"No, Horace! No! We can't!"
Horace and Kelvin were underwater, and in front of them was a desperately swimming bird. The bird's propelling wings beat steadily.
Kelvin remembered not to breathe, and then they were coming up inside the installation. Zady, already her proper self, was ready to step into the transporter.
As the dragon and its passenger arrived in the airlock, Zady raised her hand. If she only had time she would cast a spell, but that was not the main danger as Kelvin saw it. The transporter here was for pointed-ears only, and if Mouvar's warning applied here it would be destroyed if they tried using it.
"NO, HORACE! NO! NO!" But Kelvin's cries were as they had been all along, futile efforts to stop an enraged dragon.
The dragon was suddenly on the woman and taking her with its great momentum and weight into the too-small transporter.
The paneled sides of the transporter booth vanished in a pinkish, soundless flash. Still their momentum continued.
Down, down, down through a bewildering sea of twisting, turning blackness, twinkling stars and hissing comets.
"He's got her! He's got her!" Kildee cried excitedly.
"Dolt," came his brother's instant reply. "He and Kelvin were killed! It was her plan, she tricked him!"
"Helbah, tune the crystal!" Charlain demanded.
Helbah looked crestfallen. "I can't tune it to where they're going—where they may be going if they're not destroyed."
"Are they destroyed?" Glow's question came quickly.
"I don't know. My magic goes only so far. Charlain, can you try to see?"
Hastily Charlain dealt out the cards. "Kelvin," she said loudly, and lifted the first. Uncertainty. Well, at least not the death card. A second card, Possibility of Death.
"Please, cards," Charlain whispered, "tell us something we don't know."
Hesitantly she turned up the third card in the sequence. Possibility of Success. The cards had said that the possibilities were equally balanced. Kelvin might live and Kelvin might die and there was no getting past the question.
"Try Horace," Glow suggested.
Charlain picked up and shuffled the deck. She knew what they were going to tell her—precisely nothing.
She dealt out the cards. "Horace," she said, and picked up the Uncertainty card, followed by the Possibility of Success card, followed by the Possibility of Death card.
"Does the order make a difference?" Glow asked. "When you asked about Kelvin the second card was the Possibility of Death."
"Normally it makes a difference," Charlain said wearily. "In this case it may mean that Horace's chance of succeeding may not be canceled by his death."
"How—how could that be?"
"Horace's idea of success is to destroy Zady. The possibility is that he may succeed in that even though he dies. For his father death would seem to be a shade more likely and the chances of success a bit less than Horace's."
"I don't like that," Glow said.
"Try asking about Zady," Helbah suggested.
It was as good an idea as any. Almost uninterested now she laid out the cards.
"Zady," she said, and turned over the first. Uncertainty.
Second card: Possibility of Success.
Third card: Possibility of Nothing.
Glow tapped the last card with its depiction of an empty box. "Is that different from a death card?"
"For a witch it may be," Charlain said. "All the cards really mean is that she may or may not succeed in her wicked plans, and that after she does or doesn't, she may or may not continue as an existing witch."
CHAPTER 29
Devale
Helbah was more startled than anyone in the room as her warning spell was activated. The slab of crystal reserved for the warning blinked on and off several times and a voice, actually Helbah's own, said, "Visitors."
Helbah glanced at Katbah. The animal's fur was lying down, certainly a good sign when one expected enemies. Possibly it wasn't Zady or a Zady helper outside; she'd ask.
"Who's there?"
The crystal crawled with lines and circles and produced a mirror image of what was outside: Strongback, the king of Rotternik, and three of his furry court.
"Look! Babkeys!" one of the twin kings cried out.
"Rotternikers," his brother corrected him. "I wonder what they want."
"They're not hostile," Helbah said. "But what a time to come here!"
She watched until the delegation was at the blue palace door. The blue palace was actually used more than the white, as everyone knew, even citizens of Rotternik. However, the palaces were connected, blue Klingland's to white Kance's. When they reached the doorstep she made the entrance sign and went forward to meet their guests.
"King Strongback! What a pleasant surprise! Is this an official or unofficial visit?"
"Official," Strongback replied. He merely glanced at the human visitors and the lighted viewing crystals. "Most official."
"Then you have business with Klingland and Kance?"
"With the Alliance."
"Oh." She could not have said why but that surprised her.
"Rotternik wishes to join the Alliance as a member. We do not wish to disappear as did Throod."
"Well, that certainly is good news," Helbah said. At any other time it would have been cause for rejoicing. "I will tune in the titular heads of Rud-Aratex, Hermandy, and Ophal."
Helbah made a gesture and three crystals stopped their swirlings. In the smaller crystal appeared King Rufurt's aged face. In the largest crystal appeared the fish-face of Brudalous, king of Ophal. Finally, after a brief wait for the king to get to the throne room, King Hadanhowler of Hermandy. All three of the kings would be seeing this room in their own magic crystals.
Helbah motioned to Strongback.
Strongback pulled himself up stiffly, not bending forward as much as his ministers, and said, "Rotternik seeks membership in the Alliance. Is our membership accepted?"
"Confirmed," said King Rufurt. "Welcome to the Alliance."
