Nemesis

CHAPTER 4

Greven drew his black-bladed sword in a swift, fluid motion. "You're either a madman or a liar. In any case, your life is forfeit. Get him!"

The guards lowered their spears and charged. Crovax, utterly composed, made no immediate move to evade them. When the soldiers were ten paces away, the smooth black floor suddenly turned to jelly. The soldiers' feet sank into the black goo and were held fast. "Dread Lord, he commands the flowstone!" Dorian cried.

Greven circled wide around the mired troops. Crovax edged away from Greven, drawing his own sword. He seemed wary of engaging the hulking warrior.

Greven leveled his weapon. "You have some influence over the flowstone, but you don't command it as Volrath did, do you?" He cut wide circles in the air with his wickedly curved blade. "Can you direct my control rod, impostor? You have this one chance before I kill you!"

He made a terrific overhand slash at Crovax, who parried shakily. Ertai pushed to the front of the crowd of frightened courtiers. Crovax's aura was astonishingly dense and dark, far stronger than it had been on Weatherlight, and it extended to where the soldiers were stuck in the grip of the flowstone. He had little power left to fend off Greven, however.

Greven came on fiercely, cutting at Crovax's head, thrusting at his stomach and legs. One underhand lunge was blocked in the last second by Crovax's lighter blade. Greven's great muscles bulged, and he brought his blade up against Crovax's full resistance. The latter's sword snapped, and the flowstone blade went skittering away, stopping at Ertai's feet. To his astonishment, the broken blade sprouted tiny legs, stood up, and began marching back to rejoin itself to Crovax's hilt.

Taking his sword in both hands, Greven raised it high for a death blow. The flowstone released the soldiers, and the section of floor between Greven and Crovax heaved up to ward off the warrior's blow. Greven's blade stuck fast in the flowstone shield. He grunted and tugged at the imbedded blade. Crovax, breathing hard, searched for a weapon with which to strike the distracted Greven.

Three deep, even tones echoed through the vast space like the tolling of a great bell.

A shock wave blasted down the Dream Halls, silent and powerful. Lightly dressed courtiers went sprawling. Ertai dropped on his face and clawed at the hard pavement. To his amazement, his fingers probed shallow handholds in the flowstone.

The soldiers, buffeted by the noiseless blast, struggled to keep formation. Crovax's flowstone shield receded. Greven recovered his sword but stayed his hand. The tremendous displacement of air could mean only one thing-the emissary was coming.

Tumbling through the air down the center of the hall came a gray cube, turning successive faces toward them as it came. It grew rapidly in size. Only Greven and Crovax held their ground; the courtiers and soldiers, cowed by the enormous power confronting them, backed away. Once the wall of wind ceased, Ertai raised his head to see what was happening.

The cube stabilized, hovering a few inches off the floor. It was at least 30 feet to a side, and its boiling, misty surface revealed no details of its purpose or composition. Behind the veil of gray there was movement. Bumps rippled the facing surface of the cube.

The phantom gong tolled three more times, and a hand appeared through the cube-a lithe, slender hand, gloved in a black gauntlet. A knee and toe appeared, then the leg connecting them. In a simple, natural movement, the emissary stepped through the portal into the Dream Halls.

The emissary was dwarfed by Greven. Clothed head to toe in attenuated sable armor plate, the emissary was only slightly taller than Ertai. The closed helmet turned this way and that, surveying the scene. The emissary raised a hand, but not in greeting. A small device the Phyrexian held made a chirping sound, and the portal began to shrink. As it did, it spat out four large black metal boxes. The cube shrank to the size of a small nut, tumbling in the air as it hovered. The emissary's control device chirped again, and the tiny cube vanished. Back went the device into a pouch on the emissary's belt. Air rushed in to fill the space of the departed portal.

Soldiers and courtiers dragged themselves into some semblance of order. Ertai stood up, absently combing his tousled hair with his fingers.

The emissary stood motionless, and Ertai wondered for a moment if the Phyrexians had sent a mechanical creature like Karn, his former crewmate. Slowly the stranger raised its hands to its helmet. The headpiece slipped off with an audible hiss.

"It's a girl," Ertai said.

