Issola

“Sethra, are we going to attack?”

“Bide, Vlad. I’m not yet certain.”

I bit back more questions, and waited.

“There!” said Sethra, suddenly.

I looked where she was pointing, and saw a dark figure standing, about as far from the Jenoine as we were, but on the opposite side.

“It’s Barlen,” said Loiosh.

“He should help.”

I glanced at Verra, and saw her locking eyes with Barlen briefly. I felt smug, as if I’d caught her at something; supposedly they were ancient enemies and lovers. That’s the sort of thing gods do, you know. It’s all in the legends. If this thing continued. I was going to have to start believing in legends.

Then the other Lords of Judgment appeared. Four ... six ... maybe ten of them, spreading out over the area. Some I might have recognized from the Halls of Judgment if I’d been closer. Some of them appeared to be more or less human from this distance, others not—I recognized one figure that seemed to be nothing more than a burning stick; another took the form of a cat-centaur; there was a thing that reminded me a little of that chunk of trellanstone, only with legs and spindly little arms; yet another seemed like a walking prism, at least, there were a lot of colors, and my eyes couldn’t focus on it; and there was even a dragon which, from across a long distance, seemed almost to catch my eye for an instant, as if it knew me. I stared back. Could it be that one from the Paths of the Dead? No, for some reason, it didn’t seem like that dragon. Eventually it looked away, leaving me wondering.

“Sethra,” I said. “Is this it? I mean, is this going to be the cataclysmic battle between the gods and the Jenoine? And, if so, may I please be excused?”

The Enchantress of Dzur Mountain didn’t look at me, but said, “I sincerely hope not, Vlad. This would be a bad place for such a battle; the results would be unpredictable. But it might happen. My hope is just to keep them away from the Sea and unable to use it, and to inflict enough punishment on them to discourage them from trying again. And to answer your other question, no, you may not. We may require that artifact you’re carrying, and someone who knows how to use it.”

Wonderful.

The Jenoine were looking around them, and, as far as I could tell, did not seem unduly disturbed.

“All right,” said Sethra. “Let’s move in.”

Just exactly what I wanted to do. But they all just nodded, so I did too. They all started closing in on the Jenoine, so I did too. They all put expressions on their faces like they were ready to conquer or die, so I did too.

“Do you do everything they do, Boss?”

“Sure.”

“If they all jumped into the Sea of Amorphia, would you do that, too?”

“Not again.”

“Heh.”

Rocza shifted on my shoulder, and I caught the psychic whispers of Loiosh telling her something—she probably didn’t like the place much. Well, who did?

We moved closer to them—so did the gods. If I’d been at­tuned to more levels of magic, I have no doubt I would have detected all sorts of powerful enchantments swirling about above the place that was itself the most powerful of enchantments. I set Spellbreaker spinning a bit faster.

“I’d really like to be somewhere else, right about now.”

“Oh, c’mon, Boss. Where’s your sense of history?”

“I like to read about history, not make it.”

“You see, Boss? It’s because of attitudes like yours that there are so few human heroes.”

“And so many humans.”

“Heh.”

Rocza shifted again on my shoulder.

“How is she doing, Loiosh?”

“She’ll be fine, Boss.”

“Are you sure? She seems nervous.”

“Right, Boss. As opposed to you and me?”

“Good point.”

We continued on, another step, two, three, closer to where the Jenoine stood, on the very edge of the Sea.

“Boss, does this remind you at all—”

“No. It doesn’t. Shut up.”

I realized that I was still avoiding looking at the amorphia—sort of skirting it with my eyes. I didn’t want to look at the Jenoine, either, but I made myself. I watched them, and tried to keep an eye on our Divine allies. This really was shaping up to be one of those battles they write songs about. I wondered if I’d get mentioned—the Easterner, Jhereg, outcast, walking around unarmed except for a length of chain that was useful for blocking magic of a kind that I wasn’t going to encounter here. Maybe Teldra and I could find a quiet spot and continue our discussion of the philosophy of courtesy. I had enjoyed that. In fact, on reflection, I had enjoyed that more than I had enjoyed anything for several years. Strange, isn’t it? I hadn’t even realized it at the time, but trapped on a world not my own, perhaps in a universe not my own, held by godlike beings intent on some ineffable evil, Teldra and I had sat back and had the sort of discussion that I most enjoyed, the sort that Cawti and I had once had.

Bugger. This was not precisely the right time to start feeling maudlin. But those were my thoughts as I moved toward destiny or whatever it was I moving toward. Destiny, a spot in a ballad, or a quick death, maybe, if the Jenoine noticed me, or if I slipped a little and fell into that.

As deaths go, that one wouldn’t be bad.

I mean, dying in pain has never been high on my list of desires. But, on the other hand, I’m not real fond of the death that comes on you out of nowhere, not even giving you time to realize that you’re going. When I had thought about it—and, my line of work, I had found my thoughts often straying toward that most morbid of all subjects—I had often felt that I wanted to go peacefully, while awake, not in pain, but aware that I was going—with time to say goodbye to life, so to speak, even if it were only to be a temporary goodbye until an awak­ening in the Paths or in a new incarnation. But then, I won­dered, what if I got that, and, in the event, proved craven? The last moments of life have always seemed to me to be a good time for a last mental balance sheet—a chance to say to yourself: Okay, how did I do? How terrible to arrive at that point rea­sonably happy, only to find that in your last extremity you lost your dignity with your life, and that your whole image of yourself was proved to be only a lie! Rather than that, I’d prefer to go in my sleep, which I’ve always dreaded; or even by the sudden hand of an assassin, as has seemed most likely for the past several years, or perhaps by a wrong step into amorphia.

