard twisted in her makeshift saddle. Dragonbait was banging on the side of Mist’s neck with the flat of his blade. Having caught the bard’s attention, he pointed southward.

  “I think he wants you to get on with the hunt. He’s pointing south.”

  “Everyone thinks they’re an expert.”

  “I imagine he thinks he’s the boss,” Olive replied slyly.

  Mist’s neck stiffened some, and she remained silent. She banked again and began to glide away from Yulash.

  “Can you see the monster’s trail from this height?” the halfling asked.

  “Bard, I can see field mice from this height.”

  “Um, I guess I meant, could I have a look?”

  Mist turned her head ever so slightly so Olive could peer down at the ground. Yulash looked as though it would fit in the palm of her hand. Four roads stretched away from it, east, west, northeast, and northwest, but far wider than the roads was a path of crushed vegetation and broken copses of trees heading south by southeast.

  “Just how wide is that trail?” Olive asked, unable to judge size from such a distance.

  “About fifty feet. Though it seems to be growing the farther south we go,” Mist mused.

  “This Abomination must be huge,” the halfling cautioned. “Think you can handle it?”

  “Not handle a shambling mound with a gland problem?” Mist sniffed. “So far you’ve only seen me in action in Feints of Honor. Unfettered by conventions, I am a force to be reckoned with.”

  “You fight dirty,” Olive translated.

  “That walking garbage heap will want a bath when I’m through with it,” Mist bragged.

  The bard smiled. She turned to look at Dragonbait. He kept his eyes fixed on the plains.

  “Does he have a name? Besides Dragonbait, I mean.”

  “Indeed,” the dragon answered. “But it doesn’t translate well. I much prefer Dragonbait. It’s so appropriate.”

  Without the thermals rising from Yulash, Mist was forced to pump her wings to preserve her altitude. The conversation with the halfling ended as Mist conserved her breath for the exertion of flying.

  Far in the distance, on the southern horizon, a line of green marked the Abomination’s destination—the Elven Wood.

  Moander’s Revelation and the Rescue Attempt

  “You really don’t know, do you?” Moander asked with Akabar’s tongue. Carefully it rearranged the merchant-mage’s face. Placing a hand against his cheek, it dropped his jaw, mimicking a look of extreme shock.

  “I don’t know what?” Alias asked, but even as she spoke, some notion stirred deep within her consciousness like a serpent that had slumbered heavily and was only now rising, rising quickly to strike at unwary prey—her.

  “You carry my sign,” Moander said in Akabar’s cheeriest voice. “And you have done me a great service, so I should return the favor. It will help pass the time, and, I think, upset you.”

  “First, understand this,” Moander said, using the formal words of a southern scholar. It pointed one of Akabar’s fingers at her face. “You are a made thing, no different than a clay pot or a forged sword or some creeping bit of gunk in an alchemist’s lab. Is that clear?”

  “I don’t belie—” Alias began, but the serpent notion sank its fangs deep into her heart. Beneath the mossy blankets her branded sword arm responded with a sympathetic ache.

  “Yes, you do believe me,” Moander insisted. “Now that I have told you, you cannot resist the truth. Golem. Homonculous. Simulacrum. Clone. Automaton. All these things come close to describing what you are. But not completely. You are a new thing, for the moment unique. A fake human, but to all appearances the real thing. You are an abomination cloaked in the manner and dress of the everyday.”

  As a mage and scholar, Akabar would no doubt have recognized the words Moander used to describe her, but to Alias most of them were gibberish. She had a notion they involved arcane rituals of the type that made her not only non-born, but inhuman as well.

  “Now, know this,” it demanded. “Your spirit is enslaved in the prison of that body, and that body is a puppet. A puppet made of meat, you might say, in much the same way as is the body I use to speak with you.” To dramatize its point, Moander lifted Akabar’s elbow into the air, leaving his forearm and hand to droop, and slouching his ot
her shoulder downward so he resembled a marionette supported only by a single invisible thread.

  Alias’s mouth opened and closed, but she could think of no retort. Moander continued its lecture without acknowledging her distress.

  “Now, golems and automatons follow a set pattern, invested into their make-up at their creation. These patterns are usually very rigid, no more complicated than ‘guard this room,’ or ‘kill the first man to enter.’ Useless rot, entirely too limited. No creativity or resourcefulness or initiative.

  “But you,” his tone lowered with pride, “you were built differently. It took many hands to create you. My followers allied with mages, thieves and assassins, a daemon of great power, and … well, the other hardly matters. With your deceptive appearance you can allay suspicion and travel at will until you have fulfilled your patterns—traveled all the paths set before you.”

  “Paths?” said Alias. Her chest felt tight, as though she were being crushed by the mad god’s words. Each claim it made struck a resonant chord inside her, leaving her unable to deny what the god said. She choked back her screams, determined not to show this monster her helpless rage.

  “Yes, paths or patterns, whose eventual outcome will be the accomplishment of some goal set by each of your makers. Rather than simply issue you some rigid order, we set you on a course whereupon you would achieve these goals without knowing what they were, or even, once they were achieved, that you had done so. You could commit theft, espionage, sabotage, murder, and never know why or for whom, not always remembering, other times believing it to have been your own idea.”

  They’ve made me a damned thing, Alias thought, like the bowl that carries poison or the sword that deals a death blow. She pressed her nails into her palms and once again began breathing too fast.

  “The goal set for you by my last few followers was to seek my prison and release my Abomination form so that my spirit could return to this world. It was my life energy, summoned and collected by my followers, that brought you to life, you see, so that you, the non-born child, could free me.”