"Be silent!" Greven said. He went down on one knee. "All hail the plenipotentiary of the Supreme Master of Phyrexia!"

With much rustling of stiff cloth and squeaking metal, the delegation knelt before the emissary. Ertai was the first to stand. He wanted a better view of this girl from another plane.

Her features were sharp, like the elves of his world. She had high, pointed ears and the spatulate cheekbones of a pure-blooded elf. Her eyes, he saw, were identically hued. Incongruous freckles dotted her nose and cheeks. Her armor fit as if a matte-black skin, and where it ended, her own pale complexion revealed strange dark crosshatching lines. In spite of the awesome presence of Phyrexia she bore with her, the emissary looked to be little more than Ertai's agethe human equivalent of nineteen years old.

Crovax bowed smoothly. "Greetings, Excellency. Welcome to Rath."

She looked at him blankly. "Who are you?"

Ertai sniggered. At a nod from Greven, two soldiers seized the young sorcerer in an unfriendly grip.

"I am Crovax, the new Evincar of Rath."

"I've heard of you," the emissary answered coolly. "You exceed yourself. I am here to appoint a new governor, and I have not chosen you yet."

Crovax visibly recoiled. Around him the flowstone floor rose in tiny peaks, like a tempest-tossed lake. It quickly subsided.

Greven stepped forward. "Greven il-Vec, commander of all Citadel forces and captain of the airship Predator, at Your Excellency's service."

"Commander."

What a flat, emotionless voice she has, Ertai thought. The members of the court, led by Dorian il-Dal, greeted the emissary in turn, each swearing undying loyalty to her and to the power she represented. She accepted their boot licking and toadying with the same indifference with which she received Crovax's arrogance.

"What about me?" Ertai called out. The soldier holding his right arm let go and gave the sorcerer a resounding rap on the back of the head.

"Who is that?" asked the emissary.

"No one, Excellency. A prisoner of war," Greven explained.

"You bring prisoners to me? Why?"

"Good question," said Crovax.

"This one has a certain talent for magic," Greven said. "I brought him along to witness your arrival, Excellency, as an object lesson."

"Has he been interrogated?"

Greven steeled himself for punishment. "No, Excellency."

"The first task of a captor is to extract information from prisoners," the girl said. "You will see to his interrogation, Greven il-Vec."

"At once, Excellency." He signaled the guards to drag Ertai away.

Ertai looked between the hulking soldiers and said, "You haven't told us your name!"

Greven was about to order Ertai silenced, but the emissary stopped him. "A logical question. My name is Belbe."

"My name is Ertai. I was first in my class-"

"Take him away," Greven said irritably. "I will question him myself."

Crovax extended his arm to lead Belbe from the hall. She ignored his pretense of gallantry and walked briskly on. Greven asked about the crates sent with her.

"Have them taken to the evincar's quarters. I will occupy them," she said.

This was mogg work, but the smelly brutes were forbidden to enter the Dream Halls. Greven moved as if he was about to order the guards to remove the crates when Crovax made a suggestion.

"Let the courtiers do it," he said. "The palace is their business, isn't it?"

Dorian blanched at the prospective exertion. "We're not laborers!"

Belbe said, "Do as Crovax says."

"But Your Excellency!" Dorian protested.

"This man is an intruder, as much an enemy as the wart Ertai," Greven said, pointing at Crovax. "By rights he should be in a cell, too."

"No," Belbe said. "This one has received the attention of the overlords. He's not evincar yet, but he stands in contention for the post. So long as his orders do not contradict mine, he will be obeyed."

Crovax's altered face split wide in an unpleasant grin. "What are you waiting for? See to the emissary's baggage."

Dorian and the others filed past Crovax. The metal cases were six feet long and half as wide. The pampered, in some cases elderly, courtiers struggled to lift the heavy containers to their shoulders. Crovax could not restrain himself from laughing when one aged Dal collapsed, bringing a crate down on himself. Dorian directed the rest of the courtiers to hoist the box off the fallen man. Blood stained the old man's gold-trimmed robe, and his face had gone the color of cold ashes. Dorian lifted the man's wrist. "He's dead." His voice choked. Crovax stood over them. "Useless parasite," he said. His brow furrowed, and a segment of the floor detached itself and formed a stretcher. Walking on short flowstone legs, the stretcher bore the body of the elderly courtier from the hall.