Sorry to drag you along for all of this, but, as I say, those were my thoughts at that moment, and if I had to live through them, you have to as well. Deal with it.

Ummm ... would you be mad at me if, after all of this buildup, nothing much happens? Heh. Don’t worry about it. Stuff happens.

Distantly, in the back of my head, as it were, I was aware of Loiosh communicating with Rocza, who seemed to settle down a bit.

We were walking directly toward the Jenoine, but the Lords of Judgment weren’t—they were instead spreading out, as if to protect against a retreat. Myself, I was all in favor of permitting the Jenoine to retreat if they wanted to. But why did we have to be the group that moved toward them? Two answers popped into my head at once: first, we had the Great Weapons, and, second, I had no doubt that it was Sethra Lavode who was giving the orders.

There was even someone or something above the Jenoine at least, there seemed to be a hovering sort of darkness about fifty feet up that appeared thick enough either to contain some thing sentient, or perhaps even to be something sentient, though if it was it was nothing I wanted to get to know personally.

Aliera said, “Sethra, look.”

We all stopped and looked, and discovered that we were, in fact, not the only ones moving directly at the Jenoine: the dragon was, too.

“Well, that is hardly surprising,” said Sethra.

“Who is it?” asked Aliera.

“You don’t know?”

“No, should I?”

“Yes.”

“Well then, who—”

“Not now,” said Sethra. She frowned, and finally said, “Very well. Leave her alone, we’ll adjust.”

I wasn’t sure I liked the sound of that, but it wasn’t my decision. There is a certain relief that goes with knowing that someone else is making the decisions. Maybe if I were to live two or three thousand years I might get to the point of liking that feeling. Watching Sethra, I got the impression that she was in psychic contact with someone or other, maybe with all the gods at once, so she could direct the battle. I don’t know.

The closer we got, the bigger they looked. And the scarier. They didn’t look so large out here as they had when surrounded by walls; but they were big, and so bloody alien. Their arms were awfully thick, and their hands looked capable of crushing a hu­man skull without too much work, and even from this distance their eyes seemed to glitter with intelligence, and with powers beyond my comprehension. I guess the problem was, I just had too much time to think about things. In my own line of work it was different—either it was an unexpected attack, in which case I was too busy to be scared until it was over, or, preferably, it was something I had planned out to begin with. This was just all wrong.

Sethra turned to us suddenly and said, “She did it.” I was about to ask who did what, but Aliera said, “The Necromancer?”

Sethra nodded.

“Good,” said Morrolan.

“I don’t get it,” I said. “They’re already here. What’s the point of—”

“She has blocked their passage out,” said Sethra. “They have no choice now but to fight.”

I looked out over the Sea of Amorphia, then looked away. “Good place for it,” I said.

“Yes, in some ways it is,” said Sethra. “In spite of the un­predictability of the results, if they fail to achieve their link, then they have an additional threat, with no compensating ad­vantage.”

I had been being ironic, but I didn’t explain that to her. At that point the Necromancer herself shimmered into existence a few feet away, walked over, and joined us, as if she were taking her constitutional. She nodded to Sethra and ig­nored the rest of us. Apparently she was the one being in ex­istence who was immune to Teldra’s powers.

We continued our stroll toward the Jenoine: Teldra, me, Aliera, Morrolan, Sethra, the Demon Goddess, and the Necro­mancer. We kept getting closer, and they still didn’t act, though now I could hear them jabbering away in their own language, probably deciding which of them got to eat which parts of which of us. There was no indication that they were worried.

“Dammit, Loiosh. I wish they wouldn’t just stand there, waiting. I wish they’d do something.”

“Sure, Boss. What would you like them to do?”

“Well, jumping in the Sea would be nice.”

“Heh.”

“Or they could even surrender to us. That would be fine.”

I probably shouldn’t have said anything, because it was right about then that they went into action. Well, okay, it probably had more to do with the Necromancer, and even more with the fact that we were barely twenty feet away from them, but it seemed that way.

The way things had developed, there’s no way I should have been caught by surprise, but I guess that’s one of the problems with surrendering the initiative—they moved very fast, and for a second I froze—Spellbreaker flopped there, swinging back and forth a little. From their position, facing out in all four directions, they moved suddenly, and as if they’d trained for the maneuver for years. They seemed to grow larger, and one of them reached out for us, as if to grab and crush us, though more likely he was going to—

“Vlad!” said Sethra sharply, and I started Spellbreaker swinging again.

“Left!” said Loiosh, and I moved to the left, though I’m not sure what I was avoiding. I bumped into Teldra and we both stumbled. Teldra kept her balance, but I ended up on one knee, automatically raising my hand so I could keep Spellbreaker spinning. Spellbreaker obligingly shortened itself—I felt it vibrating in my hand, looked at it, and saw the links become larger. When I looked back up, my view was blocked by Morrolan and I don’t know what happened, but Sethra was holding Iceflame up above her head, and there was lightning and flashing and all that sort of stuff going on somewhere in front of me—it was really shaping up into one of those big sorcerous battles they always talk about. What was I doing here?

I wasn’t even aware of how loud things had gotten until I saw Aliera shouting but realized I couldn’t hear her—not that it mattered, she was probably yelling some sort of Dragon war cry or something. She was also moving Pathfinder around in some sort of pattern—I wanted Pathfinder to be emitting flashes, sparks, lights, but whatever Aliera was doing with it didn’t show.

