Kingdoms of Light

SIX

As was usual with examples of active hydrology, they heard the falls before they saw them. All morning, the road to Zelevin had been narrowing. Formerly negotiable slopes on their right grew more and more perpendicular, until they were striding along with a sheer wall of black basalt on their right hand and steep drop-offs immediately to their left. Moisture-loving trees and bushes, ferns, and mosses clung to the mountainside and overflowed the gorge below. Water dripped in sparkling streams from leaves with pointed tips, as if the ferns were fountains whose spigots had been left ever so slightly open. Dominating everything else was the sheer-sided plug of weathered volcanic rock known as Temmerefe's Sky-Reef, usually emerald-crowned, now reduced to a gloomy gray mass no different from the less spectacular peaks that surrounded it.

Normally, hummingbirds and sunbirds gathered in profusion to feed on the flowers that clung to the sides of the Eusebian Gorge, their shimmering metallic throat feathers glistening like enameled porcelain, while translucent flequins soared high on the rising currents of moist air and cried for carrion. Now only a few desultory cheeps and squeaks reached the travelers, so benumbed were the arboreal denizens of the gorge by the absence of color. Espying one lonely sunbird flitting moodily from vovix blossom to perapa flower, Oskar wondered how in the absence of gender-specific tints males and females could tell one another apart. Cezer wondered if the lack of color would change the taste of the high-soaring fliers' flesh. Taj gazed longingly at his distant relations, while Samm wondered…

Did Samm wonder, Oskar mused? And if so, what did the giant wonder about? He made an effort to imagine snake thoughts, failed, and returned his attention to the ground. Traveling on only half the usual number of legs, it would be easy to slip on the damp, sometimes muddy road. It was getting easier, but was a long way from being second nature. This upright human posture still found him unsteady. The urge to drop to all fours when traversing the most difficult spots had not left him. The cat folk were not troubled by the steep slope or precipitous drop. Whether on two legs or four, they remained completely at ease in high places.

"I don't see any rainbow." For the past hour, Taj had been whistling (and whistling wonderfully) to keep their spirits up.

"It's here. We're not at the falls yet." Mamakitty strode along smoothly, seemingly untroubled by her newly enjoined verticality. But then, Oskar reflected without jealousy, she and Cezer and Cocoa had cat senses. He was only a dog, with all the fears and worries dogs were heir to.

The travelers did not hear the roaring until they turned a sharp corner on the mountainside, and did not see the falls for another two hours, during which time the road angled sharply downward as it descended into the gray-green depths of the canyon. Then the tall trees that sprouted from the edge of the gorge gave way to smaller bushes and thickets of color-drained flowers, and the clamor that had been growing in their ears all morning suddenly doubled in intensity.

"Oh—how beautiful!" Cocoa stopped by the side of the road, which was now barely wide enough to allow a coach to pass, to admire the thundering cataract.

"Magnificent." Taj shook droplets of water from his hair. He would have lifted his arms to embrace the spray, but clad as he was in clothing instead of feathers, the gesture seemed certain to give rise to more difficulty than pleasure. "As is your rainbow, Mamakitty."

"If I didn't see it, I wouldn't believe it." Oskar gazed in fascination at the band of multihued brilliance that stretched from one side of the gorge to the other, fronting the white-foamed waterfall like a belt across the belly of a pallid stranger. It was like nothing he had ever seen before. Viewing it in passing on his previous visit in the company of Master Evyndd, he had been able to see it only through the color-limited eyes of a dog. Even so, his astonishment at the multihued revelation was as nothing compared to Samm's.

The giant threw back his broad chest and inhaled deeply, his tongue flicking out from between his parted lips. "So that is what real color looks like! Never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined such a thing. It tastes—hot."

Cezer frowned. "What does?"

The giant looked down at him and smiled. "Color."

Oskar continued to stare quietly. "This rainbow may be the last remaining object of real color left in the Gowdlands."

"But why should it be so?" Samm was clearly, and unashamedly, puzzled. "Why should color here alone remain, in this form?"

Though she was no scholar, Mamakitty did her best to offer an explanation. "I can't really say, except that rainbows aren't like painted walls or dyed clothing or even spotted fur. According to the Master, they exist from moment to moment. Maybe the ability to constantly renew itself through the varying action of the falls allows it to elude the effect of the Mundurucu hex."

