Darkwell - Douglas Niles [69]
"What is it? I was having a great time chewing on his tail! Can't I do it some more? Please?"
"This is more important. Remember those wonderful illusions you showed us when we fought the firbolgs in the fens? Can you show us some more?"
"Now?" Newt, disappointed, looked back at the fight. The king was giving ground steadily to the rushes of the beast. "I suppose… but the battle looks like a lot more fun to me!"
"Not just any illusion. This must be a very special one," she said conspiratorially.
"Oh, good! That's more like it!" The dragon hovered beside Robyn as she explained her plan, then giggled in delight as he darted away, ready to work his magic.
"Tristan! Over here!" Robyn called to the king, whose dance against death grew increasingly desperate. He backed away from the owlbear, dodging another lightning blow, and dashed toward Robyn.
"Now, Newt!" she cried, and to Tristan added, "Follow me!"
The druid sprinted along the shore of the tar pit. Tristan followed, trusting that she had some kind of plan, while Canthus remained behind, snapping and barking at the monster.
"Canthus, come!" he called, and the dog sprang obediently after him.
Tristan stopped, amazed at the sudden appearance of two brawny swordsmen. The fighters seemed to spring from the ground in front of the monster, both heavily armored and carrying great spears. Each wore a headdress of ridiculous yellow feathers. They fell back slowly, an illusion so real that the king could not distinguish them from truth.
Neither could the owlbear. One of the fighters appeared to stumble, while the other seemed to turn and run directly away from the monster. The beast crouched, screeched, and sprang, landing on the illusion that had stumbled.
The magic dissipated with the monster's touch, revealing only an expanse of black, sticky tar. All four of the owlbear's feet landed in the stuff as its leap carried it well beyond the pit's edge. Twisting and turning in a desperate effort to break free, it only succeeded in wrapping itself entirely in tar. Squawking in rage, it turned hate-filled eyes upon the companions until finally its screeches drowned in a gag of sticky, deadly goo.
* * * * *
The waters of the Darkwell seethed in a black tumult of rage. Bhaal greeted the death of Thorax not with sorrow, but with an explosion of boiling hatred. The god thrashed within his oily medium, cursing his lack of physical form. Bhaal desired to smash objects, to strike solid blows, but his watery form denied him that power.
As he raged, his will crystallized into actions. The perytons, gliding in eerie silence, flew from throughout the vale to gather at the Darkwell. His clerics, Hobarth and Ysalla, paused briefly in their own plotting as the stuff of their faith shook from the deep disturbance. Each recoiled before the rage of his deity, and each likewise felt immense relief that the rage was directed elsewhere.
Instead, Bhaal's rage brought them a command, imperious and irresistible. Level the Iron Keep! Bhaal's intense anger needed slaying before it would cool, and at that fortress there would certainly be many humans gathered, seeking the imagined safety of its high walls. But those within were not reckoning on the mighty power of the god of murder and his minions. His clerics instantly set to work upon the plan.
And then Bhaal gave another command, this to his flock of perytons. The monsters had gathered at the well and circled, a great cloud of corruption, above the center of their master's power. And they heard his command.
Bhaal sent them soaring across the vale, silently gliding above the wasteland of death. He ordered them to find those who had slain Thorax and kill them.
Their wings scarcely flapped as the hawklike bodies sliced gracefully through the air. Their ghastly antlered heads stood proudly upright, their eyeless sockets scouring the land. Like the clerics, the perytons hastened to obey the command of Bhaal.
* * * * *
The Starling sailed on into the long, dark night. Gwen cried herself to sleep on the bowseat as Koll stayed at the tiller, torn