Blackwand, on the other hand, was doing everything I could have wished—he would point it, and it would flash, and he’d point it somewhere else, and it would shoot out something black and scary-looking.

Verra was writhing and gyrating, as if possessed by some­thing that made her arms flail and her body twist from side to side.

The Necromancer stood very still, her arms at her sides.

The noise, I eventually realized, was a sort of constant, roll­ing thunder; it seemed to come from everywhere. I concentrated on keeping Spellbreaker moving and tried to stay aware of what was going on, and watch for anything that might come at me, though it was hard, because Morrolan was in front of me block­ing my view—and he may, of course, have been blocking more than my view.

Then Morrolan stumbled and went down in front of me, and I realized that one of the Jenoine was close. Very close. Too close. Way too bloody close—like maybe ten feet away. I wanted to look at Morrolan, to see if he was bleeding, or showed any apparent signs of injury—but I couldn’t take my eyes off the Jenoine.

Well, okay. Score one for their team.

As far as I could tell, the Jenoine wasn’t looking at me; it was concentrating on Verra. Frankly, I’d be more concerned with a God than with a one-armed Easterner too. Aliera knelt down next to Morrolan, Sethra turned away, I guess concen­trating on one of the others, and there was a tremendous flash of light from directly overhead that left me seeing spots just as I was wondering if I should get involved somehow. I kept seeing flashes out of the corners of my eyes and couldn’t tell what was from the Sea and what was caused by our friends and what was caused by our enemies. The air had that queer tang it gets after a heavy thunderstorm.

“What was that, Loiosh?”

“Something from that guy overhead, I think, Boss.”

“Good. Did it accomplish anything?”

“I don’t know. But one of them is down.”

I saw it, then—one of the Jenoine was down indeed, and wouldn’t be getting up again, and there was no mystery about what had taken it out: the dragon was holding it down with two paws and tearing chunks out of the thing with its teeth, and scattering it in all directions, as if to tell us that good, old fashioned gore did, indeed, belong in a battle of gods, demigods, and wizardry.

Well, okay. Score one for our team.

Aliera turned her back on Morrolan and took two steps, which brought her next to the Demon Goddess her mother. The two of them stood facing one of them—perhaps the one that had laid out Morrolan. I watched, motionless.

The three of them began moving in a circle, and as far as I could tell, not doing anything else. I glanced around, trying in get an idea of what else was going on. Another of the Jenoine stood on what I have to call the shore for lack of a better term, staring out over it with its hands extended—probably, I suppose, doing whatever it was they came here to do in the first place

I supposed I should do something to stop it. Heh.

Another continued to be dismembered and gutted by the dragon, who wanted to make a thorough job of it, and the remaining one stood with its back to the one on the shore, making sweeping gestures with its arms while the gods stood around it, trying to close but unable to—Barlen, in particular, was scraping his huge reptilian feet in the dirt as if scrabbling for a purchase. It is not every day that one gets to see the gods stymied; I might have even enjoyed it if I weren’t part of the whole thing.

Judging from the sparks and flashes that occurred in front of the Jenoine, the gods were throwing all sorts of things at it that didn’t get through, and there was that god overhead, dominating everything, making flashes of light that made the daylight seem brighter than bright. It was all very magical and stuff.

I tried to watch everything at once. I was conscious, once more, of how relaxed I was now that the time for action was at hand. My fear was somewhere behind me—I recognized it, but it was as if it were someone else’s fear. I don’t know, maybe that’s how heroes feel. If I ever meet a hero, I’ll ask.

Teldra knelt down next to Morrolan and bent over him. The Jenoine facing Aliera and the Demon Goddess moved to­ward Verra, and she moved toward it, and there was a flurry of activity, and Aliera gave a yell or a scream that I saw more than heard. Sethra turned toward Morrolan and Teldra, as if noticing them for the first time, and yelled something to me that I couldn’t hear over the other sounds, which had done nothing except gotten louder—the roaring was almost painful.

Then Sethra pointed Iceflame at the Jenoine that was tus­sling with Verra and moved into the maelstrom. Aliera took a step in that direction, fell, stood up, took another step, fell again, stood up again, and fell once more. The Jenoine stood over Aliera, both of its hands raised in fists over its head, looking like it wanted to pummel Aliera physically, which couldn’t pos­sibly have done her any good. The dragon, which had finished its meal and was now trying to get at the Jenoine who was holding off the Lords of Judgment, turned toward us, then, its mouth open, showing teeth the size of Blackwand, and began to move in our direction.

Then, just as if things weren’t weird enough, Morrolan’s right arm, still holding Blackwand, raised itself until it was pointed at the Jenoine—apparently without any direction from Morrolan himself, who gave every appearance of lying senseless on the ground, Teldra still kneeling next to him, bent over him. It was downright disconcerting.

Blackwand gave out some sort black flash, and the Jenoine reeled for an instant and took a step backward. Aliera rose to her feet and pointed Pathfinder at its breast. Maybe Morrolan was alive after all. The dragon, for no reason that I could see, stopped as if it had struck a wall, rolled over—something that big does a lot of rolling over when it rolls—and then came to its feet once more, and shook its head in a very human gesture.

I took a step closer to Morrolan, so I could get a clear view of his face.

“He looks dead, Boss.”

“I think so, too. I hope it doesn’t discommode him.”

