Ричард Кнаак - The Veiled Prophet

In reply, Terul could only shrug.

“Imbecile! Dolt! I shall have to deal with this immediately!” With a snort of frustration, Zorun waved the hulking figure aside. However, before departing, the spellcaster paused to say to Uldyssian, “This will give you a moment to put to order all information you will relate to me, Ascenian. I suggest you have it all ready for when I return. The questioning will begin in earnest then.”

The mage vanished from sight. Terul remained behind, the servant watching the direction in which his master had gone.

Then an odd change came over Terul. The giant’s expression twisted into something more knowing. His eyes once again radiated the extreme intelligence that Uldyssian thought he had briefly witnessed before.

Terul bent down and seized the crimson stone. A look of avarice spread across his grotesque features. Up close, Uldyssian noticed something else, a pair of odd lesions, almost burns, near the left ear. They looked very recent.

“Mephisto smiles upon me,” the servant rumbled as he gazed up at the prisoner. His manner of speaking was now more polished and in contradiction to the mind that such a small head suggested.

Evidently, there came some sound that Uldyssian could not hear, for Terul paused to glance to the side. Then, apparently satisfied that it meant nothing, the giant returned his attention to Uldyssian. His eyes stared deeply into the captive’s, and more than ever, Uldyssian was convinced that Terul was far more than Zorun Tzin assumed him to be.

And possibly a deadlier threat to the son of Diomedes than the mage was.

“Even this body, with all its brute strength, will burn out much too soon,” Terul informed him. “I thought it would last a great deal longer, but perhaps the lack of a proper brain has something to do with it. It would be interesting to find out more concerning that. Later, of course.”

Uldyssian had no idea what the giant was talking about, only that it was hinting of a direction that he did not like in the least. He tried to focus on his powers, but Zorun’s pattern kept his mind foggy where that was concerned. The spell enabled him to listen to whoever was in front of him but allowed little more than that.

“Poor Durram,” Terul went on. “He provided me with more than I dared hope, but I knew that I wasn’t going to make it to you, regardless of how quickly I raced through the jungle. I thought to cut you off near the capital—I knew you must go to the capital—but in pushing the priest’s body so hard, I only burned it out more swiftly.”

Terul’s face continued to contort as he spoke in the unsettling, highly educated tone, and in the midst of those contortions, Uldyssian briefly felt as if he recognized something. Unfortunately, the spell on his own thoughts caused it to be a fleeting recollection.

The giant must have misread something in Uldyssian’s face. “Fear not for that fool’s imminent return. His arrogance, which I fueled by stirring all his spells to greater accomplishment, has left him open to more transgressions revealed than he imagines.” Terul cocked his head. “And lest you suppose my chatter all this while idle, you might notice that the pattern below you has been slowly adjusted for my needs.”

Even as he said it, Uldyssian felt powerful energies shifting around him. They constricted his will even more and amplified the effects on his mind to such a point that had an army poured into the chamber, Uldyssian doubted very much that he would have even noticed.

Indeed, there was for him only Terul. Nothing else existed for Uldyssian save the sinister servant…who spoke to the prisoner as if they had known each other for far longer than a few moments.

And somehow Uldyssian was certain that they had. He fought anew against the pattern’s spells, struggling by physical, magical, and mental means to do something, anything.

One of Terul’s overly shaggy brows rose. His dark eyes glittered enviously. “Such strength…the bitch chose well when she chose you, I will give her that much.”

His words sent Uldyssian’s tension to new heights. Terul could only be speaking of Lilith. Yet how could he know of the she-demon?

Uldyssian managed to recall what the giant had said earlier, that he had used a priest called Durram to reach this point…used his body. That meant that this was not actually Terul, not even a living being, then, but some malign spirit possessing the giant.

No, not possessing. That inferred that somewhere deep within, the servant yet remained. From what Uldyssian could see, this creature had engulfed Terul’s spirit. Nothing, absolutely nothing, of the giant existed.

And now the malevolent shade intended to do the same with the son of Diomedes.

At that moment, the giant’s eyes widened in pleasure. “Ah! All ready!” He gave Uldyssian a monstrous grin. “With the stone and the reset pattern, I will not have to worry about burning you out. I shall be whole at last! And your body will be the one with which I will raise a new sect, one where I and I alone am supreme Primus! Mephisto will reward me well, perhaps make me master of all men.”

His tone again reminded Uldyssian of someone. It was at the edge of his memory…

“And wearing your body will be much more comfortable than wearing simply the skin of someone, say, like Master Ethon of Partha?”

His captive managed to gape. It all made terrible sense.

Terul laughed as recognition at last came to the prisoner. “Yes, I wanted you to know me well before I engulfed you, Uldyssian ul-Diomed.”

Uldyssian would have shaken his head in disbelief and horror if that had been at all possible. The resurrection of either Lilith or her brother would have been only slightly more monstrous in his eyes.

Terul was possessed by the spirit of the High Priest of Mefis…Malic.

Serenthia felt the uneasiness strike her with all the suddenness of a lightning bolt. Something had gone wrong with Uldyssian’s plan. She was certain of it.

Yet the fact that she had not been very pleased with his idea in the first place gave her pause. She had no right to supersede his commands based merely on her suspicions, no right at all. It was only a feeling, nothing more…

But, then again, she was an edyrem, and such feelings had a way of presaging actual disaster.

She sought out Mendeln, certain that he, of all people, would be able to look over her concerns with a proper analytical train of thought. He was where she could generally find him, at the remotest part of the encampment, speaking to three edyrem—a male Parthan and two lowlanders, one of them female—about something called the Balance and how death was merely a step to another level. On the one hand, Serenthia liked the thought of her father and mother still existing and even possibly watching over her. She also thanked whatever power Mendeln had drawn upon to bring Achilios back to her, albeit not quite as she would have preferred.

But there were other aspects concerning his newfound path that continued to unnerve her, especially his delving into matters concerning corpses and graves. There was also Mendeln’s passing comment that he was never alone even when he was alone. From what Serenthia gathered, ghosts of the most recent dead were drawn to him, not an appetizing aspect to her.

He looked up at Serenthia before she had the opportunity to call out. He solemnly dismissed his equally solemn pupils. They silently ushered past her, and as they did, she noticed that they had taken to wearing black clothing such as Uldyssian’s brother wore.

“They come to ask me questions,” Mendeln said to her. “I but merely try to answer them…but that is not why you come, I know.”

“Uldyssian—”