Or could he? Doing so would make it appear that he was attacking simple pilgrims. He noted two more behind the three. Five men and still their purpose was unclear. They pushed as hard as possible to reach him, even though they had to assume that he now kept an eye on each. What was the Triune hoping to achieve?
And suddenly, he knew.
Uldyssian pulled back from the eager supplicants. Even as he turned, with his mind he sought out Serenthia.
She was there, but not alone. Two figures, a small girl and an elderly man, held hands with her. Likely, Serenthia had sought to bring them to him. However, her expression—mostly puzzlement—indicated that she was just becoming aware of something amiss.
To his own heightened senses, there was very much wrong. He could see them for what they were even though they wore the semblances of others and seemed impossibly small and weak in comparison to their true, foul selves.
Morlu.
Uldyssian reached out for Serenthia, his power simultaneously rising up to strike the disguised creatures.
But in the next second, the morlu vanished…and with them, Serenthia.
10
Not again! Not again!
Those two words repeated themselves over and over in Uldyssian’s head. First Achilios, then Mendeln, and now, Serenthia. One by one, those nearest to him had been lost. It in no way eased his pain that he now suspected what had happened to his brother. Surely the morlu, using some spell, had materialized around Mendeln and stolen him away just as they had done to Serenthia.
But what had happened did not matter. Only somehow trying to save Serenthia. The temple had plotted well; most did not even notice that she was missing. The edyrem were all too busy trying to maintain some order without using their powers…a command given to them by Uldyssian. Even they would not have noticed anything amiss around Serenthia.
But now, alerted silently by Uldyssian, they straightened in disbelief. Eyes turned to where the ravenhaired woman had stood.
And to Uldyssian’s astonishment, Serenthia and her kidnappers reappeared.
She stood as if some mystical spirit summoned to the mortal plane. Around her there once again glowed the aura. Her hair flew about, as if caught up in a storm. A grim smile crossed her face.
The glow about her shot without warning toward the figures holding her hands. Hissing escaped both the young girl and the elderly male, an inhuman hissing. In the blink of an eye, their skin burned away and as it did, both their shapes and height severely altered…until the two morlu stood revealed before the masses.
“Behold the true face of the servants of the Triune!” Serenthia shouted. “Behold the evil hidden from you all these years!”
The morlu that had been a child shifted one hand behind it, the bestial warrior’s reflexes like lightning. The hand came forward again, in it a curved blade as long as Uldyssian’s forearm.
But Serenthia merely eyed the hideous creature as he attacked. The blade dissipated to ash as it reached her chest, leaving the dust to blow back in the startled morlu’s black eye sockets.
Serenthia let go of the undead warrior…who suddenly flung up and over the crowd as if a leaf caught in a tremendous gust. He rose higher and higher, finally crashing into the roof of a building some distance away.
While this had gone on, the second morlu had remained oddly still. The reason for that Uldyssian knew was again Serenthia. Her aura continued to surround the hapless fiend, who could do nothing as she pulled free his own weapon—and then, with one smooth strike, beheaded him.
As the corpse toppled, she looked to Uldyssian. “The Triune has declared itself! They leave no choice! We must move against them immediately!”
He felt her determination mingle with his own. Well aware of the things that the priests might have had in mind for Serenthia, Uldyssian’s anger grew by the second. Still, he swore that he would keep control. Uldyssian wanted no repeat of what had just happened.
“People of Hashir!” he shouted. “This is the truth of the temple! This is—”
His head suddenly filled with what he quickly realized was sinister whispering. At the same time, Uldyssian felt a pressure in his skull, as if something sought to squeeze it to pieces. There came unbidden the brief image of a gaunt, bearded man who, despite his elderly appearance, radiated a darkness akin to that of the late, unlamented Malic and was surely another high priest of the Triune.
Summoning his strength, Uldyssian managed to force the pressure away. Far in the temple, Uldyssian sensed the high priest’s consternation.
Serenthia was suddenly at his side. She placed a hand against the back of his head, cradling it. “Uldyssian, my love! What are they doing to you?”
He could not speak, for just then a violent pain coursed through him, so sharp that his heart nearly ceased beating. Vaguely, he registered that Serenthia was still calling to him. Farther away, there were concerned shouts from others.
Shouts…and then screams. Despite his own dilemma, Uldyssian yet managed to sense that there were more morlu in the immediate vicinity. He tried to rise, but the pain was too intense. Uldyssian managed at least to look up at Serenthia—only her face looked distorted, out of sync.
His ears filled with more shouts, more screams. At some point, the sky had turned red. Uldyssian could make no sense of it—
Then, Serenthia cried out as something dark briefly covered her gaze. She fell back from Uldyssian, who would have tumbled to the stone street if not for another pair of hands seizing him tight.
“I have you,” promised a voice in his ear.
Mendeln’s voice.
Before he could react, the world spun around. The cries and other sounds receded, as if Uldyssian now heard them from the end of a vast tunnel.
At the very last, he heard Serenthia call his name—and then darkness swallowed him.
Darkness and stars. Arihan had absolutely no idea what had gone wrong. Everything had been in place and all the servants had known their roles.
Capture the woman, the Primus had commanded. Capture her and you place a yoke around the male. Arihan had immediately seen the wisdom of that. One glance through a scrying globe had been enough to reveal just how much the fool cared for his companion. To keep her from harm he would give his soul…exactly what the Triune desired.
But all accounts had indicated the woman far weaker than she had just revealed. In Hashir, she had displayed abilities that even Uldyssian ul-Diomed had not. Arihan would have sworn that she was actually even more powerful than the man the sect had been battling. Two morlu had not been enough, even cloaked as they had been by a spell given to him by the Primus.
Through the scrying globe, the priests from Hashir’s temple were frantically asking what was going on. They had no idea yet that the plan had turned into an utter disaster for them. The morlu were evidence enough that the Triune had a darker side than it exhibited and with passions as they were at the moment, Arihan foresaw a violent rush upon the temple that would only end with a bloodbath.
A painful noise in his head finally made the high priest return to the globe. A harsh exhalation escaped Arihan when he saw what those in charge of Hashir had now wrought. Some fool had decided that, since he had not reacted to the unfortunate turn of events, then they had better do something themselves.
And so the cretins had sent out the rest of their morlu after the peasant and his followers, not thinking how the Hashiri would react to this further revelation of the Triune’s true calling.
They are deserving of their fate, the imbeciles! Ignoring any further contact with the priests, Arihan instead surveyed the damage their attempt was causing. Twenty morlu had materialized as if out of thin air among the populace, accompanied by twice that many Peace Warders. However, given orders by those without any good sense, the warriors of the temple were not simply seeking Uldyssian ul-Diomed and his core followers, but anyone near them.