The Obsidian Oracle

TWELVE THE FIRST GIANTS

A jagged boulder sailed over the wall, smashing the chitinous plate between the sparkling, many-faceted eyes of a mantis-headed warrior. The giant bellowed and raised his hands to the wound, stumbling backward until he tumbled off the ramparts and crashed headfirst atop a rock pile. The Saram’s neck snapped with a loud crack, then his enormous body rolled onto a pair of boys who had been passing stones up to their elders.

The death went almost unnoticed amidst the chaos of the battle. All along the wall, Saram tribesmen stood silhouetted against the yellow sky of dawn, hurling stones and insults at the enemies surrounding Castle Feral. The Joorsh were responding with a barrage of their own. From every corner echoed the sound of boulders shattering against the ramparts, a steady cadence of resonant booms that rumbled through the citadel like an exploding volcano.

Along with Sacha and Wyan, Tithian watched the fighting from the relative safety of the citadel floor, where they were moving across a small stretch of open ground in the company of a dozen terrified goats. Although far from giant-sized, the beasts were huge for their species, and the king needed to stoop just a little so that his head would not protrude above their shoulders. Hundreds of such creatures-sheep, goats, even erdlus and kanks-had broken free of their pens with the thunder of the first Joorsh volley. For the last quarter hour, they had been charging around the castle floor in panicked herds, turning the whole granite plane into a maelstrom of hoofed mayhem.

The domestic animals were not the only source of confusion. The Castoffs had spread throughout the castle and were flitting from one beasthead to another, searching for the bodies to which their heads had once been attached. Whenever they paused for more than a moment near a Saram, the warrior turned away and fled, crying for Bawan Nal, who was nowhere in sight, to save them.

A few spirits had apparently located the correct bodies. Their ethereal visages adhered to the Sarams’ beastly faces like masks, causing the victims unbearable pain. In one place, a stone-hurler had forsaken his duties to bang his reptilian head against the wall. Another warrior stood over a cart of spilled boulders, screaming in agony as she plucked the feathers from her ternlike face.

As the bird-headed woman tore at her avian features, a small boulder came soaring high overhead. It did not drop until it was well inside the citadel walls, falling just a short distance ahead of Tithian’s herd. The projectile shattered instantly, filling the air with mordant-smelling rock dust and blasting the herd with pieces of rock. Bleating madly, the goats reversed direction and fled, nearly bowling Tithian over in their terror. When they were gone, the king and his disembodied companions found themselves alone, a hundred yards of open granite between them and the silvery enclosure they had been trying to reach.

Two dozen burly, vicious-looking Saram came rushing from the compound’s gate. All had the heads of fanged and venomous beasts: vipers, spiders, and centipedes of all kinds. One of the giants even had the bony skull of a death’s head bat, while the distinctive fangs of a needle-toothed shrew protruded from the narrow snout of another. In their hands, the warriors carried steel-tipped lances as tall as trees, while their bodies were covered by plates of mekillot-shell armor.

The king turned and sprinted after the goats.

“Are you ready, Fylo?” Agis asked, peering down the sparkling shaft.

The giant still lay with the crystal jutting up through his shoulder, blood oozing from the wound and dripping steadily into the abyss. Although his eyes were only half-open, they were attentive and turned in the noble’s direction. In his good hand, he held the end of a rope stretched taut between himself and Kester.

Agis had used a dagger from the tarek’s chest harness to cut the length of cord off the rope Kester had draped through the crack before dying. Given the effort it had required to saw through the sturdy giant-hair fibers, he felt certain that the giant could pull as hard as he wanted without breaking the line.

“Fylo ready,” the giant reported, his voice a strained croak.

“Then pull!”

The giant gave the line a hard tug. Kester’s body remained stuck for a moment, then abruptly popped out of the crack and dropped limply into the abyss. After a long fall, it landed in the half-breed’s lap, causing his body to jerk from the impact. Even at the top of the shaft, Agis heard the eerie sound of shoulder bone grinding against quartz crystal, and a deep groan of agony rumbled from between the giant’s clenched teeth.

