Venom in Her Veins
Product Description
Child of prophecy? Harbinger of Doom
Zaltys is a girl like any other to grow up ranging thejungles of the Southern Lluirwood. She’s a crack shot with a bow and no stranger to the dangers that lurk beneath the deep forest canopy.
On expedition with her family to harvest the forbidden terazul flower, a powerful drug that has gathered many a dreamer into its narcotic embrace, Zaltys is about to unearth a truth long buried by the feculent loam of deception.
As the veil is lifted on the world Zaltys thought she knew, a pathway to the Underdark promises the answers her family never gave. Venturing forth in search of truth, Zaltys finds betrayal to be a much easier quarry. But it will take more than a lode of lies to quell the venom in her veins.
ALSO BY TIM PRATT
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VENOM IN HER VEINS
©2012 Wizards of the Coast LLC
All characters in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.
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Cover art by: Raymond Swanland
eISBN: 978-0-7869-5996-9
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v3.1
For Millard, Matt, and Bobby
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Contents
Cover
Other Books by This Author
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Acknowledgments
About the Author
S
CITHERON SLITHERED AWAY FROM THE FEEDING PIT,
hands bloodied with the remnants of the pre-dawn sacrifice. The segments of his lower body, a serpent’s tail the thickness of a tree trunk, compressed and expanded, propelling him along the worn path through the ruined temples of the settlement, a forgotten outpost that was once the thriving heart of his sect. The stench of the anathema’s pit still clung to Scitheron’s forked tongue, no matter how fiercely he flickered it, and he thought, not for the first time, that the community would be best served by sending down a sacrifice liberally laced with poison some morning, to put everyone in the settlement out of the anathema’s misery, and allow them to relocate to one of the serpentfolk settlements rumored to thrive in the deeper jungle.
But such thoughts were blasphemy. Scitheron’s people worshiped the god Zehir, and though much diminished, his cult still cared for the last of Zehir’s chosen ones, the anathema who writhed, multiform and mad, in the pit overseen by Scitheron and the other remaining priests.
The yuan-ti deeper in the jungle were devotees of the old god Sseth, the fools. Scitheron would rather die a true believer of Zehir than go over to their ancient, withered faith.
The malison guards at the entry to the main settlement nodded as he approached, their rusty scimitars hanging uselessly at their belts. Both had proud heads of serpents, but one had two legs like an ape, something that reminded Scitheron of the other task he had to carry out that night. There are so few of us now, he thought, it seems wrong to kill a potential warrior for Zehir while she’s still a babe, but it is the low priest’s will.
“How does the god fare this night?” the two-legged guard said.
Scitheron made the sign of the fangs. “The anathema is not a god. His kind were kings and emperors once, before the madness …” He shook his head. “The anathema is well. Quiet. I fed him three skinned apes, and he seemed sated. That should appease him until the sun rises over the horizon.”
“Waste of good food if you ask me,” Two Legs began, but the other yuan-ti guard slapped him on the side of the head hard enough to make Two Legs stumble.
“Blasphemer,” he muttered, and gave a slight bow to Scitheron. “He is young, and stupid. I would understand if you must tell the low priest of his transgression.”
At the mention of the priest, Two Legs clutched the hilt of his scimitar and began flickering his tongue wildly.
“That won’t be necessary,” Scitheron said. “This time. But Zehir hears all, half-ape. Remember that.” He could have had the guard executed, but they couldn’t spare
an able-bodied snakeman, especially for so mild a blasphemy. Seeing the guard suitably chastened, Scitheron continued through the remnant of the walls, to find almost the entire population of the settlement gathered in a plaza, sharing a communal breakfast of whatever the elite abomination hunters—all three of them—had been able to gather in the forest. Once the abominations had been the shock forces of their sect, armed with swords and grasping coils that could crush the life from any enemy. But those left were a sad remnant.