Venom's Taste - Lisa Smedman [65]
“Fine,” he said. “Let’s talk.”
CHAPTER 11
24 Kythorn, Evening
Arvin paced back and forth like an animal in a cage. He’d been trapped in this room for ages with a man he could neither charm nor fight his way past. He wanted to be out doing something. Only two days had passed since Zelia planted the mind seed, but already Arvin was starting to lose control. If he didn’t do something soon he might make another dangerous-possibly fatal-mistake. And there was a chance, it seemed, that Naulg might still be alive. But all Arvin could do was weave his way back and forth, back and forth, across the floor.
He and the cleric-Nicco, his name was-were alone in the room now. Kayla had awakened some time ago, as refreshed as if she’d never succumbed to fever at all. She’d been summoned from the room by Gonthril, presumably to join the suicidal raid on the royal palace. Arvin supposed that was the last he’d ever see of her.
Arvin had passed the time by telling Nicco his story-omitting any mention of Zelia, since the news that he was gathering information for a yuan-ti was hardly going to endear him to the rebels. Thinking of her-and the mind seed-made him wonder. Hazzan’s dispelling hadn’t broken its hold over Arvin, but perhaps clerical magic might succeed where wizardry had failed.
“I’ve been thinking about the potion,” Arvin began. “Hazzan’s dispelling doesn’t seem to have worked. I still seem to be turning into a yuan-ti. In mind, if not in body.”
Nicco nodded grimly. “You do seem to be under some sort of magical compulsion-from time to time. Right now, I’d say you were your own man. But when you attacked me earlier…”
“I’m sorry about that,” Arvin repeated. “I wasn’t… in my right mind.”
“Apology accepted.”
“You recognized me as a psion earlier,” Arvin said. “How?”
“You cast a charm spell without using either a holy symbol or hand gestures. Some wizards and sorcerers can cast spells with stilled hands or silenced lips, but the faint ringing sound I heard when you tried to charm me confirmed my guess. You’re a psion.”
Arvin’s hopes rose. “Not many people know what a psion is.”
Nicco shrugged. “I’m widely traveled.”
“Have you dispelled psionic powers before?”
“Yes… why?”
Arvin smiled. Maybe Nicco could help him. “I’ve been wondering if the potion I was forced to drink might have contained a component that was psionic, rather than sorcerous,” Arvin said. “If it did, Hazzan might have overlooked it. I was wondering if prayer might succeed where wizardry failed.”
“It might,” Nicco said slowly. “If it is the Doombringer’s will.”
“The Doombringer? Is that the name of your god?”
“In my country he is known as Assuran, Lord of the Three Thunders, but here they call him Hoar.”
“I… think I’ve heard of him,” Arvin said.
“He is the righter of wrongs,” Nicco said with a grim smile. “I heard you whisper Tymora’s name earlier. Like that goddess, Hoar is a bringer of luck-bad luck, but only to those who have called it down upon themselves by their own actions. He seals their doom-and in the process, saves those who are doomed.”
“That’s how I feel, right now,” Arvin said somberly. “Doomed.”
“Talona’s clerics did wrong you,” Nicco agreed. “The Doombringer will surely be moved to set matters right.”
Arvin let out a long, slow hiss of relief. The sooner Zelia’s mind seed was out of his head, the better.
Nicco stared at him. “Hoar’s blessings come with a price.”
Arvin gave the cleric a wry smile. “Nice of you to be up front about it. What is it?” He pictured a healthy tithe, or several tendays of fasting, self-flagellation, and prayer. The clerics who ran the orphanage had been big on flagellation.
“You must do everything you can to bring those who have wronged you to justice. And it must be in as… appropriate a manner as you are able. ‘Blood for blood-that is Hoar’s creed.”
Arvin nodded. It was easy to come up with a suitable punishment for the cultists. Slipping into their water a potion that would polymorph them into sewer rats, for