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.""That soft old goat Eltan has priests—PRIESTS!" Sarevok exclaimed in a voice like the inside of a thunderclap.The doppelganger skittered back on its haunches in a desperate attempt to avoid the voice—like it had sent a shock wave across the still chamber.Tamoko jumped and felt a tingling to her very core at the power in her lover's manner.Sarevok paused for a long time, letting the doppelganger shudder and whimper once before he continued, "Priests of the tinker god Gond, and who knows what else, wandering the city of Baldur's Gate, praying over and over for this true sight of theirs.Do you know why?""We can hide, master," the doppelganger whimpered."Please, just—""Do you know why?" Sarevok asked again, his voice calm and steady."Sire, please—""If I ask you the same question a third time, doppel-ganger, you'd best hope the answer is written on the inside of your brain, because if it isn't and I've ripped your head off for no good reason.I shall be disappointed."Tamoko drew her sword slowly, making a show of the sound and the reflected candlelight.She loved Sarevok, with her entire soul, lost as it might be, and though her confidence in him and her certainty that he was worthy of her adoration was more than wavering, she'd be all too happy to put down one of these soulless abominations on his behalf.The doppelganger saw that much, at least, written plainly in her eyes."They search for us," the creature said."They search for us with their true sight.But they won't—""Shhhhh." Sarevok hissed lightly, holding a long finger in front of his lips.He smiled that evil wolf smile and stepped closer to the cowering creature.Tamoko saw a tear roll down the doppelganger's smooth gray cheek."Of course they will, doppelganger, just as I knew they would.I was hoping they wouldn't start so soon, though, and it is in that way that you have disappointed me.""Oh," the doppelganger sobbed through quivering, hairline lips, "no—"Sarevok turned and made eye contact with Tamoko for less than half a heartbeat, and the assassin skipped forward, swinging her sword high over her head.She came in fast and steady—steady as always.She flashed her sword over her head in a rapid whirling motion designed to distract her victim—opponent—the distinction made Tamoko pause in her thinking but not in her movement.She brought her sword slashing down, driven purely by instinct honed from talent and practice.She didn't really make a conscious decision to strike.Her blade met steel with a spark and a clang that sent vibrations up through her arm and snapped her into the now.The doppelganger had managed to transform in the eye blink it took for her to attack.She hopped back lightly and quickly, withdrawing as much on instinct as she'd attacked.She needed time to assess the situation at hand.Her victim truly had, all at once, become an opponent.Tamoko rankled at the sight of the transformed doppelganger.It was her.She tipped her head to the side in what some might have thought was a salute.Tamoko meant it as a promise—the promise of a slow and dishonorable death."Outstanding," Sarevok said with obvious relish.Tamoko ignored him and locked her gaze on her opponent.The doppelganger stood and took on a wide stance.It looked deeply into Tamoko with her own eyes, and with each passing heartbeat it grew more like her.Tamoko exhaled sharply and charged it.She shouted out in her own language the name of each attack, though she was not conscious of the moment she began formal fencing.Her conscious, creative mind was pushed aside by training, experience, and a code more ancient than even Sarevok could imagine.Her sword whipped through the air with a chorus of whistles and shrieks that made the blade seem to take on a life of its own.The doppelganger managed to parry one attack after another, and it was soon dancing lightly on its toes in much the same way as Tamoko.It was still defending, though, and Tamoko didn't think it understood she wasn't really attacking but feeling her opponent's skills and weaknesses, gathering information on more than just the best way to kill it.In less than a minute Tamoko knew the doppelganger was running through her own experiences in rapid chronological order.She felt the creature make the breakthrough she had spent an entire summer working up to with sensei Toroto in the Temple of Fist and Light.She felt more, though.This doppelganger was afraid of Sarevok—an easy assumption—but it was also afraid of birds—irrationally afraid.Tamoko smiled and whistled once, a robin's call, and the thing opened itself, and Tamoko sliced at its throat
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