Amanita (Chapter 3)

Template:Amanita nav Kashya was standing by the bonfire, tense and angry. Like normal, in other words. Believe it or not, I was looking forward to this. Akara came pretty close to apologizing, but I wanted to hear those three little words "I am sorry" out of Kashya's mouth even more. It would be funny if they made her choke. Didn't happen, though. She took one look at me, and thought clear as day: *Oh, look. Oiled black leather. Figures.* Yeah, I blackened the leather. Black is harder to see and goes with everything I own. And I oiled it. That's what you do in wet weather. There's just no pleasing some people.

"Hi there," I said sweetly. "Can I ask you a question?"

"Depends on what it is," she grumbled.

"No, whether or not you answer depends on what it is," I corrected her. She bristled, but I ignored it: "Lady Akara has confided in me. She thinks someone named Blood Raven was involved with the fall of your monastery."

She snorted. "Old news. She was at the center of it." Sadness flashed across her face. She tried to hide it by looking down into the fire, giving me an unprecedented view of the top of her head. "I have no idea why."

"I'll ask her myself later. I've heard she's still around."

"She's in our graveyard." Waves of anger suddenly radiated from her. "She's violating holy ground and raising our own order's dead against us. The Sightless Eye has been our path for centuries. She's thrown all that away, and given herself to our greatest enemy!"

"Your greatest enemy?" I asked, nonchalantly as I could.

She glared at me. "No one has ever taken our monastery from us before. A lot of men have tried. We are warriors in a world that wants us to be cooks, or wives, or..." After a look that should have been sticking out between my shoulder blades, she said, "I don't know who Blood Raven's new master is, if that's what you're asking. But whoever it is likes humiliating women. Go look at her, and our other sisters. You'll see."

Maybe I shouldn't have, but I felt like pushing her buttons. "You're sure I'll share your opinion?"

"It's not an opinion. The graveyard is on the east side of the pass, past the church. Try not to let her kill you."

I smiled. "Gosh, I didn't know you cared."

"I don't. I don't want any more zombies around."

The moors were empty and silent. A lone Rogue stood guard by a fence. Beyond was no-woman's-land, if you believed Kashya. The first thing I found was a waypoint. Good. The old Horadrim made those things for quick travel, everywhere they went. Anyone could use one, unlike most sorcerer toys. Having one handy could save a lot of walking.

The ground got higher and rockier as I moved up the pass. There were more trees to hide behind, and less mud to get stuck in. If my luck was good, I'd never have to sneak through a swamp again. As I made my way through the thick grass, I found an enemy camp: hordes of demon midgets wandered around a small clearing. They milled around idly and chattered in their own language, obviously waiting with nothing to do. It could have been any military camp away from the action if there weren't so many human bones lying around. The skulls on poles were a definite giveaway. Since their leaders raise them from the dead...

My first shot missed. The boss demonling bent down to bite off a flower his followers had somehow missed, so the bolt sailed over his head and killed another one. They all stood there, blinking stupidly, long enough that I made my second shot perfect. Something else raised the leader, ruining one of my better kills. A bigger leader with green skin pointed me out from the far side of the camp, and the whole bunch took off after me.

It could have been bad if they weren't such chickens. Putting a bolt through one sent the rest squealing for their mommies, if demons even have mommies. But they always came back, snarling and shaking their little clubs and knives, even the last one, who should have known better. The leaders wouldn't leave camp. Maybe they were too smart to stray far from daddy, they didn't gang up on me when I jumped in to kill him by hand. Who knows? Maybe they didn't mind so much.

The camp was pretty sad. The only structure was the last corner of a stone building (the demons probably destroyed it themselves) with an untanned hide stretched over it, held with a few pegs. Some human things were ground into the mud: torn cloth, kitchen stuff, random coins, and an identification scroll. No clues about anything important.

While I was searching the camp, Rogues attacked me. Not like Kashya wanted to -- these were working with the enemy. I couldn't see why either. I'm not sure if you could call them "humiliated" so much... more like degraded. For one thing, they couldn't talk. They moved by half-crawling, hunched down near the ground like animals. When they came at me, they attacked with their teeth, which had gotten long and sharp -- one even had horns growing out of her head. The weirdest thing is that they were all wearing g-strings, and that's about all. Maybe I'm going out on a limb here, but I don't think panties that slip up your crack are standard issue among the Rogues. I don't have many body consciousness issues myself, but I had to admit, Kashya had a point. These women were not wearing butt floss because they thought they looked good in it, even the ones that did. Gheed would have liked looking at them, from a safe distance. I didn't have distance, so I had to kill them. As each died, an angry spirit like an animal with horns and huge teeth left her body.

