The Sorcerer_s Skull

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Nightmares stalked him, even during waking hours. He hallucinated hideous sun demons, melting men, giant behemoths, attacking mushroom people, an entire gamut of phantasms that threatened his life. One small slip, one instant of panic, and Lan Martak would dive over the edge of mighty Mount Tartanius.

The nightmares weren' t real; the death caused by reacting to them was only too real.

" Krek, he' s waging war on me and I can' t fight him. He' s too strong."

" Claybore' s power is weak."

" What? How can you say that? He: he' s driving me out of my mind." Lan shuddered as a three- headed winged creature surged upward from behind a rock. Not even the rock was real.

" If he had true power, he would slay you outright. These visions are intended to cause you to bring injury to yourself. He battles you to the full extent of his power. If you stop him now, you have stopped his worst."

" I don' t know," said Lan, but the idea appealed to him. To combat a sorcerer so powerful and win fed his vanity.

" The Kinetic Sphere is the source of Claybore' s power. When he regains it, do you think he needs to send insignificant little visions? He is now weak and attempting to frighten you. How he must fear that you will succeed where he is failing."

" Failing? Claybore?"

" Is it not obvious?" asked the spider. " We make good progress. Not as good as if I went on ahead, but good, considering that so many humans are involved. Claybore' s pace must be far less swift. He works to slow us through you by giving insignificant little visions. Nothing more."

Lan slammed back against a cold rock cliff as a flight of bees swarmed past him. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. The " insignificant little visions" were potent enough. Yet the spider was right. With the Kinetic Sphere, Claybore' s options extended considerably. He wouldn' t attack in dreams, ambushing from sleep, pouncing on unguarded moments. Claybore' s way was one of power, direct, swift, deadly.

" I seem to be able to hold back his outright invasion of my mind," said Lan. " That may be why he' s restored to the illusions."

" Your magical perceptions have improved drastically." The spider made it a statement of fact.

Lan started to protest, then considered. Krek had seen what he hadn' t. In Melitarsus, he had been under the Suzerain' s geas, yes, but not so strongly as the spider. He had been able to break away, the magical tendrils appearing weakly clinging; for Krek they had been steel cables. Even more to the point, Krek had been able to escape with him, as if the human' s mere presence was enough to loosen the magics.

The fire spell he' d used to melt footholds in the ice crevasse, usually only of short duration, came more easily to him than ever before: He had maintained it for several minutes, even if the effort did eventually tire him drastically.

Other signs of his growing ability struck him as obvious now. He " saw" the cenotaph as easily as Krek did. He sensed the flow of magic about him to the point where Abasi- Abi hadn' t even bothered denying he was a sorcerer; he had admitted it directly to Lan.

" I can resist," Lan said forcefully. " My skills are improving. I might need to hone them a bit before taking on Claybore, but I can prevent him from fooling me with those nightmare creatures."

Even as he spoke, a man- headed python slithered forward. Lan laughed and concentrated on seeing only " reality." The python creature kept coming.

" Krek!" cried Lan in panic.

" I see nothing," came the slow words from the spider. " Claybore attacks only you. You are his worst enemy now. Fight him, Lan Martak, fight him!"

No matter how Lan concentrated, the python- man refused to vanish back into the nothingness from which he came. The best Lan did was cause the image to waver slightly, as if a wall of heated air danced between them. Lan couldn' t deny the creature' s existence and make it vanish, so he changed tactics. He tried to project an image of his own.

For the span of a heartbeat, a giant condor flapped above the python, talons seeking out a grip on a potential dinner. Lan shuddered and dropped to his knees, weakened by the effort. The python creature remained; his condor had vanished.

" If it' s not there, it can' t hurt me," he said. The python struck- through him.

" Lan Martak, what is happening? You appear pale and drawn."

" This is a battle of wits, and I' m almost out of ammunition," he told his friend. " Let' s hurry and catch up with Abasi- Abi. I hope he can help me."

" I shall gather up Ehznoll. He still prays to his gods of the earth."

The tattered pilgrim knelt some distance away from the silent battlefield, praying, chanting, going through rituals that made no sense to either human or spider. Lan watched and marvelled. For Ehznoll life was simple. Pray, be answered or not, have faith. No matter that experience put the lie to what he claimed. Belief triumphed continually.

Lan Martak had to put the faith in himself and his own abilities if he wanted to survive. He closed his eyes and tried to ignore a giant spinning turtle with fire leaping from its shell.

" At last," he panted. The breathing device aided him greatlywithout it Lan wouldn' t have lasted ten minutes- but it didn' t provide all the oxygen he needed.

" It is indeed Abasi- Abi and the others," confirmed the spider.

" Praise be!" cried Ehznoll. " Just in time to join them for vespers." The pilgrim raced forward to be with Melira and the others of his group. He had harangued all day long about converting Lan to his earth religion, then shifted in the last minutes to telling how he intended to proselytize those men with Abasi- Abi.

