Antrax (44 page)

“No!” she screamed at him. Her dusty, sweat-streaked face was contorted with rage and frustration. “You promised!”

“We can’t stop it alone!”

“We have to! I’ll do it myself!”

She began snatching up clots of dirt and throwing them at the wronk, shrieking at it. Then abruptly, she dashed away, searching for another ram to knock it loose again. Quentin stayed where he was, waiting. The wronk was more than halfway out. When it reached him, he would try to knock it back down again. His hands tightened on the Sword of Leah. He could feel its power coursing through him, singing in his blood, making him light-headed and oddly detached. He watched the magic racing up and down the blade, tiny flickers of brilliant light.

He glanced down into the pit. The wronk could see the magic, too. The knowledge of what it meant reflected in Ard Patrinell’s desperate, haunted eyes.

Then Tamis was back, hauling another dead branch, one shorter and less stout than the first. Her face was so intense and her eyes so wild that he rushed to help her, and once again they tried to knock the wronk loose from its perch.

But the wronk was ready for them. It snatched the ram out of their hands before they could bring it to bear and, one-handed, swept the deadwood into them, knocking them backwards with a single, powerful blow. Quentin lost his grip on the Sword of Leah, and it flew out into the darkness. He went down in a heap, his ribs and chest throbbing with pain, the breath knocked from his body.

He was back up again in an instant, searching frantically for his weapon, their only hope. He found it quickly, but by the time he had it in hand, the wronk was out of the pit and reaching for Tamis, who stood defiantly in its path.

“Tamis, run!” Quentin shouted.

Instead, she charged, launching herself into the wronk with such
fury that she knocked it backwards, slamming her short sword into its fire-blackened human arm, grappling with its metal one, wrapping her arms about the long knife and shield.

Quentin never hesitated. He went after them as if possessed, yelling out the Highland battle cry, “Leah! Leah!” in fear and desperation, slamming into them both, trying to knock Tamis away, trying to topple the wronk. He succeeded in neither. Rebuffed, he stepped back and swung the Sword of Leah with such fury that he took off the wronk’s human arm. It fell away with Tamis’ short sword still buried in it, blood spraying everything in a red mist. A look of shock and disbelief crossed Ard Patrinell’s face, his mouth yawning in a soundless scream. Quentin realized in horror that the Elf could still feel pain.

His hatred of what had been done to Patrinell boiled up anew. No one should be made to suffer like that. He lost control of himself and began hacking at the metal shell with short, powerful blows, trying to locate a vulnerable spot. In the darkness, it was difficult to tell much of anything. Tamis was screaming and clawing at the helmeted head, using her long knife and her fingers, no longer bothering with the metal arm and its long knife, which cut at her furiously. Quentin saw the glitter of the blade and heard the Tracker grunt in pain. He redoubled his efforts, shifting to the wronk’s other side, slamming his sword into its metal-sheathed hand until it had broken the ball-and-socket joint in two and the blade had dropped from the useless fingers.

Both arms ruined, the wronk tottered back, trying to shake free of Tamis. While the Tracker clung to it, it could not adequately defend itself. Quentin pressed his advantage, hacking at the joints of its legs, and after what seemed an endless amount of time spent staggering this way and that through the bloodied night, he shattered the right ankle. The wronk dropped to its knees. Tamis sagged downward, as well, leaving Patrinell’s head exposed. Quentin began hammering relentlessly at the protective shield, his body alive
with his sword’s magic, his ears filled with its wild humming. Lost to everything but his desperate need to have it continue, wrapped in its killing haze, he no longer felt anything but its raw power.

Tamis fell away, rolling onto the earth before rising to her hands and knees, head hanging down between her shoulders. Quentin shifted his attack to the wronk’s legs again, striking blow after blow until the left one gave way, as well.

He stepped back then, exhausted and stunned. The wronk was stretched on the ground before him, limbs broken, torso battered, even the seemingly impenetrable face shield cracked. Wires and cables lay exposed and severed, and their ends crackled and sparked wickedly. The panels of lights on its chest and limbs flashed redly in warning. Unable to rise or fight longer, the wronk shuddered uncontrollably, the stubs of its severed limbs twitching. Quentin stared down at it dully, the rush of magic that had infused him beginning to fade. He looked down at himself and was surprised to discover he was still whole.

“Finish it!” Tamis snarled at him from one side, kneeling with her arms hugging her bloodied body. “Keep your promise, Highlander!”

Quentin didn’t know if he had the strength to do so. He tightened his grip on his sword and walked forward again until he stood next to the stricken wronk. And Patrinell’s eyes stared up at him through a haze of blood, searching his own. He was crying, all of the pain and horror mirrored clearly in his tears. He was begging for help. Quentin couldn’t bear it. He felt his revulsion and horror threaten to overwhelm him.

He brought the Sword of Leah down quickly and with ferocious purpose. He shattered the protective shield in two swift blows, then smashed Ard Patrinell’s face until it was an unrecognizable ruin, then severed what was left of his head from the wronk.

Dropping his sword, he staggered backwards. The wronk had quit moving, but a few lights still blinked from the panels on its chest. Then an arm stump twitched. Crying out in rage and fear,
Quentin picked up his blade one final time and chopped at the body and limbs until nothing remained but scraps of metal and bits of flesh.

He might not have stopped then except that out of the corner of his eye he saw Tamis collapse. Closing off the magic as if it were an addiction he must quit forever, feeling how close he was to losing himself to it, he threw down his sword and went to her. He dropped to his knees, turned her over gently, and cradled her head and shoulders in his lap.

Her eyes stared up at him. “Is it done? Is he free?”

He nodded, his throat tight. The front of her tunic was a mass of blood and torn flesh.

“Wherever I’m going, I’ll find him there,” she whispered. A froth of blood coated her lips.

He touched her cheek with shaking fingers. “Tamis, no.”

“I’m so cold,” she whispered.

Her eyes fixed, and she stopped breathing. Quentin held her for a long time anyway. He talked to her when she could no longer hear. He told her she would have what she wanted, she would have Ard Patrinell, that she deserved to find him waiting and he would be. He whispered good-bye to her. He was crying freely, but he didn’t care.

When he laid her down again and rose, he felt as if he had lost his place in the world and would never find it again.

E
nveloped by the slow, steady thrumming of Castledown’s machinery, Ahren Elessedil walked back through the long rows of towering metal cabinets and spinning silver disks that occupied the cavernous chamber outside Walker’s smoked-glass prison. He did not like leaving Ryer Ord Star alone to look after the Druid, did not feel at all certain that he was doing the right thing, but knew, as well, he could not turn back. The voice inside him generated by the magic of the phoenix stone was firm and compelling. The missing Elfstones lay ahead, somewhere else in the complex, waiting for him to retrieve them. He must do as the voice insisted if he was ever to find himself again and be made whole. He must go to where the Stones were. He must take them back.

He watched the dark glass of Walker’s chamber disappear into the warren of cabinets behind him, and when it was out of sight, his loneliness was palpable and his feeling of vulnerability acute. The haze of the phoenix stone’s magic was beginning to dissipate, to lose its consistency, to become more penetrable. It was a gradual change, and at first he was not certain he was seeing
it accurately. But as he got clear of the brightly lit central chamber and walked back into the darker corridors beyond, it became increasingly apparent that he was not mistaken, that the stone’s magic was failing. He immediately felt pressed and harried by the knowledge, as if he must move faster than he would have liked or than was reasonable. It was an irrational response, because he had no real idea of what the magic’s lifetime might be. Then again, not much of what he had done since entering Castledown had anything to do with being rational.

He knew that Ryer’s magic would be lessening, as well. When it was gone, she would have to rely on her connection with Walker to survive. In a way, she was better off with the Druid. At least Walker could offer her protection once he woke and freed himself. Without the magic of the phoenix stone, there was little that Ahren could do for her. Little that he could do for himself, for that matter.

Still, he would listen to the voice and go on, because the voice was all he had to rely on.

He climbed the stairs to the overlook they had come upon earlier, then moved back into the maze of corridors beyond. He took the path his instincts told him to take, keeping close watch over the shadows pressing close about him. The flameless lamps threw down their light in dim pools, but the stretches between were like quicksand. He repeatedly encountered creepers on their way to other places, and each time he stopped where he was and waited for them to attack. But the creepers still did not see or sense him, and they did not slow. He heard the skitterings of their approaches and departures, scrapings of metal that raised the hair on the back of his neck. He wished again he was braver and stronger. He wished he had Ard Patrinell to assure him that he would be all right. He kept thinking how comforting that would be. But Patrinell had taught him everything he would ever teach him and told him everything he would ever tell him. Patrinell was gone.
Ahren’s comfort, if he was to find any, would have to come from somewhere else.

As he walked deeper into the catacombs, the sound of the machinery grew louder, a steadily building whine. Without knowing anything else, he could tell that he was moving toward the power source that was the heart of Castledown. It was there that Antrax fed off the energy stored for its use by the safehold’s machines. Ahren felt himself shrink as the sound increased in volume, its dull roar filling up the corridors like a river at flood. He saw himself as tiny and insignificant, impermanent flesh and blood trapped inside changeless, unyielding steel walls. He thought again about his hopes in coming on the journey—to prove himself to be more than the callow boy his brother believed him, to accomplish something that would warrant respect and even honor, to become the man his father had wanted him to be. Foolish, impossible hopes in light of his cowardice in the ruins, yet he clung to them still. Some part of what he had dreamed of accomplishing could still be realized if he could keep himself steady.

He passed out of the corridor into a vast, cavernous room in which two giant cylinders stood side by side amid a cluster of smaller pieces of equipment. The cylinders were fifty feet across and a hundred feet high. Metal pipes and connectors ran from their casings to the equipment and surrounding walls. The sound of the machinery was deafening, a pounding throb that buried everything else in the wake of its passing. It was Castledown’s power source, and Ahren wanted nothing so badly as to get away from it.

Then he looked to his right and saw a pair of chambers similar to the one that had been used to contain Walker, except that they were much larger. The dark glass fronting them was recessed into the chamber walls, and the bulbous doors were rimmed with sleek metal bindings. He stared at them, and he knew without having even to question it that one of them contained the missing Elfstones. He could feel it the same way he had felt the need to go
there. The phoenix stone’s magic was still at work inside him, giving him his direction, telling him what to do.

Yet for a long time, he didn’t move. He didn’t know what to do, didn’t know how to do it, and didn’t really want to try. His fear returned in an enveloping wave. To go on was too much to ask of anyone; it was too overwhelming to consider. He stared at the doorways, the magic of the phoenix stone prodding at him, and fought to keep himself from bolting. He had never been so scared. His fear wasn’t of what he thought might be waiting; it was of what he couldn’t imagine. His fear was of the unseen, of the unknown danger that would cause him to flee once more. He did not think he could bear to have that happen again, and he did not know how to prevent it. He could sense the possibility of something lurking behind the dark glass, a predator, anxious for him to step inside and be seized. Anticipation alone was enough to freeze him in place, to render him hopelessly immobile. He thought in his unspeakable terror that he would never move again.