of light, with glowing tendrils arcing out in shades of blue and white-like the spines of a sea anemone. These were their spirits, easily discerned, while their flesh showed hardly at all. Bone and muscle seemed to have almost disappeared, becoming a cloudy nimbus. But still their shapes could be seen. Their skin was but a transparent sac, like the skin of jellyfish, and within that sac their spirits burned, giving light.
Fallion was surrounded by wyrmlings. The creatures were far larger than humans, though they were human in form. Each stood nearly eight feet tall, had broad shoulders, and could not have weighed less than four hundred pounds. Many were at least six hundred. The bony plates on their foreheads were topped with stubs that looked as if they would sprout horns, and their canines were overlarge. Their cruel faces seemed to be twisted into permanent sneers.
Wyrmling guards watched at every door, and three dignitaries stood at the foot of a throne. The light within these wyrmlings was very dim. Fallion could see black creatures, fluttering and indistinct, that fed upon their souls- the loci, parasitical beings of pure evil.
Fallion was not surprised by the loci s presence. His foster sister Talon had warned him that the wyrmlings had been raised to serve the loci. The wyrmlings vied for the parasites, believing that to be infected by a locus granted them immortality. They believed that their spirits were mortal, and could become immortal only once they were subsumed into immortal loci.
Upon the floor sprawled human prisoners, small folk like Fallion-people from his own world. Their innocent spirits shone as bright as stars. There was a mother, a father, and three children. They were roughly bound so that ankles and legs lay bleeding and, in the case of the father, twisted and broken.
Upon a dais sat a creature that horrified Fallion. It was not as large as a wyrmling, and not as deformed in the face. Thus, Fallion realized that it was one of the folk of Caer Luciare, who were giants by the standards of Fallion s world.
So, Fallion decided, it was a man, with long hair. Like the folk of Caer Luciare, who had been bred to war for countless centuries, he did not look entirely human. His face was narrower than a wyrmling s, and his skull was not as heavily armored. The bony plate on his forehead was not nearly so pronounced, and his canines were not so large.
His raven hair was tied at the back, and his haggard face shaven clean. His skin was rough and unhealthy, and his cheekbones were pronounced, as if he were half-starved. But he was not unpleasing to the eye. Almost, Fallion realized, he was handsome.
It was not his features that horrified Fallion: it was the creature that dwelt within this man. There was a locus feeding upon his bright spirit, a locus so dark and malevolent, Fallion could feel its influence from across the room. Indeed the evil seemed to be sprawling, and the locus was so massive that it could not fit within the fleshly shell of its host. Other loci were often not much larger than cats. But this one was vast and bloated, and it crouched, feeding upon its host s bright spirit, a spirit so luminous that Fallion could only imagine that the host had been a virtuous man, blameless and honorable-not some wyrmling horror.
The locus s sprawling gut filled more than half of the room. Indeed it seemed almost like the abdomen of a black widow spider, so huge that the belly dwarfed its head.
Fallion s captor dropped him to the floor.
In utter darkness, a voice spoke. 'Welcome to Rugassa, Fallion Orden.' The voice was deep, too deep to be human. It came from the lord who sat upon the dais. It came from the locus. The creature knew Fallion s name. 'I know that you are awake.'
'You speak my tongue?' Fallion asked.
'I speak all tongues,' the locus said, 'for I am the master of all worlds. I am Lord Despair. Serve me, and you shall be spared.'
Only then was Fallion sure where he stood. He was in the presence of the One True Master of Evil, who had tried to wrest control of the Rune of Creation from mankind, and who had shattered their perfect world into innumerable shards.
'I will not serve you,' Fallion said. 'I remember you, Yaleen. I remember when I served our people under the One True Tree. You could not sway me with your beauty then; you will not sway me with the horror that you have become.'
Fallion had fought a locus before. Using his flameweaving skills, he d created a light so bright that it pierced a locus and burned it.
Quick as a thought, Fallion reached out with his senses and grasped for the warmth of the wyrmling guards. Their bodies were massive and held more heat than the human prisoners might have. Fallion planned to suck their warmth into himself.
Ghostly red lights fluoresced as heat streamed toward him.
But as quickly as he reached out, he felt a stab of ice lance through him, and his own inner fire raced away, along with the heat that he d hoped to steal. Ice lanced through his guts.
'Aaaaagh,' Fallion cried as indescribable agony sought expression. He was suddenly swimming in pain, struggling to remain conscious.
Now he knew for certain: the Knight Eternal who stood over him was a flameweaver of consummate skill. It had to be Vulgnash.
Lord Despair said, 'If you will not serve me, you shall suffer. How great your suffering will be, you cannot guess. I have tasted such suffering in part, and even I could not bear it.'
Lord Despair clapped his hands. A guard brought a single thumb-light into the room, a tiny lantern that might have been carved from amber, with a wick that gave off no more flame than a candle. It allowed Fallion to see, though wyrmlings had to squint away.
The wyrmling guard wore armor carved from the bone of a world wyrm, armor as white and as milky as his warty skin. He strode among five human prisoners, letting the light shine above them so that Fallion could see. The first that he revealed was a child of four, a girl in a humble sacklike dress with golden hair whose face was a mask of purple bruises. Next to her lay a boy of twelve, some farm boy with two broken arms twisted and tied behind his back. Beyond was a woman who was obviously his mother, for they both had the same dark hair. She lay as if lifeless, though her chest rose and fell. Her bloody skirts suggested that the wyrmlings had put her through unspeakable torments.
Next to them was the father, a broken bone protruding through his leg. Last of all was a small boy of two, wrapped in a fetal position, his face a mask of terror.
They ve captured a whole family, Fallion felt sure. They went into some farm cottage and ripped these poor folk from the lives that they had loved.
It s my fault, he thought. I m the one who bound the worlds together.
Some of the prisoners now tried to struggle. The mother looked up around the room at her tormentors with eyes red and glazed from weeping.
'Pain can be a wondrous inducement,' Lord Despair said to Fallion in his deep voice. 'And you shall feel wondrous pain. Of all the worlds that you could have bound together, these two offer the greatest possibilities. The tormentors of Rugassa have been perfecting their art for five thousand years. Among all of my shadow worlds, there are no better. And now, because of you, they shall take their art to a higher level, to heights undreamed.'
He s going to kill the prisoners, Fallion thought. He ll torture them to death for his own amusement. Fallion had seen such tortures before, when the locus Asgaroth had taken men and threaded poles through them, leaving them skewered but somehow still alive as he raised their racked bodies up for the world to see.
But no torture was forthcoming. Instead, the Knight Eternal growled an order. Another guard came into the room bearing a red pillow.
Upon it were five small rods, each the length of Fallion s hand and as thick as a nail. Upon the head of each rod was a rune, bound within a circle.
These were forcibles, the branding irons that allowed a Runelord to draw attributes from his vassals so that he could garner their strength and speed, their beauty and wisdom.
Fallion had never tasted the kiss of a forcible. On his world the blood metal that they were forged from was so rare that only the wealthiest and most powerful lords ever owned it. And though Fallion s father had bequeathed him some forcibles, Fallion had refused to use them for a more important reason: he had not been able to stand the thought of drawing out the wit from a man in order to boost his own intelligence, for in doing so, he would turn that
