Lady of Poison_ The Priests - Bruce R. Cordell [65]
It was Marrec, running wildly under the arches. He carried the limp, lolling form of Ususi in his arms. Blood streamed from Marrec's eyes as if he wept life itself, or as if he endured a grief so great that only tears of blood could express his remorse.
Elowen swallowed, knowing that Ususi must be dead. Hollowness invaded her heart.
Gunggari raised a hand to the quickly approaching figure and said quietly, yet loudly enough to be heard, "Pause awhile, warrior. Lay down your burden."
The sound snapped the man from his running trance. His blood-glazed eyes focused on Gunggari and Elowen. The elf gasped when the gaze swept across her. Even apart from the unsettling red film over his orbs and the scarlet trails leaking from the corner of each eye, Marrec's gaze seemed to brush her with an almost predatory jolt.
"Oh my…" whispered Elowen. Something had changed, she could see that. Some part of her companion had come alive, and for some reason she couldn't identify, that thought was somehow distressing.
Marrec stopped. He gently laid Ususi to the ground. Elowen saw that the woman was bandaged, and breath, however slight, still passed her lips. "Ususi!" yelled Elowen and bent to tend her friend.
Marrec made as if to say something else, but unconsciousness claimed him before he could elaborate. Gunggari caught him before Marrec fell face first into the branch-scattered lane.
CHAPTER 17
A bone petal fell from the stem of the flower. It fell only half a foot to the slab of rough cut stone that supported the flower's vase. In a way completely unlike a flower, the petal cratered the stone slab as if shot from a crossbow. The sound of its impact thundered around the petrified walls of the Close. The new crater overlaid another, slightly older crater. Only a single petal remained.
One of the two figures standing near the slab said simply, "Anammelech is dead."
Damanda had spoken. She had entered the Close to confer with her lord when the petal fell. She looked at the final remaining petal. The remaining petal signified her connection with her master who stood nearby. In the aftermath of the other petal's impact, she was the most important agent to the Talontyr's campaign north of the Great Dale by dint of survival alone. Her brother blightlords were dead. She remained to be tested.
The Rotting Man cursed, using a language once reserved for raising abominations by a race not native to Faerun. No living creature had spoken that language for eight thousand years, but such was the heat of the Talontyr's fury that he broke an ancient covenant in breathing the words aloud. Each syllable crystallized into a locustlike entity with hatred for blood and a carapace of shimmering purple. With an effort of will, the Rotting Man switched to a less potent tongue, one with less likelihood of its merest utterance binding even his soul to an unmentionable darkness.
The shimmering creatures buzzed about the Rotting Man's head for a moment, surprised by their release from whatever nether dimension they had resided. Damanda stiffened, wondering if she was going to be tested sooner than she expected. The curse-born insects buzzed away like misshapen horseflies but quicker, and with malice aforethought.
"Are those something I'll have to deal with too?" wondered Damanda, waving after the flitting creatures. She figured that with the way things were shaping up, the Rotting Man couldn't afford to lose another lieutenant to one of his fits of rage.
The Talontyr, cloaked in his swathe of rot, ceased his curse rampage. He spoke, his voice initially unsteady from its unintended foray, "I rather think yes. Later. We have more pressing tasks to attend."
"The cleric and his small band?" asked Damanda, though she already knew the answer.
What else had so occupied her lord's mind these last few tendays? The Rotting Man was quiet with the details, but whoever the "cleric" was, the Talontyr seemed consumed with reports of his progress, which he received from agents unknown to Damanda, or perhaps via simple spells of divination.
The Talontyr answered,