Dorian looked up at him with tears in his eyes. "If you command the stone, why don't you order it to carry the emissary's baggage?"

Crovax grabbed Dorian's collar and effortlessly lifted the corpulent chamberlain to his feet.

"Prove your devotion to the overlords by carrying Her Excellency's baggage! All of you!" he roared.

Ertai and his escorts had lingered, watching this scene unfold.

"This is bad," Ertai muttered. "He's gone mad, utterly mad." He was hustled away. Belbe, Greven, Crovax, and the honor guard stood by as the aged and soft-living members of the evincar's court struggled to carry Belbe's crates.

Belbe gestured to Dorian. "What is that on that man's face?" "Tears," said Greven.

"A saline solution, excreted for the purpose of removing irritations from the surface of the cornea-"

"The old man who was killed was chamberlain before Dorian," Greven said. "He was Dorian's father."

Belbe started for the evincar's quarters without waiting for her baggage. Greven excused himself to see to Ertai's interrogation.

Before he left he said, "If Your Excellency needs assistance- or protection-you need only call. There are guards posted throughout the Citadel." He shot Crovax a warning look and departed. What remained of the honor guard awaited her orders.

"What shall we do, Excellency?" asked Nasser. "Carry on with your duties," she said.

"And I?" Crovax asked.

"If you're to command the forces of Rath, you should inspect the army and become familiar with it. They have performed poorly of late, have they not?"

"It's true, Excellency," Nasser said grimly. "There was great confusion when we found we had to deal with both rebels and an enemy airship."

"Very well, in five intervals, I expect to hear your military report, Crovax. Inform the chamberlain and Greven ii-Vec that I want them present as well."

She walked away. Crovax watched her go.

"Man to man, what do you make of her?" mused Crovax.

"Very strange," the sergeant said. "Why would the overlords send a young girl on such a mission?"

"There's a reason, Sergeant. We just don't see it yet. The overlords do nothing without a well-thought-out reason. By the way, what's your name?"

"Nasser, sir."

"How long have you served Greven ii-Vec?"

"Seven years, sir."

"Seven years, and you only command a troop of palace guards? Greven does not appreciate you."

Nasser met the other man's gaze. "No, sir, he does not."

"We'll have to remedy that." He held out his hand. "Lead on."

Nasser formed the honor guard and marched them away. Crovax strolled behind them, smiling at some private amusement.

The sound of marching feet receded in the distance. Belbe took a deep breath. Alone again, thankfully! Though she'd been on Rath scarcely an hour, she was feeling bruised by the experience. She found the company of the Citadel's inhabitants wearing-the great hulking presence of Greven, the soldiers so wrapped in armor as to seem less alive than the Phyrexian priests she'd encountered, the court officials with their washed out, anxious faces, always ready with a whisper and an open palm…

Her master, Abcal-dro, never told her that people were like this. The only two that interested her were the young one called Ertai and the dark one called Crovax. They were very different types. Ertai radiated brash wit and vast self-confidence, even with shackles on his feet. Crovax was dangerous. She could tell he'd been to Phyrexia and received the special attention of Fourth Level artificers.

She walked unerringly to the flowbot lift that could take her to the evincar's suite of rooms, halfway up the great tower. A detailed schematic of the Stronghold had been implanted in her mind when she was made. Every strut, every brace, every creeping fleshstone appliance was as familiar to her as her own hands. Yet everything was strange, too, because she knew she'd never been here before.

She stepped into the flowbot lift. The conveyance didn't budge, so she prompted it. "To the evincar's quarters."

The Citadel had existed a long time, and successive occupants had altered, decorated, and embellished it as they saw fit. Belbe passed through floors reflecting the tastes of six previous evincars, each new master having overlaid his predecessor's alterations. The basic structure was a shell of brassy Phyrexian alloy and ceramic, over which were layers of flowstone designed to resemble wood, marble, glass, and so forth. Its organic form survived every decorative whim, and centuries of human habitation afflicted it like scars on the body of a great sea beast.

