The Sorcerer's Skull (Cenotaph Road Series Book 2)

by Robert E. Vardeman

  “What?” asked Lan. “You don’t like our travelling companions? You're not going to join them in a nice dirt bath?” The sight of the spider shuddering gave Lan the revenge he needed.

  “The thought of dust eternally on my legs is worse than burning off the fur. Poof! I would ignite like a torch. A flambeau blazing throughout the night, my screams meaning nothing. Oh, woe, how can I ever avoid the dangers of this life?”

  “You’re doing a good enough job, old spider. We make quite a team.”

  “We do, at that,” Krek said, his mood changing in a mercurial fashion peculiar to him. They walked past the crushed scorpion once more. “For a fellow -arachnid, he possessed limited wit. Why, he refused to even speak to me.”

  “It talked?”

  “No, but I can; therefore he must have similar powers.”

  “Different worlds, different creatures.”

  “Humph,” snorted the spider. “You humans are pervasive, one might even say pernicious. I discern no difference between your species on one world or the next.”

  Lan saw no point in arguing. He had no explanations. What Krek said was true. On the worlds they’d traveled so far, humans had been native to each. Perhaps human cenotaphs opened only onto human worlds. If that were true, the Kinetic Sphere might lead to worlds without any men at all. Entire worlds populated with alien beings beckoned to Lan.

  First, he had to recover the Sphere.

  “Do you think it was just another pilgrim I saw?”

  “What other pilgrim?”

  “The one I saw from the cliff. I told you not ten minutes ago.”

  “I sense no one ahead of us. Why has there been no evidence of passage, if you did see a man with a pack animal?”

  “These canyons intersect. He might have come up another one, one leading into this from an angle.”

  “You invent people to take your mind off our odious companions.”

  “You might be right in other circumstances, but I saw someone ahead of us. I … I can’t explain why I feel that’s so important. We’re out in the middle of nowhere. Why should there be so many people crowding into this one small area?”

  “Mere pilgrims. Others like Ehznoll seek the wisdom of the crags. Perhaps they even wish to swing free, from peak to peak, savoring the freedom of a web. Who am I to say? I am a nothing, a poor beast beset by others of my class, an outcast good only for slaughtering weakling humans.”

  “Weakling humans?” protested Lan. “Who actually killed the scorpion?”

  “I allow myself to be enticed away from web and my dear Klawn, to walk the Cenotaph Road and humiliate myself constantly. Oh, woe, I am nothing, nothing!”

  The spider crouched down and melted into the shadows cast by the ravine wall. His eyes welled over with tears, which fell to dampen the dry sand of the arroyo floor.

  “Come on, Krek, it’s not that bad. You’re just feeling sorry for yourself. We’ll get to the top of Mount Tartanius, get back the Kinetic Sphere, and find Inyx. Wouldn’t you like to see her again? The two of you hit it off so well, I’d think you’d do anything to see her again.”

  “Inyx?”

  “Inyx,” said Lan firmly. He’d learned ways of motivating the spider when depression hit. Inyx was one.

  “We should try, I suppose.” The spider rose up and began walking on unsteady legs. Lan watched in concern. The battle with the scorpion had taken much out of the spider. He had no idea what energy it took to spin webs; it had to require considerable effort. Krek had spun almost a mile of web in a very short time. He deserved pampering — for a while.

  “Rejoice!” came Ehznoll’s shrill voice. “The earth loves us. We are a part of the mighty soil.”

  Lan shook his head. Putting up with the pilgrims might be more difficult than fending off all the grey-clad soldiers on the planet, even including the hate-driven Kiska k’Adesina. He might have made a bad mistake in not eliminating her, but cold-blooded killing didn’t suit him. At least, she and the others in her tiny band hadn’t tracked him down yet. With any luck, he’d be atop the mountain, in possession of the Sphere, reunited with Inyx, and on his way to permanently stopping Claybore before any of the greys caught up. He walked on, then stopped and looked back. Krek had frozen, eyes wide in horror.

  “Krek, another scorpion?” Visions of a nest of the twelve-foot monsters flashed through his mind. He barely heard the choked reply.

