Surfacing Ch. 20

She smirked a little. "Who did?"

"My former master, Sarilis."

"A necromancer, I trust."

"Yes. But no follower of any Greylord. He is entirely self-serving."

"An inevitable result for your kind when they lack guidance," she sneered.

Such a strange line of questioning. Hadn't Innathi or Soul Drinker both prevented me from stabbing Cris in the heart? Yet he remained ignorant of her presence, and she and Soul Drinker both had wanted to leave his possession. But they didn't want him dead, and now, Innathi grilled Gavin on Cris's disappearance, on his fate, as if it truly concerned her.

*Any weaker, and we would not be here to guide you.*

We. She had claimed "we" with Cris-ri-phon, as she had never done before. So how would she react should we at some point confirm we had killed him?

"You did not kill him," Innathi said abruptly, answering my thought with the same conviction Gavin had shown earlier. "If you destroyed his body, his soul will come back across the Greylands once again, as he has before."

"Indeed, I would not claim to have ended the existence of the Deathless," Gavin said in his own attempt to keep the conversation going.

Innathi smiled with clear smugness. "He learned well from the Elves in his time. Ask no more, though, I will not tell you."

"Then is it time for my question of you, Queen of V'Gedra?" Gavin asked.

She leaned somewhat with the title, not displeased by it. "Certainly."

"Your half-human children," he began, and she immediately frowned again. "Have you any knowledge or theory what becomes of them upon death? Do they walk the Greylands or is their transition more like the Elves?"

"That is a scholar's question," she hissed, reaching to lay her hand over her whip though she did not uncoil it. "You would truly focus on this, when you could ask me anything?"

"Yes."

My ally watched her almost without moving; I would have held my breath as I kept my mind quiet for the few moments Innathi had to decide how to respond without my input. Or whether.

"They died the same day as me," she said through gritted teeth. "I was not there to witness whether a Deathwalker came to the Palace in the nights following. Even if I knew, there were other Humans living at the Palace at the time who also saw their deaths in that coup; it would have told me nothing."

"Meaning you are not sure? In your time, had there been anything so obvious as a shepherd collecting the dead for the Elves, your grace?"

"No," she answered bitingly. "And you may ask no more, Deathwalker. I will have my question of Sirana now."

I thought Gavin would do well to recognize the same reluctance to discuss personal loss Innathi, just as when I had prodded him about his youth and his parents. When it seemed he might say something more, I squeezed his hand and shook my head slightly; he saw it out of his periphery and reluctantly acquiesced.

"Ask me, your grace," I said.

She nodded smartly, taking her moment to regain her calm. "Where did your Dragon child learn the blade techniques he used against Cris?"

That was a clear, well-formed question...and it was one I could answer. Mourn had been using the sliders during his bonding with Vian and his squad against the Illithids.

"He learned from his mother's House. They retained one, ancient grandmaster of the sliders and their song, and the half-blood was the last student trained before his passing."

Innathi grinned. "I wonder if I could recognize that old Elf? He must have learned some new tricks with those 'sliders.' Those are new."

"But the singing double-blades are not."

"No. They are quite old. Yet they are new to you, so I know Ishuna has lost all her grandmasters...either all in the split from her rule, or those that remained died too young under her tender mercies to train others."

"Possibly."

"She never did have practical foresight."

I tilted my head. "What kind of foresight did she have?"

Innathi gave a sly smile. "Is that your question in return, Sirana?"

I considered. Generous of her to offer me the choice. Did I have a better one? I glanced at Gavin and his face was like pale stone. I smiled.

"No, it is not. I ask instead for all the names of those whom worshipped by the Noldor, the Drow, and Cris-ri-phon's Human people in your time."

Innathi crossed her arms in amusement, smiling without showing her teeth as she watched me. "Musanlo, Nyx, Ianca, Fathiren, Ciberew, Locirel, Vojiwen, Beco, and Dalix, to begin. Those are the major ones. I leave it to you to match who went with whom."

Cute. Although that is exactly what I asked for and more than I expected, to be honest.

"I notice Lolth isn't listed."

"I told you, she was a demon in my time and known for spinning her traps. That she snared all of the Drow in one well-timed moment is not something of which I am proud."

"But you can blame her and your sister for your death and exile here. They needed you out of the way and plotted against you."

