Song of the Saurials - Kate Novak [147]
The patch of darkness was shaped like a doorway, and Finder recognized it immediately. It was the gate between the Lost Vale and the plane of Tarterus, the gate that Moander had used to transport its saurial minions to the Realms.
The entire body of the god had been built around the gate.
Moander's normal abode was the Abyss, but one could reach the Abyss from Tarterus. Moander must have sucked Akabar through the gate, through Tarterus, to its abode in the Abyss.
A small, brilliant gem near the base of the gate caught the bard's eye. He picked it up to examine it more closely. It was the shape and color of a drop of blood, and it felt warm in his hand. Very warm. It seemed to throb with great power. Could it be the seed that had resurrected Moander? Finder wondered. What would happen to the god's new body if it was separated from the seed by a gate?
The bard tried to toss the gem through the gate, but it bounced back. It would have to be carried through by a living person, he realized. Finder retrieved the gem and slipped it inside his boot. He approached the gate, but he hesitated before stepping through it.
In his youth, the bard had visited the ethereal and astral planes a number of times. As an older man, he'd investigated several of the elemental and para-elemental planes. As a prisoner of the Harpers, he'd been exiled to the region between the positive energy plane and a quasi-elemental plane. The thought of stepping through a gate leading to an outer plane, though, filled him with horror-especially so fell a region as Tarterus, where, the sages said, creatures from the Abyss and from Hades constantly fought one another for control of the land, foul and poisonous as it was, and enslaved any beings they discovered.
Dragonbait had leaped through such a gate into Tarterus to stalk evil creatures; that was how the paladin had come to be captured by the fiend Phalse and brought to the Realms. The paladin had suffered greatly at Phalse's hands, but he had emerged from Tarterus alive. Moander's saurial minions had survived their forced march through the plane, as well. The bard chided himself aloud for his trepidity. "Surely Finder Wyvernspur can brave its dangers." It would be easier than facing Alias without Akabar at his side, he decided.
Finder took a deep breath and flew through the dark hole, following the light of the piece of finder's stone.
*****
As Alias, Olive, Dragonbait, and Grypht watched Finder dive into Moander's body, they were filled with hope. The god cried out in agony and lost its balance on the mountain slope, tumbling down the slope into the vale, shedding great chunks of its body. Then it lay still. The adventurers emerged from the cave and for a long time continued their vigil over the god's fallen body, but neither Finder nor Akabar emerged from the mass of greenery.
Alias was beginning to consider climbing into the vale to do battle with the god herself, when suddenly she felt as if a burning brand had touched her sword arm.
She looked down at her arm and shouted with joy, "It's gone! Moander's sigil is gone! The god is dead!"
Dragonbait clutched at his chest from the pain the disappearing sigil had caused him, then embraced the swordswoman.
"Finder's destroyed Moander!" Olive shouted with glee.
"No… he has only destroyed the body Moander occupied in this world," Grypht reminded the others, and his words cast a shadow of foreboding on their elation.
20
Finder in the Underworld
Once he'd passed through the dark gate inside Moander's Realmsian body, Finder found himself hovering a few feet over a bog bordering a river. The soil from the bog glowed a dull red, bathing the surface of the plane about him in a hellish light. The plants of the bog lay on their sides, withered and brown. He was grateful his flying spell hadn't worn off yet, for he would just as soon not touch the soil or the plants. The river was as black as night and flowed fast and smooth. Although the bard had never been to Tarterus,