Finder's Stone - Song Of The Saurials Part 16

"Who were you marking the trail for?"

Dragonbait looked at her blankly, but Alias wouldn't accept his dumb animal look.

"Dragonbait, I can't believe you're treating me like this. Why don't you trust me?" Alias asked.

Dragonbait stared down at the ground. He looked genuinely ashamed.

"Just tell me," Alias said. "I promise I won't get angry. Who is it? Olive? Nameless? Another saurial?"

Dragonbait signed five letters, spelling a name.

"Zhara!" the swordswoman shouted angrily.

You promised you wouldn't get angry, Dragonbait signed.

"Zhara?" Alias asked more softly. "It can't be Zhara. Mourngrym promised to keep her at the tower."

Dragonbait signed that Zhara was a powerful priestess.

Alias scrunched up her forehead, considering the paladin's words. She hardly knew a thing about the spells G.o.ds granted their priests. Healing and removing curses was all she ever considered priests good for. That Zhara could escape a guarded tower had never occurred to her. "Breck is going to be furious when he finds out," she whispered.

He's already furious, Dragonbait signed.

"But not with us," Alias said.

If you don't tell him, Dragonbait signed, he won't know. And we need her.

"No, we don't," Alias growled. "You promised Akabar you'd look after her. Suppose she gets hurt chasing after us in the wild. Have you considered that?"

Zhara isn't helpless, Dragonbait signed.

Alias sighed. "If you say so," she said, resigned. She turned back to her horse and remounted.

Just then Breck came back down along the trail, looking for them. "What's keeping you?" he demanded. "I've found the place where the beast crossed over"

"I had to pick a pebble out of my horse's shoe," Alias lied.

"Is the horse all right?" the ranger asked.

Alias nodded. "Let's go," she said, anxious that Breck should not spot the light in the ravine.

Breck turned his mount around. Suddenly he pulled the horse still. "What was that?" he asked.

"What was what?" Alias asked.

"Over there," Breck said, pointing. "A bright light, like a fireball." To Alias's relief, his point indicated, not the ravine where Zhara's light shone, but a spot on the southwest horizon.

Alias scanned the sky for several moments. "I don't see anything," she said.

"Wait awhile," Breck replied.

Alias fidgeted nervously. If they waited too long, Zhara would make her way across the ravine and stumble on them. Then there would really be an explosion from Breck. "Maybe it was just a shooting star," Alias suggested, "or the campfire of some other adventurer."

Breck shook his head. He sat patiently, watching the dark horizon for another three minutes. Alias signaled hastily to Dragonbait to keep an eye on the rear, then turned back to the ranger.

"There!" Breck said, pointing once again to the same spot.

"It looks like a fire," Alias said, surprised. "A big one."

"It's Grypht," Breck announced.

"How do you know?" Alias asked disbelievingly.

"It's him. I feel it. We'll follow that light."

"But the trail leads north. The light's in the opposite direction," Alias objected.

"Grypht has laid a false trail. If I'm wrong, we can come back to it later, but I know I'm not wrong."

As they spoke, a second burst of light lit the horizon just near the flames in the distance.

"Another fireball," Breck said.

Alias nodded. That's what it looked like to her, too. "You must have sharp eyes to have seen that first fireball," she said. "Or Tymora's luck."

Breck grinned, flattered. "Both," he replied. "Let's go," he said, turning his horse to the southwest and nudging it into a trot.

Alias turned her mount and followed. Dragonbait took a moment to drape a strip of blue cloth over a bush before loping after them.

They spotted no more fireb.a.l.l.s bursting in the sky, and the bright fire died down, but there was a residual glow on the horizon that served them as a beacon. They had traveled about four miles when they began to smell the smoke created by the fire. They slowed the horses to a walk. Small brush fires cut across their path. If not for the rain that had fallen in the area during the day, they wouldn't have been able to proceed farther. As it was, there were swollen streams and plenty of sodden foliage to keep the fire from spreading out of control. After crossing a particularly wide stream, Breck stopped his horse and dismounted.

