The masked witches

Some of his souls simply couldn t bear the fiend s presence. They snapped and started screaming. But fortunately, most were resilient enough to allow him to ignore the clamor.

Two of the zombies, however, succumbed to the demon s influence. They fell down, thrashed, and pawed and swatted at themselves.

Uramar tensed when Nyevarra s knees buckled, and she too appeared on the verge of collapse. But she croaked a word of power and straightened up again.

Are you all right? he asked, raising his voice to make himself heard above the droning.

Yes, the vampire said, and you should be, too. I have the demon pe

Lesser, said the demon, its psychic voice stabbing into Uramar s mind, is a strange word for one of you paltry undead to apply to me.

We re the ones who have you caged, Uramar said.

For how much longer? the demon replied. Your barrier and the witch are one and the same. I push, she has to push back. And so she exhausts her strength.

If that s true, Nyevarra said, then I suppose it would be prudent to shove you back into your original prison while I still can.

The wasp-thing laughed. Its mirth was like a whip lashing and slicing the inside of Uramar s head. But you can t, little leech. I don t know how long I was bound here. A long while, I think. But I can see that you re no Nar, and you don t possess their skills.

I don t see a point to your hostility, Uramar said. The Nars enslaved you, so why would you want to fulfill their purpose? I was once in a similar situation, and I certainly had no desire to please my captors. Let Nyevarra set you free. All we ask in return is that you go in peace. Otherwise, we ll have to lock you away again or kill you.

It would be nice to thwart the Nar who bound me, the demon said. But how would he ever even know about it? Whereas you little folk are cringing right in front of me. I can actually hurt and destroy you, and that too will set me free.

We re not cringing, Nyevarra began. Suddenly the blue glimmer in the lines on the floor blinked out, and the ekolid sprang at her.

Its forelegs slammed into her shoulders and chest, and its momentum plunged her to the floor beneath it. Its tails whirled around its body to drive their stingers into her flanks. Its mandibles spread to grip her head between them.

Uramar raised his greatsword, willed his cold flesh colder, and rushed in. Kill it! he called to the zombies. He wasn t sure that any of them would obey under the circumstances, or that they d be of much use if they did, but it was worth a try.

Meanwhile, Nyevarra s body vanished in a puff of mist and swirled away from the demon s murderous embrace. The ekolid immediately oriented on Uramar, and its several tails reared like serpents.

As Uramar lunged into striking distance, he couldn t see any sign that the deathly chill that surrounded him was bothering the fiend. He hadn t really expected it to, but it was another measure that was at least worth a try.

Let s see you ignore this! snarled one of his warrior selves, and he swung the greatsword down at the demon s head.

The obyrith responded with two simultaneous actions. One of its stingers stabbed into Uramar s flank just above the hip. A different tail whipped into position to parry the sword stroke near the top of its arc.

As the stinger ripped free, a burst of pain doubled Uramar over. But the greatsword cut a little nick in the demon s tail, and it faltered, too. A psychic shriek rasped through Uramar s head.

The ekolid shook off the paralysis of sudden pain with a rattling shudder of its entire body, transparent wings, lashing tails, and all. At the same time, Uramar found renewed strength of his own in the power that shivered through his sword hilt into his hands.

The ekolid scuttled forward. Though still not fully recovered, Uramar managed to snap his point into line. The demon jerked to a halt just before it would have rammed its own head onto the blade. Then it hopped backward.

A life-drinking sword, it said. How does a slave stitched together from scraps of offal acquire such a treasure?

I m not a slave, panted Uramar, straightening up. Not anymore, he wasn t. You have no idea who we are, or the things we re going to do. It s a shame you won t live long enough to find out.

Perhaps you can tell me all about it when you re groveling to me in the Abyss, the demon said. That s assuming a travesty like you even has a soul to go there. Really, I think it s just as likely that everything you are is about to disappear like a blown-out candle flame.

The pain of the puncture wound above Uramar s hip had faded to an ache, but flared into agony once more. A pale grub the size of his thumb came squirming out of the hole.

At that moment of shock, revulsion, and pain, the ekolid lunged. The two zombies who hadn t lost what passed for their minds lurched past Uramar and swung their pickaxes. The one on the right popped a couple of the demon s round black eyes into smears of jelly. The other tore a wing. The ekolid retaliated and all but ripped them apart with arcing, whipping stabs of its stingers.

At the same time, Nyevarra, in womanly form once more, shrieked three rhyming words. Lightning crackled from her outstretched hand to blaze across the demon s hindquarters. The blast made the ekolid falter for a scant instant, but had no other effect that Uramar could discern. It continued to scuttle toward him.

He dipped the greatsword low, as if he meant to shear the obyrith s forelegs out from underneath it. Its tails shifted to defend against such an attack and strike back at his torso. He retreated just out of reach of the stingers and let go of his weapon with his left hand. Suddenly he whipped out his arm, and threw a barrage of conjured hailstones from his fingertips.

Caught by surprise, the ekolid offered no defense. And while it might be impervious to pure cold, the hard bits of ice pulped and tore at the rest of its eyes almost as effectively as the zombies pickaxes.

The demon recoiled, and, slashing, Uramar pursued. Nyevarra cast away her tarnished mask, revealing a face that a mortal might have found pretty except for its ashen pallor, needle fangs, and snarl of bestial fury. She leaped onto the demon s back among the buzzing wings and started biting.

Despite their combined attack, killing the ekolid wasn t easy. But finally the demon collapsed with much of its head, torso, and limbs either crisscrossed with gory wounds or chopped away entirely.

Its death throes were mere shudders, but from the corner of his eye, Uramar glimpsed something else crawling in the spreading pool of its dark, putrid blood. It was the larva, already bigger than when it had wriggled out of his side. He bellowed and stamped it to mush.

For a moment, slumping, he imagined that was the last thing he needed to do. Then he realized that Nyevarra was still clinging to the motionless ekolid and still licking and sucking at its wounds.

It was normal behavior for a vampire, but the results weren t. Her body swelled, and there was a squirming beneath her clothing, as though new appendages were sprouting. Her skull made crunching noises as it changed shape. Her two eyes divided into four, and the begi

Uramar dropped his sword, grabbed Nyevarra, and dragged her off the ekolid. She struggled, but her strength, though greater than human, was less than his own. Knowing of a no more sophisticated remedy, he slammed her into the wall repeatedly.

Rather to his surprise, it worked. Her shape ran and blurred, writhed and shifted in his grasp, until she was herself again, and she stopped fighting to break free.

He let go of her carefully and watched to see if her seeming return to normalcy was a trick. It didn t seem to be. She didn t use her restored mobility to attack.