Blakstar shook his head; Klaybear and Thal exchanged another glance.
“There is something strange,” Thal said, “about the way distance and time behave here. I have noticed that, although it has taken longer each time for our enemy to recover enough strength to attack us, we have been attacked by stone creatures and earthquake immediately upon entering any clearing.”
“I had noticed,” Klaybear agreed.
“So what do we do?” Tevvy asked.
Klaybear thought for a moment before responding. “I think we should go forward on the short path, just to see what is there, and then decide.”
The others nodded, and all moved quickly onto the path. Almost as soon as they entered the left way, a clearing opened, different from the others: this one was a depression, like a shallow bowl, with rocks like standing stones around the rim providing cover, as if they were supposed to see into the bowl without being seen by any who might be below. They took cover behind the rocks, looking carefully down. They could hear clinking sounds, and a rhythmic grinding sound that they soon discovered was stony chanting. Below, they saw a flat area at the bottom of the depression, a stone pillar at its center, surrounded by a score of the stone creatures, who appeared to be dancing and chanting around the stone pillar. Next to the pillar stood another stone creature, waving a rod topped with some kind of feathers. The stone pillar was revolving slowly, at the same speed as the creatures who circled, but in the opposite direction, and sinking slowly into the sand. As it turned, they could see chains binding something to the pillar, then they saw what was clearly a female figure, which caused them all to watch the pillar more closely.
“It looks like . . . ,” Tevvy started to say, before the others, since his awemi eyes could see farther than the eyes of his companions, “but that can’t be true; she can’t be here,” he finished looking both concerned and puzzled.
“Who do you see?” Klaybear asked.
“An awema I know, named Elanor,” he whispered, “she graduated from my father’s school with me; we grew up together, I think our mothers . . . ,” he started to say, but was interrupted by the kortexi.
“The figure is too large to be awema,” Blakstar objected, “she is a wetha; she looks like . . . ,” he trailed off, not completing his thought.
“Your eyes are wrong,” Thal said, “and I don’t know how you could know her, she is from the village near my master’s tower.”
Klaybear did not speak, more puzzled than before, as he thought he saw Klare chained to that revolving pillar, about to be sacrificed to some stone deity.
“You wethem are blind!” Tevvy exclaimed, “she’s shorter than me, so she cannot be who you think she is!”
As they argued, the stone pillar lurched and sank deeper into the sand; the figure chained to the pillar screamed. Blakstar growled and leapt to his feet, and, before the others could stop him, he was running down the hill, brandishing his golden, flaming sword. They were so stunned by his sudden action that no one spoke or moved until he reached the bottom of the depression and shouldered his way past the circling stone creatures. Klaybear, Tevvy, and Thal stood and followed him, but as they stepped out from behind their cover and started to run down the hill, the kortexi had swung his sword at the creature next to the pillar, cutting off one of its stony arms. Predictably, it fell down before Blakstar, prone upon the sand. They heard Blakstar’s command, echoing around the shallow bowl.
“Release her!” he shouted, “and send her back!”
The prone stone creature waved its remaining arm, and both pillar and victim vanished. Blakstar stabbed his sword into the single glowing eye of the prone creature, destroying it. The circling creatures stopped, apparently stunned into inaction by the sudden appearance of the glowing kortexi.
“Idiot!” Tevvy exclaimed, stopping. “What’s he going to do now, surrounded by twenty creatures who are not going to be happy that he interrupted their sacrifice? Run, you fool!” he shouted at Blakstar. “Before they close ranks!” Tevvy grabbed and stopped Klaybear and Thal, dragging them with him as he turned back up the hill.
Tevvy’s shout brought Blakstar back to himself, and he immediately ran toward the others, removing the heads from two of the stone creatures as he passed through their circle and started back up the hill. The other creatures turned and started after the fleeing kortexi and his companions. Tevvy and the others reached the top of the bowl and turned at the entrance to the path. What they saw stunned them: the stone creatures did not run after the kortexi, but their short legs had vanished, and they were rolling forward on the stone that formed their lower torso, quickly moving up the hill and nearly upon Blakstar.
