Venom in Her Veins

every ten generations. Or maybe she’s a throwback to humanoid stock in the yuan-ti bloodline. I always wanted to believe the latter. But ever since you met that god, I’ve been afraid it’s the former.”

Krailash lowered his guard long enough to stare at her. “But … You mean Zaltys is a spy?”

“No, I mean her family are yuan-ti. She was just an infant when they were taken, and she was raised as a human-as far as she knows she is human, unless she was unlucky enough to find the yuan-ti slaves and learn otherwise. I just hope they can’t sense their own, and that they won’t recognize her as one of them.”

“But she could have been tainted by Zehir,” Krailash said, horrified by the thought. He’d taught Zaltys to fight, hunt, stalk, kill-and she was a snakeman? Had he given the weapons that might kill him to one of his enemies? “The cultists of Zehir and Sseth are subtle, Alaia, you’ve never had to fight with them, but I have-”

“Our psion Glory checked out her mind thoroughly,” Alaia snapped. “Zaltys is my daughter, and you’re sworn to defend her too. You’re so ridiculous on this subject-it’s why we wipe your mind every time you find out.”

Krailash gaped. “I-you’ve tampered with my mind?”

Alaia gave him a thin smile. “Just a little. All legal, of course. Read your contract. When you signed, you gave us permission to protect vital family secrets-and the fact that Zaltys is yuan-ti is one of them.”

Krailash wanted to swing his axe at her: at Alaia, the woman he’d worked for and joked with for three decades, the woman he would have called his closest friend, even minutes ago. He let Thunder’s Edge sag loose in his hands. “You didn’t trust me enough to tell me the truth about Zaltys? Of course it’s a shock to hear, but I’m sure in time I would have gotten used to it.”

“I didn’t want to risk that you’d forget your oath and try to kill her, Krailash. Though I depend on you, and trust you, and care for you. Zaltys is my daughter. I never wanted to hurt you-that’s why I had Glory wipe your memories-but I had to keep my daughter safe. I needed you to keep her safe, and I didn’t know if you could continue to do that, if you knew the truth about her.”

Krailash couldn’t decide whether to walk away, or attack the nearest derro overseer, or lunge at Alaia. The conflicting demands of honor, pride, dignity, and duty pulled him in different directions, and paralyzed him.

Fortunately, he didn’t have to make a decision. He heard shouting, and when he looked toward the slave pens, he saw Zaltys-looking dirty, and disheveled, but human-running his way, trailed closely by Julen.

His training had him on his feet and racing in her direction before he had a moment to think. He was a protector, and Zaltys and Julen were in need of protection, because they were being pursued by a horror his eyes could not quite comprehend.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Zaltys and Julen were all the way across the square when they heard the shout: “Stop them!” Though they probably shouldn’t have, they paused long enough to look back. At first, Julen thought some kind of forest monster was pursuing them, perhaps one of the ambulatory and minimally self-aware conglomerations of carnivorous vines that waylaid travelers in the jungle. But as the green figure stumbled down the steps, fragments of greenery tearing away and fluttering behind, he realized it was Iraska. Shouldn’t have pulled out the knife, he thought, but he’d done so automatically-you didn’t leave a perfectly good knife sticking in a dead body. You could never tell when you’d need another blade, especially a magical one.

The Slime King was bloody and her robes were frayed. The vines weren’t coming away easily; they were taking chunks of flesh and fabric with them-but she was alive, and her phantom tentacles were lashing in the air. Most of the derro in the settlement were still busy subduing the creature that had crawled out of the portal, but she’d brought two blindfolded guards with her and, worse, all the little sovereigns and some of their creations, including the quaggoth with the eyes of a beholder wavering on stalks. One of those eyes emitted a reddish light, and the facade of bones on a low building near Julen and Zaltys burst into flames.

