Errand of Mercy

Chapter Seven

"You are a monster," said Miltiades, breaking the awful silence.

"We are the emperor," said the voice in the air. The thin lips of the yellow-gray monstrosity on the other side of the wall did not move. Enormous round eyes, black as shiny onyx and as large as windows, stared out at the group. The nose was broad, the nostrils each an arm span across. A pattern of scales ran over the face but did not mar its strange, ghastly beauty.

The reptilian coils at the bottom of the black wall twisted slowly around, ever in motion.

"Lord Garkim informed you that the blood-forges made certain alterations in those who used them," said the voice. "It is said that all kings of Doegan are fond of the sea. Our spiritual kinship with the sea, beginning even before the building of the Right Armada, has gradually taken on physical form. We can speak with the use of magic from our bloodforge, but such time is limited by the nature of the device. We will not be able to communicate with you much longer this day. We must take pains to be concise."

"We will not deal with evil!" shouted Noph, swiftly gathering heart. "We sense your true nature, and we reject you!"

"Noph!" roared Miltiades in warning.

"You know nothing of my true nature," said the voice. "I am not evil, as you know it."

Noph glanced at Miltiades, who looked back but did not confirm or deny the emperor's last statement. "He's lying, isn't he?" Noph shouted, pointing. "You said he was a monster! Look what the bloodforge did to him! How do we know he isn't going to kill or eat us?"

Miltiades swallowed but managed a grim smile before looking back at the awful, beautiful face. "We do not," he said. "Please forgive the young man. He is foolish and inexperienced." Noph slumped angrily and half-turned away.

"Let's talk about the Lady Eidola!" called Kern. "Tell us where she is right now, or I'll plant this hammer in your forehead and find her myself!"

"The water in our dwelling is poisonous, Kern of Phlan. It is excreted by our skin, and it is hostile to all living things. Should the wall between us be broken, you would swim in liquid death. It would eat the flesh from your bones while you screamed and choked. Your own wife would not recognize your remains."

Silence fell again for a few moments.

"Tell me where Lady Eidola is," Miltiades repeated, only slightly subdued.

"She has been captured by the forces of Ysdar of the Fallen Temple," said the voice. "We believe she is being held somewhere here in our own city, but is so warded that not even we can detect her location. You are right in your belief that the power that prevents outsiders from spying upon us with magic is generated by our bloodforge. It is an invisible shield woven by ourself. We will not take it down. Fiends and bloodforge armies would fight over the rubble of our empire within a decade were we to lower our defenses. There are more crucial issues for our city and our land than your quest for a petty noble's fiancee. You will hear us out on this matter, then make your choice."

Kern, Jacob, Trandon, and Noph looked at Miltiades for his reaction.

"Speak," the warrior growled, forcing the word out. "We will hear you out, but we promise you no more than that."

"The bloodforge generates an enormous degree of magical potential, which can be harvested by its user and converted into actual magical ability. We were not born a wizard, Miltiades of Phlan. We were born a normal man, destined to rule like our father, who was also a normal man, though the bloodforge had already altered him so that he was forced to spend the better part of each day bathing in a tub to keep his skin moist. We were changed more than he, because we learned early in life how to unlock the full potential of the bloodforge, and so took on more of its alterations than our ancestors."

"You took on its curse," corrected Miltiades.

"Our body is not our bloodforge's true curse, Miltiades of Phlan. Our bloodforge gathers its magical potential from the land around it. This ancient land is soaked in magical power. Our bloodforge drains the magic in the earth, buried under the soil, rock, and water, and offers it for our use. But as the magic drains from the land, it drains too from a great barrier-ward that was placed upon this region ages ago, by the ancestors of the Mar. The barrier-ward has weakened from long use of the bloodforges by all the reigning lords and kings, and it barely separates our world from that which it was meant to seal off. The curse of the bloodforges, Miltiades of Phlan, is that they have left us vulnerable to outworld horrors who would feed upon us as hungry magpies feed on worms. Their use has nearly bred our ruin."

Kern blinked. The reflections of himself and his allies in the polished black wall had for a moment seemed to blend with the great tentacles of the monster-emperor visible on the wall's other side. He thought he had seen himself and his party caught in those slowly twisting coils.

"I cannot imagine any outworld horror worse than yourself," Kern muttered darkly.

"Then you have a very poor imagination, Kern of Phlan. Lord Garkim will show you documents and bring you sages that confirm the truth of our words. Two months ago, we took pains to ward our city against attacks by tanar'ri from the Abyss, which were given knowledge of our bloodforge by Ysdar's agents. As we now speak, our city is slowly becoming besieged by fiends and monsters that lurk in the savanna and jungle around us, looking for a way past our walls to wrap their clawed fingers around our bloodforge and carry it away. The human debris that bows to Ysdar creeps past our gates, and the Fallen Temple grows stronger in our realm with each sunset. Our doom is truly at hand."

"Tanar'ri," said Trandon, getting to his feet. Though pale, he had gained control of himself again. "We fought tanar'ri, big vulturelike vrocks, at the gate in Undermountain that brought us here."

"They were doubtless among the first of the army that is arrayed against us, an army that is strengthening by the hour. There is but one course left to us all. You cannot destroy our bloodforge merely to allow Khelben Arunsun to see you through his crystal ball. Your gate to Undermountain is destroyed, and you are trapped within these walls with the rest of us. Our enemy is your own. You must work with us against our mutual foe."

"We did not come here to fight your wars," said Miltiades in abrupt dismissal. "We came to find Lady Eidola and open the way for her to go home, and no more."

