sobbing.
Though she felt the glacier's passing, Moriana never heard the nun. Her whole being strained to hold together under the terrific pressure of rapport with the World Spirit. It was like being twisted and pulled and compressed all at the same time, a million vectors tearing at her soul. She probed for her sister's mind and prayed she could hang on until contact was made.
As Erimenes predicted, Fost earned himself a place in the ballads that day. The spirit cheered hysterically from the jug while the tall man slew and slew like a figure out of legend. He used every trick of swordplay he knew, both fair and foul, and threw in alley fighting from boyhood days in Medurim. He hacked and stabbed and slashed, then smashed faces with his buckler. When an axe-blow split the shield, he hurled it in someone's face, picked up an abandoned shortsword and fought on tirelessly.
But Fost saw through the haze of blood and sweat in his eyes that Rann was the true hero. Fost fought with preternatural strength and fury, but Rann… Rann fought as no man ever had, nor would again. With scimitar in his left hand and his knife in the right, Rann walked among the Hissers like death incarnate. He disdained to parry, but no blade touched him. His weapons were in constant, blurring motion, the dagger picking at eyes and throats and exposed bellies; the scimitar slashed left and right and curved around the guard of an unsuspecting enemy to bring bloody death.
The tide of Hissers slackened. Fost staggered back against the wall. To his surprise he saw Cerestan still fought on. Synalon stood with arms upraised, straining to make contact with Moriana. Fost wondered how much longer any of them would be alive.
A figure strode down the narrow street, a green cloak flapping from its shoulders, a sword in hand. It stopped before the prince.
'You are Prince Rann,' said the newcomer. His skin was almost black, and he towered above the diminutive prince.
'And you are Zak'zar.' The scimitar whipped forward. With blinding speed, the sword snapped to guard. But the prince's stroke was never meant to connect. Instead, black blood from the scimitar's last victim spattered Zak'zar's eyes. He blinked and fell back a step. Rann lunged.
Zak'zar's reflexes were still those of Zr'gsz. His blade flashed. Rann's dagger whipped up – not fast enough. Fost saw the green blade cave in the right side of Rann's face, saw the tawny eye spilt in blood. Synalon screamed.
'Get away from her, Fost!' Erimenes shout sent him running to the right, heedless of whether he was attacked or not. He stepped on a javelin dropped by a skewered Hisser, went down, rolled and came up staring toward the wall. Synalon!
He couldn't look at her directly. Energy pulsed from her, fierce and white hot. The bird rider's garb she had worn burned away in an instant leaving her naked and splendid and terrible. Forces ebbed and flowed around her like the aurora, ghosts of color barely hinting at the potent energy fields of which they were the only visible part.
He got to his feet, looked back in time to see Rann spinning and ducking under the sweep of Zak'zar's sword. Rann whirled in a complete circle, getting inside the Zr'gsz's guard. His scimitar struck under the armpit, bit through the metal and Fost thought he heard the grating crunch when it hit the spine. Zak'zar dropped his sword with a clang. His hands spasmodically opened and closed twice, he vomited green-black blood, and died.
Rann stood over his foe's body for several heartbeats, then collapsed across the inert form.
More Hissers appeared. Several ran at Synalon. She gestured, and they turned to pillars of ash, slumping and beginning to flow, becoming incandescent piles of heated sand.
'You must flee,' Synalon said in a voice as vast as the sky. 'No one will pursue.'
She started walking forward. Cerestan lurched after, limping on one leg, determined not to leave the side of his queen. She sensed him, half-turned. 'No.'
It was too late. He entered the deadly embrace of the energies surrounding her and, with a last startled cry, turned to ash himself.
'Go, Fost!' Erimenes shouted. 'Great Ultimate, you've done it! You're free! There's two eagles left. Take one and go!' Fost turned and ran – straight for Rann.
'What are you doing, fool?' shrieked the genie. 'Leave him. You fool, save your own skin!' Fost stooped and grabbed Rann's wrist. He checked for pulse.
