Song of the Saurials

6 The Old Priestess

Morala the Harper, priestess of Milil, leaned over the table in the Harpers courtroom and stared into the silver basin she had filled with holy water. When she was satisfied that the water was completely still, Morala began singing a wordless melody. The silver basin and the surface of the water began vibrating with the power of the priestess’s voice and the magic she summoned with her spell.

After several minutes, the water began to sparkle and shine from a source of magic beneath its surface. Morala ceased singing and concentrated on the colors swirling in the water. Gradually the colors coalesced into solid shapes.

“I see him,” the priestess whispered.

“Is he alive?” Breck Orcsbane asked eagerly, moving toward the priestess.

Lord Mourngrym held the ranger back with a hand on his shoulder. Before Morala had begun her scrying spell, she had cautioned them not to distract her or touch the table on which the silver bowl rested. Breck was a veteran fighter, but too inexperienced with magic to realize the danger of disregarding the priestess’s warning.

Morala squinted at the images that had formed on the surface of the water. The gangly figure with the flowing gray hair and beard was unmistakably Elminster, but Morala had never seen anything quite like the scenery in the field of vision afforded by her scrying spell. Blue-green ferns, lavender horsetails, and green-and-yellow-striped mushrooms towered over the sage. Great trees, their trunks bare but for a small crown of red and green fronds, waved behind the sage like grasses in the wind.

Elminster stood in the strange forest, apparently alone and uninjured. His lips moved, but Morala’s spell did not allow her to hear what he said, or any other sound about him. The sage’s head was tilted back, and he gazed alertly at something high overhead. Morala brought her hands together over the surface of the water and then pulled them away. The view in the water widened to include more of Elminster’s surroundings. The sage appeared as a blot of gray on the water’s surface, but now the priestess could see what held his attention.

Five winged creatures, as exotic to Morala as the plants, flew in a V formation over Elminster’s head. Each was as large as an ancient dragon and had a vaguely dragonlike silhouette. They were covered with frayed, almost featherlike scales, and they were as brightly colored as any bird. Their heads were bright scarlet, their throats orange, their long serpentine necks yellow, and their bodies hues of blue and green. As the group watched in horror, the creatures dove toward the sage.

Elminster motioned with his hands, and a bright light flared from the surface of the water. Morala gasped.

“What is it?” Breck demanded anxiously.

“Elminster just cast a meteor swarm,” the priestess said. “He battles monsters such as I have never seen before!”

The lead creature fell from the sky, knocking down several trees as it crashed to the earth. Its companions pulled up just as Elminster released a second meteor swarm.

From her magical vantage point, Morala could see a great cat stalking the mage, sneaking up behind him. The beast was twice the size of a tiger, with a mottled orange and brown hide. It halted ten yards from Elminster. The muscles in its haunches tautened and twitched as the cat prepared to leap.

“Elminster, behind you!” Morala cried out instinctively, though she knew the sage could not hear her.

Something alerted the sage to the danger, though, for he spun about with his hands spread out before him, thumbs touching, and sent a fan of fire shooting from his fingertips.

The cat twisted in midleap, trying, without success, to avoid the sage’s fiery barrage. One side of the beast burst into flame, and it fell to the ground and rolled in the dirt to smother the fire burning its pelt. Before the cat had a chance to rise to its feet, Elminster pointed at it, and the beast crumbled to dust.

Elminster turned his attention back to the remaining feather dragons, who had circled and returned. As the dragons dropped down and soared over the sage, great plumes of sparkling dust shot from the maws of all four monsters, but when the dust had blown away, Elminster remained standing, apparently unaffected. The sage cast a wall of fire across the feather dragons’ flight path. Two of the beasts were unable to pull up in time to avoid passing through the curtain of flame. They plunged through it and immediately crashed to the earth like meteors.

Watching the sage do battle while unable to hear any of the accompanying sounds felt unnatural and eerie to Morala, yet she kept her eyes fixed on the water. She wished the blessings of Milil on the sage, though she suspected her god might have little power over events in the strange world where Elminster was now.