The sound had not even died away before Fylo pointed at the pit cover. “Go. Catch traitor Tithian.”

Agis nodded, knowing that without help, he could not pull the heavy giant free of the crystal. “I’ll be back when I find some way to get you out,” Agis said, climbing into the star-shaped crack. “I won’t leave you here.”

The giant nodded. “Fylo know.”

“You’re a brave friend,” Agis said. He pulled himself up into the yellow light of dawn.

The noble’s chest had barely risen out of the cracked lid before he felt himself being pinched between an immense thumb and forefinger. He was plucked out of the hole, then lifted high into the air.

“How fortunate we were to arrive just as you were leaving,” hissed a sibilant voice.

Agis’s captor turned him around, and the noble found himself staring at the face of a Saram giant. The warrior had enormous fur-covered ears, wrinkled nostrils, and huge scarlet eyes set into the gnarled, fleshless skull of a death’s head bat.

“Take me to Bawan Nal,” Agis said, noticing that another two dozen beastheads stood behind his captor. Most seemed to have the heads of serpents, spiders, and insects. “It’s important that I speak to him at once!”

This drew a malevolent chuckle from the entire company.

“Bawan Nal also thinks it important to speak with you,” the warrior replied. “It’s not often that he calls the Poison Pack away from its duties in the Mica Yard.”

The tip of the forked wand glowed yellow and bowed downward ever so slightly, pointing toward the center of the enclosure, where a single Saram giant guarded the entrance to a subterranean passage. Armed with a bone battle-axe as tall as a faro tree, the sentry had a hairless head more or less conical in shape, with beady eyes and small, peaked ears. His pointed muzzle ended in a pair of flaring nostrils, with a pair of venom-dripping tusks hanging from beneath his upper lips. He hardly seemed able to contain himself as he bustled to and fro, swinging his axe in great, exuberant arcs and testing the cool breeze for the scent of intruders.

Tithian allowed himself to peer at the giant for only an instant, then backed away from the corner, fearing the guard would be alerted to his presence by the awful stench of goat offal clinging to his clothes. The king moved a short distance down the enclosure wall, a huge sheet of silvery mica that sprang directly out of the bedrock, then returned his divining wand to his shoulder satchel.

“The lens is in there-and they left only one sentry to guard it,” he announced, pulling a tiny crossbow and a quiver of a dozen dartlike quarrels from his pouch. “This is going to be too easy. I had expected ten times that number.”

“You’re overconfident,” said Sacha, hovering close to his ear. “So far, you’ve inspired me with nothing but doubt.”

“Only a fool could have believed that pack of giants was chasing us,” agreed Wyan. “You jumped into a dung-filled pothole for nothing.”

“If I’m such a fool, how come you two were hiding there when I arrived?” Tithian countered, fitting a tiny quarrel into its slot on the crossbow.

That done, the king turned his free palm toward the ground, preparing to cast a magical spell. The energy came to him slowly, and all from the direction of the citadel’s gate, for he had to draw it all from the isle of Lybdos itself. If any plants had ever grown on the peninsula’s barren granite, they had long since been devoured by the domestic flocks of the Saram. Finally, Tithian had enough energy to use his magic. He started toward the enclosure entrance, hunched over and moving slowly.

He had taken no more than three steps when the muffled clatter of a ballista echoed over the walls on the far side of the castle. A pained roar followed, and

Tithian looked toward the gate. He saw a lion-headed giant fall from the wall, clutching at a long harpoon piercing his chest. The king smiled, for the sight suggested Mag’r had not yet sunk the Shadow Viper, and that could simplify matters greatly when the time came to escape.

Returning his attention to the task at hand, Tithian shuffled forward and stepped around the jagged corner of the mica wall. He held his hands in front of his stomach, folded over each other and with the crossbow concealed beneath them.

