Arvin didn’t bother to ask whether the cleric meant that literally-whether he was threatening to turn Arvin to stone-or whether he was simply promising to reimpose the spell that had held Arvin motionless earlier. Either way, Arvin didn’t really want to find out. He spread his hands in a peace gesture.

“Fine,” he said. “Let’s talk.”

CHAPTER 11

24 Kythorn, Evening

Arvin paced back and forth like an animal in a cage. He’d been trapped in this room for ages with a man he could neither charm nor fight his way past. He wanted to be out doing something. Only two days had passed since Zelia planted the mind seed, but already Arvin was starting to lose control. If he didn’t do something soon he might make another dangerous-possibly fatal-mistake. And there was a chance, it seemed, that Naulg might still be alive. But all Arvin could do was weave his way back and forth, back and forth, across the floor.

He and the cleric-Nicco, his name was-were alone in the room now. Kayla had awakened some time ago, as refreshed as if she’d never succumbed to fever at all. She’d been summoned from the room by Gonthril, presumably to join the suicidal raid on the royal palace. Arvin supposed that was the last he’d ever see of her.

Arvin had passed the time by telling Nicco his story-omitting any mention of Zelia, since the news that he was gathering information for a yuan-ti was hardly going to endear him to the rebels. Thinking of her-and the mind seed-made him wonder. Hazzan’s dispelling hadn’t broken its hold over Arvin, but perhaps clerical magic might succeed where wizardry had failed.

“I’ve been thinking about the potion,” Arvin began. “Hazzan’s dispelling doesn’t seem to have worked. I still seem to be turning into a yuan-ti. In mind, if not in body.”

Nicco nodded grimly. “You do seem to be under some sort of magical compulsion-from time to time. Right now, I’d say you were your own man. But when you attacked me earlier…”

“I’m sorry about that,” Arvin repeated. “I wasn’t… in my right mind.”

“Apology accepted.”

“You recognized me as a psion earlier,” Arvin said. “How?”

“You cast a charm spell without using either a holy symbol or hand gestures. Some wizards and sorcerers can cast spells with stilled hands or silenced lips, but the faint ringing sound I heard when you tried to charm me confirmed my guess. You’re a psion.”

Arvin’s hopes rose. “Not many people know what a psion is.”

Nicco shrugged. “I’m widely traveled.”

“Have you dispelled psionic powers before?”

“Yes… why?”

Arvin smiled. Maybe Nicco could help him. “I’ve been wondering if the potion I was forced to drink might have contained a component that was psionic, rather than sorcerous,” Arvin said. “If it did, Hazzan might have overlooked it. I was wondering if prayer might succeed where wizardry failed.”

“It might,” Nicco said slowly. “If it is the Doombringer’s will.”

“The Doombringer? Is that the name of your god?”

“In my country he is known as Assuran, Lord of the Three Thunders, but here they call him Hoar.”

“I… think I’ve heard of him,” Arvin said.

“He is the righter of wrongs,” Nicco said with a grim smile. “I heard you whisper Tymora’s name earlier. Like that goddess, Hoar is a bringer of luck-bad luck, but only to those who have called it down upon themselves by their own actions. He seals their doom-and in the process, saves those who are doomed.”

“That’s how I feel, right now,” Arvin said somberly. “Doomed.”

“Talona’s clerics did wrong you,” Nicco agreed. “The Doombringer will surely be moved to set matters right.”

Arvin let out a long, slow hiss of relief. The sooner Zelia’s mind seed was out of his head, the better.

Nicco stared at him. “Hoar’s blessings come with a price.”

Arvin gave the cleric a wry smile. “Nice of you to be up front about it. What is it?” He pictured a healthy tithe, or several tendays of fasting, self-flagellation, and prayer. The clerics who ran the orphanage had been big on flagellation.

“You must do everything you can to bring those who have wronged you to justice. And it must be in as… appropriate a manner as you are able. ‘Blood for blood-that is Hoar’s creed.”

Arvin nodded. It was easy to come up with a suitable punishment for the cultists. Slipping into their water a potion that would polymorph them into sewer rats, for example. But if Nicco’s prayer succeeded in purging the mind seed, would Arvin be expected to also enact vengeance upon Zelia? What could Arvin-an untrained psion-possibly do to someone so powerful? For that matter, did he even want to take revenge on her? She’d saved his life by neutralizing the poison that had nearly killed him, after all. And she had offered to train him in psionics and ensure that the militia would never claim him, in return for information on who was backing the Pox-information Arvin now had.

“I’ll do what I can,” he told Nicco.

That seemed to satisfy the cleric. “Sit,” Nicco instructed. “Hold in your mind the thoughts of vengeance you just imagined.”

Arvin did as instructed, seating himself on one of the pallets and picturing the cultists turning into rats. Nicco knelt in front of him and rested three fingertips on Arvin’s chest. Then he began to pray. “Lord of the Three Thunders, hear my plea. A great wrong has been done to this man. Set it right. Dispel the magic that is transforming him. Drive it from his body by the might of your thundering hand!”

The cleric closed his eyes then, dropping into silent prayer. Arvin heard a crackling sound-and a tiny spark erupted from each of Nicco’s fingertips and shot through the fabric of Arvin’s shirt. Arvin jerked back as they stung his chest.

Nicco smiled and dropped his hand. “The Doombringer has answered.”

Arvin pulled his shirt away from his chest and saw, with relief, that his skin was still intact. He let out a long, slow hiss-then realized what he’d just done. His headache wasn’t gone either. “I don’t think your prayer worked,” he told Nicco. “I feel… the same.”

Nicco scowled. “Impossible. You felt Hoar’s power at work. Whatever remained of the potion will be neutralized, now.”

Arvin nodded. The potion indeed might be neutralized, but the mind seed was still in place. Zelia’s psionics must be more powerful than either Hazzan’s spells or Nicco’s prayers.

He eyed the door, wondering when the rebels were going to return. He wanted to be well on his way before Chorl came back. Could Arvin convince Nicco that he posed no threat to the Secession, that he should be allowed to leave? Perhaps… if Nicco could be persuaded that he was an ally, a friend. But that would be difficult, without charming Nicco. Instead, Arvin would be forced to rely upon more conventional means. Conversation.

Fortunately, there was always one sure way to get a cleric talking.

“Tell me more about your faith,” he told Nicco. “How did you come to worship Hoar?”

Nicco gave Arvin a searching look. Then he shrugged and sat down on a pallet next to the one on which Arvin was sitting. “In Chessenta, slaves are not branded,” he began. “The only mark of their servitude is a thread around the wrist.”

Arvin had no idea what this had to do with Nicco’s religion, but his interest was piqued at once. “A magical thread?” he asked.

Nicco smiled. “No. An ordinary thread.”

“But what’s to stop the slave from breaking it?”

“Nothing,” Nicco said.

Arvin frowned, puzzled.

“Slavery isn’t a cruelty, as it is here, but a retribution,” Nicco continued. “Here, innocent men and women are forced into servitude against their will and work until the day they die. In Chessenta, the term of slavery is fixed. It is imposed, following a public trial and a finding of guilt, as punishment for breaking the law. The criminal is a slave until his sentence is up then becomes a free man once more. The work slaves are set to can be hard and dangerous, but sometimes, if a slave performs well, his master may negate his sentence by breaking the thread.” He paused, and the glower returned. “Of course, that is how it is supposed to work.”