joined their retreating brethren. Darkhorse righted himself and gave chase, furious beyond the point of reason and more than ready to strike a few blows out of pure frustration.
He picked out one of the avians who had formed the circle and was probably one of the rookery elders. Even as he closed in on the creature, an image leaped to life in his head. Shade was in it, a tall and ominous monster whom the Seekers feared even more than they did the stallion. Darkhorse caught hints of a promise made and the results that failure would bring. There were random images of renewed glories and a land that the avians would have ruled again if they had succeeded.
I wonder what his draconian ally would say about such promises, Darkhorse thought as his prey continued its desperate, but seemingly hopeless escape.
The shadow steed slowed abruptly, soon letting the Seekers fly off into the night without further battle. For their failure to the rookery, many of them would pay dearly. For their failure to Shade, who had instigated this entire ploy, those who had sent this flock would also pay dearly-to the warlock himself. Darkhorse could think of no better justice than that. He turned, descending to the ground at the same time.
“Darkhorse!” a familiar and welcome figure cried out. Reforming himself into something more earthbound, the shadow steed touched earth just in front of the lord of the Manor.
“I’m glad you’re safe!” Cabe wrapped his arms briefly around Darkhorse’s neck, something that unnerved the eternal more than a hundred avenging Seekers would have. So open a display of affection for him was a rarity that he could count on one hoof. Several humans and drakes, who talked among one another like old friends, looked at their lord with renewed awe. After a decade they might be used to seeing many startling things, but how often did their great and powerful master greet a demonic horse with a simple hug?
Lady Gwen’s greeting was cordial, but far less affectionate. “You have our gratitude, Darkhorse. When you broke their spell and woke us with your voice, we realized what had happened to us. My only regret is that we could not capture or kill a few more of those arrogant birds! They sometimes make the Dragon Kings seem pleasant in comparison!”
“And make my company acceptable, is that it, Lady Bedlam?”
She grimaced, then nodded her head slowly. “Sometimes, dark one. Sometimes.”
“What happened to you, Cabe Bedlam?”
The young warlock scratched his head. His open honesty was a great contrast to the secrecy and moodiness of Shade. After a moment’s thought, Cabe smiled sourly and replied, “We’ve been living an idyllic life, thanks to the Seekers. They’ve had us taking walk after walk in the garden, playing with the children, relaxing, and,” Cabe glanced at his bride and reddened, “doing whatever else gave us pleasure and took our minds off of the world.”
Darkhorse laughed, but not at that. “What a fool I was! Never did it occur to me that the Seeker I pursued briefly might have some purpose for being so near! Now I see why I failed to find him, too! With my ‘self’ diminished and my impatience guiding me, I never noticed what they were about! They must have freed you briefly and in a subtle manner so that you would not be aware of what games they were playing! Tell me. Do you remember everything?”
Both humans nodded. Gwen added, “I can’t help feeling that Shade had something to do with all of this.”
“He did.” Darkhorse explained what he had picked up from the Seeker’s mind. There were benefits to the avians’ method of communication, but there were disadvantages, too. Seekers, when in dire straits, often emitted their thoughts so powerfully that spellcasters of some ability could pick up the images in their own minds. For Darkhorse, it had been even easier.
“What now?” Cabe wanted to know. “Somehow, I don’t think our original plan holds.”
Darkhorse nodded. “I would say not. If only I knew where Shade was and what he now intends to do! Drayfitt is dead, Cabe, and his final words, if they were not another ploy engineered by the hooded warlock, are a mystery that I must solve before very long! Shade was never one to be inactive!”
“One thing,” Lady Bedlam interrupted, “that we should still do is contact the Green Dragon. He may have some information for us or, at the very least, some suggestion.”
“You do that, then,” her husband suggested. “I want to check the area out. I want to make certain that there are no other surprises.”
“That leaves only myself.”
“What do you plan on doing?” Cabe asked the shadow steed.
“Return to Talak. If I am incorrect, things will be as they were when I-departed. If, however, things have gone the way I think they have,” Darkhorse stared at them and his eyes glittered coldly, “it may already be too late to save the city.”
XVI
Shade stood staring in open contempt at the putrefying column of mixed body parts and dripping ichor that was the guardian of this opening to the realms of the Lords of the Dead. He was not impressed. Not at all.
“Shoddy. I would’ve expected better of your masters. It appears that they, too, have fallen from the ranks of pure Vraad.” He waved his hand and the guardian, with a wailing sound, crumbled into its component parts. “Is that the best you could do?” he called out to the mire-filled pit. The cavern around him echoed his growing annoyance.
Tendrils of thought reached out to him, some contemptuous, some defensive, all of them a bit fearful. What had he accomplished in all his existence? What had he accomplished other than creating an endless game between the opposing poles of his existence?
The warlock smiled coldly. “Too true. That changes now. Your existence changes now. You have a bauble of mine that I require.” Protesting thoughts bombarded him, but he shook them off like droplets of water. “Don’t bandy words with me! Return to me the tripod. Now.”
Open fears now. Fears of control lost and rifts opened.
A sigh. “This world has changed you. Like all the rest. You are not worthy of the name Vraad. You are especially not, my cousins, worthy of the name Tezerenee.”
A breath, perhaps two, passed before a dark and unprepossessing object formed at the warlock’s feet. He picked it up and examined it thoroughly. It was, as he had termed it, a tripod perhaps a hand’s length high. A black sphere, no bigger than one of his pupils, rested securely on the top. Finally satisfied, Shade thrust the artifact into the voluminous confines of his cloak.
“Thank you so very much,” he acknowledged with a mocking bow. “Having taken such great care of it, I can almost forgive you for stealing it from my workshop after my-death just doesn’t sound right, does it? My temporary displacement.” He started to fold within himself, then changed his mind. “I did say ‘almost forgive you,’ didn’t I?”
Panicked protests went unheeded as the warlock struck out.
When Shade at last left what remained of the cavern-and the now-ruined island that had once housed it-his thoughts turned immediately to the culmination of his millennia-long dream. Time was running out for him, he knew that. In two, maybe three centuries, his forcibly extended lifespan would reach its limit, but not with the normal aging results. The shadowy warlock knew what awaited him would be far worse, a last fifty or so years as a withered, decaying creature, a consciousness trapped alive in a dry husk. Only when the last vestiges of his earlier, more desperate spells dissipated would he be freed-freed to a death he had no desire to embrace. The others had given in to this world, let it master them, but not him.
He reentered the world in the emperor’s cavern, only to find it abandoned. The Silver Dragon had moved on with his campaign, likely fearing that whatever Shade had in mind for Drayfitt would upset his carefully laid plan. He had taken everyone with him. The Dragon King’s ideas had merit; planting a loyal human among his kind’s worst enemies and then manipulating that man into a position of great authority had been a plan worthy of a Vraad-and why not?
He dropped that line of thinking, deciding it was hardly worth his time now that his dreams were nearing fruition. He had mapped things out carefully in his mind, seeing where he had made his mistakes, reassuring himself of those results with the memories taken from the sorcerer Drayfitt. It had to work this time!