The sentry’s nostrils sniffed at the breeze, and he squinted in the king’s direction. “You’re a funny-looking goat,” he said. He started forward, adding, “Don’t run. It’ll only make me mad.”

“Don’t worry,” Tithian snickered. “The last thing I have in mind is running.”

Gnashing his tusks together, the sentry hefted his axe and charged. Tithian waited a moment for the guard to build momentum, then raised his crossbow and fingered the trigger, speaking his incantation at the same time. The bowstring clicked softly, launching the tiny bolt at the giant. As soon as the needle cleared the groove, it began to sputter and hiss, spewing blue sparks from its tail.

As the needle streaked away, the giant came into range for his own attack, leveling his axe at the king’s head. Tithian threw himself down, and the blade clattered against the granite bedrock at the king’s side, so close that the impact sprayed his face with hot shards of chipped blade. In the same instant, the tiny quarrel pierced its target’s chest.

The sentry slapped at the puncture as though stung by an insect. Then, absentmindedly scratching at the wound, he sneered at the king’s prone form. “It’ll take more than a blue flash to kill Mal.”

A wisp of grayish smoke shot from the tiny wound, then Mal’s rib cage gave a great heave. A muted discharge sounded inside his chest. His beady eyes bulged in surprise, and a horrid gurgle, half growl and half groan, rasped from his throat. The axe slipped from his grasp, his knees already buckling.

Tithian rolled. He heard the crash of the bone axe handle striking the granite floor, then saw the dark shadow of an axe head spreading outward around his body. The flat of the blade fell squarely on him, sounding a sharp crack inside his skull. An instant later, the sentry’s lifeless corpse fell on top of the axe, and the king’s body erupted into agony.

The ground began to spin, and a terrible ache throbbed from his skull clear down to his legs. It hurt to breathe, and he felt his mind drifting off into the gray arena of nothingness. With a start, the king realized he was falling unconscious, allowing his mind to retreat from the fiery pain flaring inside his head. He could not allow that, for to sleep now would be to die. Worse, it would be to fail, with the Oracle all but in his grasp.

“Stand, you miserable cur!” yelled Sacha.

“Die now, and the Shadow People shall have your spirit as their slave-until Rajaat is free!” threatened Wyan.

Tithian seized on their angry words, visualizing his fingers closing around a burning rope. He began pulling hand over hand, hauling himself out of the darkness, into the blinding light and searing agony that was his body. Within moments, he was once again fully possessed by his pain.

For a moment, Tithian tried to accept his physical anguish, to let it wash over his body like a searing wind, uncomfortable, but sufferable for short periods of time. It was no use. He had never been good at enduring pain, and he was no better at it now. If he was to survive this, he would have to rely on an old trick, one that he had found useful since his adolescence.

Marshaling his spiritual energy, the king used the Way to form an image of his friend Agis. His own pain he viewed as a bottomless vial of syrupy brown poison, and this he tipped toward the noble’s open mouth. Tithian felt better immediately. He could still feel the agony of the giant’s crushing weight, but it went straight into the brown vial, and from there down Agis’s throat. The king’s ribs still ached, and his head still throbbed, but no longer was the pain overwhelming.

Slowly, the king dragged himself from beneath the axe blade’s crushing weight, then rose and stood at the dead giant’s side.

“You’re looking better,” observed Sacha. “More fit to be one of Rajaat’s servants.”

“What happened?” inquired Wyan.

“Agis is bearing my pain for me,” Tithian replied. “Remind me to reward him when we return from freeing Rajaat.”

“He’ll never survive that long,” replied Sacha. “Our task will take months.”

“Agis will find a way,” the king said absently, studying the interior of the enclosure.

It was roughly rectangular in shape, surrounded by ragged slabs of mica that rose from the granite bedrock like a tall, silvery hedge. In the center of the enclosure, a pearly film shimmered over the entrance to a dark tunnel, just large enough for a Saram giant-or a small Joorsh-to crawl through. The passage tilted to one side, so that anyone passing down it would be forced to lean sharply to the right.

