The three figures walked purposely toward the area where Xiri and the Vraad stood.
“I think they want to do something with the figurines,” Dru suggested, whispering despite himself. “Now, maybe we’ll find out what the purpose of this chamber is.”
Since the two explorers stood in the way, they separated, each moving to one side of the platform where the figurines stood. As long as the duo did not interfere, Dru felt confident that the newcomers would ignore them as they had before.
Two of the oncoming creatures turned toward the tall mage. The other shifted to intercept Xiri.
Though initially stunned, the elf recovered instantly and reached for her blade. To her horror, the golem moved even more swiftly, trapping her wrist even before she could begin to unsheathe the weapon. Xiri struck her attacker with her free hand, but the blow, which would have stunned most adversaries, did not even slow the faceless construct.
The spellcaster had troubles of his own. His mind was a maelstrom of resurging doubts. He was caught between defending himself against a power incredibly old and the possible repercussions of unleashing his own strength in a place where it might do him more harm than help.
His hesitation cost him. The golems secured his arms and one of them put a hand to his temple. Dru felt as if his head swelled to twice its normal size. He tried to concentrate on a spell, but his mind wandered during the attempt. A second and third try yielded the same results. They had effectively blocked his abilities. Each time he tried to defend himself, his attention would turn to some triviality. He was barely able to concentrate on the mere fact that he was a prisoner, let alone how the two of them could escape.
Xiri was brought to his side and they were led from the dragon lord’s chamber. The faceless beings were not harsh; they used only what force they needed to control their prisoners. Dru noted the direction they were going and smiled grimly. “They’re taking us to the very place we wanted to go. The room of worlds.”
“What do you think they will do?” The elf shut her eyes and the irritated expression on her otherwise perfect face told the sorcerer that she, too, had been prevented from using any magical abilities. “Why did they suddenly notice us? We touched nothing. We did nothing.”
Dru had no answer this time. The faceless ones were complete enigmas to him. Everything about them had a question mark attached to it. Why return after all this time and why in such a manner? More to the point, what frightened the guardians so much? If these were their masters come home, should not the servants have been delighted? Their loyalty, with one or two exceptions, had seemed quite firm even after millennia of abandonment by those very same lords.
As they were marched toward the massive doors of the room of worlds—doors that the Vraad remembered demolishing during the peak of his earlier anger, but which now stood new and shining and very open—Dru noticed alterations in the corridor itself. It seemed higher and there were doors that like the first he could not recall seeing his first time through. Redecorating? he wondered in momentary amusement. Why not? It had been a few years.
His amusement was not long in lasting. At the doorway, two more of the faceless creatures met them. The ones that held Dru and Xiri released their grips, but did not move away. Not for a moment did either the Vraad or the elf think to fight or run. Both knew how little a chance they stood.
One of the newcomers pointed at the sorcerer and gestured that he should follow. The other turned to Xiri and mimicked its counterpart’s actions.
Dru glanced at his companion, who met his gaze with a look of uncertainty that mirrored his own expression. Before either could speak, the two who had met the party at the doorway turned and walked into the chamber, moving in opposite directions once inside. No one pushed them forward, but their former guards pointed at the receding figures. The two prisoners hurried to catch up to their respective guides.
“Rheena!”
Xiri’s words, the only sound other than the heavy falls of Dru’s boots, reverberated throughout the room. She stumbled into the one leading her, her attention focused on the walls and the ceiling, and instantly sprang back, fearing a reprisal. The golem did not even appear to notice once it had rebalanced itself. It continued to walk to the opposite side of the room, always succeeding in matching the pace and movements of Dru’s own guide.
When they stood across from one another, bisecting the chamber, the cowled figures halted. The sorcerer and the elf stared at one another from beside each. Dru managed a shrug in response to Xiri’s anxious visage.
Other than the two who had led them inside and the three who still stood by the doorway, there were only four other golems in the room. Even the spectral impressions of the ancients were no longer visible. It was as if they were no longer needed now that the originals, albeit changed, had returned to claim their castle.
The four in the center of the room knelt before the crystal, as if inspecting it. One touched the top, which caused the focus to glow like a dim fire. It seemed to satisfy the creatures, for they rose and took a step back from the crystal as if expecting something.
Neither they nor the two prisoners were disappointed.
Dru leaned forward, careful to avoid the attention of his guide. The entire focus wavered as if it were composed of smoke rather than crystal and metal. The four near the center stepped back again, but it was due more to some ritual, the sorcerer believed, than any fear on their part.
The focus was no longer visible as such; it now swirled, a tiny, gray whirlwind. No, not a whirlwind, for it had shape of some sort, almost a crude rectangle. What had caused him to see it as a whirlwind were tiny shapes that ran madly across its surface in an eternal chase. It was going through a metamorphosis, becoming some other artifact. Dru wondered if it would have done the same for him or whether he would have ended up killing himself.
Xiri caught his eye. She frowned and indicated the odd form growing in the center of the room. It was hardly what she had expected. The Vraad was equally confused.
