The Ruin (32 page)

Engulfed in the column of shadow, Madislak crumbled into dust, some spilling downward, the finer particles hanging as

a haze in the air. The parts of his body outside the effect— lengths of tail, feet, sections of wing—dropped and thudded on the ground.

Its work accomplished, the shaft of darkness vanished. Zethrindor leaped to his feet. His carrion flesh hung in tatters, in many places sufficiently shredded to reveal the bone beneath. The left side of his head was all naked skull, eye and ear ripped away along with the hide and muscle. Madislak, Dorn, and their allies had inflicted harm no living creature could have endured. Yet Zethrindor moved with the same fearful speed and grace as before.

Iron half leading, artificial hand poised to block, claw, and pummel, sword cocked back, Dorn planted himself in front of the dracolich’s head. With Madislak dead, and even Pavel’s store of spells depleted, it was obviously futile. But it was also the only thing to do, and still the only thing he wanted to do.

His comrades scrambled to place themselves on Zethrindor’s flanks. The white struck at Dorn. He sprang to one side, prepared to cut at the creature’s head, but the attack stopped short, while Zethrindor was still out or range. The half-golem realized it had been a feint.

One that had been intended to draw the dracolich’s other foes into the distance while he was seemingly focused on Dorn. Stival took the bait. Perceiving the danger, Natali, her hair a bristling shock of white feathers, screamed, “No!” Stival stopped rushing forward, and when Zethrindor pivoted and raked at him, he was able to dodge.

Unfortunately, Stival’s peril had distracted Natali from watching for threats to herself. Zethrindor’s tail whipped around, smashed into her torso, and flung her through the air. She slammed down hard and lay motionless as a broken doll.

No time for sorrow or outrage on her behalf, or for anything but total concentration on the task at hand. Dorn, Will, and Pavel fought with all the teamwork and tricks that had carried them through countless combats with dangerous

beasts. Stival, himself an experienced hunter and wyrm slayer, employed similar tactics. Jivex assailed Zethrindor with one magical effect after another, and whenever he saw an opening, used tooth and claw as well.

It kept them all alive for a few more heartbeats. It even allowed them to open a few more apparently inconsequential rents in the white’s body. Until Zethrindor, tiring of the game perhaps, snarled a word of power.

A thunderclap boomed, the prodigious sound striking like a blow. Dorn staggered and fell. His allies did, too, all but Jivex, who tumbled crazily through the air.

Zethrindor reached to seize Will in his jaws. The halfling made some feeble effort to get up onto his hands and knees, but didn’t appear to recognize the imminent threat. Nor were the others moving to protect him. The deafening bang had stunned them all.

Dorn too felt dazed and battered, but he forced himself up. Gripped his sword with both hands and cut. Maybe Zethrindor had placed too much trust in the potency of his sorcery, maybe Dorn’s continued resistance caught him by surprise, for he made no effort to shift away from the blow. The blade crunched deep into his skull, on the side where Madislak had already stripped away the natural armor of scales and muscle.

Zethrindor’s entire body jerked. Dorn thought he glimpsed a darkness seething up around the end of his sword and the breach in which it was embedded, as though some vile force was bleeding out. He yanked the weapon free, struck a second time, again succeeded in splintering bone.

Zethrindor floundered backward. Dorn pursued with a sudden surge of hope, until the dracolich recovered his balance and settled back into a fighting stance. His throat swelled.

Not good enough, thought Dorn. For an instant, I thought it was, but it wasn’t. I wasn’t.

Then a voice an octave deeper even than his own shouted, “You see, the small folk told the truth! The Lich is weak!

Get him! Get him! Get him!”

Startled, Zethrindor twisted his head around to glare at the young, relatively slender frost giant who’d raised the shout. Probably the dracolich meant to mete out a hideous punishment, but in that same instant, another giant threw an enormous axe and embedded it in his chest.

A barrage of missiles followed, with giants, dwarves, and barbarians alike loosing arrows and flinging javelins. Then, with a bellow of hatred, they rushed in and swarmed on Zethrindor, until the dracolich nearly disappeared behind the mass of his assailants.

Dorn realized the glacier folk didn’t care about the terms of his challenge to the white. They only wanted to be rid of Zethrindor, and once his opponents gave him enough trouble to convince them he was vulnerable, they’d risen up against him.