Tithian started toward the tunnel, saying, “Besides, it hardly matters if Agis isn’t alive when we return. If he’s not, I’ll just raise him from the dead.” When neither of the heads said anything in reply, Tithian asked, “Rajaat will grant me such powers, won’t he?”

“Rajaat can bestow you with magic,” replied Wyan. “What you learn to do with it is not for him to determine.”

Tithian reached the passage and stopped. The tunnel entrance was covered by a single flake of mica, as thin as paper and as clear as glass. Behind it, the hole descended into the bedrock at a steep slope, lined on both sides by smooth walls of the mineral. The floor and ceiling looked like the torn edges of a book, showing the ends of hundreds of closely-pressed mica sheets.

“What are you waiting for?” snapped Sacha. “Go get it!”

The king opened his satchel and removed a black belt, so wide it was almost a girdle. The buckle was hidden by a starburst of red flames, with the skull of a fierce half-man in the center. As Tithian laid the belt over his arm, the stiff leather crackled like breaking fingers.

“That’s the dwarven Belt of Rank!” gasped Wyan.

Tithian nodded. “A little token for the ghosts of Sa’ram and Jo’orsh,” he replied. “You remember those slavers Agis is so mad about?”

“The ones that mistakenly raided Kled,” confirmed Wyan.

“Yes, except it was no mistake-and they weren’t after slaves,” said the king, smiling.

With that, he pressed his fingers against the shimmering mica. He felt a brief burning sensation as they sank through, then he was looking at his hand through the silvery sheet. The membrane reminded him of the lid that covered the pit where he had left Agis. Remembering how difficult it had been to get out of there, he hesitated before stepping through.

“You two wait here,” Tithian said to the heads. “I may need you to help me get back through this.”

“I’ll come with you,” said Wyan. “Sacha can wait here.”

Tithian considered this for a moment, then shook his head. “Have you forgotten that I found the lens by locating the undead spirits of Jo’orsh and Sa’ram?” Tithian asked. “I’m more certain of finding them down there than the Dark Lens. It wouldn’t do to have them recognize you from the days of Rajaat.”

“As you wish,” replied Wyan. “But if you fail-”

“You won’t do anything to me that will be worse than what Sa’ram and Jo’orsh do,” Tithian replied.

The king stepped through the mica, then looked back toward Sacha and Wyan. The two heads continued to hover outside the entrance, watching him with suspicious frowns.

“Hide yourselves!” Tithian ordered. “I don’t want you here when I send Jo’orsh and Sa’ram out!”

The pair narrowed their eyes and began to drift away. “We’ll be watching!” warned Sacha.

The king shuffled down the slanted tunnel. Each time he touched the mica’s slick surface, a feverish tingle buzzed through his fingers. The air felt sweltering and still, heavy with the stale smell of dankness. There was no sound, save for the whisper of Tithian’s breath hissing past his lips, and the soft crunch of his boots on the floor. As he advanced down the corridor, the color of the walls changed from silver to lavender, then to green, brown, and finally, when he had gone so deep that the entrance was only a point of light far behind, the tunnel became jet black.

Soon it grew too dark to see what lay ahead, and Tithian stopped to prepare a light spell. When he opened his palm to summon the energy he needed, his whole arm began to tingle with the same burning sensation that he felt whenever he touched his fingers to the walls. Before he could close his fist to cut off the flow, the strange force rushed into his body of its own accord, as if it were being driven into him by some external pressure.

Hissing in pain, Tithian opened his palm and tried to expel the searing energy. Nothing happened, save that the smell of his own scorched flesh rose to his nostrils. Fearing he would burst into flames, the king fished a wad of glowing moss from his satchel and cast his spell.

A blinding flash filled the passage. The fiery tingle inside Tithian’s body faded as his spell consumed the energy that had pervaded his form. The rancid stench of burning flesh did not fade, however, nor did the scalding feeling inside his body. The king found himself sucking his breath through clenched teeth, and the vial inside his mind was overflowing with the brown syrup of pain.

