Ch. 5…The Hall of Preservation
As soon as we returned to the room that I was beginning to think of as ours (as if I were a guest in some manor house and not a prisoner in an underground dungeon), Ulene threw her arms around my neck.
"You saved me," she murmured and then she kissed me two, three times. I stroked her hair.
"You were only in danger because of me," I said. "I'm afraid…" and then she kissed me again.
"It is him, not you," she whispered in my ear. "Never doubt that. And I fear my sisters and I will not survive much longer no matter what any of us does." She sighed and clutched me tighter. "You have seen our trees."
Their trees were dying, here in this hellish place. She was right.
"He will never free us," she said. "We have failed him. For that, he shall let us die." And she sighed again in sad resignation.
"I don't understand." She just shook her head.
"We cannot give him what was taken from him," she said. "Now he seeks it in you. If you cannot give it to him, you will share our fate."
"But what has he lost? What does he want so badly that he will kill and torture to get it back?"
"He will not tell us," she said. "He is so cold and bitter. I think it must be love—to be able to feel love again."
Surely that could not be right. No one could mistake power for love, or believe that love could be compelled through fear and pain. That would be…madness.
I bathed quickly and dressed in yet more new and unfamiliar clothes. Ulene had winced when she saw the bruises on my back and ribs and brought me a healing potion from a small chest under the bed. By then my hair was fairly dry. Ulene combed it out and braided it in one tail down my back.
When the door opened, I assumed one of the other dryads was bringing supper. I was wrong. The man that entered moved with total confidence. He gave me a smile that contained such a mix of familiarity and insolence that I thought I must surely know him and had merely forgotten. But I could never have forgotten his face, both handsome and repellent in equal parts. What first struck me were his eyes, which glowed like red gems. Drow are said to have such eyes but he was no drow. His skin was pale, not dark, and his ears were small and rounded like a human's. His hair was cut short, like some warriors prefer, but he was richly dressed, like a noble or courtier.
Ulene stiffened by my side, and I knew he was no stranger to her, and no friend.
"Why are you here, Nalron?" she asked. He stepped closer, and when he did so, I caught his scent, a strange, rank and almost fetid odor so overpowering that I found myself taking a step backward in disgust. I suspected then what he was and Ulene's words confirmed it.
"I did not invite you in, cambion," she said. He was the spawn of a human and a fiend.
"Have you forgotten so quickly how I expect to be greeted?" Nalron asked and he smirked at her. Expressionlessly, she moved towards him and stood very still as he bent down to kiss her. He gave her no polite peck on the cheek. I watched in astonishment and growing wrath as he gave her a deep probing kiss and as his hands pushed her clothing out of the way and caressed her body. As soon as he released her, she stepped away but would not meet my eyes.
"That is better," Nalron said to her bowed head. "A pity we have so little time, for you know, my pet, how long it takes to sate my lust. Alas, our master has requested that I entertain the little god-child here while he is occupied with other business."
Nalron turned his burning gaze upon me.
"I am Nalron," he said and he held out his hand to me.
"I am Lorian of Candlekeep," I replied, and I had to work to keep the anger out of my voice. Reluctantly, I touched his hand in greeting. His thick meaty fingers closed around mine.
Because of my own peculiarities, I tend to notice people's hands. Instead of human nails, he had dark blunted claws. I half expected him to crush my fingers or to send a jolt of power through me but he did no more than hold my fingers longer than seemed necessary or polite. His hand was dry but feverishly warm.
"Lorian of Candlekeep," he murmured. "Son of a dead god, kin-slayer, protector of fair maidens, and a bard whose music can almost soften a heart of stone," he said mockingly. His eyes bored into me but if there was a message there, I could not read it. He released my hand at last.
"Like you, I am a prisoner here, or a slave, if you will," he told me. "However, I have earned a position of some trust with our master, and he permits me certain…liberties." He smiled at Ulene, who still kept her head down.
"For now, I have been asked to show you the Hall of Preservation." From Ulene's slight shudder, I could guess that this was no place I would wish to see.
It wasn't.
