Extinction

"Just as," the Master of Sorcere went on, "they have eaten others who dared trespass in their waters. Including, perhaps, any manes who survived after the shipwreck. And if they did eat any of these petty demons and thus acquired their memories. .»

Quenthel at last understood.

"The aboleth would know where the ship of chaos sank," she finished for him even as her vipers writhed in anticipation.

Pharaun turned back to Valas and asked, "What is the name of the city's matriarch?"

Using sign, Valas spelled the name out phonetically. O-o-t-h-o-o-n.

Pharaun nodded, then stared out over the lake. It was clear to Valas what the mage was thinking. Pharaun intended to meet with Zanhoriloch's matriarch himself, to ask her for information. Pharaun had powerful spells, including one he seemed confident would shield him against the aboleth's mind magic. The scout was certain the mage could handle the situation, but then Valas had thought the same of himself.

Then came a surprise.

"I will go, too," Danifae said.

Quenthel started to object, then gave the Melarn battle-captive a long, pondering look. After one glance at the uncertain motions of the vipers in the high priestess's whip, Valas could guess the questions that must have been coming to Quenthel's mind.

Was Danifae offering to keep an eye on Pharaun to ensure that he remained loyal to Quenthel, in the hope of regaining her superior's favor? Or did she have some ulterior, even more selfish motive in mind? In the end it seemed not to matter, for Quenthel nodded.

Valas ducked his head for another breath, then he reached out and tapped on the mage's boot.

You said you had something other than healing magic that could help me, he reminded Pharaun.

Pharaun's lips parted in an "ah," and he nodded. He reached into a pocket of his piwafwi and pulled out a small brown cocoon. Crumbling it between thumb and forefinger, he let the fragments drift down onto Valas's head. Then, waving his hands over the flakes that stuck to the mercenary's wet scalp, he began a spell.

Kneeling, Pharaun leaned over Valas and shouted in his ear, "Exhale! Quickly!"

Valas did and an instant later felt a powerful wrench shudder through his body as the spell took effect. His tail sucked back into his rear like a snail retreating into its shell and his fused fingers sprang apart, the webs disappearing. Hair erupted on the top of his head, and the skin of his arms, legs, and chest tingled as he membrane that had been cloaking his body disappeared.

The scout was coughing violently, retching the last of the lake water from his lungs. Even though it hurt, he didn't care. Instead he was filled with relief. Pharaun had restored him to drow form?his body was his own once more.

Except for one small detail. Staring down at his hands, Valas saw that his scars were in all the wrong places.

"What spell," he wheezed as he climbed out of the river, "did you just cast?"

Pharaun, still kneeling, was directing a second spell upon him, one that requited no arcane material component to cast. Valas saw the mage's shoulders slump as he completed it and knew it had cost Pharaun a piece of himself.

"I polymorphed you," Pharaun said when he was done. "I shaped your body into a pretty good likeness of its old self, if I do say so myself. Until something dispels it, that is. Be thankful that Ryld's not around, waving that greatsword of his."

Valas, still standing chest-deep in water, spread his fingers to admire their shape and nodded.

"I am thankful," he said aloud.

His eyes met Pharaun's, making it clear he was speaking not about the absence of the weapons master but of the presence of the mage.

Pharaun nodded, then gave Quenthel a bow that just bordered on insolence.

"With your leave, Mistress, I will begin studying the spells I need. Then I?then Danifae and I?will set out for Zanhoriloch and speak to this Oothoon."

Chapter Sixteen

Ryld shivered as he walked through the forest. Night was falling, and with it came a chill in the air. His piwafwi was still damp from the rain of the night before, and a full day of steady walking hadn't been enough to dry it. Overhead, above the branches of the trees that crowded Ryld close on every side, the cloud cover was breaking up. The sky was a mottled grayish purple, the color of an old bruise.

The air around him darkened as the last of the sunlight faded, but after a time, Ryld noticed it was getting brighter again. His dark-vision was giving way to the pale gray light that filled the surface world at dusk and dawn?even though the dawn was still a long way off. Confused, Ryld paused, and looked up through the lacework of branches.

The full moon was rising.

As it peeked above the treetops, filling the air around him with a silvery light, Ryld was suddenly no longer cold. A flush warmed his cheeks, and he felt his blood quicken. The hairs on his arms stood erect, as if he had just shivered, yet at the same time he felt hot with fever.

"Lolth protect me," he whispered in a strangled voice, glancing down nervously at the bite mark on his wrist. "That brat did infect me."

The moonlight continued to grow brighter, and with it, Ryld's anxiety rose. Flashes of red swam before his eyes, and his pulse pounded in his ears. Already he could feel his control slipping. His clothing felt tight, constricting, heavy. He pulled it away from his throat, barely able to contain the urge to tear it from his body. He looked wildly at the forest that surrounded him, wanting to plunge into it and run and run and run. .

Struggling to maintain control, he plunged a hand into the breast pocket of his piwafwi and pulled out the sprig of bellado

He waited.

The urge he'd felt a moment before?the urge to tear off his clothing and run away into the woods?disappeared. Ryld felt lightheaded. He tried to take a step, stumbled, and nearly fell. At the last moment he grabbed a tree for balance. All the while, the forest was becoming brighter, the moonlight flooding his vision. Something was wrong with his eyes.

Pulling his short sword clumsily from its sheath, he stared into its polished surface and saw that his pupils had dilated to the point where the red of the iris had all but vanished. Grimacing, he lowered his sword, stood a moment, then remembered he hadn't sheathed it. He tried to shove the short sword into its sheath but missed, instead shoving it point-first into the ground as he stumbled. Unable to catch himself again, he fell flat out onto the soggy ground beside it. Above him, the trees seemed to have turned to pale gray shadows, wavering back and forth as though they were under water.

Lying there, watching the forest spiral in circles above him, Ryld wondered if he was going to die. The bellado

Ryld cast his mind back to his training at Melee-Magthere. One of the tests initiates had been required to pass involved maintaining concentration in times of physical duress. The initiates had been instructed to strip off their clothing, sit cross-legged on the floor of the practice hall with their eyes closed, and focus on their breathing. At the time, Ryld thought the test was designed to teach them to ignore the cold of the stone floor?but he was wrong. One of the masters strolled between the rows of meditating pupils, dropping centipedes onto their skin. The insects were each as long as a finger and bit immediately when they landed, injecting a venom that raced like fire through the students' veins. Those initiates who cried out or gasped were given a sharp rap on the head. If they cried out a second time they were hit harder. A third, and they were told to leave Melee-Magthere and never return.