“I will protect this boy until the others get here.”
“Good,” said Nakor. “Fare you well, Ralan Bek.”
“And fare you well, Nakor the Isalani.”
Nakor said, “Martuch, Hirea: guide the lad.”
“Others?” asked Pug.
“You will see, soon enough,” he said to Pug. To Magnus, Nakor said, “Come, the three of us have much to do and little time. Let us go to the Dark One’s pit.”
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Magnus obliged and Pug and Nakor felt the sense of dis-location, almost a faint jerking feeling as they left one place and arrived at another. Suddenly the three of them were standing before the TeKarana’s throne on the observation platform witnessing a scene of madness beyond their experience.
Thousands of Dasati were falling from above, some bouncing off the rock face, others falling directly into the burning sea of orange energy and green flame. Others landed on the bloated thing that was the Dark God and a few pitiful wretches were still living when they landed. One or another was picked up by the Dark One’s magic and carried screaming toward his massive maw. The featureless head was without distinction, yet the two burning red eyes regarded its next victim. While no mouth could be seen, the victim would vanish into the face of the Dark One, who would swallow the Dasati whole.
“This is unnecessary,” said Nakor. “The creature can suck life energy with a touch. The eating is . . . theatrics.”
“Terror is a tool of the Dread,” said Pug. Turning to look at Nakor, he said, “Why are we here? We may be noticed at any moment, and even the three of us cannot best a thousand Deathpriests, or that thing in the pit if it reaches out to us.”
The gallery beyond where they stood and the rim of the pit above as well as a dozen openings at various levels of the cavern were thronged with Deathpriests and temple Deathknights.
“We’re waiting,” said Nakor. “We’re waiting for the Godkiller, and when he arrives, we must each carry out our appointed tasks.”
“Nakor,” asked Magnus softly, “what are you not saying?”
The little gambler sat. “I’m tired, Magnus. Your father has understood for quite a long time that I am not entirely what I seem, but he’s had the consummate good grace to let me play the fool when it served my purpose and not ask too many questions.”
“You’ve always been a good friend and staunch ally,” said Pug.
Nakor let out a sigh. “My time is almost over here, and it is fitting that you should know the truth.” He looked from Pug to Magnus. “You will inherit a burden from your father, and it is a heavy one, but I think you will be equal to that task. Now, I need a moment of time with your father, alone if you don’t mind.”
Magnus nodded and moved away to give them some privacy.
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To Pug, Nakor said, “You must make good your promise and suffer your trials, my friend, but if you are resolute, all will come to pass as it must. You will, in the end, save our world and help restore a much-needed balance.”
Pug looked hard at Nakor. “Do you speak of—”
“No one knows of your arrangement with the Death Goddess, Pug, except she and you.”
“But you do,” Pug whispered. “How is that possible? Even Miranda doesn’t know.”
“Nor can she, or any other mortal,” said Nakor.
“Who are you?” Pug asked.
“That,” said Nakor, “is a very long story.” Then he grinned his familiar grin and said, “All in good time. Now we must wait.”
Looking over at the horrific scene in the heart of the pit, he said,
“I hope our wait is short. This place is no fun.”
Men screamed in pain and shock as the Black Mount suddenly expanded in a single gigantic spasm. Where it had been half a mile away one moment, the next it loomed over the command center, mere yards from Alenburga’s headquarters. Miranda managed to get a defensive shield up but it was already too late.
The screaming stopped as abruptly as it had started. The men who had been positioned before the commander’s observation point on the ground below the hill had, it appeared, been bi-sected by the arrival of the sphere. Blood and body parts rimmed the edge of the sphere.
Miranda cried, “We must pull back!”
Stunned by the sight of the Black Mount, General Alenburga now ordered, “Withdraw!” To the four young captains who waited to carry out his instructions he said, “Head south.
There’s a knoll near a stream that feeds into the river. Grab as many maps as you can carry and take them there.” To Kaspar and Erik he said, “Gentlemen, it’s time to go.” To Miranda he said, “Madam, if you and your magical friends can shed any light on this development, sooner is better than later.”
The commanders of the Tsurani army made an orderly, but hurried, departure.
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Miranda felt confident that the sphere wouldn’t expand again for a while, but her curiosity was piqued. She closed her eyes while others around her beat a hasty retreat, and sent her mind forward.
She encountered the mystic antiscrying magic she had been repulsed by previously, and sought once more to neutralize it. She had discussed this problem with several other magicians while they were resting, and had got several useful suggestions. She realized one point made was possibly the most cogent: it wasn’t a barrier, but rather a counterspell, one designed to harm, injure, or kill should intrusion be pressed. If that was the case, she could counter it, as long as she was willing to endure some discomfort.
She forced her mind to conjure up the strength of will to push her mystic sight through the barrier and felt a sharp stab of pain as she did so. She battled the pain and erected defensive spells of her own to counter the attack on her mind, and then she looked at what was occurring inside the sphere. The revulsion she felt as her mind registered the scene before her caused her to recoil instinctively. She almost fainted as she tore her mind back to this side of the barrier.