"We'll leave the horses here. They'll be safe by the water," the ranger said, unbridling his mount. He clipped a lead rope onto its halter and tied the rope to a low tree branch. The horse immediately began grazing on the gra.s.s growing beneath it.

Alias slid down from her saddle and stretched her legs while Dragonbait took charge of her horse.

Breck nocked an arrow into his bow and began moving cautiously toward the fire.

Alias pulled the bow she'd gotten from Mourngrym from her saddlebag. Dragonbait looked at her in alarm.

"Relax," she whispered. "I'm not going to shoot your friend. I just want to be prepared for whatever else is out there. If that's him hurling fireb.a.l.l.s, there's got to be something else out there he's throwing them at."

The three adventurers picked their way through the charred undergrowth until they reached a circle of oak saplings, as close to one another as pickets in a fence. They circled round until they came upon a few saplings that had been broken and flattened to the ground. The ranger leaped into the clearing within the ring. By the light from the smoldering fires and the rising moon, Alias could just make out the silhouettes of three much larger trees lying on the ground.

Breck bent over one of the trees and stroked its charred bark. The swordswoman could have sworn she heard him sob.

"What is it?" Alias asked, stepping up behind the ranger.

"Treants," Breck said, choking back a second sob. "They've been murdereda"just like Kyre."

Alias bit her lip. She turned back to see if Dragonbait had anything to say about the fallen treelike creatures. The saurial paladin stood beside the ring of saplings and hissed. Alias smelled the violet scent the lizard used to warn of danger.

"What is it?" Breck asked, turning around to see what upset Alias's companion.

"Dragonbait senses evil," the swordswoman explained.

"Evil was here, all right," Breck said angrily. "It was Grypht. Look there." The ranger pointed to a set of large prints in the mud beside one of the fallen treants. "And therea"those must be your friend Akabar's prints," he added, indicating with a nod of his head a set of smaller prints unmistakably made by rope sandals.

Alias felt something brush against her leg. She gave a startled cry and tried to leap aside, but something had hold of her leg, and she fell heavily to the ground. Something curled, serpent-like, about her thigh and up around her waist. Alias's eyes widened at the sight of the vinelike tendrils wrapping around her. She screamed and struggled to reach the dagger in her boot.

Dragonbait dashed up to one of the treants and hacked through the creature's branchlike arm with his brightly flaming sword.

The tendrils about the swordswoman's body went limp.

Breck dashed up to the saurial paladin, screaming, "What are you doing?"

Dragonbait stepped back and held his flaming sword out to keep Breck from approaching any closer.

"He saved my life," Alias said, wriggling out of the tendrils.

"He's desecrating a dead body," the ranger growled.

Dragonbait signed to Alias.

"Breck," Alias said softly, "I think you'd better take a closer look at these treants. Don't they look peculiar to you?"

"They look dead," Breck answered angrily.

"They look sick," Alias corrected. "They didn't even burn well. They only scorcheda"like rotted wood."

"They were wet, like the rest of the brush around here," Breck replied stubbornly.

"Look at them!" the swordswoman demanded, grabbing the ranger's shoulders and forcing him to face the treant Dragon-bait had just encountered. "They're diseased . . . rotted completely through. Look inside of it," Alias said, pointing at the treant's severed arm. "Have you ever seen a treant with vines growing inside of it like that?"

With the tip of an arrow, Breck poked gingerly at the branch. The vines within looked like maggots infesting a corpse. The ranger turned away from the sight, horror in his eyes.

"Well?" Alias said. "What do you think it is?"

"I... don't know," the ranger said slowly. "I've . . . I've never seen anything like it before. Have you?"

"Yes," the swordswoman answered. "They remind me of the tendrils the undead G.o.d Moander used to control people, but the first time I saw them, the tendrils were all attached to him."

"Moander's dead," Breck said.

