Unholy

Aoth had found a battlefield to his liking. True, he and his allies would have the Lapendrar at their backs-no practical way of avoiding that-but a bend in the river would protect their right flank, and a patch of woods-and the archers Gaedy

Once he was certain that Khouryn and the zulkirs' commanders were setting up the battle formation properly, he, Jet, and half a dozen of his fellow griffon riders flew out to take another look at the foe. As before, he found himself intrigued by the steel behemoth marching in the lead. So-Kehur, autharch of Anhaurz, looked like a scorpion with some additional limbs and a mask of a glaring human face attached, and he-if "he" was the right pronoun-was as huge as the undead octopus-things that had burrowed up out of the ground at the battle of the Keep of Sorrows.

His army looked nasty too. He had mounted lancers. Spearmen. Crossbowmen. Orcs, dread warriors, Red Wizards, and shuttered black wagons like coffins on wheels to carry entities unable to bear the sun. Their progress shrouded the marching columns in a haze of dust.

"Can we beat them?" asked Jet.

"Yes," said Aoth.

"Even though we're still torn up from the last fight?"

"Yes. Why the sudden doubts?"

"Because I get peeks at what's inside your head, O Mighty Captain."

Aoth snorted. "I'd be a fool if I liked the situation we're in. But that doesn't mean we can't handle it. I suspect this So-Kehur, who- and whatever he is, has no idea of the kind of power that four zulkirs-"

"Aoth…"

It was Bareris's voice crooning his name, and, startled, Aoth reflexively cast about to find the bard. For an instant, he saw him too, standing with Mirror in a corridor decorated with painted lizardfolk. Then the image melted away, exposing the mound of gray cumulus cloud behind it. A sense of co

Aoth felt elated and disgusted at the same time, the former because Bareris had succeeded in his mission, the latter because the timing could scarcely have been worse. But there was nothing to be done about the when of it.

Responding to his master's unspoken desire, Jet wheeled and raced back toward the river. Aoth surveyed the battle lines on the rise, spotted four scarlet-robed figures-and the attendants who generally followed them around-toward the rear of the formation, and sent Jet plunging down to alight beside them.

"We have to go," said Samas Kul. Aoth observed that the transmuter had abandoned his floating throne. Once again, he wore a harness made of white light to help him carry his bulk around.

"I know," said Aoth, "but I need another moment." He dismounted, cast about, and found Khouryn already waiting to confer with him. The dwarf wore a leather arming cap but hadn't yet do

"I figured that out," Khouryn said. "You're sure you need to go too?"

Aoth lowered his voice. "Someone should be there-someone besides Bareris and Mirror, I mean-who thinks that stopping the Unmaking is more important than saving his own skin."

Khouryn nodded. "I see that. Well, don't worry. The army could use all the magic you five are taking away with you, but we'll manage."

"I know you will."

"Now!" Nevron shouted.

Aoth turned. The zulkirs had moved apart to clear a space among them, and eight soldiers stood inside it. Aoth and Jet hurried to join them.

"Are you sure about this?" asked Aoth the griffon. "Stay here, and you can fight under the open sky."

Jet clacked his beak shut on empty air. It was one of several ma

"Everyone, be silent!" Lallara snapped. She raised her staff, chanted words of power, and, one by one, the other archmages joined in.

The world shattered into chaotic points of brightness, and Aoth had a sudden vertiginous feeling of hurtling like an arrow shot from a bow. Translating oneself through space wasn't a part of his own specialized discipline, but other wizards had taken him on such journeys a time or two, so he was prepared for the sensation.

He wasn't ready for what happened next.

The travelers should have appeared before Bareris and Mirror as quickly as a hummingbird flicks its wings. Instead, they abruptly found themselves suspended in a gray void that, Aoth realized, was scarcely even a space in the truest sense but rather a condition of transition and indeterminacy.

He felt multiple pressures acting on him simultaneously. Something-the spell the zulkirs had cast, presumably-shoved him relentlessly forward. But he couldn't go forward, because something else-Szass Tam's wards against this form of intrusion-had him in its grip. Bareris and the archmages had weakened those defenses, but not enough, with the result that Aoth and his companions were like men trying to squeeze through a hole too small to accommodate them. The effect was painful and growing worse.

One of the soldiers screamed, and then, armor groaning and bones snapping, his body crumpled in on itself and disappeared. Perhaps, ejected back into the real world, the corpse had fallen to the ground somewhere outside the Citadel.

A second warrior's body compressed as if it were no weightier than a sponge. Blood gushed from his mouth and nostrils.

Lallara rattled off a spell of protection. The pressure holding Aoth in place abated, and he had a sensation of lurching forward. Then Szass Tam's defenses clamped down again, arresting him. Another bodyguard shrieked as magic crushed him like a grape in a press.

Lallara glared at Aoth. "Back at the Dread Ring," she said, "I saw you conjure a prismatic wall."

He didn't see how the spell could help them, but he was willing to follow her lead. The Firelord knew, he had no ideas of his own. "Where do you want it?"

"It doesn't matter! Just cast as many as you can."

The balance of pressures acting on Aoth's body was becoming more excruciating by the moment, but he managed to grit out the incantation with the necessary precision. Multicolored radiance flared from the point of his spear, but instead of forming the usual barrier, it arced over to Lallara and cloaked her decrepit-looking form in rainbows, which coruscated as she chanted words of command. Aoth inferred that since a prismatic wall was a defensive enchantment, she, with her mastery of that form of magic, could siphon its power to strengthen her own spells.

He cast another wall, then another, and she wrapped those around herself as well. Szass Tam's wards mashed three more soldiers to pulp. Then the gray space burst apart.

The surviving travelers materialized down the length of the corridor in which Bareris and Mirror awaited them. Aoth stumbled a step, then caught his balance. A warrior exclaimed at the sudden darkness, and, with a casual gesture, Lauzoril kindled a globe of floating silvery light.

Aoth gri

"How do you figure that?" Samas demanded, shrill with displeasure. "We nearly died. Both my guards did die."

Nevron sneered. "You're a sad excuse for a zulkir if you need soldiers to protect you. But if you do, rest assured, we still have plenty." He made a sweeping gesture to indicate his own person with all its talismans and tattoos, and, by implication, the demons and devils caged inside them.

"We did experience an awkward moment," Lauzoril said, "but in my view, the scheme worked as well as we reasonably could have expected. All the important people made it through, and a few of our underlings as well. So I suggest we turn our attention to finding Szass Tam."