Jedidiah knelt beside the girl. 'Most of these are superficial cuts, as if whatever it was was just trying to hold Holly back. The belly wound seems the most life-threatening injury, aside from the loss of blood.'
Holly moaned softly. Then her eyes blinked open.
'Holly,' Joel asked, 'are you all right?'
The girl moaned again.
'What attacked you?' Walinda demanded.
'Black thing. Furry, with wings,' the young paladin whispered. 'Like Bear.'
'Bear!' Joel gasped. 'That's impossible. We cremated him. Holly, are you sure?'
Holly shook her head. There were tears in her eyes. She turned her head toward Bors and said no more.
'She must rest,' Bors insisted. 'Yes,' Jedidiah agreed. He stood up. 'And we must get back to work,' he said, taking up the pickax he'd retrieved from the street. 'Joel, Walinda, let's go. Bors will look after Holly.'
'I will stay,' Walinda said.
'What?' Joel asked.
'I have been injured myself,' the priestess of Bane said, 'and you cannot heal me. I have no spells. I would be more hindrance than help. I will nurse the girl. I am better at causing wounds than healing them, but I do know something of the art.'
Jedidiah examined the priestess with a jaundiced eye, but after a moment he nodded. 'We'll return when we've found something,' he said. Then the older priest wheeled about and headed for the door. Joel followed in his wake.
Joel and Jedidiah walked back toward the Market Ward in the dark fog.
'That was strange, wasn't it?' Joel asked the older man.
'What?' Jedidiah replied.
'Walinda offering to nurse Holly.'
'Oh, that. Indeed it was,' Jedidiah replied.
'I would have thought she'd want to be there when we found the hand no matter how wounded she was.'
'Unless the banelich has warned her that there may be a deadly guardian protecting the hand,' Jedidiah pointed out.
'What do you think attacked Holly?'
'I don't think it was Bear. It could be another dark stalker. If the priests of Iyachtu Xvim caught wind of what Walinda was up to, they might have decided to send an agent here to prevent Bane's resurrection. Walinda said the creature attacked her first, and it left Holly once Walinda was gone.'
'It left Holly for dead,' Joel pointed out.
'But it didn't leave her dead. Did you notice Holly was crying?'
Joel nodded. 'She must be in terrible pain.'
'She turned her head away,' Jedidiah said.
Joel thought about that for a moment. 'Do you think she knows something she's not telling us? What could it be?'
'I think we should hurry back to the shop, just in case.'
From some shadows off to their right, something hissed. Then, in his head, Joel heard a voice speak their names: Joel. Finder.
Jedidiah was brought up short, apparently having heard the same voice using his real name. Joel halted beside him, his hand on the hilt of his sword.
A figure glided out from behind the curtain of fog. It wore a robe of crimson, ornately trimmed in gold. A red fez with a gold tassel crowned its octopuslike head. It was a mind flayer, what Jas called an illithid, one of Ilsensine's chosen master race.
You are Finder, it stated in their heads.
Joel noticed that the left side of the mind flayer's ten-tacled face twitched, as if from palsy.
I am a servant of Lord Ilsensine, the illithid explained. Its face twitched some more. We seek a boon from you.
'I have paid my debt to your lord,' Jedidiah replied cautiously. 'I have no further desire to deal with him.'
He needs to deal with you. The mind flayer waved its tentacles anxiously. He begs for your indulgence.
'Begs?' Jedidiah replied with amused surprise. 'Why would the greatest mind in the universe need to beg?'
Your song… The illithid's face started to twitch faster; the tentacles writhed as if in pain. After a moment the twitching slowed, and the illithid said, Your song. It doesn't end. It keeps on going, and my lord cannot get it out of his mind.
'That's not my problem,' Jedidiah said. 'He wanted it.'
Please take the song back. It is spreading to us,
Ilsensine's faithful priests, when we pray for spells. It is driving us mad.
'All sales are final,' Jedidiah replied with a chuckle.
My lord says he will grant you a boon, the illithid replied, if you will take the song back. Anything you need to know. Gods have traded one of their eyes for such knowledge.
Jedidiah paused for a moment, then said, 'There are two things I need to know.'
Agreed, the mind flayer cried out in their heads without hesitation.
'Very well,' Jedidiah said.
The mind flayer moved in close to Jedidiah. It extended its facial tentacles. The tips of the tentacles glowed with the same green radiance as Ilsensine had. The tentacles stroked Jedidiah's face, then plunged deep beneath the flesh, passing ethereally into his brain. After a moment, they withdrew, leaving Jedidiah's flesh unscarred.
In his head, Joel heard the mind flayer sigh. The creature's palsy had evaporated.
The mind flayer stepped back and bowed deeply. The answer to your first question is no, it said. The answer to your second question…The creature tilted his head. He does not know. Good-bye, Finder Wyvernspur.
The illithid slid back into the fog, disappearing within moments.
Jedidiah stood staring after it wordlessly, the blood draining from his face. His expression was one of extreme sadness.
'Jedidiah,' Joel whispered. 'Are you all right?'
The older man nodded, but he appeared distracted.
'What was that all about?' Joel asked.
Jedidiah sighed. He turned to Joel with a wan smile. 'Remember in Shishi's garden, when I thought I remembered that I had a plan? I did. I gave Ilsensine a recursive song, a tuneful little ditty in which the last verse leads directly back into the first, forming a closed loop. Ilsensine couldn't get the tune out of his head and with his powerful brain, he couldn't stop thinking about it. Then, his mind power being what it is, it spread to his priests.'
Joel thought of the times when he'd been unable to stop humming some silly ditty for days, sometimes weeks at a time. It had interfered with everything else he had tried to do. The younger bard chuckled. It would be a long time before Ilsensine poked around in a god's mind again. Then he remembered the other mystery. 'What about the questions?' he asked. 'What were your questions? You looked disappointed by the answers.'
Jedidiah was silent for a moment, then said 'They only confirmed what I already knew in my heart. We'd better hurry back to the shop in case there's someone else searching for the hand.'
The older priest pushed on into the fog. Joel hurried after him before the gloom could separate them.
Sixteen