“Zaltys, vanish, save yourself!” he shouted, but she just grabbed his hand and pulled him along after her. She’d managed to hide him in her shadow once before, but she couldn’t take him with her if she stepped through shadows to escape, and she was apparently unwilling to go without him. That was very thoughtful of her, though it was also a trifle suicidal. They dodged among the buildings as the crowd of derro and their furious Slime King pursued them, and sooner than Julen expected they’d burst out among the mushroom fields. The derro behind them were gaining, and the overseers in the field were staring at them in surprise, so Julen dropped his pack to lose the weight and make himself run faster-he had his weapons with him, and losing his food and drinking water and lockpicks didn’t rank among his current worries. He pulled his hand away from Zaltys and ran toward the field of mushrooms, shouting “Split up!” and hoping they could at least reduce the number of pursuers after each of them.

“No!” Zaltys shouted, and pointed toward the long low cages made of pale wood-the slave pens, obviously.

Dedication to family is all well and good, he thought, but I’d rather be alive than noble. But he couldn’t very well yell that sentiment, and who knew, maybe if they freed the slaves they could escape themselves in the ensuing confusion. Assuming the slaves weren’t all too cowed or drugged to bother causing any confusion.

“Mother!” Zaltys shouted, and Julen thought, Aren’t we a bit old to be calling for mommy? Then Zaltys shouted “Krailash! You heard me call! You came!” and Julen realized she was calling to people there in the cavern-Krailash was there, holding his great battle-axe, and Alaia was there too, though her ever-present dire boar spirit companion was nowhere to be seen. Julen began to grin. The Slime King was formidable, certainly, but Alaia was one of the most powerful shamans in the region, and shamans lived to destroy unnatural things like Iraska had become. He wondered what she would do-summon giant bears to eat their enemies? Call up a wind to strip the flesh from Iraska’s old bones? Summon a priory of ghost panthers to slash and bite and claw?

But she didn’t do anything. She just stood there, staring at Zaltys. And Zaltys veered off course, running to one of the cages. There were eight or ten creatures inside, roughly human-sized, and all more or less snakelike. Some had the lower bodies of serpents, while others had arms and legs, but all had the heads of snakes-as essentially reptilian creatures, they didn’t look so terribly different from Krailash, except for the absence of frills on the cheeks and ears, and the fact that they mostly lacked legs. They stared at Zaltys in confusion as she started smashing at the bars of their cage with her magical bow. It was no way to treat such a weapon-bows weren’t clubs, and could be easily broken-but then, it was a magical bow, and you could probably use it to smash down a brick wall without breaking the back or the belly or even spoiling the curve. Still, it was surprising to see Zaltys use her bow that way, when she wouldn’t even risk damaging it by leaving it strung, but desperation did strange things to a person.

Krailash rushed toward Zaltys, holding his axe high, and for a moment, Julen thought, He’s realized she’s yuan-ti, he’s going to kill her! But instead, Krailash grabbed her, swung her around behind him as easily as Julen would have moved a kitten, and then struck the cage with Thunder’s Edge. The bars splintered and shattered at the first blow, and the yuan-ti started to slither hesitantly out.

Julen looked behind him, and Iraska and her terrible retinue were very close, kicking up spores as they charged through the mushroom fields toward them. He drew his green knife again, hoping he wouldn’t need to use it, still waiting for Alaia to do something suitably shamanic and conflict-ending. Krailash took a stance between the onrushing horde and the members of the Serrat family he was sworn to protect, and the freed yuan-ti-knowing a good thing when they saw it-hurried behind him as well. The other slaves in the pens, kuo-toa and quaggoths and bullywugs and who knew what else, all chattered and screamed and shouted and croaked and pleaded for freedom. Zaltys stepped beside Krailash, her magical bow in her hands, her woefully underfilled quiver of arrows hanging from her shoulder. “For family!” she shouted, and nocked an arrow.

Then Alaia pushed past her, and stepped in front of Krailash, and said, “Avert your eyes, children!”

Julen, who’d learned very well to obey his elders, turned his head aside, and that’s when Alaia apparently exploded in a burst of blinding light.