'They were never accused of that,' Dhauna said. 'They were defenders and avengers, working in secret and sometimes against the interests of the larger temples. Six hundred years later, the charges of heresy ring more than hollow.' She flipped back to the declaration of condemnation. 'This passage about land and goods being forfeit to the templesI've seen that in too many trumped up charges of outlawry. I think Selune's clergy feared and envied the New Moon Pact.'
'Because they were fighters?' Feena snorted. 'I think I like these people.'
'They were more than just fighters, Feena.' Dhauna gave her a sideways glance. 'The New Moon Pact embraced werewolves and lycanthropes of all kinds.'
Feena opened her mouth in amazement, then closed it again, speechless.
'An order of werewolves?' she whispered finally. 'They still exist then. I've heard stories of the Sil'
'Silverstars?' Dhauna finished for her. She shook her head. 'The Silverstars accept lycanthropes, but they aren't the same. Silverstars promote tolerance and harmony in Selune's name.' She touched the declaration of condemnation. 'The Pact fought for Selune. They moved in darkness. Maybe that's what gave their persecutors the basis for the accusation of heresy.'
'Which was?' asked Feena.
Dhauna flipped through the book once more and indicated another passage. Feena bent closer and read:
… and over time they became corrupted by the darkness they had been commanded to fight, turning from Selune's light to chant and pray in unholy tongues to Shar. Worse, they then affirmed a blasphemy: that Shar was not Selune's sister, but the Moonmaiden herself, and that Shar was only a name given to Selune's dark face.
Feena gasped and flinched back. Her hand darted up to clutch the battered disk of her holy symbol. 'That's monstrous!'
'And so the ancient New Moon Pact became the reviled New Moon Heresy, its members damned and the very mention of it erased. The pact survives only in remote inscriptions and barbarian tales, the mere mention of the heresy only in charges that take more than a decade to even identify.' Dhauna closed the great tome and said, ' Our Silver Lady shield us from such horrors.'
Feena swallowed and said, 'But if the priestesses of
Glister could even be accused of such a thing ' She looked up. 'Dhauna, could the New Moon Heresy have been reborn here? Is that what Selune is trying to warn you about?'
'No,' said Dhauna, a gentleness returning to her voice. 'There's no truth to the Heresy. It was a false accusation-terrible, but false. The priestesses of Glister were caught by a shadow of a memory of it. And whispers of the Heresy in my dreams…' The High Moonmistress patted Feena's cheek. 'A clue, nothing more. One I misinterpreted in my weakness. Heresy is a danger, but knowledge of the New Moon Heresy was necessary only to uncover the truth of the Pact.'
'Then why did Selune send the dreams at all?' Feena asked in confusion. 'What does she want?'
Dhauna's gentle smile hardened. 'She wants me to bring back the New Moon Pact. That's clear to me now. She wants me to lead the fight against her enemies outside of the templesand within it. My summoning of you, that was part of her plan, too.'
Feena stared at her. 'What?'
'Only lycanthropes could belong to the New Moon Pact.' Dhauna Myritar reached up and wrenched with magic-enhanced strength at the neck of her robe, tearing it wide to expose her chest. 'Bite me, Feena! Turn me into a werewolf!' peena stared at the High Moonmistress in shock.
'No!' she spat. 'Dhauna, that's-'
'Insane?' Dhauna's eyes were bright and her cheeks flushed, but her voice was steady. 'That's what you all think of me already, isn't it? My ears are still sharp, Feena, and in spite of what everyone seems to think, so are my wits. There are things to be seen by moonlight that sunlight cannot reveal.' She moved closer, holding her torn robe wide. 'Bite me!' she ordered. 'You were the one my thoughts turned to the night of that first dream. Selune knew I would need you here to share her blessing with me! With it, I will be stronger, more vitalthe Moonmaiden's arm!'
'Dhauna, no,' Feena said. She backed away from the old priestess. 'Being, a werewolf isn't a blessing. Do you know what would happen if I were to bite you?'
'I wouldn't ask if I didn't.' Dhauna lowered her hands from her collar and said, 'On the night of next full moon, I will take the form of a wolf, with no more than an animal's wild instincts. I saw it happen to you as a girl. We had to lock you in one of the chambers in the infirmary until the night was over. But you learned to control it, didn't you?'
Feena gasped. 'I learned to control it, yes, but I was born a werewolf. The wolf has always been inside me. In you…' She spread her hands. 'Mother Dhauna, the beast would rage out of control. Believe me. I've seen it happen all too often.'
'Control can be taught.'
'I' Feena ground her teeth together, cutting off her own words. 'No. I won't do it.'
Dhauna hissed, 'You have to.' Her voice rose and broke. 'You have to! Selune has guided us both to this moment.'
'I won't!' Feena shouted.
Her refusal echoed in the sudden silence. Dhauna stared at her with hard, cold eyes. After a moment, she said softly, 'I see.'
'Mother Dhauna…' Feena began.
The high priestess just shook her head. 'I feared this,' she said. 'You reject Our Silver Lady's call. I'm sorry, Feena.' Her arm rose, fingers curled into a mystic sign. 'By the Moonmaiden's light, let your hidden spirit be revealed!'
Silver light lanced out as if the full moon itself were captured in Dhauna's curled fingers. Feena gaspedthen shrieked. The sound of her dress ripping apart vanished in the pain that washed over her. Fur raced across her skin, burning like fire. Her joints and bones popped and rearranged themselves. Muscles1 shifted and broke. Her face tore as it grew into a muzzle. The forced change was harsher than anything she had ever endured. When her paws hit the floor, it was all she could do to stay on them.
'The New Moon Pact,' snarled Dhauna, 'will be reborn!'
The night above the terrace of the Sky's Mantle was black and featureless. No moon. No stars. It draped down to shroud Yhaunn in darkness, wrapping it in thick, still heat. The terrace was the only source of light and noise.
Keph sat at a long table, the center of attention. Jarull, Starne, Baret, and Talisk sat with him, all of them laughing, all of them drinking the wine that flowed freely from a pitcher in the middle of the table. Strangely, Variance was there as well, laughing and drinking right along with them. Even stranger, so was Bolan. The priest's weird, flawless face didn't move, even when he laughed.
And they were all laughing a lot at the stories Keph told. At least Keph thought they were stories. He couldn't actually hear himself. Whenever he spoke, the words just came out as an indistinct buzz, something like a fly in a hot room. Whatever he was saying, though, it was clever and funny. Confidence rolled through him and he wished he could hear the story himself. It must have been good, maybe the best tale ever told. Everyone was hanging on his words.
Not just his friends, either. When he turned his head to the side, he realized that the table was a lot longer than he'd thought. It stretched out like a banquet table. Crowded around it were all of Shar's cultists, some hooded, some boldly barefaced. There were other people, too. The denizens of the Cutter's Dip: Stag, Drik, Noyle, Lahumbra, Kor, and other men and women he couldn't name. He focused on a knot of them as they fawned over him.
I know you, he thought, but from where?
They were Lyraene's friendsthe cronies who backed her in the fight on the bridge.
'That's right, you bastard!' the half-elf shrieked. She leaned over the table, her face damp with sweat, her blond hair limp around her delicately tapered ears. 'They're yours now. You wanted them, you got 'em. They didn't want to be around me anymore.'
She thrust her right arm in front of his face. What shriveled flesh clung to her bones was red and oozing, flaked with tattered patches of black crust. Her hand and wrist were twisted, muscles and tendons drawn taut by