As the last pair of feather dragons came swooping down on the sage, talons extended, prepared to tear him to pieces, Elminster cast a forked bolt of lightning. Before the scorched bodies slammed into him, the sage winked through a dimension door, emerging some fifty feet away, where he could not be crushed in the monsters’ death throes. Witnessing Elminster’s unscathed emergence from the battle, the priestess breathed a sigh of relief. Elminster turned in Morala’s direction and seemed to look right at the priestess. His eyes twinkled with mischief, and he gave a little theatrical bow. Then he turned away again and walked off into the strange forest.

The colors in the water began to swirl in a chaotic pattern and then fade. The water began to bubble; then, in a great burst of steam, it evaporated away. Morala stepped away from the table and swayed, exhausted from the effort of scrying.

Lord Mourngrym stepped forward and helped the frail, elderly woman to a chair.

Morala leaned back, her eyes closed. “Elminster is alive and well,” she said weakly. “The moment before my spell wore off, he had just defeated several monsters the likes of which I have never seen in the Realms. He appeared in no immediate danger. His instincts were sharp enough to note that he was being scried upon. He does not seem to be anyone’s prisoner.”

“Then why doesn’t he return?” Breck asked.

“I do not know,” the priestess answered. “He travels on foot in a strange world, and I couldn’t perceive his goal. Perhaps some other wizard has summoned the sage to perform some service and he cannot return until it is completed. Perhaps he does not realize we have need of him here.”

Alias stood in the doorway to the Harpers courtroom. She had returned from speaking with Elminster’s scribe, Lhaeo, just in time to hear the priestess report what she had seen in her scrying.

“What of Nameless?” Alias asked from across the room.

Morala thrust out her neck and squinted, trying to focus on Alias. The priestess motioned for the swordswoman to come closer.

Alias strode across the courtroom until she stood a few feet from the small old woman.

“Your grace,” Mourngrym said to Morala, “this is—”

“Alias of Westgate, Nameless’s singer,” Morala finished the introduction herself. “I could tell by her resemblance to Cassana. I am Morala of Milil, child.”

“I know. I could tell by your garb,” Alias said. The priestess’s crimson robe, elaborately embroidered with gold dragons, was standard ceremonial garb among those who served the patron god of bards.

“Alias, this is ranger Breck Orcsbane,” Mourngrym added, motioning toward a brawny young woodsman in leather armor. The ranger’s face was clean-shaven, but he wore his blond hair in a plait that reached his waist. Alias recognized his face; she had seen him in the Old Skull Inn last night listening to her sing.

The swordswoman nodded briefly, then turned back abruptly to Morala. “Did you see Nameless?” she asked. Although her eyes shone hopefully, her heart pounded with fear.

Morala shook her head. “No,” she replied. “He was not with Elminster. I shall have to scry for him separately.”

“Then what are you waiting for?” Alias asked impatiently.

Lord Mourngrym laid a hand on the swordswoman’s shoulder. “Scrying is a most difficult spell, Alias,” his lordship said softly. “Morala must rest for a while.”

Alias clenched her fist. It was frustrating enough having to rely on spell-casters to find Nameless, but being forced to wait was maddening.

Mourngrym sensed the swordswoman’s tension. As a fighter himself, he understood how she felt. She wanted to act, to hunt for Nameless, to kill anything that threatened him, to rescue him. She knew, though, that she couldn’t run off without an inkling of a direction to run in, but that realization didn’t make the waiting any easier. “What did the sage’s scribe say?” he asked the swordswoman, trying to keep her mind occupied.

Alias huffed out some of her anger, then replied, “Lhaeo said Elminster’s evasion spell hadn’t been triggered, so the sage definitely wasn’t dead, wounded, mindless, or desperate to leave wherever he is, but you already knew that from scrying or him. Since Elminster hadn’t planned to leave, he didn’t give Lhaeo any instructions about how to contact him. Lhaeo said a few other things, too,” Alias added, glancing at Morala and Breck, uncertain how they would receive what she had to say.

“What?” Mourngrym asked.

