Lan set his most powerful fire spell against Rook. Nothing happened. Conjuring an air elemental, the whirlwind whipping about the mud creature’s stick feet, did not even slow its inexorable pace. Opening a pit in front of Rook did nothing. It walked on emptiness.
“Brinke,” pleaded Lan. “I need your energy.” He did not find it. The woman’s entire being was tangled in Terrill’s immobility spell.
But help came. A feeble grasping at first firmed into something more substantial. Lan experienced it as a hand on his back, urging him forward, comforting him, giving him the courage to fight.
“Inyx,” he said softly. “Thank you.”
Rook’s bulging, sapling arms circled Lan’s body. Mud muscles tightened. The mouth opened to whiteness and turned to rip out his throat.
Lan Martak concentrated all his power into the light mote. His body slumped in Rook’s arms, more a corpse than lifelike. But the magical energies flowed like a mighty river. With Inyx’s encouragement and succor, Lan focused them into a stream of incalculable power. And this he refined into the single mote of light. It shot forward and into Rook’s obscenely gaping mouth.
Flames seared Lan’s eyebrows and hair. He stumbled back and fell heavily. Dried sticks and mud rained down on him and with the physical came more. Broken spells, tangled magics, bits and pieces of a long lifetime of being a sorcerer all poured into him, like water into a bucket. Lan not only destroyed Rook, he shattered Terrill’s mind once and for all time.
The burned out husk of a once-great mage stood in the clearing, all light gone from the eyes.
“He still lives,” said Brinke, released from Terrill’s spell. “But there is no life force.”
“You’re wrong,” Lan said. “The life force is all that’s left. Everything else has been drained. Terrill is, indeed, immortal and cannot be killed by ones such as we, but all that remains is a shell. He has no personality left, not even a deranged one. No volition, no sense of being alive.”
“How horrible,” muttered Ducasien.
“This might be a better existence than the one Claybore doomed him to,” said Inyx. “But I don’t think so. Lan, can you do anything for him?”
Lan didn’t answer. All the knowledge that had been sealed and unreachable in Terrill’s mind now unfolded for him. His powers doubled, trebled-more!
“I can do nothing,” Lan said. “That is still beyond my grasp.” He stretched out a hand to Inyx, who took it. Her eyes welled with tears as she saw within him the truth of all he said.
“He is surely doomed to be like this forever,” Inyx said. “The poor, poor man.”
“Friend Lan Martak,” came Krek’s shaky voice. “Behind you is the terrible woman. She again tries to do you harm. If you let her, can you then mate? This is so odd, backwards from the way we spiders do it. We mate first, then the female devours the male.”
Lan had forgotten about Kiska k’Adesina in the aftermath of the brief, mind-twisting battle with Terrill’s golem. He moved the barest fraction of an inch, not even taking his hand from Inyx’s, and let Kiska’s dagger pass harmlessly by his back.
Kiska spun like a jungle beast, dagger held point up in a knife-fighting position.
The snarl of feral rage on her face showed that she thought the time ripe for killing Lan.
Lan motioned for the others to hold.
“Kiska,” he said in a low voice, “you have tried to kill me for the last time.”
“Yes,” she hissed. “This time I succeed! And if they stop me, you’ll present the opportunity again for me to drive my knife into you, you weak, sniveling fool.”
She lunged and again Lan sidestepped.
“You can’t prevent me from killing you, can you, you lovesick bastard?”
“The geas Claybore laid upon me is a subtle and complicated one,” said Lan. “I have to admit to a certain admiration for the delicacy of the spell and the way Claybore wrapped it around my own vanity, ego, and need to best him. Yes, that’s what he did,” said Lan to Inyx. “As much as anything else, the geas fed my ego, making me think I was invincible.” He gave a tired little laugh.
“The irony of it is that I am invincible. Now.”
“Not to me, Martak. You love me. You love the source of your own death!”
Kiska viciously drove the dagger tip directly for Lan’s groin. The blade vaporized, taking with it her hand, wrist and most of her forearm.
“Yes, Kiska, I suppose I do still love you. The geas is strong, but I am now stronger. Terrill’s legacy to me.”
Kiska stared stupidly at her ruined hand. Her brown eyes lifted to Lan’s and a frightened look came into them. Lan made a small motion and Kiska k’Adesina fell to the ground, dead.
“You killed her.” Ducasien stared at the woman’s still body.
Brinke gasped and turned shades whiter. She put one hand over her mouth and backed from Lan.
Lan felt only sorrow for Kiska. She had been little more than a pawn in this world-spanning power game.
But Lan felt even sorrier for Brinke. She possessed enough knowledge to understand what he had become. And for Inyx, who saw inside him. She saw what he was still changing into.
“The real conflict lies ahead of us,” Lan said. “We can reach the Pillar of Night in a few minutes, if we hurry.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Lan Martak heard them whispering about him as he strode forward. The awful forest silence became more and more oppressive to him and the small, half-heard words irritated him.
“Either speak your mind or stay silent,” he snapped.
“Lan?” Inyx fell into step beside him. “You’re acting as you did before. We all want to help.”
He looked into her blue eyes and saw nothing but admiration and love there. He fought to hold himself in check.
“You know how I feel? About Kiska?”
Inyx nodded.
Lan looked ahead, not wanting to meet her eyes. “I hate myself for killing her, but if any of you had done it, I couldn’t have stopped myself from exacting revenge. Claybore is a subtle monster. The geas still binds me.”
“She is dead.”
“I still love her.”
Inyx put her arm around his shoulder. When he tried to shrug it off, muscles as strong as any steel band tightened. Lan stopped fighting it and they walked on like this, not speaking. The time for words was long past between them. The communication flowed in both directions, but the power resided mostly within Lan’s mind. Inyx carried some small measure of his energy, his ability, but it was a weak reflection. She understood what he did- and why-but could not work those spells herself. Her part was to give him stability. He trod areas that had driven others insane. Inyx lent support and a firm basis from which to act, but the action itself had to well up from inside Lan Martak.
“We need the Resident,” he said.
“I know. Are you really so concerned about releasing him?”
“He was a god once, until Claybore stole his powers. I do not want the Resident wreaking vengeance on all humanity because of something Claybore alone has done.”
“He knows who is responsible.”
“But he’s a god and who can say what a god thinks?”
Inyx tightened her arm around Lan’s waist.
“No!” Lan snapped. “I am not a god. You know that. Look at me and tell me I’m not a god, also.”
“I can’t, Lan. What is within you is so much more than human it frightens me. Even knowing you as I do, I’m scared.”
“Friend Lan Martak,” called out Krek. “These odious vines are dribbling sap all over my legs. Can we not get