"I suppose that makes sense, of a sort." Turning from the rollicking, booming torrent to face her, Cezer smiled expectantly. "So—how do we capture some of it and carry it back with us to the forest? Or anywhere else, for that matter?"

Oskar taunted his companion. "You once told me that, given a clear shot at it, you could catch anything in your paws."

The younger man held up his human hands. "In my claws, long-face." He indicated his blunt human nails. "With these I would be lucky to catch spaghetti."

Mamakitty had been giving the matter some thought. "Ever since we left the Fasna Wyzel we have been within a day's walk of pond, or stream, or town. So we don't really need these heavy water bags. We can empty them out and use them to catch and carry rainbow."

"I'm all for that." Samm grunted approvingly. Which was not surprising, since he was carrying nearly all the water and the bulk of their supplies by himself. The weight would have been better distributed if he had been able to crawl. Traveling upright had disadvantages as well, he mused.

"Why, what a fine idea!" Cezer gestured expansively into the gorge. "We'll just stroll over to that vaporous band of blurry light, pluck colors from it the way Master Evyndd's visiting help used to pick grapes from his vines, and stuff them in our water bags." His voice dropped to a huskily sardonic, but nonetheless still attractive, murmur. "There's nothing to it. All we need to do is figure out how to catch light with our bare hands."

"If anyone can do that, a cat can." Pushing past him, a determined Cocoa followed Mamakitty down into the bushes that lined the canyon. Lilting fragrances from the flowers they disturbed rose up toward the road. Color might have vanished from the world, but there was still sweet fragrance aplenty.

Oskar clapped Cezer on the back. "Come on, fuzzball. Let's see if you can keep your dainty costume spotless while slogging and sliding down through soggy vegetation and muddy hillsides."

Tugging at first one lace-trimmed sleeve and then the other, the younger man sniffed haughtily. "With the greatest of ease, my rough-hewn friend. Watch, and marvel at natural grace at work."

Samm and Taj followed behind them. "Those two have always argued, no matter what kind of body they happened to be occupying. Up in my cage, I was able to see and hear everything."

"Lucky you, living in a penthouse." Unable to fit between two trees, Samm simply shoved one aside. Upturned roots bled mud and worms as it crashed to the ground. "As for myself, I find I quite like this new perspective."

"We're all going to have get used to these new forms if we're going to fulfill Master Evyndd's last wish." Taj hopped nimbly over a small stream. "And stop staring at me like that! You're making the back of my neck burn."

"Sorry." The giant contritely shifted his gaze.

It was not an easy descent, but by relying on their natural instincts they crossed obstacles and surmounted barriers that would have given even very agile humans pause. By nightfall they had reached the base of the cataract. While the perpetual mist that rose from the water-worn rocks at the bottom of the falls did not bother Samm—much less Taj and Oskar, who reveled in it—the other members of their party were adamant about finding a drier place to spend the night. A small rocky overhang surrounded by dense vegetation provided the shelter they were looking for. Close at hand, falling water plunged earthward behind the diffuse arc of muted color that was the rainbow they had come to find.

Somewhat to everyone's surprise but to Cocoa's especial delight, Oskar proceeded to make a fire. Their amazement surprised him. "If you'd watched as many of these being built as I have, you'd understand." While he tended to the comforting blaze, the rest of them set about gathering the driest plant matter they could find with which to fashion temporary bedding.

"In the morning," Mamakitty announced, "we'll start working on how we're going to capture some of that colored light to bring back home with us. If empty water bags won't serve, we'll think of something else. Once we've gathered our fill of color, we can seek out other masters like our Evyndd. They will know best how to spread it through the Gowdlands and beat back this hex of the invaders."

"I don't think the water bags will work. I still think we need a special kind of container. Something that will hold anything." For once, Cezer was not being sarcastic.

"I wonder if we could make something?" Taj mused.

"Too bad we're not bringing back sound." Cezer's serious mien had not lasted long. "Then we could just grab it and shove it down your throat. You being the master of song, and all."

Having come so far, and participated in at least one fight (even if it was among friends), Taj was no longer so easily intimidated. "I'm composing a special song just for you, tyrant of baby mice."

