Dark Sun: Prism Pentad 5 - The Cerulean Storm (29 page)

Sadira looked up and nodded. Although it had been less than three days since they had
entered the valley, they had learned to be wary of their sense of time. The boiling ash
storm overhead cast the same red pall over this strange land all day long, rendering it
impossible to judge the hour by looking at the sky. They could not even create a sundial.
The thick clouds hid the sun and prevented even a faint shadow from showing on the ground.

To make matters worse, when night fell, it would do so with no period of twilight or hint
of dusk. The sky would simply change from a bright crimson to a dim scarlet, and Sadira's
skin would fade from ebony to its normal hue of ivory. And, as Neeva had pointed out, that
could happen soon. Morning, such as it was, had arrived much earlier that day, long before
Caelum's tracking spell had led them to the Dragon.

Unfortunately, holding their assault until morning was out of the question, for Borys knew
their strengths and limitations too well. If they let night fall, he would certainly
attack them.

Sadira stepped aside, letting Neeva and Caelum pass. “I'm fairly certain that arch is a
mystic gate, though I've no idea where it leads,” she said. “So keep a watchful eye. If
Borys activates it, our best chance of following him-and Rkard-will be to duplicate what
he does exactly.”

“What should we watch for?” Neeva asked.

Sadira shook her head. “I wish I knew. A command, or touching a hidden panel, perhaps even
something as simple as stepping out the other end,” she said.
“I
doubt that he'll try to use it until he's injured. But just in case, I'll try for your son
as quickly as I can.”

“Let us hope that Rkard still lives,” said Caelum. “And that the hour is not too dose to
dark.”

The dwarf led his wife into the ravine.

As the pair disappeared, Sadira slipped a nugget of dried nyssa resin into her mouth and
chewed. She plucked a lash from her eyelid and, when the gum had grown soft, wrapped it
inside. Pinching the resulting wad between her fingers, she whispered an incantation. Her
body slowly faded from black to gray, then grew translucent and finally became completely
invisible.

The clatter of shifting stones echoed up from the gorge, and Sadira knew Neeva and Caelum
had begun their descent. She reached into her pocket to prepare her next spell.

* * * * *

“Did you hear that?” Rikus whispered. “It sounded like clattering stones.”

The mul lay facedown on the brink of a small cliff. To one side, the precipice dropped
about thirty feet to a plain of broken basalt. To the other side, a mound of loose stones
rose fifty paces to a rounded crest that overlooked the Dragon's waiting place. Above the
summit of the ridge, Rikus could see the top of the arch, with its snaking yellow runes,
silhouetted against the crimson sky. Of course, he could not see over the hill to tell
what was happening in the ravine.

“I assume Neeva and Caelum are descending,” said Sacha. He was floating beyond the cliff
edge, well out of the mul's reach. “Be ready.”

“I am,” Rikus growled. He drew his sword and peered over the cliff edge at Tithian.

Having transformed himself into something resembling a giant scorpion, the king was using
the claws of his six legs to climb the cliff. The Dark Lens was pressed against his back,
held securely in place by his curled tail. In place of the arachnid's claws, he had
created a pair of arms as long and powerful as those of a half-giant. Only the head
remained Tithian's, looking at once demented and pitiful, with his brown eyes glaring from
deeply sunken sockets, his hawkish nose slimmed down to a crooked rib of cartilage, and
wild shocks of gray hair sticking out at all angles.

“Remember, I'll be watching you,” Rikus warned.

The king smirked up at the mul. “We're on the same side in this fight,” he said. “It's
time you accepted that.”

Rikus looked back up the hill. “I've been stung by one scorpion already,” he said. “It
won't happen again.”

* * * * *

Neeva sprang from one teetering boulder to another, her eyes watering and her throat
burning from the caustic fumes of the ravine. Most of the brown vapors in the

. immediate area were swirling around her axe's head, sinking into the enchanted blade and
disappearing from sight. The few wisps that escaped were enough to make

, her glad for Sadira's protection.

They had already traveled most of the way down the gorge. The great arch stood less than
fifty paces away, at least five times as tall as a giant. A Balican schooner could have
sailed through the gap between its pillars. Even the yellow runes on its face, now
writhing madly, were the size of faro trees.