'He's dead, Fost. By the Five Holy Ones, flee now!'
He felt the faint flutter of a pulse and rose, swinging the prince across his shoulders. He marvelled at how light he was, then noticed the sunfire had died out and the steam was beginning to dissipate.
'He wouldn't have done the same for you. You fool, you incredible fool!'
Synalon approached. She saw him and smiled. A ripple of sensation passed through him, desire and revulsion and hate and admiration all at once. She was no longer merely human. She came straight on. He dodged to the side of the street, teetering to balance Rann on his back. Synalon swept past. He felt the tingle of the energies. She was growing taller, and at the far end of the street Istu waded through buildings to meet her. Fost turned to the rimwall and ran like hell.
It was birth and orgasm and death. Moriana's soul expanded in all directions, contracted to a point, and a blazing line surged between her and Synalon. Energy sluiced through her. For a moment the two points came together, merged. Synalon screamed. But Moriana was already fading, and it did not jolt her to look into her sister and see herself.
They broke apart. Moriana was a spark, and she was dimming. Her task was done. Synalon had been right; her malice was the perfect focus for the vengeful energies of the World Spirit. Now Moriana could relax, quit fighting to maintain identity, be absorbed into the World Spirit and know peace. She plummeted down… And was caught by a gentle, unyielding grip. I have you now, my child, came Ziore's thought. I won't let go.
Moriana began to swim back upward through the layers of the World Spirit's mind, back toward herself.
Istu lashed at Synalon with his talons. She skipped aside and the swipe brought down a spindly tower. She felt the power in her hand. She struck. Istu felt fire in his bowels and screamed. Her laughter eclipsed his cry of anguish.
The eagle dropped in a dizzying spiral groundward. Somehow, Fost hung on. He heard a tumult at his back as if the sky was breaking open. He dared not look back, nor did he know how the war eagle Nightwind fared, with a half-dead Prince Rann strapped to its back.
An immense round pit yawned beneath. He realized that the flare had burned through Guardian and into Athalau; he saw where the tops of lofty spires were melted and vitrified from the awful heat. He shut his eyes, squeezing out tears. 'Goodbye, Guardian,' he said. There seemed little else to say.
'He's dead?' asked Erimenes. Fost only nodded. 'Oh, no, no, no!' The spirit chanted a liturgy of negation, and Fost was amazed at the real pain in his voice.
The ground wheeled wildly below. The white war bird that had been Cerestan's braked with her wings and landed roughly in the scorched plaza near a silent, dry fountain. She staggered and collapsed under Fost's weight. The courier rolled free. The bird raised her head and stucked in great, ragged gulps of air.
Fost struggled to his feet and started toward the Palace of Esoteric Wisdom at a lurching run. His thoughts were of Moriana. 'Wait,' said Erimenes. 'Look. Above.'
The Sky City careened across a sky gone mad. Black clouds whirled crazily and the storm beat at the City with fists of wind and rain and lightning. Rocks exploded from the Ramparts to smash among the buildings of the floating City. The earth shifted violently beneath Fost's feet and flung him to the ground.
The tremor went on and on. Fost spread his arms and clung to the pavement. Erimenes shouted something that was swallowed in the din of crashing buildings. The shaking subsided. Fost looked up again.
Some trick of the forces allowed Fost to see only Istu and Synalon facing each other on the parapet. They battled with forces he neither saw nor comprehended.
Though she must have grown several times her natural size, Synalon was still dwarfed by Istu's midnight bulk. She flickered like a flame, dodging the Demon's increasing clumsy charges. The
World Spirit's energies flowed through her to tear at the minion of the Dark Ones.
Suddenly, she darted in, closing with the Demon. He threw back his head and bellowed. To Fost it seemed the slim white arms reached inside the blackness of Istu's body.
A gasp burst from the watchers below. Synalon planted her feet and raised the gigantic form of the Demon of
