Then Pug saw that Calis was also undergoing a painful transformation, as whatever part of his heritage also was Valheru was being torn from within. Perspiration ran down his forehead, and his arms trembled, but his eyes were afire and his gaze was locked within the stone.
‘What is happening?’ Pug asked softly. ‘Something that was taken from this world is being returned to it,’ said Calis. ‘I am the instrument of that return.’ After a moment, tiny flecks of green light spun away from the glowing nimbus that surrounded Calis and the stone, flying in random directions. Pug dodged the first spray of light and it went past him, then as he turned another struck him in the chest. Instead of its causing injury or pain, he felt nothing but a sense of energy, something warm and healing passing through him.
He looked at Tomas, bent over in agony, but as the tiny green flecks struck, Tomas began to recover. After a moment, he looked up at his boyhood friend, and Pug saw his eyes were clear, free of pain.
Tomas rose and slowly moved over to Pug and Calis. He looked at Pug, and the magician saw wonder in Tomas’s eyes, wonder he had not witnessed since Tomas had taken on the mantle of Ashen-Shugar, last of the Valheru. For the first time in fifty years, Tomas looked more like the boy from Crydee than Pug had ever seen him, and in a voice filled with amazement, Tomas said, ‘My son is healing the world.’
Then, a cry of joy, a note so profound Pug couldn’t tell if it was a sound or a feeling, rang through the cave, and the gem seemed to erupt, casting an awe-inspiring flame of life throughout the room. Nakor nearly danced in delight, while Dominic made the sign of his god.
Nakor said, ‘We don’t need this,’ and dropped his spell of protection.
As it vanished, an echo from across the world, as black and evil as the previous note had been alive and good, resonated, and Nakor’s eyes widened. ‘Oops!’
The demon’s head came up from its feasting. ‘No!’ it roared as it felt something being taken away from it. Sethanon! the voice in his head screamed.
All dreams of power and primacy were forgotten. The mystic leashes to the two slaves were released as the demon strode to the front of the tent.
Two guards turned as Jakan emerged from the tent. They grew pale and fled.
General Fadawah blinked as if coming out of a daze, and he saw the demon rip apart the entrance to the tent, sending tatters in all directions. He only glimpsed the horror before it leaped to the skies, but it was enough.
The General turned to see the confused Pantathian high priest, also coming out of his daze. Rage gripped the General, and he pulled his decorative dagger. He raised it high and plunged it between the neck and shoulder of the Pantathian, driving the serpent priest to his knees. For a moment the creature rocked on his knees, then he toppled over.
Fadawah didn’t even attempt to remove his blade from the last dying member of the Pantathian race. He hurried out the rear of the Queen’s pavilion and found terrified officers standing in the command tent. He looked to where their eyes were fixed and saw the demon soaring toward the mountains, in the direction of the castle at Darkmoor.
One of the captains of the mercenary companies who had risen to the staff of the Queen’s army saw their commander before him, and stammered out, ‘Orders, sir?’
Fadawah said, ‘What has happened? I have been in the power of a monster and don’t know what has happened. Tell me!’
‘You just ordered a full-scale attack. All units. We are engaging the enemy along the entire ridge.’
‘Damn!’ said the General. He had no idea how long he had been in thrall to the demon, but he knew he had to discover quickly what had occurred. The last thing he remembered clearly was being in the Queen’s tent outside the City of the Serpent River; then he had lived in a timeless haze, a vague dream of horror and fear, and now he was on the other side of the world in the middle of a war and he had no idea whom they were fighting, where his units were deployed, or if they were winning or losing. And with the Queen dead, he had no idea why they were continuing to fight.
Looking at his staff he said, ‘Maps! I want to see where we are, where every unit is, and what we know about the enemy.’ As the staff jumped to obey, a few of them stealing glances at the diminishing figure of the demon as it sped eastward, Fadawah was consumed by one goal: Survival.
TWENTY-SIX - Confrontation
Erik fought.
What had begun as a moderate push, a probing engagement to discover potential weaknesses in the defenders’ line, without warning had turned into an all-out offensive. Erik kicked the man he had just killed, letting him roll back down the ridge into the trees below.