" I certainly agree. Praise be- that he' s out of my hearing."

Lan had scant chance for quiet. Abasi- Abi stalked over and stood before him, hands on hips and face like a mountain storm.

" Where have you been?"

" That' s an interesting question from someone who tried to strand Ehznoll and me at the bottom of a crevasse. You deserted us!" Lan took a step forward and felt a blow to the chest, the twin of the one Abasi- Abi had given him before. This time his rage alone nullified the burning impact. He grabbed the sorcerer by the collar and lifted until the old man' s toes barely touched the ground. He shook him hard.

" Put me down!"

" I ought to throw you over the cliff!"

" Put me down!"

Lan did, but not because Abasi- Abi commanded it. Behind, he saw a giant snow leopard. The creature made no sound. Its smoothly flowing muscles brought it closer, ever closer. The tiny red eyes poured out nothing but pure hatred. It reared, pawed the air with claws fully six inches long, then padded closer.

The sorcerer turned and looked, then faced Lan.

" He' s doing this. Why didn' t you tell me he was doing this to you?" The mage' s fury washed over Lan like an avalanche. He felt cold and buried and cut off from the world. When hot winds slashed at his face, he cowered back. Abasi- Abi' s rage mounted. No longer did Lan worry about the puny visions sent by Claybore. Abasi- Abi held his full attention, presented immediate danger. Krek had been right about Claybore; that sorcerer' s power was stunted.

Abasi- Abi was near, mad, powerful.

Lan fell to his knees under the flame winds charring his flesh. The snow evaporated around him, became fog, then boiled away. Squinting at the sorcerer, all the man saw was a ball of incandescent gas. He tried to call out, to beg Krek for aid; then something snapped inside his head.

Krek wasn' t the one to ask for aid. The firestorm raging would ignite his furry legs and incinerate the spider in a second. Lan had to fight this battle himself.

He fought. He fought as hard as he could, with the few tools at his disposal. His own pyromancy spell was pathetic in comparison with the ones used by Abasi- Abi, yet it was all he had. Healing chants worked too slowly, and there wasn' t any obvious way of using them to combat the tide of magic sweeping over him.

Lan lifted thumb and forefinger, set up the bright blue flame leaping from one to the other. Enough for starting campfires, but not enough to counter the flames devouring him. He closed his eyes and imagined the tiny flame high overhead, working against the leading edge of a snowbank, melting the underpinnings of half a mountain of snow.

A deep rumbling sound shocked Lan out of his trance. His minuscule flame died.

Both he and Abasi- Abi were caught under an avalanche of snow brought down from the side of the mountain. The wash of snow extinguished the sorcerer' s spell even as it buried him. Lan turned and arched his back, trapping a small amount of air even as more snow thundered down off the mountain. When the rumblings stopped, Lan was trapped in his tiny snow prison.

" What now?" he asked himself. The air came stale and choking, even with the magical breathing aid.

As he spoke, the answer presented itself. He' d used his pyromancy to bring down the snow, he could also use it to remove the snow. With a snap of his fingers, flame jumped from finger to finger. Like a knife slicing through water, he cored out a tunnel to daylight.

The last rays of the setting sun caught him fully in the face as he emerged.

Abasi- Abi had already burned his way out of the snowbank, but the brief snow bath had cooled his ire.

" We need to speak," was all the sorcerer said.

Lan helped the others free of the snow, glad that none had been hurt as a result of his tentative magics.

" You do more than sense magic," accused the sorcerer. Abasi- Abi sat beside the small campfire across from Lan, peering at him as if he had sprouted wings and horns.

" A few minor spells, that' s all."

" Minor," scoffed the mage. " Hardly. The first blast of flame should have cindered you."

" I was lucky."

" No one is lucky against me. More powerful, yes, but not lucky. From the first I sensed in you a power, a different sort of power. Inexplicably, it continues to grow. You are maturing into a mage of considerable power; such a transformation normally takes years." In a more wistful tone, he added, " With me it took even longer."

" All I can do is the single pyromancy spell and some small healing spells."

" You ward off magics too well for those to be your only power."

Lan considered this. He had been able to break free of Nashira' s spell in Melitarsus, while Krek had failed. And he' d done well enough against Claybore' s army of visions; they hadn' t harmed him even if they did frighten him with their apparent reality.

" Still, you helped me," Lan said.

" What? When?"

" Back when we' d first met. Claybore came to me in that vision. The ruby beams from his eye sockets reached out for me and you turned them aside."

" What!"

The sorcerer' s shriek brought the entire camp awake. Seeing nothing menacing, they slowly turned over and went back to sleep, mumbling about the unwonted disturbance.

" You must have helped. I couldn' t fight off Claybore by myself."

" You know of him?"

" Of course. And you know I do. We: in that dreamworld, the three of us fought. Right after we' d joined forces at the base of the mountain."

