The Gods Awaken

CHAPTER SEVEN

On the other side of the wall Palimak's tapping echoed in a vast dark chamber.

Tap, tap. Tap, tap.

Then there was a sound of things stirring, like the dry wings of large insects disturbed in their slumber.

Tap, tap, tap.

"Listen, sisters," rasped a voice. "Someone's coming!"

Tap, tap.

"Silence, sisters," said another. So deadly in tone that if there had been human ears present the voice would have chilled the foolish bearer of those ears to the marrow.

And there was silence.

Except for: Tap, tap. Tap, tap, tap.

Echoing through the chamber.

Queen Charize stirred on her throne, examining the source of the sound. She was practically blind, but that made no difference here, since sight would have been useless in her underground kingdom of eternal night. Her senses of smell and hearing, however, were so acute that she could make out Palimak and the Favorites through solid stone.

Tap, tap. Tap, tap, tap.

The hammering produced the image of a tall, wingless creature, with two legs and two arms.

Tap, tap.

And little Gundaree and Gundara were displayed in her greedy mind. They were perched on the wingless creature's shoulders. Her nostril openings widened, sniffing the chamber's hot air. The scent carried through the pores of the stone, drifting like steam wafting through from the cold Other Side.

"I smell a human, sisters," she said.

There was a low, hungry muttering from the others. "Human! Human! Human!"

Queen Charize sniffed again. "And demon as well."

More muttering. Puzzled, instead of hungry: "Human and demon?"

The presence of both races together was astounding. Could it be the two beings on the creature's shoulders?

The answer came from the spoor rising through the pores of the stone. And all her highly-tuned senses told her the two beings were clearly magical. With no real form. They were creations, not true living things. Strange spirits whose origins were very ancient indeed. Charize smiled to herself. She could almost taste the presence of the long-ago sister witch who had made them.

Again she tested the air. Separating the human and demon scents. Tap, tap, tap. Form radiating an image on her brain. And then the scent was traced back to a single source-laid over the sound image of the wingless creature.

"A feast, sisters!" she chortled. "Let him in!"

There was a hungry muttering. Broken by one voice:

"Pardon, Majesty. But what if it's Safar Timura?"

The question was a hot dagger to the huge organ that served Charize as both heart and lungs. It had been a long time since she'd truly fed on a human's spirit and her intense hunger had interfered with her memory.

"How dare you speak the name of Safar Timura?" she rasped. "It is forbidden here!"

"Just the same, sister," came the voice. It was that of Tarla, her royal rival. "I must speak it for the good of us all. It was Safar Timura who nearly destroyed us, if you recall."

Queen Charize remembered very well.

Again came the sound from the Other Side: Tap, tap. Tap, tap, tap.

And there was a slip in awareness and she found herself back at that moment-some ten sheddings ago-when her most grievous enemy, the mighty wizard Lord Timura, had confronted her. Except, in this vision, she found herself in Timura's mind. Cloaked in darkness. Danger all around. She experienced both his emotions and her own at the same time.

Charize choked in disgust as her mind merged into the filthy body of the remembered other: She was Safar Timura! And she was surrounded by darkness and ghastly beings. And those beings were herself and her sisters!

Safar heard heavy talons rattle on stone and a snuffling sound, like a beast following a strongscent. He knew he had to do something quickly before he was found.

The idea jumped up at Safar and he knew he couldn't wait and think it through, because withthought would come fear and fear's hesitation would be the end of him. He made a spell andclapped his hands together and roared: "Light!"

And light blasted in from all sides, nearly knocking him over with the sudden shock of it. He hadbeen blinded by darkness before, now he was blinded by its white-hot opposite. There were awfulscreams of pain all around and then his vision cleared and the first thing he saw ripped his breathfrom his body.

The beast towered above him, enormous corpse-colored wings unfolded like a bat's. It had the stretched-out torso of a woman with long thin arms and legs that ended in taloned claws. There was no hair on its skull-like head and instead of a nose there were only nostril holes on a flat face shaped like a shovel.

Safar nearly jumped away, but then he realized the creature was too busy screaming in pain and clawing at its eyes to be a threat. He was in an enormous vaulted room, filled with blazing colors. Great columns, red and blue and green, climbed toward glaring light then disappeared beyond. The room was filled with hundreds of death-white creatures, some crouched on the floor howling pain, others hanging bat-like from long stanchions coming out of the columns. They twisted and screamed, horrid flags of misery blowing in a devil wind of conjured light.

Safar spotted the one he wanted. Again he shouted, his magically amplified voice thundering overthe wails: "Silence!"

The shrieks and screams cut off at his command, and now there was only moaning and harshpleas for "Mercy, brother, mercy!"

Safar paced forward, moving through the writhing bodies until he came to the throne. It looked like a great pile of bones-arms and legs and torsos and skulls stacked in the shape of an enormous winged chair. As he came closer he saw the a€?bonesa€™ were carved from white stone. The creature who commanded that grisly throne was like the others, except much larger. A red metal band encircled her bony skull to make a crown. Unlike the others, however, the creature was silent and although she was hunched over, claws covering her eyes, she made no outward show of pain.