An unknowable time later, she found Erik von Darkmoor standing over her and Miranda realized she was lying on the ground. “Are you all right?” he asked calmly in the midst of the organized chaos.
“I saw . . .” she said weakly as the old warrior extended his hand to help her to her feet.
“What did you see?” he encouraged, supporting her by one arm.
“We must . . .”
“What?”
Her eyes were unfocused and her thoughts were cloudy.
She said, “We must leave.”
“We are leaving,” he said. “We’re pulling back to regroup.”
“No,” she said. “We must leave . . . this world.”
“Miranda,” he said calmly as he walked her down the hill to where a lackey held his mount. “What are you saying?”
He saw her wits return, and despite her obvious exhaustion, 3 3 8
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her eyes were wide and her features became animated. “Erik!
They’ve opened . . . I don’t know what to call it. It’s not a rift as I know it, but rather . . . a tunnel! It’s some sort of passage between the two realms, and it’s occupying almost the entire inside of that sphere!” She looked back at the monstrous Black Mount that rose up into the late afternoon sky like a terrible dark boil on the surface of the planet. “The mouth of the tunnel is this vast pit, only a hundred or so yards inside the edge of the sphere. It must expand as the sphere expands.” She squeezed her eyes shut, and took a deep breath. “Most of your troops . . . they must have fallen into that void . . . tunnel, whatever it is.”
“Gods,” he said softly.
“Erik,” she said, looking around and realizing that Alenburga and Kaspar had already departed. “You have to tell them.
Everyone . . . we must evacuate as many people as we can. There are Deathpriests inside that thing, stunning those who fell inside, your men, and they had Deathknights thr
owing them into the opening of the tunnel . . .” She closed her eyes as if willing herself to remember. “Erik, they’re feeding it. They’re using your soldiers to make it stronger, make it bigger.”
Erik’s face drained of color. “And when it gets strong enough, it’ll jump again?”
“Yes,” said Miranda, almost unable to frame the word. “The sphere will get bigger . . . and bigger . . .” Her voice grew softer and she started to wobble on her feet. “Until it covers this whole world . . .”
“But it can’t keep growing . . . forever.”
Miranda’s face was ashen. “No, it only needs to get big enough to let something come through from the other side . . .”
“What?”
“The Dark God of the Dasati,” she whispered. Miranda went limp and only Erik’s firm grip kept her from falling to the ground.
“You!” he shouted to a nearby soldier. “Get a litter! Bear her to the Supreme Commander!”
“Yes, sir,” said the Tsurani Strike Leader he had addressed.
Erik looked at the sphere as he waited. Against the armies of the Emerald Queen at Nightmare Ridge he had survived with 3 39
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what he had. This time, however, he felt a sense of helplessness.
This time maybe no one would survive.
Pug and Magnus covered their ears to protect them from the shrieking sound. Nakor was knocked to the floor.
The entirety of the cavern shook and vibrated and many of those near the rim of the cavern fell over, screaming as they fell to their death. Nakor sat up and pointed. “Look!”
A circular column of air was swirling down from above, like a giant wind funnel, and through it fell more bodies. Flashes like lightning cracked through the gloom, illuminating the vast cavern with a blinding silver light. Above a giant hole appeared at the top of the funnel, and more bodies started falling through it.
“They’re Tsurani!” shouted Magnus.
There was no mistaking the armor and the human forms as thousands of men cascaded down through the hole. Suddenly the giant form of the Dreadlord shook and he began to shimmer and flow like silk in the wind.
Then from the surface of the malignant being tendrils of foul-smelling smoke rose up, and flowed into the funnel, combining with it, and seeming somehow to add to its volume.
“What is happening?” Pug shouted to Nakor.
“The Dreadlord has opened a passage between this world and Kelewan,” shouted the small man. “It is not like your rifts, Pug, or even the portals used to gain a foothold. Now this world and Kelewan are linked, and as the Dreadlord gains strength, he’ll push the area of his control outward. The greater the surface of Kelewan he covers, the more people under the dome of his control will die. The larger the number who die, the bigger the dome. Kelewan is to be his next home. He is using his own being, the energy he has stored inside himself from thousands of years of death, and he’s using it to pull himself through to Kelewan. Somewhere in this process, and soon I fear, he will begin his journey through that tunnel to Kelewan.”
“What of the Dasati?” asked Magnus.
“They are dupes on an unimaginable scale.” He looked at Pug. “Your father has already come to understand the truth about 3 4 0
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the Dark One. He is using them as a means to gain access to the next highest plane: the idea that he is opening up a new realm for the Dasati is a lie. He will abandon this world and move on, but not before he drains this one of all life.
“Once he’s established himself on Kelewan, he’ll erect a Dark Temple, like this one, then return the planet to its former state, and whatever remnants of humanity exist on it will be allowed to breed and repopulate and form new societies while the Dreadlord sleeps. He will sleep for centuries, but his dreams will hold sway over the emerging tribes of mankind. He will make Kelewan a mockery of its former greatness, turning the Tsurani into murdering death worshippers like the Dasati and start them moving upward to the next highest realm.”
“How do you know all this?” asked Pug.
