The Druid Queen - Douglas Niles [28]
"Very few, actually," said the cleric. He looked around the great hall, with its smoke-stained beams and wooden columns supporting the broad ceiling, the long stone walls, and the broad hearth. "Perhaps we could find a smaller chamber-a bedroom or private apartment would be best. You'll want to rest, I'm certain. As for me, I could use a bite to eat and a glass or two of wine-for my strength-and then we can get started."
"Splendid! We'll use my library upstairs. Alicia, will you have Gretta send up some nourishment for the patriarch? I'll show you the place. It should be perfect." The three men left the hall, ascending the wide stairs to the family's apartments on the second floor while Robyn accompanied Alicia to the kitchen.
"Do you think it'll work, Mother?" inquired the princess nervously after they had requested a tray and bottle for the priest.
"I don't see why not," Robyn said, without conviction. "After all, an Exalted Inquisitor, so I've heard, is a rank achieved by no more than a handful of clerics at any given time. He must be very knowledgeable of his god."
"I hope so!" Alicia declared with passion.
The two women joined the priest and the king in the library. Upon Hyath's instructions, they pulled the shutters and shades across the window, darkening the room, while Tristan made himself comfortable on a long, bedlike couch. Meanwhile the patriarch enjoyed some of the salt meats, bread, cheese, and wine of Corwell.
"If you three will wait in the next room, we'll get started," Hyath instructed them after he cleaned his plate and very nearly emptied the bottle.
Robyn rose with noticeable reluctance, following Keane and Alicia into the adjacent anteroom. The inquisitor closed the door firmly behind them, and they settled down impatiently to wait.
For a time, they heard nothing, and then Hyath's voice emerged from the room. The priest performed some kind of chant, his voice following a precise cadence, rising and falling in pitch as he drifted, almost singing, through phrases that none of them could identify. Then his voice dropped again, though the soft murmur of verbal rites still came from beyond the door. Then even that faded into silence.
For several more minutes, they listened but heard nothing, aching with curiosity, not daring to open the door. Robyn rose and began to pace, while Alicia clasped her hands before her and Keane sat in attentive silence, alert for any sound from the darkened library.
The quiet broke suddenly with a sound of gurgling shock growing quickly into a scream of terror. They heard a crash, like a boom of thunder, and Robyn cried out in alarm.
Keane reached the door in less than an instant, twisting the latch and throwing the portal open with a surprisingly powerful push of his shoulder. He stumbled into the room, waving his hands to clear thickening smoke from the air as the queen and princess rushed in behind him.
"What… what happened?" gasped Alicia, racing to her father's side.
Tristan lay on the bed, blinking and shaking his head. He groaned softly. At least they could see that he was still alive.
Only then did they notice the patriarch of Helm. The Exalted Inquisitor lay motionless on the floor, sprawled on his back as if he'd been knocked over by some shocking force. His eyebrows were singed, his face blackened, and his huge body displayed no sign of life.
Alicia turned back to the king as Tristan raised his left arm. They both saw that the limb still ended in the blunt stump of his wrist.
* * * * *
The dwarven community proved to have an exceptional number of well-stocked wine cellars-so many, in fact, that the hulking conquerors settled for plundering only a select few. Trolls, sinuous and flexible, searched the small houses while the giants waited outside. Several times trolls reported a solid door in the basement of one of the dwarven homes.
Quickly firbolgs wielding axes and hammers smashed a path to the cellar door, usually by knocking out a wall and then collapsing the floor