Goddess Worldweaver sc-3

by Douglas Niles

  Mem’ries of violence,

  Shortage of breath;

  Shades shout “Hail!”

  And pray

  To the mistress of fate.

  From the Tapestry of the Worldweaver, Bloom of Entropy

  Regillix Avatar was past the sun now, barely conscious as he drifted upward on the blast of the hot, dry wind. His wings smoldered, seared by the intense heat. He closed the protective inner lids over his eyes, reducing his visibility to a cloudy murk, and even that wasn’t enough to insulate him from the massive, fiery orb.

  He lapsed into a kind of torpid agony, his body numbed to all sensation, reducing the awful pain to something he could at least tolerate. Water… he thirsted for the life-giving kiss of water, but there was none to be had, not even a cloud in these parched skies. There was just that air, as hot and dry and crushing as if it emerged from a blast furnace. It pushed him from below, rushing past in an explosion of wind, seemed to dry out every drop of moisture in his flesh.

  Even in the depths of his groggy pain, however, the mighty dragon realized that it was the very force of this air that gave him a chance of surviving. He still rode his massive wings, extending those vast membranes to either side. No longer did he have the strength to stroke, to pull his way upward through the labor of his muscles. But still he continued to rise, because the air was bearing him upward with such force. The cosmic draft between the worlds was flowing fast, a strong current of air-Socrates had been right-countering the Worldfall, aided by the surge of Nayve’s Lighten, it lifted him, bore him toward home.

  Gradually a new awareness penetrated his mind; he knew that time was passing, that the day of Nayve would be approaching its end. At the Hour of Darken the sun would begin to rise, and the corresponding rush of air into the vacuum created by its departure would start to flow downward. If he had not reached his destination by then, he never would.

  So once again he worked, driving his wings through the dry air, lifting, pulling, straining now as the image of the Overworld came into his mind. How far above? He couldn’t know. When he looked upward, he saw that the sky was light around the edges, darkening to black in the middle, as if he looked into a hole stretching impossibly far into the distance. But the sun was far below now, and the air was not so lethally burning. That patch of darkness became his objective, and he strove mightily, thought of nothing else… Reach that place, and his burning flesh would be cooled.

  Still he labored, and at last he began to move beyond the lethal fire, until finally the crushing heat was but a memory. Soothing coolness surrounded him, masking the rays of the now-distant sun. For a long time this was blessed relief, moisture caressing his burning scales, filling his nostrils with invigorating mist. The burned scales, the seared membranes of his wings were balmed by the moisture.

  It was when that mist began to thicken that he began to understand where he was. He had to work to move, to fight through increasing resistance. More and more water surrounded him, dense and choking, until he was swimming, struggling upward through actual liquid. No longer could he breathe, for he was in the depths of the Cloudsea, had reached Arcati only to pass into his home world through the bottom of the ocean.

  How ironic, he thought, as darkness closed in from the edges of his vision… how ironic that he would fly through the air, through lethal heat, to go home…

  Only to drown in the depths of the Overworld’s largest sea.

  Natac told Crazy Horse where he would find the elves of Hyac. Together with about a hundred survivors from the fleet of druid boats-all of them human warriors with cavalry experience-the Sioux chief made his way along the base of the vast earthwork, marveling at the extent of the wall that had been raised in just a couple of days.

  The barrier finally terminated at the base of one of the largest of the Ringhills, a craggy bluff that served to anchor the rampart, which abutted the base of the precipice in a very strong position. Walking around that elevation, the warrior found a shallow stream flowing out of the hills and followed it into the valley where he had been told the Hyac were encamped.

  Crazy Horse found the elven warriors in their bivouac, which was nestled very much like a Sioux camp in the lightly wooded valley between a couple of rocky outcrops. The elven huts were rounded domes, not cone-shape tepees, but they were still formed of animal skins draped over wooden frames, close enough to the abodes he had known all of his earlier life to give him a pleasant sense of memory.