Huge glass jars filled with some viscous liquid housed the battered and broken bodies of humans, elves, and other people less easily identified. A strange apparatus connected the jars, which were lit from below with an eerie blue light, showcasing the pitiful remains within. I could sense Nalron's silent presence at my back as I walked through the large cavern, staring with horrified fascination.
"For the gods' sake, what is the purpose of this display?" I finally had to ask. We had stopped before the jar holding the body of an elven man, who had obviously died in some horrific fire. His skin, little more than a blackened crust, hung from his flesh in patches and his eyes and much of his face had been burned away. "Are these the bodies of his enemies? Or are they specimens? Is this perhaps some bizarre memorial?"
Nalron laughed.
"My dear Lorian, these are what remains of our master's most trusted friends and allies," he said. Then he rapped his knuckles against the glass. The man—the body—turned and pressed his charred fingers against the side of the jar.
"Release me!" the elf cried. Some sort of magical amplification made him sound as if he were standing right beside us instead of immersed in liquid stasis. I stumbled back in horror, bumping into Nalron.
"Sweet Sune, he is alive," I whispered. The imprisoned man heard me.
"I still feel the pain, master," he said. "I burn—oh Seldarine, I burn! You promised to heal me when you had the power." His voice broke in a sob. "Please don't leave me here like this! Master, have you forgotten me? You promised…you promised…"
"Come away," Nalron said, and with his hand on my shoulder, he steered me towards the door. He leaned into me and he radiated heat like a stove.
"This will be your fate if you fail Irenicus," he said. "You face eternal life in a bottle, forsaken and alone, with madness and despair your only companions."
"Death would be better," I said, trembling with sick horror.
"Indeed it would be," the cambion said. "Death would be the release you would pray for with every thought. And death would be denied you for as long as the mage lives."
"What does he want from me?"
Nalron's fingers tightened on my shoulder. His stench seemed to flow over me like a fog. As if aware of my thought, he said, "I can smell the taint within you, Lorian. Like blood freshly spilled, it calls to me." I shut my eyes to evade his blood-colored eyes but his words could not be avoided.
"You deny it, push it away. You pretend it doesn't exist. But Lorian, your god's blood is your only hope. You must learn to nourish and embrace the taint within you. It is your salvation."
"I can't," I said. "I would lose myself. I would lose…everything."
"He will strip everything from you until there is nothing left but the taint," Nalron whispered in my ear. "That is his goal—can you not feel it? You must feed the power within or it will be taken from you, along with everything else. And then—the bottle."
I shuddered and shook my head.
"I can help you," Nalron said. His breath was warm against my ear. He was attempting to manipulate me with his words—as a bard, I am experienced in such things—but that did not mean that he was lying. Everything Irenicus had done to me was aimed at this one goal—to force me to surrender myself to Bhaal's power. I could still remember the terrifying dreams that had plagued me when my dead father's power first began to show itself. I had never been told of my heritage and I had thought I was losing my mind.
I wanted to refuse his help. I wanted to say that I would never give myself over to the taint within me. I wanted to believe that I would never fall to the evil inside me.
But Irenicus had shaken that belief. I no longer knew what I was capable of doing. I did not know what to say, so I said nothing.
Nalron smiled and he squeezed my shoulder.
"Come," he said. "I have something else to show you."
The cambion led me down yet another dark side passage. This place was a maze.
"What is that sound?" I asked. There was a whir, as if from some giant's spinning wheel, and a crackling noise like throwing wet wood onto a bonfire.
"It is yet another of Irenicus' contraptions. He is as ingenious as any six gnomes," Nalron said a bit contemptuously. The cambion opened a door that I could barely see in the gloom, and then there was the blue flash of lightning. I blinked in the sudden glare.
A djinni, half again my height, was chained against the cavern wall. In the center of the cavern was the rotating device which I had heard, and from time to time it spit out bolts of raw electrical energy at the djinni. He groaned in agony but bit his lip and fell silent when Nalron approached the machine.
"I believe you have yet to experience this device," he said to me.
"What is—this is used for torture?"
