The Cerulean Storm

SEVEN THE BANSHEES

Rikus gnashed his teeth, trying to be patient and not succeeding very well. He stood at a tangled intersection of mine tunnels, holding his hand out in front of him. A single tongue of scarlet flame flickered in his palm, scorching his flesh and rising straight up into the gloomy air. The tiny fire cast just enough heat to wash out his dwarven vision, and its small sphere of scarlet light was barely large enough to illuminate the black maws of a dozen passages gaping at him from all directions. Beyond that, he was as blind in this murk as Neeva.

At last, Rikus looked to Caelum, who was standing at his side. “The flame’s not pointing anywhere,” he growled. “Your spell isn’t doing anything except burning my hand.”

“I’m sorry you find my fire-beacon uncomfortable,” said Caelum. He raised his own hand. “I would have held it in my own palm, but …” He opened his fingers, revealing the scales and red lips that had formed there when he had tried to heal the Scourge.

Rikus looked away. “Good enough,” he said. “But which way now? The flame’s not pointing toward any tunnel.”

“Isn’t it?” Caelum asked, looking up.

Rikus tipped his head back and saw a circle of blackness.

“Wonderful,” he grumbled, raising his hand over his head. The flame’s light revealed a man-sized cavity, roughly circular in shape, rising straight up. “How am I going to climb that without smothering the fire-beacon?”

The mul said nothing about the sporadic dizziness he had been suffering earlier, for it had all but disappeared during the long walk. Occasionally, he would feel lightheaded for a moment or two, but the sensation no longer caused him to stumble or fall.

“You’re not going to climb anything, Rikus,” Neeva said. She turned to the dwarves at their back. “Brul Siderite, present yourself with a rope.”

A young man promptly came forward with a coil of rope. Compared to the boulderlike shape of most dwarves, Brul was rather gaunt and lean, with gangling arms and bowed legs. Neeva had him remove his armor and sling the rope over his shoulder, then boosted him into the shaft. The warrior began to climb, his long arms and bowed legs flickering over the rough-hewn walls in search of secure holds.

Rikus waited in the musty darkness with the others, the mine’s humid air forming cool beads of water on his bald head. Every time a groan or scrape sounded from above, he cringed, fearing Brul was about to come crashing back down.

Though Rikus recognized Neeva’s wisdom in sending the dwarf up first, that did not make waiting any easier. Even with Caelum’s fire-beacon guiding them through the maze of mine tunnels, he feared that it was taking their group too long to work their way back to the mouth of the valley. The Iron Company had not gotten lost once, but it had encountered many obstacles that delayed its march. Several times, the dwarves had crawled on their bellies through long spans of partially collapsed tunnel. Once, after the fire-beacon had directed them into a passage filled with foul-smelling air they could not breathe, they had found it necessary to backtrack and find a different route. Neeva had even been forced to ferry the entire company of dwarves across a stretch of flooded cavern, wading back and forth through fifty paces of muddy water as deep as her chin.

At last, Brul’s panting voice echoed down from the top of the shaft. “Rope!”

As soon as the end of the line dropped into the tunnel, Neeva tied it around Rikus’s chest. “Haul away!” she said.

The coarse rope bit into the mul’s chest, and he felt his feet leave the ground. Brul hauled him up in a steady cadence of long pulls. The shaft was small enough that the fire-beacon lit it completely, revealing rough-hewn walls cut from red rock. Once, Rikus got stuck in a narrow section and could not free himself until he had taken off his scabbard belt-no easy feat with one hand.

Near the top of the shaft, Rikus felt an arid breeze blowing across his skin, sapping the dew that had collected on him in the lower, more humid depths of the mine. He resisted the urge to cheer, knowing there were a hundred portals in the valley. Just because he felt an outside breeze did not mean they had reached one of the exits overlooking the gorge where the Granite Company was trapped. The mul glanced at the fire-beacon in his hand but did not find the answer to his question there. The flame was flickering, but it still pointed upward.

A moment later, Brul pulled Rikus into a small passage so cramped that the mul’s broad shoulders barely fit between the walls. Rikus scrambled onto the ledge. He did not even try to stand, for the ceiling was so low that it scraped his back even when he rested on his hands and knees.