Then Teldra stood up and looked at me, and if there had been any doubt about Morrolan’s condition, Teldra’s expression would have removed it.

If you ever feel like torturing yourself, playing the “if only” game is a good way to go about it. If I had heard what Sethra had been yelling at me, or had managed to guess it. If I had known what they were doing. If I had moved a little quicker or a little slower. If, if, if. You can kill yourself with ifs.

Or you can kill someone else with them, I suppose.

I looked up at the Necromancer, hoping maybe she could do something, but she hadn’t even noticed Morrolan fall, and I dared not disturb whatever she was in the middle of.

One thing I know about revivification is that time is critical. I stood there, Spellbreaker spinning, and tried to think of something I could do that would get this over with fast, so Aliera or Verra or Sethra could start working on him. My arm twitched again in its sling, just to let me know that it would probably be useful again when it was too late. I would have liked to have at least dragged him away from the fight, but I couldn’t with one ­arm.

Then Aliera went flying backward, tumbling backward like a seed bag without the seed, landing next to the dragon. I thought she was dead, or at least injured, but she put her hand on the dragon’s head, and, using it like a handhold, rose to her feet at once, shook her head in a gesture terribly reminiscent of the dragon’s, then turned back toward the battle.

It was terrifying to think that one of those things was entertaining the Demon Goddess, Sethra Lavode, the Necromancer, a dragon, and Aliera e’Kieron—after having killed Morrolan e’Drien. Quite terrifying. And another one was holding its own against the Lords of Judgment, against the gods themselves. I just didn’t belong here at all.

Aliera didn’t seem too worried—she raised Pathfinder, gave a scream that was so loud I heard it over the roaring, and charged.

The Jenoine noticed her, flung the Demon Goddess away, and faced Aliera.

Pathfinder seemed about to take it in the neck, but it held up a hand and, just as before, Pathfinder was held motionless, as was Aliera.

Evidently, they had succeeded in re-establishing their link with the Sea. I wondered if that meant we could retreat now, call it a lost battle, and go home.

I guess not.

Verra jumped on its back, biting and scratching at it like a tag in a brothel who just discovered that someone has borrowed her favorite gown and gotten a wine stain on it.

The Jenoine spun quickly, striking Aliera with the Demon Goddess’s feet—the whole thing suddenly looked more like a tavern brawl or a scene in a farcical play than an apocalyptic battle between the forces of Good and Evil. Aliera was knocked backward again, while the Goddess fell from its back, landing at its feet, leaving its back to us. There was the perfect backshot I’d been looking for before, but I will confess to you that never for an instant did it occur to me to take it.

It did occur to someone else, however.

I felt a pluck at my side, as if a clumsy cutpurse were op­erating against me. I reached down to grab the wrist, forgetting that that hand didn’t work. Before I could do anything else, Teldra was past me, holding the Morganti dagger she had pulled from its sheath at my belt.

Before it could turn around, Lady Teldra struck it, hard and low in the back.

No matter how powerful the Jenoine, a Morganti dagger between the shoulder blades will seriously cramp its style.

I guess it was the surprise, the unexpectedness of the attack that did it, but, of all the sorceries and Great Weapons and gods and dragons and necromancies, it was that attack with that weapon that got through.

The Jenoine jerked and tensed, spun around, and its face, insofar as I could make out an expression on its alien features, seemed twisted into a grimace.

For a moment that, in my memory at least, stretches out forever, I felt hope; could it actually be that after Iceflame, Blackwand, and Pathfinder had failed, that thing had succeeded? Teldra had stuck it deep, that was for sure, and maybe, just maybe.

Time stretched out, and everything took a horribly long time.

The Jenoine reached behind itself, and when its hand came back into view, it was holding the Morganti dagger, which it neatly and smoothly buried in Lady Teldra’s breast. 16. Funereal Customs

The Jenoine, having destroyed Teldra, turned away; obviously still in pain, and, it seemed to me, maybe even a bit disoriented. Well, I suppose if you’ve just had a powerful Morganti dagger plunged into your vitals, you are permitted a little disorientation. Aliera shook herself and started to stand, the Demon Goddess rose to her knees, Sethra lowered Iceflame and turned toward Teldra. The Necromancer stood there, apparently oblivious. Morrolan remained dead, but not as dead as Teldra was or I felt.

I was close to her; I took a step and knelt down beside her, suddenly as oblivious as the Necromancer to both my friends and to the Jenoine. The expression on her face was one of mild astonishment. Her eyes were opened, but sightless, vacant; there was nothing there. It was all gone. Teldra was gone.

The Morganti dagger was deeply buried in her, and still leak­ing blood—with a blade that long, it must be nearly all the way through her.

I reached for the dagger to draw it out of her, though I knew it was already too late. Maybe I was thinking of saving her, maybe I was planning to attack the Jenoine with it; more likely I was just not thinking.

It was hard to get a grip on it with Spellbreaker still in my hand; I was unwilling to drop the chain, and I had no other hand to use. I managed to wedge the end of the chain between my palm and the hilt of the blade, and got a sort of weak grip.

A tingling began to run up my arm, mild but unmistakable. It was different from the tingling I was used to feeling when Spellbreaker intercepted some nasty that was aimed at me—it was sharper, for one thing, and it didn’t stop. I kept hold of the weapon and the chain, and the tingling increased, becoming almost painful.

“Boss, what is it?”