  And these beautiful hills! It did not take a lot of imagination to be reminded of his beloved Black Hills. Even the pine trees scattered along the upper slopes and the crests would have been right at home in the lands of the Dakota. He looked along the rounded lower elevations, half expecting to see the hummocked, shaggy brown shapes of grazing buffalo.

  “You men wait here,” he suggested as they reached a flowered meadow beside the stream. “I will seek this Janitha, daughter of the khan.”

  The smell of the horse herd was a fine perfume in the still air, and he paused to admire the steeds grazing just a short distance downstream from the elven camp. There were thousands of them, sturdy and muscular, fattening up on the valley grass. Several of the animals were exceptional prizes, spotted pintos, golden mares, and a sleek, black stallion. “You are the chief’s horse, are you not?” he murmured to this one.

  He smiled, remembering countless thieving expeditions, when he set out with his friends to take ponies from the Shoshone, the Crow, or the Pawnee. Even as he enjoyed the memory he could not avoid a taint of regret in that smile, for he also recalled how much of his energy he had expended against those other tribes, and they against the Sioux. Since he had come to Nayve he had begun to imagine the power they would have had together, if they had united. Instead, they had allowed petty wars to drain their strength and their focus, all the while allowing the real enemy to encroach farther and farther onto their lands.

  Idly, he picked out another fine stallion, a pinto, admiring the way the horse watched him alertly, even moved to interpose himself between the human and the mares when the warrior approached. A touch on the nostrils calmed the animal, and Crazy Horse whispered a greeting. “You are a warrior yourself, aren’t you? I’ll bet you fairly fly into the fight!”

  Energized, he breathed the Ringhills air with new awareness, tasted the lush pines in every pore. This was a place worth fighting for, he knew. He had a sense, for the first time upon Nayve, that he might have found a home.

  A few minutes later he came to the first picket, an elven archer who studied him carefully with an arrow nocked in his bow. “Natac sent me,” the American warrior explained. “I am to seek Janitha Khandaughter.”

  The sentry gestured with his weapon. “There. Her hut is beside the third fire.”

  That elfwoman was eating a meal of beans and rice, using her fingers to scoop the mixture from a leafy plate into her mouth. She looked up as Crazy Horse came to her campfire, finished her last bite, then rose, wiping her hands on her leather pants.

  “I would like to join your company. I bring a hundred men from the druid fleet,” he said. “If you will have me.”

  “That depends,” she said, looking at him critically. “Do you know how to ride a pony?”

  “Don’t move!” Shandira said, standing rigidly still in the middle of the bowl-shaped valley.

  Miradel didn’t need any encouragement. In the first instant after the gargoyle landed she had been frozen by terror, transfixed by those hellish, glowing eyes. As soon as she stopped moving, however, the creature’s focus shifted, and it seemed to be looking around as if it had lost sight of her.

  The monster shifted position, taking a step forward with a sound like the scrape of stone grinding against stone. Those massive, bestial legs stretched and extended, bent as it crouched, the grotesque belly dangling, swinging loosely. Miradel could barely suppress her gasp of horror as the gargoyle peered around, blinking, uttering deep, bone-shivering growls. The two wings looked to be solid stone, but they spread
wide easily, as if they were made of tanned leather. The beast fanned them convulsively, and the blast of cold air struck Miradel like a physical blow. She needed every bit of her strength and courage to keep from staggering backward; somehow, she continued to hold herself statue still.

  Standing between the two druids and the lofty throne across the valley, the gargoyle seemed oddly hesitant. Miradel could see their objective, tantalizingly close now, on the mountainside rising before them. The shimmery substance was not a godly robe, she now perceived; it was water, spilling from a crack in the rock, flowing across the face of the mountain, then pouring into a stream that spilled from the front of the ledge forming the seat of the Deathlord’s throne.

  Karlath-Fayd’s massive, burning eyes still glowed above, disembodied, floating against the darkness. How often had she looked at them in the Tapestry, seen and feared the power there. Yet now, in the hall of the god himself, it was the servant, the gargoyle, that truly inspired fear.

  “We have to get closer!” Shandira said. “I have an idea-but you have to stay still, like a statue, until I say to move.”

