Venom’s Taste

Arvin shook his head. He was doing it again. Linking, thanks to the mind seed, with Zelia’s memories and drawing information from them.

He saw that his wanderings had carried him to the vicinity of Zelia’s rooftop garden. He could see the tower between the buildings up ahead. How in the Nine Hells had he allowed himself to wander so near to it?

He turned abruptly, intending to stride away in the direction from which he’d just come and nearly collided with a man who had been walking a few steps behind him. The fellow had his neck craned to look up at the buildings ahead of him and saw Arvin only at the last moment. He gave an irritated hiss-which made Arvin take a second glance at the fellow. All Arvin needed was to run afoul of a yuan-ti. But this fellow appeared wholly human- and he had four chevrons branded into his arm. Yuan-ti were never called for militia service.

Muttering his apologies, Arvin walked on. He’d gotten no more than a few paces before a hand reached out of the shadow of a ramp to grasp his arm.

A hand covered in fine green scales.

“Zelia!” Arvin gulped as she stepped out into the street. “What a coincidence. I was just heading back to the tower to look for you.”

Her lips crooked in a smile. “I can see that,” she said. “Obviously you have something to report, something important enough to have come in person, rather than using a sending.” She stared unblinkingly at him. “What have you learned?”

Arvin thought furiously. What could he tell Zelia? “You were wrong about the flasks,” he began. “They don’t contain plague.”

Zelia merely stared at him. “No?”

“They contain a potion.”

“What kind?”

“One that transforms humans into yuan-ti. It comes from the Serpent Hills, possibly by way of Skullport. A contact of mine saw a flask similar to the ones the Pox carry, a few months ago in a potion seller’s shop. He tried to buy it, but before he could, it was purchased by a slaver.”

“What was the slaver’s name?” Zelia hissed.

“Ssarmn.”

Zelia hissed thoughtfully. Apparently she recognized the name.

“That’s all I’ve been able to learn so far,” Arvin concluded.

“Is it?” Zelia asked.

“Yes,” Arvin answered evenly. He stared at Zelia. The last thing he needed was for her to question him, to force him to tell her about the Extaminos connection to the Pox. If he did, he’d be a dead man. Deliberately, he forced Osran’s name out of his mind-but not quickly enough.

Zelia’s eyes suddenly flashed silver. She gave a long, slow hiss. “Osran? I suspected there was a bad egg in the brood.”

As she spoke the name aloud, Arvin felt a stabbing pain in his throat. Doubling over, he began to cough. Dark droplets flecked the ground; when he swallowed, he tasted blood. He felt a chill of fear course through him as he realized what was happening. The geas was taking hold, even though he hadn’t spoken the name aloud-hadn’t even intended for it to be overheard. He swallowed again, his throat raw. Hoar, he pleaded silently. I didn’t mean to. Please don’t kill me.

Zelia didn’t even ask what was wrong with him. She just stood, smiling like a snake that had swallowed a mouse. Arvin, meanwhile, felt the pain in his throat ease-just a little. Then his coughing stopped. Hoar, it seemed, had heard his plea and spared him.

Arvin touched the bead at his throat. “Nine lives,” he whispered. He followed it with a silent thank-you to Hoar.

At least it was Middark. Tymora willing, the assassination would already have taken place and the Secession would be on their way out of the palace.

“Zelia,” Arvin said, finding his voice again as the raw ache in his throat at last subsided. “I’ve given you what you wanted. Remove the mind seed. Get out of my head.”

Zelia’s eyes blazed. “You dare make demands?” she hissed. “The seed will remain in place-at the very least, until I’ve had a chance to put a few questions to Osran.”

Unbidden, an image flashed into Arvin’s mind. Of just what Zelia meant by “putting a few questions” to Osran. First she’d place a lock on his higher mind, causing a mental paralysis that would render him unable to take any physical actions. Then she’d slither into his mind. She’d poke and prod into the darkest crevices of his thoughts, finding his weaknesses and fears. One by one, she’d bring these into the light of full awareness. She’d nudge his helpless mind this way and that, forcing him to dwell upon that which most demoralized him, filling him to the brim with fear. Then, when she’d forced her victim to retreat into a tight coil of despair, she’d beat the last of his will down with her questions. What did it matter, she’d say, if he revealed his secrets to her? All was lost, hopeless, bleak. He was doomed. She was in control, not him.

Arvin dwelled upon the image, gloating. It felt good to be the one in command. To savor the raw, weeping anguish of another that he so thoroughly dominated. He remembered the first time he’d ever used his psionic powers to reduce someone to sniveling helplessness-his former master. The master whose psionic powers Arvin had so easily surpassed. The human had proved as fragile as an egg when Arvin at last tired of toying with him…

Arvin felt sweat trickle down his temples. He shivered, despite the warmth of the night air. He wrenched his mind back to the present, away from Zelia’s memory, and glanced around.

Zelia was gone. Having gotten what she wanted from him, she’d slithered away into the night without another word.

Arvin pressed his forehead against the stone wall next to him, savoring its coolness. It helped ease the throbbing of his headache. Through half-closed eyes, he saw the pale-green shimmer of residual magical energy the stones contained. The color matched the scales on Zelia’s skin-and reminded him that he could no more shed her than the stone could shed its luminescent glow. Nicco had been right. Arvin was doomed.

No. He was thinking like one of Zelia’s victims. There was still hope if Tanju could be persuaded to help him. But how to make contact with the tracker? Tanju might be quartered at the militia barracks, or he might not. Being an auxiliary, rather than a regular member of the militia, might have its privileges. If Arvin tried to ask one of the militia where Tanju was, he would probably be mistaken for Gonthril again, and the chase would be on.

And Tanju would be summoned to help track him.

And if, in his flight to “escape,” Arvin swung through the section of the city that contained the palace, he might just draw enough of the militia away from it to enable Gonthril and the others to make their escape after the assassination attempt. And in the process, make amends to them for having let Osran’s name slip.

Grinning, Arvin set off in the direction of the palace.

25 Kythorn, Darkmorning

Arvin clung, panting from his rapid climb, to the underside of a viaduct. In the street below, three members of the militia pounded past, never once thinking to glance up as they ran directly beneath his hiding spot. Escaping them had been too easy, he thought. Despite the hue and cry they’d raised after spotting “Gonthril,” they hadn’t called out their tracker. Tanju was nowhere in sight.

This was getting ridiculous. Arvin had allowed himself to be seen in at least a dozen different locations, without success, and it was almost dawn. He’d have to find some other way to flush out Tanju.

Climbing back down the pillar that supported the viaduct, Arvin jogged in the opposite direction the three militiamen had just taken. As he made his way up the winding street, he caught glimpses of the tower that rose high above the central courtyard of the royal palace. The tower was capped with an enormous statue of a cobra, its flared hood covered in overlapping scales that were said to be slabs of solid gold. The eyes of the statue-which flashed red in daylight, but which by night looked like dark, brooding pits in the golden head-were rumored to be chunks of ruby as large as a human heart. No rogue had ever climbed the tower to find out if that was true, however. Just getting into the palace compound was problem enough. The walls were protected by magical glyphs far more powerful-and deadly-than the one Arvin had fallen victim to in the Secession’s hiding place, and the grounds were patrolled by officers from the human militia. Assuming the rogue actually made it inside the palace,