There were a few more possessed Rogues, and some Bigfeet. A few times, I tried knocking whatever spirit was in the Rogues out, but it never worked. They'd wormed their way in too deep for a minor mentalist to pry 'em out. Mostly, the plains were full of whining midgets. It got to the point where I just got tired of looking at them, even to take aim. I haven't seen anything that needed to be put out of its misery that much since I was a kid and had to spend a week feeding our neighbor's spaniel. The dog was completely deaf, mostly blind, and had arthritis so bad he dragged both hind legs, but dear old Mrs. Fluffynutty couldn't bear to have the little bastard put down no matter how much he begged.

A burning mess near one side of the pass must have been the church. There was a tall part that might have been a steeple, and one of the dead guys outside looked like a priest. He was a he, surprisingly enough. I borrowed his studded leather jerkin, and his pants. They were the only pants I'd seen in the whole damn pass, and I'm sure a priest wouldn't want me wandering around being humiliated all day.

There was a cave on the other side of the pass. I like dark places, and I could always use the practice sneaking around. If Blood Raven was raising the dead, the cave was where she was storing them. Everywhere there were zombies, some so old all the flesh was gone and they were nothing but bones. The toughest took enough bolts to hold up a pavilion. At the rear of the cave, a single group of possessed Rogues was hiding out. These dear ladies still had their thigh-high boots, and kept enough of their minds to use weapons -- not very well, but it's the thought that counts. One of the funniest things I found in the cave was an enchanted club someone had named "Corpse Splitter." It had heavy anti-undead magic in it, so the "corpse" part fit, but who would name a club "splitter"?

Charsi noticed my new outfit. "Oh. I think that vest used to be brother Mensel's."

"When I found him, he wasn't in pain any anymore," I said. "If it bothers you, I'll not wear it." Most people, when you offer to do something that spares their feelings, think they're at fault for being upset. Pretending to care lets you get away with a lot.

"No, no, that's all right," she said, still looking sad. "Almost everything we have belonged to someone who's dead now. Why'd you dye it black?"

Good girl. "It's the color of mourning and sadness. Burning churches, you know."

"Oh, I'm sorry," she said, eyes wide. "I didn't know you were upset. It's really hard to tell what you're feeling. Before, I wondered if you cared about anything."

It shouldn't have, but that stung. Probably because I knew she meant it. This girl was as open as a window on a sunny spring day. Nobody in the Viz-Jaq'taar ever left themselves like that. "Uh, yeah. I was surprised to see he was a he. I thought this monastery was for women only."

"Oh, he wasn't in the monastery, he ran the visitor's church in the pass. Outsiders didn't come to services in the cathedral. They used to, but some of them got kind of upset about Lady Akara's sermons."

"Yeah, sermons can get to me, too. There are a lot of little shrines around there too."

"Yeah, they've been there since, like, forever. I think they're from some old religion."

"Ah." That's the problem with Charsi... she was more than willing to talk, but didn't have much important to say. "Say, where'd you get your pants?"

"I made 'em... I needed something to protect my legs from the sparks."

"Good idea. Well, thanks for everything."

Eventually, got back to the graveyard. Maybe I should have been faster, there were a lot more zombies waiting for me. They move pretty slow, so I had lots of time to look the place over. The graveyard fence was wrought iron, stylish but expensive. The gateposts were decorated with female nudes, an odd choice for a graveyard. Looks like the Sightless Eye has no objection to displays of the female form. Not too surprising: even Kashya shows enough thigh to make a bishop kick a hole in a stained glass window. Still... it was different with the possessed Rogues. These stone maidens weren't degraded, and I could not tell you why they were not -- any more than I could tell you how a leer from one greasy lech got me to put on a pair of pants.

One thing the Viz-Jaq'taar taught me is: never to go in the front door. The graveyard fence had fallen in several places, so entry was easy. A weeping willow tree grew in the center of the yard, a very sentimental image spoiled by the fresh corpses hanging in its branches. The headstones were too small to hide behind, but it didn't matter anyway: the zombies saw me as soon as I poked my head up. As a flaming arrow arced over their heads, something that wasn't human anymore rasped, "Join my army of the dead!" I made sure I wouldn't be where that arrow landed, and at my leisure, scampered like hell around the tree for a clear shot.

