“What is that?” Darkhorse asked innocently, curious as to this new form.
“An elf.” The sorcerer recalled his one-time desire to capture an elf so that he could dissect it. That desire, that Dru, turned his stomach now. “There have been none in Nimth for thousands and thousands of years.”
“Obviously there are. She is here.”
Dru held back from commenting, having no desire at present to argue about whether this was Nimth or not. He dismounted and looked over the corpse for any clues, any bits of information that would better help him understand his situation. Unfortunately, the elf had nothing with her save her clothing and a tiny knife. The Vraad took the knife gratefully. As tiny as it was, it was still a physical weapon.
At last satisfied that he would find nothing more, Dru mounted up again, saying to Darkhorse, “The things that killed her have a habit of rising from the earth. It would be an excellent idea to keep an eye out… just in case.”
“As you say, little Dru.”
The sorcerer, about to suggest that they move on, shivered as something cold seemed to brush by him. He twisted back, scanning the area around him, but saw nothing. Dru was too experienced to think that he had imagined the sensation. “Darkhorse, was there something near us?”
“One of the concentrations of power passed through us. I think it wanted to know more.”
“It wanted to know?”
“It exists, after a fashion. Much the way you think of me.”
Dru gripped his companion’s mane tight. “It thinks? Why didn’t you say something before? I-”
“I did not know until it actually crossed me. Then I felt its thirst for knowledge-fascinating! Your world never ceases to amaze me! Shall we go forward again?”
“I don’t-” Dru was unable to finish his sentence, for Darkhorse pushed ahead immediately after asking the question, despite whatever opinion his friend might have had. The sorcerer clamped his mouth shut and opened his senses as much as they allowed. Oddly, there was no resistance this time, possibly because he was now attempting to work with the land. In a vague way, the Vraad felt the massive concentrations of power around him and how they moved with purpose, though their patterns might have once appeared random. Dru knew he could not be far from the place that Darkhorse had spoken of. Whether he found anything there…
“You are so very quiet, friend Dru! Are you whole!”
A feeling of unease was gradually creeping over the weary spellcaster. It was as if every bit of rubble had eyes and ears and was following each move the duo made.
“I feel like a blind lamb about to enter the den of a pack of silent, starving wolves.”
Wolves.
Dru gave a start. Darkhorse also tensed. “They are concentrating more and more in one location!”
The Vraad nodded, sensing an overwhelming level of raw power ahead of them. Though other structures still blocked their view, he knew that what he and the ebony stallion sought was very, very near… and it was there that the power concentrated.
Wolves.
There it was again! As if the wind itself had spoken!
“Something happens, friend Dru! Prepare yourself!”
Prepare himself? The sorcerer wanted to know how. His senses warned him that the danger lay everywhere, including above and below him. With his present distrust of his skills, how could he even consider fighting back against…
Against the ruins of the city.
It began with a tremor far worse in intensity than that which had signaled the rise of the underdwellers, the armored monstrosities from below. No, whatever caused the ground to quiver so, if it was not an actual earthquake, was far greater than them.
A building before them exploded, but the fragments, instead of raining down upon the two, flew high into the air above where the edifice had stood. Rubble from the streets flew up after them, joining together and forming great clusters. Nothing was spared; mortar, bits of marble from shattered statues, even vast pieces of the tower they had bypassed… all gathered together.
Beneath the Vraad, Darkhorse shied. There was a limit, evidently, to even his bravery. Had he turned and charged off madly, Dru would have urged him on. As it was, neither of them took up the option of flight. The form slowly taking on vague shape had them almost entranced. It stood taller than the great domed building where the demon steed had rescued his companion. There were four limbs, a tail, which was made at least partially from a column, and, if one stretched the imagination to the limit, a head.
Only when it opened its mockery of a mouth, revealing teeth formed from jagged, broken pieces of stone, did Dru identify it as any particular beast.
It was, as the wind had whispered to him, a wolf… more than forty feet tall.
XI
“Do you like my home, Shari darling?”
“It’s so… alive!” the younger woman breathed. Melenea’s citadel, what Sharissa could see of it, was awash with gay colors and glittering crystals. Silk was everywhere. Figurines of fantastical design capered and celebrated. A furry carpet that Dru’s daughter was tempted to lose herself in covered the entire floor. Bright candles lit up the vast room they had materialized in, candles whose flames were of all sizes and more than a dozen different flickering colors. Panoramas of women and men competing in game after game covered one wall. The Vraadish symbol of gaming, used most often when announcing a forming duel, was the centerpiece of the wall across from the entranceway of the chamber. It would be the first thing someone saw when they entered here. The symbol consisted of two masks, one crying and one laughing, with the former partly obscuring the latter. Sharissa knew that the masks represented the basic aspects of the Vraad mentality.
Her father had summed it up in his own special way. “When your enemy flaunts his weakness, look to your back. When your allies grow too friendly, trust in your enemies.”
Sharissa was not certain she liked what she read into her father’s definition, but she allowed that there was probably some truth to it.
“Have a seat, sweet thing! Rest yourself. I know how terrible things have been for you of late. There’s so much I have to prepare, anyway.”
“I really couldn’t…” Despite her words, Sharissa wanted all too much to relax, to sleep. Her constant fears, the race against time, and the very dominant worry that it might all be for nothing, that her father might be dead, were taking their toll on her again.
“I insist.” Melenea shoved her backward. As Sharissa fell, the thick, shaggy carpet swelled upward, catching her softly in what was, a second later, a comfortable couch. The soothing fur encouraged the young Zeree to rest. “I promise that I will not forget you, Shari. You may count on that.”
It was too overpowering. Sharissa settled in and nodded, already half asleep.
“That’s fine,” the enchantress said, smiling at her guest. She raised a hand, palm upward, and formed a fist. When she opened it again, a small pouch lay within. Melenea took hold of the pouch and opened it. She reached in and pulled out a tiny, squirming figure.
Sharissa, though a part of her wondered what her companion attempted, could not rouse herself to do more than watch through half-closed eyes. Even when the tiny creature, now set loose on the floor, began to grow and grow, the novice sorceress simply stared. It was as if everything around her had taken on a dreamlike quality.
“Come, Cabal,” she heard Melenea say to the creature, a blue-green wolf already as tall as its mistress. It had fangs that seemed as long as Sharissa’s forearm, and though she was in no state to truly count them, she was certain that its teeth numbered more than a thousand.