The Keep

Papa! He had regained consciousness and was on his feet, leaning against the wall of the gateway arch. It sickened Magda to see the thin trickle of blood ru

"You!" Rasalom said, pointing to Papa. "Take the talisman from her! She has joined our enemies!"

Magda saw her father shake his head, and her heart leaped with new hope.

No!" Papa's voice was a feeble croak, yet it echoed off the stone walls around them. "I've been watching! If what she holds is truly the source of your power, you do not need me to reclaim it. Take it yourself!"

Magda knew she had never been so proud of her father as at that moment when he stood up to the creature who had tried to plunder his soul. And had come so close to succeeding. She brushed away tears and smiled, taking strength from Papa and giving it back to him.

"Ingrate!" Rasalom hissed, his face contorted with rage. "You've failed me! Very well, then—welcome back your illness! Revel in your pain!"

Papa slumped to his knees with a stifled moan. He held his hands before him, watching them turn white and lock once again into the gnarled deformity that until yesterday had rendered them useless. His spine curved and he crumpled forward with a groan. Slowly, with agony seeping from every pore, his body curled in on itself. When it was over he lay whimpering in a twisted, tortured parody of the fetal position.

Magda stepped toward him, shouting through her horror. "Papa!" She could almost feel his pain herself.

Yet he suffered through it all with no plea for mercy. This seemed to incite Rasalom further. Amid a chorus of shrill squeaks, the rats started forward, a dun wave that sluiced around Papa, then swept over him, tearing at him with tiny razor teeth.

Magda forgot her loathing and rushed to his side, batting at the rats with the hilt, swatting them away with her free hand. But for every few she swept away, more sets of tiny jaws darted in to redden themselves on Papa's flesh. She cried, she sobbed, she called out to God in every language she knew.

The only answer came from Rasalom, a taunting whisper behind her. "Throw the hilt through the gate and you will save him! Remove that thing from these walls and he lives!"

Magda forced herself to ignore him, but deep within she sensed that Rasalom had won. She could not let this horror go on—Papa was being eaten alive by vermin! And she seemed helpless to save him. She had lost. She would have to surrender.

But not yet. The rats were not biting her, only Papa.

She sprawled across her father, covering his body with her own, pressing the hilt between them.

"He will die!" the hated voice whispered. "He will die and there will be no one to blame but you! Your fault! All you—"

Rasalom's words suddenly broke off as his voice climbed to a screech—a sound full of rage, fear, and disbelief.

"YOU!"

Magda twisted her head upward and saw Glaeken—weak, pale, caked with dried blood, leaning against the keep's gate a few feet away. There was no one in the world she wanted more to see right now than him.

"I knew you would come."

But the way he looked, it seemed a miracle he had made it across the causeway. He could never stand up to Rasalom in his present condition.

And yet he was here. The sword blade was in one hand, the other he held out to her. No words were necessary. She knew what he had come for and knew what she must do. She lifted herself away from Papa and placed the hilt in Glaeken's hand.

Somewhere behind her, Rasalom was screaming, "Nooooo!"

Glaeken smiled weakly at her, then in a single motion, smooth and swift, he stood the blade point down and poised the top of the hilt over the butt spike. As it slid home with a solid rasping click, there came a flash of light brighter than the sun at summer solstice, intolerably bright, spreading in a ball from Glaeken and his sword to be caught and amplified by the images of the hilt inlaid throughout the keep.

The light struck Magda like a blast from a furnace, good and clean, dry and warm. Shadows disappeared as everything within sight was etched in blinding white light. The fog melted away as though it had never existed. The rats fled squealing in all directions. The light scythed through the standing corpses, toppling them like stalks of dry wheat. Even Rasalom reeled away with both arms covering his face.

The true master of the keep had returned.

The light faded slowly, drawing back into the sword, and a moment passed before Magda could see again. When she could, there stood Glaeken, his clothes still ripped and bloodied, but the man within renewed. All fatigue, all weakness, all injury, had been wiped away. He was a man made whole again, radiating awesome power and implacable resolve. And his eyes were so fierce, so terrible in their determination that she was glad he was a friend and not a foe. This was the man who led the forces of Light against Chaos ages ago ... the man she loved.

Glaeken held the reassembled sword out before him, its runes swirling and cascading over the blade. His blue eyes shining, he turned to Magda and saluted her with it.

"Thank you, my Lady," he said softly. "I knew you had courage—I never dreamed how much."

Magda glowed in his praise. My Lady ... he called me his Lady.

Glaeken gestured to Papa. "Take him through the gate. I'll stand guard until you're safe on the causeway."

Magda's knees wobbled as she stood up. A quick glance around showed a jumble of fallen corpses. Rasalom had disappeared. "Where—?"

"I'll find him," Glaeken said. "But first I must see you where I know you'll be safe."

Magda bent and grabbed Papa under the arms and dragged his pitifully light form the few feet that took them across the threshold and onto the causeway. His breathing was shallow. He was bleeding from a thousand tiny wounds. She began dabbing at them with her skirt.

"Good-bye, Magda."

It was Glaeken's voice and it held a terrible note of finality. She looked up to see him staring at her with a look of infinite sadness on his face.

"Good-bye? Where are you going?"

"To finish a war that should have been over ages ago." His voice faltered. "I wish..."

Dread gripped her. "You're coming back to me, aren't you?"

Glaeken turned and walked toward the courtyard.

"Glaeken?"

He disappeared into the maw of the tower. Her cry was half wail, half sob.

"Glaeken!"

TWENTY-NINE

There was darkness within the tower. More than mere shadow—it was the blackness that only Rasalom could spawn. It engulfed Glaeken, but he was not entirely helpless against it. His rune sword began to glow with a pale blue light as soon as he stepped through the tower entrance. The images of the hilt laid into the walls responded immediately to the presence of the original and lit with white-and-yellow fire that pulsated slowly, dimly, as if to the rhythm of a massive and faraway heart.

The sound of Magda's voice followed Glaeken within and he stood at the foot of the tower stairs trying to shut out the pain he heard as she called his name, knowing that if he listened he would weaken. He had to cut her off, just as he had to sever all other ties to the world outside the keep. There was only he and Rasalom now. Their mille

He let the power of the glowing sword surge through him. It was good to hold it again—like being reunited with a lost part of his body. But even the power of the sword could not reach the growing knot of despair tangled deep within him.

He was not going to win today. Even if he succeeded in killing Rasalom, the victory would cost him everything ... for victory would eliminate the purpose of his continued existence. He would no longer be of use. to the Power he served.