'I'm sure you have,' Leliana said, 'but there's just one small problem. None of us knows how to bestow a curse.'
Q'arlynd felt a rush of relief. Things were back on track again. 'I realize that,' he said solemnly. 'Vlashiri's dead, but I overheard one of the priestesses saying that there are others at the Promenade who are familiar with curses. Send me there, and I'll teach them how to word a curse to reveal a Nightshadow in disguise.'
Leliana laughed.
'What's so funny?' Q'arlynd asked.
'They know how to remove curses, not bestow them. Eilistraee won't permit anything else.'
Q'arlynd's had to struggle to keep his emotions from showing. 'I see.'
Leliana moved to the door. 'You're not ready to visit the Promenade yet.'
'Meaning you don't trust me.'
'Not fully, no.' She opened the door, made ready to usher him out. 'But I will send a message on your behalf to Qilue, if only to-'
The rest of her words were lost in a metallic crashing noise that came from below. It sounded like swords clanging together, but faster than any mortal hand could wield them. Doors banged open above and below Leliana's room.
'The barrier!' a priestess shouted. 'Something's triggered it!'
Leliana sprang for her sword and armor. She shrugged on her chain mail as quickly as someone donning a shirt then ran for the open door. 'Come on,' she shouted as she rushed past him. 'If it's the judicator again, we could use you.'
Q'arlynd didn't wait for a second invitation. It was a chance to fight at Leliana's side-to at last prove himself to her. He yanked his wand out of its sheath and followed her to the door. Glancing outside as she hurried down the ladder, he saw magically animated blades whistling by several paces away from the tree, forming a circle around it. He wondered, briefly, why the magical trap hadn't sprung earlier, when he himself had crossed whatever invisible boundary encircled the tree. Perhaps because he was one of the 'faithful' now. Shrugging, he cast a protective spell on himself. Then he jumped and activated his House insignia. As he slowly levitated to the ground, other priestesses scrambled past him down the ladders, swords in hand. One of them already stood at the bottom of the tree, spinning in place, her sword held out in front of her.
She stopped abruptly, pointing with her sword. 'There!' she shouted. 'He went that way.'
Another priestess called a bolt of moonlight down from the sky. It lanced down into the woods and illuminated, just for a moment, the figure of a running man with black skin. He staggered as it struck the ground next to him and glanced over his shoulder. Even from a distance, Q'arlynd could see his mask.
'A Nightshadow,' he whispered under his breath.
One of the priestesses spoke a word, negating the barrier of blades. As it fell, the other priestesses charged after the assassin, one of them blowing a hunting horn. Leliana ran after them.
'Q'arlynd!' she shouted over her shoulder. 'What are you waiting for?'
Q'arlynd hesitated. He'd noticed something she'd missed. Rowaan's door was open, yet he hadn't seen her during the mad scramble to chase the assassin. He levitated to the opening and peered inside.
What he saw didn't surprise him. Rowaan lay on the floor of the room, her eyes bulging, a deep crease in her throat. The assassin must have been strangling her, even as Q'arlynd and Leliana were chatting.
And Q'arlynd had unlocked the door for him.
Leliana would realize that the instant she saw the dispelled glyph. All of the suspicions she harbored about Q'arlynd would be 'confirmed.'
That was it then. He'd never get an audience with the high priestess now, except, perhaps, as a prisoner.
He cursed and sheathed his wand. Then he teleported away.
CHAPTER NINE
Qilue was in the Cavern of Song, lending her voice to those of the other priestesses, when Iljrene's urgent message came. The Nightshadows have struck again. The Misty Forest this time. They've stolen another soul. Her body has just been brought to the Hall of Healing.
I'll be there at once, Qilue replied. She hurried out of the cavern, gathering up her clothes from the floor as she went.
As she strode down the passageways that led to the Hall of Healing, Qilue's expression was grim. It was the third soul Vhaeraun's assassins had claimed: one from a priestess at the Gray Forest shrine, another from a priestess of the Chondalwood, and the third, from the Misty Forest.
Two other souls that had been stolen had been restored, praise Eilistraee. The soul of Nastasia, the first to fall, had been set free by unknown causes, and the priestess who had been killed at the shrine in the Forest of Lethyr had also been raised from the dead after the assassin who had attacked her was killed. His body had been questioned by a necromancer-an unpleasant, but necessary task. The corpse had revealed that Malvag was alive. The pair had met a day before the attack the Lethyr shrine. The plan to open a gate was indeed going ahead, and when it came to fruition, the souls of Eilistraee's priestesses would be consumed.
Iljrene was waiting for Qilue in the Hall of Healing, beside another priestess Qilue knew well-Leliana. Qilue had taken Leliana's sword-oath more than a century ago, when she had first come up from below.
Leliana turned, a stricken look on her face, as Qilue entered. 'Lady Qilue,' she said. 'It's my daughter Rowaan. The Nightshadows killed her and Chezzara can't raise her from the dead. Her soul…'
Qilue touched Leliana's arm. 'Let's be certain first.' She glanced past Leliana at the alcove where two novice priestesses hastily prepared a bed on which to lay a body. Two other priestesses-both just teleported from the Misty Forest, judging by the snowflakes still melting in their hair-stood by, holding the corners of a damp blanket on which Rowaan's body lay. Even in death, she looked remarkably like her mother.
Qilue moved closer and noted the telltale mark of an assassin's cord around Rowaan's neck. She murmured a prayer of detection, and a distinctive shadow appeared across the lower half of the dead priestess's face.
Leliana moaned.
'Tell me about the attack,' Qilue prompted.
'It happened late last night,' one of the priestesses holding the blanket answered. 'The Nightshadow who did it got away. So did the one who aided him.'
Leliana's face twisted with anguish. 'It's my fault,' she blurted. 'I was stupid. I trusted him.'
Qilue frowned, not quite understanding. 'This second Nightshadow-you knew him?'
Leliana nodded. 'He posed as a petitioner.' A bitter laugh burst from her lips. 'He even took the sword-oath, but he betrayed us in the end. He dispelled the glyph on Rowaan's door then kept me talking while the other Nightshadow went into her room and…' Her voice faltered, and her eyes strayed to the priestesses who were gently laying her daughter's body on the floor. 'Stole her soul.'
Leliana tore her eyes away from the body of her daughter. She took a deep breath then spoke again, shaking her head all the while. 'I still can't understand it. I questioned him under a truth spell, and he gave his name and the details of his coming to the surface readily enough. He wasn't truly a petitioner-he only sought us out in order to find his sister-but he fought beside us when the judicator attacked, and later, when he took the sword-oath, I thought that perhaps he had-'
'Leliana,' Qilue said, cutting the other priestess off in mid-flow with a touch on the arm. 'You're getting ahead of yourself. One piece of the story at a time, please. What name did this male give?'
'Q'arlynd Melarn.'
Qilue' gasped. Moonfire danced on her skin, washing the cavern with light. There was the second coin, dropped at her feet. It had landed, as Eilistraee had foretold, on the side that was betrayal. 'Tell me everything about this male-and swiftly, but start at the beginning this time.'
Qilue listened as Leliana's tale unfolded, occasionally interrupting with a question. When it was done, she stood in thought for several moments. 'It seems odd that he confessed his knowledge of Vhaeraun to you on the very night the Nightshadow struck.'