“First off, from what Kyre said—that Elminster disappeared and Grypht appeared in his place—Lhaeo suspects that Grypht used a variation of a teleport spell called transference. By switching places with another mage who’s already standing in a safe place, it guarantees that a mage can teleport without ending up too high off the ground or inside a stone wall. It’s a rare spell. According to Lhaeo, you could count the mages in the Realms who know it on the fingers of one hand. According to Lhaeo, there aren’t any creatures from the lower planes that can use it. Lhaeo also said that there was no way anything from the Nine Hells or the Abyss could have gotten past Elminster’s wards on this tower. He’d bet his father’s sword that Grypht is a wizard, not a monster.”

“If Kyre says Grypht is from the Nine Hells, then that’s where it’s from,” Breck insisted. “Kyre would never make a mistake about something like that. She’s very accurate.”

“Just how well do you know her?” Alias asked curiously.

“She brought me into the Harpers,” Breck explained. “We’ve worked together often in the past.”

“I see,” Alias said. If Kyre had been Breck’s sponsor for the Harpers, the swordswoman realized she’d never convince Breck that Kyre was capable of error. She looked to Mourngrym to support Lhaeo’s opinion.

His lordship looked uncertain. “Grypht did break Elminster’s one-way spell on Nameless’s cell,” Mourngrym pointed out to Alias.

“That’s not the same thing as a ward against evil creatures,” the swordswoman argued.

“That’s true,” Morala agreed. “There are important differences. A protection ward is very cut-and-dried, but Elminster’s one-way spell required provisions so that the servants and guards and the sage could enter and leave Nameless’s cell unhindered. I suppose the spell would have also allowed Nameless to leave if the room was burning, say, or in the case of some other emergency that threatened the bard’s life. If Elminster’s wording had been ambiguous on some provision, the spell might have broken from the strain of determining whether or not the provision was met.”

“Excuse me, your lordship,” a voice said from the hallway.

Mourngrym turned toward the voice. A tower guard stood at the door to the Harpers’ courtroom.

“Yes, Shend? What is it?” his lordship asked.

“Captain Thurbal has finished checking the tower security. He said to tell you everything seems in order, except for two things. First, he can’t get into Nameless’s cell; the door’s locked.

“Akabar Bel Akash felt unwell, so he’s resting in there,” Mourngrym said. “Harper Kyre is tending him. No need to disturb them. I’ll check with them later. What’s the second thing, Shend?”

“When I was on guard duty early this morning, I let someone pass through the gate without announcing her. She said it wasn’t necessary. Now we can’t find her, and no one saw her leave the tower. Captain Thurbal thought it a little strange, so he wanted me to report it to you personally.”

“Who was it, Shend?” Mourngrym asked.

“That halfling Harper,” Shend replied.

“What halfling Harper?” Morala asked.

Shend’s eyes wandered up to the ceiling, as if the halfling’s name might be written there.

Alias felt her heart skip a beat. It can’t be, she thought.

“You know the one, Lady Alias,” Shend said. “The bard what helped you and Dragonbait kill the kalmari two years back. Tree name she ’ad … Peach or Maple or—”

“Olive,” Alias supplied, rubbing her temples with her fingers.

“That were it. Olive Rustiepan.”

“Ruskettle,” Alias corrected.

“Who?” Breck asked.

“There aren’t any halfling bards,” Morala pointed out.

“She’s a rogue,” Alias explained. “A thief … a minstrel … an adventuress.”

“Olive Ruskettle,” Breck murmured. “I don’t recall any Harpers by that name. Who was her sponsor?” he asked.

Alias swallowed. “Nameless,” she said softly.

“Nameless!” Morala exclaimed. “You mean he gave her a Harper’s pin?”

Alias nodded.

“Of all the reckless, arrogant—The man is impossible!” the priestess declared.

“Olive freed him from Cassana’s dungeon in Westgate, then helped him rescue Dragonbait and me,” Alias explained.

“She could be the Princess of Cormyr and we still wouldn’t accept Nameless’s sponsorship of her,” Morala insisted. “Nameless was exiled in disgrace. He has no business—”

“Excuse me, your grace,” Breck said, “but we might yet reverse our decision, in which case this Ruskettle might be of some use to us—that is, providing she wasn’t involved with this Grypht creature. Is it possible she might have allied with Grypht in the hope that it would rescue Nameless?” the ranger asked Alias.