A squeaky voice announced each floor as they passed. "Observation deck… courtiers' apartments… flowbot repair shop… evincar's museum…"

"Stop," Belbe said. The lift shuddered into place. They were halfway between floors. "Go down to the evincar's museum."

The lift obediently climbed down several feet. Belbe stepped off the platform. The floor was dark, with only a few reflective glints showing.

"Light," she ordered. Nothing happened. "I want light!"

Some flowstone globes burst into full illumination. Other contrary appliances refused to light at all. As a result, the room was harshly shadowed, a condition made worse by the bizarre contents of the museum.

Volrath had made it his business to catalog all forms of life on Rath. Specimens of every species were here, carefully preserved and mounted on "marble" flowstone pedestals. There were animals, birds, reptiles, and fish, all with staring glass eyes. Some of the specimens were old and suffered from neglect and decay. As Belbe walked slowly past, she touched the plumage of a stuffed bird. Pale blue feathers turned to dust in her hands. Belbe brushed the powder away, and a small two-legged machine scuttled from the shadows, its bell-shaped proboscis noisily sucking up the offending dust.

Volrath hadn't settled for just animals. Each sentient race on Rath was represented by four preserved specimens: adult male, adult female, child male, child female-all in appropriate costume and with typical accouterments. She passed exhibits of the Kor, the Dal, and the Vec. Sleek, powerful merfolk were artfully displayed inside blocks of transparent green flowstone, simulating the sea in which they lived.

The last race displayed were the Skyshroud elves. Only a single example was provided, a fully grown male. Belbe paused, arrested by what she saw. The face, though masculine, was very similar to hers. She climbed on the pedestal with the embalmed elf and stared curiously into his long dead face.

Who were you? Some hunter, some fisher the evincar's soldiers caught one day? Where did you live? Why do you look like me?

Belbe touched the elf's face. It was cold, dry, and hard. The taxidermist had given the elf blue-gray eyes. She touched the dusty pupil with her fingertip. It was not glass. It yielded to her touch.

Belbe jumped down from the pedestal, trembling. She rubbed her hands repeatedly on the skirt of her armor. The room had suddenly grown small and oppressive. She had to get out, now.

The lift was waiting for her. She leaped aboard and said, "Go."

"Go where?" asked the device.

"To the evincar's quarters. At once!"

By the time the platform stopped at the lowest level of the evincar's suite, the structure had narrowed to a mere two hundred feet in diameter. The antechamber was cool and dim.

"Give me light."

The room gradually brightened with an intense, pulsating blue light. Belbe moved to the center of the room as the walls passed from opaque to translucent. The throbbing blue light was the energy beam outside. She could feel the energy bleeding through the walls on her skin. The bottom floor of the suite was one large room with inward curving walls, and as she stood, fascinated by the energy passing between the Flowstone Factory and the Hub, the floor began to flicker. Languorous waves of color circled the floor in alternating bands of red, orange, yellow, green, and blue. Centered in this silent vortex of color, Belbe stood in silence. The chromatic waves circled the room around her feet. She knew this was caused by feedback in the flowstone as it soaked up the energy seeping through the walls, but it was delightful, whatever the cause.

She drifted a few steps toward the stairs leading to the next floor. As she did, the color wheel shifted to re-center on her new position. Amused, she backed up a few feet. The clockwise swirl followed her.

Belbe trotted around the room. Her re-engineered legs were capable of formidable speed, but in the confines of the tower, she did not test her limits. The spectral bands in the floor chased her, no matter how fast she ran. Static charges built up in the air. Belbe held out her hands, laughing as white sparks discharged from her fingertips.

On her twentieth circuit of the room, she noticed Crovax standing by the lift. She skidded to a stop. The floor went through noiseless paroxysms of clashing color, finally settling into its wheel pattern once more.

"Light," she said. Her heart was beating rapidly, and her hair was damp with sweat.

The walls became opaque as the artificial lighting came up. Crovax, hands clasped behind his back, looked somber in his black robes and acid-etched Phyrexian breastplate.

"What do you want?" Belbe asked.

"I came to see if you were all right, Excellency." He used the language of a subordinate, but he did not speak like one. "From below we could see colored lightning playing about the tower. I didn't realize you were… enjoying yourself."