“Can you slow them down?” Tevvy asked.
In reply, Klaybear whipped out his staff, pointed it at the stone creature closest to the kortexi, shooting a bolt of green fire, which struck the stone creature and blew it apart. Thal raised his rod and shouted, “Plotugel!” A stream of water issued from the tip of his rod, hitting the sand behind Blakstar and freezing into a sheet of ice about ten feet square. The stone creatures behind the kortexi lost traction, but only for a moment, until their bulk broke through the ice. However, that moment was enough, and Blakstar reached the place where the others waited. They backed into the path, Klaybear swapping his staff for his mace as Blakstar turned back to fight the stone creatures. Klaybear smashed the head of the first one to approach; Blakstar stabbed the eye of the second, and the stones that made up the two creatures fell apart, blocking the entrance to the path. They turned to follow Tevvy and Thal, who had already reached the fork.
“We should turn again at the fork in the path,” Blakstar said, looking over his shoulder, “to slow them down again.”
Klaybear looked back and saw that the remaining stone creatures were pushing past the stones of their fallen comrades. “Not for long,” he noted.
“It will be enough,” Blakstar added as they turned down the other path.
They again turned and waited only moments before dispatching two more creatures and blocking the path. Klaybear looked up and saw more of the stone creatures coming from the previous clearing toward them.
“There are more coming,” Klaybear said as they turned to flee again.
“I saw them,” Blakstar replied, looking over his shoulder periodically as they ran. “We will have to turn again, soon.”
Klaybear nodded, looking ahead. “It doesn’t look like we have far to go; the others appear to have entered another clearing.”
“And what will they find?” Blakstar asked. “More of these creatures, I suspect. They are nearly upon us,” he noted after glancing back again. “We need a good archer,” he mumbled.
Klaybear heard and smiled, getting ready to turn.
“Now!” Blakstar exclaimed, stopping suddenly and turning to stab his sword into the eye of the closest stone creature. It fell apart, causing the creature behind it to stumble. Klaybear brought his mace down hard, crushing the stone head of the second creature. The two creatures’ remains blocked the path and again, momentarily halted their pursuit. Blakstar and Klaybear turned and ran, hoping they could catch up to Thal and Tevvy before their pursuers could catch them again. They heard grinding stone behind them, and looking back, saw their pursuers pushing the stones blocking the path out of the way.
“They are getting better,” Klaybear quipped as they ran.
Blakstar shook his head. “How many more are following us?”
“It is hard to tell,” Klaybear replied, “since vision here is obscured by dust.”
“Too many for us to handle easily, I’d say,” Blakstar said.
“I fear you are right, which seems to contradict what we were told,” the kailu noted, “equal opposition.”
The kortexi looked back and saw the stone creatures were, again, gaining on them, and turned back to Klaybear. “We’ll have to stop them just before the next clearing opens, if we want to have any chance of surviving.”
“Let’s hope there are not more of them waiting
for us,” Klaybear replied.
Blakstar nodded. “A little further, I think,” he noted, continuing to glance back periodically. They could see the opening twenty yards ahead of them, and they took four more strides and turned, ready to attack. When the first pair of stone creatures neared them, Blakstar lunged forward, stabbing out the eye and sidestepping as the pieces of the stone creature rolled past him. Klaybear swung overhand and sidestepped, bringing his mace down on the second stone creature’s head, crushing it. The pieces crashed into the remains of the first, blocking the path behind them. Before they could leap over the stones, the next pair of creatures were upon them, so they both repeated their previous actions, sending more stones to pile against the others blocking the path behind them.
“I think we made a mistake,” Klaybear said.