  “Water. Coming down the canyon. We’ll all drown!”

  The spider shot forth a long strand of climbing web and vanished up the face of the cliff that had taken Lan long minutes to scale.

  “Krek, come down here. There’s nothing to —”

  Lan Martak felt the earth shuddering beneath his boot soles, shuddering as if a tidal wave thundered down upon him.

  CHAPTER NINE

  “Krek, don’t!” screamed Lan. The spider bounded away, bouncing once or twice off the face of the cliff, climbing swiftly, leaving Lan and the other humans behind to face their deaths.

  The rumbling grew greater, deeper, more powerful. Lan glanced from side to side, estimating his chances. A wall of water coming down from high in the mountains would easily fill this ravine. Merely getting up on the slopes of the arroyo wouldn’t help much if the flash flood proved too large.

  “Krek, use your web to save us!”

  The spider’s bulk diminished as he scuttled over the top of the cliff. Lan saw his friend shiver and shake in fear. The only thing the arachnid feared more than fire was water. Lan took no time to berate Krek for his cowardice. Much had happened to the spider to shake what little self-confidence he had. He had to move quickly. Saving his own life took precedence.

  “Up the slopes. Hurry. Flood!” he cried to the pilgrims. They stared at him, eyes wide, expressions blank. They were so lost in their religious ceremonies that they hadn’t felt the vibrations beneath their feet — or if they had, they thought their earth god answered their supplications.

  Lan rushed forward, using the flat of his sword to smack bottoms and chivvy along the pilgrims. They moved — too slowly.

  The entire planet shook under Lan’s feet. A quick look up the ravine made him shake as hard as Krek had. A grey-green wall of water forty feet-high smashed its way down, ripping out dead trees, picking up boulders five feet in diameter, promising sudden death. Lan forgot about the pilgrims; his own life hung in the balance. He scrambled up the side of the sandy embankment, fingers clawing frantically.

  The first rush of the water lipped him loose from his precarious hold. Flung outward, he smashed painfully into a rock. As agonizing as this was, it saved his life. The powerful current earned him around the rock and up against earth. The pounding of water against his body wedged him further and further into the crevice between rock and dirt. Gasping, sputtering, he fought weakly against the water.

  He survived. That thought went over and over in his head. He struggled harder and pulled himself up onto the rock that had saved his life. The man looked downriver at the watery maelstrom boiling around the site of the battle with the scorpion. Neither the carcass nor the boulder that had crushed the life from it remained.

  If he’d been swept into the raging river, no amount of swimming ability could have saved him.

  He turned, slipped, caught himself, then more carefully sat on the rock and peered upstream. Tiny water droplets exploded into the air, caught the sun, and turned into colorful prisms splitting the sun’s rays. Even in destruction came beauty. The awesome tide abated but little. Lan Martak peered at the banks, seeking some sign of life, some indication that Ehznoll and the others had lived.

  Nothing.

  “Ehznoll!” he cried out. His words were sucked under by the roaring waters just a few feet away. “Ehznoll!” he called again. “Where are you?”

  A tiny murmur, hardly more than a subliminal message, reached his ears. The singsong chant built in tempo and volume until he recognized the words.

  “Ehznoll!”

  The chant came s
till louder. The fanatical pilgrim recited his prayers. He’d survived the onslaught of water.

  Then Lan saw another survivor: Melira. But from the way she clung desperately to the rock in the center of the river, he could see that her strength would soon vanish and she’d be swept away.

  “Melira, are you hurt?”

  “The good earth will protect me,” she called back. Her voice started out strong enough, then weakened. “Water is a part of the earth. The soil sucks it up, embraces it to its bosom. I shall join the water.”

  “Don’t let loose. I’ll save you!”

  How he’d perform this miracle feat, Lan didn’t know. The first thing he did was strip off his heavy sword belt. His boots and tunic followed. Only then did he study the expanse he had to cross to save the woman. The floodwaters had receded slightly, but not enough to aid him. There wasn’t any way a human could swim that torrential outpouring from high on the mountain.