“I don’t know. There’s something—”

Spellbreaker stirred in my hand, twisting against the smooth hilt of the dagger. I watched, fascinated, as it twisted and curled up and around, doing its snake imitation. I’d seen it before, at odd moments, and never understood why. Nor did I now; I just watched.

The links, already small, were becoming even smaller—they shrunk as I watched, which was creepy. At the same time, the end of the chain touched the blade, and then ran up its length in what was almost a caress. The other end, the end I was hold­ing, was almost moving, though at first I didn’t feel it through the tingling that was still running up my arm.

Spellbreaker’s links kept getting smaller, almost vanishing entirely as distinct links, and it seemed to be getting longer overall. Was it, somehow, trying to rescue Teldra? If it was trying, did it have a chance?

I watched, fascinated. If the Jenoine had wanted to, it could have crushed my head without really trying, because between the death of Teldra and the strange things Spellbreaker was doing, I had forgotten it was there; but I guess it was distracted by Sethra and Aliera and Verra, the way I was distracted by—

—The links were entirely gone now, leaving Spellbreaker looking almost like a thin golden rope, and as I watched, it began to wrap itself around the hilt—it really was trying to save Teldra. I realized I was holding my breath.

It continued slithering around, more snakelike than ever, covering the hilt as if it were a hangersnake trying to strangle it; I had moved my hand to get out of the way, keeping contact with the blade only through the pommel. The tingling continued, and then I realized that the weapon was actually vibrating in Teldra’s breast.

If there was, as I suspected, some sort of battle going on within the Morganti blade, then continuing to hold it was a bad idea.

I should let go.

I really should let go.

“Boss—”

“I can’t. I just can’t do it.”

Well, if I couldn’t get away from the fight, maybe I could help.

“Boss, do you know what you’re doing?”

“Not a clue, Loiosh. Be ready to pull me out.”

“I don’t know if I’ll be able to.”

“I know.”

There was a battle raging around me—gods and demigods and wizards and undead battling; but I might just as well have been in my old office, in the quiet space in the basement, where I used to perform witchcraft when I had nothing to worry about except how to find the guy whose leg I wanted to break, or how to get the most out of the new brothel I’d just opened.

I miss the days when I used to be nostalgic.

Lady Teldra was inside the dagger, somewhere, somehow, and I was going to go get her or ... well, I was going to go get her.

I should have been surprised by how easily my awareness entered the chain, but even the action seemed normal, natural, inevitable—sending my consciousness spinning along inside Spellbreaker was the easiest thing in the world, and I could have done it at any time, if I’d ever thought to try. I was moving, flying even, through corridors of gold; endless corridors, with side paths and trails leading everywhere and nowhere, with a warm, almost hot breeze caressing my face.

I felt Teldra all around me, from everywhere—a sort of friendly reserve, giving the gold a reddish tint, and in that mo­ment, I think I discovered her secret, I learned how she could manage to be so friendly to everyone who entered Morrolan’s keep for whatever reason: She liked people. She just plain liked them. It was strange. My grandfather was like that, too, but I couldn’t think of many others. Cawti, perhaps, when she let herself. It was strange, knowing someone like that; I guess it was why I had never been able to understand her, and why I always, even to myself, made ironic remarks about her courtesies, and tried to find hidden motives in everything she did; it is hard to be comfortable around someone who just likes you for no reason, when you’ve always—

No, there wasn’t time for that. I needed to find her—find the center of the Teldra-ness amid all the confusion of gold and movement and corridors whipping past.

I called her name, but got no response, and yet I could feel her presence; her personality, which I’d had so much trouble defining, was overwhelming. But it was static, too: that is, she didn’t seem to be feeling or doing anything, she just was.

As I hunted for her—moving, it seemed, in part because I desired it, and in part pushed along by some power of which I was only dimly aware—I began to notice, here and there, what seemed to be nondescript greyish threads hanging haphazardly among the corridors through which I sped. I grabbed one as I passed; it seemed the right thing to do. The thread came with me easily, and as I held it, Teldra seemed closer—the feeling of her presence stronger. I grabbed another, and another, one of them with my left hand. Okay, here and now, I had two good hands. Why not? Each time I saw a greyish strand hanging from a wall or ceiling, I grabbed it and held it, and if I missed one I reached back without even looking and got it, too. I pulled the threads in and tied them together, holding them.

I was no longer aware of the tingling sensation that had been running up my arm, but now, instead, it seemed as if that entire tingle was filling my body, leaving me feeling strong, alert, even powerful; it was a heady sensation, but not an unpleasant one. I wondered if I should be worried.

“Loiosh, should I be worried?”

There was a long, long moment before he replied, which was unusual, and when the reply came, it was faint and distorted as if from a distance. “I don’t know, Boss. I don’t know where you are, or what you’re doing, or ... everything is heating up here, the Demon Goddess and Sethra and Aliera are ... I’m scared, Boss.”

When your familiar is scared, it’s a good time for you to be scared, too.

But—

I didn’t feel worried. The whole idea of having a familiar is to tell you when to be frightened by something that doesn’t appear frightening—a familiar is your other self that watches to make sure nothing is being done to you while your attention is elsewhere, and this was just such a situation, but my instincts were telling me to push on, to keep searching for Teldra, to keep grabbing at whatever those strands of power were.

If Loiosh had told me to pull out, I would have, but he wasn’t certain, which left me to make the decision. It was close. But one thought just wouldn’t go away: If it were me in there, and Teldra had decided to look for me, she wouldn’t have stopped while there was any hope left.

