Destiny

laddad camp. From that vantage point, the movement of the black cloud was plain. The vast mass wasn’t merely thinning and expanding to cover more area, it was turning slowly on a central axis sited directly over the valley’s geographical heart. The rotation was antisunwise, to Sa’ida a sign of negative power. She willed herself to move toward it, but her naes could not pass through the cloud. She made a second attempt and the reaction was violent. Instead of merely being halted, she was hurled back to her body. She arrived with such force, her body was thrown backward. It struck the side of the tent, knocking a support loose and collapsing half the structure. As she lay, gasping for breath, laughter sounded in the darkness.

“Woman, you cannot trifle with me!”

Sa’ida struggled to sit up. “Faeterus! What are you after here?”

“What every practitioner of our art wants: power! When I have it, the first to feel my wrath will be the spawn of those who condemned me. And after I’ve dealt with the elves, I shall turn to you desert-dwelling vermin.”

Sa’ida lifted her hand to the Eye of Elir-Sana. It was a simple gesture, meant to shield the goddess’s image from Faeterus’s blasphemous presence, but contact with the jewel sent a surge of new strength through her. She concealed it, maintaining her pose of cowed weakness.

“Why do you hate the laddad?” she asked carefully. “You are one yourself.”

“I am not!” Although the shout echoed like thunder, she knew no one else could hear it. Faeterus’s voice was meant for her alone. “Chance gave me their form, but I am not of their cursed race!”

“What race are you, then?”

A figure took shape in the darkness. Faeterus allowed his naes to reveal his true form, without the disguise of his heavy robes. Sa’ida’s hand tightened convulsively around the amulet.

“Begone,” she gasped. “Go back to whatever dark place spawned you!”

Faeterus laughed. His phantom hand reached out and grasped Sa’ida’s wrist. When he raised his arm, he pulled her naes out. Her physical body went limp.

“You will witness my triumph. It will be most instructive!”

With a speed that left Sa’ida breathless, they soared above the laddad camp, rising-far higher than Sa’ida had done alone, then they rushed eastward. In seconds they were at a broad shelf cut into the side of Mount Rakaris, which Faeterus called the Stair of Distant Vision.

Her spirit form went sprawling as he abruptly released her. He lifted a hand, and immediately it was filled with a spear. Rather than an actual, physical weapon, the spear was the representation of a spell. He drove it through her thigh, pinning her in place, and the shock of the spiritual impalement drew an involuntary scream. But pain was a force Sa’ida understood. She conquered her agony quickly although she could not free her naes. She remained firmly anchored to the stone.

None of this was visible to Favaronas. From his place at the edge of the Stair, all he saw was the sorcerer standing rigidly by the center pinnacle, head bowed. Abruptly, Faeterus lifted his face and arms to the darkened sky and broke his long silence, declaiming in a loud, clear voice. The language was Old Elvish, and Favaronas recognized the rhyme scheme and meter as an ancient bardic recitation called a houmrya. He had never heard it spoken before. The poetry was said to have erratic, uncontrollable magical effects, and Speaker of the Stars Sithel had banned it long, long ago.

Because Favaronas was an accomplished scholar, be detected the changes Faeterus was making in the houmrya. Faeterus declared himself “breaker of worlds,” when the actual houmrya line was “maker of worlds.” With such twists, he was transforming an ancient poem of creation into an evocation of destruction.

As he recited, the monoliths of Inath-Wakenti began glow. The effect was subtle, like reflected moonlight, but in the unnatural gloom, quite noticeable. When the sorcerer entered into the second canto, the aura brightened to a steady glare.

Desperately Favaronas scanned the slope below. There was no sign of the elf scouts, and a dreadful thought came to him. Had he only imagined the figures darting among the bushes? Was his terrified mind concocting phantoms? Did he await a rescue that would never come?

* * * * *

The Lioness’s little company was concealed behind several large boulders below the plateau. Unnerved by the glowing monuments, Kerian had sent her party into cover. When time passed and nothing else untoward occurred, she told Robien to take the lead. He studied the situation briefly then chose a narrow track winding up the southern end of the plateau. It was steep but seemed to offer more concealment than the way on the north side.

The others followed, but fired by nearness to his goal, Robien outpaced them. He glimpsed someone hiding in the rocks above and dropped on his belly to avoid being seen. A figure dressed in black was lurking behind the boulders on the slope above the plateau. Was it one of Faeterus’s hirelings, guarding the sorcerer’s back while he worked his conjuration? Peering at a very low angle through scattered brush, Robien saw the clear outline of a crossbow. He unslung his bow and nocked an arrow. His shoulder throbbed, but he ignored the pain, firming his right elbow. He took careful aim. After loosing the shaft, he turned downslope to warn his comrades.

“There’s an archer in the rocks above the plateau!” he called, keeping his voice low.

He began to turn round again but pitched abruptly backward, his bow flying from his hand. Kerian, Taranath, and Hytanthas dropped to the ground immediately.

“Robien!” Hytanthas called hoarsely. “Robien, answer me!”

There was no reply. Hytanthas was closest to the fallen bounty hunter. He could see an arrow protruding from the Kagonesti’s chest, but in the uncertain light couldn’t tell whether Robien was alive or dead.

They resumed climbing and Hytanthas was amazed and relieved to find Robien still lived. The arrow had caught him high on the right side of the chest and he lay on his back, stifling gasps of pain. Hytanthas tore a strip of cloth from his own geb and tried to stanch the flow of blood.

Gripping his bloodstained hand, Robien gasped, “Leave me! Get Faeterus for me!”

Hytanthas gave the Lioness an anguished look. She told him to remain with the injured elf. She and Taranath resumed the slow ascent.

Above them, Favaronas had seen neither Robien’s shot nor the return volley. His whole world had narrowed to Faeterus’s recitation of the perverted houmrya. Only two cantos remained, and he was certain that if Faeterus finished it, the race of elves would be wiped from the face of Krynn. Blinking away tears, he looked out over the valley.

Columns of light had risen from the glowing monoliths. They formed a pattern on the roiling underside of the black cloud. The message that had been too agonizingly bright and fleeting when etched by the glare of the setting sun was written now in ivory light on the cloud. The knowledge feared by the ghosts of the Lost Ones teetered on the edge of Faeterus’s grasp.

Perhaps he had seen warriors on the slope below, but Favaronas couldn’t risk waiting. He might be the only one with even a slim hope of stopping Faeterus. He had no idea how he would do it, but it was up to him to try.

He leaned on his battered hands and pushed himself away from the edge, back toward the chanting sorcerer.

* * * * *

When the monoliths’ pale glow became a dazzling glare, Gilthas ordered his people to flee to open ground west of camp, where there were no standing stones.

“Every able-bodied adult is to carry a child or help the old or infirm,” he declared. “Cut all the animals loose.” If there was going to be a conflagration, he wanted any living creature in its path to have a chance for escape. He also called for Sa’ida. While warriors sought the priestess, Gilthas obeyed his own orders and went to help a child wandering nearby. The boy was looking in vain for his parents.

“You’re not my father!” the boy declared as the Speaker hoisted him up.

“No, I’m not. Who is your father?”

“Naratalanathas, son of Cyronaxidel.”