Dru kept his expression indifferent, but, inside, the disturbing feeling was growing. It was more than just the golem now. The Vraad had a new world awaiting them, but it was one that Barakas Tezerenee was mapping out to his own desires. The anxious sorcerer looked down at the still form lying next to them and could no longer repress the shudder.
“Is something wrong, Zeree?”
Before he could respond, Gerrod spoke. “Father, Rendel will need some watching for the next hour. Despite earlier expectations, he is not yet in the Dragonrealm. We have judged the cross-over to be a slower and more tedious process than originally calculated and his body must be kept well during that extra time. If I have your permission, I would like to discuss with Master Zeree what opinions he has concerning our progress here and the possible difficulties we may not have foreseen… unless, of course, you have need of him still…”
The Lord Tezerenee’s gaze measured Dru. “I have no need of him now. What say you, Zeree?”
“I would be only too happy to add whatever I could to ensure the success of your spell.”
“Very good.” The patriarch reached up and took Sirvak’s beaked countenance in his hand. Dru could feel the familiar’s nervous breathing against his neck, but Sirvak, to its credit, did nothing otherwise during the span in which the large Vraad studied it. When Barakas finally released it, the creature carefully lowered its head and pretended to resume its napping.
“A splendid piece of workmanship. How would it fare, do you think, against a wyvern?”
“Sirvak has a certain skill in combat.” Dru purposely smiled as he looked at the beast and scratched its throat. “As for wyverns… he killed both of them in under a minute.”
The patriarch’s face darkened, but he kept his voice composed. “A splendid piece of work, as I said.” To his son, he commanded, “I am to be notified the moment something occurs. The exact moment.”
“Father.” Gerrod bowed, staying in the subservient position even after the Lord Tezerenee had vanished in a verdant cloud that threatened to spread throughout the chamber. Finally standing, the younger Tezerenee dispersed the greenish mist through an open window with a violent twist of his hand. He glanced at Dru. “He’s quite mad, Master Zeree, even more than the rest of us.” When there was no response, he added, “And we would have to be mad indeed to think of toppling him. Come take a look at this.”
With that last peculiar twist, Gerrod had turned toward the pentagram and those who maintained the spell. Dru followed silently, thinking about how much truth there was in his guide’s words.
“You have, of course, thought of the one difficulty with my father’s plan, haven’t you?” With his back turned to Dru, Gerrod looked like nothing more than a vast piece of cloth hung up to air out. His steps were surprisingly inaudible, a contrast to the heavy thuds that generally accompanied his armored relations.
Dru knew what the hooded figure was talking about. “Your golem is here; how will he get it to the Drag-How will he get it to the other side?”
“It was my idea… mine and Rendel’s, that is. A matter of power, as Father would say. Power will always prevail if you have it in sufficient quantities.” A low laugh escaped the all-encompassing hood. “Father is such a philosopher.”
“And what was that idea?”
Gerrod turned and indicated the pentagram. At that moment, the smile on his face was all too much a copy of his father’s. “What one Vraad cannot do, perhaps more, acting in concert, can. A group like this is out in the middle of the phantom forest, sitting among trees that are not quite there, stretching forth with the might of the Tezerenee, and creating for Rendel-and those who follow-vessels drawn from sources of the shrouded realm itself.”
It made sense of a sort and would only work with such as the Tezerenee. Only they could gather enough Vraad willing to work together to have a chance at success, even if that success was no more than a ghostly hand invading a ghostly world. The Vraad could not travel physically to their new home, but their power would build them another path.
Dru blinked. “Are there dragons over there?”
“Of course. It was-let me see-a cousin or brother or maybe even a sister, I forget which, who saw it. You can imagine how thrilled Father was. Our destiny was clear then. Until we found the beast, Father had intended on using some of those damn elves.”
Whispers of creatures inhabiting the shadow lands had slowly circulated through the network of spies and allies among the various Vraad. The elves were the most interesting, being a race long extinct on Nimth. They had been the first to suffer at the hands of the early Vraad. As Serkadion Manee, a singular sorcerer who had decided to chronicle the rise of his kind, had written, the elves had been too peaceful and giving to coexist with the new race. They had vanished virtually overnight. Nimth had seemed to die a little then, if Manee’s words were to be believed.
Living elves meant only one thing to the Vraad. Slaves and toys. It burned deep within Dru that his initial reaction had almost been as terrible as that of the rest; he had thought of what it would be like to study one, to take it apart and see how it differed from his own kind.
Sharissa would have abandoned him there and then had she only known.
He realized that Gerrod was staring at him, the younger Vraad’s eyes glistening.
“I want it to fail.”
At first, Dru was uncertain that he had heard the other correctly. When Gerrod’s expression did not change, however, he knew that the sons of the dragon were indeed all insane. In the end, Dru could only ask a simple “Why?”
The hooded Vraad looked at him helplessly. He seemed unconcerned that anyone might hear his traitorous words-traitorous to both his clan and the Vraad race as a whole.
“I don’t know! I feel it sometimes, as if my head were about to split in two! That something very wrong awaits us, something that means death… and more… to the Vraad, all Vraad!”
Suddenly Gerrod stared up at the ceiling. His mouth drew shut, a tight, thin line across his countenance. His head snapped down a second later. The eyes that met Dru’s were full of both relief and despair.
“Rendel’s made it. I can feel him. His ka now definitely inhabits the realm beyond. Our success”-Gerrod hesitated, visibly tasting the words and disliking their content-“is a certainty now!”
For the second time in only a matter of minutes, Dru could not hold back the shiver that coursed through him.
Though it had no mouth, it screamed.
Though it had no eyes, it turned its head toward the dark, raging heavens, as if seeking some power to end its agony.
Its visage was blank. No mark, no hair, graced its head. There were no ears, though it seemed to listen. Naked, it stumbled to its feet, which had no toes, and grasped the tree it had fallen against with hands that were little more than stubs. It was a sexless being, devoid of any distinguishing feature over the expanse of its entire body. It could feel the elements warring around it, but could do little else.
It was a golem, the first to be grown and the first to be claimed by the Vraad.
A flock of wyverns, half as tall as the helpless creature staggering below but capable of tearing asunder predators thrice their size, huddled fearfully in the few trees dotting this area of the storm-drenched field. It was not the wind and the lightning that sent shivers through their reptilian forms. What they feared was the being feeling its way around the trunk of the tree on which many of them perched. It was not exactly the scent that stirred their anxiety, but a presence of power so foreign to their limited existences that it frightened them into immobility.
The faceless monstrosity guided a foot over the upturned root it had previously tripped over. As it did, bulbous growths sprouted from the end, twisting and shaping themselves into individual toes. The other foot was also whole now, though the change went unnoticed by the creature itself. It could only feel its pain.
The storm had swept across a clear evening sky mere moments before, but it was already at its height. As it vented itself, the thing paused, seeming to consider something.
It suddenly pulled back its fist and, for no apparent reason, harshly struck the trunk of the tree. The wyverns squawked in panic; the blow nearly cracked the trunk in half. Sorcery crackled in the air around the blind wanderer. As it pulled the hand back for a second try, blood dripping to the already-soaked earth, stubs emerged from the front, mad little points that stretched and wriggled, creating fingers and forming a true hand in the space of a single
