Dark Sun: Prism Pentad 5 - The Cerulean Storm (13 page)

While they arranged themselves, Patch and one warrior, probably Fosk judging by the name
Rikus had heard a moment ago, entered the valley. In three steps, they had already walked
more than a quarter of the way across. The mul did not see the other two giants.

At Rikus's side, Neeva suddenly cried, “Suit? Where in the name of Ral are you?”

The mul looked toward the tunnel entrance, where he saw three ranks of dwarves standing
with axes drawn and bucklers guarding their chests. “What's wrong?”

“Suit Ltak and his Granite Company are missing,” Neeva reported.

Just then, a giant's angry bellow rolled across the valley, followed by the distant sound
of crumpling armor. Rikus looked back toward the canyon. Beyond the lumbering forms of
Patch and Fosk, he saw a third titan kicking madly at something on the ground.

“They're still in the canyon!” Rikus said. “They must have fallen behind!”

“Either that, or stayed on purpose,” said Caelum, coming to the mul's side. “The
yalmus
of the Granite Company is a brave man-sometimes overly so.”

“You mean he'd hang back on purpose?” Rikus gasped.

Neeva nodded.
“If
he thought he could kill a giant, he would.”

In the dark shadows of the narrow canyon, the mul could see little, only the silhouette of
a huge knee rising and falling as the giant stomped at his attackers. Curt death cries and
the creak of folding armor suggested that the brute's foot found its target all too often,
but Rikus could also hear a softer sound: the incessant thump-thump-thump of dwarven axe
blades biting into tough flesh.

Looking back to Patch, Rikus said, “Call him back, Neeva. They'll be wiped out.”

Neeva shook her head. “I can't do that, even if Suit Ltak's men would obey,” she said.
“They've
declared for honor.”

“Declared for honor?” the mul asked.

“You remember how Yarig fought?” Neeva replied.

Rikus groaned. “They wouldn't do a thing like that.”

He and Neeva had trained with a dwarf named Yarig during their days in Tithian's gladiator
pits. Before each match, the squat gladiator would make victory over his opponents his
life focus.

Neeva nodded. “In Kled, they call that declaring for honor,” she said. “Suit and his
warriors must kill the giant or die trying. If they retreat now, it's the same as breaking
their life focus. They'll become banshees when they die.”

“I thought your militia was disciplined!” Rikus snapped. He cursed and kicked at the
ground. He barely noticed as his callused foot sent a melon-sized stone rolling away.

“It's not Suit's fault,” Neeva said. “Every
yalmus
has the right-even the responsibility-to act on his own initiative.”

“Suit is dividing the enemy's forces, just as Neeva taught him,” added Caelum.

The mul cursed the dwarf's initiative and tried to think of a way to save the company.
During the war with Urik, too many brave warriors had died needlessly for him to want to
see the same thing happen to the Granite Company.

Before anything came to mind, Patch and Fosk surprised the mul by stopping their advances.
The giants stood thirty of Rikus's paces away-only five or six of their own-and glared
down at the three ranks of dwarven warriors.

Rikus drew his sword and stepped forward. The blade remained gray with the stain of the
wraith attack, and the weapon's magic did not seem quite as powerful as before. Although
the Scourge brought the dying screams of Suit Ltak's dwarves to his ears more clearly, he
still could not understand their words-as he would normally have been able to do.

“Where is our Oracle?” demanded Patch.

“If you want to talk, call off your warrior's attack,” Rikus countered, pointing toward
the gorge.

Patch peered over his shoulder, then looked back down at Rikus with his one uncovered eye.
He smiled, revealing a cruel set of filed yellow teeth. “Not until you answer.”

Rikus sighed, then said, “We don't have it here.”

“We knew that when your ugly little dwarves started shooting needles instead of giving it
to us,” sneered Fosk, standing a step behind his leader. “Where have you hidden it?”

“If you make us call the rest of the tribe to break into Tyr, we'll raze the city,” warned
Patch. “We won't leave nothing standing.”

“There are many powerful wizards in Tyr-including the one who imprisoned your war party
this morning,” Rikus bluffed. “Besides, we only need to borrow the lens. We'll give it
back as soon as we kill the Dragon.”

Patch's single eye went as round as the sun, and Fosk could not stop himself from stepping
forward.

“No!” boomed the giant leader. “Especially not for that!”