Blood Raven was dead white and puffy, with dark rings around her eyes. At first I thought she looked bruised, until I saw the swollen flesh had bone under it, like her whole skeleton was changing shape. Her hair was all gone; she had two bony horns up there instead. Other parts of her looked as good as ever... maybe better. If someone was changing her body, he didn't like women at all, but had definite ideas about what he wanted a woman to be. One thing he wanted Blood Raven to be was fast. She dodged like a wasp away from my first shot, and my second, and third. I had more trouble avoiding her shots; the crowd of zombies staggering around the yard didn't help any either.

We traded a few dozen shots. She was a lot more generous than I was, and those damn burning arrows hurt. I got her once. She didn't stop to tell me if it hurt. The crossbow was getting me nowhere fast -- she was better than me. If I was going to win, I'd have to make the fight mine, doing something I was better at. That meant blades. I hid behind a crypt to change weapons, and Blood Raven was angry or bloodthirsty enough to come in after me. I wanted to take her alive, she had some talking to do. But even at close range, with no zombies to hide behind, she was too dangerous. In the end, I had no choice -- it was her or me. I nailed the b!tch to the crypt wall. The spirit in her took a long time to blast its way out, almost destroying her body. Its zombies dropped like sacks of mud. She'd been hostess to something big, but not anymore. When I kill something, it stays dead.

Looking around, I was surprised at how many corpses were scattered around. You expect them to stay where they are once they're six feet under. I guess demons don't care what's hallowed or not. There's a lot of argument among the Viz-Jaq'taar about whether a priest is just another kind of mage, and if they're using is the same magic sorcerers do. Personally, I think priests don't do magic themselves, they appeal to a spirit to do their thing for them. A priest doesn't have to know anything, and most don't, they just have faith. In a lot of ways, that makes them more dangerous than sorcerers. Demons can claim to be benevolent spirits, and a faithful, naive priest would never know the difference.

Even with Blood Raven dead, I had to make sure everything in the graveyard was properly disposed of. Enough zombies were left that I was sure I'd be seeing a lot more of them in the future. In one of the mausolea, some force made a pentagram of fire that I couldn't put out. Whoever's doing all this doesn't care who knows it, that's for sure. The Rogues also left a lot of barrels in the crypts. Some exploded when cracked open, an old trick meant to catch grave robbers. All it does is encourage them to avoid barrels.

Meanwhile, back in camp, Kashya's attitude had lightened a bit. "I can hardly believe you've defeated Blood Raven!"

It makes me uncomfortable how the Rogues know what's up before I tell them. If they've got scouts trailing me, I have never spotted them. "Yeah, but I never got her to talk. She was too good. I had to put her down hard."

"But... but you defeated her!"

"When I didn't want to. I wasn't good enough." Then I saw what was really on Kashya's mind. "She was a better archer than me. I had to trick her, and it was a trick that left me no leeway. The only thing I could do was kill her."

She nodded, more satisfied now. She could still be better than me, in her mind. "She used to be my greatest friend. I couldn't understand how she could make the choice she did."

"She didn't make a choice, it was made for her. Now, I have to go."

"What? Where are you going?"

"Akara told me Blood Raven went to a town called Tristram. I think whatever she had, she brought back from there, so that's where I'm going next. We don't have any agents in that part of the world."

Kashya blinked in confusion. "We?"

"The Viz-Jaq'taar. Ask Akara, she's probably heard of us."

I was almost out of the camp before she called out, "Why don't you go the quick way?"

From what I remembered of Khanduras, Tristram was a tiny town at least a week's journey from the Rogue Pass. You could probably walk right past it if you didn't know where it was. If I had to go, a quick way there was worth investigating. I came back. "Quick way?"

"Yes," Kashya nodded, staring curiously at me. "The quick way. The one Blood Raven and the others used. You're not going to walk there, are you?"

"Don't tell me, let me guess," I said, ignoring her question. "This insignificant town not only has its own bishop, it has its own Horadric waypoint."

"No. They used the old gate out on the stony field. It's a ring of five stones. Touch them in the right order, and a portal opens that takes you there."

That would be better. "Where is this gate?"

"In the stony field just north of the graveyard. Can't miss it."

"Good. What order do I touch the stones in?"

Kashya frowned. "I never got to use them. Akara knows."

"Good. Looks like we both have something to ask her."