Fire and Fog

CHAPTER SIX

Lan Martak sank to his knees on the narrow ledge, the snapping, stabbing, bloodsucking insects all around. The spells cast at him by Claybore and the gnome wizard Lirory Tefize further sapped his strength and his will to fight.

" You must not allow them to win so easily," said Krek.

" Easily!" cried Lan. " I fought. I: I can' t fight any more."

" They do this to you. Their spells somehow rob you of all desire to continue. Protect yourself, friend Lan Martak. Protect yourself and do not think of me."

Lan glanced at the giant spider. Krek waved front legs back and forth in a futile attempt to ward off the insects. The swarming bugs bothered him as much as they did the human- and perhaps even more. They got into the coppery fur of his legs and burrowed, and then began sucking away at his life juices. Lan cried inside when he saw the sorry sight of Krek' s blood dripping down those mighty legs.

Then he looked to his own body. The insects treated him far worse. Not a square inch of exposed skin escaped unscathed. Fiery red marked where they chewed on him and their poisons entered his bloodstream, further debilitating him.

But worst of all by far was the spell cast upon him by Tefize.

The gnome slowly rose out of the rock into which Lan had cast him. The spell turning the stone into liquid had faded and Lan no longer maintained it, allowing Lirory Tefize to escape. And with him came Claybore. The mechanical legs had been damaged, bent and twisted into impossible shapes, but Claybore remained in full control of the powers he had recovered during their long battle along the Road.

The disembodied sorcerer used them all now.

Lan began to sob, to feel more and more insignificant. Why continue? The two mages' spells were too potent for him. He was only a simple hunter from a primitive world dabbling in the arcane. What did he know of magic? He was better off with sword in hand and even this ability had fled him. It had been far too long since he had relied on his strong arm and quick reflexes. What prowess with the blade he had once possessed was long past. He had gambled on attaining supreme magical power and had now lost that wager.

Lost. Lost. Lost!

" Lan," came Krek' s soft voice. " The ledge narrows. They chew away at it even as their odious bugs chew at our flesh."

" What' s the difference?" he moaned. " Let them cast us into the pit. It can' t be any worse than this." His arms burned with the insects' poison and his brain was reduced to nothing more than lard renderings. Weak, incapable of forming a single thought, he felt he deserved to die.

Lan wiped sweat and blood from his eyes in time to see Krek spit forth a web and swing upward. The spider worked quickly, easily, in spite of the injuries the swarming insects forced upon him. Lan knew he should take heart in this, but couldn' t. He felt too miserable.

" Goodbye, Martak," came Claybore' s gloating words. " Soon enough you will enjoy the fate I endured for so long. I shall rip the tongue from your mouth and regain it. And your body? That will be scattered along the Road as was mine. You will never die, but you will never again be alive, either."

The demonic laughter filled the chamber and reverberated down long corridors within the mountain.

And Lan sat with back against rock, feet dangling over the ledge and thought, really thought. The blackness at the edges of his brain lit up a little with the effort. His familiar dancing energy mote returned and cast light where only shadow had been. Lan Martak saw more clearly in that moment because of what Claybore had said.

Claybore was going to scatter his body along the Road? Lan Martak could never die? Could this be so? Had his magical powers grown to such a level that he and, Claybore were alike in this respect?

" I cannot die?" he asked aloud.

From deep within his soul came a stirring, a feathery touch, a gentleness backed with seemingly infinite power. The answer formed and glowed within him like a beacon.

" No, you cannot die. You can oppose them. Do so. Now!"

" What? Who are you?" Lan cried. The sensation had been familiar and yet vastly different from any he had experienced before. He knew the words had been thrust into his head just as Claybore spoke, without physical words, but the feeling was entirely unlike the other mage' s communication.

" You do not hallucinate. Fight Claybore. Fight Tefize. Do it or you will suffer the fate Claybore has decreed for you."

" Help me!" Lan begged.