"Ophal confirms membership," said Brudalous. He was trying to push back a strand of seaweed that had gotten caught on his headcrest. As was almost always the case, he was underwater and his gills were opening and closing in typical orc manner.
"Confirmed," said King Hadanhowler. Unlike a former king of Hermandy he was quite young and handsome and wasn't reputed to be at all sadistic.
"That leaves Klingland and Kance," Helbah said. "Kildom, what do you think about Rotternik joining the Alliance?"
The young redhead swallowed. He and his brother had seldom dealt directly in matters of state, but that was changing as they gradually matured. In earlier times Helbah had decided for them and spoken for them, as was her nonofficial but practical right.
"I think it would be nice to have some babkeys around," he said. "Klingland confirms Rotternik's membership."
"Forgive His Highness for an immature observation," Helbah said. The ministers would not have been offended, but Strongback could have been. Babkeys were after all hardly representative of Rotternik's most intelligent inhabitants. Yet in his own mind the mischief maker was only complimenting the kingdom for having something the others didn't. Helbah understood and she knew the others would as well.
"King Kildee, you have the deciding vote. Speak up."
"I, King Kildee, Sovereign Almighty King of Kance, think it appropriate that Rotternik be in the Alliance. I say confirmed."
Helbah felt like cheering. Kildee had to outdo his brother just a bit, but the title, grandiose as it was, was legitimate.
"Now you take an oath," King Rufurt prompted unnecessarily. The roly-poly king of easygoing days was definitely becoming senile as he continued to pile on unneeded weight. Helbah made up her mind to slim him and find him a magic cure if the danger of Zady ever passed.
Strongback was already raising his hand: "I, Strongback, King of Rotternik, hereby swear allegiance of my kingdom to the Alliance. My ambassadors will visit each of y
ou in request of foreign aid."
Typical, Helbah thought, but also practical. Of all the kingdoms Rotternik could use the most help. The great forests would always be retained, but the hairy inhabitants would visit the ground regularly and some would start to live there. Soon there would be hairy tourists, some of them with tails and manners foreign to the inhabitants of other member kingdoms.
In short order the Rotternik delegation left the palace, and the crystals lost their kingly faces. Things were back to normal now as they awaited their nonexistence or the dawn of a hard-won new life.
"Does this mean," Glow said, speaking up timidly, "that Kelvin's prophecy is fulfilled?"
"Until from Seven there be One/Only then will his Task be Done." Charlain recited the familiar near-verse. She sighed, giving Helbah an uncomfortable look. "I only hope that his task will all be done. If Zady gains control it won't matter if we say there's one kingdom or ten."
"There should be a line that says, 'When Zady's done, then all the kingdoms come,' " Kildom offered.
Helbah approved the young monarch's sentiments, though surely not his attempt at verse. But future hopes aside, the situation here hadn't changed.
As young Kathy Jon had remarked previously, all any of them could do was sit here and wait.
"We have to find him!" Merlain wailed. They had to concentrate on that. Now that her dragon brother and her father were off chasing Zady they had to deal with what was most important to her: her husband.
"Don't worry," said Charles, being brotherly once again. "We're certain to find him if he's alive. You know how Zady loves to torment people. She may have done something painful to him that won't have killed him outright."
"You're such a comfort, Charles." Strangely, he was, his unpleasant suggestion aside. "I've been searching with my mind, but either he's far away or—"
Dizziness afflicted her. Almost too late she realized that Glint was projecting his thought to her. She hadn't been able to reach him because he was high up in an eagawk nest. As she looked up, where she had not thought to search for him, the height of the peak with its precariously balanced nest was overwhelming.
Zady got me, Merlain. It was my own fault. From the projecting cliff in Forbidden Mountain I watched her growing her new body. I watched the eagawks bringing her nourishment, and then it was as though I never wanted to come here again.
She spelled you, Glint. Are you hurt?
No. But the surroundings here aren't the most pleasant.
Neither are we hurt. Horace and Daddy rescued us and are after Zady. This time they're going to fix her proper. Can you get down?
Not without Horace. Merlain, it's really hot here with the sun beating down. And the air—
"Grandfather," Merlain said aloud, "do you think you can use your belt to get my husband? He's up there, in that old eagawk nest."
Grandfather Knight looked upward, straining his eyes, she knew, in the sun's bright glare. Then he activated the belt and lifted. She watched him soar high and higher until he seemed with distance to become first the size of a bird and then an insect. She saw him hover near the top of the spire, then descend. She knew he was in the nest. She waited and waited, now and then giving Charles a nervous look. What was keeping him?
"Grandfather will fetch him," Charles said. "Unless of course Zady set a trap. That could be why she brought Glint here—to act as bait."
At that moment the insect, now larger, lifted. It flew at them, coming lower and lower, finally becoming Grandfather Knight carrying her husband. They landed in front of her and Charles, and Glint immediately let loose of her grandfather's shoulders and slid off his back. A moment later Glint was rushing at her in the most incredible charge.
Merlain hardly caught her breath as he hugged her, pressing her tight. He hadn't seemed so passionate since the night of their wedding, and Lord, but he had tried.