Rikus frowned. 'The Dragon is everyone's enemy,“ the mul said. ”He may not take giants to
fill his levy, but it's his magic-and that of his followers, the sorcerer-kings-that
turned Athas into a wasteland."

“Better to live in a wasteland than die in a paradise,” countered Fosk.

“What's that supposed to mean?” Rikus asked.

Patch and Fosk looked at each other with blank expressions. Then, as if it would explain
everything, the leader said, “That's what Jo'orsh and Sa'ram say.”

“What do you know of Jo'orsh and Sa'ram?” demanded Caelum, stepping to Rikus's side.

“They gave us the Oracle,” Patch informed him. “They said if we lose it, almost everyone
on Athas could die.”

“Then they must have changed their minds,” Neeva said, joining the pair. “Because they're
the ones who told us that it was time to kill the Dragon.”

Fosk's cavernous mouth dropped open, and Patch raised the brow of his uncovered eye in
disbelief. “They're here?” asked Fosk.

“They visited us ten days ago,” Rikus said. He carefully avoided any mention of Rkard,
deciding that he would leave it to Neeva to reveal or keep secret what the banshees had
said about the boy's destiny. “They said nothing about returning the lens to the: giants.”

Patch scowled doubtfully. “If you really saw them, what'd they look like?”

“They were the size of giants-not quite as big as you, but close,” Neeva replied. “They
were nothing but bone, all twisted up. One had a skull, and the other didn't. Neither one
had any skin, but both had orange eyes and long gray beards.”

Patch ran a hand through his snarled hair braids. “And they didn't take our Oracle back?”
he gasped. “Where are they?”

Neeva started to answer, but Rikus raised a hand to keep her from speaking. “First, stop
your warrior from smashing any more of our friends.”

Patch motioned to Fosk, who turned and bellowed, “Gait, leave them guys alone for a
minute-but don't let 'em out 'til Patch says.”

Gait reluctantly stepped back. He grabbed a huge boulder and dropped it into place at the
mouth of the canyon. Rikus heard the sound of crumpling armor, then dozens of angry
dwarves screaming for the giant to come back and fight.

“Right now, we don't know where Jo'orsh and Sa'ram are,” Rikus said. “We haven't seen them
since they said it was time to kill the Dragon. But I suspect they've gone to protect the
lens until we get there.”

“Get where?” Patch demanded. “Our Oracle isn't in Tyr?”

Rikus smiled, proud of himself for salvaging their original plan. Even with Sadira
unconscious, it seemed he would be able to lure the giants away from Tyr-perhaps even
convince them to abandon their demand for the lens altogether.

“No, Agis didn't bring the Dark Lens back to Tyr,” Rikus said. “He sent word for us to
meet him someplace else.”

Fosk scowled, and Patch narrowed his eye. “Agis told you meet him?”

“Yes,” Rikus replied. “We'll leave as soon-”

“Liar!” Fosk thundered. He stooped down and scooped up an entire pile of waste rock.

Caelum touched his palm to the crimson sun on his forehead and pointed his other hand at
the giant. Rays of scarlet light shot from between the dwarf's fingers, illuminating the
valley in eerie, flickering hues as they streaked over and enveloped the titan's hand.

When Fosk whipped his arm forward, no stones flew from his hand. Pink balls of sticky,
bubbling gel arced off the ends of his fingers, igniting small circles of flame wherever
they spattered. The drops that fell on the ground flared briefly and faded, but the
burning sludge stayed in Fosk's hand. The giant screamed in pain and slapped the hand at
his thigh, kindling a fire even larger than the one he was attempting to put out. Finally,
he simply dropped to the ground and began to roll, sending clouds of dust high into the
sky.

“Nicely done, husband,” said Neeva.

Rikus grunted his agreement. Keeping a watchful eye on Patch, who was studying the fallen
giant with a wary scowl, the mul asked, “How many other spells do you have like that?”

“That was my most effective. That's why I saved it,” Caelum replied. “It may not kill him,
but it should keep him from bothering us for now.”

“Perhaps Magnus will have some wind-magic-”

“I doubt he'll be coming,” Rikus interrupted. “I assigned him to slow the giants back at
the farm. He must have gotten trapped on the other side, or he'd be here by now.”

As the mul spoke, Patch looked back toward the gorge. “Kill the dwarves, Gait!” he yelled.
“All of 'em!”

