Sword Play (26 page)

But at that point in the story Candlemas had been distracted, wondering what Sysquemalyn intended, reckoning how he might get the upper hand and defeat her without harming himself.

If only he’d paid better attention.

These black thoughts came in a flash, then exploded to black as his forehead crashed on glass.

Groggy, Candlemas snorted and pushed at something brushing his face. His clumsy hand banged against stone.

Sitting up with a start, he bumped his nose on more rock. He could see nothing but darkness. If stone lay all around, he must have been buried in an avalanche. With the thought came panic, and he bashed his knuckles and hands on more stone that was oddly warm. Then he realized his hands were free, after a fashion.

The stone before his eyes slipped down, away, and he could see. Though not everywhere, for a searing, blue-white light filled the center of the chamber, and he had to avert his eyes.

He saw that the stone prison moved on its own, like snakes of living rock. Then he saw fingers and knew they were stone arms. Moving, passing over and down his body, trapping him. He could stick his arms through gaps, but then sliding stone arms would force them down again, pinning him like a fox in a trap.

“Awake, dear?” cackled a woman’s voice. “I’m so glad! I’ve much to tell you!”

Oh, yes, Candlemas recalled, I’m in the Nine Hells. Animate stone beings were to be expected where madness reigned. And there would be no waking from the nightmare. Or rather, only waking as he’d just done, plunging him afresh into new nightmares.

This one was worse than most.

The stone arms were only part of the phenomenon. The walls in this large chamber rippled and convulsed in all directions, so a body grew seasick watching them. Corpses of animate stone formed the walls. Humans, elves, orcs, dwarves, and other races that Candlemas couldn’t identify had been turned to stone and fused together like madcap building blocks. Yet some life or unlife still remained in them, for the carcasses heaved and twitched and groped until the walls seemed thick with gray, crawling beetles. A head would bob up, roll blind eyes, then be submerged as a hand or leg or buttock shoved it back and down and another lost soul writhed to the surface. Arms, fingers, toes, breasts, shoulders, bobbed on the sea of living stone like drowning folk struggling for air.

And perhaps they were. Candlemas couldn’t imagine a much worse torment than being turned to stone—to live forever frozen—then being cast into an ocean of like-damned sinners, to struggle for purchase, for air, for a chance to see light, only to be dragged back down into black death. The mage, who’d seen many awful things in his years of magic-making, shuddered uncontrollably at the fiendishness of it.

But there was more to see. He was pinned by groping arms and legs that somehow had been stimulated to entrap him. So, too, was Greenwillow, who hung, upside down, on the far side of the chamber. The doughty elf struggled against her stone bonds whenever she got a hand or leg loose, but she only succeeded in winning herself more scrapes and bruises. Still, Candlemas had to admit she was trying to win free, and he wasn’t. But then, he knew better how small their chances of survival really were.

Here, too, was the raven. The flustered bird hopped and flew a dozen times a minute as it vainly sought a spot to alight that didn’t writhe or bear thorns. It had little luck and squawked unhappily. Some of its discomfiture communicated itself to Candlemas, its master, pity heaped on sorrow. Much of his own making, his own fault.

There was still more to take in, for at the center of the chamber was a huge, twisted ball, like a giant snarl of yarn. Yet the strings were metal branches studded with wicked thorns. Suspended in the thorns, punctured in a dozen places, was the still-unconscious Sunbright. The silvery metal glittered in the eye-smarting, blue-white brilliance that emanated from deep within the center of the loose snarl. Candlemas couldn’t comprehend the source of the light, but guessed they would all have been blinded by it if not for the thicket of thorns. What could shed that much light?

“Do you like it? I fetched you all here to admire it!” Striding over writhing stone bodies came Sysquemalyn, raking her red hair back in her vainglorious fashion. She still wore her Ruellana garb, with the rips and claw marks from the fiend that had dragged her off. For that matter, some of the wounds still dripped blood. But the female mage didn’t seem to notice as she wiped her nose and left a red streak. From her scraped hand trailed Sunbright’s heavy-nosed sword, Harvester of Blood.

“This is my finest creation!” The mage waved her arm and sword at the hideous chamber. The blue-white light cast her shadow dozens of feet tall, eclipsing the lost souls in their perpetual struggle. “It’s not what you think, not the Nine Hells, but my very own unique construct for the delight of my friends and enemies!”