“Is this the way?” asked the dwarf, shielding his eyes from the fire-beacon. “I think there’s an exit here, but the shaft also continues up for at least another hundred feet.”

Rikus looked at his hand and saw the flame pointing straight down the side passage.

“This is it,” the mul reported. He pressed his palm to the wall and sighed in relief.

Once Rikus had smothered the fire-beacon, he saw a square of moonlit night at the other end of the tunnel, about a hundred paces distant. He untied the rope around his waist and squeezed past Brul, anxious to see what had become of Sult, the Granite Company, and the giants.

There was no need to wait. Patch’s muffled voice sounded from the other end of the tunnel. “Nasty dwarves! I’ll kill you like you killed Galt!”

Rikus heard a distant crash. A muted rumble rolled through passage, shaking dust and loose stones from the ceiling.

“It sounds like the Granite Company killed one giant,” the mul said, turning to Brul. “Have Neeva bring me an axe, and we’ll see if we can’t get another.”

While the dwarf lowered his rope back into the shaft and relayed Rikus’s request, the mul strapped on his scabbard belt. By the time he finished, Brul was heaving on the rope again. With the fire-beacon gone, the mul’s dwarven vision had returned, and he saw a halo of rosy light appear as Neeva’s head rose out of the shaft. She carried a pair of battle-axes in her arms and an extra rope over her shoulder.

Rikus reached past Brul and grasped the weapons. “Over here.”

The mul pulled the axes past the dwarf, then took one and started up the passage. Neeva followed close behind. As they crawled, Patch’s voice continued to rumble down the passage, punctuated by muffled crashes and distant booms. The noises did not seem to grow much louder as they neared the exit, which made Rikus fear the battle had already moved farther down the canyon.

Rikus finally reached the end of the tunnel. Directly ahead lay the moonlit crags of the gorge’s opposite wall. He looked to one side. He and Neeva had come out as intended, where the narrow canyon opened into the valley. In the other direction, the gorge ran for only a short distance before kinking sharply. Had he not known better, the mul would have sworn the chasm ended there. He saw no sign of Patch in either direction.

“Make room,” said Neeva, crawling alongside Rikus.

As her flank pressed against his, the mul could not help smiling at the warmth of her soft flesh. It reminded him of times past, when they had lain pressed together all night, too tense to sleep or talk, knowing the next morning they would leave the arena as they were then, victorious or dead, but together still. Rikus had never thought he would miss anything about being a gladiator, but now, with Neeva pressed against his side, he realized he did miss one thing.

The crack of a shattering stone sounded from somewhere below, reminding Rikus that dwelling on his past with Neeva would do him no more good than wishing the Scourge’s blade had not been snapped. The mul looked down and saw that they had come out much higher than he had hoped, as he could tell by the sight of a tangled nest of giant braids far below.

Rikus squinted, trying to see what was happening more clearly. The moonlight reflecting off the gorge’s walls washed out his dwarven vision, so even after careful study, he could distinguish little more than a hulking pair of shoulders filling the canyon from wall to wall. Nevertheless, it appeared that Sult and the Granite Company were giving the giant a good fight. Patch’s head was tilted forward to look at the ground, and he seemed oblivious to anything but stomping and cursing the dwarves at his feet.

“Rikus, didn’t you see that?” Neeva asked, a note of urgency in her voice.

“What?” the mul asked. He scoured the gorge’s shadows for something he had missed.

“Up there,” Neeva corrected.

She pointed into the sky, where a crimson sphere hung just above the opposite rim of the gorge. The ball was flickering and sputtering, like a torch that had burned all its oil, and was so faint it barely stood out from the night.

“What’s that?” Rikus asked.

“Rkard’s sun-spell.” Her voice cracked as she spoke. “He’s in trouble.”

“It’s about to go out,” Rikus observed. “How long does it last?”

“A quarter hour,” Neeva replied. She looked at Rikus then asked, “Do you think there’s any chance Sadira’s awake yet?”

“If she were awake, there would be no need for Rkard to cast his spell,” the mul replied.

Neeva started to back down the tunnel. “We’ve got to help him!”

Rikus grabbed her shoulder. “It’ll take too long to return,” he said. “But I know a faster way.”