To his dismay, the spell did not work quite as he had planned, either. Instead of the soft crimson glow he had expected, the corridor was filled with hundreds of globes of scarlet light, erupting into existence one moment, then, an instant later, expiring in a maroon burst.

It took Tithian’s eyes a few moments to adjust to the strange illumination. When they did, he almost wished that he were still blind.

Crawling up the corridor were two skeletal lumps, about the size of Saram giants and warped into shapes scarcely recognizable as manlike. Their legs were gnarled masses, with knotted balls for feet, while the thighs, knees, and calves were all curled together in a single coil. Long, twisted shards of bone jutted out from their shoulders, lacking any sign of elbows, wrists, or hands. One figure had fused ribs and a hunched back, with a slope-browed skull sitting on his squat neck. The other’s torso was more normal, except that his neck ended in a knobby stump with no head at all.

Regardless of whether or not they had skulls, a pair of orange embers burned where their eyes should have been. Where the chins had once been, coarse masses of gray beard dangled in the air, unattached to any form of flesh or bone.

Tithian took an involuntary step backward. His research had revealed to him how to find Jo’orsh and Sa’ram, what he needed to make them listen to him, even how to force them to forsake the lens-but it had not prepared the king for the horrors he saw before him.

Nevertheless, he gulped down his fear, then demanded, “Are you Jo’orsh and Sa’ram, the last knights of Kemalok?”

Tithian asked not because he doubted their names, but because he wanted to remind the spirits of who they had once been. The king had learned that after dying, a dwarf who violated his life’s focus slowly forgot his identity, over the centuries becoming an unthinking monster. Such oblivion, it seemed, was the only way for him to escape the terrible pain of betraying the very essence of his own being. For Tithian’s plan to work, Jo’orsh and Sa’ram could not be allowed that small comfort. They had to be reminded of who they were.

The spirits showed no sign of recognizing their names. Instead, they continued to shuffle forward, stopping less than two paces away. They remained motionless for a moment, then voiced two deafening wails that sent pangs of fire shooting through Tithian’s head. A scorching gale blasted over his face, searing away the top layer of his skin and leaving what had been underneath cracked and wrinkled. He opened his mouth to scream, and a fiery draught filled his lungs. The inferno of pain quickly spread through the rest of his body, charring his bones and searing his flesh, until even his joints erupted into unbearable anguish, burning away the few vestiges of youth that remained to the king. He focused his thoughts on the vial inside his mind, trying to enlarge it so that he could pass more of this new pain on to Agis.

The vial shattered, spilling its contents back into Tithian’s body. His mind was filled with a churning torrent of misery. Agis’s face disappeared in the flood, leaving the king feeling feverish, weak, and scorched.

Tithian dropped to his knees and brought his satchel around in front of him. The hand he thrust into the pouch was that of an old man, gaunt and flecked with liver spots, flesh hanging off the wrist in pallid folds and the joints swollen with infirmity. The king gasped, and though he could not hear it above the keening of the spirits, the voice that rattled in his throat felt coarse and feeble.

Still, the gruesome pair did not end their wails, and Tithian sensed that he was growing older by the instant. He pulled an owl’s feather from his satchel, then turned his palm toward the ground. Again, the energy that rushed into his body caused him great pain. He could feel it literally broiling his flesh from the inside out, but that hardly seemed noticeable compared to the agony being inflicted on him by the two spirits.

Tithian tossed the feather into the air and croaked his incantation, using his tongue to feel his way through the syllables. Again, the spell did not work quite as he had expected. Instead of imposing an absolute silence over the area, it muffled the keening, so that the terrible sound seemed to echo from the far end of a long canyon.

The searing agony slowly faded, leaving a thousand minor pains in its place. Every joint throbbed with a feverish ache, his stomach churned as though he had eaten a meal of brimstone, and his ears rang with a terrible chime that would not die away. Nevertheless, Tithian knew that he had, for now, survived the ill effects of the keening.