Dorn supposed that in his place, another man would be elated, but he still couldn’t feel anything but hate. He tried to push his way through the press of warriors around Zethrindor, back into striking distance, but couldn’t manage it. Too little strength remained in his hurt and exhausted human half.

Zethrindor started bellowing a spell, but quickly fell silent, as did the entire struggling horde of combatants. Some priest or shaman had cast a charm of quiet to keep the dracolich from using his magic.

Still, the battle raged on until Dorn started to fear that even such a horde of foes couldn’t prevail against the dracolich. But then a giant wearing a breastplate carved from presumably enchanted, unmeltable ice stooped, straightened up, and raised Zethrindor’s severed head high above his own. The glacier folk, or at least all those outside the field of silence, raised a thunderous cheer.

Jivex swooped down to hover beside Dorn. The faerie dragon surveyed the scene, then sniffed. “Why aren’t they cheering me?” he asked. “I did all the work.”

Stival kneeled beside Natali’s motionless body. Despite the owl eyes and feathers, she seemed the fairest thing in the world.

“I was a fool,” he said. “l should have invited you to share my bed when I had the chance. You might have said yes. By the unicorn, maybe I would have even married you, if that was what it took.”

He reached to close her eyes, and froze in shock when they shifted toward his face.

“I accept your proposal,” she croaked. “Now fetch a healer.”

As he hurried away to find one, conflicting emotions tangled and ached in his chest. Joy to find her still alive, and anxiety that she might still succumb to her injuries if he didn’t bring help quickly. Delight that she fancied him, and dismay to discover himself betrothed to a woman whose purse was as empty as his own.

But after a few strides, the dismay began to fade. Maybe her poverty didn’t matter all that much. They were two of the heroes who’d destroyed Zethrindor, weren’t they? That ought to earn them titles, a tract of land, and chests of gold. It was simply a matter of making sure the right people knew about it.

Pavel peered up at the tableland. The glacier folk were clamoring in jubilation, but he wasn’t ready to celebrate just yet, because he wasn’t sure the battle was over. The surviving whites and ice drakes presumably had some way of discerning the outcome of the challenge, but wicked, faithless creatures that they were, might not honor Zethrindor’s bargain.

He held his breath when the pallid reptiles soared up into the darkening sky. But instead of attacking, they flew west, and at last he too felt the urge to cheer.

Trying to swagger but pretty much hobbling instead, Will came to stand beside him and watch the departing drakes, making certain, as poor, lost Raryn would have done, that the creatures didn’t double back. “Maybe,” the halfling said, “they only fought because Zethrindor bullied them into it, like he did the dwarves and such. After all, Sossal was going to be his kingdom, not theirs.”

“Or perhaps,” Pavel replied, “they just don’t like their chances anymore. Or else they’re eager to reach a cult enclave and start their transformations. The important thing is, it’s over.”

“No thanks to you. ‘Out of spells.’ Pathetic.” The halfling grinned, then pointed. “Look, the stars are coming out.”

*****

Taegan crept toward the cave where he and his companions had chosen to hide. From the outside, thanks to the subtle illusions Kara and Brimstone had woven, the pocket in the rock looked empty.

Perhaps, at the moment, the appearance matched the reality. If the dragons had succeeded in unlocking the elven citadel, and Raryn had already joined them inside its walls, the cave might actually be unoccupied.

But no. When Taegan skulked in far enough to penetrate the curtain of illusion, the bard, smoke drake, and dwarf all popped into view. He scarcely needed to behold their glum expressions to understand what had happened, or rather, what had not.

Anger welled up inside him. By all the powers bright and dark, it wasn’t fair! He’d done what was supposedly required. Against all rational expectation, he’d succeeded in keeping the Tarterians occupied for a considerable time. Why hadn’t the drakes performed their task? How difficult could it be—

He clamped down on his ire. He and his comrades had known at the onset that Kara and Brimstone, accomplished

sorcerers through they were, would find it difficult to counter the enchantments of a legendary mage like Sammaster. Recriminations would be unjust, and certainly serve no purpose.

Taegan took a breath, composing himself. “I surmise,” he said, “that we’ll need to try again.”

Brimstone sneered. “Do you imagine you can fool the Tarterians a second time? They learned from what happened today. Next time, they’ll catch you before you can draw a dozen breaths.”

