the room had no exit. Worse yet, there was a body lying on the floor, next to the far wall. Another initiate-one who didn’t survive whatever disease was in the poisoned fangs? No, this “body” was stirring.
Arvin lifted his dagger, ready to throw it, but something made him pause. The creature that rose from its slump to stare at him was horrifying. Its eyes were sunken and bloodshot, its body misshapen and gaunt, its skin a diseased-looking yellow-green with the hair falling out in clumps… except for the heavy eyebrows, which met above the nose.
“Naulg?” Arvin whispered, lowering his dagger.
The creature wet its lips with a forked tongue. “Ar… vin?” it croaked.
The voices in the hallway drew level with the door. There were two of them-a man and a woman, arguing about whether the initiate had been the one to open the door of the “chamber of ashes,” then slam it shut. “Something stirred up the ash rats,” the woman insisted. The man at last concurred.
“Search the upper chamber,” he shouted at someone down the hall.
Hearing that, Arvin prayed that Nicco wasn’t slumbering there still. He reached for his breast pocket. Perhaps the lapis lazuli would allow him to contact Nicco before-
The pocket was gone-he must have torn it away with the rest of his burning shirtfront-and so was the lapis lazuli. Arvin cursed softly as he realized the stone must be lying in the hallway where he’d killed the rat.
Another voice joined the two outside the door. “What’s happened?” It was male, and sibilant, the inflection that of a yuan-ti. The voice sounded vaguely familiar, but Arvin couldn’t place where he might have heard it before.
Naulg, meanwhile, shuffled across the room to Arvin, his arms wrapped tightly around his stomach, his eyes glazed. “It hurts,” he groaned, letting go of his stomach to pluck imploringly at Arvin’s sleeve. His fingernails were long and yellow, almost claws. The stench that preceded him made Arvin’s eyes water, but Arvin kept his face neutral. He remembered, from his days at the orphanage, how it felt to have a stench spell cast on him-how the children would pinch their noses and make faces as they passed. The crueler ones would throw stones.
Arvin might have lost the lapis lazuli, but he still had his power stone. He thrust a hand into his pocket, trying to decide whether he should teleport Naulg out of here. The rogue was obviously unstable; if Arvin tried to sneak him out, he’d probably give them both away. But brain burn wasn’t something Arvin was willing to risk, not with a yuan-ti just outside the door.
Naulg’s voice rose to a thin childlike wail. “It
Arvin winced. Naulg’s plea reminded him of how he’d felt during those long months in the orphanage before he’d finally found a friend: lost and alone-and frightened. He pressed a hand against the rogue’s lips. “Quiet, Naulg,” he whispered. “I’m going to get you out of here, but you have to be-”
The clicking of the lock’s bolt was Arvin’s only warning. He whirled as the door opened, whipping up his dagger. As the patch-haired cultist leaned in through the door with an oil lamp, flooding the room with light, Arvin hurled his dagger. The weapon whistled through the air and buried itself in the cultist’s throat. The cultist fell, gurgling and clutching at his bloody neck, his lamp shattering on the floor. Arvin spoke the dagger’s command word and his dagger flew back to his hand. He caught it easily, despite Naulg tugging on his sleeve.
Arvin shook him off. “Not now!” From the hallway came the female cultist’s voice, raised in rapid prayer. Arvin sprang toward the doorway, trying to line up a throw at her, but the yuan-ti whose voice Arvin had heard a moment ago stepped into the doorway, blocking it. He was a half blood with a human body and head, but with a snake growing out of each shoulder where his arms should have been. The lamp wick-still burning, feeding off the puddle of spilled oil-threw shadows that obscured the yuan-ti’s face, but Arvin could see his snake arms clearly. They were banded with red, white, and black. The snake heads that were his hands were hissing, their fangs dripping venom. If either of them succeeded in striking Arvin, he’d be lucky to feel the sting of the puncture; a banded snake’s venom was that swift.
Arvin took a quick step back. The yuan-ti followed him, his head weaving back and forth, his snake arms thrashing and hissing. Arvin wet his lips. Hitting a vital spot with his dagger was going to be difficult.
“Ar… vin!” Naulg wailed.
Arvin elbowed the rogue aside.
In that instant, the yuan-ti attacked-not with his venomous hands but with magic. A wave of fear as chilling as ice water crashed into Arvin’s mind and sent shivers through his entire body. Gasping, Arvin staggered backward. Irrational fear gripped him, made him fling away his dagger, turn his back to the yuan-ti and scrabble at the wall like a rat. The yuan-ti was too powerful; Arvin would never defeat it. Crumpling to his knees, he began to sob.
A small portion of his mind, however, remembered the pouch he’d stuffed into his pocket-the one that held the assassin vine he’d sold to Naulg-and realized that this could be a weapon. But the main part of Arvin’s mind was consumed with the magical fear that engulfed him as water does a drowning man.
Hissing, slit eyes gleaming, the yuan-ti walked slowly and deliberately toward him.
The fear increased, making it difficult even to sob. Arvin was going to die-he knew it. He… could… never-
Arvin screamed then-a scream of defiance, rather than fear. He yanked the pouch out of his pocket, ripped it open, and hurled the twine at the yuan-ti. The yuan-ti tried to slap the writhing twine aside, but it immediately wrapped itself around his wrist and swarmed up his arm. A heartbeat later it had coiled around his throat. The yuan-ti staggered backward, his snake hands trying to get a grip on the twine around his neck but only succeeding in tearing slashes in his throat with their fangs.
The fear that had nearly paralyzed Arvin fell away from him like an unpinned cloak.
Arvin scooped up his dagger and leaped to his feet. “Naulg!” he shouted, shoving the rogue toward the door. “Let’s go!”
The yuan-ti had at last managed to grab the twine with one of his snake-headed hands and was pulling it away from his throat. He glanced wildly at Naulg then gestured at Arvin with his free arm.
“Kill him!” he cried.
Before Arvin could react, Naulg spun and leaped on him. Together, they tumbled to the floor. Naulg was weaker than Arvin, and slower, and Arvin had a dagger in his hand-but he was loath to use it, even though Naulg’s eyes gleamed with crazed rage. Arvin vanished it into his glove instead. Seizing the opportunity, Naulg grabbed Arvin by the neck. Arvin was able to wrench one of Naulg’s hands free, but the rogue continued to cling to Arvin. He snapped with his teeth at Arvin’s shoulder, his neck, his arm. Only by writhing violently was Arvin able to avoid Naulg’s furious attacks. Locked together, they rolled back and forth across the floor.
Out of the corner of his eye, Arvin saw the yuan-ti at last succeed in tearing the twine from his neck.
That brief glance was Arvin’s undoing. Naulg reared up, lifting Arvin with him, then slammed Arvin’s head into the floor.
Bright points of light danced before Arvin’s eyes. They cleared just in time for him to see Naulg swoop down, mouth open wide. Arvin felt Naulg’s teeth stab into his shoulder-and a hot numbness flashed through him.
Poison.
Naulg’s spittle had turned poisonous, just as the old sailor’s had.
Arvin tried to draw air into his lungs, but could not. His body was rigid; he was dying. His mind, however, was whirling. He was stupid to have tried to rescue Naulg. He should have listened to the mind seed’s warning and killed the rogue the instant he saw him. Instead, the faint hope of aiding an old friend had been his undoing.
Arvin let out a final, hissing sigh. The room, the snake-armed yuan-ti, and Naulg all spun around him as he spiraled down into darkness.
CHAPTER 17