The king pushed himself to his feet and stood before the two spirits, his head swimming from the effort. Doing his best not to tremble and not to cower when he met their fiery gazes, he demanded, “Again, are you the last dwarven knights, Jo’orsh and Sa’ram?”

To the king’s surprise, this time the spirits answered-and they seemed anything but unthinking. “We are not dwarves, human!” thundered the figure with the head. “We are Jo’orsh and Sa’ram, the first giants! We have felt your magic searching for our Oracle, and you shall not have it, thief!”

Tiny red flames sprouted from the stumps of the spirits’ arms. They began to crawl forward, slowly bringing their twisted limbs around to point at his face. Tithian backed away, stumbling and nearly falling when his old man’s legs did not respond as he had expected. He started to reach into his satchel for the components to another spell, then, remembering how the last two spells had seared his flesh, he elected to try something different.

Tithian closed his eyes and visualized himself as a statue, carved from a solid block of granite. As he summoned the spiritual energy to use the Way, the statue’s features changed with no input from him. The gaunt features became haggard and almost skeletal, deep circles appeared beneath his eyes, and his hawkish nose protruded so far that his thin-lipped mouth seemed little more than a shadow. His shoulders hunched over, and his long hair stuck out at all angles.

Although repulsed by the image, Tithian did not bother to change it. The flesh had become stony and resistant to fire, which was what mattered most at the moment. He forced himself to stop retreating, then stood up straight as his two attackers approached.

The bony creatures stopped less than a pace away, pointing their arms straight at Tithian’s chest. The flames at the end of their stumps shot out, washing over the king’s body as had their scorching breaths earlier. The fire had little effect, swirling harmlessly over his breast.

“You may have fathered giants, but you were born dwarves,” Tithian said. He focused his eyes on the embers floating above the necks of the headless spirits, then quoted the first line from the dwarves’ sacred text, the Book of the Kemalok Kings: “ ‘Born of liquid fire and seasoned in bleak darkness, we dwarves are the sturdy people, the people of the rock.…’ ”

While he spoke, the king formed the ludicrous image of a bearded, hairy dwarf, as he understood that the ancient dwarves were portrayed in their portraits. He used the Way to project this construct toward the burning embers of the headless bone creature. He was not making a mental attack so much as simply hoping to contact whatever passed for the thing’s mind.

He continued to recite: “ ‘It is into our bones that the mountains sink their roots. It is from our hearts that the clear waters pour. It is out of our mouths that the cool winds blow. We were made to buttress the world, to support the cities of the green races, to carry the weight of the verdant fields upon our shoulders.’ ”

Tithian’s dwarf construct passed into what remained of the spirit’s intellect, and the king was suddenly blinded by a brilliant crimson glow. The ground vanished from beneath his feet, sending him tumbling head over heels into the red radiance.

The king visualized a pair of wings sprouting from the dwarf’s back, trying to bring the descent under control. He had a queasy feeling in his stomach as a surge of energy rose from deep within his aged body, and the appendages appeared on the back of his mental construct. Wisps of smoke began to rise from the wings almost instantly, then they burst into flame.

Hoping to reach the spirit’s memory before his construct went the way of his wings, Tithian had it repeat the opening lines from the Book of the Kemalok Kings: “ ‘Born of liquid fire and seasoned in bleak darkness, we dwarves are the sturdy people, the people of the rock. It is into our bones that the mountains sink their roots. It is from our hearts that the clear waters pour.…’ ”

The dark circle of a cave’s mouth appeared in the crimson glow, directly in front of Tithian’s construct. As the imaginary dwarf continued to fall, the black disk grew larger and larger. Soon, it replaced the crimson fire altogether, and the king’s construct was lost in the darkness. Somewhere in the blackness, a stream of water trickled into a still pond, and Tithian smelled a sweet odor of dampness. On his skin he felt a cool breeze, carrying on its breath the promise of shelter and safety.