“You’re mad.” The whisper slipped from Candlemas unintentionally, but it didn’t matter, he supposed.

“What?” The woman peered up at him like an adult puzzled by a child’s odd question. “Did you say mad?”

“Insane. Moonstruck. Addled. Crackpated. Buzzy-brained. Pickle-witted.” Candlemas had to pause as a stone arm slid past his nose, brushing his beard. He resumed, strangely calm, in the voice of a tired man ready for death. “Funny I never spotted it, working with you all these years. But such is dementia. It creeps up slowly, and no one notices, until one day the loon lashes out and kills folks, and then it’s too late.”

The red-haired mage lifted the sword to where Candlemas hung pinned and prodded his toe, drawing blood. “I don’t like to be called mad.”

“No, I imagine not. Nor do ugly people like to be called ugly, nor cruel folk cruel, nor fat nor slow, and so on. But anyone who would meddle with the Nine Hells…”

“This is not the Nine Hells!” Petulant, Sysquemalyn jabbed at his foot, missed, and bounced the point off a stone orc’s head. “I made this place, I tell you! You’re just jealous.” Angry, she batted at a stone finger and only dinged Harvester’s edge.

“By the Silver Lady!” Candlemas shook his head, thumping his ear on a stone nose. “You don’t know what you’re dealing with. It’s impossible you made this place. Look around! There are thousands of trapped spirits here. Where did they come from? You couldn’t have conjured them all from thin air. Most gods couldn’t do that. And these tunnels, endless numbers of them, all dipping deep into the very bowels of hell. Can you honestly believe you’ve plugged them all? And what about that yellow fiend that dragged you here? You’re still dripping blood from the wounds, yet you claim to have crafted it? You’ve tapped the wrong portals. You don’t have the strength to cope with the Nine Hells!”

To his horror, Sysquemalyn only laughed with delight. “Ah, yes! Did you like my fiend? True, it was a little rough when it came to fetch me, but that’s just the merest bump to hammer flat. And your ‘wrong portals.’ Piffle! I’ll admit I drew certain grace notes from the Nine Hells—I studied them long enough—but this is a creation all my own! My presentation, my ‘entertainment’ at Tyralhorn’s party, was merely a rough draft, the most preliminary sketch. This is the perfection! Let’s see the Snorting White Sow top this!”

There lies the explanation, Candlemas sighed in his mind. Unknown to him, Sysquemalyn had spent too much time studying the Nine Hells. And watching madness, mulling it, dipping and drinking it, had infected her mind. Like a missionary amid lepers, she’d become what she sought to conquer.

“I won’t argue—much. But whatever you did, and no matter how clever you think yourself, you’ve released lesser horrors from the pits all over Netheril. After you were dragged off, my palantir suddenly rattled with reports of hellfire and trolls, plagues of maggots, and rampaging ghouls. Delia was beset by giant black bats lusting for the blood of your chambermaids!”

For the first time, doubt flickered over Sysquemalyn’s face. Her red lips pouted; her brow clouded in thought. Then the storm passed as she reverted to her self-centered fantasy. “Oh, valiant effort, dear ‘Mas! Nice try! But you won’t talk your way out of this. I won, and you lost. But yes, let’s sound the finale of our little symphony.”

Sword trailing and clittering on stone heads and limbs, Sysquemalyn pranced to the thicket of silver thorns. With a snap of her fingers, Sunbright jerked, shook his head, then immediately froze as he felt sharp points prick him.

“How’s the head?” called the mage. “I saw the owlbear eat it, but it looks sturdy enough now. That’s the beauty of my private hell: I can torture someone to death, make them feel every agony, then resurrect them to suffer anew! A dozen times a day, if I wish!”

Carefully, Sunbright opened his eyes, flicked them over the surroundings, then focused on Sysquemalyn.

“Ruellana,” he spat without moving. “You’ve deceived me yet again.”

“Oh, I’ve done much worse than that,” chided the mage. “And my name is Sysquemalyn. Reins of Shar, but you’re a dense child! I show you a goddess aborning and you see a randy barmaid. As low-minded as humans are, I don’t think you even qualify as one. I’ve taught dogs tricks more quickly. You’re hopeless!” Her tsk made Sunbright writhe in his barbed bonds.

Dismissing the youth from her mind, Sysquemalyn returned to gloat before the podgy Candlemas. “Old friend and partner, I’ve reconsidered my concession of your win, whenever that was. I’d rather win. So your precious barbarian will not, after all, survive his sojourn to Tinnainen. Or rather, he won’t after I drop him through that portal I’ve opened into the core of a star.”