Neeva allowed herself to be pulled up the passage. “How?”

Rikus took the rope off her shoulder. He began tying it around himself, looping it first between his legs, then around his hips, over his shoulders, and beneath his arms so it would spread the impact of a long fall over the strongest points of his body.

“Leave about ten arms of rope between us,” Rikus said, finishing his harness off with a secure knot. “Fasten yourself into the other end of the line like I have. Then come up here next to me.”

By the time they finished, Caelum was crawling up the tunnel toward them. “What’s wrong?” he asked, eyeing the rope strung between his wife and Rikus.

“Your son’s in trouble,” the mul answered.

Rikus checked Neeva’s harness then twisted himself around so that he sat at the mouth of the tunnel, his legs dangling over the edge. Neeva passed him his battle-axe and sat next to him, cradling her own weapon in her arms.

“Wait!” Caelum cried. “That rope isn’t tied off. You’ll fall-”

“Not now, husband,” Neeva snapped. Without looking back at the dwarf, she peered down at Patch’s shoulder, which was just a little bit ahead of their perch. “I know what to do.”

“Just like old times,” Rikus answered, smiling. “Go!”

Gripping his axe with both hands, he slipped out of the tunnel. He pushed off the gorge wall with his legs, driving himself to the side so that he would fall in front of Patch’s body. In the same instant, Neeva also slipped from her perch, though she launched herself straight ahead so she would come down behind the giant. The rope stretched out between her and Rikus, keeping them connected as they plummeted into the shadows.

Rikus heard Caelum cry out, then the roar of the wind filled his ears and drowned out the dwarf. The mul felt his own voice vibrating inside his skull and knew he was screaming, but he simply ignored the panicked part of his mind and focused his thoughts on one simple task: clutching his battle-axe.

Rikus plunged past a tangle of hair braids, and Neeva passed out of sight behind Patch’s massive collarbone. The mul hit feet-first, then glanced off the giant’s breast and bounced away. The rope caught him an instant later, his makeshift harness biting deep beneath his legs and arms as the cord stretched with the force of the fall. It squeezed tight around his ribs, filling his chest with a terrible ache and driving the air from his lungs in an involuntary groan. He heard a similar grunt from Neeva’s side of the shoulder, then felt himself arcing back toward the titan’s chest. As painful as the stop was, Rikus knew that it would have been much worse-possibly even snapping his back or breaking his ribs-had he not taken the time to tie himself into the line as he had.

Patch roared in surprise and wrenched around to see what had fallen on him. The motion sent Rikus swinging toward the gorge wall, and the rope skipped as his weight hit the end. Fearing the line would slip off the huge shoulder, he swung his axe as hard as he could. The steel head drove deep into the titan’s breast, instantly stopping the mul’s flight and drawing a pained howl from the giant.

Releasing his weapon, Rikus grabbed a fold of the giant’s smelly sheepskin tunic and pulled himself forward. Patch’s hand slapped down behind him. The back edge of the double-bladed axe sank deep into the titan’s palm, and the giant bellowed in anger. While the titan plucked the battle-axe from his palm, the mul climbed for the opposite shoulder. He saw Patch raise a hand to claw at him, then the giant abruptly stopped as a flurry of dull thumps sounded at his feet.

“Stomp the Granite Company, will you!” cried a dwarf’s angry voice. “We’ll chop you off at the ankles, you lout!”

Patch hopped from one foot to the other. Each time he changed legs, a dwarf cried out in pain, and the sound of folding steel echoed up from the dark gorge. Determined to make the most of the diversion, Rikus continued his climb and soon pulled himself over the giant’s shoulder. He met Neeva coming from the other side. Like Rikus, she remained harnessed into the rope.

“Everything okay?” Rikus asked.

“It will be, when we choke this giant,” Neeva replied.

The warrior scrambled away, crossing in front of the titan’s throat. The mul jumped over the back of the shoulder. Patch did not attempt to stop them, his attention fixed on the dwarven axes hacking at his ankles. Rikus waited until he saw Neeva appear behind the giant’s other shoulder, then braced his feet and pulled. She did the same. The rope, now looped around the huge throat like a garotte, tightened.