Again the four who had been the catalyst for the change stepped away, this time giving the object—or perhaps it was a familiar or demon of some sort—a far greater space into which to spread. That proved a wise move, for in seconds the rectangular shape had risen to a height nearly half again as tall as those who had summoned it. As it had grown, so too had the shapes scurrying about its frame. They were black and might have been reptilian in nature, though they moved with such speed that they were generally little more than blurs. Staring at them for more than the blink of an eye stirred an uneasy feeling in the disconcerted spellcaster’s stomach. He had no desire to study them closely.
Returning his attention to the structure as a whole, he finally recognized what stood before them. Xiri had mentioned that her ancestors had discovered a hole… or a hole had discovered them, for as with so much that this ancient race had created, it had a life of sorts. A life in a similar sense to the way Darkhorse had a life. Certainly, it did not live as she or Dru did.
It was a gate. No, not merely a gate. That was hardly suitable for the pulsating, magical doorway standing before them. Rather, it was the Gate. A name more than a description since it lived. Dru dared to take a few steps to one side. No matter what direction he looked at it, it always seemed to face him. He knew that Xiri would see it the same way.
Glancing at the worlds painted on the walls and ceiling, he understood now how the founders might have crossed from here to any of their creations.
Nimth.
He caught sight of the image, stared at the figure of a Vraad, then felt an uncontrollable urge to face the Gate once more.
“Serkadion Manee!”
Within the frame of the Gate, there now stood the entrance to another world. Dru did not have to ask to know it was his own.
His guide left his side and stepped toward the waiting artifact. The shapes on its frame seemed to slow, though they were still not quite in focus.
Less than an arm’s length from the passageway to
Dru’s world, the golem halted. It raised one hand, then lowered it in one harsh swing.
Nimth vanished, to be replaced by… nothing. More than nothing. The sorcerer knew what doorway had now been opened. His recognition of the Void was accompanied by a sense of growing dread.
The faceless being who had stood beside him turned then and, indicating the vast emptiness within the Gate, gestured for Dru to step forward.
XVI
THERE WERE STILL angry Vraad moving about what remained of the communal city, but most had departed. Ever distrusting of their brethren, the majority had returned to the safety of their private domains, there to brood and pout at the trick that had been played on them. They would be so engrossed in their self-pity and their eternal plots for vengeance that they would probably never get around to devising their own ways of escaping… something the Tezerenee had proved quite able to do.
It was those few who still remained, still seeking to find some stray ally of the dragon clan or merely desiring to unleash their frustration, who worried Gerrod. Having had one attempt at teleportation misdirected, he was not looking forward to a second try at any point in the near future. Sharissa shared his fear in that respect, which was why the two of them still remained in hiding, despite the occasional passing of a blood-thirsty sorcerer. The room they presently called safety was a tiny storage chamber in a flat, black building on the opposite side of the city from the building where the Lord Barakas had made many of his fine speeches of cooperation, including the one in which he had seemed to promise that all Vraad would indeed be crossing into the new world.
Oddly, it was Dru’s daughter who had finally had enough. She stalked over to her hooded companion and leaned over him, arms crossed. “The great and powerful Tezerenee! To think that I was afraid of you! What have you brought us to? How could you abandon Sirvak?”
Gerrod had no answer for the first question and he had already answered the second one more than a dozen times in the past few minutes alone. That, by no means, prevented Sharissa from asking it again. With her father gone, Sirvak was all she had. She no longer trusted Melenea, which, as far as the young Tezerenee was concerned, was the only good that had come of the whole incident.
“I told you, child! Sirvak flew out one of the windows the moment I snared you! It is likely back in your domain, awaiting us!” He looked up at her, more than matching her glare. “Try and remember that for at least a second or two, will you? I need to think!”
“Maybe one of those grateful folk outside would be willing to help you think! You’ve done nothing but brood since we found this place!”
He started to snap back at her, then saw that she spoke the truth. He was acting much like those he had always despised. The Zeree whelp had not helped his situation, however. He spread his hands wide and replied, “I would welcome whatever masterful plan you have conceived during all the time you’ve been berating me.”
Sharissa clamped her mouth shut and gave him a stare that should have, by rights, burned a hole through his head.
“I thought as much.” Stimulated by both her words and his growing shame, Gerrod pushed himself harder.
“Have you noticed something?” she asked, disturbing the peace he had finally gained.
“Besides the inability on your part to remain silent for more than a breath?”
She ignored his remark. “For all the damage they did to the city, it should have been far worse.”
“I think they’re doing an admirable job.”
“I mean that they’re in the same predicament as we are! They can’t trust their spells!”
Gerrod straightened, feeling very stupid. He had understood that when dealing with Melenea, understood it because he knew she lived near an unstable region. The warlock had not considered it in respect to Nimth as a whole. Sleep. I need sleep! That was why he could not think straight. When was the last time he had slept? “And so? What else does that suggest to you?”
“I don’t know.” Sharissa looked crestfallen.
The Tezerenee slumped again. “Waste of time!”
“At least we could accomplish something if we were back home! I haven’t given up on Father! I know he’s alive somewhere!”
