Vanity's Brood - Lisa Smedman [107]
A droning filled the air around him as he tried to force his way into her mind. If he could convince her, even for an instant, that she had heard an unconditional summons from her god, she might leave. A simple splicing of her memories would be all it took. He pushed against her will, looking for the tiniest chink in her mental armor through which his own mind could slip.
Sibyl forced him back. Then she hissed. Her tail began to glow with an unbearably bright light then whipped forward. As the tip of it slapped against Arvin's face the brightness exploded, filling his entire vision. He blinked but could see nothing but white. He was blind.
He could no longer see Karrell, but he could hear her deep, shuddering groans. He could also hear, over Sibyl's hissing laughter, the soft pops of the flowers on his net releasing their compelling dust. Sibyl, he had seen in the instant before he was blinded, was still too far away from the net to be affected by the dust, but Karrell was close. Too close.
"Karrell," he shouted again. "Get away from the-"
His teeth slammed together as what must have been a second lightning bolt struck him. Muscles rigid, he fought against the blackness that threatened to swallow him. He had been foolish, he realized, to attempt to rescue Karrell alone. He should have tried harder to convince Ts'ikil to come with him. He pictured the couatl as he'd left her on the ledge, realized he should have at least told her he was entering Smaragd. Even wounded, the couatl was the one creature who might actually be a match forNo. There was one other who might be able to beat Sibyl in a head-to-head fight.
The marilith demon. Arvin knew just which card to play to get it on his side: the fate link.
Allowing his body to go limp-playing dead- Arvin pictured the demon in his mind. The face was easy to visualize. It had seared itself into Arvin's memory on that terrible day that Karrell had been drawn into the Abyss. Sulfur-yellow hair framing an angular face with wide lips and a V-shaped frown, the hair whipping about in an invisible current. The body, female from the waist up, but with six arms. Below the waist, a writhing serpent's tail covered in green scales that shimmered as though they had been dipped in oil.
As Arvin made contact, he saw the marilith whirl, a hiss on its lips. Its mouth silently framed a word: "You!"
Sibyl is about to kill Karrell, Arvin sent. Teleport to Karrell. Now!
The demon didn't bother making a reply; its image simply vanished from Arvin's mind. A heartbeat later, he heard a whoosh of displaced air that announced its arrival. He was already busy manifesting a power. His face felt cool where ectoplasm coated it. Blurry images filtered in through the skin of his forehead and cheeks as they became sensitive to light. Two towering shapes, confronting one another.
Suddenly he could see again.
The marilith cuffed Sibyl away from Karrell and screeched something at it in Dra conic. Sibyl hissed angrily and snaked her tail toward Karrell. The marilith flung out all six hands, and swords appeared in them.
Arvin smiled. Drawing air deep into his lungs, he charged his breath with psionic energy, then he blew the scents of saffron and ginger, first at the marilith, then at Sibyl, linking their fates.
The shouting was dying down and the marilith was lowering her swords. Time to stir the pot a little. Arvin manifested a second power, insinuating himself inside the demon's mind. It was an ugly mind, volatile and irrational, filled with violent fantasies that centered on what it would do to the worthless dretches-the creatures that were its minions-who had clearly shirked their duties. It bubbled with loathing over the fact that Sibyl-an insignificant half-demon-possessed the one necessary quality that would al low her to become Sseth's avatar: a mortal soul. But the anger that had boiled like lava through the marilith just an instant before was already cooling. Sibyl had agreed to deal with Ubtao's worm later, after she became Sseth's avatar. Once the chains that bound