Again Innathi would not go farther than what Cris-ri-phon has already told me, and what I had already guessed. She gripped the hard leather coil as she scowled and brought up her free arm in a summoning gesture, ending that discussion abruptly. I heard the hiss of rushing sand that sounded more like rushing water than I would have guessed, and a blue cloud just visible far below barreled toward us and swept up the side of the pyramid to my right.

Hot air buffeted us and grit stung my face and eyes; I nudged Gavin farther to our left to make room as Innathi shifted closer to the dust cloud. It dissipated as quickly as it had come into being, leaving behind two naked Men on their knees: one a dark-haired, green-eyed Noiri of very good form, the other a much larger male, his skin ghostly pale and scarred, his head bald, and his whole body heavily tattooed in blue and black design.

The Inquisitor and the Hellhound.

Their eyes were glazed over at the moment and they did not look aware. I glanced just to check for penis piercings; there were none. Not yet, anyway.

"Ask your questions of them," Innathi snapped at us.

"You will help me in this coming battle?" I clarified.

"For feeding Soul Drinker, for seeing you live through this to go back home, yes," she said, and though I could tell she was not pleased with the delay, she and I had both agreed I must see to my living agreements without her direct interference. In exchange, she would get Lelinahdara and the chance to face Ishuna in the flesh.

I breathed out to settle my stomach and draw Gavin forward; we still had to hold hands, and I think Gavin knew this because he didn't complain or resist too much. Isboern had said I was the focus for Gavin's awareness being linked to mine, even as the death mage was the anchor to give Innathi someone else to contend with for that focus. Mostly, Gavin only seemed unaccustomed to timing his movements to be in sync with another, which made sense for someone who had never even spent an entire night with a partner in bed.

"Think the Hellhound knows Common?" I asked aloud when neither soul seemed to react to our approach. "Or will it be you speaking Ma'ab, Gavin?"

"There is no language barrier here," Innathi said. "It is more than a talent for speaking to spirits that your Deathwalker is able to understand me. Just speak to them each in turn."

Good to have the clarification. "Will the other be listening?"

"If you wish it."

Considering, I said, "I do not, your grace."

"Very well." Innathi strode closer. "Which will be first?"

"Best that you ask the Guild's tactical questions," Gavin said. "I will probe the Inquisitor but you go first."

"The Hellhound will be first," I said to the queen.

Innathi stepped to Gavin's side, continuing to avoid me as she took hold of the High Inquisitor's ear and tugged him off to the side. He scuffled and scrambled on knees and fingertips to follow her, the glazed film never leaving his eyes.

At the same time, the Hellhound blinked. And focused on us. Deep, black eyes beneath a heavy brow switched from Gavin to me and back; the nostrils of a strong hump-nose flared as he inhaled our scents like a beast of burden, and downturned lips further tightened as if a line had been cut in solid granite. His neck was massively thick like I'd imagine a giant's, the thick bands of muscle there matched further through his shoulders and his entire torso and legs. Old injuries and scars showed clearly, ruffling the edges of some tattoos, on his limbs mostly, and I believed that I saw before me someone who had done little else while he lived besides travel, work, and fight.

"Half-caste," the Ma'ab said, and it was one of the deepest voices I'd heard so far in my life. He drew back hostile lips to show yellowing teeth. Then he looked at me. "Black Witch."

"Hellhound," I added helpfully with a smile. "Welcome. You have evaded the Greylands. Your old masters will never get you now."

Gavin's eyes slid toward me at that opening but he said nothing as it seemed to confuse the Ma'ab, but also gave him something to consider. The Hellhound looked around carefully, noting the clear, Star-pocked Sky, the blue dunes, and of the warm, tan stone that made up the pyramid upon which he kneeled.

"You killed me, witch..." he said quietly.

I nodded. "I did. But you wanted to die. Look behind me. The Dark Sorceress from a hundred years ago, whom your high-born killed, enslaving her demon-son to further their magic? She will see her revenge. You belong to her now."

I could see recognition for the story in his face, even if he may not be old enough to remember or even from a family involved in the capture and ownership of our Priestess and her Draegloth son. I figured with Vesram being living proof this whole time, no one doubted this had actually happened in Ma'ab history, if that was what the high-born wanted to tell of it. However, my statement of his fate did not seem to worry him.

