sword and stood next to him. Trandon tucked his quar-terstaff into the crook of his arm and took up a position behind the swordsman.
'But what of the evil in the other direction?' asked Aleena.
'There's evil everywhere down here,' said Miltiades. 'Besides, I don't want to separate the party. It's too dangerous.'
'Then let's send a small group, just to spy it out,' suggested Able. 'We don't want to be caught from behind.'
'They're right,' said Kern. 'I'll go investigate it alone.'
'No, I'll go,' volunteered Able. 'If that much evil radiates from the east, you two should stay here in case whatever's down there comes this way. Ill just peek in this direction and be right back.'
'Trandon, you're light on your feet,' said Miltiades. 'Go with him.'
'Right.' Trandon swung around to the northeastern cave mouth.
'If it's okay, I'd like to go, too,' said Noph. The paladins looked at him doubtfully. 'I mean, I'm not even wearing armor, so I can sneak better than any of you. I promise I'll be careful.'
'All right, but don't start anything,' cautioned Kern. 'Just check it out and get right back. And hurry. We've got a princess to rescue.'
'I'm telling you, Kern, she's not a princess,' growled Aleena.
The trio crept down the water-carved passageway and slipped around the bend. Soon, the backward cast of their dim blue light faded from view of the cavern where the rest of the party waited. The passage stretched on for several hundred feet, cutting a crooked path that turned toward the north. A few cave links large enough for one person to squeeze through branched off here and there, but they kept to the main shaft.
The party reached a sharp turn and paused. Around the corner, they spied reddish light.
'Can you see what it is?' whispered Able. The others shook their heads.
'I’ll crawl up there and see if I can get a better look,' hissed the boy.
'Be careful, Noph. Be very, very careful!'
Kastonoph drew his dagger and clenched it between his teeth. It forced him to pull his tongue way back into his throat and felt uncomfortable, but it did give him a fleeting sense of confidence. He dropped to his belly and wriggled around the corner, making his way toward the source of the light. Quietly he shimmied into a shallow depression of the cave floor. He clawed his way to its opposite rim and peeked over, looking into the cave beyond.
A hulking, brutish creature, with reddish-brown fur covering most of its body and gray flaps of skin along the sides of its face stood with its knuckles resting on the floor, looking into a mirror. It grinned wickedly into the glass, baring its long fangs, and lifted one forehand to flex its six digits in a grotesque wave at itself. Noph choked back a gasp.
The mirror began to glow brilliantly, and the beast covered its eyes with a hairy paw. A low hum swelled, followed by the shrill snap of lightning sparks. Before the boy's amazed eyes, a red-furred, six-toed foot stepped from the mirror's smooth surface. A second later a duplicate monster fully emerged, paused a moment while it checked its footing, and then drew itself up before the other. The new arrival snarled and raised its hackles at its twin, and they began to slowly circle one another.
Noph took advantage of the moment to slip back toward Able and Trandon.
Something against the wall next to him shifted…
Noph caught the movement out of the corner of his eye and froze. He tensed his muscles for a spring and dug his fingernails into the soft sandstone, then raised his buttocks as he shifted to his knees, finding purchase for his toes. His eyes and nostrils flared wide. With a final deep breath, he leaped up and forward, grunting with the effort. His hands left the ground as he shifted his weight to his feet and pushed off for all he was worth. A cool breeze slid through his hair as he accelerated.
In a flash, a massive claw shot out from the cave wall and snatched the boy by the collar. His feet swung out in front of him with a jerk as his forward momentum came to a sudden stop. Another one of the creatures, somehow camouflaged against the cave until now, lifted him by the back of his shirt and grinned cruelly into his eyes. Noph gawked back at the thing and opened his mouth to scream, but no sound came out.
'Stop!' shouted Able, who stood two paces away. The creature looked his way with a start. 'Filthy Abyssal bar-lgura! You shall not have him!'
