Blood of the Fold

He suddenly straightened in his saddle. Of course. The Creator wouldn't want to reveal His intentions to the profane by letting them see disciples who looked the part. Evil would expect the beauty and glory of the Creator to hound them, but would not be spooked to go to ground at the sight of disciples in this guise.

Tobias let out a relieved sigh as he watched the mriswith leaning in, conferring with one another, and with the sorceress, in whispers. She called herself a Sister of the Light, but she was still a sorceress, a streganicha, a witch. He could understand the Creator using the mriswith as messengers, but he couldn't understand why He would give streganicha such authority.

Tobias wished he knew what they had to talk about all the time. Ever since the streganicha had joined them the day before, she had kept company almost exclusively with the five scaled creatures, having precious few words for the lord general of the Blood of the Fold. The six of them kept to themselves, as if they only happened to be traveling the same direction as Tobias and his company of a thousand.

Tobias had seen but a handful of the mriswith dispatch hundreds of D'Haran soldiers, and so felt less uneasy about only having two fists of his men with him. The rest of his force of over a hundred thousand of the Fold waited a little more than a week out of Aydindril. Tobias had been told by the Creator, when He had come in a dream that first night with his army, that they were to remain behind, to participate in the conquest of Aydindril.

"Lunetta," he said in a quiet tone as he watched the Sister gesticulating in her conversation with the mriswith.

She stepped her horse closer to his right side. She took his cue and kept her voice low. "Yes, my lord general?"

"Lunetta, have you seen the Sister use her power?"

"Yes, Lord General, when she moved the windfall from our way."

"Could you tell her power from that?" Lunetta gave him a sltgnt nod. "Does she have the power you do, my sister?"

"No, Tobias."

He smiled over at her. "That be. good to know." He glanced around to make sure no one was near, and the six were still visible. "I am oecoming puzzled by some of the things the Creator has been telling me in the last few nights."

"Do you wish to tell Lunetta?"

"Yes, but not now. We'll talk about it later."

She idly stroked her pretties. "Perhaps when we can be alone. It be time to stop soon."

Tobias didn't miss the demure smile, or the offer. "We'll not be stopping early tonight." He lifted his nose as he took a deep whiff of the cold air. "She's so close I can almost smell her."

Richard counted the landings on his way down so he would be able to find their way back. He thought he could remember the rest of it because of the sights along the way, but the inside of the tower was disorienting. It smelled of rot, like a deep bog, probably because water that came in the open windows collected in the bottom.

At the next landing platform, Richard saw a shimmering to the air as he approached. In the light coming from the globe he was holding, he could see something standing to the side. Its edges glowed in the humming light. Though the thing wasn't solid, he recognized it as a mriswith standing with its cape drawn around itself.

"Welcome, skin brother," it hissed.

Berdine flinched. "What was that?" she whispered urgently.

Richard caught hold of her wrist as she tried to put herself in front of him — she had her Agiel in her fist — and pulled her to the other side of him as he continued on. "It's just a mriswith."

"Mriswith!" she whispered in a hoarse tone. "Where?"

"Right here on the landing, by the rail. Don't be afraid, it won't hurt you."

She clutched his black cape after he forced down her arm with the Agiel. They stepped onto the landing.

"Have you come to wake the sliph?" the mriswith asked.

Richard frowned. "Sliph?"

The mriswith opened its cape to point with the three-bladed knife in its c!aw down the stairs. When it did so, it became solid and fully visible, a figure of dusky scales and cape. "The sliph is down there, skin brother." Its beady eyes came back up. "She is accessible, at last. Soon, it will be time for the yabree to sing."

"Yabree?"

The mriswith lifted its three-bladed knife and gave it a little wiggle. Its slit of a mouth widened into sort of a smile. "Yabree. When the yabree sing, it will be the time of the queen."

"The queen?"

"The queen needs you, skin brother. You must help her."

Richard could feel Berdinc trembling as she pressed against him. He decided that he should be going before she became too frightened, and started down the steps.

Two landings down, she was still hanging on to him. "It's gone," she whispered in his ear.

Richard looked back up and saw that she was right.

Berdine muscled him into the recess of a doorway, flattening his back up against a wood door. Her penetrating blue eyes were intense with agitation. "Lord Rahl, that was a mriswith."

Richard nodded, a little puzzled by her ragged panting.