No sounds issued from within the chamber beyond the door. Whatever was happening, someone had made sure through some means, magical or otherwise, that it didn't rouse the rest of the hall.
When she drew close, Kashada paused. She watched the priest, waiting for a sign. Zasian turned toward her and nodded.
With a flick of her fingers, Kashada's body melted into the darkness and she found herself in a shadowy mirror-world of the one she had departed. The features were all there, identical in size, shape, and placement, only different. Everything looked less solid to the woman's eye, and the colors appeared washed out, gray and dull. Only the shadows themselves seemed real, somehow more physically firm than the surfaces upon which they were cast.
No versions of Zasian or anyone else stood within that hall.
Kashada paid no mind to the surreal quality of the place. With practiced ease, she flowed along the shadows, coming up to and then passing through the wall separating the hall from the chamber beyond, the one she knew served as Helm Dwarf-friend's bedchamber. She found the room to be in a similar condition to the passageway behind her. Shadow versions of all the furnishings sat arranged within the confines of the chamber, but of the Master of the Hall, there was no sign.
Kashada moved to a darkened corner and undid the magic of her spell. Instantly, reality returned to normal, and the light of hated Selыne shining through the slats of the shutters revealed the mounded form of someone in the bed. Kashada stood unmoving for a moment, watching the sleeping figure while listening for any signs of disturbance from the chamber beyond the door. Nothing emanated from that place, and Helm Dwarf-friend slept soundly.
Smiling, Kashada crawled into bed beside the man and snuggled up against him. Helm snorted once and rolled toward her, one thick arm coming to rest draped across her waist.
Kashada waited.
A deep thunderous rumble tossed the room around, and Kashada nearly pitched from the bed. She gave a little shriek as Helm cursed and sat up.
'What was that, lover?' Kashada asked, her voice disguised as Ansa's. She huddled close to the man at her side and tried to sound frightened.
'By the Lady's horn, I don't know!' he rumbled, flailing to free himself from the bedcovers. 'I'm going to find out, though.' He drew up his trousers. 'Stay here,' he added, turning to look at Kashada. 'I'll be back soon.'
'Very well,' Kashada replied, pulling the covers around herself. 'Hurry, lover.'
Helm gave her a quick smile and a wink before yanking his shirt over his head and heading out the door. In the chamber beyond, a commotion arose. Kashada watched as Helm reached the door and yanked it open. The man took one stride through and drew up abruptly just as a blazing white light filled the chamber from some source out of Kashada's line of sight.
Kashada heard several gasps, and someone murmured, 'Blessed angels!' It was not difficult for her to cower in the sheets and wait as she had been told. She did not want to come face to face with a holy being. The thought turned her stomach.
Take the fool alu and be gone, Kashada thought. Don't come sniffing in here.
She heard a voice ring out. 'By Lord Tyr's justice, we claim this fiend for our own purposes.' Its tone was thunderous, charged with power. 'Do any among you offer reason we should not?'
Some faint murmuring reverberated from the chamber, but none dissented against the speaker.
'Very well,' the being continued. 'Then this one shall not trouble you again.'
Kashada blinked. The blazing light was gone.
Helm turned and looked to Kashada. He nodded once, satisfied that she was safe, then slammed the door. She could hear him, his voice muffled through the portal, demanding to know what in the everlasting Hells was going on.
It took the rest of the night to sort everything out.
By morning, Helm Dwarf-friend was convinced that the city had come under attack, and that his own life had been targeted by a fiendish creature who had attempted to disguise herself as Ansa. His seneschal Zasian, acting on reliable information, had brought a team to the Master's chambers just in the nick of time. The alu had been defeated, and angels in the service of Tyr had taken her away for judgment.
Helm was exhausted when he finally returned to his chambers the following evening. Ansa was there, of course, ready to soothe his tired muscles with her soft, delicate body. She tended to him with all the care and warmth of a young, vibrant lover, and the Master of the Hall did not suspect a thing. When he was asleep not long after, Kashada smiled to herself.
Soon it would be time to raise her secret temple to Shar, within the very heart of Sundabar. And when she was ready, Kashada would bring the Dark Goddess's revenge upon all the North.
CHAPTER ONE
The wind howled and buffeted Zasian, and he fought against it. Learning to fly in dragon form was harder than coercing magical energies to aid him in flight. The priest struggled to familiarize himself with subtle shifts in frame. He practiced flexing muscles he never imagined possessing before. It was not easy.
He had to work all the harder because of the distractions. The wind certainly made things more difficult, but that was a mere inconvenience, an occasional jarring shift that he could account for and dismiss. A gust or down shear might startle him, but it would not ruin him.
He felt some residual queasiness from the mushrooms Aliisza had introduced into the dragon's system, too. The occasional rumble or twitch deep in his belly led him to suspect that they were not completely purged. He hoped they would not become a greater problem.
The dragon fighting to regain control of his own body was far more dangerous. Zasian could feel the being's rage, sense the overwhelming power tucked away, pounding futilely against the dweomers he had erected to contain him. Though he trusted that the magic was strong enough to withstand the raw fury of the dragon, he had to be careful not to succumb to his crafty wit.
That's not quite right, the dragon would say. You're too stiff with the tail. You must let it glide, not twitch. If you'll allow me, I'll demonstrate.
But of course Zasian would not relinquish control, even for an instant. To do so would mean death for him. Still, he admired the beast's efforts, his desire to live. Despite the panic the dragon must have felt from not being in control, he whispered, suggested, always so reasonable, so helpful.
I understand your fear, dragon, Zasian said, but your efforts are wasted. I know your mind better than you do. My course is set. I know the inevitability of what must happen. You cannot undo this. The dragon grew quiet, and Zasian could feel his fear grow.
He ignored the beast, and the journey continued.
Eventually, the dragon renewed his efforts, but Zasian was prepared. He fought the dragon with the same growing ease with which he battled the unfamiliar shape and muscles.
A searing pain filled the priest's abdomen, and for a startled breath or two he feared that it was the dragon, finally finding some crack in his prison, at last reaching out with some energy to stab at Zasian's presence from within. But the dragon seemed just as surprised as he, and before the beast could take advantage of the priest's confusion, Zasian had his guard up again.
But he was going to be sick.
Damned mushrooms, Zasian thought. I must land. He began to look everywhere below him, desperate for a safe haven. Another sharp, white-hot pain shot through the priest, and his fear of injury and falling to his death overcame his cautious hesitation. Even if there were any cursed celestials nearby, he would just have to risk it.
The priest spied a smallish bit of land, an uprooted, inverted mountain bobbing and weaving in the tempestuous winds. It slipped in and out of view several times, obscured by the racing, roiling clouds, but Zasian kept his bearing true and half-flew, half-tumbled to its upper surface.