As Cezer's expression tightened, Oskar stepped in front of him. "Since you're so full of suggestions and energy, why don't you help me gather some more fuel for the fire?" He indicated the cheerful but modest blaze. "That is, unless you fancy waking up cold sometime before dawn."

"No, that doesn't appeal to me." Joining his companion, Cezer added, "The Master knew what he was doing. Ordinary humans would have difficulty spending the night in a place like this, but not us. We're all used to sleeping on the ground."

"Speak for yourself." As the other men disappeared into the bushes, Taj started looking for a comfortable tree in which to make his bed.

The relentless rumble of the falls served to hasten everyone's sleep. Not that help was needed. The difficult descent down the mountainside to the river below had exhausted everyone. A short evening meal was followed by rapid dispersion to individual beds.

Oskar was the last to allow himself to relax. By the time he had finished thinking, and planning, everyone else was already asleep around the fire. Samm had gone off by himself, to find a separate clearing where he would have enough room to make himself comfortable—and also so that he would not roll over in the middle of the night and crush one of his more fragile companions.

With a sigh, Oskar rose and walked over to the berth he had fashioned for himself out of leaves, smashed twigs, and other forest floor detritus. It was not his soft, padded bed back home in the Master's house, but it was better than the bare, rocky ground. Nearby and not far below the site of their campsite, the river Shalouan foamed its way eastward, toward Zelevin and Sibrastkou and the other mountain communities that had so far largely escaped the most devastating effects of the Totumakk invasion. Eventually, he knew, the Horde would extend its hand here as well, to these peaceful hillside towns and river communities, to pillage and despoil. Before that happened he hoped he and his companions could furnish the means for forestalling any further abominations.

Stepping into the center of his bed, he paced his ever-tightening circles before finally sitting down and curling into a sleeping position, his head resting on his hands, legs stretched out away from him. The resounding music of the cataract overwhelmed all but an occasional crack of burning wood from the fire, and lulled him into a deep and unforced sleep.

When he awoke, it was still dark out. Not the dark induced by the Mundurucu hex, but true middle-of-the-night dark. A sound had disturbed him. As he rolled over onto all fours preparatory to rising, he saw Mamakitty standing protectively alongside Cocoa, with Taj and Cezer hovering nearby.

Confronting them were a pair of tall, slender shapes clad in black capes and matching caps. Each held a crossbow trained on his friends. Reaching down and behind him, Oskar silently felt for his sword, which he had removed for sleeping. It was not where he had laid it, nor was his dagger in its sheath on his belt. Both, he quickly saw, lay in the heap of confiscated weapons piled beside the two caped figures.

In front of them, twirling a small but nasty-looking mace like a conductor warming up with his baton before a concert, stood a slightly shorter but far more muscular individual. His long jaw and nose combined to create an extraordinary silhouette. But it was his eyes that drew Oskar. Even in the reduced light at the bottom of the gorge, they burned with a maniacal fury.

As he rose, that gaze turned to confront him. "Ah, the last drowsy wayfarer awakes. Please to come forward and join your friends, Mister—?"

"Oskar." Walking slowly over to stand next to his companions, he considered making a jump for his sword.

His unspoken intention amused the leader of their captors. "Please to try it." The mace ceased rotating. "I can crack your skull three times before you reach your weapons. I would very much enjoy doing so, to hear your bones break and see your blood gush. But I am constrained by those whom I serve."

"No need to ask whom that might be," a disconsolate Cezer muttered.

"How did you find us?" an angry Mamakitty wanted to know.

It was Ruut who replied, the cocked crossbow held easily in his exceptionally long, limber fingers. "Did you really think anything of note could escape the attention of the Khaxan Mundurucu? They are alert to even so insignificant a threat that such as you might pose. Quoll speaks the truth when he says he would like to break your bones. But we are commanded to bring you back with us to Kyll-Bar-Bennid. The Mundurucu wish to know what you intended to do, you who mouth the names of a dead wizard."

"We're not doing anything." Taj took a step forward. "When we heard that our master had died, we felt free to leave his house. We travel together to seek gainful employment in Zelevin."

"Really?" Ratha's lips hooked upward in a humorless smile. "That's all?"

"That is all." Taj nodded and smiled back.

