Vanity's Brood - Lisa Smedman [79]
"The lower half," he said. "The one Dmetrio had."
Show me.
Compelled, Arvin's hand slipped inside his shirt. It pulled out the lower half of the Circled Serpent. The serpent nodded.
Arvin stared up at the feathered head. "What… are you?"
A couatl, the voice trilled. One of those Ubtao known as Ts'ikil.
Karrell's friend. Supposedly. "Are you an avatar?" Arvin asked.
Laugher rippled into his mind. No. A servant of the god, nothing more. The couatl nodded at the artifact in Arvin's hand. Where is the other half?
"It was lost in the river."
Was it? The voice sounded bemused. Let us see.
Arvin felt the couatl sifting through his thoughts, like a finger idly stirring sand. He clenched his hand around Karrell's ring. Without any energy to fuel his psionics, it was his only defence. The familiar rush of magical energy up his arm didn't come.
It does not block me because I made it, the couatl said.
The couatl rummaged a little longer in Arvin's mind then withdrew.
Arvin felt sick. He knew the couatl must have found what she was looking for: a memory of the cave where he'd hidden his backpack.
Pakal nodded in response to an unheard command and stepped forward. He held out a claw-tipped hand.
"Don't make her force you," he warned.
Reluctantly, Arvin handed the Circled Serpent to him. The dwarf tucked it into his belt pouch.
"Please," Arvin said, his eyes locked on Ts'ikil's. "I need to rescue Karrell. She's in Smaragd, pregnant, and about to give birth. I have to get her out of there. Just open the door that leads to Smaragd long enough for me to slip inside; I'll find my own way out."
For a moment, Pakal looked sorrowful. Then he snorted. "You really expect us to trust you?" The ruddy glow that surrounded his body intensified. The claws on the hand that held the lower half of the Circled Serpent lengthened.
Arvin tensed, ready to counter the attack he knew was coming.
The dwarf, however, turned toward Ts'ikil. "No," he said. "He might tell the Se'sehen where-"
The couatl must have given him a silent rebuke; Pakal backed down.
Ts'ikil turned to Arvin. Karrell's plight fills me with great sorrow, she said. If I could shift to the layer of the Abyss she occupies, I would have attempted a rescue myself, but it's just not possible to reach her.
Arvin's heart beat a little faster. His eyes were locked on Pakal's pouch. "It is possible. Now that we have both halves, we could-"
The risk is too great.
Pakal gave Arvin one last glare then climbed obediently onto the couatl's back. Ts'ikil coiled her body beneath her, unfurled her wings, and sprang into the air.
"Wait!" Arvin called. "Take me with you!"
Too late. Ts'ikil burst through the trees into the open sky and flew away.
Arvin didn't waste his breath cursing. Instead he threw himself into the bhujang asana. It took all the willpower he possessed to still his mind and enter a meditative state. Frantic thoughts of Karrell filled his head.
He had to hurryStay calm! he growled at himself.
To fill his muladh ara and morph into a flying snakeBreathe in through the left nostril, out through the right.
To beat the couatl back to the cave where he'd hidden his backpackBreathe! Draw in energy. Force it down. Coil it into the m uladhara.
Before Ts'ikil got there. Before she found the other half and destroyedStop it! Still your mind! Control!
He completed his meditation then whirled through the five defence poses and five attack poses like a manic dancer. Sweat flew from his body as he thrust with his hands, twirled and kicked. At last he was done.
He yanked a mental fistful of energy into his navel-nearly making himself sick in the process- then up into his chest. The scent of saffron and ginger exploded into the air as he morphed. He did it clumsily, not caring that his serpent tail ended in two human feet or that his head, though tiny, was still human. What mattered were the wings. He thrust them out and muscled his way into the air, bursting out of the treetops like an arrow loosed