It was like a wagon, insofar as it had a flat bed and what would have been a driver’s bench, except there were no animals drawing it. And rather than a cargo bed in the back, there were more benches. “Jump!” Nakor shouted.
They did, and all three arrived within one bench of one another.
“It takes some practice, I guess,” said Nakor.
“What is it?”
“I don’t know what they call it here, but I think of it as a really big tram.”
“Tram?” asked Magnus.
“Miners use them,” said his father. “Dolgan the dwarf king in the Grey Towers told me about them. We were traveling though an ancient mine and I saw an abandoned tram off in a side tunnel.”
Nakor said, “I’ve seen them down in Kesh, in the copper and tin mines. They have big wheels so they can be pulled by mules. They load them up with ore and haul it out of the mine.
They use little ones they push by hand to fill the big ones. Sometimes they lay roadways of wood.”
“How does this thing work?”
“There’s some massive contrivance, an engine of some sort, perhaps water-driven or by some other means, that moves along on a giant tether in a big loop. If you ride it long enough, you end up back where you got on.” He paused. “Hang on, there’s a place ahead where we—” Before he could finish there was a hard jolt and suddenly the tram picked up speed. “I think there’s a device that moves it from a slow tether to a fast one. There’s another jolt when we slow down at the other end.”
“Who built it? The Dasati?” asked Magnus. Pug understood his son’s question. The constructions on this world and Kosridi were massive, beyond the abilities of people on Midkemia or Kelewan who had built some impressive structures by 2 4 6
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human standards. But the scale of the building and engineering in this world required such things as they had observed: massive doors beyond any known means of moving; arching bridges that spanned miles and defied the imagination. Nothing they had seen of the Dasati indicated that this was a significant population with the talents and abilities to build such things, nor was there a hint of any new construction or projects. To all appearances, it was a society stagnant to the point of necrosis.
“Where does this take us?” asked Pug.
“Into the heart of madness,” replied Nakor as the tram sped along into a vast tunnel leading to the darkness.
The tunnel seemed endless. Pug lost track of time, though he was certain they had been moving for less than half an hour. Still, at the rate of speed they were traveling, they must be at least ten or more miles from where they boarded. “How much longer?”
“We’re about halfway. That’s why I said we had to hurry.
And we cannot linger at our destination. Or at least I can’t. You and Magnus can decide what to do when I show you what you need to see. I have to get back before they rouse the recruits lest Bek does something . . . well, something that Bek might do.”
Pug noticed that since coming to the second realm, Nakor’s usually cheery spirits were all but absent. He was subdued, and Pug could understand why: not only were the Dasati a grim and bloody people by human standards, but their concept of humor was almost exclusively limited to pain and suffering. There was more. Over the last few weeks, there had been a growing sense of despair and fear, and the attitudes and habits of the population in the city had been changing. Fewer ventured out after dark, and markets that had been thronging when Pug had first arrived on Omadrabar were all but deserted. Groups of Lessers scurried in the shadows and cringed visibly as Deathknights rode past. Deathpriests and Hierophants were all but absent from public view, being locked away in the black heart of the Dark One’s temple, involved in preparations for the Dark One’s next horror.
Martuch and Hirea were even more stoic than usual, barely 2 4 7
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speaking unless asked direct questions. Pug was left with the impression that there was usually a sense of relief after a Great Culling, a sense of survival and relative calm. But this time something was different. Rumors abounded in the city, but no one really knew what was coming next, for nothing like this had ever occurred before. The loss of two of the TeKarana’s legions was a sacrifice unprecedented in Dasati history.
The tram jerked and slowed and Nakor said, “We get off in a moment.”
They stood up, and when the tram moved alongside a long platform, they all stepped off. “This way,” said the little gambler.
They hurried down another long corridor and then Nakor stopped them. “From here I got lost, and the only reason I wasn’t killed was because Bek behaved himself back at the training barracks so no one noticed his Lesser was not there for a day.
I wandered around and found this thing I must show you. But now that you’re here we can get there fast.” To Pug he said, “You need to make us invisible again.” To Magnus he said, “You need to fly us, straight up there.” He pointed up into the gloom above them. “It goes very far up. Then you’ll need to fly us straight that way”—he pointed straight ahead—“and then we’ll need to go down, very far down, into a very dark place. Are you ready?”
Pug said, “Yes,” and wove his enchantment, rendering all three of them invisible.
“Hold on,” said Magnus, and Pug gripped Nakor with one hand, and his son with the other. They rose straight up into the air, rising rapidly until there was nothing but gloom above and below.
“How far up does this go?” asked Pug.
“Seventy-five flights of stairs, but I lost count so it may be seventy-six or -seven.”
They reached the topmost floor and Nakor said, “A bit more, over the rooftops.”
Magnus took them up until they were higher than the highest roof. The sky above was still lost in darkness. “How big is this place?” asked Magnus.
“Really big,” answered Nakor. “I used a couple of tricks 2 4 8
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and the best I can tell is that the roof is another two thousand feet above us.”
“Who could build such a thing?” asked Pug.