The crossbow bolt grazed his left side, slicing through the flesh and bringing forth a swift flow of blood. Clutching at his ribs, Taj looked down uncomprehendingly. Warm redness oozed out between his fingers.

"You—you shot me," he mumbled in stunned disbelief.

"No." Ratha was already reloading her weapon. "I almost shot you. That was just a tickle, to show you how we treat those who think us stupid. If I'd really shot you, you'd be lying on the ground now, with a metal shaft sticking out of your guts, squealing like a pig on the killing hook."

"Why?" Mamakitty trembled with anger.

"We want to move quickly. That means we don't have time to waste on foolish lies. Personally, I don't care what your real intentions were." Sharp teeth flashed briefly in Quoll's mouth. "It is not our business to find out. Only to bring you back." Red-gray eyes burned. "So long as one or two of you survives to answer the Mundurucu's questions, they will be content. I don't care which two." He jiggled the heavy, spiked end of the mace, bouncing it up and down against his open palm. "Come to think of it, five is an unwieldy number. It cries out to be reduced." He spoke without looking back at his companions. "Please to tell me what you think?"

"I think six is even more unwieldy," hissed an unexpectedly sonorous voice.

Samm did not burst from the woods so much as throw himself into the clearing. One massive foot landed in the fire, sending a whirlwind of orange-red sparks flying. The iron-tipped bolt that caught him in the right shoulder, he ignored. Swiping downward, he snatched the other crossbow away from Ruut. Fingers contracted tightly, and the sound of snapping wood and tortured metal rose above the roar of the falls.

Oskar made a dive for his sword. As he did so, Quoll darted with astonishing speed to intercept him, the lethal business end of the mace rising high above his head. He let out a stiff, startled squeal when Cezer slammed into him from the side. Its trajectory altered, the mace struck only bare ground. Snatching up his blade, Oskar rolled quickly onto his feet, ready to thrust and hack with abandon.

But the fight was already over. Capes flashing briefly in the glow from the fire, their extraordinary assailants had vanished into the undergrowth. Contorting his body with incredible abandon, their leader freed himself from Cezer's grasp and rushed after his companions, moving through the dense brush faster than even a rearmed Mamakitty and Cocoa could follow.

By the time the two women returned, Oskar and Cezer had already extracted the crossbow bolt from Samm's shoulder and were applying a makeshift patch to Taj's side.

"That was brave of you, to try and dissuade them with a lie." Cezer tugged the bandage tighter around Taj's injured flank. For once, the cat-man spoke without sarcasm.

The smaller man shrugged, then winced. "I wish I had spent less time singing and more listening to Master Evyndd. Who knows? Perhaps I might have picked up a useful spell or two."

"Foul creatures." Mamakitty put her sword aside and wiped sweat from her forehead. "So the Mundurucu are aware of us. That's not a good thing."

"But they don't know our intentions." Finishing up the bandage, Cezer gave it a little pull to make sure it would hold. Taj winced at the contact, but did not cry out.

"Small comfort." Oskar found himself gazing intently into the dark woods. "They know enough to want to stop us." He glanced back at the largest of his comrades. "Your arrival was timely, Samm. You probably saved us all."

The giant tried to shrug, but his bandaged shoulder would not permit it. "Not timely enough." A cumbersome finger pointed. "Taj was almost killed."

"But he wasn't," Cezer announced brightly. "Just got a scratch."

"Scratch you," the songster muttered in pain.

"We can't stay here." In the darkness, Mamakitty had begun gathering up her few belongings. "We have to go."

"What—now?" Cezer eyed her uncertainly. "In the middle of the night? You really think they'll be back, and so soon?"

She met his gaze. "If you had been given a task by this Mundurucu, would you return and confess to failure? I don't want to be shot at in my sleep, or surprised by whatever other skills these empowered predators may possess. Or did you think they were regular people?"

"No," Cezer admitted. "They are transformed, like us. The smells of the caped ones I recognized. The other—his scent is new to me. As new as it is unpleasant."

Mamakitty nodded knowingly. "I sniffed the same. We move now."