Patch forgot the dwarves and tried to pull the rope away. His efforts were to no avail. Rikus and Neeva had pulled the cord so tight that it bit deep into his flesh, and the titan could not slip his fingers beneath the taut line. A deep gurgle rumbled from the brute’s throat.

Patch stumbled around, turning his back toward the cliff. Anticipating the giant’s next move, Rikus called, “Cross and

over!”

Still pulling on the rope, the mul shuffled across Patch’s spine. Neeva did the same, and they crossed. The giant leaned back toward the cliff. They threw themselves over his collarbone and narrowly avoided being crushed as he slammed into the rock wall.

Patch kept his back against the cliff, his rasping chokes echoing down the canyon. He raised one hand toward each of his tormenters.

Rikus could not see what Neeva was doing, but the mul tried to draw his dagger. He found the hilt tied into place beneath his harness. The giant’s fingers encircled his body. Rikus grabbed the rope with both hands and pulled, kicking at the enormous hand with both feet. He almost slipped free, then Patch caught his legs. The titan squeezed, filling Rikus’s knees and hips with agony.

The choking giant had already grown very weak, and the torment was not as bad as it might have been. None of Rikus’s thick mul bones cracked, and he did not even feel anything pop out of socket. Deciding he could bear the pain until Patch fell unconscious, the warrior braced himself against the titan’s thumb and index finger, concentrating his efforts on keeping himself from slipping deeper into the huge fist.

The mul peered around the giant’s gullet and caught a glimpse of Neeva. Somehow, she had braced her feet against the back of the hand and had wrapped both her arms around the titan’s little finger. She was pulling it back against the joint, though Rikus suspected she had little chance of snapping it.

A series of deep, racking coughs shook the giant’s torso. He tried to jerk Rikus and Neeva away from his throat. They were still connected to the rope, and he succeeded only in drawing it tighter. Patch began to sway, then dropped to his knees.

Cheering madly, more than a dozen dwarves began hacking at the giant’s thighs.

A long convulsion ran through Patch’s body, then his hands opened, and he pitched forward. His face slammed into the gorge wall, leaving his killers dangling from the rope around his neck.

Rikus and Neeva pulled themselves up the rope to Patch’s collarbone, where they freed themselves from their harnesses. They tied the ends of the cord together so the garotte would not loosen before it had done its work completely, then they slid down the unconscious giant’s back. Their feet had barely touched the ground before Neeva was yelling for Sult to report.

“Here, Commander.” A grizzled dwarf stepped forward, wading through a river of blood that was pouring from a wound in Patch’s thigh. He had a weather-lined face and a thin, crooked nose that looked as though it had been broken a dozen times. “Fifteen survivors for the Granite Company.”

“Never mind that,” Neeva replied. “How many giants did you kill in this canyon?”

“One, aside from this one,” the dwarf replied. “The fourth one stayed at the farm to fight the windsinger.”

With a curse, Neeva turned and started down the dark gorge at a sprint.

From his hiding place on the butte, Rkard saw Magnus run out of the faro orchard below Rasda’s Wall. The windsinger looked utterly exhausted, stumbling over rocks and flailing his massive arms as he tried to retain his balance. He veered away from the four giants who had died during the day and raced for the far end of the valley.

A series of thudding footsteps echoed behind him. A single giant appeared from behind Rasda’s Wall, carrying a stone he had torn from the ridge. The titan looked as exhausted as Magnus. He had two jagged cuts on his brow, and his body was covered with huge bruises so dark Rkard could see them even in the pale light of the moons.

The marks were evidence of the terrific brawl to which the young mul had been listening until just a few seconds ago. After the four surviving giants had followed Kled’s militia toward Pauper’s Hope, a terrible storm of whirling winds and rumbling thunder had erupted behind Rasda’s Wall. The din had been answered by the clatter of breaking stones and angry bellows. A moment later, most of the titans’ voices had begun to grow more distant and muffled, and Rkard had guessed they were chasing the militia into the mountains. One brute had stayed behind, however, and the sounds of battle had continued to rage for a long time.