Okay, the decision was made: Press on.

A famous Iorich once said that the difficult part of being a Justicer was sounding one hundred percent when you felt fifty-one percent. I knew what he meant: I tried to put the doubt behind me so I could continue my psychic, or necromantic, or mystical journey through Spellbreaker, but it wasn’t easy, be­cause doubt is less easily dispelled than illusion, and with doubt come tentative half-measures—and nothing worthwhile has ever been accomplished by tentative half-measures.

There was a keen sense of traveling along with me, almost an ache for Teldra, but it was a distraction—as were my uncer­tainties about whether I was controlling or being controlled by the forces I was playing with, and my knowledge that, while I was sending my consciousness through the links of the strange artifact I called Spellbreaker, all the time the battle was going on around my physical body—but then, there wasn’t a lot I could do to influence that anyway, was there? I couldn’t do them any good, and it was pointless of them to have brought me to this place. If only I had—

If only I had—

Oh.

Maybe you’ve had it all figured out all along and have been waiting for me to catch on—those of you who have been fol­lowing my path, walking beside me through sorceries, deaths, pain, betrayal, and wizardries beyond human comprehension—but believe me it is much easier to figure out when you are sitting back watching it unfold before you than when you have your awareness spinning through strange, mystical corridors while outside of you rages a battle in which the very gods are only holding their own. In any case, it was only at that moment that I understood what I was doing, what I was creating.

Half-remembered conversations, half-heard remarks, bits of folklore, years of observations without comprehension—so the Serioli had simply been telling me the simple, unvarnished truth in the most straightforward way it knew how; and that was why the Goddess had been so ambivalent; and that’s how Pathfinder had saved Aliera’s life—all came together into the explosive epiphany that I had been, all unknowing, doing just exactly what I should be doing.

Yes, now I understood.

And with that understanding came confidence, and with confidence came decision.

Teldra was gone, and yet not gone. She was there, but it was pointless to find her. What mattered were those greyish strands of power. What mattered was completing the transfor­mation, that would save as much of Teldra as could be saved.

Fine, then.

By an act of will I stopped, and I summoned the greyish threads to me until I held all of them in my grasp—an instant it seemed, and I think it was. I wrapped them around my left wrist. The next one, and the next one. I had all the time in the world, so I could be careful and thorough, and I was; as careful as an Issola is of every nuance of tact; as thorough as a jhereg is at extracting every morsel of food from a corpse. I took my time, and did it right: pulling in the tiniest threads and securing them, making sure they were woven so close to me that we could never be separated; there was no longer a Spellbreaker, or a Lady Teldra, or a Morganti dagger, or even a Vlad; we were all some­thing different now. The Jhereg? Heh. Let them come after me with their pathetic Morganti weapons. Just let them.

Almost as an afterthought, I repaired the trivial damage in my left arm, which had been repairing itself anyway. I both knew and felt that what I was wrapping the links around was, in fact, my soul. My conversation with Teldra about the nature of the soul came back to me with a sort of gentle irony; Teldra was like that. My own irony was harsher—maybe she’d exert some influence on me. I didn’t think I’d mind. I wasn’t seeing any­thing anymore, nor was I hearing anything, I was just being, and doing, and then I was done.

I came back to myself, to the real world around me, and found that I was still on one knee, next to Teldra’s lifeless body. She lay with an arm up over her head, her eyes open, glassy, and sightless, her long hair all scattered about. She’d never have permitted her hair to look that way. Her mouth was open a little, in that moronic way you see from time to time on derelicts who gather in the evenings near Barlen’s temple near Malek Circle. It was all wrong on Lady’s Teldra’s face. I looked away, and at what was in my right hand—a long Morganti dagger, with a hilt like a very fine golden chain. It fit my hand like an additional finger, like it should have been there all along, or maybe it had been there all along and I’d never been aware of it.

It?

Her. It was, after all, Lady Teldra.

I stood up and faced the Jenoine, which was moving at an impossible speed, fending off attacks from Sethra and Aliera and Verra—Aliera had some blood on her, and seemed both dazed and determined; the Goddess had grown larger, and her eyes flashed with hate. Sethra, like the Necromancer, who still hadn’t moved, had no expression on her face at all, but moved in and out, looking for openings in the Jenoine’s defenses—which were, in fact, rather formidable: there were lines of power flowing from its fingers, which formed glittering patterns in the air that left no room for anything to get past, but through which it could strike at will, lines that I knew must have been there all along, but which I could now see for the first time. Lines keeping Path­finder and Iceflame, and Verra with the power she embodied just by being who she was, completely absorbed in coping, be­cause to do otherwise would court destruction of those who wielded the Great Weapons, and permitting the wielder to be destroyed was something a Great Weapon would not permit, because beyond any practical considerations—far, far stronger than any practical considerations—there were bonds of love: Pathfinder loved Aliera, Iceflame loved Sethra. Blackwand loved Morrolan.

And Lady Teldra loved me.

The defenses the Jenoine had formed were, as I said, for­midable, but the defenses were also, at the same time, laughable. Of course Iceflame and Pathfinder and Blackwand would be stopped by them; powerful as those weapons were, they had not been made for this. As I attacked the Jenoine’s defensive spells I felt the same tingling I used to feel when Spellbreaker used to intercept something aimed at me. I cut through them as if they were paper.

The Jenoine felt its defenses fail. It turned around and, quick as a striking Issola, I thrust Lady Teldra up under its chin and into its head.

