She screamed. Her rune-magic acted to protect her, but the sigla on her skin were starting to wither in the heat.
Swiftly Haplo formed his own runes into a huge spear, cast it at the tytan. The spear slammed into the giant’s chest. The point penetrated flesh and muscle. The tytan was wounded, though not seriously, and in pain. The flames around Marit died.
Haplo caught hold of her, dragged her to where the steering stone rested. Outside the window, he could see two mensch—an elf and a human—waving their arms and dashing frantically around the ship, as if searching for a way in. He paid them scant attention. He placed his hands on the stone and spoke the runes.
Blinding light flared. The sigla on the ship’s walls glowed with dazzling brilliance. The mensch outside the window vanished, as did the citadel and the jungle around it.
They were in Death’s Gate. The tytan was gone.
Colors flashed and swirled: blue water, red fire, green jungle, gray storm, darkness, light. Faster and faster the images spun. Haplo was caught in a whirlwind of color. He tried to fix on a single image, but they all swept past him too rapidly. He could see nothing except the colors. He lost sight of Marit, of Hugh, of the dog.
Lost sight of everything except the Sartan blade. It lay on the deck, a quivering, malevolent force. Once again it was an iron knife. Once again they’d defeated it. But they were nearly finished and the blade’s magic was powerful. It had lasted through centuries, perhaps. Survived its makers. How could he destroy it?
The colors—the choices—swirled around him. Blue. One force existed which might destroy the knife. Unfortunately, it might destroy all of them. Haplo shut his eyes against the colors and chose blue. His ship left Death’s Gate and slammed into a wall of water.
The blur of colors disappeared. Haplo could see the ship’s interior again and, outside the window, the peaceful aqua sea that was the world of Chelestra.
“Where the hell are we now?” Hugh the Hand demanded. He was conscious again, staring in bewilderment out the porthole.
“The fourth world.”
Haplo could hear ominous sounds in his ship. A groan from somewhere in the hold, strange whispering sighs, as if the ship were lamenting its fate. Marit heard them, too. She tensed, looked around in alarm. “What is that?”
“The ship is breaking apart,” Haplo answered grimly. His eyes were on the knife. Its runes glowed faintly.
“Breaking apart?” Marit gasped. “That’s not possible. Not with the rune-magic to protect it. You’re... you’re lying.”
“Fine, I’m lying.” Haplo was too tired, too badly hurt, too preoccupied to argue. Keeping a wary gaze on the knife, he cast a glance around at the steering stone. It stood on a wooden pedestal well above the deck. Still, when the ship began to break up that wouldn’t matter. “Give me your vest,” Haplo told Marit. “What?”
“The vest! Your leather vest!” He glared at her.
“Damn it, I don’t have time to explain! Just give it to me!” She was suspicious. But the creakings were growing louder; the dismal sighs had given way to sharp cracks.
Taking off the leather vest, which was covered with protective runes, Marit flung it at Haplo. He tossed it over the steering stone.
The runes on the Cursed Blade glowed an ugly green. The dog, apparently unhurt and now morbidly curious, crept near, sniffed at the knife. The animal leapt back suddenly, hackles rising.
Haplo looked up at the ceiling. He recalled the last time he’d landed on Chelestra—his ship breaking apart, the rune-magic failing, the water starting to seep through the cracks. Then he’d been amazed, raging, afraid. Now he prayed for a drop.
There it was! A tiny trickle of sea water, running down one of the bulkheads.
“Hugh!” Haplo shouted. “Grab the knife! Put it in the water!” Hugh the Hand didn’t respond. He didn’t move. He was crouched against the hull of the ship, holding on to it for dear life, staring with gaping mouth and frantic eyes at the water.
The water. Haplo cursed himself for a fool. The human came from a world where people fought over water; a bucket of the precious liquid was wealth. He had undoubtedly never in his entire life seen this much water. And he certainly hadn’t seen it as a terrifying fist closing over the ship, slowly crushing its wooden shell.
Perhaps there was no word in the mensch language on Arianus for drowning, but Hugh the Hand didn’t need a word. He could picture such a death vividly. Haplo understood; he’d gone through this himself.
The choking, the smothering, the bursting lungs. Useless to try to explain to Hugh the Hand that he could breathe the water as easily as he could breathe air. Useless to explain to him that if they acted quickly they could leave before the ship broke apart. Useless to remind him he couldn’t die. At this juncture, that might not appear to be much of a blessing.
A drop of water, falling from one of the slowly widen-ing cracks in the wooden hull, fell on Hugh’s face. He shuddered all over, gave a hollow cry. Haplo lurched across the deck. Grabbing hold of the assassin, the Patryn dug his nails into Hugh’s arm. “The blade! Grab it!”
The knife flew from the deck, sprang into Hugh’s hand. It had not altered form, but its greenish glow intensified. Hugh the Hand stared at it as if he’d never seen it before.
Haplo backed swiftly away.
“Hugh!” The Patryn tried desperately to break through the man’s terror. “Put the knife in the water!”
A yell from Marit stopped him.
She was pointing out the porthole, her face pale and horrified. “What... what is it?”
Foul ooze, like blood, stained the water. The beautiful aqua was dark now, and hideous. Two red-green glowing eyes peered in at them, eyes that were bigger than the ship. A toothless mouth gaped in silent, mocking laughter.
“The dragon-snakes ... in their true form,” Haplo answered. The knife. That’s why the Cursed Blade hadn’t changed form. It didn’t need to change. It was drawing on the greatest source of evil in the four worlds. Marit couldn’t look away. Slowly she shook her head. “No,” she said thickly.
“I don’t believe... Xar would not permit it...” She stopped, whispered almost to herself, “The red eyes...”
Haplo didn’t answer. He waited tensely for the dragon-snake to attack, to batter the ship to pieces, seize them and devour them.
But the dragon-snake didn’t, and then Haplo realized it wouldn’t. I grow fat on your fear, Sang-drax had said to him. There was enough fear and hatred and mistrust on board this ship to feed a legion of dragon-snakes. And with the ship breaking apart slowly, the dragon-snake had only to wait for its victims’ magic to diminish and die, wait for them to feel the full extent of their helplessness. Their terror would only increase.
Another snapping crack, a series of cracks from farther back in the ship. Water dripped on Haplo’s hand. The sigla, which had flared blue and red at the appearance of the dragon-snake, began to dim; their light—his magic—was growing faint.
Soon his magic would break apart, as his ship was breaking apart. Revulsion twisting inside him, Haplo reached out and snatched the Cursed Blade from Hugh’s unresisting grasp.
The pain was worse, far worse than if he’d taken hold of a red-hot poker. His instinct was to drop it. He gritted his teeth against the pain, held on. The burning iron seared his skin, melted into it, seemed to flow from his hand into his very veins.
The blade came to life, twisted and wrapped around his hand, burrowed insidiously into his flesh. It devoured his bone. It was beginning to devour him.
Reeling, in a blind and frantic effort to free himself of the pain, he stumbled to his knees, thrust his hand into a pool of water forming on the deck.