perfect blackness. Making no sound nor showing any expression, the daemon warrior moved over to Garimeth. Then he dropped to his belly, and gently kissed her feet. Finally he rose again to stand tall and magnificent, master of chaos and lord of the underworld.
In that visage Garimeth discerned images of other shapes as well, a vision of unspeakable blackness, and then a great, undead serpent draped in tendrils of festering flesh. An awareness of his awesome power once again made her knees weak, and she was his to command. The Helm gave her the ability to share his consciousness, to thrill to the awareness of his being.
'Please, my daemon, please know me, and grant me the freedom to sail on your power.'
She murmured the words as if they were a prayer, too quiet for any of the dwarves to hear. But the flaming eyes of Zarak Thuul flared more brightly than ever, and she knew that he had heard and he was pleased.
She realized the creature's presence greatly exalted her stature in the eyes of Darkend and the other dark dwarves. This knowledge gave her a sudden, powerful thrill.
'All our pieces are in place,' Darkend ventured to say, gesturing to the multitude of dwarves amassed along the waterfront to either side. 'Let our great attack begin.'
Garimeth translated his words into that wretched, profane tongue. The monstrous warrior stood and listened impassively. Then she repeated Darkend's statement, seeking some sign of acknowledgment, all the time feeling the twisting pleasure and longing desire course throughout her being.
'Ask him this,' Darkend was saying. 'Can he create a route through the stone whereby our legions can climb upward and strike at the very core of Hybardin?'
Garimeth asked the question, following her brother's exact wording. Though Zarak Thuul gave no outward sign that he heard or understood, she sensed his pleasure with the violent command and his intent to obey. She turned back to the thanes and explained. 'He agrees.'
'I didn't hear anything,' Pounce Quickspring declared skeptically.
'He told me alone,' Garimeth said, with a meaningful glance at her brother.
'My sister speaks the truth,' said Darkend. 'She can communicate with him via this magical device. Surely you can see that!'
'Very well. Let the attack begin!' barked the thane of the Theiwar as he turned to lead his troops.
Immediately the dark dwarf companies were mustered away from the waterfront and they began climbing one of the large piles of rubble that had been left when some of the upper portions of the Life-Tree had collapsed. That mound came into contact with a wall of the overhang, and it was there, Garimeth said, that Zarak Thuul would create a passageway.
A familiar figure, robed all in black, emerged from among the Daergar gathered at the edge of the water, and Darkend and Garimeth were quick to recognize the assassin, Slickblade.
'Ah, Slickblade. I assume this means that Tarn Bellow-granite is dead?' The thane shot his sister a look of cruel triumph, pleased to see Garimeth's face tighten, her lips trembling slightly as she made an effort to control herself.
'Sadly, my lord, no.'
'My son lives?' demanded Garimeth.
'Aye, for the time being.' The assassin's voice was devoid of emotion. 'I tried to follow him, and I believe he has come here, to the city of the Hylar.'
'Then find him now and kill him!' screamed Darkend.
'I am making every effort, my thane. The half-breed stole a boat from Daerforge with gulley dwarf assistance, and used it to make his way here. I believe that he is somewhere in the vicinity, perhaps skulking around on this very shore.
'Wait.' The thane turned to Garimeth. 'Where would he go first? Would he come here to the waterfront?'
'I don't know,' she lied, certain that Tarn would in fact move mountains to make his way back to the city of his birth at this time of crisis.
'Don't trust her, lord. She deceives you!'
'Be aware that your own trust may be misplaced,' she retorted, with a meaningful look at Slickblade.
She could tell by a foray into her brother's mind that he didn't believe her about Tarn, but he couldn't see any way to prove that she was lying either. Slickblade melted away into the shadows, but by then Darkend was distracted by the upcoming battle plans, and Tarn was temporarily forgotten.
The fire dragon rose up on wings dripping flame and spark, scalding dozens of dark dwarves who were too slow to get out of the monster's path. With the daemon warrior riding between its shoulders, the dragon ascended, circled once, then flew into the side of Hybardin's stony pillar. The fiery beast showed no hesitation as it swept against the solid rock.
Immediately some of that stone tumbled away, and Darkend cursed bitterly as dozens more of his force were crushed by the rockfall. Other remnants of the dark dwarf army scattered in confusion. Before they could reform the monstrous attacker was out of sight. Behind, however, it left a wide cave, remarkably smooth-floored, which curved at a gentle angle upward toward the high levels of Hybardin.
After reforming their scattered troops into ranks and companies, the two dark dwarf thanes and Garimeth led the army into the newly bored passage.
The final attack had begun.
Interlude of Chaos
Zarak Timid rode Primus into the stone, and the bedrock of Hybardin parted before him like waters breaking before the prow of a sleek ship. Wings of fire seared through the layers of sediment, rock sizzled into dust, and smoke billowed in a great cloud as the mighty serpent forged ahead, digging, driving, boring upward into the great Hylar city.
Primus brayed into the bedrock, and the daemon warrior laughed, relishing the power and the destruction, all the while, fondly thinking of the dwarven female who had sent him such relentless and powerful appeals. She was intriguing, that one, undeniably intriguing and tempting. What was it that made her so different, so appealing? He didn't know, but he realized keen pleasure in working her will. There was one who was worthy, who brandished the unusual power to motivate him. In her name gladly would he destroy.
Despite his glee, the daemon warrior took care to keep the grade of the ascending spiral shallow enough for the footbound creatures to follow, for this was as the dwarven female had wished it. Weapons held ready, cries of war echoing from a thousand throats, the horde of Daergar and Theiwar marched in Zarak Thuul's wake, led by that entrancing female. In other places the shadow-wights wafted upward in their own way, following the surface of broken rubble, clinging to pipes and shafts and debris as they slithered over faces of bare rock.
Soon the daemon warrior and his fire dragon burst from solid rock into an inhabited upper level of the Hylar city. Some of the more foolish dwarves stayed to fight, and they died in cinder and ash without putting a single blade to Zarak Thuul or his mighty mount. The others turned and fled, vanishing into the maze of their city's Level Three.
Now Zarak Thuul and Primus flew down the wide avenues, crashing through walls and buildings, igniting fires that burst from the rock itself and soon filled all this level with a thick, choking smoke. Back and forth they flew, scorching their way through the maze, exulting in the powers of raw destruction and pure, unadulterated chaos. The killings were plenty, the dwarves burning and dying in numbers gratifying to behold.
Sometimes, for the sheer pleasure of power, Zarak Thuul dismounted from his blazing steed and swelled his body into monstrous size, striding through the streets in the guise of a great, skeletal dragon. In this form, devoid of flesh but grinning with razor-sharp fangs, the daemon warrior brought death to any who opposed him.
Then the blazing dragon and his master continued on, boring again into the rock, climbing higher and higher in the Life-Tree. As a worm might bore through the rotten wood in the trunk of some forest giant, Zarak Thuul and his dragon ascended upward into the highest reaches of the Hylar city.
And like that worm, the fire dragon was an agent of weakness and decay, twin factors that in any tree must eventually bring about its fall.