"Malaaq here has yet to learn the importance of swift and unquestioning obedience," Nalron said, giving the djinni a cruel smile. "The strength and frequency of the shocks are governed by this dial here," he told me. "But watch." He turned the dial and the pitch of the machine's hum dropped significantly. "At the lowest intensities, the sensation becomes one more of pleasure than pain, particularly for a creature from the Plane of Air. Is that not correct, Malaaq?" He turned to me and smirked. "He can become quite aroused by a gentle hand at the controls."
The djinni closed his eyes and turned his face away.
"In time Malaaq can be taught to love and crave his torture just as sometimes a penitent learns to love the scourge more than the sins he commits to earn his punishment." He gave me a slow evil smile. "Is that not…interesting? I can teach you to love and crave the taint within you, Lorian. I can help you." His smile and his gaze turned intimate.
"You are an affront to the gods," I said in a low voice. I turned away but the cambion caught my arm before I could leave the cavern and swung me back to face him.
"Neither squeamishness nor goodness will serve you here," he said. "Nor will the gods save you. I have heard you pray to Sune. Do you think she can hear you in this place?" He raised his free hand to my face and dug his claws lightly into my cheek. "Do you think your goddess will still love you when I ruin your handsome face?"
I froze and the cambion's eyes glittered with satisfaction. It was well known that Sune would turn away from the disfigured.
"Irenicus may cling to his foolish desire for beauty despite everything he has learned but you see the truth, do you not? Anything beautiful withers and dies at his touch." His claws caressed me. "You have seen the jars. There is no beauty here, only horror and death. Give yourself over to the chaos within and you may yet save yourself." I felt his fingers flex and I knew he longed to slash the flesh from my face.
"That's enough," Irenicus said from the doorway. For a moment there was a look of utter hatred in Nalron's eyes, and then he gave a mocking smile and turned to face the mage.
"I see the little god-child is not the only squeamish one here," the cambion said with a sneer. "I have told you what you need to do." The mage took three quick steps into the room, his face set with anger. "The sooner you recover your manhood the better, Jon."
Irenicus struck him a backhanded blow that must have been augmented with magic, for the cambion flew back and slammed into the wall behind him with a sound that would have meant broken ribs or a broken spine in a human.
"Stay here," he told me curtly. He gave the cambion a vicious kick and then grabbed him by the collar and dragged him out of the chamber. As soon as he was out of sight, the djinni beckoned me to come closer.
"We only have a moment," he whispered and despite the noise of the machine behind us, I could easily hear his voice in my head. "Free me, and I will do my best to free you as well."
"Can you free my companions also?" He frowned at me but nodded.
"Be they prisoners here, I will attempt to free them."
"How do I release you?" The manacles that held him to the wall seemed magical in nature.
"The mage has a flask in his possession. You will know it when you see it. If you can find it and bring it to me, I can free myself from his geas."
"Where is it?" I asked but the djinni gave me a warning look and fell silent. A moment later, Irenicus returned alone. He strode to the machine's controls and turned it off.
"Return to your lamp, Malaaq," he said. The manacles opened and then the djinni disappeared. A swirl of wind brushed past me and he was gone.
"His lamp?" I asked. There was no lamp in the room. The mage gave me a frown.
"Come," was all he said.
He moved with the quick steps of exasperation and I hustled to keep up.
"Nalron has his uses but he may be more trouble than he is worth," he said. I thought he was talking to himself but then he turned and looked at me. "I may let you kill him."
It was difficult to know how to respond to that so I said nothing. Apparently that wasn't good enough.
"Would that please you?" he asked. He slowed his pace.
"I don't know that any death would please me," I said after a moment's thought. Except yours. The mage gave one of his small cold smiles.
"Perhaps I should tell you what he has done to your friend Imoen."
"Where is she?" I asked and I found myself grasping his arm. The look he gave me made me release him though. "Is she well?"
"She lives," he said casually. He kept walking. "I may let you see her in time," he added, "If you continue to please me as you have today."
I had pleased him by killing one of his duergar slaves. I wondered what it would take to continue to please him. If killing a cambion was what he wanted of me—I thought I could find the will to do so.