Alias paused to consider. After the close call Olive had had with the pseudo-halfling Phalse, who had turned out to be a fiend from Tarterus, one would have thought that the halfling had learned her lesson about dealing with strangers. Still, Olive could be awfully unpredictable. She might do something truly foolish if she believed it would help Nameless. She had seemed exceptionally fond of the bard last year in Westgate.

On the other hand, Olive’s affection might work the other way. Alias had also noted that as long as Nameless’s attention had been fixed on her, the halfling had seemed to behave with unusual civility and honor. “She wouldn’t suggest a plan to Nameless that she knew he’d disapprove of,” Alias answered.

“Where could she have gone?” Mourngrym asked.

“She would have tried to see Nameless,” Alias said.

“She would have been trapped inside Nameless’s cell, then,” Mourngrym said. “She could still be in there, hiding behind the curtains or something.”

“Unless Grypht took her along with Nameless,” Breck suggested.

“Kyre didn’t mention seeing a halfling,” Mourngrym pointed out.

“A halfling could easily hide behind such a beast,” Breck replied. “Kyre might have missed seeing her in the excitement of the moment.”

“Or perhaps Kyre mistook Olive for an imp,” Alias said with a hint of sarcasm.

Breck glowered at the swordswoman. “Grypht was a denizen of the Nine Hells,” the ranger growled. “It had horns and scales and claws and a tail.”

“I think,” Morala interjected calmly, “that whatever Grypht is, it is not as important as where it took Nameless.”

“If your grace will excuse me,” Mourngrym said, “I’m going to have a second look at Nameless’s cell. Alias, do you want to come along to see how Akabar is doing?”

Alias glanced anxiously at Morala.

As if she could read the swordswoman’s mind, the priestess said, “I think Alias should stay here to keep me company until I recover sufficient strength to scry for Nameless. Breck, why don’t you accompany Lord Mourngrym? Maybe the halfling left some tracks you could follow or something.”

Breck sensed Morala was dismissing him, but he shrugged indifferently. Searching for a halfling would be far more interesting than watching the old priestess fuss and chant over a bowl of water.

The ranger and the guard, Shend, followed Lord Mourngrym out of the courtroom.

When the two of them were alone together in the room, Morala motioned for the swordswoman to have a seat near her.

As Alias pulled out a chair from behind the table, the priestess sat with her eyes closed, absentmindedly humming an A-minor scale, at the same time brushing her fingertips along the golden embroidery of her robe. Alias noticed specks of gold flaking from the robe. Suddenly Morala started visibly and snapped her eyes open, as if she’d been napping. Alias wondered if perhaps the ancient priestess’s wits weren’t beginning to flake away like the embroidered decorations on her ceremonial robe.

“How much longer until you’re rested enough to scry again?” Alias asked the priestess.

“Not long,” Morala replied, smiling at the swordswoman’s impatience. “Perhaps, in the meantime, you could tell me if you know anything about these disappearances.”

Alias stiffened. “You think this was a plan of mine to rescue Nameless, don’t you?” the swordswoman asked, unable to keep the anger from creeping into her tone.

“No … not really. I’ve been told you are a good woman. However, we must investigate every possibility before we can rule it out,” Morala replied calmly. “So tell me, child, did you have anything to do with Elminster’s or Nameless’s disappearance?”

“No, I didn’t,” Alias answered hotly. “If I had wanted to free Nameless, I certainly wouldn’t have involved Elminster, and I wouldn’t have needed help from some wizard or whatever this Grypht is. And I wouldn’t admit it to you, anyway.”

“Yes … I can believe that,” Morala said with a chuckle. “But then, I’ve cast a detect lie spell on you.”

Alias’s eyes narrowed angrily. She was unaccustomed to having her word questioned, let alone magically analyzed. She was even more annoyed that she hadn’t caught on to Morala’s spell. The old priestess hadn’t been drifting off to sleep after all; she’d been concentrating on her spell. “I should have realized. Milil is the lord of all songs. Music is a language, too. That humming was actually your spell chant, wasn’t it?” the swordswoman asked.

Morala nodded. “Nameless taught you well,” she said. For a few moments, she studied Alias’s face. “You may look like Cassana, but there is nothing of her in you,” she said.

“Did you know Cassana personally,” Alias asked, “or are you merely comparing me to the character in the opera about her and her lich lover Zrie Prakis?”

