Sword Brother

quiver to the right side of his belt.

*I try, at any rate. I promised Brandark I'd keep you from getting too full of yourself.*

'Remind me to be thanking him the next time I see him.'

*I imagine you'll remember all on your own,* Walsharno reassured him.

Bahzell snorted, then turned to study the hillside above them.

Most people would never have realized there was anything there, but Bahzell and Walsharno weren't most people. Both of them could sense the dark miasma hiding in the heart of the hill, and the cloaking power of Sharna which should have hidden the tunnel opening was useless against the eyes of any champion of Tomanak.

Bahzell bared his teeth as he saw the loathsome image of Sharna's scorpion, carved into the keystone of the outer arch, and he remembered the first time he'd seen that same image. What he didn't see was anything remotely like a sentry, and that worried him.

'I'm thinking as how they must know we're out here,' he said.

*After what happened at the village?* Walsharno snorted yet again, this time in emphatic agreement.

'Then wouldn't you think it's just a mite overconfident they're being with no one posted to be keeping an eye out for us?'

Walsharno nodded, and Bahzell's frown deepened. Although Sharna couldn't hide the entrance from him or Walsharno by arcane means, things could still be physically concealed, and there was an uncomfortable crawling sensation between Bahzell's shoulder blades.

'Well,' he sighed, 'I'm thinking there's only one way to be finding out what it is they've got in mind.'

* * *

It was remarkable how quiet something the size of a Sothoii courser could be when it put its mind to it. Walsharno's ability to move almost soundlessly, even through underbrush, had always impressed Bahzell. He himself had spent years honing his ability to do the same thing, and he was far smaller than the stallion, with only two feet, to boot. Despite that, Walsharno made little more noise than he would have made by himself, and what sounds they did make were lost in the sigh of the steadily strengthening night wind.

Thunder mutter-grumbled, and lightning flickered blue-white against the clouds far to the east. It was coming closer, and there was something almost soothing about the natural power of the oncoming storm.

No windrider would have dreamed of using reins, and no courser would have tolerated such an impertinence if he had. Nor was anything so crude required. Walsharno was linked with Bahzell, their thoughts flickering back and forth almost as if they were a single being. There was no need for Bahzell to tell Walsharno where to go, or for Walsharno to tell Bahzell where they were going.

Which, Bahzell reflected as he nocked an arrow, also left both of his hands free for other purposes.

Walsharno emerged from the last few feet of the undergrowth fringing the streambed and started up the slope just as quietly and cautiously. The sense of the evil flowing out of the tunnel opening spilled down the hillside like a viscous tide, black as tar and just as clinging. The stallion breasted its flow, forging upward against it, and Bahzell felt the two of them settling into even deeper fusion.

*Now, Brother?*

'Not quite,' Bahzell murmured back. 'Let's be getting as close as we can before-'

The night suddenly shattered as something even darker and blacker than it was, and almost as enormous, exploded from the tunnel mouth. Bahzell's mind insisted that it couldn't possibly have squeezed itself into an opening that small as huge, segmented spiderlike legs-blacker than black, yet glaring with sick green light for eyes that could see-and ribbed, bat-like wings unfolded themselves. A head that belonged on something from night-black depths where sunlight never shone opened its mouth to bare curving fangs half as long as Bahzell, and the demon shrieked its fury as it launched itself down the hillside towards them with all the impossible quickness of its hell-born kind.

'Tomanak!' Bahzell bellowed in reply, and heard Walsharno's defiant challenge echoing deep inside him. The clean blue corona of Tomanak snapped into sudden, glittering existence about them both, and Bahzell reached out. It was as if he stretched one hand to Tomanak and the other to Walsharno, and a stuttering electrical shock exploded through him as their hands reached back.

'Tomanak!' he shouted once more, drawing that shared strength and support deep into him even as he called the Rage's transcendent power to him.

His bow sang with a musical, chirping snap. A steel-headed war arrow howled from the string, and the azure power of Tomanak touched it. It flashed across the night like a blue meteor, and the demon shrieked again-this time in as much pain as fury-as the meteor slammed into its long, sinuous neck. It struck just below the head, and blinding light exploded from the point of impact.

The hideous creature flailed its head in obvious anguish, but its charge barely hesitated, and Walsharno wheeled on his haunches, then sprang into a full gallop with a speed only another courser could possibly have matched.

The days when Bahzell had sat the saddle like an abandoned sack of meal were long past. He and his courser were one being, and his right hand flashed down to the quiver at his belt. Another arrow fitted itself flawlessly, perfectly, to the string, and he sighted, drew, and released in one flowing motion.

Another blue-flaming arrow shrieked across the night, but this time the demon wasn't taken by surprise. Mere arrows had never posed a threat to it in the past. They'd rattled uselessly, harmlessly, off its hard scales and thick carapace, but these arrows were a very different matter, indeed. Not only could they drill effortlessly through its armor, but they exploded deep within its unnatural flesh like lightning bolts when they did. Yet this was one of Sharna's greater demons. It was more than a mere appetite. It was capable of thought. It could learn from experience, and it realized that these arrows could hurt it and twisted aside with the lizard-fast quickness of its breed. It couldn't completely evade the arrow-not one fired by Bahzell Bahnakson at a range of under fifty yards-yet the steel head which should have struck its throat almost on top of the original ichor-spurting wound struck it in the chest, instead.

The demon staggered, howling in fresh pain and fury, but it didn't go down. Instead, it gathered its feet under it once again, wings beating for balance, and lunged. The wind from those flailing wings buffeted Bahzell and Walsharno like some foul-smelling hurricane, and there wasn't time for another shot. Bahzell dropped his bow and raised his hands, summoning his blade, and five feet of burnished steel glared with the blue furnace-fury of the war god.

'Tomanak!'

Walsharno charged to meet the demon, screaming the wordless whistle of his own war cry, and the glittering sword hissed as it descended in a two-handed blow like Tomanak's own mace.

The demon twisted its head out of the way at the very last instant, and Bahzell's sword slammed into one of its wings, instead. A fountain of blue light exploded upward, the demon shrieked, and Walsharno pivoted with lithe, impossible grace. He swerved to one side, and both rear hoofs lashed out, ablaze with the same blue glare as Bahzell's sword. They caught the demon in the side with a gruesome, ear-shattering 'CRACK!' of splintering carapace and a fresh eruption of blue lightning.

Not even a greater demon could shake off that impact. The creature lurched sideways, stumbling, almost falling, with a fresh shriek of pain. Walsharno snapped back around to face it, and it was slower as it gathered itself this time. It hesitated, crouching down, hissing and bubbling in mingled fury and anguish. Walsharno started towards it, and it actually backed away, sidling sideways, head cocked, watching its