Vanity's Brood - Lisa Smedman [14]
When it stopped, a face appeared inside the crystal ball: one of the high serphidians. "Mistress," he hissed in alarm, "a spy has been detected within your sanctum."
Heart pounding, Arvin realized the scribe must have noticed the gap in her memories, realized that the burn on Arvin's shoulder was of her own making, and come to the correct conclusion, which meant that Arvin could no longer afford to wait for the cleric who had led him there to present the pack to Sibyl. Wrenching it out of his hands with a curt, "I'll present it to her myself," Arvin started to force his way to the front of the crowd.
Sibyl, meanwhile, hissed an angry rebuke at the crystal ball. The cleric inside it gave an urgent reply-"No, Mistress, within the temple itself!"
Sibyl's eyes blazed. She pointed at Medusanna. "Seal the temple. Find the spy."
Arvin elbowed the Se'sehen nobles aside as he desperately struggled to reach the altar, the cleric following in his wake.
"Mistress!" Arvin called out. "I found the-"
Before he could complete the sentence, Sibyl thrust herself backward with a mighty beat of her wings. The darkness closed like a curtain around her.
"No!" Arvin groaned, his voice lost in the murmur of confusion that swept through the chamber.
Rage and despair filled him in equal measure. He'd prepared for six months-had come up with the perfect weapon with which to kill Sibyl and been ready to sacrifice his own life, only to have the opportunity snatched away at the last instant.
His body tingled, and started to lose its shape. In another moment, his metamorphosis would end. He could restore it a heartbeat later-but not before the dozens of yuan- ti closest to him saw his human form. He couldn't alter that many memories.
If he was going to survive long enough to get a second chance to kill Sibyl, he needed to think of something else. And fast.
CHAPTER 2
Arvin withdrew his awareness deep into himself. Plunging it deep into his muladhara, he imagined the color leaching from his body, imagined his body fading, then disappearing altogether. At the same time he leaped to the side, vacating the spot he'd just occupied.
I was never there, he broadcast to the yuan-ti around him. You did not see me. You do not see me now.
He knew the manifestation was successful when one of the Se'sehen nearly walked into him. The power had clouded the senses of those in the altar room. Though Arvin could see and hear himself, he was invisible to them, impossible to detect even by sound or scent, and just in time. Looking down at his arms, he saw that the black scales were gone. His metamorphosis had ended. Putting his pack back on, he glanced around.
The altar room was in turmoil. The Se'sehen babbled at each other in their own language while the nobles from Hlondeth milled about in confusion. Clerics ran for the doors, shouting orders. The high serphidian who had led Arvin through the temple stood with hands on hips, searching the room-his gaze passed over Arvin without stopping-and began elbowing his way through the crowd toward Medusanna.
Arvin started toward the exit that led back to the portal room, then remembered the snakes that surrounded the portal. Several were venomous, and he no longer had the yuan-ti's natural resistance to poison he'd gained by assuming yuan-ti form. He could manifest another metamorphosis, but the concentration necessary to reshape his body would result in the loss of his invisibility.
Whispering an oath under his breath, Arvin looked for another way out. The altar room had ten other exits: the five arched corridors along each side wall, between the statues of Varae, but which to choose?
Even as he tried to decide, Medusanna cast a spell, her arms moving in sinuous gestures as she prayed. Malevolent glyphs sprang into view at the top of each exit and the corridors beyond filled with a swirling mist. A whiff of it drifted out to where Arvin stood and stung his nose: acid.
His heart pounded. There was no escape. Then