Now, it was finally clear who had won. As Rkard watched, the giant braced himself and hurled his stone. The rock glanced off the windsinger’s shoulder and tumbled away. Magnus dropped in midstride, tumbling head over heels for the length of a dozen strides. He finally came to a rest flat on his back, with his head toward his attacker.

Rkard almost forgot himself and cried out, but at the last moment managed to choke his scream into a strangled croak, “Magnus!”

The windsinger lay motionless for a moment, and Rkard worried that the stone had killed him. Then Magnus raised his head and, with a great deal of effort, pushed himself into a sitting position. The arm that had been hit by the boulder hung limply at his side, and he hardly seemed conscious of the giant’s heavy footsteps behind him.

“Get up, Magnus,” Rkard whispered. He knew Magnus could sometimes hear messages carried on the wind. Since a gentle breeze was blowing down the butte, the boy hoped his words would reach the windsinger’s funny-looking ears. “The giant’s coming.”

Magnus continued to sit motionless, and the titan stopped behind him. Rkard touched his fingers to the crimson sun on his forehead and felt a warm, tingly sensation running through his arm. Most people assumed the red disk to be a tattoo, but it was actually the sun-mark, a birthmark that served as his mystical connection to the sun during times of darkness.

The windsinger suddenly pricked up his big ears and glanced toward the butte. He shook his head and rolled over onto his hands and knees. Rkard breathed a sigh of relief, thankful the windsinger had spared him the necessity of deciding whether or not to cast his spell. After Jo’orsh and Sa’ram had appeared to him, his father had told him that he must never risk his life, not even if it meant saving the entire militia-or his own parents. His father had said more than a few lives depended on his destiny, and that if he got himself killed, everyone on Athas would die with him.

Rkard didn’t like what his father had said. And he thought his mother probably didn’t either, though she had not told him as much. After that nasty head-Wyan-had arrived with the Asticles signet, and everyone had decided that it was time to kill the Dragon, she had told him to think about his decisions very carefully. She had said he should never do anything dangerous unless he had a good chance of succeeding, and even then he had to think of a way to escape first.

In the valley below, the giant kicked his foot into Magnus’s ribs. The windsinger arced out over the valley, crashing into a jumble of sharp stones thirty paces away. The impact would have killed a human, and probably even a mul, but not Magnus. He just rolled across the rocky ground and tried to pick himself up again.

This time, he did not succeed.

The giant grabbed a pointed stone as large as a kank. Rkard could not decide what to do. Neither of his parents would want him to cast his spell now. The worst thing he could do to the titan was blind him for a few moments, and then the brute would probably come to hunt him and Sadira down. But the thought of standing by while the giant smashed Magnus gave the boy a sick feeling in his stomach.

The titan stepped toward Magnus.

Rkard slipped behind his boulder and looked down at Sadira. The sorceress lay motionless on the ground, her amber hair glowing softly in the moonlight, and her almond-shaped eyes closed tight. Her chest heaved as though she were sobbing, and the way her fingers fluttered reminded the boy of how they moved when she cast a spell.

Rkard kneeled at her side and shook her shoulder. “The giant’s going to kill Magnus,” he said. “Wake up!”

The sorceress’s chest continued to heave, and she showed no sign of stirring.

“What should I do?” he asked.

Sadira’s head rolled to one side, but she did not answer.

“Okay, I’ll decide myself,” the boy answered. “What would Rikus do?”

Rkard knew instantly that his hero would not stand by while a giant killed a friend. Rikus would do whatever he could, even if it meant he might die himself. That was why everybody liked him so much.

The young mul stepped past Sadira and clambered to the top of the boulder. The giant was standing over Magnus, just raising the stone to slay the unconscious windsinger.

“Hey, ugly!” he yelled.

The breeze carried Rkard’s voice across the valley as though the boy were a giant himself, bouncing it off the rocky scarps on the other side. The titan pulled the heavy stone back to his chest and looked toward the echo first.

“Who’s that?” he called, searching the barren slopes at the base of the Ringing Mountains.

“Over here on the butte, you dumb hairy giant!” Rkard yelled.