The power resided within him, but no further encouragement came. Lan again wiped blood from his eyes and peered aloft. Krek hung from a web, suspended over the pit. On the far side stood Claybore and Tefize. The gnome' s entire body burned with an intensity that should have been painful to witness. Lan stared directly into the hot green blaze, into the twin orbs that matched the sun' s intensity, and did so without flinching.

His familiar burst upon him now, ready to renew the battle.

" He fights well," commented Tefize in an offhand manner, " but he is weak. He will fail. Feel him slipping into depression once more?"

" Yes, Lirory. I feel it. So does he," answered Claybore.

But Lan felt only their redoubled efforts to cast their insidious spells. He rose and clapped his hands together. The insects began turning into miniature bombs. One by one, only a few at first, they exploded. With increasing rapidity the insects blew apart, blood and ichor spattering everywhere. Within seconds Lan had magically destroyed the physical manifestations sent to weaken him.

As the final insect burst like an overinflated balloon, Lan sensed something he had not thought possible. Claybore' s fear filled the chamber like a dense, black cloud of dust.

Claybore, master mage, feared him!

Lan laughed aloud and cast forth his light mote. Like a bolt of lightning, it surged directly for Claybore' s cracked, chipped skull.

" Protect me!" the mage screamed at Tefize.

Lan almost fell from the ledge when the gnome' s spell smashed against his defenses. He reeled and had to brace himself against the rock wall. Lirory Tefize did not gloat over the moment' s victory; the gnome sent another counterspell, which turned Lan' s legs rubbery.

He toppled forward into the pit.

Lan was barely aware of swinging freely, being scooped up in midair, and carried over to the far side of the pit.

" Friend Lan Martak, do be more careful," came Krek' s words. But Lan scarcely heard. His attentions focused solely on the pair of sorcerers whom he battled to the death.

Death? Claybore was immortal. And Claybore had let it slip that Lan was himself immortal. How can a battle, even a magical one, be to the death when immortals fight?

" There is eternal pain," came the soft, vibrant words from deep within his head. " Death is surcease. Immortality carries infinite agony."

" Who are you?" Lan demanded. " I should recognize you but I don' t."

" Fight."

Again the voice faded from within his head, and again he felt rejuvenated, refreshed, able to carry the battle without swords to his enemies.

Lan sensed the strange magical twistings in the chamber around him. Claybore prepared to use the Kinetic Sphere to change worlds. Lan dared not let the mage go; finding him along the Road might prove impossible without some tangible link. To get here he had used one of Claybore' s commanders. If the sorcerer successfully shifted worlds, locating him might take centuries- longer.

" You will regret this, Martak!" raged Claybore. The pinkly pulsating sphere within Claybore' s chest cavity glowed as brightly as Tefize' s emerald eyes; then something went wrong. The luster changed subtly, the hue altered, the power diminished.

Lan, Claybore, and Tefize shifted worlds but their bodies remained firmly rooted inside the mountain kingdom of Yerrary.

" What are you doing?" shrieked Claybore, out of control. " You will maroon us all between worlds. Do you want to be lost in the whiteness forever?"

" You had no compunction about stranding Inyx there," said Lan.

" She' s only a mortal."

" What would it be like, Claybore? What would you do for all eternity trapped in a dimensionless space?" Lan fought the other sorcerer as Claybore turned new and different spells against him. They shifted worlds repeatedly- and still their bodies remained in Yerrary.

" What does he do?" asked Tefize. " This is confusing to me. We go to other worlds along the Road and yet we remain in the chamber."

" He is sapping the power of the Sphere. I don' t know how. Damn you, Martak, stop that!"

Lan reached out and employed his world- shifting spells only to the Kinetic Sphere. He guessed Claybore felt as if his heart were being wrenched from his torso.

Lan took a brief moment to regroup his own powers, to muster his newfound abilities. While he didn' t know for certain, he felt he could move between worlds now without either Kinetic Sphere or cenotaph. He was beyond physical instrumentality; he had moved to a more magical plane, transcending even that occupied by Claybore.