It was then that Tithian noticed that the spirits had stopped attacking his physical body. They now stood to each side of him, their mangled arms lowered and no longer spouting flame. The orange embers had been replaced by the glowing effigy of true eyes, with bushy eyebrows, long gray lashes, and a calm serenity that bespoke of ancient wisdom and integrity of character.

Inside the mind of the headless spirit, a pair of flickering brands appeared in front of Tithian’s construct, lighting the darkness for him. To the king’s surprise, he discovered that his dwarf was not standing in a simple cave passage, but in a vast subterranean courtyard. Directly ahead lay the arched entrance to a magnificent tower, flanked on each side by a sconce holding one of the torches that lit the area. The keep rose high overhead, its roof joining directly into the ceiling of the cavernous chamber in which it had been built.

Tithian took his construct past the bronze-gilded doors and entered the keep. He found himself standing in a dimly lit foyer. To one side of the entrance sat a low stone bench, sized for the short legs of dwarves. On the other side was a higher bench, appropriate to the longer legs of humans. Another door opened on the opposite side, and above this arch hung a pair of crossed battle-axes, ready to fall on the neck of anyone who passed through that portal without permission.

A pair of dwarves stepped through the inner door. Both were dressed in gleaming suits of steel plate, embossed with simple geometric patterns and trimmed in gold. One of the figures carried his helmet beneath his arm. Still, all that could be seen of his visage were a pair of steady brown eyes and his proud hooked nose, for his long hair and bushy beard formed a mane that hid everything else from view. The second dwarf wore his helmet with the visor down, leaving nothing but a pair of green eyes and the tufts of his long beard exposed to view.

“Why have you called us back to the caves of our ancestors?” demanded the helmeted figure. “Why have you come to us speaking of the roots of mountains, of clear waters and cool winds-of the people of fire and darkness?”

“The time has come for you to rejoin your king, Sa’ram,” Tithian replied, reasoning that the dwarf who refused to show his head would be the ancestor of the beasthead giants.

The dwarf showed no reaction to the mention of his name, but said, “That is not possible. We have a duty to perform to our descendants.”

“You have a duty to perform to your king!” Tithian said sharply. “Rkard has summoned you, and you must obey.”

“Rkard is dead,” replied Sa’ram, angry orange embers beginning to glow behind his visor. “He has been dead these many centuries.”

“Rkard has been reborn, and I have come to summon you back to his service,” the king said. If the spirits discovered his lie, Tithian had no doubt that he would suffer a terrible and lingering death. But he had no intention of letting them find him out. He had come prepared to corroborate his story, or he would never have made such an outrageous claim. “My body holds in its hands the symbols to prove that I speak the truth.”

Tithian found his construct ejected from the spirit’s mind. Once again, he was standing in the sweltering mica tunnel, flanked on either side by a giant-sized lump of fused bone that had once been a dwarf.

These symbols-show them to us, ordered Sa’ram. Lacking a mouth, or even a head to put it in, he used the Way to send his message.

Tithian held out the Belt of Rank, draping it over Sa’ram’s fleshless arm.

“That is the Goblin’s Head,” objected Jo’orsh. His eyes also began to glow orange. “It is the crest of the dwarven general, not the king.”

“Were they not one and the same when Kemalok fell?” Tithian countered. Judging by the orange color returning to their eyes, his plan was not working quite as well as he had hoped. He plunged his hand into his shoulder satchel, then said, “Nevertheless, I feared that one symbol would not be enough. That’s why I brought this as well.”

Tithian pulled a jewel-studded crown of white metal from his satchel, then slipped it over the stump of Jo’orsh’s arm.

“Rkard’s crown,” confirmed the spirit. He sounded strangely disappointed, and the orange glow faded from both his eyes and those of Sa’ram. “What does he wish of us?”

“Return to Kemalok,” Tithian replied, breathing a secret sigh of relief. “There you’ll find a young dwarf-human crossbreed with crimson eyes. He is the vessel in which Rkard has chosen to reincarnate himself. You must guard this child from harm, for it is his destiny to unite the armies of men and dwarves under the Tower of Buryn’s banner.”

