Iron Tongue
Robert E. Vardeman
CHAPTER ONE
" Where is he?" dark- haired, fiery- eyed Inyx demanded of Knoton. " Where is Alberto Silvain?"
" The human leader of the grey soldiers?" If metal shoulders could have shrugged, Knoton' s would have done so. The mechanical' s expression defied interpretation, but the way the body canted forward indicated an intense desire to discover their adversary' s location. " I have patrols out looking into every room of this palace. If he is within the walls, he' ll be found. We look most of all for the Lord."
Lan Martak limped in and sat heavily on an ornately carved ash footstool. The way Knoton stared at him told Lan how bad he actually looked. He felt worse. If someone had reached inside and ripped his heart out, he couldn' t have been in a more debilitated state. The use of magic had pushed him beyond the limits of his endurance. Being cast into the Lord' s maze had almost killed him. The long fight to regain freedom had taken a further toll. And now he had to perform still another task: finding Alberto Silvain.
" The Lord of the Twistings isn' t a concern any longer. He will never again trouble you." The mechanical seemed inclined to doubt the human' s opinion, but Lan was too tired to argue. What little strength he still possessed had to be saved for the battle to be joined all too soon. " But Silvain is another matter. He poses an immediate threat."
" Impossible."
" With Claybore backing him, the threat is incalculable," continued Lan. He fought blacking out, wondered if it were worth the effort not slipping into Lethe. " Claybore conquers entire worlds. As he regains his body' s parts and reconstructs himself, his power grows. The Lord of the Twistings was a powerful mage. He blended magic with the mechanical wondrously well, but Claybore is more powerful. He controls energies we cannot begin to comprehend."
Lan Martak let out a long, low sigh and felt the blanketing darkness creeping over him. He fought it off as long as he could. Silvain was the sorcerer Claybore' s chief assistant. Eliminate him and Claybore' s plans would be dealt a severe setback. But the effort of controlling his body- and holding back the fear and dread he had of Claybore- became too much. Sweet oblivion took him. Lan succumbed to the warmth of that embrace.
" Silvain is still within the palace," said Lan Martak. " Where, I can' t say. But he' s waiting for something."
" The cenotaph," spoke up Krek. The more- than- man- high giant spider towered over his human companions. Bouncing slightly on his coppery- furred legs, the huge arachnid appeared ready to jump. While Inyx and Lan were used to him, Knoton was not. The mechanical kept his distance from the ferocious- appearing beast. " You remember the one we ' felt' yesterday?" Krek reminded Lan.
" Yesterday?" Lan sat upright, momentarily dizzy. " I' ve been asleep for an entire day?"
" A bit less. The cenotaph opened and closed. Perhaps he waits for it again."
" Why do you seek a cenotaph?" asked Knoton, overcoming his distaste for the spider enough to question the humans. " What has this to do with finding Silvain?"
" A magically endowed cenotaph," explained Inyx, " allows us passage from world to world. Claybore has regained the Kinetic Spherehis heart. He can walk the Road at will; we must use less sure paths opened by others."
" Friend Lan Martak is able to open cenotaphs for us to walk," said Krek. The huge spider clacked his mandibles in a menacing fashion. Knoton tried unsuccessfully to ignore him.
" You appear to be the match for these interlopers," said Knoton, eyeing Lan dubiously. The young adventurer looked the worse for his experiences. Learning magics in the Twistings had sapped his mental vitality, and battles with the Lord of this world had added cuts and abrasions to his body.
" Where' s the graveyard?" Lan demanded of Knoton. " I sense the openings and closings, but I' m too weak to pinpoint the exact cenotaph he' ll use."
" I know where it is. I have not been slumbering away my life while desperate characters like this Silvain rush about uncaptured."
" Take me there. Let' s all get there. Don' t waste time!" Lan cursed to himself all the way out of the palace and toward the back lawns. Inyx had to give him more support than he' d have liked. He vowed that the first thing he' d do when all this was behind them was rest for a week, then spend another week with Inyx in more enjoyable pursuits.
Afterward:.
He cursed the burdens placed upon him. Stopping Claybore from seizing power in every world along the Cenotaph Road was a duty better suited to a mage trained for the task, a mage as powerful as the legendary Terrill. Lan Martak had begun on a pastoral world that was just developing the magical contrivances that abounded on so many other worlds. He had grown up hunting, finding peace and tranquility in nature, depending on his strong arm and steady nerve for a living. But that was all past. Now Lan Martak got pulled deeper and deeper into the vortex of incomprehensible magics swirling between worlds. Where once he had used simple fire- starting spells to cook dinner, now he wrought magics able to smash armies and send entire planets spinning crazily into their suns.
He alone of those adventurous souls walking the Cenotaph Road had the power and ability to stop Claybore from reconstructing his scattered body and becoming the greatest despot of myriad histories.
They made their way out onto the neatly cropped lawn, down the path and toward a small stand of trees. From this close, Lan " saw" the cenotaph- or cenotaphs. No fewer than eight neatly tended crypts clustered in this minuscule graveyard.
" I' ve never seen so many in one place."
" Nor I," agreed the spider. " This is a world of strange contrasts. Obviously great courage is possible. Perhaps that goes with great evil, also."
" What are these cenotaphs?" asked Knoton. " You humans speak of them as if they were the most marvelous things in the world."
How could flesh and blood ever explain the concept of death to a mechanical? Or was it possible that mechs recognized disassembly in the same way? Lan didn' t have the energy to explore the topic at the moment.
" They open gateways to other worlds by tapping the spirits of those dead but never properly interred. Using the Kinetic Sphere- his heart- Claybore walks the Cenotaph Road at will now, collecting hidden body artifacts. Silvain and others aid him; we oppose them."
" Succinctly put," came Alberto Silvain' s words. Lan spun, reaching for a magical death tube at his belt. His hand froze halfway there when he saw that Silvain aimed one of the weapons directly at Inyx' s head. The commandant of Claybore' s grey- clad troops laughed, saying, " So it' s as I surmised. You' d face your own death willingly enough to stop me- and Claybore. But you won' t risk her life. Claybore will find that interesting."
" You know what he' s trying to do," said Lan, trying to find the most convincing words. " Join us, oppose him."
" I side with winners."
" Like the not very lamented Lord of the Twistings?" asked Krek, his voice curiously mild and childlike for a creature so large.
" I had no choice in his case. Claybore ordered me to support him. Given the chance, I would have removed him permanently. I see that our lovely Inyx did that and more. She has a ruthlessness in her that I admire."
" I' d rip out your liver and stuff it down your throat, if I could," the woman said, her tone low and menacing. She jerked against the man' s strong forearm, held in a bar across her throat. Attempting to sink teeth into his flesh availed her little. He turned just enough to prevent any damage.
" See? Such an admirable display of courage. Too bad I must kill you all before joining Claybore."
" He' s not doing too well regaining his tongue." Lan made it a statement, not a question.
" How' d you know: Ah, a trick. There is no way you can know what happens on that world. You don' t even know which world he' s on. But as you have already learned from me in a careless moment, yes, progress is much too slow. I am now free of this world and can aid him. Then I shall return to this world and make it my own personal domain. He' s promised me."