The Dragon continued to stand in the shadows beneath the arch, his head cocked as he
watched them approach. The closer they came, the harder it became to see him dearly. The
glow rising from the abyss at his back grew brighter with each step, until the glare
blurred the edges of his scaly body.

Neeva had expected Borys to attack by now, but it did not disturb her that he had not. The
closer he let them approach, the longer Sadira would have to position herself.

The warrior glanced at her axe head. They were all keenly aware that the Dragon ahead
could be a double, like the one they had faced in Samarah. One of the enchantments Sadira
had cast on the weapon was to make the blade reveal the true appearance of anything
reflected in its dark sheen. The image Neeva saw was that of Borys.

“Watch yourself!” Caelum cried. “He may be attacking!”

The dwarf pointed at the top of the great arch. One of the sigils was glowing white and
whirling madly. An instant later, it vanished in a bright flash.

Neeva pressed herself close to her husband's side, holding the axe between them and the
arch. Before she could ask what he expected to occur, a sheet of steaming white sludge
sizzled from a long fissure in the canyon wall. She thought they would be swamped, but the
sheet split apart as it neared them. A huge glob struck Neeva's axe and swirled into the
blade in a great whirlpool. The rest of the muck fell around them, blanketing the rocks on
the ground. A harsh hissing and popping sounded from beneath the white shroud, then it
quickly dissolved into brown vapor and rose up around them in a caustic cloud.

Neeva swung her axe through the choking vapors, clearing them away with a single pass of
the blade. Both she and Caelum looked back to the arch immediately. To their relief, no
more of the runes disappeared.

They advanced farther down the gorge, until they were close enough to see that the yellow
runes in the arch's face consisted of flowing ribbons of molten stone. The bright glow
behind the Dragon sent blazing daggers of pain shooting through Neeva's eyes, and blasts
of fiery wind gusted up from the depths of the abyss to sear her flesh. Determined not to
show her weakness, Neeva continued to advance without shielding her eyes or looking away.

A loud, spiteful voice came from beneath the arch. “Stop there, and we will speak.”

The warrior and her husband obeyed, keeping a watchful eye on the yellow runes above.
“What do we have to talk about?” Neeva asked.

Borys stepped to the front edge of the arch, his body now blocking most of the glare. He
lowered his serpentine neck and fixed his scorching gaze on the two intruders. The spiked
crest on his head stood completely upright, the barbed tips of its spines gleaming with
orange light. A scorching light shone in his beady eyes, and wisps of yellow smoke fumed
from his dark nostrils. The Dragon's beaklike mouth gaped open. Neeva brought her axe
around, fearing he intended to spray them with his fiery breath.

Borys did not attack.
“If
you give me Tithian and the lens, I'll return your child and let you live,” he offered.
“I'll even leave Tyr alone.”

Neeva looked up at his hand, far above. She could see Rkard's feet and hands protruding
from between the Dragon's claws, but nothing else.

“How do I know my son's still alive?” Neeva asked.

The warrior found herself croaking the words. She did not know whether the dryness in her
throat was due to her fear or the parching wind blowing in her face.

Borys poised a claw over the center of his palm, approximately where Rkard's chest would
be. “Would you like to hear him scream?”

“That won't be necessary.”

Neeva glared up at the Dragon for a moment, then faced her husband as if to speak with
him. As badly as she wanted to agree to the terms, she did not trust Borys any more than
she would have trusted Tithian. She had no intention of revealing the lens's location, but
was simply trying to buy Sadira a little more time to maneuver into position.

Caelum turned a palm upward, calling upon the sun for his spell. To Neeva's horror, a
spout of glowing red ash shot down from the sky to lick at her husband's hand. The dwarf's
eyes went wide, and a sound like roaring wind howled from inside the arch.

Neeva spun around, holding the flat of her blade before her. Borys had drawn himself up to
full height, his bony chest puffed out with air. His snout gaped so far open that she
could see a yellow glow rising from deep in his gullet.

At least we're holding his attention, Neeva thought.

