Baldur's Gate II Shadows of Amn (20 page)

It occurred to him that he was looking for a vampire. It was night, but early. Bodhi would have to be someplace as far away from the sun as possible. A cellar under a cellar—what was that? A root cellar? Not a wine cellar, not in this place—in any case, it was a good bet he’d find a vampire in there.

Elhan’s mage seemed sure enough that Bodhi was here. He had some way to feel her or sense her or something. Another improbable force Abdel had to trust.

Abdel knelt over the trapdoor and grabbed the cold iron ring that served as a handle. He almost lifted it open, then stopped himself. He pulled his sword, held its weight, let the creaking of Minsc’s footsteps above calm him, and realized he didn’t want to kill Bodhi. The elves had told him how evil she was, and there was the fact that she was a vampire and all, but there was something there. Reason enough not to kill her at least. He looked at the blade of his sword in the darkness and realized that it wouldn’t kill a vampire anyway.

He slid the sword behind his back, and his right hand found the carved wooden stake tucked into his belt. The elves had given it to him. It was carved from a windblown branch, a branch of a tree in the forest of Tethir, on the edge of the sealed, doomed city of Suldanessellar. They gave it to him to kill Bodhi because if they were to survive, they needed her to die, and needed the artifact she certainly wouldn’t hand over if she were alive.

He squeezed the wooden stake and opened the trapdoor.

The space below was lit by three candles flickering in a very old candelabra made for six. The ceiling was too low to allow Abdel to stand up, and there were no stairs, no ladder. He slid off the edge and dropped to the dirt floor. The place smelled of mildew and rat droppings, and the only thing down there besides the candelabra and Abdel was an empty coffin.

The fact that it was empty filled Abdel with misplaced relief.

Imoen was asleep again, laying under an amazingly sturdy lean-to the elves had woven of vines, sticks, and leaves. Jaheira sat over her, one hand holding her holy symbol and the other on Imoen’s forehead. The prayer came to an end, but where there should have been a surge of healing power there was nothing.

Imoen’s strength was fading fast. Her skin was pale and cool, and she slept most of the time. This was the third healing prayer Jaheira had attempted, and nothing had helped. The evil in Imoen’s veins seemed to be drowning her soul, thanks to Irenicus’s ritual. Mielikki was withholding her grace. It didn’t seem fair, but Jaheira tried to understand.

“Phaere …” Imoen mumbled in her sleep.

“She’s dying,” Yoshimo said from behind her, startling Jaheira.

“Yes,” Jaheira said, not looking back at him.

Yoshimo stepped forward, squatting just behind and next to Jaheira. “What people will do …” the Kozakuran mused.

“For immortality?” Jaheira asked, wetting a rag and wringing it out.

“For immortality,” Yoshimo said, “for coin, for loyalty to a crown, a flag, or a man.”

Jaheira placed the wet rag on Imoen’s forehead—knowing it was a silly, futile gesture but feeling she should do it anyway—and said, “Would they kill?”

Yoshimo laughed at Jaheira’s obvious stab. “Where I come from,” he said, “assassin is an honorable profession.”

“It’s murder,” Jaheira said flatly, “wherever you are.”

“A difference of view,” the Kozakuran said. “People have killed for less, yes?”

Jaheira gently pulled the rag off Imoen’s head.

“Abdel will save her?” Yoshimo asked. He seemed happy enough to change the subject.

“Abdel?” Imoen murmured in her sleep.

Jaheira gently touched her shoulder, and Imoen’s eyes popped open.

“Abdel!” she said, her voice clear and loud in the quiet of the elf camp.

“He’ll be here,” Jaheira told her. “He’ll—”

“Silence!” Imoen growled, her voice deeper now and coarse. Her eyes flashed yellow, and Jaheira gasped. Imoen sat up in a burst of motion, and Jaheira felt a hand grab her and pull her back. Imoen’s jaws snapped in the air in front of Jaheira’s face as if the girl was trying to bite her.

“Imoen—” Jaheira said.

“She’s not herself,” Yoshimo whispered.

Imoen laughed, and it wasn’t her usual pleasant giggle. “Who am I, Kozakuran?”

“Bhaal…” Jaheira answered for him.

As if in response, Imoen fell back onto the bed of leaves and was asleep.

Abdel pulled the punch he threw into Gaelan Bayle’s midsection, which was the only reason Bayle survived.