“Not an enticing prospect,” Taegan conceded. “Ergo, we need a new plan.”

“I invite you to devise a feasible one,” the vampire said. “Even if the Tarterians actually believe you somehow used a broken gate to leave the valley, we’ve stirred them up. They’ll patrol more diligently. It will be all we can do to stay hidden, if, in fact, we can even manage that. We certainly have no hope of conducting lengthy experiments outside the castle.”

“Nor would it matter if we could,” Kara sighed. “Brimstone and I both agree, we’ll never break Sammaster’s ward.”

Taegan arched an eyebrow. “We’ve journeyed a long way and overcome a fair number of obstacles just to abandon hope on the ancient elves’ very doorstep.”

“I know,” she said, “and nobody wants to fail. But Brim,stone’s thirsty, frenzy’s pounding at my mind, and neither of us can see any possibilities at all.”

“Nor can I,” said Taegan, “not as yet. But you, milady, will cling to your love of your kindred, your music, and Dorn, and you, Sir Vampire, to your hatred of Sammaster, to fend off your less agreeable impulses. Raryn and I will tighten our belts. The four of us will watch for opportunities, and even if none presents itself, wait for our allies to locate us.”

Brimstone spat sulfurous smoke. “How?”

“I can’t imagine. But I lack the talents of a Firefingers, or a Nexus.”

“Taegan’s right,” said Raryn, sitting with his back against the wall and his short, burly legs outstretched, his white mane, beard, and polar bear-fur armor ghostly in the gloom. “We may fail, we may very likely die, and if so, there’ll be no shame in losing against. long odds. But you don’t stop trying.”

Kara forced a smile. “No, you don’t. Please, forgive my whining.”

“I didn’t mean I would give up,” Brimstone growled. “But neither am I inclined to deny the truth of our predicament. So I leave the posturing and prattling to the three of you.” He wheeled and stalked into the darkness deeper in the cave.

Afterward, Taegan reflected that the smoke drake’s parting remark had contained a measure of truth. He had been striving to feign an optimism he was far from feeling.

Because the dragons’ demoralization, transitory though it probably was, had shaken him. Kara and Brimstone were creatures of exceptional courage, and far more powerful and knowledgeable about occult matter than he. If they could see no hope—

No. Enough of that. Seeking to break his somber train of thought, he grinned at Raryn. “Is there any of your delicious spadderdock remaining? I believe my exertions may actually have actually left me famished enough to choke down a bite or two.”

After months of strife, the Sossrim and glacier folk were willing to make peace, but felt no inclination to fraternize_ The former camped on the ridge they’d defended at such a heavy cost, the latter, on low ground some distance back from the foot of the slope.

Mostly burned down to coals and ash, Zethrindor’s remains smoldered where he’d fallen, about equally distant from each encampment. His destroyers had burned him to purge his flesh and skeleton of any lingering malignancy

that might otherwise poison the earth. Or perhaps to make absolutely sure he wouldn’t rise in the night.

Pavel found Dorn standing alone, staring at the pyre. Here and there, a few blue and yellow flames still danced, and some of the dragon’s blackened bones maintained their shape. The air smelled of smoke, but not decay, not anymore.

“Supper’s ready,” Pavel said. “Stival even found some wine, the gods alone know how. He and Natali would like it if you’d drink to their betrothal.”

Dorn didn’t answer.

Pavel tried a new tack: “We should get an early start tomorrow. It will be difficult, but I think we can still make Thentia in time for the conclave. The Sossrim will do everything they can to help us on our way, and so will my folk, once we cross into Damara.”

Still no reply.

“Talk, damn it!” Pavel exploded. “You owe me that much. There lies Kara’s killer, burned to nothing, or near enough. You have your revenge. Doesn’t it make a difference?”

“But did we truly destroy him?” Dorn asked. “Or is his spirit just lurking in a phylactery, awaiting rebirth?”

Pavel hesitated. “Well… presumably the latter. But consider this: If he was one of Sammaster’s newly minted dracoliches, he’s been busy furthering the wizard’s schemes and attacking Sossal ever since his transformation, He probably never got around to caching spare bodies near his amulet, and that likely means he’ll never have the opportunity to occupy another. Imagine what it would be like to be