The beast dropped his head and spewed a cone of white-hot sand at the warrior and her
husband.

* * * * *

Rikus saw a strange spout of crimson ash whirl down from the sky, descending into the
gorge just a short distance from the great arch. Then came a roaring sizzle he recognized
from previous battles against the Dragon: the blast of scorching breath. Clouds of blazing
hot sand billowed up around the ash. The spout quickly dissolved, drifting away in a fog
of gray flakes. Borys's breath continued to roar.

Rikus looked down at the king, who was less that ten feet away, hanging from the cliff
face by all six claws. “The fight's started!” the mul yelled. “Hurry up!”

Rikus jumped to his feet and started up the rugged slope. He had taken only three steps
when a long chain of yellow runes squirmed off the great arch and streaked down to the
mound's crest. They struck with boom after thunderous boom, and the entire summit seemed
to explode into shards of basalt and plumes of acrid smoke. The mul covered his head and
waited for the eruption to pass. When the choking haze thinned, he saw thirteen obsidian
statues standing on top of the ridge. They had round, featureless heads with no faces, and
their arms ended in fan-shaped blades.

The statues came lumbering down the slope with plunging, stiff-legged strides that sent
loose rocks skittering down the hill before them. As the golems came nearer, Rikus saw a
single yellow flame twinkling in the dark breast of each one.

“What's that racket?” called Tithian. He was still hanging on the cliff and could not look
over the top to see the approaching golems.

“Nothing I can't handle,” Rikus answered. “But watch your head. There might be some
falling rocks.”

Rikus drew the Scourge and waited, deciding that he could use the cliff to good advantage
against the clumsy statues. The four golems in the center reached him first, slashing at
his neck. The mul ducked and counterattacked, bringing his blade through the breasts of
all four attackers. The enchanted steel cut through the obsidian like flesh. As the sword
sliced through the yellow flame inside each golem's breast, the statues burst into shards,
opening more than a dozen deep slashes along the mul's side.

Rikus hardly noticed the cuts, except as a warning to be more careful about how he
destroyed the other statues. He had not suffered any crippling wounds when these golems
exploded, but he might not be so lucky next time.

The mul turned and charged one flank of the golems' line. He ducked the flailing arms of
the first statue, then counterattacked with a series of vicious slashes that took the legs
off both it and the next one in line. The third golem stooped over to slash at Rikus's
legs, anticipating that he would duck again. The mul leaped over its head and sent it
tumbling over the cliff with a stomp-kick to the back. He found himself descending
straight into the thrashing blades of the fourth golem.

Rikus flipped his blade around and drove it straight down to the thing's yellow heart. It
exploded as the others had, but the shards sprayed out horizontally, and the mul suffered
no cuts as he came down before the last statue. This one split its attacks, one arm
slicing low and the other high. Rikus leaped back and waited for the appendages to cross,
then darted forward and sliced them both off at the elbows. The thing threw itself at him.
Rikus grabbed a stump and sidestepped, bracing a foot against its ankle. When he pivoted,
the golem's own momentum carried it over the cliff.

As it shattered on the stones below, Rikus faced the last four golems and found them
forming a semicircle above him. The mul backed to the edge of the cliff and braced
himself. The dark statues closed ranks and rushed, their hands slashing high, low, and
through all points in between. Rikus parried for a moment, lopping off a couple of
obsidian hands, then stepped back and dropped off the precipice.

As he fell, Rikus drove the tip of the Scourge down into the cliff at a steep angle,
catching himself just a yard below the top. Only two golems followed him over the edge,
unable to stop their advances in time to keep from falling. Still attacking as they
plummeted past, one managed to open a deep gash next to the mul's spine. Then they both
shattered against the rocks below.

The last two golems kneeled at the cliff's brink.

The mul thrust his free hand into a crevice and knotted his fist, twisting against the
stone to jam it in place.

As the two statues above began to slash at him, he pulled the Scourge free and severed one
golem's head. The thing hardly seemed to notice, thrashing at the arm Rikus had thrust
into the crevice. When it could not reach, it dropped to its belly. The other golem, now
excluded from the combat, returned to its feet and stepped away, where the mul could not
see it.