From high on the opposite wall, Greenwillow gave a shriek, then returned to struggling her way free. She reckoned that if she timed the groping stone arms correctly, she might slither free without breaking a limb. What she’d do after that, though …

“Star?” Candlemas groaned. “Is there nothing you won’t tamper with? You’re like a child with a hammer set loose in a potter’s shop. You’ll destroy the universe on a whim! Please, Sys, listen. Let the mud man go. The game has gone too far. It never should have begun. Call it a draw if you like, or say you’ve won, but we must quit this foolishness! Let me go, and perhaps together we can patch the holes you’ve rent in the fabric, before the gods themselves stride down from on high and snuff every one of us like candles.”

“No, dear ‘Mas. No.” Bright-eyed, the mage waggled a finger tipped with a broken red nail. “If I let the groundling go, you’ll just change the rules. No, I’ve already decided the forfeit for the final game, which you’ve just lost. You shall spend a year here, exploring all the reaches of my custom-made hell, experiencing the ultimate in torment hour by hour. I think it a small enough punishment for opposing me all this time, when you knew you couldn’t win. I’m just too powerful for you. Look around yourself! Having harnessed a shadow of the Nine Hells, am I not more powerful than the Malodorous White Maggot? So … where was I? Ah, yes!”

Skipping like a child, the preening goddess-to-be approached Sunbright, who hung on hooks like a rabbit ready for the pot. Smiling, she called, “Thanks for the fun, dear boy!”

With a grimy finger, she drew a small circle in the air that encompassed Sunbright, then swirled the spell toward the fiery heart of the pulsing star beyond the portal.

The barbarian hissed as the metal thorns twisted, curled, parted, coiled. Still entrapped, he saw one side of the thicket part to reveal the distant blue-white light. He averted his eyes rather than be blinded, fought to slide a hand or even a foot loose so he might hang on. But, as one by one the barbed strands sprang free, he was nudged from behind by hundreds more, making it impossible to retreat or dodge aside.

As the last thorn was plucked from ravaged skin, he was hurled headlong as if shot from a catapult.

Cursing, grabbing madly for any purchase, Sunbright spun head over heels. Whirling, a cool nothingness enfolded him even as the heat of the star made his skin prickle with violent burns. He sucked air to make a final effort to fight, somehow, but was stunned to find there was no air to breathe.

He was falling through nothingness into a star. What a legend this would make. Too bad he’d never hear it.

His lungs ached, crushing him from within. His heart pounded like a war drum. Even his eardrums and eyeballs threatened to explode. And all the while, the blue-white light cooked him as if it were a bonfire.

The heat built intolerably. Soon he’d scream out the last of his air, fly shrieking to his flaming death.

Then, just as his lungs swelled to bursting, he disappeared.

Squinting, Sysquemalyn pouted red lips. It was hard to see into the fearsome blue-white brilliance, but…

” ‘Mas, dear, did you see that? The manling just vanished. But how? I didn’t do that!”

Pinned by stone-snake arms, Candlemas groaned. No matter how bad things got, he’d often noted, they could always get worse. And just had.

“I think,” he growled at Sysquemalyn, “you’ve finally attracted the attention of…”

He, too, vanished.

Sunbright landed with a crunch on his shoulder, fetching his head a solid crack that made it sing.

Grunting, he flopped on his back. But he was unfettered and alive, though he couldn’t guess how, and so he snatched Dorlas’s warhammer from his belt and crouched to bash his way to freedom if possible.

In an eye-blink, three people flickered onto the stony ledge where he stood: Greenwillow, Sysquemalyn, Candlemas. The raven appeared a moment after.

The podgy, bald mage finished his sentence. “.. .someone big.”

Sunbright attacked.

He didn’t sound a battle cry, for while it may have startled his foe, it also would have warned her. He simply leaped and swung the warhammer from the end of his arm.

The long tapered head, five pounds of hardened steel, struck Sysquemalyn at the juncture of neck and shoulder. The weapon would have crushed her skull or snapped her neck if the light weren’t so bad or the footing so uneven. As it was, the warhammer shattered her shoulder to flinders, for her shield spell was down or magically drained. The thud of the blow and crunch of bone made Greenwillow and Candlemas grunt.