Only then the sorcerer steadied. He seized the crystal with one hand. Fiery forces from Sirrion’s gift poured into the crystal.
With a guttural roar, Tyranos went flying back. He would have fallen to his death, but a gargoyle appeared from behind another building to catch him.
Chasm, who had escaped his captors too late to help Idaria, hefted his master back to the roof. The wizard regained his balance just as Safrag began to pull the staff by its head through his torso. He shot Golgren an incredulous look.
“Even death is transformed by the Fire Rose!” Safrag cried as he tugged the last of the staff free. The removal was accompanied by a horrific sucking sound, for the gaping wound swiftly began to seal itself. There was no sign of blood. In fact, what could be glimpsed inside the Titan’s wound was not akin to tissue, organs, muscle, or even bone. It was as if Safrag were made of one gray, solid material throughout his body.
Tyranos muttered a spell. The staff vanished from Safrag’s hand, returning to his grasp.
The sorcerer remained amused. “Oh, you could have had that back! Once, I might have prized that toy, but now it is nothing, just as you are.”
Pain suddenly wracked Tyranos. He tried to move but could not. Crystalline growths spread over his body.
“I shall shape a temple to honor my achievements, with each of you to mark the passing of an age of fools before the rise of the new Golden Era.”
Tyranos tried another spell, but his mouth was no longer working. As with Morgada, only his eyes remained untouched by the change. The rest of him had become pure, transparent crystal.
Safrag shook his head at the wizard. “One more alteration! Let us see your shame in all its glory!”
The crystallized mage twisted. The harsh crack of glass accompanied each turn, each alteration. Tyranos’s form swelled and his face expanded.
In moments, there stood a statue of a minotaur, a statue whose only sign of life was two glaring eyes.
“Uruv Suurt you were born; Uruv Suurt you shall forever exist!”
Chasm leaped from the shadows, seeking to avenge his master. He got no farther than Tyranos, for the air around him solidified to stone, and the gargoyle was swallowed whole.
“The would-be wizard and his loyal pet. You two act as one; you shall be one.”
The captured gargoyle was flung into Tyranos. The wizard shattered but the pieces immediately flew back, attaching themselves to Chasm. Minotaur and gargoyle were fused together, creating a macabre, crystalline figure with wings, two distinct heads, and eight mismatched limbs, the last of those creating an image reminiscent of a strange arachnid.
The lead Titan started to turn back to the task of remaking his race when he noticed the efforts of his fellow sorcerers. Safrag looked displeased.
The Fire Rose brightened. The other Titans became as wet clay. They shrank slightly and grew broader of shoulder. Their hair reshaped into lion’s manes of gold; their skin became shining silver. Their eyes were piercing black, and instead of five fingers, each hand boasted four elongated ones ending in nails of pearl. They wore full suits of thin, flexible armor that matched their hair in brilliance and color. The only hint of their previous incarnations was the symbol of the Fire Rose that adorned breastplates.
Yet that did not please Safrag either, as one might have expected. He shook his head, declaring, “Not perfect. It must be perfect. I shall have to start all over again.”
At that, a few of the other sorcerers raised their voices in protest. “Great Master,” one called carefully and humbly. “These forms are wondrous! There’s no need for further change! They cannot be outdone!”
“At least experiment on the populace first,” suggested a second. The Titans saw nothing wrong with treating the rest of their race like raw materials to be used however they pleased, but when it came to themselves …
Safrag frowned. He held the Fire Rose high, and a ceiling of flame suddenly draped over the capital and drove back the attacking gargoyles. The winged creatures for the moment no longer held much interest for him, however, and he asked of the dissenters, “Are you then questioning my decisions?”
Those who had protested were quick to shake their heads or answer wisely. Yet still the lead Titan did not look satisfied. He fixed his baleful gaze on the first and second who had spoken.
“Perhaps these forms would be more to your liking,” Safrag said curtly.
The pair shrieked as their bodies bent and twisted. All the beauty of a Titan vanished in each of the two, and a more familiar-not to mention grotesque-shape was theirs.
They had been changed into ordinary ogres. From their expressions, Safrag had left them with all their gained intellect intact, which all the more visibly crushed their spirits.
“Is that more to your liking?” When the pair shook their heads, the lead Titan smiled. The Fire Rose flared, and the two were restored to their previous shapes. Safrag tittered.
Above Garantha, the ceiling of flames faded. The gargoyles immediately resumed their attack, regardless of the great cost to them thus far and the little they had to show for that cost.
“Finish the vermin,” Safrag ordered indifferently. “The power of the Fire Rose flows through me into you. Finish them off and, if you please me, I will deign to hear your thoughts on what the final guise of our race ought to look like.”
The Titans did not hesitate to obey. Again, gargoyles perished by the scores, in numerous and ghastly ways, as the Titans eagerly vented their frustrations on their enemy.
Safrag had almost forgotten Golgren, but it would have been good for the Titan to glance one last time at his foe. He would have seen, then, that the half-breed was free, thanks to Tyranos, who had accomplished that feat-one of two magics he had bestowed on Golgren-before attacking the Titan.
And Golgren stood poised, ready to make use of the second of the wizard’s gifts, when suddenly a voice whispered in his head.
The moment is now. Rise up and reach forth to the Fire Rose. Now.
Although aware that such a strategy at that moment was probably suicidal, Golgren found his body obeying. Against his will, he raced toward the sorcerer.
Somehow Safrag sensed him coming. The Titan spun around and, giving the half-breed a patronizing smile, beckoned him on.
The roof over Golgren became fluid. A raging river of liquefied stone, it washed Golgren toward the waiting Safrag.
Without warning, the Fire Rose quivered and fought to escape the Titan’s grip.
Safrag let out a gasp and held tight his precious prize. The Fire Rose leaned toward Golgren, as if attracted to him.
“No! It’s mine! Mine!” Safrag succeeded in maintaining his hold, yet the Fire Rose continued to strain toward Golgren.
Something broke from it, a small fragment, the very fragment that Safrag had once used to locate the artifact.
Seize it. Seize it, ordered the voice.
Golgren did what the voice commanded. The fragment flew unerringly into his palm. His fingers tightened around it.
Golgren once more stood on a solid surface. He bared his teeth in a grin and displayed the fragment for Safrag to behold.
All else forgotten, the sorcerer laughed harshly. “That tiny bit will avail you nothing, mongrel! The full Fire Rose is a thousand times stronger!”
Sirrion’s creation burned brighter than ever but so, too, suddenly, did the piece that Golgren wielded. A monstrous light erupted around both figures. Heat more scorching than the noonday sun beat down on the two adversaries, yet Golgren and Safrag refused to succumb. A battle of wills took place.
And between the duo materialized a third, terrible being:
Xiryn.