While Cocoa and Oskar kept watch, they hastily loaded up their supplies—with Samm, as usual, hefting the bulk of them. When all was in readiness, Mamakitty led the way through the moonlight while Oskar and Samm guarded the party's rear. Several times Oskar thought he sensed movement in the sodden brush, but when he looked in the appropriate direction, he saw nothing. Nor did Samm, whose eyesight was sharper still. Unfortunately, the giant could not also make use of his exceptional sense of smell, or his unique ability to sense the heat given off by living things. At the bottom of the gorge, individual odors and temperatures were masked by the omnipresent mist generated by the falls.

The air grew steadily damper as they forced their way through the thick vegetation and approached the base of the cataract. Trees and bushes gave way to expanses of bare, slick rock, and the revealed moon brightened their surroundings. Cocoa hissed with delight when their objective finally came into view from behind a quartet of blooming mistberry trees.

"You were right, Mamakitty! It is permanent! I never would have thought you could see a rainbow at night."

The older woman surveyed the band of color, subdued but unmistakable, that arched across the roaring river. With her humanized eyes, she could for the first time see all of it. In so doing, she could at last understand why humans always stopped to marvel at the sight.

"At night it would more properly be called a moonbow, I should think, but they are one and the same thing. Don't credit me with overmuch knowledge. If you had spent more time in the company of Master Evyndd, you would know as much as I do."

"He was always pushing me off his lap," Cocoa replied regretfully. Using caution, she approached the edge of the ledge onto which they had emerged.

"Same with me." Cezer was equally entranced by the nocturnal spectacle, though he tried hard not to show it. "I was always too busy with more important matters. Chasing dust motes or hunting vermin, for example." He leered good-naturedly at the fine young woman beside him. "Bet he wouldn't push you off his lap now."

"Cezer, you are incorrigible!" She edged sideways, beyond his reach.

"Actually, I'm a tabby, but what's a whisker or two between friends?"

"What do we do now?" Oskar found that he could approach the rainbow quite closely. It seemed to him that this was an unusual quality for a rainbow, which he had thought tended to retreat whenever a person drew near. This one, though, remained fixed in place as if cemented to the rocks, the muted colors growing brighter and more intense the closer he came.

Unslinging her collapsed water bag, Mamakitty advanced to join him. "This is empty. Let's try making use of it and see what happens." Holding open the spout, she encouraged him with a nod.

Nothing to lose, he thought as he reached out with both hands. Holding them tightly together in the manner of someone preparing to scoop water from a stream, he pushed them forward into the moonbow. Something might have tickled his fingers, but he couldn't be sure. As he drew back his cupped hands, the movement seemed to stretch the edge of the glowing arch ever so slightly, as if the diffuse, colored light possessed some slight viscosity of its own.

His curving palms, however, were empty of light or color, and contained nothing to place in the waiting water bag.

"Well, that didn't work," he murmured. "I thought I could feel something when my hands were inside, though."

"Feel what?" Though still dubious of the enterprise, Cezer was intrigued.

Oskar considered. "Hard to say. A kind of stickiness. It was barely perceptible. I don't think an ordinary human would have noticed it. We dogs have a more sensitive touch."

"Now there's a contradiction," Cezer sniffed. "A sensitive dog."

"There's something there." Mamakitty studied the nearby band of coloration. "We just have to figure out how to draw out some of it."

"Here, let me try." Hands extended, Cocoa pushed past both of them.

"No more time for experimenting, I'm afraid." At Samm's unexpected warning, everyone turned to follow his gaze.

Something was dropping out of the moonlit sky. A pair of massive winged shapes had wheeled around above the northern horizon and were now diving straight toward them. Identifying the specters from a picture he had seen in one of the Master's open books, Taj went cold in his belly.

Morggunts. With riders. Riders he recognized.

The two caped assassins sat just behind the long necks of the morggunts, feet pointed forward, bodies arched over the heads of their mounts. Long silvery teeth protruded above and below the lip line from narrow, crooked jaws. Membranous wings caught the rising air of the gorge, imparting profound maneuverability to the nocturnal fliers. Tripartite black tails whipped the clouds, and nostrils flared. Like all morggunts, they had no eyes.

Clinging more tightly to the third monster was the quoll. No flier he, the airborne assault was less to his liking than that of his companions. Nevertheless, he clung gamely to his terrible steed, relying on its teeth and claws to do all necessary work.

The morggunts were big enough to pose a real threat even to Samm, Oskar reflected as he fought to unsheathe his sword. Assuming a defensive pose, he found himself lamenting the absence of an archer among them. Not that arrows or bolts would have done much more than irritate a diving morggunt. What they really needed was a cannon.

