Pathfinder Tales: Lord of Runes (22 page)

In its own hideous way,
Gluttonous Tome
was making a slave of me. The thought that I could no longer trust my appetites and desires horrified me. Yet before I could long dwell on that comparison, I realized its fault. A book of arcane secrets enthralled my imagination and compelled me toward gluttony. My captor was the power of a long-dead necromancer, my shackles formed of magic. Fellow humans had claimed ownership over Radovan. I had been trapped by a curse, but he had been betrayed by his own family. No matter how wretched my current predicament, I could not compare it to his.

“What’s this oracle’s name?” said Radovan.

“I don’t know. Many Shoanti don’t share their birth names with tshamek. They have names based on their role in the Quah, or from some memorable deed. The oracle’s daughter Kazyah, for example, is ‘the Night Bear.’”

“Because she’s cuddly like a bear cub?”

“Give it a rest.” Janneke punched him in the arm. Radovan grinned. Doubtless he had hoped for such a reaction.

“Because when she was a teenage girl, her tribe sent her into a cavern deep in the Mindspin Mountains. They stood vigil for days, refusing to let her emerge until she’d killed an animal and brought back its skull. Most Shoanti braves bring back the skulls of lizards or giant bats, sometimes animals that were already dead. Kazyah brought back the head of a giant cave bear, its blood still dripping from her klar.”

Radovan whistled his appreciation. “What’s a klar?”

“Would you stop interrupting him?” said Janneke.

“A klar is a Shoanti weapon. You’ll see one at the yurt.”

“What’s a yur—? Ow! Not so hard!”

“Go on, Kline,” said Janneke.

“The oracle is very important, both among his people and in the Bottoms, where he helps the locals. Does everybody have the gifts I gave you?”

Everyone else nodded.

“What about me?” said Zora. She carried her cloak over her wrists to hide the manacles Janneke had placed on her. The bounty hunter remained close by her side.

“You don’t need a gift. Until the oracle removes your geas, you’re
skentok
.”

“What does that mean?”

“Literally, it’s a child who’s been kicked in the head by a goat. Still functional, just not very useful.”

“Typical horsers,” spat Zora.

“And none of your Korvosan slurs. We have to be polite. The good news is, polite for the Shoanti mostly means keeping your mouth shut. Don’t stare at Kazyah’s tattoos. Don’t look her in the eyes. And whatever you do, Radovan, don’t mention you’re from Cheliax. Apart from your spurs and those teeth, you look more Varisian, so you’ve got that going for you. Just don’t mention where you were raised.”

“Not a problem,” he said. “But what about the boss?”

“I’m hoping we can smooth that over.” He turned to me. “How’s your Shoanti?”

“Good, but I speak a Lyrune-Quah dialect.”

“That’s fine. The oracle’s father was from the Moon Clan, and the cave bear is one of their totems. Some mistake Kazyah for Lyrune-Quah because of her bearskin cloak and helm.”

“Another helmet fancier.” Radovan nudged Janneke. “You two ought to get along.”

Janneke pointed to a dome-shaped yurt. “Is that it?”

“That’s it,” said Kline.

A fence surrounded the aurochs-hide tent on three sides, creating a yard containing a cook fire, a water barrel, and a pair of tethered goats. Just outside the fence stood a man and a young girl, anxiously watching the closed yurt flap. Inside the fence, an enormous woman sat on a log beside the fire.

Nearly my height, she appeared twice my weight, all of it muscle. She wore dark buckskins over a homespun tunic, both sleeveless. Her biceps would have shamed a stevedore. Behind her lay a bearskin cloak with a preserved head for a helmet. One of the massive mauls the Shoanti call earth breakers lay on its head beside her. From the butt of its handle hung a bladed buckler crafted from the head of a horned spirestalker gecko.

“
That
is a klar,” I told Radovan.

“I want one.” He was gazing at the woman, not the klar.

“Don’t stare.”

I could hardly stop myself from doing the same. Every inch of the woman’s exposed skin had been tattooed. Black ink made a death’s head of her face. Along her arms, Shoanti warriors and shamans battled armies of the undead. Great spirits of stone rose up to fight beside them as they summoned storms and earthquakes to devour their foes.

We walked toward the yurt, careful to stop outside the unmarked fourth border of the fence.

“I greet you, Kazyah, Night Bear.” Kline slapped his chest as he addressed her in Shoanti.

