Кейт Новак - Song of the Saurials

“She? You mean the simulacrum?” Breck asked.

“He succeeded in animating it, then?” Morala asked with a defeated sigh.

“Actually, she’s more than animated. She’s very much alive and possessed of her very own soul and spirit. Not even ye, thy grace, could tell she was unborn.”

“Impossible!” the priestess declared.

“Impossible for Nameless and the evil beings who backed him, but not impossible for a god.”

“Moander is the Darkbringer. He could not give her a soul,” Morala insisted.

“I did not speak of Moander,” Elminster said.

“What god, then, Elminster?” Kyre asked.

“I’m not certain. The fiend Phalse kidnapped a paladin from another world to supply the simulacrum with a soul, but the paladin still lives. Somehow his soul doubled, and a shard of his spirit broke off. Both grew inside Nameless’s creation. It is possible one of the paladin’s gods made this possible. I also suspect that the goddess of luck, Tymora, may have interfered in the creation. Nameless still invokes her name on occasion, and the simulacrum seems to have an affinity for Lady Luck. Perhaps it was a joint effort of these gods. Whatever the case, the woman lives.”

“Why did Nameless make this creation a woman?” Breck asked.

“For her own vile reasons, the sorceress Cassana insisted it be made in her image,” the sage explained. “Perhaps that was for the best. Nameless gave the simulacrum much of his personality, but in an effort to make her a more ‘ideal’ woman, in his own view, he created in her a tender and nobler side Nameless himself had never displayed. She has already made a name for herself as a brave and clever sell-sword. The paladin I mentioned before, a noble saurial known here in the Realms as ‘Dragonbait,’ travels in her company, totally convinced of her goodness.”

Breck gasped. “You don’t mean Alias of Westgate!”

“The very same, good ranger,” Elminster replied. “You have met the lady, then?”

“Well, not exactly,” Orcsbane admitted. “I’ve seen her down at The Old Skull tavern, though, and listened to her sing. She has a voice like a bird—sings some of the most moving songs I’ve ever heard.”

“She sings!” Morala shouted angrily. “She sings his songs, doesn’t she, Elminster? And you’ve done nothing about it!”

“What could I do, thy grace? She is a free woman who has committed no crime. The people of Shadowdale consider her a hero. The time is long past when the Harpers could intimidate ordinary folk into obedience, let alone demand it of heroes.”

Elminster could tell Morala was struggling to control her rage. The priestess was breathing deeply, with her eyes closed and her jaw set. The sage had no desire to anger Morala, but he would not be reprimanded for behaving in a civilized fashion.

“Perhaps we should meet this woman,” Kyre suggested calmly. “Will she speak with us if she is summoned forth?”

Elminster nodded. “She is eager to speak if there is a chance it will help Nameless.”

“Ah-ha!” Morala cried. “She is his creature indeed.”

“No, Morala,” Elminster snapped back, fighting hard to keep his own anger in check. “She is her own creature. She is fond of Nameless, though, as any generous and good woman would be of a father who nurtured her as best he could.”

Morala looked down at her hands, fearing that she had aroused the sage’s wrath. As old as she was, Elminster was many years her senior, and he was the Harpers’ most powerful ally and advisor. “We should hear her speak,” she agreed softly.

Kyre signaled the page and ordered him, “Find Alias of Westgate and request that she come before this tribunal.”

Heth stood up, bowed before the tribunal and hurried out of the courtroom to fetch the Nameless Bard’s singer, Alias.

The patrons of The Old Skull applauded enthusiastically as the singer finished her song. Even the innkeep, Jhaele Silvermane, paused a moment from her duties at the bar to show her appreciation. The singer bowed once to her audience and then to the songhorn player who had accompanied her.

The rustic common room was full of farmers who only half an hour ago had been grumbling and cursing the rain that kept them from the season’s haying. Now, instead of nursing their first drink for two hours and worrying about how they were going to feed their livestock all winter on moldy hay, the farmers were ordering their second pint and cheering for the singer to give them another song.

The singer, the sell-sword Alias of Westgate, also known as Alias of the Azure Bonds, smiled gratefully. She sang to keep herself occupied, since the Harpers would not let her visit her father, the Nameless Bard, and she sang to defy the Harpers, who had tried to wipe out the bard’s music. Mostly, though, she sang because she knew the bard would want her to, no matter what happened to him. Secretly, though, she was struggling to think of a graceful way to decline singing any further this day.

“Please, Alias,” the songhorn player whispered to the singer. “They need something to keep their minds off this weather.”

“Han, I … I think I’m losing my voice,” Alias whispered back.

“Your voice sounds just fine,” Han insisted.

“One more at least,” a deep voice rumbled from a table beside the musicians’ platform, “or I’ll have to have the watch haul you off for denying the happiness of the good people of Shadowdale.”

Alias laughed good-naturedly at the threat. The speaker was Mourngrym Amcathra, lord of Shadowdale, and the swordswoman counted him among her friends. She tossed her red hair behind her shoulders and flapped the bottom of her green woolen tunic in an effort to cool off. “Then I suppose I’d have to sing for the watch, wouldn’t I?” Alias asked Mourngrym.

“That’s right,” Mourngrym replied with a twinkle in his eye. “And then,” he added, “I’d have to sentence you to sing lullabies to my son for a year.” His lordship bounced the aforementioned baby on his knee and asked him, “You’d like that, wouldn’t you, Scotty?”

Although he was far too young to understand the question, Mourngrym’s heir responded to his father’s enthusiastic tone of voice by laughing and clapping his hands.

“A fate worse than death,” Alias said with mock terror.

The farmers laughed and Scotty shrieked happily. Still Alias hesitated. She’d been singing at the Old Skull for three days in a row, and the audiences loved every song she sang. Four times since spring, however, she’d lost control of her voice and had begun singing strange words and changing Nameless’s melodies. She was sure it was only a matter of time before it happened again. Here in Shadowdale, though, she risked more than shocking her listeners. If Nameless heard about it, he would be greatly displeased with her.

From the back of the room, she caught Dragonbait’s eye. The saurial paladin motioned encouragingly with his hands. Alias sighed inwardly. Nothing’s going to go wrong, she told herself. Stop being such a ninny and face the music.

Trying to focus her thoughts on her audience, Alias chose a farming song, the lyrics of which were an old folk rhyme that Nameless had set to music. Han knew the rhyme, but he was unfamiliar with the tune, so he stood silently beside Alias, listening carefully, hoping he could pick up the melody with his horn by the second or third verse. Alias sang out clear and strong: