Triplet

"More bedrooms and storage," he called. "Okay. Go back to the shower and turn it on as high as it'll go. Have you got anything that you can use to stuff into the drain?"

"Just my clothes."

"Use your bodice—you can afford to lose that. Soak the rest of your clothes and put them on. Keep the door closed while you do it."

"Right."

The operation seemed to take an eternity, but it was probably only a couple of minutes before she was dressed in the dripping clothes and easing the door open again. The water that had collected inside flowed gently out, adding steam to the smoke already there. It also snuffed the flames directly by her feet, and for a moment she dared to hope it would be enough to cut her a path back to the bedroom. But a quick look crumbled that hope completely. The entire ceiling and floor seemed to be ablaze now, creating a solid wall of flames in both directions.

And she was now thoroughly trapped.

"Ravagin?" she shouted, fighting to keep her rising panic out of her voice. There was no answer, and for a horrible second she wondered if he'd gone out the window. Deserted her... "Ravagin!"

"I'm right here," his voice came reassuringly through the roar—but from the wrong direction.

Twisting around, she peered through the smoke the other way down the hall. Facing directly into the odd wind was a mistake, and in seconds her eyes were watering blindly with smoke and soot. But in that first second she'd been able to make out a dim figure beyond the flames. "I'm still here!" she shouted back, rubbing furiously at her stinging eyes. "Can I get through that way?"

"We don't have any choice. Are your clothes and shoes still wet?"

"Yes, and the water's still flowing around my feet."

"Okay. Go back and get Your bodice; you'll want to put it over your head. Hurry—we haven't got much time."

She didn't need the urging. Ten seconds later she was back at the door, the sopping bodice wrapped around her face and hair. "Are you still there?" she called, feeling the panic rising again. "I can't see you."

"I know—I can barely see you. Grab hold of this."

And like magic a thin cord appeared through the flames in front of her. It wasn't until she'd grasped it and its tip curled firmly around her hand and wrist that she realized what it was: the whip of Ravagin's scorpion glove. "Got it," she called.

"Now make sure your eyes are covered, and then grab the whip with your other hand."

"Ready."

"Okay." He paused, and she could sense somehow that he was bracing himself. "On the count of three I want you to come around the corner and toward me like all of Melentha's demons were right on your tail. I'll help pull; you concentrate on keeping your feet under you. Ready? Okay: one, two, three."

Clamping her jaw tightly, Danae leaped out into the hallway—

A blast of hot air hit her square in the face, burningly hot even through the streaming bodice. Dimly, she felt her entire body blistering where she stood; but even as she took her first step, she found herself flying through the burning hallway. Her arms felt like they were being pulled out of their sockets; she stumbled once, her feet striking what felt like liquid lead—

And abruptly she slammed into something solid that caught her and half dragged, half led her into sudden coolness.

"Ravagin," she gasped, clutching him tightly.

His hand slid over her face, pulled the bodice free. "It's okay, Danae—you're safe now," he soothed her.

She took a shuddering breath, blinking enough of the tears out of her eyes to see that they were in another bedroom. Across the room a broken window was blowing a stiff breeze toward them. "I thought Shamsheer houses were more fireproof than this," she gasped.

"They also come with built-in detectors and fire-fighting systems," Ravagin growled. "Our little friends apparently figured out a way to shut them down."

"Our—?" Danae's stomach tightened into a knot. With the fire driving all other thoughts from her mind she hadn't even made the co

"Who else? Come on—let's get out of here before they come up with something else to try."

Together they headed over to the broken window, and Ravagin took a careful look outside. "Looks clear. I'll go first, you come down after me. Watch the broken glass."

It was indeed clear outside, and a moment later they were hurrying around toward the front of the house, keeping to the middle of the narrow grass strip between the house and the edge of the forest.

Above them the roof of the house was begi

"They must have gotten into the central control system and found a way to overload the wiring throughout the house," he replied grimly. "Damn them, anyway. I never even thought they might do something like this."

They rounded the corner—and skidded to a halt.

Resting up against the front of the house was a huge, spindly circle sitting vertically on a wheeled base. A white haze filled its circumference, a haze that mixed with a billowing mass of black smoke streaming out its for end. "My God," Danae gasped. "What in the worlds is that?"

"It's a giant fan," Ravagin growled. "It's pulling the smoke out of the hallway, probably so as to give the fire a good head start before we smelled anything and woke up. Gives the fire a good air flow, too, of course."

Danae stared at the huge device. "But where did it come from? You're not going to tell me they had something like that in storage here, are you?"

"Not hardly," he said grimly. "There's a Forge Beast out back. I guess they got into that, too."

Forge Beast: a computerized forge capable of designing and making any desired metal object, the definition from her orientation came back to her. "They must have been in the house for hours—

maybe even since before we got here."

"Maybe," Ravagin said slowly. "On the other hand... well, it should be easy enough to test."

She watched, frowning, as he stepped to the nearest tree and sliced a thick branch off with his sword.

"What are you going to do with that?" she asked.

"See just how strong this fan really is. Stay here."

"Ravagin—" She bit down on the protest. He surely knew what he was doing....

Carefully, he moved to within a few meters of the fan and stood there for a moment studying it.

Then, taking hold of his branch with the whip of his scorpion glove, he extended it as close to the fen as it would go—flipped it into the blades—

And with a horrendous grinding of broken metal, the blades shattered into shrapnel.

"Well, that settles that," Ravagin said as he walked back to where Danae stood. "Extremely cheap construction, probably thrown together in less than an hour. Which means that it took them—" he glanced at the sun, glinting now between the trees to the west—"eight or nine hours to find us, get into the various systems and learn how to use them, build the fan and get it into position, and actually start the fire."

"That's pretty fast," Danae said, a sinking feeling tightening her stomach.

"Yeah," Ravagin nodded heavily. "But it could have been worse. Such as if you hadn't woken up and taken that shower."

Danae swallowed, remembering. "It was a bad dream that woke me up. One where trolls had the green glow of demon possession."

Ravagin cocked an eyebrow at her. "Interesting. You may still have some spirit sensitivity left over from your demogorgon contact. Could prove useful."

"If we can get to civilization in one piece, you mean—" She jumped as a sudden crash came from the house beside them. "What—?"