" I never defended you. You did it by yourself, unconsciously perhaps, but by yourself. I' d never aid another. Too risky."

" I held off Claybore by myself." Lan actually impressed himself with the idea. He remembered all too well the decapitated sorcerer' s power.

" What do you know of him? How do you come to battle him?"

" Not so loud. I' m afraid Ehznoll thinks Claybore is some sort of new god to worship. Ehznoll saw one of the visions sent and thinks it some divine revelation."

" Over the rim with Ehznoll," snapped Abasi- Abi. He leaned forward, hands on knees. " What of Claybore?"

Lan quickly outlined his battles with the decapitated sorcerer, his vow to stop him and his grey- clad soldiers, and ended with his dedication to joining again with Inyx.

" I feel responsible for her plight," he explained. " Many times, she could have gone on her way and been safe. She chose to fight alongside me; I owe her for that, if nothing else. She' s lost between worlds, and it' s my fault."

" You know that, too," said Abasi- Abi, rubbing his temples. " You know much for someone who professes to know so little. Your skills are being brought out with every new contact with Claybore. His attacks are a catalyst for your power. Never have I heard of such a thing, but such natural talent must exist. You are it."

" So you see why I want to stop Claybore. What' s your interest in him?"

The old sorcerer leaned back, arms crossing over his thin chest. A sly look came to his eye.

" The same as you. To keep him from spreading to all worlds along the Cenotaph Road."

" There' s more," accused Lan. " And I don' t need magic to tell me that."

" Very well. I shall tell you, for what good it' ll do you. Our battles date back a long, long time. Claybore and I are ancient enemies, from two continually warring worlds along the Road. I won' t pretend that my motives are as altruistic as yours in this matter. He has wronged me many times, and I him. But when I discovered he spread his influence along the Road, I knew I had to stop him."

" Why?"

" There are many magical artifacts along the Cenotaph Road. Claybore was denied them once, by a mage vastly more powerful than either he or I combined. He would regain them."

" You want them for yourself, is that it?"

Lan wondered what the Kinetic Sphere meant to Abasi- Abi. It certainly proved potent in untrained hands; what might it do with proper magical training?

The harsh laugh greeting him surprised Lan.

" Hardly. I want to destroy them, if I can. Only Claybore can use the artifacts. I would deny them to him permanently. This will prove a feat beyond even the original divestiture."

" Why is that?"

" You wouldn' t understand."

Lan felt irrational anger at this. He was being treated like a small child told he wouldn' t understand- until he grew up. He deserved better. After all, hadn' t he successfully withstood Claybore' s most vicious attacks?

" Try and make me understand."

" Very well. A magical relic once belonging to Claybore rests atop this mountain."

" I know," said Lan. " When we were in the world between worlds, I almost got it away from him."

" You failed? You had the chance and you failed?"

Lan felt the rising forces of magic around him, radiating outward like ripples from a rock tossed into a still pond.

" Calm down," he said. " I failed once. I won' t fail again."

" Claybore makes better progress to the summit than we do. He will arrive long before we can," Abasi- Abi said angrily. " And this race is unnecessary. If you' d only stopped him when you had the chance!"

" I' m not so sure we aren' t ahead of him," contradicted Lan. " And arguing about my failure between worlds won' t change the past."

" It can."

" Not now," said Lan, wondering if the sorcerer meant what he' d said in a literal sense. To change history:

He shrugged it off. He had to sleep. The day had worn him down, and the magics had left him as weary in mind as the climb had in body. He made a quick circuit about the encampment, saw that Ehznoll and his pilgrims had snuggled down under their pathetic tents to keep the evil sky from stealing their souls, then curled up near a fire and drifted off to sleep.

No illusory nightmares disturbed his sleep.

Lan Martak tossed and turned, then half- woke. He rubbed sleep from his eyes with an icy hand and wondered what troubled him. Claybore' s nightmares were strangely absent. He sat up and glanced around. Nothing. He lay back and soon drifted again to sleep, the uneasiness gnawing at the fringes of his consciousness like a cat worrying a mouse.

The moaning of rock moving sounded over the faint wail of the wind. Huge dark shapes moved with barely perceptible progress toward the camp. Heat radiated from each sleeping human, heat attracting the creatures. They rolled closer, ponderous and stony. Tiny rocks circled one tent holding a pilgrim. The stones crowded closer. The man inside cursed as a flailing elbow smashed into rock.

Larger stones rolled up. A boulder joined them. The man' s curses were replaced by a high- pitched scream as the rocks, in a concerted effort, all rolled over him, crushing life from his struggling body.

His death screams were caught on the wind and smothered. Even those sleeping a few feet away didn' t hear.

The smaller stones ground themselves down into the bloody pulp remaining, while the larger rocks moved on- to another victim.

And another and another and still another.

The sentient rocks circled Lan Martak, waiting for their larger companions to come.

The human slept on, dream- free but restless.