“Throw you over,” Baro answered.
“I will die!”
“No, here you cannot die. Whatever happens to you, it will not kill you. You will live on eternally.”
Arboghast looked into the young man’s face and clearly did not relish what he saw there.
“Please,” he said.
Baro pointed with his chin. “Do you see that creature circling below,” he said, “the one with the leathery wings and talons on its feet?”
“It has the head of a beast.”
“Would you believe that that creature and I are engaged in a contest?”
Arboghast began to moan.
“It is a contest to see which of us hates you more.” He shifted his grip.
“No! Don’t!”
Baro flung the man who killed his father out of Heaven. Ardmander Arboghast fell screaming, arms flailing as if he hoped to fly.
Once beyond the ambit of Bandar’s thran, he was noticed by the flying demon. It lazily flapped its wings, then flipped onto its back and caught him with its hind feet. Baro saw the dark claws sink into the flesh of its unexpected catch and the high-pitched scream told him that Bandar had brought over enough of Arboghast to make his endless sentence in Hell a true torment.
Baro watched the fiend spiral down toward the lake of fire. “And I have won,” he said.
This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this novel are either fictitious or are fictitiously.
BLACK BRILLION
Copyright © 2004 by Matt Hughes Company, Ltd.
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portions thereof, in any form.
Edited by David G. Hartwell
A Tor Book
Published by Tom Doherty Associates, LLC
175 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10010
Tor® is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.
eISBN 9781466824812
First eBook Edition : June 2012
Black Brillion Page 26