Neeva spun around, commanding, “Into the tunnel. Now!”

As the dwarves obeyed, the mul shook his head in bewilderment. “Stop it, Patch!” he
yelled, trying to keep the anger out of his voice. “I thought you understood. Jo'orsh and
Sa'ram don't want the lens back.”

“Be quiet, little liar!” Patch countered. He picked up a huge boulder and stepped toward
the mul. “Agis died in the Bay of Woe.”

“You're the one who's lying!” Rikus yelled. “Agis is alive. He just sent us a message!”

“Tithian stole our Oracle,” Patch insisted. “And you're trying to hide him.”

The titan hurled the stone with both hands. It arced toward Rikus. He had time to see that
it was easily large enough to flatten both him and his companions. The mul brought the
Scourge up and slashed at the rock with all his strength.

Rikus did not feel the enchanted blade biting into the boulder, as he had expected. His
arm just went numb. A loud, clanging knell punched at his eardrums, and a black flash
erupted from where his sword had met the rock. The dirt vanished from beneath his feet,
and he felt himself being slammed into the ground by a tremendous blast. Everything fell
quiet, and he expected to feel the crushing weight of the boulder smashing down on his
body.

Instead, he was pelted by a stinging hail of gravel shards. He found himself gasping for
breath as he struggled to draw air back into his lungs, and marveled that he had survived.

“Rikus!” Neeva screamed.

“I'm fine,” he groaned. The mul ran a hand over a stinging cut above his ear, then picked
himself up off the ground, nearly fell, and put out a hand to steady himself.

It was then that he realized he no longer held the Scourge.

“My sword,” he growled, shaking his head and glaring in Patch's direction.

“There,” Neeva replied. “It exploded.”

She pointed to the ground next to where Rikus had landed. The Scourge of Rkard lay in two
pieces, still tainted gray and disjoined about midway between the tip and hilt. From the
jagged ends of the blade oozed a stream of black fluid, thicker than syrup and smelling as
foul as a briny well. Instead of sinking into the dirt, the liquid drew up into glistening
beads, which immediately rolled toward each other and began to form a single, much larger
glob.

A cold ache rolled over Rikus's entire body. “No!” he cried, snatching the two pieces of
his sword off the ground.

The mul spattered his fingers with several drops of the black fluid. The beads quickly
rolled over his hand and started up his wrist, leaving a stinging trail of blisters in
their wake. He yelled in surprise and whipped his hand downward, flinging the liquid onto
the ground.

“What is that stuff?” he gasped, watching the beads crawl toward the larger blob on the
ground.

“What does it matter now?” responded Caelum. He pointed toward Patch, who had grabbed
another boulder and was raising it to throw again. “Let's go!”

With that, the dwarf seized the mul's arm and pulled him into the tunnel. Patch's boulder
crashed down outside and bounced off the cliff wall, filling the mine with a resonant boom.

Caelum led them into the deep recesses of the cavern, where the three remaining companies
of Kled's militia waited safely beyond the giant's reach. The dwarves had not bothered to
strike torches. When there was no true light available, their eyes detected the ambient
heat emitted by all objects. It was an ability they had inherited from their ancient
ancestors, who had lived out their entire lives in the black snugness of subterranean
depths. Since he was a half-dwarf himself, Rikus was also blessed with this gift.

From outside came Patch's distant voice, deriding the dwarves as pointy-eared cowards,
backstabbing thieves who couldn't grow a hair braid between them, and a dozen other names
that he considered insulting. Each time the giant uttered another indignity, the tunnel
trembled with the impact of another boulder hitting the cliff face outside. Once, a stone
even entered the mine and rattled around the collar for a few moments before coming to a
harmless rest.

Caelum stepped over to Rikus's side, his hand already glowing with crimson light.

“My healing magic is not as strong at night,” he said, gesturing toward the gash above the
mul's ear. “But at least I can stop the bleeding.”

Rikus pulled away. “Wait a minute. I have an idea.”

The mul looked at the Scourge's broken blade. The black fluid continued to drip from its
jagged breaks. Enough of the stuff had gathered on the tunnel floor to create a knee-high
blob of the stuff.

Rikus fit the two pieces of his sword together and held it toward Caelum.

“What do you want me to do?” the dwarf asked. He stared blankly at the blade and the dark
fluid dripping from it. “I'm no smith.”