  At the sound of the druid’s voice, the gargoyle looked in her direction but did not step forward. Miradel, trembling, saw that the black woman stood rigidly still, a monolith of human pride before monstrous evil. Only her eyes moved, roving this way and that, seeking… what?

  “When it comes after me, you go!” said the African woman. “You’ll only have one chance. Run as fast as you can!”

  At first Miradel did not fully grasp what her companion intended; perhaps her mind balked at the reality. When she did understand, she was numbed by horror and awed by the other druid’s courage. Shandira was saying something quietly, praying, Miradel realized.

  “… walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil…”

  “Shandira-no!” cried the druid. She thought of a mad impulse herself: she should move, dance, run-anything to draw the monster’s attention! But she remained frozen, only her mind in motion, bringing words to her mouth. “We’ll get out of this together!” she shouted. “Don’t!”

  “For Thou art with me.” On the last word, Shandira looked at Miradel and smiled. Her expression was calm, almost beatific. “Thank you for all you have shown me, taught me,” she said. “I think on the world of our birth, you would be called a saint.”

  “Shandira!” Now Miradel moved, but it was too late. The tall druid was already sprinting to the side, away from her companion. The gargoyle again uttered that low, ground-shivering growl and pounced after her with catlike speed, landing with a crash of stone on the flat ground where Shandira had been standing.

  But now she was running with exceptional speed, evading the savage grasp of those monstrous claws in her first burst of acceleration. She darted to the side as the beast pounced again, nimbly evading the lumbering charge.

  “Miradel-go!” screamed the African woman, the word echoing like an immortal command in the vast emptiness of the mountain hall.

  Miradel took off in that same breath of sound, racing unnoticed behind the gargoyle as it lunged after her companion. She ran with her eyes on that lofty throne, nothing else even existing in her mind. The sounds of pursuit, the roars of the monster, seemed to be coming from very far away… another place… even another life.

  Her feet pounded across the ground, the rhythm of her flight the only sound she knew. Her momentum carried her up as she reached the foot of the slope, until massive rocks like steps for a giant blocked her ascent of the mountainside.

  Here she pulled with her arms, kicked, crawled up one after the other. Higher and higher she climbed, hearing no sounds now except the rasping gasp of her own respiration. She didn’t dare to look back. Instead, she only climbed, scrambling over another obstacle, ignoring the torn skin on her knees, the fingernail that ripped away during another frantic upward pull. Always she worked to climb, the great shelf of the throne drawing nearer with each second.

  At last she stood on the seat of that lofty throne and stared upward in disbelief. The seat of Karlath-Fayd resembled nothing so much as a natural shelf in a steep mountainside. The spring on the far wall leaked a spray of water down the cliff, draining into a cut that had eroded across the rocky surface over countless centuries.

  And those eyes? The immortal orbs of a lethal god, red fire that she had observed for centuries, had studied, and feared?

  The two slits, the fiery eyes of the Deathlord, were merely cracks in the rock. The heat of the infernal ground, bubbling lava and spuming fire, glowed through.

  The throne of the Deathlord was… simply… empty.

  The gargoyle roared, throwing its head back, bellowing the blast of sound toward the dark sky. Now Miradel looked across the basin, the valley floor. Shandira was gone, and the monster was enraged. It bellowed again, face turned toward the sky, until that bestial visage lowered, the glowing eyes coming to rest upon the lone druid on the mountain shelf.

  “It’s not real; there is no Karlath-Fayd!” Miradel gasped out the realization, then cried out in anguish. She understood everything in that instant-and chief among those realizations was the knowledge that she had gained enlightenment too late… too late to help Shandira, to help the people of Nayve… even too late to help herself.

  The water spilled from the gash in the stone, pouring across the empty rock, trickling through its channel and spilling off the ledge. The gargoyle took a step forward, strangely silent now, and she was grateful for that, grateful that at least she could hear the deceptively peaceful noise of the stream now, in the last moments of her life.

  The monster stared at her for what seemed like a long time, those red eyes flashing wickedly. Wings spread, it crouched, then sprang into the air, taking flight toward the druid on the lonely mountainside, alone at the end of the cosmos.

