The watching priests made not a sound, but some leaned forward eagerly. Not one looked away, even for an instant, as swiftly building spells erupted into bright bursts, one flaring atop another as the priest who stood alone at their heart cried phrase after phrase, his voice loud now with confidence, his fingers writhing like excited snakes in ever more rapid weavings.
White sparks sheaDied the spellweaver's body, drawing in about him in thick coils, until it seemed a forest of large and ever larger serpents was lovingly encircling their creator. Their twining force slowly lifted the priest off the floor until he stood upright on empty air almost his own height off the ground, hands still furiously shaping spells.
Each new magic reached up, straining toward the lofty ceiling of the chamber. The unfolding spells seemed to draw upon something up there, unseen in the darkness, that sent down spiderweb-thin lines of force-force that blossomed into cold, bright fire when it touched the silently raging serpents woven by the lone priest.
In the heart of the light his incantations gasped and stammered on. Sweat drenched him, and his racing fingers were trembling now, his body shuddering as if fighting to stand against the snatching gusts of a gale.
A spell burst into a sudden shower of sparks, and there came a sudden, brief murmur-part consternation, and part satisfaction-from the watching clergy as the bald priest convulsed, shrieked something despairing, and clawed at the air as if to ward off a pouncing monster.
Sparks fell, and there came another explosion, bright and then dark,
motes of fire raining down in all directions as the spellweaving priest sobbed bitterly. Burst after burst, in swift succession, tore the dancing serpents into a swirling cloud.
At its flickering heart the lone, sweat-soaked figure frantically waved fingers grown impossibly long, trying to shout words with a voice that had suddenly tightened into a loud hiss. A forked tongue darted from grimacing lips as the sparks raced aloft to shape many bright serpent heads-which then struck in unison, lashing down at the wildly gesturing man with terrible speed.
The bald priest screamed under those fangs of light, high and shrill. His suddenly long and rubbery arms flapped helplessly in the brightly boiling radiance-and then caught fire in a long gout of flame.
He screamed again, dancing grotesquely in the rushing conflagration, flesh melting and receding from bones with horrible swiftness. Smaller explosions bloomed and rolled all around that capering figure, and in the wake of each a freed spell fell away from the doomed priest and became a ghostly white serpent of flickering force, writhing and undulating in uncanny silence.
Within this ghostly circle of swaying heads and lashing coils, the dying priest danced on, his flesh melting. His screams became raw, faint and feeble… and he sank to the floor, still dancing-jerking back and forth, helplessly and horribly, like a stick puppet flailed about at a market fair for the amusement of small children.
Sprawled on the dark stone, the priest melted swiftly down to near bones-and as he became more skeletal, the freed, slithering spells dancing around him moved in, coiling into and out of the writhing bones. Where they passed, bones parted, dissolving into streamers of smoke, and shifting… twisting…
The skeleton was soon little more than a flaming skull atop a whirlwind of tumbling bones-remains spun into the undulating shape of a serpent by the ghostly Serpent-spells.
The fading serpent-shape coiled, reared menacingly-and the skull atop it exploded in a puff of bone-dust. The bones below faded, and out of that writhing collapse rose the last glowing wisps of magic, drifting up to whatever it was that hung high overhead in the darkness.
There they shone for one whirling moment around a mottled, hand-sized stone floating alone in midair. Glowed, and then sank into the stone, to glow no longer.
As darkness returned to the ceiling, the watching priests looked down from where the wisps had gone, tightened lips grimly, and sighed-some with wistfulness, and many more with relief.
"This failure was not unexpected," one man said into the silence, his cold tones loud, firm, and flat. "Shall we resume?"
Another priest lifted a hand. "We shall- and with Ghuldart gone, and his boasts and claims with him, one thing is certain: None of us has the might to master the Thrael. The Great Serpent is come not back among us. Yet."
A third, younger priest asked, "Could some of us not cast a few spells of the Thrael each, and so weld together a ruling council from among our ranks? Need it be one man?"
The first priest rose to his feet and replied, "There I hear the voice not just of you, Lothoan, but of all your ilk: the young, eager, and restless amongst us, who thirst for power and see change as no concern at all if it wins us more power swiftly. Hear me, now, all of you younglings. Hear and learn"
Caronthom "Fangmaster" turned slowly to survey all the robed men on the benches. No women sat in the chamber; he and the knives of elder priests of like mind had seen to that. She-priests were vicious and treacherous, but alluring; there would be time enough to empower such when it came to open strife, and such qualities could serve the Brethren-and be the ready excuse for slaughtering the women as soon as it became needful.
"The Serpent who spawned us all was never a god. He was a mortal man, a great wizard-as were all his successors, Great Serpent after Great Serpent. None of us particularly loves serving a tyrant, but this is how it must be. Only one being can be master of the Thrael at a time. Once cast, the Thrael exists as a web of magic whose backlashes slay many linked to it if someone tries to wrest control of the Thrael from its creator, or craft a second Thrael that comes into contact with the first. When we pray to the Great Serpent, we send calls along the Thrael to him, calls he can hear. If he chooses to do so, he sends us back spells or healing energy or raw power, drawing on his own manifest power-which is that of all of us who are touched by the Thrael. Literally, our lives, and those of the sacrifices we slay in specific ways, empower the Thrael and the Great Serpent, and he returns power to us as he sees fit. Forgive this blunt speaking, but 'tis time and past time you heard it shorn of all the 'holy' nonsense we must always cloak it with, to conceal this central secret from lay believers."
Caronthom sighed, threw back his head, and continued, "So I say again: The Serpent was a man, not a god. Great elder magics create his recurring manifestation, and that of the Dragon who opposes him. Divine magics, if you prefer-magics we no longer understand or know how to control, augment, or destroy. From the Serpent we have his teachings, the secrets of the Thrael spells and of its working-and the sacred writings of what has gone before, which stand as lessons to us in what to do and not to do to win power."
He strode slowly along the benches, meeting the gazes of some priests thereon directly, and added, "Wherefore this council is met. As always, we must scheme and work and refine our plots, when seeking to win greater power in Aglirta-for no god aids us. We all saw Ghuldart try and fail to craft the Thrael, and witnessed his fate-and I feel no shame in admitting that, overambitious foolishness aside, Ghuldart was the most confident and powerful seeker amongst us who desired to master the Thrael. None of us is powerful enough to survive those castings."
The second priest rose. "Every word you utter is blunt truth, Caronthom. It should be clear to even the youngest and most restless amongst us that this council's most urgent business has now been determined."
He began his own slow walk along the benches. "You know me as Raunthur the Wise. Hear now my latest wisdom, and know it for no more than truth. We came here to discuss how to win power in the Vale, but could decide nothing until we saw if Ghuldart could ascend to the rank of Great Serpent over us. His failure means we must find and recruit a wizard powerful enough to become the new Great Serpent, so as to conquer Aglirta at last. Each of us-even as we work against the officers and authority of the boy king-must seek suitable men to become our leader. To borrow the words of the Old Viper who taught Caronthom and myself, 'The tyrant we must obey must be found.' "