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only entrance to the
Dome Chamber; he d left it there because he d need it to move around the
chamber without getting wrapped in one of his own traps. He went through the
arch at its center, turned sharply left, moved along the wall to the first of
the cells then began a careful circuitous almostdance across the floor, staff
held before him to sweep aside the air webs. He reached the chair intact and
immaculate, with a memory of heat close to him. Having seated himself in the
greatchair which was ample enough to hold him with room to spare and more
comfortable than it looked, but not much, he laid his staff across the arms
and settled himself to wait.
A whitish waxy muzzle nosed slowly, awkwardly, through the low arch. He
waited. When the thing emerged a bit more, he was amused to see it was an
inverted table with Brann and Danny Blue crouched be-twe:m its legs. Floating
a yard above the floor, it inched forward until it was clear of the arch then
, stopped, rocking gently as if blown by summer breezes on a sum-mer pond. The
changers followed it in, twin glimmer-spheres so pale they were visible only
as smudges of light against the blackstone wall as they hovered one on each
side of the table.
For a breath or two he considered calling to them, working out some
sort of compromise, but
Amortis was seething overhead, ready to seize and swallow at the first
sign of hesitation, not caring whom she took, him or them, BihYAHtii
trembled on his chest, hungrier and more deadly than the god, and, beyond all
this, he re-membered the thousands of landfolk who d left home and harvest for
him, trying to interpose their bodies between him and those on that table.
There was no room left for talking.
There never had been, really. He swung the staff up, knocked its end against
the dais three times and took all restraints off his voice.  I give you this
warning, he roared at them,  This alone. Leave here. Or die. There is nothing
for you here. While he was still speaking, before the warning was half
finished, he fingered the staff and loosed a sucking airtrap, throwing
it at the table. There were many ways of managing that lift effect; it
didn t matter which Danny Blue had cho-sen, for the trap would negate the
magic behind the effect, send the table crashing to the floor and prison it
with its riders in one or another of the stonetraps.
Nothing like that happened. Danny Blue didn t even try to counter the trap.
While it twined about the table and withered futilely away, Dan spat into his
palm, blew at the spittle. It flew off his hand, elongated into a blue-white
water form that arrowed at Maksim, a water ele-mental (which surprised Maksim
quite a lot since Ahzurdan s forte had been fire and fire-callers, like
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ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
earth-singers, seldom could handle water at all, let alone han-dle it well;
this was either the Godalau s work or the Akamarino melded with him, which
made one wonder what else he could do and what his weaknesses were); Maksim
drew briefly on the chair s power, channeled it through his staff and twisted
a tunnel through the air that sucked in the elemental and flung it into the
bay.
The table moved azhair or two forward. Dan was frowning, trying to read floor,
air, ceiling, walls as
, if he had forty eyes not two. The Drinker of Souls knelt beside him, silent,
frowning, one hand resting lightly on his shoulder. The changers drifted
beside the table, waiting. For what, Maksim did not know, perhaps they wanted
to get closer before they came at him; one thing he did know, he did not want
them anywhere near him. He prodded a reluctant Amortis, ordered her to stir
her-self and start attacking, wanting her to draw the chang-ers into
striking back at her, thereby taking themselves out of the game.
While she shaped and flung a storm of firedarts at the sled, he scanned his
prisoned demons, chose the players for his first demon gambit.
Third cell on the right: small bat-winged flyers with adamantine teeth and
claws, a poison dart
at the tip of whippy tails.
He released the pentacle and sent the fly-ers racing at the sled.
Third cell on the left: one creature there, a knotty tentacled acid
spitter, capable of instantaneous transfer across short distances, capable
also of terrific psychic punches when it was within touching distance.
He tripped the pentacle on this one a few seconds after the other, waiting
until
Danny Blue was focused on the first set of demons, fishing for the release
call that would send them home.
Demons in the remaining ten cells, waiting to be loosed to battle.
In two separate cells, two vegetative serpents thirty feet long and big around
as a man s thigh, immensely powerful with shortrange stunner organs that they
can use to freeze their prey before they drop on it.
In three separate cells, three swarms of Hive de-mons each three inches long,
they suck up magic like flies suck up blood, hundreds of units in each swarm.
In three separate cells, three tarry black leech things, eyeless, with feelers
that they extrude and withdraw into themselves, each with a rhythm of its own;
like the hivers they drink magic rather than blood, they are capable of
sensing traps and avoiding them and nothing but death or dismissal will take
them off a trail they re started on.
A mist creature, a subtle thing, slow, insinuating; given sufficient time it
can penetrate any shield no matter how tight; once in, it consumes whatever
lives inside that shield.
A roarer, a swamp lizard mostly mouth and lungs, it attacks with sound, [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]