As he spoke, the young mul pressed his fingers to his sun-mark. Again, he felt a warm tingle descending through his arm. Had it been daylight, he would have pointed his hand toward the crimson sun instead of touching it to his forehead. The feeling in his arm would have been excruciatingly hot rather than merely warm, but he was far from glad to avoid that pain. His spell would have been much stronger during the day, perhaps strong enough to do more than merely distract the giant.

After searching the slope of the butte for a few moments, the giant’s dark eyes finally settled on Rkard’s small form. “I’m not as dumb as you,” he said, squinting at the boy. “I know better than to make fun of-”

Rkard pointed his hand at the giant’s face and spoke a mystic syllable.

A crimson ball formed around the giant’s head. The titan screamed and dropped his stone, almost crushing his own foot. He raised his hands to his face and began stumbling about, screeching as though his flesh were melting.

Rkard knew that the giant’s reaction was more fear than pain. While the crimson sphere might look fiery and even feel hot for a brief moment, it was far from a searing ball of flame. The spell consisted entirely of red light, shaped into a bright orb with flickering tails that looked like fire. His father had taught it to him so he could honor the sun on days when blowing sand obscured the real thing, and because it served as a good distress signal.

Anticipating the giant’s reaction when he realized the true nature of the spell, Rkard jumped off his boulder and threw Sadira’s limp body over his shoulders. Though the sorceress was much larger than he was, he had no trouble carrying her up the steep slope. As a young mul, he was already as strong as most humans. Besides, she did not weigh much more than the huge water pails his mother made him fetch from the village well every day.

By the time the young mul was halfway up the butte, the giant’s screams had ceased. Rkard paused to look back and saw his spell rising over the valley, casting an eerie orange glow onto the rocky ground. Once it was high enough, the sphere would stop and hang motionless in the sky, just like a miniature sun.

Now that his head was no longer engulfed in the bright light, the giant had begun to stumble toward the butte. He was rubbing his eyes with one hand and holding the other out before him. The titan had left Magnus where he had fallen, motionless but out of danger for now.

“Papa’s going to be angry when he sees this,” Rkard said, continuing his climb.

The boy did not even consider trying to deceive his father, for he had grown up with the certain knowledge that the sun would always bring the truth to light.

As Rkard reached the summit of the bluff, he heard stones clattering below as the giant clambered up the base. The young mul slipped behind the crest of the butte and onto a narrow ledge that overlooked the road to Tyr’s iron mine.

“Come back, you little varl!” thundered the giant. “Don’t hide-it’ll only make me madder!”

Rkard pushed Sadira into the deep crevice that he had selected earlier as a good hiding place, then quickly stacked boulders over the entrance to conceal it. By the time he finished, the giant was so close that his heavy steps were shaking rocks off the ridge overhead. Knowing that the angry titan could easily tear the top of the butte apart, the boy decided to lure his pursuer away from Sadira. He rushed along the ledge until it ended, then scrambled up a rift and onto the top of the butte.

Rkard found himself standing at the giant’s feet. Wishing that he were strong enough to cast more than one spell a day, he swallowed and drew his weapon. The glow of his sun-spell sent glimmers of red light twinkling along the edge of his sword’s obsidian blade.

“What are you going to do with that thorn?” demanded the giant. “Stick me in the toe when I step on you?”

Rkard stepped forward, raising his weapon. He focused all his attention on keeping his blade from shaking and craned his neck upward to meet the giant’s gaze. His mother had always told him that a show of confidence would do more than ten blows to defeat a powerful enemy, and if ever there had been a time he hoped she was right, it was now.

“Leave me alone-and Magnus, too,” Rkard said, imagining that it was Rikus and not himself speaking. Without taking his eyes off the giant, he pointed his sword toward the edge of the cliff. “Go away, or I’ll cut off your foot and push you over the cliff.”

The giant’s big belly shook with laughter-until he looked toward the edge of the cliff, where Rkard was pointing. Then the titan’s huge mouth fell open and his eyes widened in surprise.

“You?” the brute gasped.

“Yes, me,” Rkard replied. He stepped forward and poked the giant’s yellow-nailed toe with his sword.

“Now, listen,” the boy ordered. “What you want isn’t in Tyr-and even if it was, you couldn’t have it.” Rkard pointed his sword down the hill, then added, “Now go home and tell all the other giants what I said.”