The headiness of this revelation left him weak with surprise and intent on putting those powers to their fullest use.

Lan Martak began a new weaving of spells but off in the distance, from a point beyond infinity, he heard, " Friend Lan Martak, what are you doing? Where are you going?"

He had no time for anything but the battle raging between worlds, throughout all time and space. A single gesture made the nagging voice vanish, a spell of dismissal to free him from the annoying spider. And Lan felt amusement rising within. He was more powerful than even the vaunted Claybore. Mere mortals were beneath his contempt now. He could wage a magical battle and win.

Claybore would succumb to him. Soon. Very soon.

" Martak, you overreach yourself," came Tefize' s words. " Look around you and note well this spot. This is your grave. You will never leave here. You cannot!"

" Don' t prattle on so, gnome. Your powers do not affect me in the least."

But Lan did risk a quick glance about. He stood on a mountaintop looking out over a gently rolling plain. In the far distance rose a mountain of incalculable height, dwarfing even the rock on which he stood. That monstrous pillar rose up and gutted the sky with a dozen spikes of the purest jet protruding from its top. Of the blackness that comprised the shaft itself, Lan saw only the depths of space. This mountain of midnight was material and yet immaterial. It sucked in light and yet gave forth reflection. Heat and cold meant nothing to it and Lan Martak experienced those and more from its surface so far away.

" Look upon it and know you will never leave this world, Martak," came Tefize' s softly menacing words. " It is your bane. You will die because of that. Die!"

Lan sent his light mote hurtling for the distant mountain. Incomprehensibly, the vast, thick pillar of night- black represented his destiny. But not now. Not until- what? When?

The light mote went around- through- between that mountain peak in some fashion Lan didn' t even try to understand. The time for knowing would be soon, but not yet.

Laughter welled up, laughter all too familiar to the young warrior mage. Claybore had gained something while his attention had been diverted by the mountain.

" My powers weren' t adequate before, Martak. They will be now. I didn' t approve of Tefize showing you what you have just seen, but it all worked out for the best. Witness!"

Again in the rock chamber, Lan faced the gnome and Claybore. Workers from the Tefize clan toiled to pull out a metallic case from the pit. Lan glanced over the jagged rim and down to a platform fifty feet below where more gnomes frantically dug.

How long had he stood and gazed at the column of blackness on that other world? A second? A year? However long it had been, the pause in the battle had allowed the gnomes to reach their goal.

" You will keep our promise, Claybore?" asked Lirory, oblivious to Lan' s presence now.

" The arms. Give me my arms!"

" Your promise first."

" Yes, yes, of course. All that and more will be yours. Compared to these, what are a few paltry worlds?"

" You might be right," mused Lirory Tefize.

" Give them to me!"

" Very well." Lirory motioned and the gnomes pulled forth the metal- sheathed box. " You will note how well I have preserved them for you."

" Damn your eyes. Stop stalling."

Lan tried to send forth another magical attack and found himself stymied. Simply being in the presence of that metal box snuffed out his most potent attacks. When one of the gnomes opened the box and Lan saw the withered arms within, his heart leaped to his throat.

" Yes, Martak, you' ve lost. Oh, yes, yes, you' ve lost it all now." Claybore cavorted about like a madman while Lirory Tefize reached into the box and reverently lifted forth the left arm. Claybore spun and thrust the shoulder stump out. A blaze of eyesearing light filled the chamber as arm touched torso. Several of the gnomes standing too close caught fire and burned to cinders even before their screams of agony stopped echoing through Yerrary.

" And now the other," said Tefize. He reached out and stroked the mummified right arm.

" Wait," Lan said. " Claybore will never keep his promise to you, whatever it was. Give him this power and he will be invincible. He won' t need you any more. He' ll kill you as he has killed millions!"

Lirory Tefize smiled, revealing broken teeth. The emerald eyes burned with manic fury.

" He will not betray me. I retain control over him. He needs more than just the arms. I have the legs, also!"