“I’d like very much to kill you,” Abdel told him.

Bayle’s only response was a series of rumbling coughs.

“Oh,” Minsc breathed, “I’m sure that did hurt, Boo.”

Abdel looked over at the red-haired madman and said, “You need to go for a walk or something, Minsc. The Copper Coronet is closed for the night.”

Minsc looked at Bayle then back at Abdel, smiled, and left quickly, whispering, “Looks like we’ll need a new job soon, Boo.”

“Where is she?” Abdel asked for the third time. “And remember what I told you would happen if I had to ask a fourth time.”

Bayle looked up and forced a spittle-lined smile. “All right,” he gasped, “all right … two thousand … gold pieces. That’s my … that’s my final … my final offer.”

Abdel returned his smile and drew back his arm. Bayle closed his eyes, trying to prepare himself for the blow that was coming soon and would likely kill him.

“I knew you’d come,” Bodhi said, sliding out from behind the curtain leading into the back room. “You can let him go.”

Abdel turned back to Bayle, who smiled at him and winked. Abdel smashed his fist into Bayle’s face and dropped the bartender like a bad habit.

Abdel didn’t bother watching Bayle hit the ground. He looked up at Bodhi and took her in all at once. She was dressed in a tight silk dress that shimmered in patterns of vines and spiders. Her hair fell around her pale face and accentuated her gray eyes. Her face was regal and perfect, and Abdel could see that she might have once been an elf. She wore no jewelry or shoes.

She stepped closer to him and said, “You’ve come to kill me.”

Abdel saw her glance at the wooden stake in his belt, and he met her gray eyes. They seemed calm and confident. Abdel knew she was sure he wasn’t going to kill her, but of course he was.

“Everyone has been lying to you, Abdel,” Bodhi said, her voice as sincere as any voice Abdel had ever heard. “I’ve lied to you … over and over … but I’m not the only one. What did they tell you?”

“Who?” Abdel asked.

“The elves,” she said, stepping closer still. Abdel’s hand went to the stake, but he didn’t pull it out. “They told you, what? That I was an elf once? That I did something terrible to them or one of the sacred thises or holy whatses?”

“They told me—”

“A giant crock of horsesh—”

“Enough!” Abdel roared, yanking the stake from his belt but stepping back one stride.

“Abdel …” she said, and he looked her in the eyes again. “I’m sorry. I had to do all these things. I had no choice and neither did you.”

“I had—”

“No choice,” she said again. “Name one thing in the last month you decided to do on your own.”

Abdel sighed, and Bodhi’s eyes softened. Her pupils seemed to widen, and Abdel felt his jaw relax, felt his grip on the stake relax, then a yellow fog passed over his vision.

“Abdel,” Bodhi whispered, “be with me…”

Irenicus had warned her that this might happen, and Bodhi had very casually brushed it off, saying she’d seen monsters before. In more ways than one, she was a sort of monster herself, wasn’t she?

But what she saw Abdel transform into, she really wasn’t ready for.

The stake in his hand snapped in half first, then the link she’d established with him broke all at once, and his body contorted and transformed.

Bodhi was fast, fast enough to stay away from the Abdel-Bhaal thing—the raving, murderous beast. It smashed the bar to splinters and sent stools and chairs hurtling through the air so fast and so hard they shattered the plaster when they hit the walls. White dust was in the air, and the room was full of deafening sounds: roars, the footfalls of something heavier than an elephant, shattering glass, splintering wood, crumbling brick, and disintegrating plaster.

At first the thing was just breaking up the place, lashing out at everything close enough to smash. Bodhi wasn’t sure exactly what to do. This was as close to an avatar of the dead God of Murder that anyone alive had ever been, and she admitted to herself that she was well out of her depth.

She knew she couldn’t turn and run … or could she?

She didn’t have a chance to decide before the thing that used to be Abdel turned and fixed its blazing yellow eyes on her.

Jaheira was practically panting, and Yoshimo’s hand was still on her shoulder for a very long time after Imoen had collapsed back into a deep but fitful sleep.

“She might kill us all before she dies,” Yoshimo said.

Jaheira spun out of his grip and spat, “That’s enough!”

The Kozakuran bowed his head, his eyes fixed on Jaheira’s, and took one deliberate step back.

“She is possessed,” he said pointedly.

Jaheira closed her eyes, calmed herself a little, and said, “I wish it was that easy, Yoshimo.”

