The wheels fell off, and the platform holding the tree dropped a few feet to the ground. The tree settled into the earth as if it had been there forever, suddenly just a part of the landscape, smaller than the surrounding trees, but not otherwise noticeably out of place. The leaves and bark were different from the other trees in the jungle in some way Glory couldn’t immediately articulate, since her sum total knowledge of trees was limited to the fact that some shed their leaves in the autumn while others had needles.
“Farewell, tiefling,” Quelamia said. “You have full authority over the camp, but don’t worry-it won’t be for long.”
“Wait wait wait. You’re going?”
Quelamia nodded. “My true mission here has been accomplished. And my ostensible mission, to serve Travelers of the Serrat family, is irrelevant, as the Travelers no longer serve any purpose. So I will go, yes.”
“You’d better tell me what in the blasted ruins of Mulhorand is going on here.” Glory crossed her arms. “I’m tired of the cryptic I’m-a-million-year-old-feything routine. I want answers, and if you don’t give them to me, I’ll take them.”
Quelamia cocked her head. “There’s no reason it can’t be told, though I’m not inclined to stay here and do the telling. The Serrats may be wroth about my role in this, and though they pose no threat to me, I don’t relish conflict, so I had best be going. Yes, I think it’s better if you take the answers. Reach into my mind, then. I have something to show you.” The wizard took Glory’s warm hands in her own cool ones, and opened her mind.
Glory was used to slipping in through cracks in automatic mental defenses, but going into the eladrin’s mind was like strolling in through an open door-though she got the sense that openness would extend only to the one particular room of her mind that Quelamia wanted her to see. The room was actually the size of all outdoors, specifically the jungle, specifically at night. Dark trees crowded in from the sides, and in the center, there was a ruined plaza, and Quelamia sat cross-legged on the stones.
This is fifteen years past, Quelamia whispered into Glory’s mind, which was quite a trick, since Glory was inside her mind.
A figure emerged from the trees, cloaked in a garment of dust and shadows, and sat cross-legged across from Quelamia on the ground. “Eladrin,” it said, voice a whisper.
“God,” Quelamia said, nodding as if greeting an equal. “You may call me Quelamia.”
“You may call me the Serpent Lord, Master of Poisons and Shadows, Keeper of Secrets and Teller of-”
“I will call you Zehir, if you don’t mind.” Quelamia was polite. “The full list of honorifics would be rather time consuming, and I should get back to camp before I’m missed.”
Zehir laughed like a hundred serpents hissing at once. The form underneath the cloak didn’t move like a human body at all. “Fair enough. This shouldn’t take long. We have certain parallel interests. You want to stop the Slime King of the derro from opening a vast portal to the Far Realm, and to cut off the roots of the poisoned terazul trade.”
“And you want to punish the derro for some transgression against you.”
“The Slime King was one of my servants once. She betrayed me, and my other followers, and went over to the derro. That was some time ago, as humans reckon the years, but I’ve only just noticed in the past dozen years or so-I’m a busy god. I’d like to see the traitor’s works destroyed and my people freed.”
Quelamia nodded. “And you believe you have an instrument in the caravan.”
“Zaltys,” Zehir said, ending the name in a hiss. “She is only a babe now, but she will grow up, and when she does she should be the direct cause of the Slime King’s downfall. There are certain pleasing symmetries in that arrangement, which you would not appreciate. Zaltys is my chosen one. Shutting off access to the Far Realm would distress the Slime King, but, ah, reducing the amount of madness in the world is hardly my area of expertise.”
“Fine,” Quelamia said briskly. “I can help make sure Zaltys is raised to learn martial skills, and magical and psionic ones, if she shows any aptitude. And I can offer weapons capable of combating the influence of the Far Realm-a shard of the Living Gate, a dagger imbued with the power of the Feywild, perhaps other things. I can give Zaltys the means to achieve what you ask. What will you provide?”
“Guidance through the Underdark, where I’m able. Safe passage, where it’s possible. A push in the right direction if things go off course. There are forces in the dark that would stand against me, but I can provide certain advantages, if not overwhelming ones. And of course, I am a god. I can influence events in such a way that Zaltys will want to go into the Underdark to rescue my servants. It’s remarkable what one can achieve with dreams and visions and whispers. And the odd snake to lead someone out of the dark.”
“I trust you will do so subtly,” Quelamia said. “If the Serrat family had known that I intended to destroy so much of their livelihood … if Alaia knew that I had planned to let Zaltys find out what she truly is …”
“Seeing such treachery in a noble eladrin is a rare and delicious thing,” the god said, voice dark with amusement. “Are you sure you don’t want to become my worshiper? You wouldn’t be the first eladrin to pledge herself to me, though I admit, it’s been some time since the last one.”
Quelamia turned her face away. “You repulse me. If I could do this on my own, I would, but venturing into the Underdark personally is too perilous for me.”
Zehir waved a hand-not that it was really a hand-in dismissal. “We have a common enemy in these derro scum and their dabblings in the Far Realm. That doesn’t mean you and I have to stop being enemies.” He rose. “I think we’re done here.”
“How will I know when the time has come for Zaltys to go into the caves?” Quelamia said.
“Oh, you’ll see. I’d hate to spoil the surprise. Let’s just say I’ll send a suitable emissary from the Underdark.”
Quelamia nodded. “I will trust in your ability to scheme and plot, god.”
“As well you should. We won’t meet again-either we’ll succeed, and it won’t be necessary, or we’ll fail, and you’ll probably be dead.” The cloak fell to the ground, and scores of serpents writhed and wriggled out, streaking into the jungle.
“Gods are so dramatic,” Quelamia observed to no one. Then she turned her head, and looked right at Glory, which should have been impossible, since Glory was only spying on a memory. “Psion,” she said softly. “I assume you’re watching this. Do tell Alaia I’m sorry, would you? I didn’t mean to trouble her family or destroy her livelihood, any more than a man who cuts down a tree for firewood means to deprive birds of their nests. It is merely an unintended consequence of a necessary act. Now, if you please, I need some privacy.”
Glory opened her eyes and groaned. She was flat on her back on the ground in the shade of the tree that had, a little while ago, been Quelamia’s trailer. She sat up, rubbing the spot between her horns, and looked around for the wizard, but she was gone. Probably long gone, and gone for good.