" Don' t do this!" pleaded Lan.

The left arm had ignited lightning blasts that illuminated worlds. As the right touched torso, intense cold filled the chamber. Mindnumbing cold, cold from the depths of space, cold more frigid than any borne by arctic winds.

Lan watched helplessly as the arms, now firmly in their proper places, began to swell and take form. No longer desiccated, fingers wiggled and pointed. Power welled up from within Claybore, power unlike any Lan had experienced before. If Claybore had been a menace before, he was a thousandfold more so now.

Irrational fear surged and died within Lan. Claybore was immensely stronger, but he made no move to attack. Since he and Lirory Tefize had played for time to free the buried arms, there had been no new magics directed at him. Lan wondered at this, then allowed his light mote to probe forth, stinging needle- sharp at his foes.

Lirory Tefize shrieked in abject pain and rolled into a tight ball on the floor. He was not seriously injured, but he had been touched. He now knew Lan Martak still represented a formidable opponent.

Claybore' s response was less pronounced, but the mage still had to struggle to retain some semblance of his aplomb.

" Y- you cannot kill me. The gnome, perhaps. Try it and you will suffer the consequences."

" Really, Claybore? Are you truly immortal? Might there not be spells to be found along the Road that will dissipate your consciousness and spread you so thin that you can never regain your present form, your present condition?"

Lan taunted the sorcerer to see the response. No magical attack came. They were stalemated, for the moment. Lirory Tefize was a sorcerer of considerable power, but now that Claybore had regained his arms, the gnome meant nothing. And Lan knew that his own power matched Claybore' s- in spite of his recovering the arms. How or why he couldn' t say, but Lan' s power had grown, too.

Tefize' s revealing the pillar of black to him had augmented his abilities, even as it had delayed him. Nothing had been gained in the exchange when he and Claybore compared relative strengths.

But compared to other mages, Lan Martak knew he was the single most capable anywhere along the Cenotaph Road. He had gone beyond warrior and mage to: what?

Lan Martak felt godhood within his grasp. Who else stood against Claybore? The moment of incomparable ambition passed and Lan found himself staring out into the chamber, Claybore and Tefize rapidly retreating down one of the corridors. He blasted forth a fire spell that only added wings to their feet.

Then Lan noted a new danger. The gnomes who had done such a quick job digging out Claybore' s arms now circled him, approached, and menaced him with spades and pickaxes. He lifted his hand to send forth a simple spell that would freeze them in their tracks and found his arms leaden.

" Stop!" he called out, using the Voice. All the power of Claybore' s magical tongue went into that command.

The gnomes still advanced.

Lan moved then as if he had been dipped in molasses. Legs moving sluggishly, he started forward, following Claybore. The gnomes lashed out, shovels smashing at his knees. He toppled onto his face.

" I' m a god!" he raged. But his powers had been depleted, just as water in a reservoir is used during a drought. Lan had no idea how long it would be until his magics came flowing back. Even the simplest of spells eluded him.

Unbelieving, he held out his hand and tried to make the elementary fire spell send sparks between his fingertips. Even before he had walked the Road he had been able to manage that much.

Not now.

An axe blade missed his head by a fraction of an inch. The gnome wielding the pickaxe cursed and struck again, this time grazing Lan. New head wounds opened and threatened to blind him.

" Krek!" he called out, but the spider was nowhere to be seen. Lan felt abandoned- then a cold chill shook his body. He remembered the faint voice coming to him during battle, begging for aid. A simple wave of the hand had dismissed such foolishness.

What had he done to Krek?

A gnome kicked him in the side, sending waves of agony washing throughout his body.

He stroked over the necklace of power stone he had been given in Wurnna. Some small measure of his magic returned, but not enough. Even this had been exhausted in his duels with Tefize and Claybore.

" Claybore has left too early, it seems," came a cold voice from further down the corridor. Lan rolled over, got to his feet, and stared at the woman, feeling nothing toward her, not even hatred. He was too exhausted for such a high level of involvement.