The eternal optimism of the child, Gerrod thought bitterly. It did gall him, however, to sit here, virtually helpless. He was used to acting—not without thought, of course—but what could he do? The business with Melenea was not finished; he knew her too well to think she would simply lie down and wait for the end of Nimth. No, to her thinking, he had made a master move. Now, it was her turn… and, perhaps, that was the fear that kept him sitting in this hole rather than doing his best to find a way to cross. As much as he despised the company of his clan, the shrouded realm did represent continued life and that was the hooded Vraad’s primary goal now that he had the Zeree child.
He had hoped she knew more than she had let on, but such was not the case. The information was there, but…
Fool! His laughter, full and vibrant, brought a panicked look from Sharissa, who could not understand what he found so amusing. She would not have understood how the laughter was both a sign of his relief and his way of mocking himself for being so blind. He stood up and, in his merriment, took Sharissa and hugged her tight. Even after he finally released her, she stood there, stunned into immobility.
It was not his fault entirely. Tunnel vision was a trait that his race could claim as one of their most dominant features. A Vraad who deeply believed in or desperately wanted something would concentrate on that one thing with an obsession that would make them ignore a hundred more reasonable solutions or beliefs. It was what had kept many a feud going for centuries. It was why few Vraad mixed with one another for more than a few years, if that long. It was a stubbornness of sorts, one that made a solution to the eventual death of Nimth and its inhabitants impossible, for that meant putting aside their arrogant belief in themselves and working in cooperation with one another.
“We’re leaving! Somehow, we’re leaving! Even if we have to walk back to your domain!”
“Why? What do you have in mind?” Sharissa was smiling, caught up in his enthusiasm and the dream of returning to the citadel of pearl.
“We’ve both been wrong. You wanted to find a way to bring your father back here. So did I. Why?”
“I… he’s my father!”
Gerrod sighed. “And you worry about him. Fine. Let me rephrase it, then! What was he hoping to accomplish?”
“He hoped to find a different way to cross over to the realm beyond the—oh!”
“He found one! He has to be over there! Why bring him here, something we don’t know how to do, when we can follow him there! If it worked for Master Zeree, then it should work just as easily for us!”
The fear had returned to mar her delicate features. She was not unattractive, he knew, but she had a way of grating on him that the young Tezerenee could not explain even to himself. “What is it now?”
Sharissa described her father’s departure, including his struggle to escape.
Gerrod saw the problem instantly. “Then we shall be careful not to teleport during the change. That leaves us with only two more problems.”
Emboldened once more—and evidently more willing to trust him now that he had made concrete suggestions in regard to her father—Sharissa responded, “One is the timing. It fluctuates. We don’t know how long we might have to wait… if it will happen at all.”
“Oh, it will.” Having had both Dru Zeree’s notes and those of his brother’s to add to his own knowledge, he probably now knew more about the unstable regions of Nimth than anyone did, especially concerning the rapid rate of growth they had achieved. Nimth did not have half as long as his father had once believed. Of course, the Vraad would still all be dead before then, the wild magic of the world and their own stupidity a combination they could not possibly survive. “I doubt we’ll have to wait for very long.”
He started walking to the door, deciding that things were not yet
desperate enough for sorcery, but she stopped him with a question. “What was the other problem?”
Gerrod looked at her in surprise. “Surviving long enough to get there.”
DRU SHOOK HIS head at the creature who stood near the Gate. If it came down to it, he would fight them with his fists and his teeth. A spell might be beyond him, but he would not go passively back into the Void.
The golem gestured again… and the Vraad’s body obeyed even while the mind began to struggle against it.
Something flashed in the light of the chamber, a metallic missile that flew toward the pointing golem with remarkable accuracy. It would have struck the being squarely in the side of the throat… had it reached its target.
Less than a foot from the open flesh, the blade Xiri had thrown in a futile attempt to save him ceased moving and fell straight down. It did not even make a clatter when it struck the floor. The assembled golems, even the one who had stood beside her, failed to even look her way. They remained intent on the portal and the Vraad, who was nearly at the base of the huge artifact.
Only two or three steps from an eternity of endless nothing, Dru’s body stopped. In the short walk, he had sweated profusely. Somewhere out in the Void, Darkhorse wandered, possibly looking for a way back, unless the guardians had broken yet another of their rules and removed that knowledge from his mind. It was a slim hope, but if they did send him through, the shadowy steed might find him again.
If not, Dru would float forever.
He readied himself, waiting the final push that would send him falling into the Void. When it did not come, he tried to observe the one who had forced him to this point. It was impossible; though the Vraad’s eyes could move, his head would not. He was transfixed before the Gate.
When his body became his once more, the sorcerer was so startled he nearly condemned himself to the very fate he had thought the faceless ones had planned for him. A hand caught the back of his robe and pulled him to a position farther from the menacing portal. The Gate closed off the pathway to the Void. Its sleek companions increased their pace once again, ever chasing one another over and over the artifact’s surface.
Legends of the Dragonrealm, Vol. II Page 55