Alias s.h.i.+fted uneasily, realizing that the treants could be a sign that the G.o.d was returning to the Realms. Akabar could be right after all, but she still couldn't bring herself to admit it aloud. "Yes . . . Moander's dead." she said.

"Then this rot, these tendrils in the treants must be something Grypht did to them," Breck claimed. "We'll know for certain when we catch him. We'll follow his trail until we're out of the burnt-over region. Then we'll go back and get the horses." The ranger began looking for tracks near the broken saplings.

Alias rubbed her temples. She was tired and hungry and frustrated with the ranger's single-mindedness. "Breck," she called, deciding to try once more to enlighten the ranger. "It could be that Kyre was wrong about Grypht. These treants might have attacked the creature. Of course it would have defended itself as best it could."

Breck spun about angrily. "Is that why it murdered Kyrea"to defend itself from her?"

"Something else might have killed Kyre," Alias replied.

"Or someonea"like your friend Akabar," Breck suggested.

Alias threw her hands up in the air. For lack of another thought, she addressed the ranger's previous supposition. "Suppose Grypht did kill Kyre in self-defense? Suppose she mistook him for a monster and attacked, and he fired back?"

"Kyre didn't mistake Grypht for a monster. He is a monster!" Breck declared and stomped off to search for the trail.

Alias looked at Dragonbait and shrugged. After a few moments, the pair of them followed the ranger.

Grypht's trail wasn't hard to follow, even in the moonlight. The creature had been running, oblivious to the fact it left a clear trail behind. Suddenly the trail ended abruptly, however. Beside Grypht's tracks were two sandal printsa"Akabar's. Then there was nothing. The creature and the southern mage had vanished into thin air.

"Beshaba's brats!" Breck cursed. "They've whisked themselves away by magic again."

"Let's get back to the horses and make camp," Alias said. "We'll have a look around in the morning."

"They could be anywhere by then," Breck objected.

"They're already gone, ranger," the swordswoman snapped. "And I'm not going anywhere in the dark. Neither are you."

Breck's shoulders slumped. He turned wordlessly and headed back to the stream where they'd tied their horses, with Alias and Dragonbait following him, as usual.

When they'd reached the spot where they'd tied the horses, they found their mounts were missing. No portions of their lead ropes were left attached to the branch at all. The horses hadn't chewed through the ropes; they'd been untied.

"Someone's stolen the horses," Breck said.

Alias glanced at Dragonbait. "Who?" she asked. "We're out in the middle of nowhere."

"I don't know, but I'm going to find out," Breck said, looking over the ground until he found a set of bootprints.

"Here we go again," Alias muttered as they followed the ranger out of the clearing after the horse thief. This is Zhara's doing, isn't it? she signed to Dragonbait.

The saurial began examining the ground with exaggerated interest.

Suddenly Breck broke into a run, heading upstream. Alias looked up and gasped. There, not far from the stream, framed in a clearing in the moonlight, was a female figure in robes standing in front of a horse.

"Why doesn't she just throw another light spell so he can see her better?" the swordswoman cracked sarcastically.

Dragonbait sheathed his sword and dashed after Breck.

Apparently unaware that she was being observed and about to be attacked by an angry ranger, the robed figure stood calmly stroking the horse's muzzle and feeding it something from the palm of her hand. Alias was pretty sure it was Zharaa"only a priestess was stupid enough to stand out in the open like that.

Alias walked slowly toward the scene. This trouble is Dragonbait's fault, she thought. Let him handle it.

Breck leaped at the woman, knocking her to the ground. The horse neighed and s.h.i.+ed backwards. Zhara screamed. Dragonbait pounced on Breck.

Alias pulled an apple out of her knapsack and began munching on it. While the ranger, priestess, and saurial rolled about on the wet gra.s.s, Alias grabbed hold of the horsea"it was Breck'sa"and pushed it out of harm's way. Slowly she fed it her apple core as Dragonbait pulled Breck off Zhara.