"An amusing effect," she replied. "I discovered it by accident."

"An interesting substance, flowstone. It can be controlled, if one has the will to do so. Half-controlled and half-influenced, it is unpredictable. Please be careful, Excellency."

Without a spoken command, the sides of the lift rose to enclose Crovax.

"Until later," he said as the device sank through the floor.

She was tired. Being on display was wearing, and her sprint around the room used up what vitality she had left. Belbe climbed the ornate stairs to the next floor. An evincar could have willed the stairs to carry him, but she had to make her own progress.

She wandered through chambers filled with paintings and statues, mostly warrior's portraits and battle scenes. Most of the individual images bore the face of Volrath. Belbe found it odd anyone would want to be surrounded by pictures of himself, especially such exaggerated, extravagant images. Volrath slaying an entire army with just his sword. A colossal Volrath, wreathed in cloud, standing astride the Stronghold. Volrath trampling nations and worlds beneath his feet.

Interspersed among the statues, paintings, and tapestries were more useful items-cabinets, cupboards, shelves, chairs, settees. The furniture was uniformly hard when Belbe sat on it. From its dished and bulged shapes, she deduced it was flowstone and that it would soften for the evincar but no one else.

She found a bed at last, a large circular mattress laden with handmade quilts and pillows. These were gifts of the evincar's subjects, and thankfully were not flowstone. The bed was sized for a very tall occupant, so she had to boost herself up. As she sat there, her feet dangling, she noticed another statue, much different from all the others. It was sited so that only a person lying on the bed could see it in the adjoining room. Belbe hopped down for a closer look.

The statue, executed in genuine white marble, depicted two figures facing each other. The taller figure was inescapably Volrath, though this was the only statue in which he wore royal robes instead of armor. His hand was extended, clasping the hand of the facing figure. Belbe circled the twelve-foot-high statue, trying to see who the other figure was.

The figure facing Volrath was shorter and proportioned like a normal man. He had neck-length hair and the suggestion of a beard, and was likewise dressed in peaceful fashion. When Belbe finally reached a spot where she could see, she discovered the figure with Volrath had no face at all.

"Let's talk this over," Ertai said.

Greven nodded to his two mogg warders, who tore Ertai's shirt from his back. He didn't regret the loss of the garment, as it was in tatters anyway, but he did take exception to the assorted irons roasting in a brazier not three feet away.

"This isn't going to accomplish anything," Ertai added. "I have nothing to say."

Greven took an instrument from his belt pouch: a slender red rod, wound in a tight, flat coil. He pinched the end of the coil between his fingers and it slowly unrolled into a rigid rod.

"What is that?" Ertai asked, clearing his suddenly tight throat.

The hulking warrior loomed over him. He gave one end of the rod a twist, and short spikes appeared on the opposite end. Ertai decided he preferred the branding irons. He backed away. The wall stopped him.

Again Greven gestured to the moggs, who seized Ertai's ankles. They jerked his right foot up, and Greven bent over it, rod in hand… Ertai shut his eyes.

Click. The heavy shackle fell from his leg. Ertai opened his eyes in time to see Greven withdraw the spiky rod from the keyhole. He repeated the operation to the other shackle.

"Keyworm," the warrior said, tucking the slowly coiling creature back in his pouch.

"By all the colors," Ertai said, sighing gustily. "I thought-"

The warders slammed him against the wall. Greven picked up an iron. The tip was pale orange, almost white hot.

"Now," said Greven, "tell me about Weatherlight."

Ertai, his hands pinned, closed his eyes and conjured a psychokinetic blast from his locus, his solar plexus. Such conjurations were not as controllable as ones channeled through the hands, but considering his situation, he had little choice. He mentally hurled it at Greven and was rewarded by the sound of the iron clattering to the floor.

"I can keep this up longer than you," Greven said. He retrieved the fallen iron, now cooled to cherry red, and returned it to the fire. "This can take all day, or it can be over when you wish it to be. What do you say?"

"A modicum of resistance is mandatory," Ertai said faintly. "After all, I am the most naturally talented sorcerer of the age."

Greven picked up fresh, hot irons in each hand. "Down here, Boy, you're just meat."