"Oh Merlain, Merlain, Merlain!"
"Oh Glint, Glint, Glint!"
Grandfather was being disgustingly sick and Charles was holding his own nose and pointing first at Glint's rescuer and then at Glint. Merlain sucked in air through her nostrils and immediately knew the reason for her grandfather's sudden illness and her brother's mental affliction. She had, in that one breath, a good reason to be sick herself.
She had to be diplomatic, she supposed. Like her dragon brother Horace and her human brother Charles she knew how to appreciate a good stink. But an eagawk nest that had held a stinking witch for twenty long years had a stench not to be appreciated.
"Husband, Grandfather," she gasped, "you're just going to have to take baths, both of you! Even Horace wouldn't come near you smelling like that."
Another too-small booth exploded outward, and Horace was so startled by where they were that he let Zady loose. In his mouth were the remains of her dark-red dress. She ran screaming down a long marble corridor, pushing startled students aside; leather-bound books hit the floor in her wake, spines cracking and emitting smoke. Fallen would-be witches and warlocks scampered to get up and save their lives by any means possible. Accepting this strange confined place with its dark wood paneling and twisted, tortured artworks done mainly in blacks and reds, Horace opaled after.
"Save me! Save me!" Zady screeched. She yanked open a door and ran inside. "Professor Devale, I can't stop it! Help!"
Horace opaled into the office, smashing doorway and room furnishings. A shred of red dress remained caught on a front tooth.
"Incompetent!" Devale said, and hurled Zady's naked, bleeding form back at Horace. Horace shot out his forked tongue, lassoed her throat, and yanked her partially into his mouth. He clomped his great jaws with sickening crunch and spat out her head at the master enemy.
Devale ducked the missile, and Zady's head was neatly skewered on his left horn. He lifted the head on his own, meanwhile gesturing with his hands and blowing a bluish powder. The light-blue dust enveloped them and entered Horace's and Kelvin's nostrils. Kelvin thought to blow off the powder but found immediately that he could not.
"You fools," Devale said with the rasp of triumph, "you've fallen into my trap! You are both too dangerous to play with, so I'll do with you what I did with Throod. I am going to finish this spell I have started, and when I am finished neither dragon nor hero will ever have existed. Thus in one move I will have finished this game and won!"
Kelvin had to wonder what Devale had won and what the game was. His father had talked a little about a game Zady's protector and his own might be playing. Unfortunately Kelvin had thought his father was talking nonsense and had paid it scant attention.
Devale began mumbling, oblivious to Zady's head, speared through its cranium and bobbing with his. Drool came from Zady's open mouth and ran down his forehead; Devale ignored it.
Horace ignored the mutilated body of the beautiful young woman under his raised foot. He seemed never to be going to put down that foot to render and tear her and to lower his jaws to bite. His great tail remained still, not clearing the room of broken furniture in one fast sweep.
Kelvin knew that he and Horace were done. He couldn't move and he knew that Horace couldn't. Devale must have started his magic while they were chasing Zady. Kelvin had been motionless and helpless before. First he had been held by Zatanas, Zady's wicked and somewhat untalented brother. Next he had been paralyzed and held motionless by the stare of a great silver serpent, then again by a Flopear intent on splitting him on an oversized sword. In every instant of complete helplessness something had intervened. In the three incidents now remembered so clearly it had been the gauntlets.
He wore but one gauntlet now, and Devale was out of reach and far too big to strangle. The gauntlet could act by itself and save them only if it had a weapon. He had given away his weapons. Glint had the chimaera's sting that might have saved them. His father had the levitation belt that might have hurled his body into the monster's face. Charles had the right-hand gauntlet, and even if they could reach Devale it would certainly take both to choke him. He had gi
ven his daughter Merlain something else, and—
And she had given it back!
The gauntlet acted before his thought was finished. With one motion it dragged his hand under his loose shirt, grabbed the weapon with his fingers, and activated it.
Devale was just flinging out his own fingers in a triumphant gesture. The bell-shaped muzzled weapon beneath the cloth took his attention on the last syllable he spoke. He could not retract it, though he seemed to try. It was also during his final thrust of commanding motion. Too late now to change the spell and prevent its effect.
In an instant it was over. All over.
CHAPTER 30
Mouvar
The weapon in Kelvin's suddenly reactivated hand jumped and hissed under his shirt, and with the sound and the restoration of his nervous system Devale and the remains of Zady vanished. Not only Devale and Zady's severed head were gone, but every drop of blood and spittle and other bodily fluids were completely and cleanly vanquished.
Kelvin moved the gauntlet now, placing the muzzle of the antimagic weapon more firmly in his belt. He withdrew his hand and looked at it, wondering as he did so why he wasn't shaking. His hand was all right. He was all right. Horace was all right. Only Devale and Zady had been affected by Mouvar's weapon.
"Horace, we've won! We've defeated them!"
It materialized slowly in front of them: a dwarf with a very large head and skin the color of pale-green grass. The creature had pointed, not rounded ears, and hands that were webbed between the fingers like a froog's.
The creature blinked light-orange eyes at them while transparent eyelids opened and closed sideways. It did not speak to them, but thought.