The Hellhound looked over my red uniform slowly, not in lust but in appraisal before looking up and behind me at Innathi in her outfit. The belief was clear in his eyes, at least that he was not in the Greylands and that the Dark Sorceress stood now stood before him, though his expression firmed up to one of cold observation.

Perhaps taking the cue from his leader, he grunted, nodding, and he went quiet, staring at the blue sapphire around my neck. It seemed not even Gavin was enough affront to speak further; he waited like a soldier for an order. I could oblige him.

"Do all Hellhounds release plague as you did upon being killed?" I asked curiously.

He smirked then, dark eyes looking up. "Did it get you?"

I scowled at him, playing along. "It did. It is why I am here with you. Your brother-warrior got the half-caste. You are both bastards."

His stomach moved in a silent laugh as he continued to stare at me; it struck me then that he had not acknowledged Gavin after that first exchange.

"So...all Hellhounds are infectious, correct?" I prodded.

He shook his head. "Not all. One must volunteer and make an oath to see the task complete, or it will sicken the body long before it is time."

"I see. Missions where you are not expected to return alive."

"Correct, witch."

"Who created the spell to infuse you with plague after you volunteered? It must be a powerful sorceress...was it Vo'Traj?"

He gave me an odd, suspicious look. "How do you know her?"

He was much taller than me, but I took advantage of the fact that he was kneeling and made as if I towered over him. "Do you think old enemies do not pay for good information? You are not the only ones to deal with the Guild."

He grunted and nodded once, not questioning me.

"So it was her," I said with full confidence, even though I was not sure.

"What does it matter now, Black Witch?" he rumbled, tilting his head slowly at me in a way that made me think of the mountain cats during my first months on the Surface.

I rolled my eyes Skyward. "It would seem to me that the blessing of any death plague would be an intimate act, rather like killing another with your own hands, would you not agree?"

The look the Hellhound gave me, somehow stoic and interested at the same time, was not too far from a look of lust in its own strange way. He did understand.

I smiled. "This is why I can call you, but not your brother-warrior. The cursed blade which killed you may be in the hands of the Ma'ab now, and if it is placed into the hands of the sorceress who blessed you with plague, you may be able to speak with her even after death."

"And why would you want any such thing, Black Witch?"

"The Dark Sorceress stands behind me and you have to ask?"

"I will not betray my own Commandress."

I grinned with as much sinister pleasure as I could muster. "The alternative is much more unpleasant."

Innathi seemed to take a cue at that, and though I didn't expect her to help with this she stepped forward with a soft grind of her boots against grains of sand, leaving the Inquisitor alone and still for the moment. She lifted her first two, elegant fingers and placed them in the center of his forehead, about the same place where I had seen that glowing oculus in Pig Eyes as I had plumbed his thoughts for answers of where Jael had been kept.

Gavin and I each looked around as we tried to identify from where the sound was coming, a sound that reminded me of the cannibal cultists bearing down on us through the twisted forest, long before we could see them. It contained the hollow echo of eternal hunger, and made me think first that if it caught me, it would eat the baby straight out from my gut while I watched. I pursed my lips and focused on the coolness of Gavin's hand, doing as Mourn suggested and blocking any fear of this place with knowing that I wasn't alone and I wasn't really here. Not the way that the Hellhound was truly here.

The big, tattooed warrior shook visibly, his eyes rolled upward, and his blue-tinged nipples had turned rock hard as bumps swept over his skin and scars, and his dark, flushed scrotum visibly drew up tight against his body. I expected him to make fists of his hands but when it didn't happen, I realized that he was truly shocked, not in control and only now beginning to realize it.

Innathi stepped back and only then did the Hellhound take the equivalent of a gasping breath, dark eyes staring up at her in awe and fear. While it would have taken me much longer to have wrangled bits of information out of him with deft, flexible words, I thought the desert queen had just saved me a lot of effort by rampaging a path straight through his will.

I took that moment. "Was it Vo'Traj who blessed you with plague?"

"No... No," he gasped low like the sound of a giant bear grunting deep within a cavern. "Commandress Vo'Kyahn."

I smiled, not looking at Innathi as I might have but staying focused on my questions. "Was she the only one in the army who could grant such an honor? If she was cut down at some point, would another have done it for you?"

