The Gargoyle King

XXII

Dagger gripped tightly, Golgren did not look at all shocked to know Safrag had been aware of his existence. Nor did it appear the lead Titan was disappointed by that lack of shock.

And both were not in the least surprised to find the air filled with gargoyles.

“Persistent gnats,” Safrag remarked. Casually turning his back on Golgren, he confronted his fellow sorcerers. “I will let you feel the gifts of the Fire Rose and allow each of you to choose exactly how you would prefer to remove these pests!”

The artifact flared. From its petals burst fiery bolts that arrowed out and struck each Titan. However, rather than cause the Titans harm, it instead made each sorcerer raise his fists in what could only be described as utter exultation.

“It-it’s so much more than I could have ever imagined!” sang Gadjul in the Titan tongue. “All we were … all we are is nothing compared to it!”

He thrust one fist toward a part of the vast swarm just out of reach of the sorcerers. From that fist erupted blazing, black streaks of energy that mirrored the bolts of fire that flowed into him and the others.

His spell spread as it reached the attackers, encompassing dozens. Some of the gargoyles wielded objects that briefly seemed to stave off the Titan’s spell, but that defense was short lived.

The gargoyles caught in Gadjul’s spell twisted like wet cloths being tightly wrung out. Their cries were enough to disturb even the hardiest ogres hiding below. Not so the Titans, however. Gadjul only laughed and pressed his spell.

From fearsome, winged beasts, the gargoyles were transformed into water drops, but they were water drops that rose skyward. The drops blinded those gargoyles directly behind. Indeed, each drop burned like the energies within the Fire Rose itself. From the many he had decimated, Gadjul had created death for scores more.

The other Titans did not stand idle while Gadjul kept busy. Each was casting a spell of his own choosing, using the power of the Fire Rose to terrible effect. The sky filled with monstrous transformations that began to wreak havoc on those gargoyles higher in the formation. The winged attackers perished in droves, some turning into unrecognizable shapes or dispersing into liquids, energies, or clouds of sinister gases.

A grinning Safrag glanced at Golgren, who had not budged. The lead Titan indicated his followers with his free hand. “The smallest of the Fire Rose’s gifts and look what they can do with it! The magic of the Titans is a poor thing compared to such power, and the Titans themselves are a poor creation of a failed goddess.”

With that, Safrag’s eyes grew brighter. The Fire Rose also surged.

The other Titans began to change form even as they continued their assault on the gargoyles. They grew thinner and taller yet, and their skin changed from blue to a blinding gold. Their faces became of one kind-semblances of Safrag’s-and long, silver hair cascaded down their backs. Their garments became form-fitting robes of a fire-red color, with a blazing flower symbol etched in their chests.

“So much more appropriate,” the lead Titan commented. “Why bother with the false legacy of the High Ogres? Why not create a new order? A race of such perfection that even our ancestors looked like shambling mockeries in comparison?”

Still, Golgren did not move. Safrag’s brow briefly furrowed, but the half-breed was too far away physically to attack the sorcerer. However, the sorcerer nevertheless finally raised his hand toward his adversary.

The building beneath Golgren’s feet suddenly softened. Before he could react, his feet were sealed up to the ankles.

“You will watch all of this, mongrel,” Safrag cheerfully remarked. “You of all people deserve that experience! In fact, I may even let you live when all is said and done, live so that you can savor the rise of the ogre race and the transformation of all Krynn by my hand!” He chuckled. “Of course, you won’t necessarily look as you do now … or look like anything anyone has seen before.”

Safrag turned from Golgren.

And the half-breed threw the ancient dagger at the sorcerer’s back.

The weapon struck Safrag, but as it did, it, too, transformed. The blade split open, bending five different ways. The handle became a pair of bright silver gossamer wings. The altered weapon fluttered up, changed into a fantastic flying flower with long, leafy petals of gold.

“In the end, so very predictable,” Safrag stated. He gestured and the flower hovered under his nostrils. As if he had no care in the world, the towering sorcerer-himself still unaltered-sniffed his creation then sent it on its way. “Now be good and watch as I do what both you and Dauroth could only dream of doing.”

With the other sorcerers keeping the gargoyles at bay, Safrag scanned Garantha. Clutching the Fire Rose with both hands, he held it out over the main part of the capital.

“Come out, my children!” he called in Common, his voice booming like thunder and causing both his followers and foes to momentarily falter. “Come out, my children, and become your future!”Garantha blazed with the crimson-orange light of the Fire Rose. As Golgren silently watched, the light began to settle over the dwellings of the city’s inhabitants.

A flat stone roof peeled as if it were a piece of fruit. Another followed then another and another until, in moments, all that the eye could see had been opened in that fashion.

And from each building, figures began to rise up into the air. The ogres of Garantha … or Safrag’s Dai Ushran.

Most were far enough away that their expressions could not be seen, and not one made a sound, likely as Safrag dictated. The few that Golgren could see close up were fearful. Trapped by such powerful magic, their bodily strength was nothing. They were reduced to little more than helpless children.

By the scores then the hundreds, they were gathered up. Whatever caste they were from no longer mattered. In the eyes of the Titan, they were all lacking.

But not for long …

“I will not rule over beasts!” Safrag proclaimed. “I will be a god above gods!”

The Fire Rose burned. As it did, so, too, did the captive ogres.

However, before Safrag could fulfill his intentions, a hooded figure suddenly materialized behind him. One hand outstretched toward Golgren, Tyranos thrust the head of the staff into the lead Titan’s back just as he had done before, to Falstoch.

Accompanied by violent sparks of magical energy, the crystal bore through Safrag, its head emerging out of his chest. The Titan let out a gasp.

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.

The High Ogre’s snowy eyes were wide with triumph.

My two cat’s paws, he spoke in their minds, each word taunting Golgren and Safrag. My perfect puppets.

Golgren struggled to move. It came as no comfort to him that Safrag, too, was finding it impossible.

Xiryn extended a bony hand toward each of them. The two could do nothing to prevent themselves from joining with the shrouded figure. Safrag was forced to his knees.

The end of the long waiting is at hand! Xiryn proclaimed, his words ringing harshly in their heads. The centuries upon centuries of striving, of being patient, are at last at end.

As his two captives closed with him, the gargoyle king placed a hand on each of their shoulders. Golgren and Safrag both shivered.

One we shall be: the master, — he indicated himself-the strength, — he nodded his cowled head to Safrag-and the impossible vessel-he gave a last nod to Golgren. The destiny of the High Ogres-of all ogres-has finally come.