Blakstar nodded, lunging for his third stone creature, stabbing out the eye; Klaybear swung at his third, crushing another stone head. However, the pursuit had caught up to them, so the stone remains of these two did not roll as far as the others, which gave the kortexi an idea. “Go!” he shouted to Klaybear. “I’ll hold them here!” He turned to lunge toward his fourth stone creature, stabbing out its eye. He parried the swing of the next creature, but before he could stab out its eye, a bolt of green power passed over his right shoulder, then it struck the eye of the creature whose blow he had parried. The bolt flashed and sizzled for a moment, the creature shuddered and fell apart, the orange gem going suddenly dark and sliding from the eye socket.
“Now!” Klaybear shouted from behind, and Blakstar ducked and rolled beneath a second green bolt, coming to his feet again and leaping over the stone remains that had stopped just behind them; Klaybear stood grinning at him, pointing his staff toward their pursuers. The kailu opened his mouth to speak, but stopped suddenly, hearing Thal’s voice from behind them.
“Duck!” the white maghi shouted, pointing his rod in their direction. Both dropped immediately to the ground. “Strelo-sporna-okwum!” A bolt of yellow lightning leapt from the tip of Thal’s rod, touching the eyes of the next three stone creatures, who were trying to push the stony remains of their fallen comrades out of the way. All three stopped and started shaking, as smaller bolts of lightning forked from Thal’s main bolt, surrounding their bodies with crackling electricity.
On the ground, Klaybear heard and recognized Thal’s incantation. “Stay down!” he hissed to the kortexi. Both felt their hair standing up, hearing the bolt of lightning crackling overhead. As quickly as it had flashed to life, the bolt winked out, but the three closest creatures remained, for a few moments longer, encased in forking bolts of lightning, shuddering and grinding, until the lightning winked out, and the three creatures fell apart, the charred remains of their gemstone eyes falling to the ground.
“Quickly!” Thal exclaimed, “while we have time!”
Klaybear and Blakstar jumped to their feet, half leaping, half crawling over the stones blocking the pathway and entering the sandy clearing where Thal and Tevvy were waiting for them. This clearing was as small as the first one they had entered, what seemed to them days ago; there was no other pathway, except the one on which they had entered, and the boulders surrounding this small clearing leaned over the clearing, threatening to collapse and cover the sandy space.
“Over here,” Tevvy said, waving to them from the side farthest away from the path. “I think I found the way out.”
They could hear the grinding sounds of the stone creatures, pushing the remains of their fallen comrades out of the way. They rushed over to where the awemi squatted, brushing sand off a portal stone, next to a pile of bones that included a skull. Thal squatted next to him, examining the stone.
Blakstar nudged the bones with his boot. “Looks like he didn’t quite make it,” he noted.
Klaybear nodded. “That could have been us, if we did not get lucky back there,” he added, turning to the others.
“There,” Thal said, touching a symbol on the stone with a glowing finger.
A gray shimmering archway, similar to the one opened by Blakstar’s sword, flared to life in the air before them. At the same moment, the stones blocking the pathway into the small clearing ground out of the way, and their pursuers rushed toward them. They stepped through the archway and back into Shigmar’s tomb.
Chapter 10
There are times healing when the kailu must admit defeat, must recognize that the patient’s life has run its course and the patient should be allowed to die; this decision–to stop healing–is probably the most difficult that we ever face. . . .
Tarlana, Headmistress of Shigmar, 167-194
“Is this the same room as before?” Klaybear asked, looking around.
“Look,” Tevvy said, pointing, “there is the sling bullet I threw into the room.”
Blakstar pointed to the wall. “And isn’t that the crate that contained your weapon and armor?”
“But the inscription is different,” Thal noted, pointing at the archway that had lead them to the earth realm, “so the inscription must change as we successfully pass through each of the five realms.”
“Why couldn’t we,” Tevvy began, “just skip the other realms, and go directly to Shigmar’s tomb. Wouldn’t that save time?” he finished, raising his hands.
“I don’t think we could,” Thal said, shaking his head. “The fact that the inscription has changed indicates that we must progress forward through each realm before we can enter the place where the staff lies. Remember that Shigmar told us that this was a test, mostly to prevent the staff from falling into any hands but ours.”