It roared and spasmed as if every muscle in its body had contracted at once, and then I felt rather than saw Iceflame and Pathfinder join the party, and a sense of power, energy, and well-being flooded through me, and I understood the reason for that now, too.

It collapsed into a heap at my feet; I felt as if I could take on all the Jenoine in the universe with one hand tied behind me. I heard myself laughing as I turned to face the remaining two, but at that moment, the Necromancer gave a cry and fell to her knees, and, just that quickly, they were gone, leaving only half the gods in the world, one very large dragon, and our little group standing on the spot of Adron’s Disaster, next to Mor­rolan, who was dead, and his seneschal, who was more than dead.

Or perhaps less than dead.

The sudden silence was shattering; I basked in it, feeling as if I could emit sparks, and would if I weren’t careful for those around me. It was so quiet, I could hear my companions breathing; I realized then that the Sea made no sound, not even ocean-type sounds.

“Doing all right, chum?”

“Grand, Boss. And Rocza is fine, too. And so are you, by the way, though I was worried there for a bit.”

“Yeah, me too.”

“I think I’m jealous, though.”

“Bite me.”

He did, but in the nicest possible way.

Sethra knelt next to the Necromancer, who stirred and shook her head as if to clear it—positively the most human thing I had ever seen her do.

“They broke the Necromancer’s block, didn’t they?”

“Brute force and desperation,” said the Demon Goddess in her strange voice, made even stranger by the awful silence. “But for some reason, they released their link to the amorphia.”

“So we won?” asked Sethra, sounding surprised.

Verra looked at Morrolan and Teldra lying on the ground, and nodded.

Aliera said, in the strangest voice I’d ever heard from her, “Daddy did it. Daddy took their link from them.”

Sethra stared at her.

Aliera nodded and said, “I asked him to, and he did.” Well, it was nice to know they were doing something while I was distracted.

Sethra looked out over the Sea and said, “Adron is out there?”

“Yes. I suspected he would be.”

“Conscious? Aware?” said Sethra.

Aliera shrugged. I understood that shrug. “Consciousness” and “awareness” aren’t always clear-cut concepts, as I had just learned. There were tears in Aliera’s eyes. Well, there was plenty to cry about, I suppose, and there’d be more if we didn’t get to work on Morrolan soon. I looked over to where the Jenoine had been, but there was no trace they had ever been there; the gods and even the dragon were gone as well. It was only Sethra and Aliera and the Necromancer and the Goddess and me; and Mor­rolan and what had been Teldra. Morrolan’s sword had returned to his side, still gripped by his dead hand; I’m not sure when that happened.

“We need to get to work on Morrolan,” said Aliera, her eyes still glistening.

Sethra stood up and nodded to her. “Yes,” she said. “And quickly.” She looked at Teldra’s body, lying on the ground, then at the weapon in my hand, then at me.

“Well done, Vlad,” she said.

Aliera, standing dazed and bloody behind her, but with a grim expression on her face, nodded. The Demon Goddess, how­ever, had eyes only for the blade I carried. Well, who could blame her?

“You can put that thing away now,” she said at last.

I looked into her eyes and chuckled. “Very well, my God­dess.”

Verra scowled.

I cleaned her on the Jenoine’s body—some customs must be observed, after all—then sheathed her, with some regret, my hand trailing over the smooth, gold hilt that had once been Spellbreaker. I was delighted to discover that sheathing her did not diminish the sense of her personality.

I watched Verra, who was looking back at me, but she had nothing more to say. With an aimless gesture of farewell, she turned into shimmering sparks and was gone. Sethra, mean­while, had lifted Morrolan in her arms.

“Come, stand next to me,” she said.

Aliera looked out over the Sea, I suppose saying farewell to her father. Then Aliera, the Necromancer, and I took positions next to Sethra, and then we were gone from that place, and we were once more in the heart of Dzur Mountain. 17. Taking One’s Leave of Friends

They laid Morrolan on a couch, and Aliera and the Necroman­cer began working on him. I watched for a while, then turned to Sethra. “So we won.”

She nodded. “Yes, I’d call this a victory. They wanted to establish their own link to amorphia. That is, a permanent link, on our world, with which to challenge us. They failed to do so. And we destroyed two of them, which is no small feat.”

“Good.”

Sethra shook her head and murmured, “Adron.”

“Yes.”

“It’s hard to believe. Sentience is, well, I don’t know.”

“Yeah, sentience is a strange thing, isn’t it?

She glanced up at me, catching my tone of voice, and said, “I shall miss her.”

“Yes,” I said. Then, “Did you know?”

Her eyes widened. “You mean, what was going to happen?”

“Yes. Teldra, the weapon—all of it.”

“No, Vlad. I had no idea. If I’d had any idea, I should never have—no, I didn’t know.”

“What was it you yelled to me, in the middle of it all?”

She gave me an ironic smile. “You don’t want to know.”

“Probably not, Sethra, but tell me anyway.”

“I told you to watch out for Teldra. It looked like she was contemplating doing something foolish.”

“Yeah, I guess she was.”

“But I suppose it is best for all of us that it turned out that way.”

“All of us, except for Lady Teldra.”

“Yes. Well, you are now a member of a rather exclusive club, Vlad. You are one of those the gods have cause to fear. Con­gratulations to you, and to Godslayer.”

“Lady Teldra,” I corrected her gently.

She shrugged. “As you prefer.”

I touched the hilt and it was almost as if I could feel her fingers touching mine. I said, “Do you suppose the Jenoine knew?”

