Alara Unbroken - Doug Beyer [73]
“He is recuperating, just like you. He will be fine.”
Mubin could not feel his legs.
“Tell me straight, healer,” he said. “Will I ever walk again?”
“You’re awake,” said the cleric. He closed his book, a heavy tome of prayers to Asha. “And … yourself. That’s good.”
Mubin’s huge form took up the entire sickbed. He could see his own legs lying there in front of him, unmoving. He didn’t even look injured, he thought. No wounds, no bandages anymore. He just looked still.
“My legs. Will they work again?”
“Time will tell,” said the cleric.
“Uh-huh. But it looks bad.”
“I’m sorry, Sir Mubin. It’s … not in our power to heal this kind of injury. The wound went too deep. It broke crucial parts of your spine.”
Yes, Rafiq had seen to that. One blow, and Mubin was paralyzed from the waist down, possibly for life. His best friend in the world had done that to him. But then, he thought, didn’t he force Rafiq’s hand? Why did he make Rafiq do it to him?
“How many died?” Mubin asked.
“In the battle?”
“No, not in total. How many … did I …?”
“Oh. I haven’t heard whether the exact number has been reckoned. But it wasn’t your fault, sir. Your mind was controlled by the enemy.”
“Tell me. Please. I have to know. How many was it?”
The cleric wouldn’t meet his eyes. That was a bad sign.
“It was a lot, wasn’t it?”
“Perhaps …”
“What?”
“Perhaps with time, your legs might heal. Miracles may happen with time and prayer. The angels grant blessings to the faithful.”
“Get out.”
“Sir …”
“No, I get it. We’re down to hoping for miracles already. I understand. It’s fine. You’ve done your proper penance, by staying with the invalid murderer. I’ve woken up. You can go tell Rafiq. No—actually, don’t tell him. Tell him to stay away. I don’t want to see him.”
“Sir, I …”
“It’s all right. You may go.”
The cleric nodded, closed his book of prayers, and got up to leave.
Great, he thought. That was how the rhox was treating a Sighted-caste cleric who was just there to help him.
“Wait,” said Mubin. He slumped down on a stack of pillows. “Do something for me.”
“Yes?”
“Would you … leave me that book of prayers?”
GRIXIS
You summoned me, Master?” said the demon-dragon Malfegor.
“It’s the maelstrom,” said Bolas. “It’s forming so slowly.”
“The worlds have collided. War has broken out across every border. We’re harvesting more life essence than Grixis has known. Not since Alara fractured has there been this kind of chaos across these worlds. The maelstrom will be born in time.”
“I don’t have time,” said the elder dragon planeswalker. “All these infinite worlds, all these millennia, and I have hitched my hopes to the energies of this one world, you understand? I’m counting my breaths. Another goes by, another goes by, and I’ll never get them back. And I’m held back at every turn by the failings of leonin and humans. We need to speed things along.”
“Yes, Master.”
“I want you to travel to Bant.”
Malfegor’s eyes narrowed.
“Go to the site of the obelisk there, and awaken it.”
“I? Personally? Master, wasn’t that your agent’s task?”
“He failed to appear at our last rendezvous. An entire walk to Bant wasted. My minions among the Skyward Eye report that he’s been captured, so he’s useless to me now.”
“So you want me to conduct the ritual in his place. By marching on Bant.”
“Yes.”
“The place from which you just returned. A place filled with angels and paladins.”
“I believe I was clear enough.”
“Master, that would be an enormous undertaking. The journey alone would take—”
“Then you’d better get started, hadn’t you? Unless you’d prefer to feel my claws squeezing the pulp from your consciousness. Unless you’d prefer to wither and die an irrevocable death, nibbled by leviathans under the Kederekt Sea. Unless you’d prefer that I grant Grixis to the lichlord Sedris, or perhaps the soothsayer Caladessa.”
“I’m going,” said Malfegor.
“Hurry, please,” said Bolas. “And anything you can destroy in Esper on your way there—I’ll leave that up to you.