" The fog?" suggested Kiska.
" That might have something to do with it. Or it might be something else." Bitterness came to Lan Martak.
" Ducasien," Kiska said, striking the soft spot in Martak' s heart. She sensed his jealousy of the man from Inyx' s home world and played on it. His anguish thrilled her even if she did not allow it to be mirrored on her face.
" What does she see in him?" he wondered aloud.
" There is definite love for him," goaded Kiska. " The pair of them have been intimate."
The man' s expression told her she traveled unsafe territory. No matter how potent Claybore' s magical workings, the power over Lan Martak was not complete.
" She loves me."
" Who couldn' t?" asked Kiska, stroking Lan' s cheek. The man pulled away, hesitated, turned back to her. Every use of magic on his part strengthened the spell binding the two of them together. Kiska saw that Lan became less and less aware of Claybore' s intrusion in this matter, another manifestation of the spell.
Even she found it increasingly difficult to remember the few things Claybore had told her before sending her forth. A dagger at the enemy' s back, Claybore had said. A chance for revenge, he' d said. Kiska k' Adesina hadn' t questioned her master; she was too good a soldier for that. She did not care for this form of warfare, but if it gained her ends, so be it.
Lan Martak would die at her hand. Claybore had promised that. She held on grimly to that single thought.
" The legs," Lan said suddenly. " Why can' t I grasp their importance, their use?"
" Rest, my darling," Kiska said, sickened by her honeyed words. " Rest and it will all come to you. You overwork yourself. Tired, you can' t hope to win. Rest, sleep, sleep, yes, sleep."
She cradled his head and held it close. Muscles in her upper arms twitched spasmodically as she fought down the urge to place one hand on the man' s chin and another on the top of his head and jerk as hard as she could. That might break his neck.
It might also fail.
Her time would come. Soon. Claybore promised it. Soon.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The world exploded around Lan Martak, stars orbiting wildly about his head, the very planet tipping and gyrating and sending him to his knees. The walls of the pyramid- shaped stone chamber first cracked and then turned to powder. The floor beneath his feet became transparent and he hung suspended over a bottomless pit.
And wind- Wind seared his flesh, threatening to strip his bones clean. Squinting, arm up to protect his face, he looked into the galeforce wind and saw an all too familiar figure: Claybore.
The chalk- white skull showed thin fracture lines- and this gave Lan hope. He had put those cracks in Claybore' s skull. And he could do more, ever so much more.
" This is silly, Claybore," he said, fighting to keep his face covered. " You attack with only wind?"
" Surely a man of your vast ability recognizes an air elemental when you encounter one," the other mage said with studied politeness. " If you don' t like it, I' ll stop it. Now!"
The sorcerer' s newly attached arms rose and formed a steeple over the skull.
Lan dropped into the pit.
He felt his stomach jerk and the air whistling around him in a new direction. The wind he could tolerate. To allow Claybore to cast him downward meant only death. With a surge of effort, he formed a new floor under his left foot. A solid patch took shape under his right and stopped his insane fall. Slowly, the hardness spread, merged with other spots, rose.
He again faced Claybore, the floor substantial once again.
" Very good," said Claybore. " The illusion is not a common one. You defeated it nicely. Your skill has grown to rival mine."
Lan did not reply with words. He sent his own air elemental shrieking mindlessly for Claybore' s body. He hoped to catch the sorcerer off balance and knock him to the floor. With any luck the skull might smash into the stone and crack further.
Luck was not with him. Claybore easily withstood the writhing, screaming puff of air and dismissed it with the wave of a hand. Lan realized then how important those arms and hands were to Claybore. They not only augmented his power, they gave him command over a new set of spells.
" Surrender!" Lan said, using the Voice. The vibrancy of the tongue within his mouth caused the onset of a headache unlike any he had felt. He immediately stopped and the shooting pain diminished and finally went away entirely.
" You cannot use my tongue against me like that, fool," said Claybore, now turning to his usual manner. All pretense of politeness stopped. " I can give you undreamed of powers. You still learn. I know!" The jaws of the skull clattered together emphasizing the words that were not spoken but were still heard.
" You can give me nothing, Claybore. You seek too much power. You must be destroyed."
" Why try?" asked Claybore, his tone curious. " You oppose me, but why? What is it to you? There isn' t the hard core within you to make power your goal."
" I don' t want dominance over others," said Lan. " I want freedom from that power. You won' t impose your will on me or anyone else."
" And you don' t want to impose your will on others?" asked Claybore, as if genuinely surprised at finding a fact he had not ever considered to have existed.
Lan Martak spun about, his fingers strewing sparks. The powdery ruins of Lirory Tefize' s chamber snapped back into their original form.
" Your illusions fail you, Claybore."
" Do they?" the sorcerer asked softly. " You find the simple ones. The more complex ones might amaze you- had you the wit to see them."
Lan shifted uneasily at those words. Something gnawed at the corners of his mind, as if Claybore had given him a crucial clue to unlocking the dismembered mage' s power. He groped for the clue and failed to find it.
" Lan?" came a hesitant voice. " Are you all right? You look strained."
He blinked and lost sight of Claybore, his physical eyes now doing the " seeing" for his mind. Kiska k' Adesina stood before him, the expression on her face a mixture of emotions he couldn' t put into words. Whatever he read there, true caring was not present.
" I' m fine," he said. " Claybore started an attack. Didn' t you see what he did?"
The woman shook her head, a brown shimmer of hair circling her face. She pushed a vagrant strand back and simply stared at him.
He heaved a sigh. The visions Claybore sent were designed strictly for him. The battle they fought was a personal one and need not involve others- unless drawing others into the conflict aided one of them. Lan tried to figure out how best to use Kiska against Claybore and failed. The mage had made no mention whatsoever about her capture; it was as if this was a problem belonging to Lirory and since the gnome had perished, the matter was closed.
" It won' t be long before we have one last meeting," said Lan. " The time is drawing close. I sense the powers mounting all around and: and I can' t control them." The insecurity of his position troubled him strangely. Never before had he worried over this to such an extent. He held more power than any mage except Claybore and now he hesitated, now he doubted himself.
" You tire so easily," said Kiska. " You do need to rest. Don' t let Claybore force you into a battle you can' t win."
" What' s it to you?" Lan flared. " You are his chief commandant now that Silvain is gone. You should be thinking of his welfare, not mine. Or is that the way it really is? Are you thinking of Claybore' s victory? Is this part of it?"
" Lan, how can you say that?" Kiska' s words soothed him enough that the edge of anger left. Only confusion remained. He turned from her to go to the table holding Lirory' s grimoires. Placing both hands on the table, Lan leaned forward, head down and eyes closed tightly.