“And how?” said Magnus.
“Only the gods, I think,” replied Nakor. “Only the old gods of the Dasati.”
Remembering the Necropolis of the Gods in Novindus, Pug said, “Perhaps. Certainly I can’t imagine any mortal being building this.”
“Neither can I,” said Nakor. “And I can imagine a lot of things.”
They flew above the huge set of rooms below them, and at last came to a vast cavern. “How big, do you think?” asked Pug.
“Miles,” said Nakor. “They have a lifting device I found a distance from here, and it took a long time for me to get where we are going. But no matter where I was, or what sort of tricks I used, I couldn’t see the far side. It was like standing on the edge of a great bay where you can see coasts curving to your right and left, but vanishing into the mist, and you can’t see beyond the horizon.”
“Where are we?” asked Magnus.
“Ah,” said Nakor. “I thought you’d have deduced it; we’re in the Temple of the Dark One himself.” Softly, he added, “He’s down there.”
Downward they sped, through a murk unmatched by anything Pug had ever encountered, for not only was it devoid of light, it was as if life itself had been leached out of the very fabric of reality. Soon they saw a light below them, an angry red-orange glow with a tiny fringe of green at the edges. “The god is down there,” said Nakor, softly, as if fearful of being heard.
“But won’t we be seen?” asked Magnus.
“It seems occupied with its own concerns,” said Nakor. “At least the last time I was here, it didn’t pay attention to me.”
They continued down, until a shape emerged in the middle of the red-orange glow. At this distance it was a large featureless 2 4 9
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black mass, but as they approached they could see it was undulating around the edges. “What is that?”
whispered Magnus.
Nakor said, “That is the Dark God.”
Pug looked astonished. He had interacted with the gods on Midkemia but they had always presented themselves in roughly human form. This being, however, looked nothing remotely like a human or even a Dasati.
It was enormous, easily hundreds of yards across, and its shape was difficult to apprehend, because the edges kept moving, flowing and undulating, as if a supple bag of some material had been filled with oil or water, yet it moved with a slower motion than liquid. Pug was reminded of silk flowing slowly in a breeze. There was no color on the surface of the being, yet it could not properly be called black. The sensation was that of a void of color and light, without the accompanying energies visible to the Dasati eye. Evil, was how Pug thought of it, yet even that was attributing too much vibrancy and dimension to it. It was devoid of anything he could recall . . . save for one time!
He pushed aside a stab of fear bordering on panic.
The head of the creature was massive, but dwarfed by the enormity of the rest of its body, rising up at least four feet above the torso, on some semblance of a neck.
“Somewhere out there,” said Pug, “there are arms and legs.”
There was a tone in his voice Magnus and Nakor had never heard before.
“What is it, Father?”
Pug looked more closely at the creature’s head, at the two searing red slashes of glowing orange light in the black mask.
Around the head, like a crown, floated flickering tiny red flames.
“I know it,” he said.
“What?” asked Nakor. “What do you mean, you know it?”
“It is no god, Nakor, or at least not as we understand such things.”
Magnus said, “What is it then?”
“The Dark God of the Dasati is not of this realm, or of any other we comprehend. The Dark God of the Dasati is a creature of the Void. We are looking at a Dreadlord.”
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“What?” asked Magnus, steering them away from the Dreadlord toward the edge of the vast pit. Little was known of the Dread, but he had heard enough to understand why his father’s voice was forced to calm; his father was frightened, and Magnus had never experienced that before. “What is it doing here?” he asked, his own calm barely maintained.
“Ah,” said Nakor. “That explains much.” He sounded surprisingly unfazed by the revelation. Magnus glanced at Nakor and saw the little gambler had his eyes fixed on the Dreadlord, studying it as they moved across the pit.
They could feel a strange heat rising, a heat that was both unnatural and troubling. The red-orange light from below seemed to liquefy, as if the Dreadlord were squatting in a huge lake. Pug had a worrying idea. “See that green flame dancing across the surface of the liquid?”
“Yes,” answered Nakor. “Life trying to escape.”
Magnus said, “We can see life?”
“I’ve seen it once before, when your mother and I helped Calis destroy the Lifestone and set free all the trapped souls within.”
“Like so many things we can’t see as humans, we can see with Dasati eyes,” answered Nakor. “This monstrous entity is living in a sea of captured life. It is bloated to a massive . . . thing, huge beyond its original capacity. It has become engorged, like a glutton at a feast that never ends, swollen like a monstrous tick endlessly sucking blood from a dog. Look!”
As they approached the edge of the vast pit, they could see that there was a ceremony under way. A dozen Deathpriests stood arrayed in two rows, behind which stood armed Deathknights wearing orange armor. Pug assumed they were temple guards. A long line of shuffling Lessers came inching toward the edge of the pit, and when each reached the edge, a priest would give a quick benediction and they would be pushed over the edge. The Lessers fell into the roiling surface of the liquid, which Pug now understood was mostly blood, and sank from view.