Despite what he said, Tithian had no knowledge that Rkard had been reincarnated in any child. Instead, the king had fashioned the lie after several painstaking months researching archaic dwarven legends and interrogating his disembodied tutors. He had based his final story on the ancient dwarven belief that the kings of Kemalok would always rise to answer their city’s call for protection. Since he knew that Rkard had, in fact, recently risen to protect the city, Tithian felt confident that Sa’ram and Jo’orsh would not have too much trouble accepting his fabrication.

For several moments, the two spirits stared silently at each other. Finally, Jo’orsh shook his head. “We cannot answer our king’s call,” he said. “Our duty to guard the Oracle-”

“Is not as great as your duty to your king,” Tithian said, watching the pair carefully. After judging that the spirits had accepted him as a true messenger of Rkard, he added, “Nor is it as great as your duty to uphold the oath you swore to kill Borys.”

Sa’ram’s eyes flashed. We cannot keep that oath.

“Not directly, but the time will soon be at hand-when Rkard is old enough to assemble the armies of men and dwarves,” Tithian said. “The weapons he needs are within his grasp: the Scourge of Rkard, a sorceress with the magic of the Pristine Tower, and, here on Lybdos, the Dark Lens. All you must do is guard the child until he’s old enough to slay the Dragon. I’ll stay with the lens until you return for it.”

“No. We have learned that there are worse evils than Borys,” objected Jo’orsh. “Otherwise, we would not have forsaken our pledge to kill him, nor condemned ourselves to this.” He ran the gnarled stump of an arm down his skeletal body.

If the Dragon dies, Rajaat will be freed, Sa’ram added. He’ll resume his wars on the green races and won’t stop until all of them have perished. We cannot condemn all the races of Athas to death to avenge the dwarves on Borys, or even to spare ourselves an eternity of suffering.

“That’s why we must all do as the king commands. Rkard has returned to defend not only the dwarves of Kemalok, but all the races of Athas as well,” Tithian argued, bringing all his persuasive talents to bear-even though he cared little for the causes he espoused so eloquently. “The Dragon and his champions have turned the land into a wasteland. If we don’t kill Borys, there’ll be nothing left for the dwarves or any other race to inhabit.”

“And what of Rajaat?” demanded Jo’orsh. “It will do no good to kill Borys if Rajaat destroys the world.”

“We’ll find a better way to take care of Rajaat. But even if we cannot, what difference will keeping him locked away make if Borys destroys the world?” Tithian asked. “For too long, we’ve tried to trade one evil for the other. We must eliminate them both, or Athas will perish as surely as if we had let them both roam free.”

His words have the ring of wisdom, Jo’orsh, observed Sa’ram.

“He has never fought Rajaat,” countered Jo’orsh. “He did not see the massacres of the Green Age.”

“But your king did. He’s the one who sent me to take over for you here,” Tithian countered. When the two spirits still seemed unconvinced, he added, “On the way to Kemalok, you’ll see what has become of Athas. After your journey, you won’t think the world is a better place with Borys free.”

“And if we do?” asked Jo’orsh.

“Then all you have to do to save the Dragon is kill one child and return to the Oracle. But I’m sure you’ll see that your king is right, or I would never suggest such a thing to you,” Tithian said. In truth, it did not matter to him whether the spirits protected Neeva’s child or killed the young mul, so long as they left Tithian alone with the Dark Lens. “Now go! You have no choice, for your king has summoned you. You must keep the pledges you made when you were alive!”

He’s right, Jo’orsh, said Sa’ram. We must see what has become of the world. It may be that we’ve done more harm than good.

“And it may be that we’re about to,” Jo’orsh responded. “But we shall see.”

The two spirits started up toward the surface, Sa’ram carrying the belt and Jo’orsh the crown. Tithian watched them for a short time, then started down the tunnel. With the two spirits gone, all that separated him from the lens were a few yards of darkness.