The giant looked toward the cliff edge again, then licked his lips as if uncertain of what to do. “I can’t go back without the Oracle,” he said, his tone more pleading than insistent. “We need its magic to make us smart again! Patch is the smartest one of us left, and he’s getting dumber all the time!”

Rkard considered this. Even at his young age, he understood that without a smart leader, any community would collapse into disorder. “Maybe you can have the Dark Lens back after we’re through with it,” the boy suggested.

Some of the tension drained from the giant’s huge face, and he looked directly at Rkard again. “How long will you keep our Oracle?”

The boy paused before answering. In his short life, the only journey he had ever made was from Kled to Tyr, and he could not imagine how much farther away the village of Samarah must be. “We’ll be gone a long time-a hundred years,” he answered. Having lived all his life among dwarves, who commonly lived three times that long, the guess did not seem unreasonable to the young mul. “Maybe even longer.”

The giant shook his head stubbornly. “No! We’ll be dumber than kanks by then!”

Rkard raised his sword, expecting the brute to stomp him, and tried to look confident. The attack never came. Instead, a deep voice behind him said, “Then you will learn to live like kanks!”

Rkard spun around and found two giant-sized heads peering over the top of the cliff-though it may have been an exaggeration to call them heads. One had a hideous, misshapen skull with a sloped brow and gnarled cheekbones, while the other one’s neck ended in a knobby stump just above the shoulders. Regardless of whether they had skulls or not, pairs of orange embers burned where their eyes should have been, and coarse masses of tangled beard dangled from where their chins had once hung.

Though Rkard could not see the bodies hidden beneath the cliff edge, he knew they were little more than huge skeletal lumps, warped into shapes scarcely recognizable as manlike. The legs were gnarled masses with knotted balls for feet, and the thighs, knees, and calves were all curled together.

“Jo’orsh! Sa’ram!” Rkard gasped. They were the last dwarven knights, who had become banshees after they had disavowed their life focus and had died without killing Borys. The young mul had not seen the pair since they had returned his namesake’s belt and crown to him, then told him that he would slay the Dragon. “You’ve come back!”

“We never left,” said the one with the lumpy skull, Jo’orsh.

The other banshee focused his floating eyes on the giant. We have let you giants use the Dark Lens for too long. Rkard heard the words inside his head, as if a mindbender were speaking them. You have all grown weak and foolish. It is time you learned to live without it.

The giant gasped, and a rancid-smelling wind washed over Rkard. “We can’t!” the brute cried.

“You can and you must,” retorted Jo’orsh.

Do as the boy commanded, added Sa’ram. Return to Mytilene and tell the others to think of the Dark Lens no more. We have taken it back, and you must learn to live without it-or perish.

Rkard looked back up at the giant. The brute had a stunned and dismal expression on his face, as if he had just been cast out of his home village.

“And know for every giant your tribe sends to seek the Lens, the tribe shall suffer a century of barbarism,” said Jo’orsh. “Now go!”

The banshee’s voice broke over the giant like a thunderclap, sending him stumbling down the hill backward. He took five huge steps before he turned around and scurried into the valley, giving Magnus a wide berth.

Once the giant was gone, Rkard’s arms and legs started to tremble. He tried to sheathe his sword, discovered he couldn’t hold it steady enough, and gave up.

“Thanks for saving me.” He could not bring himself to face the banshees again, not when he felt so frightened and foolish. “Are you as angry as my father will be?”

Why should we be angry-or your father, for that matter? Sa’ram asked.

“Because I disobeyed him.” Rkard kept his eyes fixed on the ground. “I nearly got killed.”

“You saved a friend,” countered Jo’orsh. “That was very brave, and your father won’t punish you for it.”

Rkard shook his head. “I took a foolish chance,” he said. “And when I did that, I risked all of Athas.”

Before you can save Athas, you will have to risk it, said Sa’ram. You mustn’t be afraid to do that-just as you weren’t afraid to endanger yourself to save your friend.

Rkard frowned. “But I didn’t save Magnus.” He looked up at the banshees. “You did.”

Jo’orsh shook his head. “All we did was stand behind you.”

Yes, added Sa’ram. Just as your friends and your parents will stand behind you when you attack Borys.