'You and Curley hurry to our friends' need,' Gellor said firmly. 'Hew the demons down! I'll counter Gravestone's dweomers with my music — I
For a moment the big hillman hesitated, torn between his desire to hack the priest-wizard to pieces and the logic of what the bard said. 'All right.' he growled. 'You keep the filthy scum in check for a few minutes, then we'll come to help you finish the business. Come on, Curley. We've got a couple of lousy demons to deal with.'
Greenleaf would have laughed at those words, only his throat was somehow constricted and no laugh would come. Deal with a pair of demons? Chert made it sound like a hawking after hares! More likely it would be doom for them or Gellor. No, probably doom for them all. Without Gord they didn't have much chance. Still, the plan Gellor had sketched was the only one that had any hope at all.
'I'm coming. Chert,' the druid managed to say, hurrying and puffing as he trotted after the barbarian. 'Slow up a bit, for we should fall upon the enemy together as a force!'
As the two dashed off to assist in the fight against the demons. Gellor drew forth his slender little harp, placing a ring upon his right forefinger as he gently touched the silver and gold strings of the kanteel. With care he sang a song whose verses had immediate effect. The one-eyed man was suddenly beside the demonurgist, and the latter was just as quickly immersed in black rituals of magic to counter the dweomer of the music Gellor played and sang. The denizens of the netherspheres who had been surrounding Gravestone vanished at the first of the troubador's notes. The two were alone in their contest.
Shabriri happened to be the closer of the two ancient demons to Chert, so Brool sang its song for the multi- eyed demon's discomfiture. Chert came running, swinging the massive battleaxe at waist height as he rushed into the fray. Its edge took Shabriri's scaled calf, laying it open. Ichor flowed, and the demon snarled at the stinging pain. It was far from a telling blow, but the hillman saved Timmil's life by his sudden onslaught. Shabriri had been about to finish the priest. Now the great elder demon had another foe to contend with. As Shabriri turned and battled with the wild giant. Timmil crawled off a little way and tried to gather strength to resume the fight. He was weak, nearly dead, but the old cleric was not ready to surrender to the mercy of a demon!
It was much the same with the druid's reinforcement of Allton. The lion-maned mage had nearly exhausted his spells, and was in sore straits when Greenleaf arrived to do battle with Pazuzeus. The enchanted staff that the druid wielded and his store of dweomers sufficed to save Allton from death, but the archmage was in no position to take advantage of the arrival of help by pressing his own attack. As Green-leaf contested with the huge demon. Allton retreated out of harm's way for a moment and sought remedies for his ebbing strength.
There was a series of terrible exchanges between demon and druid. The latter dealt great harm to Pazuzeus, no question. Allton saw the ancient one of demoniacal evil reel and writhe from spell and staff as Curley Greenleaf fought valiantly against the fiend. Even after all that the mighty demon had undergone before, however, his power was too great for the druid. Inexorably, the might of Pazuzeus was wearing down Greenleaf. Allton had to rejoin the battle and even the odds. Only a short step from the gates of death himself, the wizard set his face in a determined line and came forward again. Just then, the demon struck Greenleaf with some spell or force that caused the druid to scream and fall senseless.
Nearby. Chert was faring but little better in his light with the huge Shabriri. Seared, battered, bleeding from many wounds, the barbarian still stood firm and struck. Brool's kiss had left the demon a gory reminder from leg to torso, but no blow from the edge of the enchanted axe had been telling. Hurt, weakened, but by no means on the verge of defeat, Shabriri was devising his final stratagem, the attack with which he would slay the barbarian who dared stand and fight against him, when Timmil reentered the melee.
'Demon!' The priest's voice was an unnatural boom. Shabriri spun toward the challenge, startled and surprised. The cleric's staff was cast aside, its force exhausted, but Timmil grasped his amulet of faith, and the pure metal of the symbol glowed with a radiance that nearly blinded the demon.