“Wouldn’t it have been simpler,” Tevvy said, “to simply prevent anyone but us from entering? Surely the fact that the founders knew us well enough to create these,” he pointed to his black leather bracers, “means they could have locked the staff away in a place that only we could enter.”
“They did,” Blakstar said impatiently, “this place.”
“I meant,” Tevvy said, throwing up his hands in exasperation, “some place that was easier for us to enter than this one is.”
“If they made it easy for us,” Blakstar growled, “it would be easy for anyone, and the staff would have been removed long before now.”
“Let’s examine the inscription,” Klaybear said, cutting off further argument.
Thal moved closer to the archway and ran his fingers over the new words. “Creatures made of heat alone,” he translated, then pointed to the first word of the second line. “I’m not sure about this one, it means, literally, those who make statues sacred,” he noted, and Klaybear interrupted him.
“Idolaters,” Klaybear said, “people who worship idols, or statues.”
Thal nodded. “Your realm, more than mine, I think,” he said, then looked back at the inscription. “Then I should think the line reads, idolaters worship us, the right-wise. . . .”
“Righteous,” Klaybear inserted.
“The righteous,” Thal corrected himself, “hold us in high regard, always the source of heat,” he finished, thinking for a moment before speaking again. “Fire,” he said, “we must next pass through the realm of fire.”
Tevvy groaned. “So instead of constant earthquakes and grinding boulders, flame spouts and blistering heat? That’s just great!” he added sarcastically, throwing up his hands.
Thal nodded. “Since we have a better idea of what to expect, what can we do to prepare?”
“Can’t I just sit this one out?” Tevvy asked plaintively.
Klaybear shook his head. “I don’t think so,” he said, “since Shigmar told us that the four of us had to pass through the test.” He turned to Thal. “There is one orthek I can cast on us, an orthek that will help us better tolerate the heat, but it is not very powerful, because I’m not very powerful, and it requires a drop of argwiwo, a very expensive and rare item, of which I have very little: for the four of us, maybe two applications.”
“How long would that last?” Thal asked.
“Maybe
fifteen minutes each,” Klaybear replied, “if the heat is not too intense.”
“I think we can count on the heat being ‘too intense,’” Tevvy noted wryly.
Thal nodded. “I suspect that you are right,” he said. “Thirty minutes, then, it took us several hours to get through the earth realm, it won’t be enough,” he finished softly, speaking to himself.
“I should add,” Blakstar said, “that part of my training included surviving extreme conditions, and with heat the advice was to keep a cool head.”
Tevvy snorted. “That is the problem!”
Thal frowned at Tevvy. “How did they tell you to do that?” he asked the kortexi.
“Cover your head, and neck, with a cloth,” Blakstar said, “and keep the cloth damp.”
“That sounds like an awful waste of water,” Tevvy said, “water that could be drunk, rather than dumped over one’s head to evaporate.”
“The evaporation,” Blakstar replied, “is what keeps you cool.”
“We will also need,” Thal went on, “some kind of shield, to protect us from flame spouts, if, as Tevvy believes, we are assaulted in that way. I can create a shield, but, like Klaybear, it will not be very powerful, or proof against all.”
“Do you think there might be something here that will help us?” Blakstar asked. “Extra filled water skins would be helpful.”
“The extra containers would be enough,” Klaybear said. “We kailum work many of our ortheks using the element of water, so I can create as much as we need, at least until I run out of energy.”
Blakstar went and opened the crate next to the one that had Klaybear’s armor and weapon. The others followed. The kortexi lifted up several empty, canvas water bags and handed them to Klaybear.
Klaybear took them, one eyebrow rising. He examined them carefully, and was surprised to find that they looked newly made. “How is it possible,” he noted, holding up one of the bags, “that this could survive three and a half millennia and still look brand new?”
The Redemption, Volume 1 Page 47
