Lady of Poison_ The Priests - Bruce R. Cordell [86]
Absalme, elf thin, gowned in thin white leather, hummed a tuneless dirge, awaiting Damanda's next command. Her fingers played along the length of a flute of fused humanoid vertebrae.
The contorted, constantly twisting frame of Ezekial was draped in dull black cloth, hiding the extent of his deformity. Because of his nature, Ezekial's posture hid a secret assassin's strength, redoubled by his deathless spirit.
Finally there was diminutive Lex with her tomes, scrolls, and wands. A shock of purple hair grew like fungus on Lex's graceful skull.
Lex grinned, showing her cruelly pointed canines, and said, "Some other demon got your elf before he even reached here, eh?"
"Perhaps. It is what we must discover. Ezekial!" "Yes, Mistress?" creaked he of cloaks, daggers, and teeth.
"Find the missing elf, or better yet, the girl-child he has with him."
Ezekial bent, so precipitously and shockingly that those unused to his contortions might have thought that he had broken and his top half toppled. His nose a mere whisper above the floor, he began to sniff. Sniffing, he shuffled away from the greenish light, back along the way Fallon should have come.
Damanda and the other vampires followed.
CHAPTER 23
Cracks riddled the stone walls of the passage. Over the eons, trickling water had nearly dissolved away some sections, though a lingering malign influence restricted the damage from being total.
Marrec pressed forward, hoping to come to the core of the Sighing Vault, but paranoid that each new shadow hid an ambush by Eschar. His companions stepped cautiously behind him, Victorious bringing up the rear.
Ususi had bolstered the ice demon with magic that should make it more resistant to instant neutralization by Eschar. That would be important were they to face Eschar again.
Echoes of their footsteps sometimes leaped ahead, causing Marrec to pause suspiciously. Marrec said, "There is an open area ahead by the sound of it." Whispers of his voice echoed back.
They pressed ahead, and the corridor emptied into a vast space. Shapes glowed with their own foul light, tumbled under a great subterranean ceiling. Pale domes, cracked sarcophagi, and possibly thousands of clay vessels, earthenware containers, and other containers lay scattered and broken around the chamber, most half buried in millennial dust. It was impossible to tell how many thousands more containers lay completely buried.
Even the slightest sound sent echoes scurrying and whispering across the chamber.
Victoricus intoned, "The Sighing Vault."
Ususi asked, "How can we find the token amidst this morass? It would take years."
"I smell it," the ice demon said, almost as if surprised.
It began to slide forward, passing the outermost vessels of the gargantuan pile. Casual inspection showed that the chests, vessels, and pots that were broken were empty of all content.
"Stay alert," said Marrec, gripping Justlance. "Eschar's got to be here, waiting." He followed on the demon's heels. Gunggari followed him, next Ususi, and Elowen took up the rear, guarding their flank.
They passed out into the great cavern, passing between larger vessels of stone and iron so large that they were like windowless, doorless buildings. Narrow "streets" of clear space wound through that city of silence, and Victoricus followed one such lane to the center of the tumbled pile.
Some of the vessels where carved with faces, bodies, skulls, demonic glyphs, and more depraved symbology. It was clear that many Nar treasures and secrets resided there in their hundreds.
Marrec said quietly, "Eschar's been a busy collector over the centuries."
Ususi responded, "That or he happened upon a dumping ground of failed Nar experiments. I doubt there is much of any use here. I can't detect any magic in any of these." She waved her hand over a field of crooked, half-shattered clay pots.
"Looking for goodies?"