In lieu of artillery, Taj shouted at them from behind. "Here, this way! I think I've found something!"

Ordinarily, Cezer would never have been so quick to follow the songster's lead. But with only seconds to go before the morggunts and their riders were in among them, Taj's disdainful companion was the first to follow his suggestion. Mamakitty and Cocoa followed close behind. Samm unleashed one swing of his colossal axe, forcing the morggunt carrying Quoll to back air. The eyeless demon struck with its snakelike neck, and teeth ripped the giant's cloak. A sound testimonial, the frantic Oskar reflected, for wearing loose-fitting attire in time of battle.

Demonstrating remarkable agility for one so large, Samm stumbled backward along the route taken by his companions, covering their flight. Oskar remembered swinging his sword two or three times. The wild blows did not make contact, but they kept Quoll's own rapier at bay. By the time the three morggunts had landed and were massing fang and claw for an overwhelming attack, their quarry had vanished.

Vanished? Vanished where? Oskar found himself wondering. That they had vanished could not be denied. Or maybe it was the world around them that had vanished. One minute he was swinging his sword wildly when his guts told him to leap and bite—and the next, he was drowning in color. Seeing color, breathing color, hearing and smelling color. Samm was right about the latter—it was hot.

The moonbow, he realized. They had not stumbled through the moonbow, but into it. As if trapped in a powerful stream, he felt himself caught up and swept toward the top of the arc. Color roared blue in his ears and burned yellow against his eyes. Then he was falling, falling, down through hue after warm dampish hue. Purple cushioned his plunge. Tiny moon-bows sparkled in his eyes as he steeled himself to make contact with the rocks on the far side of the river.

When he finally did hit, the shock blew the little moon-bows away from the inside of his eyes. The roaring blue left his ears. The ground beneath him was hard, but it did not feel like water-slicked rock. For one thing, it was sandy. For another, it was dry. But that was impossible. Here at the bottom of the gorge, at the base of the falls, everything existed in a state of perpetual clamminess.

As the last of the miniature moonbows faded from sight, he saw that not only was it no longer damp—it was no longer night. In front of him, in broad daylight, his friends were spreading out, forming a small circle as they marveled at their wholly unexpected if timely transposition.

Broad daylight. Normal daylight. For a wild moment, Oskar thought that color and natural light had returned to the world. Looking around, he realized that more than the light had changed. The world had changed. There was no sign of the moonbow, or the waterfall that sustained it, or even the Eusebian Gorge.

They had gone through the moonbow and come out on the other side. The only problem was, the other side was not just the other side. It was another side entirely.

Another world. Or at the very least, another place.

Collecting himself to examine his new surroundings, Oskar exulted silently in the realization that if he was confused, their pursuers must be even more so. Because wherever they were now, there was absolutely no sign of morggunts, black-clad riders, or the red-eyed, maniacal Quoll.

That individual was presently feeling even more surly than usual. Dismounting from his morggunt, he strode quickly to the base of the moonbow. Around him, the river Shalouan crashed and bounced over the jumble of boulders that formed the base of the falls. Behind, he could hear his bemused comrades puzzling over the abrupt disappearance of their seemingly cornered prey.

"Where did they go?" Ratha slid lithely from the neck of her mount. "I saw no flash of necromancer's light, heard no outbreak of sorcery."

"There wasn't any." Black cape billowing in the damp wind from the falls, Ruut moved forward to stand alongside the stockier Quoll. "They all stumbled backward, and went away."

Murderous red eyes glared up at him, and the shorter man's nose twitched. A quoll's nose was always twitching, always searching, but in this instance it smelled nothing but water. Even their quarry's odor had vanished with them.

"Is that what you want to tell the Mundurucu?"

What little color there was drained from Ruut's pale countenance. "No, but what else can we do?" Long, spiderlike fingers gestured fruitlessly. "They have gone."

"Then we must follow. Somehow." A deliberate hand held out before him, Quoll slowly advanced on the moonbow. His fingers made contact, sensed a slight tackiness, and continued to penetrate. Taking one step at a time, Quoll walked completely through the moonbow's edge. Pivoting, he repeated the exercise, until he was once more standing alongside his two gaunt comrades.

