Cinnabar Shadows (Dark Sun: Chronicles of Athas 4)

Pavek opened his eyes and levered himself up on his right elbow. "If you want to do something useful, find Kakzim, instead." Between his old scar and the pain he was trying to hide, Pavek's smile was nothing any sane man would want see. "The bastard must be around here someplace."

Zvain, who'd been watching everything, pale and silent from the start, needed no additional encouragement. He was off like an arrow for the gallery where they'd seen Kakzim yesterday. Mahtra headed after him, but Kakzim was just a name to Ruari, and Pavek had lost a dangerous amount of blood.

"Go with them," Pavek urged. "Take your staff. Keep them out of trouble."

"You need a healer—bad."

"Not that bad."

"You've lost a lot of blood, Pavek. And—And your hand—it's bad, Pavek. You need a good healer. Kashi—"

Pavek shook his head. "Kakzim. Get me Kakzim."

"You'll be here when we bounce his halfling rump down those stairs?"

"I'm not going anywhere."

Ruari turned away from Pavek. He looked into the priest's blue eyes, asking silent questions.

"There's nothing more to do here," the priest replied. "I'll stay with him. We're well out of harm's way, and these two will stay—" He cocked his head toward the two templars who'd remained with them. "If anyone gets the bright idea to finish what they started before the great king comes to render judgment."

"The Lion closed his eyes," Ruari snarled and surged to his feet. He found himself angry at the sorcerer-king, and disappointed as well. "He's not coming."

"He'll come," Pavek assured him. "I'll wager you, he'll be here before the fighting's over. You've got to find Kakzim first."

By the screaming, shouting, and clash of arms, the fighting remained fierce around the abattoir gate. Ruari couldn't be certain, but he thought there might be more templars— perhaps Nunk and his companions, perhaps the other war bureau maniple—outside the gate, keeping the brawlers on the killing ground until the war bureau fighters finished their retribution. He could be certain that Pavek was safer right now with two templars and a priest watching over him than Mahtra and Zvain were, searching the gallery for Kakzim without weapons or sense.

"I'll be back before the Lion gets here," Ruari assured the group closest to him before running to the gallery stairway, staff in hand.

Finding Mahtra and Zvain was no more difficult than listening for Zvain's inventive swearing from the top of the charred but still serviceable stairway. Although the gallery appeared deserted, Ruari set himself silently against a door-jamb where he could see not only his friends ransacking a nearly empty room, but the rest of the gallery and killing ground where two templars stood similar watch over Pavek and the priest.

"Find anything?" Ruari asked, all innocence within the shadows.

Mahtra said, "No," with equal innocence, but Zvain leapt straight up and came down only a few shades darker than Mahtra.

"You scared me!" Zvain complained once he'd stopped sputtering curses.

Ruari countered with, "You'd be worse than scared if it weren't me standing here," and could almost hear Pavek saying the same thing. "You're damn fools, leaving the door open and making so much noise."

"I was listening," Mahtra said. "I would've seen trouble coming; I saw you. I would've protected—"

"What's to see? There's no one here!" Zvain interrupted. "He's scarpered. Packed up and left. Cut and run. Got out while the getting was still good—just like he did with dead-heart Escrissar."

Ruari's spirits sank. Pavek wanted Kakzim; not catching him was going to hurt Pavek more than losing his hand. "Is there anything here? Pavek..."

"Nothing!" Zvain said, kicking over a stool for emphasis. "Not a damn thing!"

"There's this—" Mahtra held out a chunk of what appeared to be tree bark.

"Garbage!" Zvain kicked the stool again.

Ruari left his staff leaning against the doorjamb and took Mahtra's offering. It was bark, though not from any tree that grew on the Tablelands. Holding it, feeling its texture with his fingers, he got a vision of countless trees and mountains wrapped in smoke like the Smoking Crown Volcano... no, mountains wrapped in clouds, like nothing he'd seen before.

Any other time, he'd cherish the bark simply for the vision it gave his druid spirit, but there was no time, and the bark was more than bark. Someone had covered it with straight black lines and other, irregular

"Writing," he mused aloud.

That gave him Zvain's swift attention. The boy grabbed the bark out of his hands. "Naw," he drawled, "that's not writing. I know writing when I see it; I can read—and there're no words here."