As Gunton looked down on Gan, he saw the hobgoblin's dying face was a mask of confusion and indecision. Some realization must have dawned on Gan in his last moments. Perhaps, Gunton thought, in those last moments the hobgoblin understood the full power the axe had wielded over him.
Gunton choked back tears as he looked at the mangled wreck of Royce's body. He turned to the white-clad men and women still approaching from the Sanctuary. He spread his arms wide to show that he was unarmed.
'He was a brother to me,' he explained. 'Do you understand what that means?' He repeated himself in Illuskan, more furiously.
'We never should have dealt with a Zhentarim,' he continued in Common, not worrying that they might not understand him as they approached with steady steps. 'That was our first mistake. It wasn't just Geildarr's coin we craved. He truly seemed to treasure the things we found for him. He seemed as passionate about history as we were. He was hard to resist. We were just as deluded as Gan. May Shaundakul accept our Souls despite our weaknesses.'
Gunton made no attempt to run as one of the figures stepped out of the Sanctuary before him. It was a woman, her white face as gnarled as a tree branch, jet black hair spilling over her shoulders. She extended a hand, and the axe rose from the water and into her grasp.
Gunton turned his back to her and braced himself. 'I am the only member of this expedition not killed by a companion,' he whispered to himself, awaiting the axe's impact.
Instead a bony hand clamped onto his shoulder and squeezed. He yelped in pain.
'We have use for you,' the old woman said. 'You must earn your rest.'
* * * * *
Two days passed before the Thunderbeasts arrived, their path clarified by Vell's descriptions. They passed Mount Vision to the east, passing through the forest until they found the remains of the Sanctuary. The strange, thin trees were slowly dying. The cold mountain water from the Heartblood River had penetrated the marsh, and its magical warmth was lost. With the behemoths gone, the region was empty and desolate. Vell's heart cried out when he saw it—it was not the living, vital preserve he knew from his vision, but a drab, ruined, and useless waste.
On the northernmost phandar tree, the crow-pecked remains of one of the invaders made a gruesome spectacle. He was tied high up on the trunk, his hands severed and lashed alongside him. His head, thickly bearded and with its eyes stolen by birds, rested between his two feet.
'A warning against further intruders,' Thluna said, unable to bring himself to look at it for long. 'But who left it?'
'The Shepherds,' said Vell. 'Whoever they are.' He looked across the Sanctuary to the menhir and immediately saw the difference. 'The red light is gone. The invaders stole it when they stole the behemoths. It must have been the source of the magic that preserved this place.'
'It is so,' came a voice. A figure appeared from nowhere, white-clad and ancient. He was older even than Keirkrad and looked as if his flesh were ready to slide from his bones. While Keirkrad was unnaturally old, he was preserved by Uthgar's grace, and retained something of his youthful self. This figure made Elaacrimalicros seem young. His skin was mottled, halfway between skin and scales. Yet, despite his vast age, the old Shepherd had jet black hair like an Uthgardt, streaked with only a few strands of white. His eyes were a lifeless brown.
'Your failure is utter,' he said. His voice was cold, without compassion. 'You of Uther's blood have led us to ruin, once again.'
All eyes stared at the strange old man. More of his kind emerged from the swamp, as if they had been hiding beneath the water, or simply melded with the marsh. A dozen appeared in all, men and women both—all of them equally ancient, as if all their life-force had long ago been sucked from their bodies. One of the women held the legendary axe, lifting it with ease despite her slenderness—the axe Sungar had wielded and left in the Fallen Lands two years earlier.
'Who are you?' asked Thluna.
'We are the Thunderbeasts,' the Shepherd replied, pronouncing the word like a curse. 'All others are but pretenders to the noble name.' He huffed. 'As are you, who dare travel with the blood of an orc—a creature even more debased than yourself.' He pointed to Rask.
'This is an Uthgardt of the Tree Ghost tribe you offend,' Thanar warned.
'We know of no Tree Ghost tribe, and hold little esteem for any of the Ruathan race that poisoned your spirit twelve hundred years past,' the Shepherd said. 'Uther Gardolfsson and his island race invaded our lands and polluted our strain.'
They all knew that it was Uthgar—called by his mortal name—he defamed, but the warriors did not know how to react. Such a brazen insult to their god provoked wars among tribes, but what war was possible against these creatures?
'What fools we were to place our protection in your hands ' cursed the old woman carrying the axe. She stepped from the water and dropped it at Vell's feet, then pointed an angry finger in his face. 'You carry the power of us all—we stripped ourselves bare for you! And you failed us.'
'Your powers,' Vell said, suddenly understanding. 'You bestowed them on me at Morgur's Mound on Runemeet.' He looked over all the ancient faces. 'All of your powers, into me.'
'True,' the man said. 'Many of us have not worn our human forms in many centuries. We had hoped that you, who carry more of the pure bloodline than any other of your tribe, would retain the nobility to handle it properly.' He looked at Vell with unalloyed disgust. 'A poor choice on our part.'
Vell looked him in the eye. 'It is only an accident of birth that I have any relationship to you.' There was absolute conviction in his voice.
'Let us understand,' Kellin said, hoping to diffuse the situation. 'Are you descended from the Thunderbeast tribe as it was before the coming of Uthgar?'
'Not descended,' the Shepherd answered. 'We are they.' He looked at Kellin more closely. 'And you—you have the blood of dragons. Why do you deign to travel with these mongrels?'
The barbarians looked at her in puzzlement. 'Sorcerers carry the blood of dragons,' she said. 'Or so some sages say. But how dilute must the blood you speak of be? And does that not make me a mongrel myself? Why praise some and condemn others?'
The Shepherds frowned at her.
'Let me introduce myself,' said Thluna. 'My name is Thluna, Chief of the Thunderbeast tribe, son of Hagraavan...'
'And many dozens of generations past, son of the traitor Tharkane,' the Shepherd said, unimpressed. 'The same Tharkane who took this axe of legend—' he prodded it with his foot '—and made it an offering to the conqueror Gardolfsson.'
'Gardolfsson?' asked Thanar. 'Uthgar wielded the axe?'
'Indeed. With it he slaughtered one of our kind, who dared venture forth from the forest to contest him. Several centuries passed before we regained the power lost to us that day. Our fallen fellow's bones surmount Gardolfsson's grave.'
'Morgur's Mound,' said Vell. So that was it! The bones of the beast were not of any natural behemoth, but of one of the Shepherds transformed into a behemoth. And through those bones, they transferred their powers to him.
All of their powers. No wonder he could not wield them—they were not meant for an individual, but for many persons. Like the treant Duthroan had said, Vell was a receptacle.
'So Uthgar defeated him,' Thluna said proudly. 'Killed him.'
'He did,' the Shepherd confirmed. 'And so our Thunderbeasts became his Thunderbeasts. But we have kept watch from behind the Sanctuary's walls where we could, through the bones of our fallen fellow, and through this axe. We felt such sadness as our children mated with other tribes and the Ruathans, as our blood weakened into something we no longer recognized. Under Uther's hand, all memories of us were steadily winnowed.'
Thluna and his followers stood quietly for a time, letting the words sink in.
Kellin looked down at the axe. 'What magic connects you to the axe?'
'Powerful magic and tangled, dragonborn,' the Shepherd woman said. 'On yonder menhir, until recently,