“Be welcome, my cousin.” The woman rose from the log. Her long black hair spilled down to her waist. Her facial tattoos made it difficult to judge her age, but I estimated she had lived closer to fifty than forty years.

“This is my friend, Varian Jeggare, a Pathfinder like me.”

“Wielder of claw and thunder,” I spoke in her native tongue and proffered the pouch Kline had purchased. “I greet you with a gift of salt.”

Kazyah regarded me. Her eyes lingered on my satchel, not my sword. She looked at Arnisant, who sat at my heel. With a barely perceptible nod, she accepted the parcel and said, “Be received, stranger.”

Kline named the others, except for Zora. In turn, each offered a gift of corn, leather, and smoke. Kazyah showed more interest in Amaranthine than in Lady Illyria. She locked eyes with Janneke, but the bounty hunter looked away first, for which I credited her professionalism. At last, Radovan lit the pipe and drew on it before passing it to Kazyah.

Kazyah puffed on the pipe and eyed Radovan before completing the ritual and accepting the pouch he held out, which he had filled with coins rather than tobacco. She felt its weight and said, “I accept your gifts. Sit. The oracle will see you soon.”

She sat on the log, leaving enough room for someone to join her. While the rest of us sat on the ground, Radovan looked to me. The Shoanti protocol eluded me, so I replied with a subtle shrug. With a shrug of his own, Radovan sat beside Kazyah. He nodded at her weapons and said, “Nice klar.”

Beside me, Eando choked.

Kazyah leaned over, looming over Radovan more by mass than by stature. She peered over his shoulder down the back of his jacket. “Nice tail.”

Radovan pulled the big knife from its built-in sheath. He offered it to her grip-first. “Want to hold it?”

I glanced at Kline to see whether Radovan was insulting the oracle’s daughter. Kline looked back, equally nonplussed. By the time I had exchanged similar glances with Lady Illyria, Janneke, and even Zora, Radovan was examining Kazyah’s klar while she studied the scarred and spell-inscribed surface of his blade.

A pregnant woman emerged from the yurt, bowing thanks to the occupant before rejoining her family at the fence. Kazyah returned Radovan’s knife and said, “Wait here.”

She went into the yurt and closed the flap. All eyes turned back to Radovan, who appeared puzzled by our attention. “What?”

The rest of us could only shake our heads. We sat in silence until Kazyah opened the tent flap and beckoned us to enter. I bade Arnisant to sit outside the yurt.

Inside, an old man sat across a circle of stones. He looked perhaps seventy, but the lines of his face indicated a weight of hardship as well as years. Beside him, an aromatic steam rose from a simmering pot. On the other lay jars of colored sand and three stacks of books bound in tooled leather.

Within the circle lay a sand painting. Its colored patterns formed the image of a sunset over red hills. At intervals around the circle lay six wolf pelts. Kazyah knelt beside the old man and fanned the steam toward his face. He leaned in to breathe deep as we took our places.

Hide shields and fetishes of dyed string and bone hung from the yurt walls. Above our heads, gourds dangled among glowing glass spheres in nets. The smell of roast meat and soured goat’s milk lingered in the yurt, along with a fainter scent of tobacco.

The oracle spoke in a reedy voice.

“I have prepared for this day since first meeting this
skentok
.” He nodded toward Zora, who jutted a resentful chin at the term. I had not even considered that the thief would have visited the oracle, but it made sense if she had been sent to find the
Kardosian Codex
.

The oracle waved a leathery brown hand above the sand painting. With a soft hiss, the colors shifted to form an image of a bearded man standing before the yurt, holding out an empty hand. Zora’s distinctive scarf betrayed the figure’s true identity. “She came to me with a false face. She gave me a false name. She had stolen one part of the terrible book, and she wished to know where to find the others. I warned her of its dangers, but she would not hear me. I sent her away.”

He waved his hand. The yurt remained, but the visitor changed into the stylized but unmistakable likeness of Eando Kline.

“Later Eando Kline came to me. He too had found a part of the book and wished to be rid of it. Because he is nalharest to the Sklar-Quah, I tried to help. But the curse of the
azghat
was too strong for me to break.”

“What’s an azghat?” said Radovan.

“Hush,” Illyria whispered in his ear.

I said, “Azghat is the Shoanti name for the runelords.”

“They are demons,” said Zora. All eyes turned to her. She looked away, appearing to regret drawing our attention.