Those who hesitated were picked up and thrown in by 2 5 1
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Deathknights. Most wept or had a shocked look of resignation on their faces, but a few revealed wide-eyed panic and some tried to bolt. Those who did were cut down by the Deathknights standing behind the priests, and their bodies were rolled into the mass.
“Over there!” said Nakor, and Pug looked to where he pointed. A small raised dais, perhaps used by some high-ranking official, perhaps even the TeKarana himself, had been erected here from which to observe the endless sacrifice.
Nakor said, “Magnus, can you remember this place well enough to bring us back here in a hurry if you need to?”
“I think getting us out of here in a hurry would be a better idea.”
“That, too,” whispered Nakor. He added, “Sometimes the creature seems to sleep but I wouldn’t want to try to sneak in that way again. Last time I was with a bunch of those poor souls who are being fed to that monster so I was unnoticed when I walked in.”
“How did you get out?” asked Pug.
“I used some tricks,” Nakor said. “Come, we need to start back: I don’t want to leave Bek unattended.”
“Nakor, is Bek the Godkiller?”
“Maybe, maybe not,” answered the little gambler as Magnus lifted himself and his two companions into the air. “But he has a role to play. When I’m sure it’s safe to leave him, there are some places I must visit.”
“Where?” asked Pug.
“There are rooms all over this temple, many containing scrolls and things that no one looks at anymore. These were once a great people, Pug. Magnificent even, and I think it was the Dasati who built these amazing places. That meant they were like the Ipiliac. Much of their creative greatness was drained away by the need to survive between the realms. Here, the Dasati turned all their energies to build, to create, to investigate. They must have had great scholars, poets, artists, musicians, healers, and engineers living here. They must have been almost gods themselves when this horror came to them.”
“There is so much we may never know,” said Pug. “How 2 5 2
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a creature of the Void came to live at the heart of this world . . .”
“Better go faster, Magnus,” said Nakor. “Time is fleeting.”
Magnus used more speed in leaving than he had in approaching, so they rapidly reached the top of the enormous pit.
As they descended down to the tunnel leading to the tram, Nakor said, “Whatever Bek’s role may be, I believe he needs to try to kill it.”
“But you said you didn’t know if he was the Godkiller,”
said Magnus.
“Yes, he may not be, but he needs to try.”
“How do you know, Nakor?” asked Pug.
The little gambler emerged from his invisibility. “I don’t know how I know, Pug. I know a lot of things and I don’t know how I know them. I just do. Now, we had better move along.”
Pug and Magnus became visible, too, and Nakor turned to hurry down the tunnel toward the tram. The father and son exchanged a silent question. Both knew that Pug had not removed the invisibility from Nakor. Nakor had done it himself.
Pug hurried along after the strange little man wondering if he would ever learn the truth about him.
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Chapter 16
sun elves
Miranda shouted in aggravation.
Unable to contain her frustration, she threw the message across the floor. She swore, then said, “The King won’t see me.”
Caleb said, “It’s understandable, Mother. Father hasn’t been on good terms with the Crown of the Isles for many years. In fact, he hasn’t been on good terms with any nobles save those working with the Conclave.”
“I’m your mother! I don’t expect you to be reasonable. I expect you to agree with me.”
Caleb was motionless for a moment, then he started to laugh. “I see. I’m sorry.”
“I’m losing my sanity,” said Miranda as she began to pace in her husband’s study. “I fea
r I’ll never see your wrath of a mad god
father again, despite his reassurances that he will return. I fear for Magnus and even Nakor.” Softly she added, “I really don’t know what to do next, Caleb.”
Caleb had never seen his mother so distraught. She even sounded helpless as she admitted her uncertainty. His mother was many things, but never in her life had helpless been one of them. There had to be a reason for this lack of decisiveness.
“What is it?”
She sat down in her husband’s chair. “I’m agonizing over what your father would do in this situation. Would he simply appear in the King’s private chambers and threaten him?”
“Hardly,” said Caleb. With a wry smile he added, “You might, perhaps, but not Father.”
She glared at him a moment, then was forced to smile. “Yes, you’re right.”
“I think he’d find those nobles of influence who are most favorably disposed toward us and speak with them.”
“That’s either old Lord James or Lord Erik.”
“James is, by some convolution, a cousin,” said Caleb.
“That might have some weight in persuading him to intercede with the King. Erik, on the other hand, is an old companion of Nakor, and he’s seen at firsthand what enemies like the Dasati can do. He stood at Nightmare Ridge.”
That one statement spoke volumes. Miranda knew that those who had suffered and fought through the Serpentwar would understand the price of not preparing, not standing staunchly against the coming insanity. If the Dasati were not stopped in Kelewan, there was nothing to prevent them from invading Midkemia next. The problem was that few who had stood at Nightmare Ridge, or who had fought in any fashion against the Emerald Queen’s army during the Serpentwar, were still alive. And even those who were still living were in their seventies or eighties. Those few nobles who hadn’t retired to their estates were outnumbered by younger men, to whom the Serpentwar was just a fight their fathers or even grandfathers talked about. Like the Riftwar, or the War of Jon the Pretender, or so many struggles with Great Kesh, it was 2 5 5