" It has been a while, Kiska," he said to Claybore' s remaining human commander.

" It will be even longer before we meet again, Martak. You and I will meet only again in Hell!" The woman drew forth a long rapier and slashed at the air in front of her with it. The whishing noise caused the gnomes to step back. The woman' s visage told them not to interfere; her hatred for Lan Martak was complete. Her victory must be, also.

" I can reduce you to a smoking cinder," said Lan, standing his ground. Kiska k' Adesina advanced, the blade' s tip aimed directly between his eyes. Lan never flinched, but inside he quailed at the idea of being sliced apart. His magics had gone and his physical weakness was almost complete. He could barely stand after the magical battle.

" Do it then, worm. You killed my husband. For that I' d love to see you die the death of a thousand cuts. One small cut. Not enough to bleed to death, but painful. And another and another. Soon enough the blood would flow from you like a river, from each little scratch." She slashed at him, the sharp point cutting open his tunic and leaving a red track behind where she had lightly pinked his skin.

" Claybore wants you to kill me?" he asked, curious.

“ I want to kill you. Claybore be damned."

" Claybore told me I' m immortal, that my magics are so great I will live forever. You can' t kill me."

" Then I' ll have the pleasure of hacking you to living pieces and feeding you to the dogs!"

Another cut barely missed his cheek. The steel rang loudly against the stone wall. Lan retreated. His mind worked over the energy spells he knew. This was a desperate maneuver that would leave him even weaker than he was now, but he needed a bit of magic, a spell, a small geas- anything!

" Don' t do this," he said, putting all his power into using the Voice.

Kiska k' Adesina advanced, lunged. The blade slid to one side as he deftly twisted.

" I want you to resist," the brown- haired woman said. When Lan had first met her, she had chased him into the mountains. He had wondered at this mousy- appearing woman who had risen so high in Claybore' s ranks, but he wondered no more. He read the insanity blazing within her like a forest fire. He might have killed her husband- he had and with grim pleasure because alLyk Surepta had murdered his lover and his sister- but this was only an excuse for the woman. If the death hadn' t occurred, Kiska k' Adesina would have found some other reason, some other cause.

He again dodged her lunge.

In the chamber, near the rim, Lan looked down into the pit. It fell at least a hundred feet.

" No, worm, I won' t be confused into stepping over the edge. Your magics must be dimmed or you would have used them." The smile contorting her face gave Lan a moment' s rush of fear. Only great effort allowed him to settle his emotions, to think, to act.

Kiska lunged once more, point aiming true for his heart. Lan kicked out with his feet, felt the blade slide along the length of his chest, then fell heavily forward. His feet tangled the woman' s. One snapped down heavily on Kiska' s knee, while the other caught behind her foot. She flailed wildly before turning in air and crashing to the floor.

The battle was not to be won so easily. Like a tiger, she regained her feet, but this time without her rapier.

And a new factor entered the fight. Lan' s magics were still weak, but physical power returned.

" I will kill you!" she shrieked, launching herself at him with fingernails drawn back into claws.

Lan grabbed a wrist, turned, and dropped to his knee. Kiska flipped over and landed hard on her back. He gave her no chance to recover her wind. He dropped onto her chest with his knee, further forcing the air from her lungs. She turned white, then flushed a bright red as she struggled for air.

As she gasped and weakly writhed on the floor, he scooped up her rapier. The first gnome coming within range died, the blade spitting him. Another ended up toppling into the pit when Lan kicked forth and landed a heavy boot on the gnome' s rear.

The others turned and fled. Lan laughed, more and more physical power flooding into his body. By the time Kiska had regained her breath, Lan knew she could never again menace him.

Physically he was as fit as he had ever been- and his magics seeped back.

The only blot on his victory was Claybore' s recovery of both arms. But Lan pushed that from his mind. He had held off both Claybore and his captive mage Lirory Tefize. He could defeat them again.

And he would.