Trandon came to the cleric's side and twirled his quarterstaff threateningly. 'You shall know and fear the power of Tyr!' he cried, pointing at Able. 'This priest carries the god of justice within him!'
At Trandon's words, Able started and froze. He held forth his warhammer with Tyr's scales of justice emblazoned on its head, but no words came to him. Trandon looked at him with a frown of concern, and both the bar-lgura and Noph paused in dread, watching him-yet nothing happened. Five more bar-lgura stepped away from the walls. They were joined by the two from the room beyond.
'We feel nothing!'' sneered voices in Abie's head. 'No power of Tyr. All we sense from you is… fear.'
'Able, call upon Tyr!' urged Trandon, taking a step back
'Feel the power of the Abyss!' whispered the telepathic voices. The bar-lgura released their aura of terror and Noph screamed. Able and Trandon fell to the floor as though they'd been run over by a war wagon, crying out in horror themselves. 'Tyr-slime, unloved by Tyr,' the bar-lgura sneered. 'We shall eat you alive and take this man-boy back to the Abyss, where he will be turned into a larva!' Macabre laughter rang through their heads.
'No!' shrieked Able. 'Tyr, why have you forsaken me?' He looked at the wretched tanar'ri leering at the boy, who dangled helpless before them. Suddenly, his fear turned into fury, and he climbed to his feet. The bar-lgura looked at him, surprised.
'No, I say!' declared the warrior-cleric. 'You shall not have him! If there is justice in this or any world, I shall have it, wherever I stand!' He looked at the fiends before him with a wild glint in his eyes. 'Your evil power is nothing before justice! Nothing!'
The symbol on Abie's warhammer caught the dim light of the chamber and flared to brilliance. A wave of screeches passed through the fiends. The one holding Noph dropped him to the ground. The symbol burned brighter still, bathing the entire cavern in holy white light
'My god!' uttered Trandon, somewhere beside him, amazed at the sudden burst of power. 'Noph, come to me! Come to me! Come now!'
Pure energy such as he had never felt filled Able, surging through his body and flowing into his hammer. He dropped to one knee and held his blazing holy symbol high. 'Justice!'' His voice resonated through the cavern. 'Justice is Tyr, and He is Justice. So long as it lies within me, so does my god!'
With an ear-piercing howl, the nearest bar-lgura exploded! The one beside it threw back its head and shrieked in agony, then shattered into ichorous shreds while the rest began to wail and stumble toward Able, claws raised.
'Noph, run!' cried Trandon. The boy turned at the sound of his name and blinked uncomprehendingly at the cleric, then burst to life. He scrambled in the sticky mess splattering down from above, dropping his dagger. The screaming bar-lgura began to move with him, pressing toward his friends, so Noph grabbed at a furry leg and used it to catapult himself by, sliding toward his comrades and tripping the fiend in the process. It went down with a thud and ruptured, spraying flesh everywhere. Trandon leaped forward and seized the boy. Together they rolled away from the carnage and made their way behind Able.
'Run!' ordered Able. 'Run for the others!'
'We won't leave without you!' Noph yelled.
'Go! For the quest!' He turned back to look at Noph for an instant, his eyes beaming with surety and light. 'For justice!'
A bar-lgura seized Able by the neck and lifted him in the air. 'Run!' he screamed. Then the fiend swept its massive claw with a snarl, ripping his head from his shoulders. Trandon and Noph bolted down the corridor, the slap of heavy paws on the stone at their heels.
As Trandon ran, he seized a ring upon his left forefinger and turned it; a blue glow rose on its surface.
'What are you doing?' panted Noph. At that mo- ment, a hairy hand caught his ankle and tripped him. Trandon ground to a sudden halt, spun about, and threw out his pointing finger in the face of the two remaining fiends. A streak of jagged, radiant blue lightning shot forth, catching them both in its electrical fork with a peal of thunder. They bellowed in pain, fell over Noph, and disappeared!