  “Friend Lan Martak. I am so pitiable. A coward, not only to my own kind, but to humans, as well. How can I ever redeem myself?” The words came amid tiny chokes and moans of emotional pain. Lan looked over to the top of the cliff, barely ten feet above him now because of the water. Krek cowered there, trembling, his head hanging over the precipice while the bulk of his body remained safely on solid rock.

  “Spin a web. Hurry, Krek. Let me swing out to the middle of the river. Melira.” He pointed. The spider bobbed his head, then emitted a spitting noise. A long, slender strand whirled down to splat! on the rock beside the man.

  Lan looked at it with trepidation. The web-stuff s diameter was hardly more than a single sewing thread’s. He tested it and worried even more. The elasticity of this silk might drop him into the drink. Still, Lan had no other choice but to trust the spider’s spinning skills. Melira weakened visibly, her fingers turning white against the rock, slowly slipping, letting her body be whipped about by the current.

  Lan Martak took a deep breath, gripped the thread, then stepped out over the river.

  “Noooo!” he shrieked as the thread lengthened under his weight.

  Just as the man was positive he’d be dropped into the river and swept away, he snapped hard and swung past Melira. The web-stuff had stretched as much as it could and now held his weight easily. But he’d gone past the woman and crashed into the side of the cliff. Getting back to her might prove difficult.

  “Allow me to aid you,” came the spider’s voice from above.

  The thread jiggled and bounced, then began pulling Lan upward. When he reached an out-jutting, Krek stopped.

  “Swing free now. It is simple enough for even a hatchling.”

  “Here goes nothing.” Lan again stepped into nothingness. This time, however, he aimed more carefully. As the short arc swept him by the failing Melira, he reached down with one arm and caught her about the waist.

  Accomplishing this made his hand slip on the thread. It was too thin for an easy grasp.

  “Krek, I’m slipping, I … I can’t hold both her and myself.”

  The spider didn’t answer with words. A tiny drop of amber fluid dripped slowly down the length of the taut web material. Lan held on the best he could to keep Melira from flying away in the current. His arms aching from the strain, his hand cramping and ready to release and throw both of them into the water to drown, the man wondered why his life should end in this fashion.

  The droplet touched his skin. He shrieked in pain and involuntarily tried to pull back, to let loose of the web-thread. His hand glued firmly to the fine.

  Slowly, one inch at a time, he felt himself rising. He tightened his grip around the now-unconscious woman’s waist. The effort made his shoulders ache even more. Muscle strain and sudden spasms caused his right hand to open on the thread; the spider glue held him firmly. Seeing this, Lan concentrated all his effort on holding the woman. To drop her now after rescuing her would be worse than never reaching her at all.

  “There,” he finally heard the spider say. “You are safe. Now you may berate me, denigrate my abilities, call me craven.”

  “Krek,” Lan cried, throwing his arms around the spider’s bulky abdomen, “thank you!”

  “He thanks me,” the spider sighed. Tears formed in the dish-shaped chocolate eyes. “I show my true colors and he thanks me. I am a coward, friend Lan Martak — no, not friend. I dare not call anyone my friend. Who would have me?”

  “I will, you crazy eight-legged fool. You saved me — both of us.”

  Melira stirred on the ground, still unconscious.

  “I allowed you to be placed in the danger.”

  “Krek,” Lan said seriously, seeing the spider needed consoling, “bravery isn’t doing daring acts. Bravery is overcoming your fear. You were frightened and yet you overcame your fear of the water enough to rescue both me and the pilgrim.”

  “You think me brave?”

  “I do.”

  “Humans are most peculiar.” With that Krek trotted over to the now-stirring woman. He poked at her with one taloned claw. “She needs some attention. Perhaps you should perform some of those human mating rituals now.”

  “I think not.” Lan knelt beside the woman, now sputtering to get fluid out of her lungs. She turned onto her side, coughed, and finally began breathing normally. Her eyes opened, stared up at Lan. “Y-you saved me.”

  “Krek helped.”

  “Why?”

  “Couldn’t just let you die, could I?”

  Melira sobbed as Lan held her. He found this chore less tiresome than it might have been earlier. The water had washed away most of the dirt in her hair and on her body. While she wasn’t totally clean, she’d been improved by the ordeal.

