but that was on floors and cobbles. He couldn’t match the sellswords on grass and mud.
Gaedynn abruptly drew and released. Oraxes hadn’t realized there was anything to shoot at, nor did he see where the arrow flew. He supposed the lanky redhead had shot at a picket and killed him too, because they all kept slinking forward and nobody sounded an alarm.
The vague black mass that was the enemy camp and the east wall of Soolabax rising behind it swam out of the murk. Gaedynn raised his hand, and, up and down the formation, sergeants did the same. Everybody stopped advancing.
Gaedynn turned to Oraxes, smiled, and waved his hand at the foe like an elegant host inviting his guests into a feast.
Oraxes swallowed away a sudden dryness in his mouth. He tried to call the words of a spell to mind. For one horrible moment they wouldn’t come, but then he had them. He whispered the rhyme, building to a crescendo even so, and thrust out his left hand. A spark leaped from his fingertips and streaked over the ground.
Gaedynn had made it clear that above all, he wanted light. But the trouble with a simple enchantment of illumination was that a sorcerer on the other side could rather easily dispel it. It might be more difficult to extinguish the glow of a burning tent.
Besides, Oraxes had a yen to show those hardened professional warriors, those Brothers of the Griffon, that he was as dangerous as any of them. And certainly the most dangerous of the spellcasters they’d recruited in Luthcheq. Even if it was the first time he’d ever used magic in such a blatant, savage way.
The spark exploded into a blast that engulfed and ignited two tents. Silhouetted against the yellow blaze, bodies tumbled and flew to pieces. For a heartbeat the destruction amazed Oraxes, like he hadn’t had anything to do with it. Then he felt sick to his stomach.
But excited too.
Off to the right, another blast set fire to a different part of the camp. Less bloodthirsty, creative, or ambitious, the remaining mages contented themselves with conjuring pools of phosphorescence, one amber and one a sickly green.
“Shoot!” Gaedynn called, drawing and loosing. The skirmishers followed his example.
The arrows arced high and plummeted down. Men, orcs, and kobolds reeled and collapsed beneath the barrage.
Aoth Fezim had put together the force from a portion of his own company and various native Chessentan troops stationed along the border. By itself it was still smaller than the army besieging Soolabax. But the hope was that a surprise attack would more than compensate for the numerical disadvantage.
And it might. But it looked to Oraxes like the Great Bone Wyrm’s warriors wouldn’t remain stunned and disorganized for long. Already there were officers bellowing orders and goblins scrambling to grab their weapons and form up into squads.
Oraxes abruptly remembered that his part of the fight wasn’t over. In fact, it had scarcely begun. He threw darts of crimson light at something big. An ogre maybe, or some sort of tame troll. The creature staggered but didn’t fall down.
“What are you still doing here?” Gaedynn barked. Startled, Oraxes jerked around to find the archer right beside him. “I told you to get behind the shields!”
Oraxes scowled. At himself, because he’d forgotten all about that part of the plan, or even that there were any shields. He turned and saw that the spearmen had moved up unnoticed behind him. As he ran in their direction, an arrow or crossbow bolt whistled past his head.
Someone-Shala Karanok, most likely-had found a mansion on the edge of the religious quarter to serve as Tchazzar’s interim temple. As he surveyed the place from the air, Aoth wondered what the former war hero had needed to do to persuade the householder to vacate.
The griffon gave a rasp of annoyance.
Jet set down in an alley near the mansion. Aoth reluctantly left his spear secured to the familiar’s saddle. It was too recognizable, too threatening, and impossible to conceal. He’d make do with the short sword hidden under his shabby beggar’s robe. At least it had a little magic stored inside it.
He scratched Jet’s head, then, shaking a wooden bowl to rattle the coppers inside it, shuffled in the direction of the temple. Behind him, wings rustled and cracked as the griffon took to the air again.
He was careful to keep his head bowed. The cowl did a good job of shadowing his face, but he couldn’t depend on it alone to mask the light in his eyes. Fortunately, a servile posture jibed well with the other features of his disguise.
Seen from ground level, the mansion was even more impressive. Reflecting the Chessentan fascination with martial endeavor, it had turrets and battlements like a fortress, and friezes carved with men-at-arms slaughtering one another. It also had rosebushes at the foot of the facade, and even in the dark Aoth’s fire-touched eyes could see that the new buds were crimson, like drops of blood fallen from the carnage overhead.
A priest with a shaggy black beard sat on a stool beside the door. From his casual air, his mismatched and no doubt improvised red and pink vestments, and the jug sitting beside him, Aoth took him for one of Halonya’s longtime followers, not a priest of Tiamat. The newly minted cleric tossed a coin in the begging bowl.
“Thank you, holy sir,” Aoth mumbled, bobbing his head. “But I want to go inside too. To pray.”
The bearded man grinned. “And sleep indoors? I know how it is. Go on, then. But if you snore, we’ll have to toss you out.”
Beyond the door was a hall of considerable size. It smelled of sawdust as well as incense, and it was plain that carpenters had been working hard to turn it into a proper sanctum complete with benches where the rich and nobly born could sit and worship in comfort.
The chamber was already full of works of art, painted and sculpted depictions of Tchazzar as both dragon and man. Aoth assumed they were left over from the living god’s previous reigns.
A second priest stood behind the elevated bloodstone altar. Tall, with a long, ascetic face and mottled, sun- damaged skin, he stared intently into the chalice cradled in his hands. The fire flickering up above the rim burned blue, then green, then black. The shifts reminded Aoth of the variously colored candle flames he’d seen in the wyrmkeeper’s lair in Soolabax.
The priest glanced up when Aoth entered. Then, perhaps deciding that a grubby mendicant wouldn’t comprehend the significance of what he was seeing, he sniffed and returned to his meditations.
Aoth glanced around, taking note of the other doorways leading out of the room. He didn’t see how he could slip through either of them without the wyrmkeeper spotting him. But maybe he could wait the fellow out. He positioned himself in front of a painting of Tchazzar in wyrm form rearing bloody-jawed over the corpses of a green drake and a blue one. He folded his hands and watched the cleric from the corner of his eye.
And watched. And watched. While the flames in the cup danced from one color to the next.
Smoke streamed up from the cup of fire into the wyrmkeeper’s face. He started coughing.
Aoth charged the altar, counting on the thick smoke to hide his approach. Unfortunately, it hid the wyrmkeeper too. Though spellscarred eyes ignored darkness and pierced illusion, they couldn’t see through something that was real. But he’d taken careful note of the priest’s position, so maybe it wouldn’t be a
