Groniev slithered to the ground, stunned, but Faron lurched forward from the impact. As he did so, despera-tion broke him free of whatever fear had restrained him. With a cry of pain and anger he bent forward, snatched up the knife that Groniev had dropped and in one smooth movement hurled it at Dan-Tor.
It was a swift and powerful throw and the knife struck Dan-Tor squarely on the chest.
Then it clattered to the floor.
He doesn’t wear armour, Urssain thought, but his momentary bewilderment vanished as Dan-Tor stepped forward and, taking hold of Faron, lifted him clear of the floor and hurled him against the opposite wall of the room. Again the deed seemed to be effortless.
Urssain needed to feel no pulse to realize that this second impact had killed Faron, but it was Dan-Tor’s casual indifference that chilled him. It was far worse than any callousness or wild-eyed cruelty.
Dan-Tor looked down at the fallen knife. He opened his hand and the knife rose up into it.
Then he extended his other hand, palm upwards, and drove Groniev’s knife into it. It did not penetrate. No scratch appeared, nor blemish. He repeated the attack several times but the hand remained uninjured. ‘You could not wield the weapon that could injure me, commander,’ he said. Then, as if bored, he tossed the knife away idly.
Groniev meanwhile had struggled to his feet. He was leaning against the wall, his eyes wide with terror and rage.
Dan-Tor cast a brief glance at the broken body of Faron, then turned to Groniev. ‘Superior force, com-mander,’ he said quietly. ‘Indeed, vastly superior force.’
Groniev did not reply.
‘And I know my enemy, commander, do I not?’ Dan-Tor went on. ‘I know his very heart; his darkest, closest, fears.’ The tone of his voice made Urssain shiver. Dan-Tor held out his arm to the stunned audience. ‘As for leadership, let your men choose now who they wish to follow.’ No one moved.
‘What was your other point?’ he said thoughtfully. ‘Ah yes, the terrain. Well… ’ He paused. ‘I know and understand that better than you can begin to imagine.’
Groniev, still leaning on the wall, looked hastily from side to side, seeking an escape from his plight. Urssain felt again a brief sympathy for this fellow creature caught in the path of a force he could not begin to understand, but it faded rapidly. The man had seen the destruction of Vakloss; if he chose to dispute with its perpetrator then let him take the consequences.
Dan-Tor raised his right hand towards Groniev as if he were about to offer a blessing. With a flesh-crawling screech of protest, a wide and jagged crack appeared in the wall immediately behind the commander and, with a surprised cry, he tumbled backwards into it.
Several of the watching officers moved forward instinctively but a wave of Dan-Tor’s left arm froze them all where they stood.
Groniev managed to regain his balance, but even as he did so, the crack closed a little, wedging him tightly and he let out a brief but unexpectedly fearful shout.
Urssain remembered that Groniev had a morbid and abiding fear of enclosed places. He felt Oklar’s spirit filling the room.
‘I know and understand my terrain, commander,’ Dan-Tor repeated. Then, slowly, as if to a foolish child, ‘And I am master over all that shape and form it. From the weather-blasted peaks of the highest mountains, through the choking, suffocating dust of the southern deserts, to the rocks that lie bound helpless and airless in the dark, crushing, depths far below us; the rocks from which this tower is built.’
As he spoke, the crack slowly began to close and Groniev began to struggle desperately.
‘Do you doubt this, commander?’ Dan-Tor contin-ued.
Groniev opened his mouth as if to reply, but all that emerged was a choking cry; a cry of terror that began to rise rapidly in pitch and intensity, until it was a howling, pleading scream.
Urssain then saw that the crack was not crushing Groniev as he had imagined, but closing around him so that soon he would be entombed. Groniev’s scream became one of primeval, inhuman terror. Urssain tried to swallow, but could not; the scream seemed to resonate with every tiny, unreasoned fear lurking in the dark unknown reaches of his own spirit. And it went on and on and on…
Then the crack was gone, closed utterly, and the last shrieking note of Groniev’s nightmare rose into the dank silence of the room and died.
All that could be heard then was a faint and distant stirring as of some tiny burrowing rodent scuttling behind a panel, though it seemed to Urssain that the whole room was vibrating with the frenzy of Groniev’s demented struggling.
Dan-Tor stared pensively at the wall for a moment. Urssain noted that he was leaning slightly towards his wounded side as if it were troubling him.
The officers, somehow released from their paralysis, seemed unable to look at each other. All were pale and visibly shaken. Some sat down heavily, as their legs refused to support them. One man vomited.
Dan-Tor remained standing, staring at the wall for a long time, as if awaiting some event, then, though he made no movement that Urssain could see, the crack opened again, silently and suddenly, and Groniev slithered from it. As he crawled clear, the crack closed with what, it seemed to Urssain, was almost a sigh.
Groniev lay at Dan-Tor’s feet and made no effort to rise. His choking breaths were as inhuman as had been his screams.
Dan-Tor signalled to two men at random. ‘Take him and leave him in the valley somewhere,’ he said.
Wrinkling their noses, the two men hoisted Groniev into a standing position. He was unable to walk so they placed his arms roughly around their shoulders and hauled him hastily from the room. His feet dragged lifelessly.
Urssain stepped aside as they passed. Groniev’s finger nails were torn and bloody. And he stank! Urssain’s stomach heaved as the smell wafted past him, but he fought down the spasm. Worse than that was the slack-jawed mouth and the dreadful blankness in Groniev’s eyes. Whatever he had been, he was that no more. The Ffyrst had weapons far worse than death ready to hand.
Dan-Tor watched the departure of the would-be usurper impassively and then turned his attention to the shocked officers, awaiting their own sentence in silence. Those who had sat down, stood again, as inconspicu-ously as they could.
‘As for you, gentlemen,’ Dan-Tor began. ‘I own to a mistake.’ His voice, however, lacked the self-reproach of the words. ‘A mistake in trusting in your loyalty, a mistake in imagining that you knew where your best interests lay, a mis… ’
‘No, Ffyrst,’ began the cries before he could con-tinue.
‘We were lied to and misled-threatened-forgive us, Master,’ was the gist of the ensuing babble.
Dan-Tor watched impassively. Then he stepped forward and walked among them. Tall and straight, and the desperate focus of all there, he was like a hunter surrounded by his fawning dogs.
Abruptly, he was almost avuncular. ‘Gentlemen,’ he said, smiling. ‘I think perhaps you persuade me. These… misunderstandings… are the inevitable conse-quence of our confinement here. Men such as yourselves-warriors-fretful at such inactivity when a treacherous enemy lies so near, can easily fall pray to the corrupting forces that pervade these times. But you are officers, leaders, you must be vigilant. Doubts and lies can be as deadly weapons as swords and spears.’
He looked around at his audience. ‘Sit down,’ he said, making a signal to Urssain and Aelang to remain standing. ‘I reproach myself a little for allowing this to arise. I’ve been too long away from you, occupied with matters of wider strategy. Tell me now your fears and concerns so that I can undo the work of those traitors.’