Morala chuckled. “I knew her. I wrote that opera.”

Alias’s eyes widened. “You did? I … I didn’t know. I’ve never heard it sung. Elminster told me about it. Why did you ever want to write an opera about Cassana?”

“At the time, Cassana’s evil was a danger to us all,” the priestess explained, “but she had many powerful friends, and the Harpers didn’t have the strength to drive her from the north. The opera made the details of the sorceress’s life common knowledge. Cassana couldn’t stand ridicule. The gossip following the opera’s performance caused her sufficient embarrassment to leave the region,” Morala said. A grin lit up her wrinkled face.

Alias grinned back. She found herself liking the foxy old woman, even if she was a priestess and one of Nameless’s judges.

“I have something else I want to show you,” the priestess said, holding out a lump of what appeared to be ordinary red mud. “I picked this up from the floor. Grypht held it when he first appeared. It’s clay—of very high quality and rare color.”

“Maybe this duke of the Nine Hells is a potter,” Alias joked.

Morala smiled gently. “The clay was glowing when Grypht first appeared … as would a spell component,” she explained.

“Don’t creatures from the lower planes have a natural ability to cast magic without spell components?” Alias asked.

“That’s what I’ve always been told,” Morala answered. “Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, Kyre knocked the clay out of the beast’s hand and ruined its spell before it was cast, so we don’t know what the beast intended. In clerical spells, clay is a component that affects stone, though I’m sure it has other uses in spells for wizards. Elminster might have been able to identify such spells for us. Could your friend Akabar Bel Akash do so?”

“Akabar’s pretty clever,” Alias replied. “When he recovers, we can ask him. So you think Kyre made a mistake?”

“In elvish, Kyre means ‘flawless,’ ” Morala said, shaking her head. “She has a reputation for not making mistakes. I think it more likely she wanted us to believe that Grypht was something evil.” Morala smiled slyly.

“You mean you think she lied?” Alias asked with surprise. “Why would she do that?”

“She may have put some personal goal ahead of her duties as a Harper,” Morala suggested. “Kyre is a bard, after all.”

“You think she planned Nameless’s escape!” Alias guessed. “Grypht is just a smoke screen. Then Nameless is all right!” Alias said excitedly. “You don’t have to scry for him!”

“But I do,” Morala insisted. “Kyre might have made a foolish alliance. Grypht may not be from the Nine Hells, but he still could be an evil wizard. He might be holding Nameless against his will, threatening his life.”

“But suppose Nameless is all right?” Alias asked.

“He must still be brought back here for his trial,” Morala said.

Alias’s face fell. “Don’t you think Nameless has suffered enough?”

“You misunderstand, child. The Harpers did not send Nameless to the Citadel of White Exile to make him suffer. We sent him there in order to protect other innocents from his reckless behavior.”

“But you don’t have to send him back,” Alias insisted. “He’s sorry about the apprentice who was killed and the one who was hurt. He wouldn’t do anything like that again. Besides, now that he’s done creating his singer, he’s satisfied.”

“Is he?” Morala mused. She leaned forward and stroked Alias’s hair with a withered hand. “He would be a fool not to be pleased with you, child. Tell me, do you love Nameless?”

Alias lifted her chin and answered proudly, “Yes, I do.”

“As a daughter loves a father?” Morala asked.

Alias nodded.

Morala pursed her lips together and shook her head sadly. Alias could see that the old woman’s eyes were moist with tears. “He does not deserve your love,” the priestess whispered.

“Love is something people give freely,” Alias argued. “It’s not a commodity to be earned or forfeited.”

Morala sighed and clasped her hands together in her lap. “Yes. That’s the problem, all right. It doesn’t have to be earned, and it is not easily forfeited.” Morala was silent for several moments. Then she said coldly, “Maryje loved Nameless, though not as a father. Maryje was one of Nameless’s apprentices … the one who was wounded.”

“She lost her voice, then she committed suicide,” Alias recalled from Nameless’s tale. “Is that why you can’t forgive Nameless … because Maryje was a friend of yours?”