“Because it’s happened before, Pug,” answered Nakor. “In other places and here, on this world.” Nakor signaled for them to make their way to the relative shelter of the dais behind the TeKarana’s throne. He crawled around behind it on all fours, and they staggered against the wind and crouched down next to him.
He said, “It’s that long story I mentioned.”
“Is it time to tell us?” asked Pug.
“Yes,” said Nakor. “It is time for the truth.” He held up his hand and suddenly time stopped.
“That’s a very good trick, Nakor,” said Magnus, true awe in his tone.
“Yes, it is,” said Pug.
“I can’t hold this for very long, but at least we’ll have a bit of quiet,” said the little gambler. He sat down on the stones. “I’m very tired, Pug. I should have died a long time ago, I think, but as you know better than anyone else, sometimes the gods don’t care what you think should or should not be happening.”
“What is this truth you’re going to tell, Nakor?” Pug pressed.
“There are some things I don’t know, and some things that are still in doubt and can’t be foretold. And even a few things I’m forbidden to tell you.”
Pug looked at his longtime friend and said nothing.
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After a moment, Nakor said, “I have something inside me, Pug. As does Bek, but what he carries and what I carry are not the same. Inside Bek is a sliver of something very powerful.”
“You said you thought he might have a sliver of the Nameless within him,” said Magnus.
Nakor grinned and shook his head. “No, I lied. That’s not it. When he was a boy I think he was just a bad boy, a lout, a thug or killer waiting to get hanged or have his throat cut . . . but somehow he became entangled in this thing we do, this struggle to restore a long-lost balance in . . . well, in everything.”
“Go on,” said Pug.
“The first night he stayed with me, outside the cave with all the Talnoy hidden inside, he was curious, as I expected him to be, and he sneaked inside to look. I pretended to be asleep. I knew then I’d either have to kill him or use him. So, I did something to him.”
“What?”
“I reached inside him and there I found a strange and marvelous power. It was familiar and I had a dream.” Nakor smiled. “More of a vision, maybe. Anyway, time stopped then, or I had hours of thoughts in seconds, but suddenly I knew . . . everything. Bek came to me because it was preordained that he should. The thing that moved him was the same as what moved me, when I was young.
Both of us were tools of the gods, but with a different purpose. I was to be his guide, and he was to be the vessel to bring something back to Omadrabar that had been lost. So, I made him a vessel.”
“A vessel?” asked Magnus. “For what?”
“For what was inside one of the Talnoy in the cave.”
Pug was speechless. What the Dasati with Macros’s memory had told him was that each of the Talnoy housed the soul of a lost Dasati god. “You put a god inside him?”
“Only a tiny little bit, but enough.”
“Enough for what?” asked Magnus.
“Enough to make sure the TeKarana died, even if Valko didn’t kill him, and that something of critical importance would come back here.”
“What?” asked Pug, now totally confused by the little man’s convolutions.
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“The gods, Pug. Remember, all the gods on all the realms are just aspects of the same fundamental powers, and all the gods of our realm and those above and below are locked in a struggle with the creatures of the Void. When the Dark One rose to power, a mad plot was put in place, one that caused the ten thousand gods of the Dasati to hide in plain sight.”
“The Talnoy.”
“Yes. The Dark One is powerful, but there is nothing intelligent a
bout the Dreadlords. I don’t even know if they can be said to think the way we do. They exist, they act, they have purpose, but . . . they are beyond our understanding. So, the Dreadlord first subverted the worshippers of the God of Death, Bakal, and began the Dark Temple. When the Chaos Wars raged here, the Dasati gods were given haven.”
“On Midkemia,” said Magnus.
“Yes, in that cave, where they have stayed for . . . more years than I can count.”
“What of the one Kaspar found?”
“That was put there by Macros, at the bidding of . . . well, the one who is really behind all of what we’ve been struggling with. Macros was only another agent of the gods. So, Bek is the first of the ancient Dasati gods to return home. To these people, he is Kantas-Barat. On our world he would be Onan-ka.”
“The God of Battle,” said Pug.
“It seemed right for these people. The Happy Warrior has come home. Bek will remain for a while, but his mortal days are over. He has been consumed by the god that is within him. Bek as we knew him when he first appeared is no more. He has been dead since before we came to this realm, really.”
“How did you put . . . a tiny bit of a god into Bek, Nakor?”
asked Magnus.
“That’s the hard part to explain,” said Nakor. He pointed to his own chest. “I have something here, and sometimes it . . .
takes over. Sometimes I remember it doing things, tricks I don’t know, and other times . . . it’s just blanks. I go to sleep one place, wake up another, and sometimes people are very angry with me, or sometimes I have things I didn’t have before in my sack.”
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“Do you know who’s doing this?” asked Pug.
“Oh, yes,” said Nakor with a grin. “And you need to know, because you need to take him back.”
“Take who back?” asked Magnus.
“Ban-ath.”
Pug sat down next to Nakor. “The God of Thieves?”
“The Midkemian god of thieves,” confirmed Nakor. “He cannot stay without a protective vessel” —Nakor pointed to his own chest—“or he will perish—well, he won’t perish, but the tiny part of him I carry within will—and what he has learned here must go back. You must be his vessel for a little while, until you get home.”