She opened her eyes and saw that Yoshimo was looking down at Imoen, his right hand resting uneasily on his sword hilt. She needed to get the Kozakuran away from Imoen before he tried to do something either cowardly or heroic. She stepped to him and put a firm hand on his chest.

“Let’s let her rest,” she said.

Yoshimo glanced at her, then back at Imoen, and said, “Wouldn’t it be the safest thing?”

“Her soul is being drawn away from her and into the part of her blood that carries the essence of the God of Murder,” Jaheira explained. “You haven’t seen what she’s capable of. A burst of temper and an unsettling change in the tone of her voice … you have no idea, Yoshimo.”

“All the more reason,” he said, looking Jaheira in the eye. “There may not be another chance.”

Jaheira pushed him gently and said, “Let’s talk about this outside.”

Yoshimo looked down and nodded reluctantly. “You have a few moments, but if she moves again….”

Jaheira sighed, happy to feel Yoshimo step back, happier to see him turn and duck out of the lean-to.

“If I have to,” she said to his receding back, “I’ll kill her myself.”

She followed him out, and they walked a short distance in silence before Yoshimo turned to her and said, “What will convince you that you have to?”

“All hope exhausted,” she answered flatly.

“Spoken like a true priestess,” was his curt reply.

“Druid, actually,” she joked, though her heart wasn’t in the banter.

“There’s a chance Abdel has already failed,” Yoshimo said. “I understand your confidence in him, but Bodhi is no ordinary woman and more than a match for your strong young friend, blood of a god or no.”

“I’ll have to tell you again that you have no idea what this god’s blood can do.”

Bodhi’s whole body exploded in pain—a kind of burning agony she hadn’t experienced since before she’d become a vampire. Things had pierced her flesh before, but weapons of steel or claw never hurt her. A blade had to be enchanted to make her bleed. No fist could bruise her, and no claw could rend her, but here she was, being torn apart by this thing’s bare hands.

She’d tried to speak to him, to hypnotize him, to run from him, but nothing worked. The roof had been ripped off the Copper Coronet, revealing the dark, moonless sky. The thing that was once Abdel Adrian had destroyed the tavern, then turned its full attention on Bodhi. She’d even tried to tell him where to find the pieces of the Rynn Lanthorn. She’d tried admitting all her lies and manipulations. She’d even said she was sorry.

It took her leg off, and the pain was literally blinding. It ripped her arm off, and she almost passed out. She could feel cool blood drying all over her.

The creature bit into her chest, and she could feel her heart burst, and more blood exploded out everywhere. One of her breasts came off in its mouth, and she screamed. The sound was as alien in her ears as it was in her throat.

“Abdel!” she screamed, the blood that had filled her throat fountaining out with the name. “I love you … I loved you, Abdel….”

The inhuman, wild eyes that had been burning a solid, hot yellow flickered, and the huge, misshapen head tilted to one side.

“Abdel,” Bodhi said, and for the first time in more years than most humans could count, she started to cry.

He started coming back all at once, and watching his transformation actually succeeded in distracting Bodhi from the fact that she’d been ripped to pieces. There were few enough ways to kill a vampire, but that was one of them. Her head was still attached to her shoulders though, and at least some part of her heart still quivered spasmodically in her chest. Bodhi came to the nightmare realization that she could live for hours, no days, years, even centuries just exactly like this—in agony.

“Bodhi,” he said, in a voice that almost sounded like Abdel’s.

“Abdel, please …” she said.

His hand came back to normal in the time it took for him to reach for, grab hold of, and lift the sharp half of the broken wooden stake. The yellow faded from his eyes.

“Where?” he asked, his all too human face covered, dripping in blood.

She coughed out another gout of cool red blood and said, “My casket… under the soil. In the dirt.”

A tear slipped out of one of Abdel’s eyes, and Bodhi hoped it would fall on her. It might have, but she couldn’t see or feel it.

“Careful,” she whispered, shifting her blood-drenched shoulders to turn her open chest to him. The movement sent wave after wave of burning agony through her, but she had to do it. It would be hard enough.

Abdel held the point of the stake over the last remaining fragment of Bodhi’s heart.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered.

She felt the stake go in, heard something that might have been dry leaves blowing over stone, and there was nothing.

Finally.

Jaheira was about to turn and go back to the lean-to when a blast of hot air blew her off her feet.