  Darann regained consciousness to a sensation that she was still in the middle of an explosion of uncontrolled violence. Her body was trembling, and noise roared in her ears. She was numb over most of her body, mostly deafened, and had been battered so much that her teeth hurt. In fact, she was rather surprised to find out that she was still alive.

  The walls of the great chute were passing in a blur, masked by the reality of impossible speed. She felt strangely weightless, an effect that Donnwell Earnwise had warned her to expect. How long had she sat in this chair? How far had she traveled? It was quite impossible to tell.

  Then-miracle! She felt her tremendous speed begin to slow, though the missle still rose through the long tunnel in the Midrock. There was nothing to see-the shield of heavy steel at the head of the rocket masked any forward observation-but she was sure that, by now, she had passed through the blue magic barrier.

  Only one question remained: would she reach Nayve alive?

  “Is he alive?”

  “I don’t think so. But let’s fish him out anyway. From the look of that wing, he’s a big one. Someone will want to know that he got drowned.”

  Regillix Avatar felt an annoying tug on his neck, claws digging into his chin and jowls. But he lacked the strength even to utter a growl of displeasure. Instead, he submitted to the indignity of being dragged from the Cloudsea onto the rainbow brightness of the shore.

  At least, his head and neck were dragged out of the water. It turned out that his rescuers lacked the strength to pull his whole, massive body out. Even so, he drew a ragged, choking breath, then exhaled a cloud of steam in relief.

  “He’s alive, Daristal! Go tell your sire! We found a big dragon!”

  “Don’t you recognize him, silly Cantrix? This is Regillix Avatar! He fell into the Hillswallower storm when we were just newts, when he went to look for Plarinal!”

  “Well, you’re right, it is! You get your sire, and I will tell the angel Gabriel. Regillix Avatar has returned!”

  Awfulbark stood at the crest of a hill, above a precipitous drop to the plains of brown grass. Jagged, irregular clumps of granite obstructed the smooth ground below, in the sha
dow of the Ringhills, but he could see around those outcrops and far across the landscape beyond. That land was covered, as far as he could see, by the creeping presence of the Deathlord’s horde.

  The troll made his observations from the lip at the summit of a cliff, nearly a hundred feet above the great earthwork that his trolls had erected with such alacrity. From here he could see for miles along the wall in both directions. This was the left end of the barrier. For this stand, though-unlike at the Swansleep River-Natac had mixed the elves and trolls together. Instead of protecting one flank, Awfulbark’s warriors were now stationed across the whole length of the line, approximately one troll with every band of twenty or thirty elves. The top of the barrier was lined with these defenders, weapons ready, troops silently watching the approach of their enemy.

  Beside the king stood a grizzled dwarf, one of the Seer veterans who had been brought to Nayve with Natac half a century earlier. He was a gunner, manning a shiny steel battery, and Awfulbark looked at the weapon with awe. The troll king had seen the lethal silver spheres fly from the powerful spring, exploding with white-hot fire among the enemy; now, he was glad that it was up here, backing up the defenders of the wall.

  “Another half hour and they’ll be in range,” noted the dwarf laconically. “Superlong range, to be sure… might not hit the exact fellas I’m aiming at. But once they get that close, can’t hardly miss, y’ know?”

  “I know,” Awfulbark observed solemnly. “I count…” he started to grunt a tally, concentrating, his gaze sweeping across the many ranks of dark warriors marching in a snake like column. “I count lots of ’em, with about a million spears in front.”

  “Well, we’ll give ’em a good taste of fire and steel, eh?” The dwarf’s tone grew more somber as, like the troll, he studied the mass of darkness, stretching as far as they could see across the plain. “A taste, for starters anyway.”

  “For start, and for finish,” Awfulbark concurred. He suspected-seeing that horde, he knew-that the finish would be an unhappy one. He really, really wanted to go away. But if elves could stand here, and dwarves, and even those few gnomes who had escaped from the beach, it made him feel somehow that the trolls should stay here, too.