“No,” said Sethra. “They would never have put the weapon into your hands if they had suspected. They wanted you to kill Verra, just as they said.”

“You mean, that was it? They really expected me to just go and kill her?”

“Yes, which would have allowed them access to the Lesser Sea, where they could have established their own link—that is, a permanent one, with, in essence, their own Orb. It would have been a powerful blow against us. Although, knowing that Adron is still, in a sense, in there, I don’t know what effect that would have had.”

I shook my head. “But Sethra, all kidding aside, I was never going to kill Verra. I mean, I never even thought seriously about it.”

“Yes, I know.”

“It doesn’t make sense.”

“It doesn’t make sense to us, Vlad.”

“If they have so little understanding of us, Sethra, I’m not sure how worried about them we should be.”

“Whatever their understanding, they have a great deal of power.”

“But still. With such intricate plans, how can they be that far off?”

“They don’t understand us, that’s all. They never have. Talk to Verra sometime; that’s been their flaw from the beginning “

“I don’t think the Demon Goddess wants to have a lot to do with me these days. And that’s fine with me.”

“Yes, I suppose it is. And Vlad—”

“Yes?”

“Should I happen not to be around when Lady Teldra wakes up, you will not forget to give her my regards?”

“Wakes up? What do you mean?”

She smiled. “I think I’d rather not tell you.”

Damn her.

Aliera, still bloody and dazed-looking, stumbled over and sat down next to us. I looked over at Morrolan, and saw the gentle rise and fall of his chest.

I nodded to Aliera. “Congratulations,” I said.

She nodded and closed her eyes.

Sethra said, “Good. Now let’s see to you.” Aliera was, evi­dently, too exhausted to argue; she struggled to her feet, and accompanied Sethra out of the room.

The Necromancer walked over from Morrolan’s side and sat down opposite me. We looked at each other for a while, and then she said, “I can bring you wherever you’d like.”

“Thanks,” I said. I looked over at Morrolan. “Who gets to tell him about Teldra?”

“Sethra, I should imagine.”

“Lucky Sethra.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Same thing I’ve been doing.”

“You have rather less to fear from the Jhereg now—at least, Morganti weapons shouldn’t frighten you as much.”

“That’s true. But I’ve recovered a bit from the bravado I was feeling, uh, earlier. I’d just as soon not give them a chance.”

She nodded. “Where then?”

“Perhaps I’ll visit my grandfather.”

“I’m certain he’d like that.”

“Or else I’ll head East.”

“Your ancestral homeland?”

“Yes. I was there once before, and rather liked it. Maybe I’ll organize a defense there, in case Sethra the Younger decides to try to conquer it. I beat her once, maybe I can beat her again.”

She studied me for a little. “When did this idea come to you?” she said at last.

I shrugged. “I don’t know. Just now, I guess, while I was talking to you. Why?”

“It sounds a little public-spirited for you, Vlad.”

“Maybe it’s Lady Teldra’s influence,” I said ironically.

“That’s what I was thinking,” she said, without irony.

“Oh,” I said. “Well, maybe I’ll do something else.”

“Is Lady Teldra’s influence that bad a thing?”

I thought about that. “No, I suppose not.”

“I shall miss her,” said the Necromancer. “And you,” she added.

I almost made an ironic remark about that, just out of reflex, but I refrained.

Maybe my reflexes were changing, but I didn’t care to ex­amine them too closely to find out.

I said, “Has anything exciting been happening in Adrilankha lately?”

She smiled a little. “I’m afraid I don’t keep up on such mat­ters.”

I nodded. “All right,” I said, deciding suddenly. “Here’s what I’m going to do. I’m bloody well going into Adrilankha, and I’m bloody well going to have a meal at Valabar’s, and if the Jhereg find me, fine, and if they don’t, I’ll figure out what I’m going to do next while I eat. If there’s one thing I’ve missed—”

There was a soft moan from the couch. As I looked, Morrolan’s eyes fluttered open. His mouth opened and he tried to speak, but couldn’t manage.

“We won,” I told him. “It wasn’t pretty, but we won.”

No, I wasn’t going to be the one to tell him.

“Boss, your stomach is going to be the death of us all.”

“Very probably, chum. But don’t complain, you get the scraps.”

“Oh, I’m not complaining. Just observing.”

Rocza shifted on my other shoulder; I imagine Loiosh had given her a hint of what was coming. For a wild jhereg, it hadn’t taken her long to develop a taste for civilized food.

“All right,” I told the Necromancer. “Let’s go, then.”

“Now? You don’t wish to wait for Sethra and Aliera?”

“Please give them my farewell.”

“You sure, Boss? Right now?”

“I don’t want to be here anymore.”

The Necromancer stood up. I said, “Can you put me right in front of their door?”

“Easily,” she said.

“Good, then.”

“What are you going to have?”

“I don’t know, but it will start and end with klava.”

Morrolan cleared his throat, tried to speak, then exhaled loudly and lay back.

“I’m sorry,” I told him.

He looked at me, eyebrows raised.

I shook my head. The Necromancer put her hand on my shoulder, I put my hand on Lady Teldra. Loiosh and Rocza took their positions, and Dzur Mountain was gone, and I was out­doors, facing the familiar sight of Valabar’s, which, of all things, hadn’t changed a bit. I smelled onions and garlic and broiling kethna. There were no assassins waiting to kill me, at least yet.

I removed my amulets from their box and put them back on, just out of reflex, and stepped inside.