A biasing beam of violet light sprang from the art! fact, stabbing into the cloud. The dark smoke seemed unaffected by it. In fact, the smoke fractured the ray, splitting it in twain, and the twin beams thus created seemed to stoke the purple glow within the cloud of smoke. Now there were two gaps in the blackness, and from them burned the amethyst light. Holes like eyes, light as of lambent orbs within those sockets.
"I... Nooot" It was the cambion's turn to shriek denial, to try to flinch back to escape what he saw.
"Oh, yes!" laughed a gigantic voice of pure evil.
The top of the dark column had formed itself Into a head. The bright amethyst fires were Tharizdun's own eyes, of course. The being's vast maw was a purple-black deeper than endless night, a lipless mouth with teeth and tusks and fangs in site and profusion beyond belief. Hide as black as Graz'zt's own midnight skin, as hairless as a newborn babe's skin, as hideout as the leathery coverings of the gates of doom. Every unspeakable evil, each blemish of the world's ugliness covered Tharizdun — at least all of the terrible being that was now visible to Gord's horrified gaze... and to the eyes of the shrinking cambion.
"Greatest of Great Evils," Iuz whimpered, "forgive your worthless spawn, Iuz. I beg you to accept my homage, this... this artifact which is truly yours." As he spoke that, Iuz held forth the tripartite instrument. This time, however, he made no attempt to wield its power against the half-formed lord of the netherspheres.
Tharizdun chuckled and drew a deep breath. The relic of his binding, the hoped-for eternity of unending slumber, crumbled into bits, the pieces themselves into flakes. Those in turn became motes, and all vanished into the flaring nostrils of the most vile one.
"Better, little demon, much better." Tharizdun said in a whispery voice. "Now come! Kiss the hand which will rule you!"
The cambion almost flew out of his own bloodhued skin at the command. Then Iuz managed a shaking, trembling bow, and literally leaped to obey. He flew toward the ever more complete being of evil incarnate, saying, "I am your slave. Most Wicked. I am yours to do with as you will."
"Very commendable, Iuz," Tharizdun boomed. The cambion now stood close to him, very close. Tharizdun reached out. Iuz was a rabbit before the paw of a tiger; nonetheless he stood steady and actually kissed the massive hand of the ruler of the depths. "I accept your homage," Tharizdun whispered.
He then spoke further in a voice that rose to a thundering volume again. "I likewise accept your slavery, and now grace your unworthy existence with an act of my own — the first in eons."
"Unto me, Utmost Darkness?"
"Unto you, Iuz-that-was." With a deep laughter that was totally an expression of malign hatred and ineffable wickedness, Tharizdun took the cambion into his monstrous right hand and lifted him high. "Observe the view as your Master sees it," Tharizdun bellowed, still with a voice brimming with evil mirth. Then the terrible god tossed the cambion up, caught him again, and squeezed. A piercing shriek came from Iuz as his bones were splintered, organs ruptured. Pinkish ichor started to flow from his orifices — eyes, ears, nostrils, mouth, everywhere.
Tharizdun's talonlike nails sank deeper into his victim's flesh as he looked down with satisfaction at his handiwork. "Yes, slave, I choose your death now, rather than wait for betrayal and rebellion at a later time." Then the glowing eyes of pure purple looked up from the corpse of Iuz clutched in his hand and out across the chitinous plane. "Now for you, little champion.... Muoohhahahahahal"
Gord had soiled himself in far less threatening circumstances — years before, at a time when he was little and helpless. Yet he thought of that time now, and he felt as powerless as "Gutless Gord" had felt in the grasp of the bully-boy called Snaggle. His knees sagged, his spirit quailed. Gord had found revenge against the ones who had made his childhood a nightmare of fear, hunger, and self-disgust. His reason told him that no such evening of the score would ever occur hereafter. "If that be the case," Gord managed to say to himself aloud, "then why not go as a wolf rather than a rabbit?"
"Go? You will go nowhere!" Tharizdun had heard.
The amethyst eyes bathed Gord with a wash of brightness. "You think to fight against Me. You will attempt to, even though I can break you in one hand as I did the bloated spawn of Iggwilv and Graz'zt! That is stupid. I will kill you easily, if you try."
Gord lowered the tip of his sword, uncertain. It had taken all of his strength, his resolve, to point it at the terrible creature of darkness. Tharizdun was taking time to speak to him, and that made the young man pause.
"Good! Well you might ponder, wonder, consider. I will crush you in an instant if you think to fight against Me. I will accommodate your talents if you serve. Think you that I love or trust the vile dregs of the netherworld who fawn upon Me? Never! They are a race of liars and backbiters, each seeking to usurp My headship. If you swear oath to Me, Gord, accept Me as your King, then I will make you the Lord of Arms of My Kingdom, and that is All... Everything. You will repress all the others, be a Viceroy, have everything I do not desire personally."
* * *
"He is a deceiver, Gord."
"What? Oh.... Tharizdun is false?"
"That, too."
"Of course, but I—"
"You what? Listen? Consider?"
"No. I seek to not fulfill my obligation."
"That one slew me, Gord."
"I think otherwise. Tharizdun has been chained and helpless till this moment."
"Remains thus; and you do not heed. The one you see is the murderer."
"Now... I understand."
"Blessed culmination of my being, all fortune to you."
"Will we speak again thus?" Gord's mental voice was strained, then almost pleading.
That cannot be, as you know in your heart... not yet for ages of your time will we meet otherwise. It is naught. We shall. You are. Let that suffice."
"Thank you, my father."
There was no reply, no form visible to his mind's eye. Gord was again alone, his brain unoccupied by anything save his own thoughts. The voice of the dark, nearly formed Tharizdun penetrated his consciousness.
* * *
"Well? What is your answer, man? I grow impatient. Those who think to be Mine must instantly obey!"
"Obey you? That is a jest!" Gord spat in the general direction of the monstrous being, raising Black-heartseeker as he did so. "I'm loath to spoil this fine weapon by thrusting it into such corruption as you, Tharizdun — but I shall!"
Iuz was still clutched in Tharizdun's huge left hand, the long, misshapen fingers of the malign monster smeared with the cambion's blood. The great right hand stretched forth toward Gord, purple talons as long as scimitars, clicking and rattling eerily as the digits writhed in anticipation. "Come then, Gord-the-dead. It is your doom!"
As the hand suddenly shot toward him, Gord leaped to meet it.
Chapter 16
THE LONG, SALLOW FACE of Gravestone was beaded with sweat, but otherwise there was no sign that he was alive.
He sat, in a trance, upon a flat pad on a steplike dais. It was circular, dark, and graven with sigils and writings of power and warding. Near to him three candles burned, each with a flame the color of its wax — black, plum, deep crimson. From a brass bowl resting on his crossed legs arose smoke, tiny columns of vapors. Each was of a different hue, each betokening one of the netherspheres.
The faint haze reeked of noxious drugs, an odious stench. These drugs aided the priest-mage in his work. When he needed the stuff of flame and incense, the candles flared and smoke streamed upward. A sudden Inhalation, more sweat, then absolute stillness again. The flickering tongues of the candles' flames receded to mere glimmers then, and the tiny streams of noisome stuff resumed their slow rising.