The only thing that seemed to be missing in his fear response, as he blinked eyes over whatever he had been seeing when Innathi touched him, was his heartbeat. "Lieutress Vo'Reye and Vo'Traj Senatrix... can also bless us if needed."

And all three were dead if I wasn't mistaken.

"I would know the name of the Hellhound who killed me," I said.

This seemed to help him focus past his shakes as he became still and could look up at me once more.

"Yuncis Divigna," he answered, his bare chest expanding.

Gavin and I each went still; I didn't see much likeness to Kurn, but...

"A relation to the fearsome Kreshel Divigna?"

It took another moment for the description to sink in, but he smirked just a bit and nodded. "I am a third cousin."

"How many years has he been your leader?"

"As many as I have been a Hellhound."

"And that is?"

"Twenty-three."

I considered whether that was a long time or not.

"For an army rank in Humans, that is impressive," Innathi broke in. "It means he likely reached this position early and had the strength and desire to keep it through his prime years."

"But if necromancy is more common among the Ma'ab, their 'prime years' may be defined differently from mere Human," I said, and Gavin nodded.

"The Ma'ab are still a recent infection on our land," the desert queen sneered. "They cannot have learned to alter the lifespans of their common men yet."

Yuncis made eye contact with me and I could guess that Innathi was correct. Even though some high caste sorceresses may have kept Vesram prisoner for a century, and none of the most powerful would ever wish to die and possibly return back to the Greylands, it remained as Gavin had told me: most of the common Ma'ab had bred with Humans and were now mostly Human on this plane.

I asked a few more practical questions for the Guild; when needed, my probing was cloaked as grudging compliments or frustrated obstacles. I asked about those self-grinding, spiked chains, about the level of customized weapons on each Man, of vomit-spells such as one of his other brothers had spewed in the temple, the tattoos. He answered with little prodding; Innathi had only to step either to one side or another where he became aware of her again. Even with her not being Ma'ab like him, he responded to her command as he had from his Ma'ab sorceresses during his time of service. He was not nearly as stubborn as Kurn had been.

"I met another Hellhound on the road to Manalar," I told him with a calm lilt to my voice. "A disgraced one. He was after the relics you sought to keep for his own."

"We kill all traitors," he rumbled darkly. "There are no rogue Hellhounds in my time of service who still live."

"Oh? The name of Kurn Divigna doesn't sound familiar?"

I was shocked to see the answer on his face. It was no. To Yuncis, the name wasn't familiar. Interesting. I was less inclined to think it was the blue sands leaving a hole in his mind than that the brute who had chased me into the canyon simply wasn't a part of his circle. Kreshel kept a far distance between his Men and his offspring. Or the women did.

"Kurn?" Yuncis frowned. "You make up lies."

I shrugged. "Or he did. Yet what if another Ma'ab reached the relics before you?"

"It was not my objective to reach the relics."

"But it was for Kreshel and Vo'Traj, and you supported their mission infiltrating the temple."

I could tell he was used to strong females challenging him this way, forcing him to defend his own words. Innathi even stepped in to nudge him again.

"You will answer her," she said in a voice that flowed down my back like a firm caress.

He jerked his head once and stated flatly, "We would capture and flay any Ma'ab to lay hands on them without permission."

I smirked. We'd see about that, given that they were both in the hands of a certain half-caste "slum" necromancer at my side. "What about you, Yuncis? You are not high-born enough? What is your caste?"

"Second Tier."

He held no shame for this, as if he knew exactly where he stood. By contrast, I knew a Drow would be looking for the figurative ladder before the first century was out.

"What do you know of the scepter and the crown?"

"Only that my mistresses want them back. Only the First Tier may use them."

I laughed, leaning in toward his face. "You know what I say? I say the Guild will grab those relics before yours can, and they will use them how they see fit."

I expected him to scowl now, but he didn't.

"The...Guild..." he repeated, blinking as if trying desperately to remember something through a powerful sedative.

"Yes. Kreshel will have to barter with them again, as he did for them to spoil the pool as you took out the Bishops and the temple."

"The temple," he repeated, and his face flushed an odd green beneath his blue-white skin as he clenched his teeth in rage. "The Guild trapped us...you...and he..." He finally acknowledged Gavin again. "Drained...I..."