"They have gone through the rainbow. For them, it was a door. For us, it is nothing more than light reflecting from droplets of water. Something turned it, for them, from a phenomenon of the natural world into a means of escape." Bushy eyebrows shadowed those icy, penetrating eyes. "Or someone."

"Someone?" Ruut exchanged a glance with his equally mystified mate. "But the wizard Evyndd is dead, slain by the glorious Mundurucu at the battle for Kyll-Bar-Bennid." He indicated the place of disappearance. "You saw how they fled from us."

"I also smelled their fear, which was strong enough to rise above this accursed dampness. There is no sorcerer among them. The wizard Evyndd has not risen from the dead to save them." Sitting down on a rock and tucking his legs beneath him, a thoughtful Quoll sat as still as he was able and contemplated the enigmatic moonbow. "They truly smell of cat and dog, as the informant insisted. Apropos of that, sorcerers and witches of different stripe often have certain elements in common. Familiars, for example. Working with a necromancer, alongside one, such creatures are known to sometimes pick up shards and fragments of their master's skills."

Ratha nodded slowly. She would have been truly beautiful had she not worn unsheathed savagery like eye shadow. "So you think the wizard Evyndd's familiar may be among those we pursue, and that it has worked some strange alchemy to preserve them?"

"Do you think they crossed a bridge over this river where none exists? Did they transform themselves into puffs of cloud and drift away downstream?" Quoll's lips parted, exposing teeth shaped and pointed like white needles. "Please to realize that there is impressive thaumaturgy at work here." Rising, he headed deliberately toward his quietly salivating, waiting mount.

"I will take it upon myself to return to Kyll-Bar-Bennid. When it flies level with the ground, the morggunt flies slowly, but it will still be far faster than walking. I will describe to the Mundurucu the events we just witnessed."

The terrible-visaged Ruut was impressed. "Are you not afraid?"

Pausing with one leg half-raised as he prepared to mount, Quoll glared back at him. "My kind are afraid of nothing—not even the Mundurucu. We live to kill, and so deal daily with death. I know the Mundurucu can do worse, but the keen ones among them think before they slay. They want dead those whom we hunt; not me and thee. I think I will return with most of my limbs intact, together with the means for following our bumbling but opportune pilgrims. When we identify the one who is the familiar that travels among them, we will deal with it first. Once that individual has been slain, the others will quickly submit or perish."

Swinging his leg over the narrow neck of the morggunt, he whispered into its upthrust, spike-fringed ear a word that must go unmentioned. Snapping at the dank air of the canyon, the demon of the night sky lifted its head and spread its wings.

"Until I return, you must keep watch. Perhaps there is no air where they went, or food, and they will be forced to come back out the way they went in. In that event, you must be ready for them."

Ratha nodded, one hand falling to caress the red metal of her sword. She stood close to Ruut as the morggunt rose into the air. Circling to gain altitude, it was visible for several minutes before, at its rider's urging, it straightened out and disappeared over the rim of the gorge, heading northwest.

Turning, Ruut considered the moonbow. Falling water was clearly visible through the wide bands of diffuse color. Reaching out, he waved one waxen hand through the edge. It came away damp, without penetrating to unimaginable realms beyond.

Disgusted, he looked away. "We can make a camp in the shelter of the trees, and there is plenty here for the morggunts to eat." He tapped the crossbow now slung against his back. "If they show themselves here again, we will take out their legs."

Ratha nodded agreement. "The giant first, since we don't know which one is the familiar. Aim for his ankles. The others we will take in turn."

"And if they don't come back out, we will go in after them." Ruut was feeling more and more confident. "From the Mundurucu, Quoll will acquire for us the means of following." Striking out suddenly with one hand, he snatched a salamander from its resting place among the rocks, popped it into his mouth, and chewed noisily, spitting out small bones one after another.

His kin and companion watched enviously. "That reminds me: I'm hungry, too."

"A tidbit." Plucking the small, now bloodless skull from between his lips, Ruut cast it absently aside as he glanced back over his shoulder. "As Quoll said, the Mundurucu will want only one or two to question before they dispose of them. The rest will be ours, to drink at our leisure."

Contemplating the vision, Ratha felt better. As viewed through her red-stained thoughts, the anticipation was delicious.