The oracle gestured above the circle of sand. “When Eando Kline left my yurt, my ancestors kept watch over him.” The sands shifted to depict Kline reading books from the Therassic Spire. They shifted again to show him consulting sages in Widdershins. They changed again, this time showing me and Kline as we struggled to hold onto the
Codex
and the
Grimoire
. “When I saw the reunion of two parts of the terrible book, I knew you would come to me.”

He waved the sands into an image of a fertile landscape dotted with great cities.

“To understand what I will tell you, you must know the history of our land. Once, all were part of the Empire of Thassilon. It began with the wizard-king Xin.”

The sands formed the image of a tall man with the distinctive Azlanti features: purple eyes, a regal nose, and long black hair with a widow’s peak.

“Xin led thousands of followers to this land to form his own kingdom. His knowledge was great, but he consulted wise and powerful allies.”

The oracle’s hand moved, and an image appeared of Xin addressing five dragons with scales of brass, bronze, copper, silver, and gold.

“Xin set before his people the example of the goddess Lissala, who in those days represented the best qualities of just rule.” In the sand, a king stood before three kneeling servants. One held a black sword, another a quill, and the third an open hand. Behind the king stood a six-winged woman with the tail of a snake and a sihedron star for a head.

“I’ve seen that snake-lady on the Street of Little Gods,” said Radovan.

Illyria patted his arm to hush him. From her perch on Illyria’s shoulder, Amaranthine stretched her neck to nip at Radovan’s ear.

“In those days, Lissala’s virtues had different names,” said the oracle. “In the common tongue, you would call them earned wealth, nurtured fertility, honest pride, shared abundance, eager striving, righteous anger, and deserved rest.”

The image transformed into a scene of farmers harvesting crops and warriors defending caravans from giant insects bursting up from the ground. “Xin’s people divided themselves into two castes, brave warriors and cunning providers. Working together, they were fruitful and their many accomplishments were great. In time, the empire grew beyond King Xin’s ability to rule it. He appointed seven wizards to govern his domain while he turned to arcane studies. These are the azghat, now known as the runelords.”

He shifted the sands to show seven figures, each clutching a different polearm. “Each azghat wielded only one sort of magic, unlike King Xin who studied all. The azghat of rich Shalast used magic to fill his vaults with hoarded wealth. The azghat of bounteous Gastash used magic to feast on all manner of flesh. Thus were the virtues of Lissala corrupted into the seven sins.

“As their powers grew, the azghat forged pacts with evil dragons, outsiders, and even the veiled masters of legend. They grew cruel, treating their citizens as chattel.” In the sands, the runelords presented slaves to dragons of white, black, green, blue, and red scales.

“One day a pillar of scarlet flames consumed Xin’s Crystal Palace, and King Xin vanished. The azghat claimed his lands.” The sands formed a map of seven domains, each marked by different colors and different runes.

“King Xin lived only a little more than a century,” said Illyria. “Had the runelords discovered the secret to eternal life?”

“No,” said the oracle. “The azghat passed down their mantles of authority from master to apprentice.”

“What of the tales that one or more runelords survived Earthfall?”

The oracle nodded as though he had expected that question. “It is said that the azghat foresaw the cataclysm and prepared different ways in which to survive. Zutha chose the deathless path. His undead body lies hidden, awaiting the return of his
Tome
to revive him.”

“What I want to know is why the hell your ‘friend’ left you this cursed book.” Radovan made no attempt to disguise his anger.

“Perhaps he hoped you would know how to destroy it,” said Illyria.

“If so, he would have left a warning … unless he did, and someone removed it.” I turned to Zora. “Did you?”

Her mouth opened and snapped shut again. Yet again, the geas prevented her from speaking.

I turned back to Illyria. “Did you remove anything from Ygresta’s chambers?”

She raised an eyebrow but answered smoothly. “No.”

I shivered at a chill in the air. Already the power of the combined books seemed to be affecting me.

Heedless of our conversation, the oracle sifted a handful of sand onto his painting. The images whirled again, reforming into the rough outlines of our continent as it had appeared over eleven millennia earlier. A glowing meteor descended, crashing into the land where the Inner Sea now divided Avistan from Garund. “Earthfall shattered our world, but the Thassilonian people endured. The warriors are the ancestors of my people. The Varisians descended from the providers. But the descendants of the azghat also survived.”