Umbra’s hand tumbled from the end of his arm, spewing thick black fog over the ground. Neeva toppled over backward and lay shivering as the shadow fingers slipped from her body and drained into the ground.
Bellowing in anger, Gaanon stepped forward and leveled his mighty club at the shadow thing. Like Neeva’s axe, it passed through the black body without harm, snapping like a twig when it smashed into the ground. Umbra kicked at the half-giant, planting his foot squarely in the big gladiator’s chest and driving him to the ground.
Screaming in agony, Gaanon tried to roll away. His efforts were to no avail, for Umbra kept him pinned securely in place as a pool of blackness slowly spread across the half-giant’s torso.
Rikus struck at the shadow giant’s legs. Again, the blade bit into the black form. The dark beast cursed in a series of deep-throated gurgles that no human tongue could reproduce, then slapped the mul with his good hand. The blow knocked the Scourge of Rkard from the gladiator’s grasp, but the only thing Rikus felt was a terrible chill that took his breath away and made his bones ache at the marrow. Rikus tried to reach for his sword, but his cold-muted reflexes were slow to obey. The weapon clattered to the ground a few feet away.
“Vorpal steel,” Umbra hissed angrily. “Where did you come by that?”
As Umbra finished his question, the sound of sizzling and sputtering echoed off the rocky walls of the gorge. A short distance away, a curtain of shimmering air shot from one wall of the canyon to the other. The fleeing Urikites, more frightened of their pursuers than the magic before them, paid the translucent barrier no attention and continued to run. As the first wave approached the strange obstacle, they suddenly cried out and turned away. Their efforts did not save them. The press of those following drove them forward. As each man came close to the curtain, he burst into flame, then disappeared in a puff of black smoke.
Umbra looked toward the commotion and again uttered a curse in his strange language. Rikus threw himself toward his sword, passing over it in a rolling fall. He grabbed the hilt and returned to his feet in the same swift motion, lashing out at Umbra in a sweeping crossbody slash.
The blade sliced through empty air, for the shadow giant had already turned away. The dark creature was striding purposefully toward the curtain of searing air, the stump of his shadowy forearm trailing black mist.
Rikus went to Neeva’s side and helped her to her feet. “Are you hurt?”
“Frozen to the bone, but not hurt,” she said. She rose and retrieved a pair of obsidian short swords from fallen Urikites, then looked toward the shimmering curtain up the canyon. “What’s that?”
“Caelum and Jaseela, I hope,” Rikus said. He looked to Gaanon. “What about you?”
The half-giant forced himself to rise. “Just c-cold,” he answered, wavering on his unsteady feet. “I’m not injured.” He tried to step toward Rikus, but his frozen legs hardly moved and he fell face-first to the ground.
“Wait here. The sun will warm you,” Rikus said, motioning for Neeva to follow him.
“No, wait!” cried Gaanon, again rising. “I’m fine.”
Once more, the half-giant’s legs failed him. He collapsed to the ground, still protesting that he was ready to fight.
On the other side of the curtain, Jaseela pointed at the shimmering barricade and glared down at Caelum with her torpid eye. “This thing-”
“It’s a sun fence,” Caelum offered.
“Whatever it is, it isn’t a part of Rikus’s plan!” she snapped.
“Rikus’s plan, if he has one, is no masterwork,” the dwarf replied.
Along with K’kriq, they stood atop an outcropping of granite, more or less in the center of the thin line formed by Jaseela’s small company of retainers. Through the ripples of Caelum’s sun fence, they could barely see the Urikites pushing one another forward and bursting into flames as they neared the scorching barricade.
“Fence burn up prey,” K’kriq observed. “Leave no food for pack.”
“We’re not eating the Urikites,” Caelum growled.
K’kriq looked down his proboscis and clacked his mandibles at the dwarf. “Pack large-need much meat,” the thri-kreen said. “K’kriq know what you do. Hide all for self.”
Caelum looked away, disgusted.
“Take it down!” Jaseela said.
“I won’t,” the dwarf objected. “This is the most efficient way to stop the Urikites.”
“And keep my company out of the fight,” the noblewoman objected. “My retainers didn’t march halfway across Athas to watch the final-”
Jaseela’s mouth dropped open, and she did not complete her thought, for something else had seized her attention. Approaching from the other side of the sun fence was a figure as tall as a full giant and as black as a well-bottom.
“What, by Kalak’s grave, is that?”
“From Neeva’s descriptions, I’d say it’s Umbra,” the dwarf replied.
The shadow giant took two long strides and was standing at the wall, looking down on the barrier with two eyes of gleaming blue. After a moment’s consideration, he stooped over and a billowing cloud of black fog issued from his mouth. It settled over the sun fence like a pall, opening a gap more that a dozen yards wide before it dissipated into the ground.
Caelum’s face went pale. “It cannot be!” The dwarf grabbed Jaseela’s arm. “Scatter your company. Tell them to run!”
The noblewoman jerked her arm free. “I’ll do no such thing. We came to fight, and fight we shall.” She waved her arms at both flanks of the line, yelling, “To the center! Plug the gap!”
It was difficult to tell whether the officers could hear her all down the line, but even if they couldn’t, her gestures and the situation were sufficient to make her meaning clear. As the first Urikites began to pour through the gap, Jaseela’s retainers rushed to meet them. The chime of clashing blades and the screams of dying men rang off the walls of the narrow gorge, with more men from each side pouring into the battle each second.
Though the Tyrian retainers held their ground well enough, Caelum felt sick to his stomach with dread. “I beg you, my lady, sound the retreat before it is too late. Our enemy is too powerful-”
“Be still,” said Jaseela. “Just because a walking shadow undoes your magic-”
“It is not my magic that he overcame,” Caelum said. “It was the sun’s!”
Ignoring him, the noblewoman stepped to the front edge of the outcropping. As the last of her retainers poured into battle, she shouted encouragement and commands with equal vigor. Although the Urikites outnumbered her men and were fighting with the desperate urgency of doomed soldiers, her company was holding the gap.
When Umbra stepped into the breach, however, Jaseela’s pride changed to concern. The shadow giant studied the battle raging at his feet for a moment, then passed his wounded wrist over the combatants. Long wisps of black vapor trailed from the stump and hung in the air.
“What’s he doing?” Jaseela demanded. “Caelum?”
The dwarf did not hear her. He stood in deep concentration, one glowing hand raised to the sun and the other stretched out over the edge of the outcropping.
As Jaseela watched, the shadow giant spread more of the black vapor in the air. The dark mist coalesced into a thin cloud and spread outward, passing over the noblewoman’s head and engulfing all of her army. At the same time, Umbra grew visibly thinner, until his limbs were no thicker than those of a half-giant. The shadow giant then began to shrink to a height proportionate with those limbs.
The black cloud began to descend like a fine mist. Almost as one, the Urikites stopped fighting and, screaming in mortal terror, threw themselves on the ground.
In that moment, Jaseela realized that she had been wrong not to listen to Caelum. “Retreat!” she called. “Run!”
Her cries did no good; the Tyrian retainers were so confused by the Urikites’ behavior and the black cloud that was settling over them that they were incapable of any cohesive action. Some of them turned to flee, as she had ordered. Some hacked mercilessly at the bodies of their prone enemies. Still others pulled their cloaks over their heads as if a thin layer of cloth would protect them from the dark fog descending on them.