Hopping out to see who invaded his domain came the toadlike Eckalt.
" What is it?" the creature demanded. " My time is precious. You interrupt important work. There' s water to be: aieee!"
Lan made a quick pass with his hand and stifled the toad- being' s words. Still as if he walked in a daze, Lan returned to the chamber containing the cistern. Eckalt half- hopped, half was dragged by the spell Lan had cast. Without allowing the being another word, Lan physically picked up Eckalt and dropped him into the pit.
Amid the curtains of blackness came a stirring.
The Resident of the Pit spoke.
" Lan Martak, we meet once again. It has been a considerable time for you and only a fraction of a second for me."
" Resident of the Pit," he said unsteadily, " did you aid me in my duel with Claybore?"
" The questions most important are those least asked. For the true question, look into your own soul and study what you find. But perhaps those answers are the hardest to accept."
" You did help me?"
" I gave you nothing but the vision of what powers you truly commanded."
" What is this?" asked Kiska. " There' re things moving down inside the well, but I can' t make them out. Is this a ghost?"
Lan ignored her, as did the Resident.
" If you only revealed what was already inside of me, why can' t I defeat Claybore? Can I?"
" Claybore is a cunning mage and a powerful one. He has claimed to be immortal."
" He said I was immortal, also."
" Lan Martak, many make the claim. Few actually are. And those select few are the damned."
Lan went cold inside.
" Explain, Resident of the Pit. What do you mean by that?"
" Your destiny lies not on this world but on another."
" Where Claybore retreated?"
The Resident didn' t answer directly. The obliqueness troubled Lan more than prediction of complete failure would have.
" Decisions are never easy. The past must be laid to rest before the future can be born."
" What are you telling me? Will I defeat Claybore? If he' s immortal, I can' t kill him."
" You, too, are immortal."
Lan' s mind raced. The wording answered the question. Claybore hadn' t lied about this. Lan looked down at his body as if seeing something new. Immortal? The idea was hard to accept.
" I can' t die?"
" Physical death is not your primary concern," said the Resident of the Pit.
" Claybore is," said Lan. " I need to find him. Give me the powers I need to find and defeat him."
" Give you the powers?" came the answer after a long pause, as if this astounded the entity within the well. Lan couldn' t tell if it was scorn or amusement locked within this answer.
" He' s still more powerful than I am. Give me what I need to destroy him."
" Claybore imprisoned me. I cannot give you power to destroy him. That is one condition of my servitude."
" Then tell me where I can find him. You' re a deity. You can do that much. You once said your being spread across all space and time. You have to be able to find him."
" For millennia I have been trapped and virtually powerless. All I could do was keep shifting Claybore' s parts about to keep him from recovering them, but he has grown far too strong for that ploy now. Other weapons must be used."
" Tell me!" cried Lan, frustrated.
" Use your own instincts. Consider Claybore and his immediate goal. Would he abandon his legs?" The voice of the Resident faded and the stirrings in the shadowy depths of the well began to subside.
But Lan hardly noticed. He came out of his inner fog and smiled when the answer came to him.
" Claybore' s legs are still here. They' re locked in a chamber over there." He pointed at a solid rock wall.
" Where?" asked Kiska eagerly.
" Some miles off through solid rock, but there, still there. No, Claybore wouldn' t abandon them. He needs those legs. And he didn' t flee when I began to triumph over him. He only hid. He' s around somewhere. He' s got to be!"
Lan again sent out his light mote and again it returned without discovering Claybore' s hiding place. Frustrated, he sat on the rim of the well and thought even harder, his mind once more beginning to really function. Nothing was wrong with his logic. Claybore had simply outsmarted him, made better use of the magics at his command.
Lan' s fingers traced out a simple triangle in the air in front of him. He began the chant to produce a scrying spell he' d found in Lirory' s grimoire. At first the air remained calm and only the threesided frame burned with activity. Then Lan found the right combinations of minor spells and a picture formed within the perimeter.
" He is still within Yerrary!" he said. The familiar skull loomed starkly and then winked out. But Claybore' s defeating the magic didn' t matter. He had found out the sorcerer hid. That information alone made the effort worthwhile.
" You have become his equal," said Kiska.
The woman sat beside him on the rim, her leg brushing against his. Her hand reached out hesitantly, lightly brushed his, then moved upward to undo the fastenings on his tunic. Lan watched in silence, his heart feeling as if it would leap from his breast.
" I want you," Kiska said softly. Her words came out choked with emotion.
Lan started to brush her off, to push on and complete what he saw as his mission- to destroy Claybore' s legs. But welling up from deep within came emotions Lan couldn' t control.
" And I want you," he said in a weak voice. Their lips met, crushed together passionately. Then their bodies pressed tightly and they slipped to the cold rock floor. Neither noticed, neither minded as they slowly twined and untwined, each movement carrying them closer to their mutual goal.
Lan looked down into Kiska' s desire- wracked face and felt the dizzy confusion of emotions vying for supremacy. She was his most hated enemy, the woman sworn to kill him, and now he made love to her. He saw the same contradictions mirrored in her face even as he moved above her, his hips swinging and hers lifting upward.
Faster and faster they moved together until the world burst around them.
Lan sank forward, his arms circling Kiska' s thin body. The woman' s brown eyes blazed with unholy glee as she gazed past his shoulder and at the silent Inyx standing in the entryway, her face pale and her hands shaking. Inyx had witnessed it all and Kiska took sadistic pleasure in knowing it.
Without a word, Inyx turned and walked off. Her once confident stride now faltered and she stumbled twice within Kiska k' Adesina' s sight.
Kiska immediately turned her attention back to Lan Martak, began doing small things, intimate things, and soon enough they were again passionately engaged.
Kiska k' Adesina' s revenge had been fed but not sated. That would come. Claybore had promised her that it would come. Soon.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
" The spells. They are incredible. Since speaking with the Resident of the Pit, I' m able to see what Lirory meant rather than what he wrote." Lan Martak hunched over the table creaking under the weight of Lirory' s grimoires. The pages now burned with runic writings. The man' s eyes scanned the arcane words with practiced ease.
" Did this Resident creature give you this extra ability?" asked Kiska k' Adesina.
" I don' t know. I don' t think so, but simply being near such power as he commands might have released reservoirs inside me I hadn' t known existed."
" You' re the greatest mage to ever walk the Road," she cooed.
Lan smiled broadly at the praise. He felt nothing hollow in it at all. The spell had progressed too far for that. Lan saw only love and adoration- and felt only love and adoration for Kiska.
" This book is a record of Lirory' s travels along the Road seeking out Claybore' s parts. He used a spell to locate the arms and draw them back to the tunnel where he placed them in special boxes. When he had them safely in place, he collapsed the tunnel and left them there for almost forty Yerrary years."