Tymora's Luck - Kate Novak [107]
Joel didn't care whether the priestess made her appearance because of the signal from the finder's stone or because she had read the bard's thoughts as long as her appearance made an impressive spectacle. Suddenly the air around the boulder shimmered and the priestess manifested herself. She was kneeling on the magic carpet, which hovered five feet off the ground. As the carpet glided forward, Holly stepped from the dark ranks of the bulezau and walked along beside it. Then the marilith slithered forward behind Holly.
The carpet halted directly before the gate. The ebon aura of power that surrounded the evil priestess had grown until it blocked out the light from the lava river behind her.
From the wall above, Joel heard the gatekeeper call out, "Who goes there?"
Walinda, with her head held high and her back as straight as an eastern princess's, called out, "I am Walinda of Beshaba. I have come at the summons of Lady Beshaba."
Joel stepped back away from the portcullis so that Petitioner Perr could see him from the window in the gate control room.
Perr looked down upon the bard disguised as Hate-master Morr. Joel gave him the signal to open the gate. Perr disappeared from the window.
All right, Perr, old buddy, Joel thought, this is it. Your moment of destiny. Please don't make me look like a fool.
Both portcullises raised up all the way, as if Perr wanted to be sure this woman he believed to be Beshaba's sister didn't feel inclined to damage his newly repaired gates.
"Enter and be welcome, Walinda of Beshaba," Joel called out, "in the name of the New Darkness."
One of the larger yugoloths came running up to Joel and halted at his side. An agonizing pain blazed across the bard's head as the creature shouted telepathically, There are hundreds of invisible bar-lgura all around the priestess!
"I am aware of that," Joel lied, realizing that the yugoloths could see the invisible beings he had only suspected were present. The magic carpet carried Walinda through the gatehouse. Holly and the marilith entered beside her. All three moved toward the bard.
The bar-lgura are entering the courtyard!
"It's all right," the bard said with a calm, reassuring tone. "They are our allies."
The yugoloth grabbed at Joel's robe and shook him. Allies do not enter with their weapons drawn!
The marilith's tail whipped around the yugoloth, and she yanked the struggling creature toward her. She lay all six hands on the creature's body and hissed.
Joel's mind reeled with the yugoloth's telepathic scream as the marilith's touch magically bruised and burned the creature's body.
"Leave him be!" the bard shouted at the snake-woman.
The yugoloth vanished.
"What did you do to him?" Joel demanded. He fled from my attack with his magic, the marilith answered telepathically.
Walinda leaned forward on the magic carpet. "Is that you, Poppin?" she asked with astonishment.
"Of course it's Joel," Holly snapped. "He's the only person here not radiating evil."
"I am impressed, priest of Finder," the priestess said. "I had no idea you would prove such a talented saboteur. You have ensured our victory."
"And you may have just thrown it away," Joel retorted sharply. "You still have to win your way to Beshaba. We might have reached her with stealth, but now that you've attacked one of the guards, we may not be able to avoid a fight."
Even as the bard spoke, the giant yugoloths in the courtyard surged toward the intruders.
"So there will be a fight," Walinda said. "That is what we have armies for."
The yugoloths stopped about a hundred feet away from the wall, and it soon became clear that they were blocked by invisible bar-lgura. The larger yugoloths apparently had no trouble seeing the shorter apelike tanar'ri, invisible or not, and engaged them in combat. As the bar-lgura began to fight back, they broke the spell of invisibility that surrounded them. Then Joel was able to see what had so alarmed the yugoloth