'Back to the dark netherworld forever!' Timmil commanded as he advanced. 'Never return, spawn of the elderdregs!'
Shabriri took a small step backward, more in uncertainty than fear. The cleric was no longer powerful enough to exorcise him, that the demon knew with certainty. Then his long-nailed foot slipped just a little on the blood his raking talons had drawn from Chert's body. Shabriri directed his multi-eyed gaze down to the floor for a second. The demon had no intention of slipping and falling, of being laid prone and vulnerable.
That was all the opportunity Timmil needed. With a resounding shout of triumph, the priest launched himself through the air, grabbed the huge creature, and spoke a word of condemnation. That potent word carried Timmil and Shabriri both from the place to the depths of the netherplane that was Shabriri's own. Chert saw the flash, heard the rolling thunder of the consignment, and wept.
As if in a ritualized ceremony, a tragedy with a prescribed conclusion, Allton was engaged in a desperate act even as the old antagonist of demonkind sacrificed himself to exile Shabriri. The mage had no great spells left, no power in his castings, no repository of energy with which to continue on against Pazuzeus — except one. His staff still contained some strength, and Allton now used it to smite his demoniacal foe. As he struck, he recited the syllables of release, of unleashing, of direction. Each had its purpose, one to channel dweomer one way, another to send energy another, a third to free power, a fourth to change forces in some fashion.
Four and more Allton cried aloud as he struck. Each took effect. The staff was a tuner, a receiver and transmitter of energies as well as a store for such forces. It resonated, opened channels, sent forth rays, drew power, and it did so all in an instant of time.
'Cease, foo-' was all Pazuzeus managed to bellow before the ancient construction of wood and metal and magical bindings malfunctioned. The event occurred just as its wielder knew it would. Too many energies flew from it, too many currents were drawn into its confines — far, far beyond the capacity of its strength.
A tiny rupture between its forces and the negative flow of the anti-world occurred. The fabric of the multiverse mended itself quickly enough. Only a brief spurt of the dark energy came out to meet the raging blazes of power from other places. But even as the demon tried to shout, to delay, even to beg a truce, the dark and light blended and devoured each other. Only a little of the bright disappeared, enough to balance the negative — but the great force of that brief transfer of energy blew the ancient staff to nothingness. The eruption of power from that explosion devoured demon and mage alike in a pink-white flash that sent Curley Greenleaf farther along the path toward death's looming gates.
The condemnation of Shabriri to the depths of wherever he sprang from, Timmil's sacrifice, and that of Allton at nearly the same time, made Gellor falter in his contest. The demonurgist blinked too, but he recovered more quickly. He sent forth a wave of unmaking, a power stolen from the archmage Mordenkainen. Its force disjoined the song of his enemy, scattered its dweomer, broke the strings of the kanteel the troubador held. The rebounding of the bard's own casting stunned him, and Gellor was laid low instantly.
'Five in the pot,' Gravestone said with a sneer. 'One more to make the dish better still, and then my feast is done!'
Chapter 15
The shark-toothed rocks rushed to meet his body, to impale his helpless flesh upon their waiting points. But Gord simply willed it otherwise, and it was. He fell no longer; rather he strode along a dun road in a wild land of twisted trees and formless evils.
Was this another of the demonurgist's creations? Perhaps… but there was a subtle difference here. Wherever he looked Gord could see clearly, as if mighty beams of light sprang from his eyes, and nothing could escape his gaze here.
'I would the road were smooth,' he muttered. At his command the surface under the soles of his high boots became as a polished floor of marble.
'Let me ride a mighty destrier,' he thought, and suddenly the young champion was astride the broad back of a stallion. Despite different saddle and barding, Gord knew the animal instantly. 'Blue Murder! Valiant steed of younger days, how came you here?' The stallion whickered and shook its head at the words as if relating his surprise at finding himself as Gord's mount in this strange realm.