  “I … I cannot thank you. The good earth must do that.” She turned wide eyes up to Lan’s. He felt a surge of discomfort.

  “Better check to see how the others in your party fared.”

  “Yes,” she said, the moment gone. “I hear the earth chants being sung. Ehznoll survived.”

  Lan helped her to her feet. The three started the long, arduous climb down the far side of the cliff, skirting the deadly waters to find a handful of survivors gathered around their leader.

  “Their deaths were good,” insisted Ehznoll. He leaned forward and thumped a fist into hard ground. “They were swallowed up by the waters, and the waters soaked into the earth. They returned to the bosom of dirt from which we all sprang.”

  “No death's a good one,” said Lan glumly. After rejoining Ehznoll and the four others who had escaped the floodwaters, they’d walked along the rim of the canyon, heading upward into the mountains. Less than an hour's travel had brought them to an earthen dam intended to hold back the water. “Especially when it is deliberate.”

  “How can you say that? The earth barrier gave way. The earth wanted to receive our pilgrims. Their destiny wasn't atop Mount Tartanius. It was here, going into the earth.”

  “Someone ripped open the dam and tried to drown us,” said Lan. He pointed out the clear indications of the attempted murder. Sheer, mirror-smooth sides remained above the water, showing where incredible forces had been unleashed. The dirt itself had fused into a glassy substance that broke under Lan’s knife point.

  “The god of earth did it in his … new form.” Ehznoll’s voice softened and he dropped into tones reserved for his more reverent moments. “I saw him. The new god.”

  “You’re saying your god sliced through the earth like that?” A large chunk of the vitrified dam came loose and tumbled into the still-raging water. The green, turbulent water swallowed the material as if it were only an appetizer before a larger meal.

  “Yes.” Ehznoll’s voice lowered even more. “I saw! He was as our god of the earth: disembodied. Only his intelligence floated.”

  “What?”

  “His head floated. He nodded toward me and eyes flashed. He is a new god on earth. And we are privileged to be here at his assumption of power.” Lan Martak scowled, then glanced over at Krek. The spider appeared not to be
listening. The arachnid had been lost in his own thoughts since they’d rejoined Ehznoll’s band. The description Ehznoll gave of his new god worried Lan more than Krek’s depression.

  “This new god’s eyes,” he pressed. “Did ruby beams shoot from them?”

  “No.”

  Lan let out a lungful of air he hadn’t known he held.

  “The beams were crimson.”

  “Claybore!”

  Ehznoll stared at the man.

  “You know of him? That’s his name? Our god of the earth is nameless, omnipresent, needing no human term. But this new god is compact, condensed, a living relic. Even his name speaks of the earth.”

  The pilgrim gripped Lan’s arm with steely fingers. Lan pulled free and sat back on his heels, looking from Ehznoll to Melira to the other four. The zealots accepted every word Ehznoll uttered as gospel. He talked them into believing Claybore was a god.

  “I’ve heard of this Claybore, nothing more,” Lan said carefully. The man feared Krek would contradict him, but the spider remained wrapped in the dark cloak of his own thoughts and feelings.

  “Our tenets change. This new god — Claybore! — works wonders on our earth, for us, through us, because of us. He split this dam to carry eighteen of our order to their justly deserved graves.”

  “Surrounded by dirt,” chimed in Melira and the others.

  “One with dirt,” Ehznoll answered ritualistically. They crossed their wrists and dropped into a kneeling pose, eyes afire with religious fervor. Lan left them to go study the edge of the dam more closely.

  Glass. It sloped down five feet and then vanished into green, swiftly flowing waters. Claybore had used a spell to slash through the retaining dam and send a wall of water down the canyon. That much was clear. But who aided the decapitated mage? Who acted as his legs? Lan felt sure now that he had seen a man with a pack animal. That man carried along the wooden box containing the sorcerer’s skull. Without the Kinetic Sphere, Claybore lacked mobility.

  In a way, he felt happy this had happened. Claybore feared him, feared his ability to reach the top of Mount Tartanius first. Knowing that a foe as worthy as Claybore felt this way added spring to Lan’s step, energy to his body, determination to his quest.