The gigantic face in the black wall shifted, turning slightly to look directly down at the silver-armored warrior with its empty black eyes.

"We feel no pity for you, Miltiades of Phlan," said the voice. "You choose your own path in life and proudly bear the consequences. But we feel great sorrow for Lady Eidola, who is now in the hands of Ysdar's agents. She is no doubt becoming very familiar with the peculiar ways of Ysdar, the secret lord of the Fallen Temple, that creation of Tyr's justice-loving priests who contaminated our empire with their holy filth two and a quarter centuries ago. Is it not ironic that the righteousness of Tyr's paladins now throws her forever into the claws of cannibals and torturers who were themselves once among Tyr's chosen?"

"Liar!" roared Kern. His hammer arm whipped over and down.

"No!" shouted Miltiades. Garkim uttered a strangled cry, leaping forward as if he thought he could fly through space and seize Kern's hammer as it spun through the air at the mage-king's impassive face.

The hammer slammed into the wall directly between the mage-king's eyes. It rebounded with an ear-splitting crash, flying back to smash into the stone floor behind the crouching Trandon. Dust filled the air. Stone chips rang from metal armor.

Breathless, everyone stared at the hammer, then at the black wall. There was no mark on it.

The gigantic beautiful face had not once changed expression.

"Lord Garkim," said the voice. "You must forgive us for not mentioning to you long ago that this wall, though transparent like glass, is impervious to all physical forces. You would then have been able to warn our guests of this and thus prevent embarrassing mishaps."

Garkim stared at the hammer on the floor, too stunned to speak.

"My time grows short," the voice said. "Miltiades of Phlan, we challenge you to ask your god if you and your comrades should join forces with such as us. Our wards do not prevent communication with divine powers. The fate of our empire and your lady, if not the city of Waterdeep as well, hangs by a thread this day. Pray to your mighty Tyr and see if you will sever that thread or save it."

Miltiades glared hard at the empty black orbs. He was a fool to even think about this. The choices were so obvious. The mage-king was not to be trusted. Miltiades should lead his force out of this trap and set about escaping from the palace, then use the necklace to locate Lady Eidola. Nothing was simpler.

And yet…

Distrusting the mage-king, Miltiades cleared his mind and closed his eyes.

His comrades nervously watched as he did, glancing back and forth from him to the mage-king's face. A half-minute passed.

Miltiades opened his eyes. He lowered his weapon, seeming to relax. Then he stood stiffly straight and began tying his hammer to his belt by its strap.

Kern's mouth fell open in astonishment. Trandon, Jacob, and Noph looked at one another in confusion. Lord Garkim frowned, clearly surprised.

When Miltiades finished, he looked up at the beautiful face.

"We will destroy the enemies of Doegan," he said to the face, "and we will find Lady Eidola. On this you have my word." Then he turned and walked toward the doors. The doors thumped as he reached them. The paladin put his hand on a handle and pulled one of the two doors open with ease. He looked back at the others. "Well, come along," he said, as if speaking to children.

Kern retrieved his hammer. He and the others silently followed the paladin out, leaving only Lord Garkim behind. Miltiades looked back at Lord Garkim before he left with a curiously calm expression, then shut the door.

Lord Garkim looked back at the great black eyes floating above him. "Your Majesty, what did… ah, did you do something to-"

"We did nothing to him. He prayed to his deity. He will join us in our fight against Ysdar. We calculated a high probability that he would be told to do so by Tyr."

Garkim shook his head in wonder. "Your Majesty, he is a holy warrior, an instrument of his deity. I could not see how he could be ordered to take up our cause. He regards us as enemies, and-"

"You are correct, Lord Garkim," said the voice. The face began to withdraw from the black wall, fading into the darkness and pulling its coils back with it. The room rumbled as water shifted and sloshed in the distance. "You are correct. We are his enemies. We believe Tyr told him to liberate this land from our rule, from the tyranny of the bloodforges. He did not truly take up our cause. He said, We will destroy the enemies of Doegan,' by which he meant us, Lord Garkim-we, your emperor, as well as Ysdar, the Fallen Temple, the tanar'ri, and all beasts that inhabit this Utter East who dare oppose him. He left because he could do nothing else here; he will not waste his time on futile gestures. He is very wise, this Miltiades of Phlan. You must be prepared to kill him soon, Lord Garkim."

The last words had not fully settled into Lord Garkim's mind by the time the mage-king had fully vanished into the depths of blackness beyond the great wall, When they did, Garkim caught his breath, staggered at the implications. Kill Miltiades? This was a dangerous task indeed, the hardest he had ever been given. It was not a challenge he welcomed. It would have to be done, certainly, but how? He would have to kill or disable the other visitors, too, but they would be less of a problem. Poison was out, thanks to that ring Miltiades wore, and that other paladin was immune to most magical effects. This would be a serious problem.

And there was the curious thing that happened after Miltiades had prayed. Suddenly, Lord Garkim could no longer read the silver warrior's mind. Instead of the usual stream of thoughts, Garkim could pick up only a chanted prayer to Tyr from the paladin's thoughts. It reminded him uncomfortably of his parents' old trick. This was a bad development. Why had the paladin started this? Did he suspect…?

Lord Garkim looked after the vanished mage-king, then slowly walked to the chamber exit.

"Lord Garkim," said the voice in the air. "Yes, Your Majesty," he replied, never breaking stride.

"Send triple our usual offering to the Temple of Umberlee this evening. Then speak with Wavelord Gethonar if you feel the need for additional advice or assistance in this matter."

Garkim stopped for a moment, then resumed his walk. "Why, thank you, Your Majesty," he said as he left. There was no reply.