Morala took Alias’s hands in her own and squeezed them hard. “I cannot forgive Nameless because he lied, and his lie bound Maryje to her wounds, and her wounds bound her to her shame, and her shame bound her to her death. The truth would have set her free, and she would not have killed herself.”

“What lie?” Alias demanded. “What are you talking about?”

“Ask him,” Morala demanded. “Ask Nameless to tell you the truth—the truth he would not admit to Elminster, the truth he would not tell the Harpers, the truth about himself that even he is ashamed of. If he will do that, he will set himself free and even I will forgive him.”

Alias pulled her hands away from the priestess and backed her chair away. Her heart was racing wildly, and despite her wool tunic, she felt chilled. “Suppose I don’t want to hear this truth?” she asked.

“I thought you loved him,” Morala said. “Would you have him bear the burden of his guilt to his grave?”

“All right, I’ll ask him,” Alias said defiantly, “and he’ll tell me, and I won’t love him any less, whatever it is he says.”

“I did not think that you would,” Morala replied.

“Why won’t you just tell me what it is?” Alias asked with a growing sense of frustration.

“I intend this test to remind Nameless of what he has already taught you about love but seems unable to remember for himself,” the priestess explained. Morala’s mood became suddenly businesslike. She slapped her hands down on her thighs and said, “First, though, we must find Nameless. I am rested enough, now.” She held her hand out.

Alias rose hastily to her feet and helped the old woman rise from her chair and return to the table. The swordswoman watched curiously while Morala cleaned out the silver bowl and refilled it with more holy water.

A growl came from across the room. Alias looked up. Dragonbait stood in the courtroom door with Akabar’s wife, Zhara. The saurial paladin pointed at a spot on the floor directly before him. He wasn’t in a patient mood.

“Excuse me,” Alias said to Morala. “I have to see what my friend wants.”

Morala nodded without looking up from her silver bowl. Alias hurried toward the lizard. Dragonbait thrust a dead, singed thistle at her and signed furiously.

“What do you mean, you were attacked by thistles?” Alias asked with annoyance. “What were you doing? Walking through Korhun Lherar’s old pastures?”

Dragonbait signed again.

“In her room?” Alias asked. “Of course I didn’t send them. What do I know about thistles?”

Where’s Akabar? the saurial signed.

“Resting,” Alias said. “He … uh, he wasn’t feeling very well,” she explained briefly, not wanting to give Zhara the details of Akabar’s attack. She’d heard enough of the priestess’s interpretations.

Take us to him, Dragonbait demanded.

“Morala is about to begin to scry for Nameless,” Alias explained. “He’s missing. He may have been kidnapped. Can’t you wait?” she asked impatiently.

No. Immediately, Dragonbait signed.

Alias huffed angrily, but from the garlic scent the saurial emitted, she could tell he wasn’t going to give in. “All right,” she growled. Just in case Kyre hadn’t yet made any progress in convincing Akabar of the folly of his priestess wife, Alias suggested, “Zhara, maybe you’d like to wait here.”

Dragonbait shook his head.

“She’ll be fine here,” Alias said, signing to Dragonbait that Zhara must stay in the courtroom.

The saurial ignored her. He stomped his foot.

“Fine,” Alias whispered angrily. “Have it your way.” The swordswoman looked back at Morala. The elderly priestess had aleady begun her chant, so Alias didn’t dare disturb her. “Follow me,” she said, striding purposefully out of the courtroom.

Morala was vaguely aware that Alias had departed, but she was too wrapped up in her spell chant to find out where the swordswoman had gone. Several minutes later, the water in the silver bowl began to sparkle and shine, and the priestess ceased her chant.

Squinting into the water, Morala could just barely discern the features of the Nameless Bard. His face was illuminated by a flickering torch, but everything else about him was masked in darkness. The priestess sighed. The bard could be anywhere—in a cave somewhere on the same world as Elminster, in the tunnels beneath Waterdeep, in a closet in the tower of Ashaba—anywhere.

Morala motioned over the water with her hands. Now she could see a second torch, held by a small figure walking beside Nameless. “Well, well. It must be our little halfling Harper,” the priestess muttered. As she turned her attention back to Nameless, an angry look swept over the bard’s face. “What’s wrong, Nameless?” Morala mused aloud. “Where are you, and what are you up to?”