Magic's Pawn

there was now - nothing; not even a ghost of what had been.

The link between them surged with loss, and Vanyel's vision darkened.

He heard Tylendel cry out Gala's name in utter despair, and willed his eyes to clear.

And to his horror he watched her fling herself at the five fiends, heedless of her own safety.

They swarmed over and about her, their darkness extinguishing her light. He heard her shriek, but this time in pain, and saw the red splash of blood bloom vividly on her white coat.

He tried to stagger to his feet, but had no strength; his ears roared, and he blacked out.

He barely felt himself falling again, and only Tylendel's scream of anguish and loss penetrated enough to make him fight his way back to consciousness.

He found himself half-sprawled on the cold ground. He shoved himself partially erect despite his spinning head, and looked for Gala -

But there was no Companion, no fight. Only a mutilated corpse, sprawling torn and ravaged, throat slashed to ribbons, the light gone from the sapphire eyes. Tylendel was on his knees beside her, stroking the ruined head, weeping hoarsely.

Beside her lifeless body lay one of the five monstrosities, head a shapeless pulp. The others flowed around the Companion's body, as if waiting for the corpse to rise again so that they could attack it. Two of the others limped on three legs - but two were still unharmed, and given what they had done to Gala in a few heartbeats, two would be more than enough to slaughter every man, woman, and child of the Leshara.

Finally they left off their mindless, sharklike circling, and turned to face the terrified celebrants. They took no more notice of Tylendel than of the dead Companion.

A man bolted from the crowd. With a start, Vanyel recognized him for Lord Evan. Whether he meant to attack the beasts, or simply to flee, Vanyel couldn't tell. It really didn't matter much; one of the beasts that was still unhurt flashed across the intervening space and caught him. He did not even have time to cry out as it disem- bowled him.

A woman screamed - and that seemed to signal the beasts to move again. They began to ooze in a body toward their victims -

And a bolt of brilliantly white lightning cracked from behind Vanyel to scorch the earth before the leader.

There was a pounding of hooves from the Gate. Vanyel was momentarily blinded by the light and by another surge of weakness that sent him sagging back to the ground.

When his eyes cleared again, there were three whiteclad Heralds and their three Companions closing on the fiends, lightning crackling from their upraised hands. They were using the lightnings to herd the beasts into a tight little knot and barring their path to their prey.

He barely had time to recognize two of the three as Savil and Jaysen before battle was joined.

Once again he started to black out, feeling as if something was trying to pull his soul out of his body. He fought against unconsciousness, though he felt as if he had nothing left to fight with; both the rage and the despair were gone now, leaving only an empty place, a void that ached unbearably.

He felt a tiny inflowing of strength; it wasn't much, but it was enough to give him the means to fight the blackness away from his eyes, to fight off the vertigo, and to finally get a precarious hold on the world again.

The first thing he saw was Tylendel; still on his knees, but no longer weeping. He was vacant-eyed, white as bleached linen, and staring at his own blood-smeared hands. Where the five creatures had been there was now nothing; only the mangled body of Gala and the burned and churned-up earth.

Taking her hand away from his shoulder was Savil - her face an unreadable mask.

Savil pulled her attention away from Tylendel, who was slumped in a kind of trance of despair beside her, and back to what Vanyel was telling the other two Heralds.

'… then she said, 'I don't know you, you aren't my Chosen,' ' the boy whispered, eyes dull and mirroring his exhaustion, voice colorless. 'And she turned her back on him, just turned away, and charged those things.'

'Buying time for us to get here,' Jaysen murmured, his voice betraying the pain he would not show. 'Oh, gods, the poor, brave thing - if she hadn't bought us those moments, we'd have come in on a bloodbath.'

'She repudiated him,' said Lancir, the Queen's Own, as if he did not believe it. 'She repudiated him, and then-'

'Suicided,' Savil supplied flatly, her own heart in turmoil; aching for Tylendel, for the loss of Gala, for all the things she should have seen and hadn't.. 'Gods, she suicaided. She knew, she had to know that no single Companion could face a pack of wyrsa and survive.'

Tylendel sat where they had left him; unseeing, unspeaking - all of hell in his eyes. Mage-lights of their own creation bobbed overhead, pitilessly illuminating everything.

Jaysen contemplated Savil's trainee for a long moment, but said nothing, only shook his head slightly. Then he spared a glance for Vanyel, and frowned; Savil heard his thought :The boy is still tied to the Gate, sister. He grows weaker by the moment. If you want him undamaged - :

Unspoken, but not unfelt, was the vague thought that perhaps it would be no bad thing if Vanyel were to be 'forgotten' until it was too late to save him from the aftereffects of the Gate-magic. That undercurrent of thought told Savil that Jaysen placed all of the blame for this squarely on Vanyel's shoulders.

:It wasn't his fault, Jaysen: she answered, heartsick, and near to weeping, but unable to be anything other than honest :He didn't do anything worse than go along with what 'Lendel wanted without telling me. What happened was as much due to my negligence as anything he did.:

Jaysen gave a curt nod, but a skeptical one :In that case, we need to get that Gate closed down as soon as possible, or the boy will sicken - or worse.: