Dark Sun: Prism Pentad 5 - The Cerulean Storm (37 page)

Then she remembered Rikus's description of his fight with Umbra. Even with the Scourge,
the mul had been unable to defeat the shadow giant until he dropped his torch. The
weakness of Khidar's people, she realized, was that without light there could not be
shadow.

Sadira turned her palm toward the ground, preparing to cast a darkness spell. She felt the
energy flowing up her arm-then the familiar tingle abruptly vanished when it reached the
black stain on her shoulder. The half-shadow gripping her by the collar screamed in pain,
then suddenly released his grip and fell away. He looked as though a bolt of lightning had
blasted away part of his body, with wisps of black smoke streaming off the empty place
where there had once been the silhouette of a shoulder.

At first, Sadira did not understand, but then she realized what had happened. Shadow
people had no life-forces of their own; they existed only as silhouettes marking the
absence of energy-usually in the form of light. So direct contact with a mystic power-one
of the most potent forms of energy-annihilated them.

Sadira turned her palm toward the ground again. Already Rikus's entire back had turned
black, with the stain rapidly spreading around his ribs and down over his hips.

“Let go, Khidar!” the sorceress hissed, pulling more magical energy into her body.

“Why? So you can save Rikus?” he sneered. “You might escape, but your husband comes with
us.”

“No!” Sadira threw herself forward.

She thrust her hand into the stain on Rikus's back. The half-shadow did not even scream.
His body simply exploded into black vapor, casting his arms and legs, still material, in
all directions. The blast hurled Sadira through the air, then she heard a loud crack as
the back of her skull slammed into the cobblestone street. Her vision started to dim, and
a terrible ringing filled her ears. The sorceress pushed herself upright, fighting back
the curtain of oblivion that threatened to descend over her.

“Fine,” said Khidar. He reached across Sadira's body and grabbed her free hand. “We'll
take you instead of Rikus.”

Sadira turned her palm toward the ground. Already her hand was swaddled in shadow up to
her wrist. She began to pull, trying to summon more magic. Sadira succeeded in drawing
nothing but a bone-numbing chill into her body.

“Don't be afraid,” Khidar hissed, his blue eyes locking onto hers. “You'll grow accustomed
to the cold.”

“Not likely,” said Rikus, stepping up behind the halfling.

The mul brought his hands down on either side of Khidar's head, driving his palm-heels
into the ears. The halfling's eyes bulged out, then his skull collapsed with a loud crack.
The Black ceased to spread from beneath his shadowy hands.

Rikus stepped back, pulling Khidar's head away. The Black came with it, peeling off
Sadira's body like wet silk. The mul tossed Khidar's lifeless head aside.

“At least we know we're not too late,” Rikus said.

Sadira rubbed the lump that had appeared where the back of her skull had hit the
cobblestones. “And why's that?”

“They wouldn't have attacked unless they thought we could stop Tithian,” the mul answered.
He pulled her to her feet and started down the street. “All we have to do is figure out
why they were so worried.”

*****

A searing wave of pain hissed through Tithian's serpentine body. He contracted into a
tangled knot of coils. His scales rose on end and quivered, bending back against their
natural pattern to point toward his head. Fighting to keep his tail wrapped around the
Dark Lens, the king clenched his teeth and waited for the spasm to pass.

He was in the Dragon's sanctum, a beautiful grove of a thousand exotic trees. There were
tall conifers with red needles as long as daggers, stubby palms, each topped by a spray of
barbed fronds, and majestic hardwoods with crowns as white and billowy as clouds. A carpet
of blue moss covered the forest floor, decorated at odd intervals by a blossoming bush or
a curving hedge of brightly colored leaves. An eerie calm hung over the place, for there
was no wind, and the king had not heard the cry of a single bird, insect, or creature of
any kind.

“Don't stop now!” Sacha's screech shattered the ghostly silence. “We're almost there.”

A short distance ahead, two more paths emerged from the silent forest and joined this one
to form a circle of polished jet. In the middle of this plaza, a dull black sphere hovered
in the center of a sable-sheened basin. The orb was pulsing madly and spinning in all
directions at once. Torrents of dark energy poured from it into the hollow below, then
came billowing out to gush toward the Dark Lens in a roiling stream.

“Crawl, worm!” commanded Sacha. “Use the Way.”

Tithian closed his eyes and visualized himself uncoiling, slowly stretching forward. He
felt no surge of energy from the Dark Lens, but his body slowly stretched out, utilizing
the energy already pouring through it. Once he had pushed his head forward, the king
allowed his muscles to contract, dragging himself closer to the black sphere.

Progress came slowly, for Tithian had to call upon the Way each time he stretched out. His
belly scales would not lie flat, and they began to break off as he dragged ¥ himself
forward. The pain searing through his body grew steadily worse as he neared Rajaat's
prison, and he felt sure he would burst into flame.

When he reached the edge of the plaza, the Dark Lens turned crimson. The black spout
stopped rising from its glassy surface. Dark fumes began to swirl off the king's scales,
streaming into the pit ahead. The heat of boiling blood filled Tithian's body, and he
screamed.

“Crawl,” urged Sacha. “The Dark Lens has drawn away the magic of the caging spell. Touch
the Black, and Rajaat will be free!”

Tithian pulled himself forward and reached across the pit. He lowered his hand, and his
fingers brushed the numbing cold of the Black. A crimson glow flashed from the king's
flesh, and his body erupted into fiery pain. His teeth clenched so tightly that several of
them cracked, and his muscles clamped down on his bones so hard that he feared they would
break.

The black sphere burst open, spraying wisps of cold gloom in every direction. A seething
cloud of blue steam boiled up into Tithian's face.

* * * * È

From beneath the protective shadows of an ornamental tunnel vault, Sadira peered over
Rikus's shoulder. Fifty yards ahead, a granite wall blocked the way, though it seemed
incorrect to say that the boulevard ended there. The cobblestone pavement ran clear to the
base of the rampart, passing beneath an imbedded arch as though the street continued on
the other side of the wall.

Before the arch stood four of the sorcerer-kings, their gazes fixed on the stone blocks in
their path. As Sadira and Rikus watched, Andropinis floated down from the top of the wall.
He shook his head and said something they could not hear, though Sadira guessed that he
was telling the others they could not fly over the wall. This seemed to anger Hamanu, who
cast a ray of golden light against the stones beneath the arch. The beam sprayed back over
the monarchs, showering the street with flickering yellow sparks that ate through the
cobblestones as though they were cloth.

When Hamanu finally lowered his hand, Sadira saw that the spell had not even scorched the
wall.

“Borys sealed it against even them,” Sadira whispered. “He must not have trusted his
sorcerer-kings entirely.”

“Or never thought that they would need to get inside without his help,” Rikus suggested.

“Perhaps. But if five sorcerer-kings can't get past the wall, how could Tithian?”

“The same way he and I crossed the lava sea-with Khidar's help,” Rikus answered. “Do you
think you can get us to the other side?”

“Perhaps, when the sun-”

The crack of a distant explosion interrupted Sadira. It came from somewhere far beyond the
arch, and the sorceress could tell from its sharp report that the blast was a powerful
one. A patchwork of cracks raced through the granite wall, then the entire rampart blew
apart with a deafening boom. The sorcerer-kings vanished beneath a maelstrom of billowing
dust and flying boulders.

Sadira grabbed Rikus. Before she could turn to run, a tremendous shock wave slammed them
to the ground. The vault blew off its foundations. The walls clattered down at their
sides, and the arch crashed onto the street behind them. Sadira covered her head and
curled into a tight ball, protecting herself from the dozens of fist-sized stones that
rained down on her body. When the bruising shower ended, she found herself choking on a
thick cloud of rock dust.

Rikus's strong hand grasped her arm. “Are you hurt?”

“I'm fine,” Sadira said, allowing the mul to pull her up.

The sorceress saw that they were surrounded by an arc-shaped pile of debris. They had
escaped serious injury only because they had been standing at the front of the arch when
the explosion blew it over backward.

At the end of the street, it did not look as though the sorcerer-kings had been so lucky.
The wall they had been trying to cross was now a mountain of rubble. Sadira saw no sign
that any of their enemies had escaped the devastation.

“By Ral!” Rikus cursed. “What's that?”

The mul pointed over the top of the boulder heap. In the distance beyond, a blue spout of
water was rising into view. For a moment, the sparkling pillar held steady, its frothing
white cap just visible above the rubble ahead. Then, seeming to gather strength, the
shimmering column shot toward the boiling ash storm above. It struck the red clouds with
an almighty crash, then swept the billowing ash from the sky on the tide of a cerulean
storm.

Tithian opened his eyes to a turquoise dawn. He blinked several times, trying to clear his
vision, but the firmament did not change color. He saw that it was streaked with blazing
rays of azure light, while a bank of puffy blue clouds slowly formed overhead.

The king sat up and looked eastward. He did not recognize the luminous sphere he found
hanging just above the horizon. The orb resembled a huge sapphire, with shining blue
facets and an azure fire burning deep in its heart. It was the sun, but not the sun he
knew.

Tithian stared at the blue sphere in amazement, until his eyes began to ache and he
realized the glow would blind him if he stared too long. He forced himself to look away
and saw that the forest around him had been utterly destroyed. The trees all lay on the
ground, their tips pointing away from the grove's center and their boles ripped clean of
limbs. In the far distance, there was no sign of the huge wall that had once surrounded
the sanctum, or of the great edifices that had stood outside it.

As he surveyed the devastation, the king saw that he still sat in the plaza where he had
found Rajaat's prison. The Dark Lens lay on the cracked cobblestones at his feet, murky
and cold. Tithian remembered using his serpent's tail to cling to it when the Black
exploded, anchoring himself to the ground and calling upon its energy to keep himself from
being torn apart by the blast. The effort had finally proven too much for his body, and he
had fallen unconscious as the storm began to subside.

On the other side of the Dark Lens lay the marble basin that had held Rajaat's prison. The
bowl was now filled with a bubbling, foul-smelling ichor as black as obsidian. In the
center, the yellowed bones of a hand protruded above the pool. Its crooked digits looked
more like talons than fingers, slightly curled and ending in barbed tips.

“What are you waiting for?” snarled a familiar voice.

Tithian looked over his shoulder and saw Sacha floating toward him. The head was badly
battered, with deep lacerations on his scalp, a smashed nose, and yellow bruises covering
his face.

“Pull him out!” Sacha demanded.

Tithian lay down at the edge of the basin and stretched an arm across the bubbling soup.
He closed his fingers around the hand's naked bones and tried to draw the thing out, but
only succeeded in pulling himself toward the ichor. The king opened his grip-then hissed
in pain as the hand dug its barbed talons into his palm. It dragged him forward, until his
shoulder and head both hung over the dark sludge.

Tithian saved himself by thrusting the fingertips of his free hand into a cracked paving
stone. He stopped his slide and slowly drew himself back onto the plaza. Once he had
anchored himself securely in place, he began pulling the hand toward him. First the arm,
then the shoulder, and finally the head rose from the ichor.

The skeleton had a flat, grossly elongated skull with a sharp ridge crest and a sloped
forehead. Beneath its heavy brow, crooked forks of blue light glimmered deep in each eye
socket. Wisps of white mist puffed from its nasal cavity. Its jaws were lined with curved
yellow needles, while a huge mass of knobby bone formed a long, drooping chin.

“Rajaat?” Tithian gasped.

“Who else?” answered Sacha.

Rajaat sank the talons of his free hand into the stone. He ripped his other claw free and
drove it down on the other side of the king, pulling himself to the basin edge. Tithian
scrambled back on all fours, barely saving himself from being stepped on as Rajaat pulled
himself from the dark pool. The ancient sorcerer's frame was about as tall as an elf and
completely skeletal, with hunched shoulders, gangling arms, and ivory-colored thighbones
as twisted as they were thick.

The creature's eyes lingered on Tithian's face for an instant, then flickered over the
barren trees lying around the plaza's edge, and finally returned to the Dark Lens. Rajaat
stared at the black orb for several seconds before finally looking skyward. The fleshless
jaws parted in a crude imitation of a smile, then Rajaat opened his mouth wide.

“Free!” he bellowed, his voice rumbling over the sanctum like thunder. Streamers of blue
fog gushed from his mouth, condensing into tiny droplets and falling to the ground like
rain. “Let the traitors tremble and wail! I have returned, and my retribution shall be
Bloody and painful!”