Safar stopped at the throne and said loudly, for all to hear: "Are you queen to this mewling lot?"

"Yes, I am queen. Queen Charize." As she answered she couldn't help but raise her royal head, carefully keeping her eyes shielded. "I command here."

"You command nothing," Safar replied, voice echoing throughout the chamber, "except what I, Lord Timura of Kyrania, might permit."

Queen Charize said nothing.

"Do you understand me?" Safar demanded.

He made a motion and the light became brighter still. The creatures shrieked as their pain intensified.

Even the queen could not stop a low moan escaping through her clenched lips.

"Yes," she gasped, "I understand."

"Yes, Master," Safar corrected her. "You will address me as a€?Master.a€™"

The queen gnashed her fangs in protest, but she got it out: "Yes … Master!"

Tap, tap. Tap, tap, tap.

The sound brought Charize back to awareness. It was just in time, because as her great head jerked upward she sensed danger.

Not from without, but from only a few feet away where Tarla was sidling closer. Charize could smell the hate musk on her rival's breath. Hear the faint clatter of talons reaching for her throat.

The queen slashed with her mighty claws. There was a cry, the sound of a falling body; then the heady scent of death filled the chamber. And Tarla was no more.

Excited whispers came from her subjects as word was passed on what had happened.

"Are there any others, my sisters," came Charize's deadly voice, "who wish to challenge me?"

The whispers died.

Silence.

Except for the tap, tap, tap from the Other Side.

And then the remembered humiliation of the incident with Timura combined with the shock of Tarla's recent bold attempt at regicide to force a decision. Charize had to show them who ruled here. A raw display of power was required to silence those who had favored Tarla.

"Let him in, sisters," she said. "And we will feast!"

Palimak pressed an ear against the wall, listening as he tapped with the haft of his dagger. Tap, tap, tap.

All his senses were focused on the hollow echo that came back to him. The space behind the wall was quite large, he guessed. More of a chamber than just a rift in the rock's surface. Also, it was obviously a place that was quite warm. Witness the steam rising off the stone.

Getting ready to make another sounding, he shifted and felt a scratch against his cheek. He drew back, noticing a raised ridge on the otherwise smooth wall.

"What's this?" he asked.

On one shoulder, he felt Gundara shiver. "I don't like this place, Little Master," he said.

"Maybe we should leave," Gundaree added.

"Is there danger?" Palimak asked.

Frightened as he was, Gundara could not help a snort of derision. "We said it was hungry, Master," he pointed out.

Gundaree's teeth were chattering. Still, he managed to add, "And it wants to eat us!"

Palimak ignored their fear. "Make the light brighter," he said.

"Are you deaf, Little Master??" Gundara said. "Didn't you hear us tell you to leave as fast as you can?"

"Do as I ask," Palimak said. Then added, "Please."

"All right, if that's what you want, Little Master," Gundaree said. "But don't blame us if you end up in the belly of some nasty thing."

"I won't," Palimak said.

The two Favorites muttered a little chant, the ball of light grew brighter and Palimak was able to see the raised area of the rock more clearly. It was a carving of a winged snake with two heads, its tongues flickering out to taste the air.

"The sign of Asper," he whispered.

At that moment the Favorites cried out in unison: "Look out, Master!"

There was a low rumble, then a loud grating noise, and as Palimak stepped back the wall began to shift in its moorings. Palimak drew his sword-double-arming himself by readying a defensive spell. But then the wall stopped moving. Foul-smelling steam hissed through an inch-wide opening between the wall and its stone frame.

He waited, whispering a spell to turn the awful odor into something more bearable. The Favorites were silent, which he supposed was a blessing. But the lack of their usual chatter was unnerving.

Palimak had rarely seen them so afraid before. During grave danger to himself their usual attitude was a cheery resignation that they'd receive a new master if the danger proved fatal to Palimak. Sure, they'd miss him. Perhaps even mourn him a little. But the fact was that after a thousand or so years they'd become fatalistic about the many short-lived creatures who had been their masters. What would be, would be. In this case, however, their attitude was far from indifferent.

Palimak probed the darkness for some sign of the danger that was worrying them. He didn't doubt its existence. Gundara and Gundaree were never wrong about such matters. But all he could sense was the spoor of the long-dead magic he'd encountered when entering the tunnel.

Once again he looked at the twin-headed snake symbol of Asper. Unconsciously he reached out to touch it. But as he did so he had a quick mental flash of something-a horrible something-leaning forward in anticipation. Its enormous fangs exposed in a wide grin.

At that moment the ball of light sputtered and died and all became darkness. There was a subterranean rumble, then the heavy grating of stone against stone: he sensed that the door was opening wider.

Palimak took a deep breath and stepped through.

And then there was a loud, echoing boom! as the door slammed shut behind him.