The barbarian wondered if anyone would rescue him. He remembered the disregard of the lieutenant and the crabs and hoped he could count on the Cabal forces. At the very least, someone would have to take care of the giant corpse.
"Perhaps they will enchant it and have it walk away." The crab might weigh over a thousand pounds, but he was sure that he could get out without the tons of flesh holding the shell in place. He imagined a giant undead monster crushing the crab and the life under it into oblivion as it tried to rise. Kamahl thought of his killing blow. He realized that with no intact spine, it was unlikely that even raised, the monster would be able to move. It seemed colder somehow.
The tremendous ringing of magical energy made him believe that he was dying, and new planes of existence called to him. Then his senses located the source of the power. A locus of exultation, a shout of birth, it lay some distance away. His mind demanded he move, run to the source, but his body stayed relaxed, impotent under the great weight. His thoughts grew hazy as the energy retreated. He had sensed this before, though it wasn't as strong. The treasure room! He recalled the sphere behind the sword. Someone else must have seen its value and called forth its essence. His mind swirling, he tried to imagine what champion might hold it now. It was harder to think, the air thicker. He could not call power, the pressure on his body seeming to squeeze the magic out. Just a few more minutes of rest and them he would cut his way free. After all, a victory without being alive to enjoy it seemed pointless. Just a few minutes more…
The sound roused his attention at once. The rhythmic cuts of a sharp edge into flesh transmitted themselves through the corpse. He might have been gathering himself for a few minutes or for days, but he shouted loudly, pushing the sound out despite aching, compressed ribs. There was a pause in the beat and then it resumed, louder than before.
The leathery scrape of scales signaled the shifting of the dragon's mass. Pressure spiked and eased as the giant corpse slumped to the side. Shy beams of light peaked under the crab's shell, and the crunch of metal in chitin showed the worker was near.
"Have a care," shouted Kamahl trying to shift the beast above him. It gave a little, though it still seemed pinned down on one side. "The crab is right on top of me!"
A great hand wormed its way under the shell and another joined it. The knuckles went white as the shell lifted a fraction. The barbarian forced his complaining body to lift as well, and the additional force flipped the crustacean to the side. Kamahl reeled at the release of weight, and the light left his eyes watering. Seton stood, his sides heaving, with a bloody axe beside him. As the barbarian moved out of the shallow depression, he could see Cabal servants advance on the crab, sledgehammers falling as they smashed armor and threw fragments into a nearby wagon. Other servants with huge cleavers attacked the dragon's corpse, a steady stream of bloody lumps of flesh falling to the street. The meat went to other carts, and some rumbled toward the arena.
"Waste not, want not." Seton laughed as he came closer to Kamahl. The barbarian allowed himself to lean on the giant.
"What happened?" the mountain fighter asked, speaking with difficulty from his chapped lips. He waved a water carrier over from his round of the Cabal workers.
"What happened?" the centaur replied incredulously. "You are standing in the largest open- air butcher shop on the continent, and you ask what happened? As if you missed a few seconds of a play?" The simian face writhed with suppressed merriment.
"I don't mean this," Kamahl said irritably, dismissing the battle, his triumph, and his near death with a wave. "What force cried out so loudly long after the dragon fell?" The centaur moved away from the other workers.
"The Cabal presented a prize to Lieutenant Kirtar for killing the beast," he whispered. "When he held it in his hands, it released such power that all the city was stunned by it. He left for his camp and soon after went north. Word came of other attacks by forest creatures, and the Captain called him away." The centaur knelt, bringing his mouth closer to the barbarian's ear.
"They say the Master of the Games has disappeared, punished for giving away such power. He has gone to feed the beasts I wager. I heard the ambassador's servants tell a Cabal officer that Laquatus would be leaving the city shortly for 'consultations.' " Seton looked over the destruction and the blood running into the gutters. "What happened here is merely the beginning."
Kamahl thought of the prize that he desired given to the Lieutenant.
"They rewarded Kirtar for killing the dragon?" he said hotly. "They gave him what was rightfully mine, and he has run away north." He began to pace, his injuries momentarily forgotten. He ran to the pit where he had fallen, shouldering aside the workers. Kamahl went to his hands and knees, looking determinedly over the ground, ignoring the complaints from offended servitors. Seton followed and quelled the comments with a frown. Kamahl stood suddenly, his great sword in his hand. The long blade whipped through the air, the dragon blood burning away in a trail of smoke.
"I will go reclaim my prize from Kirtar," the barbarian said, steel ringing in his voice. "1 will have my reward though the entire Order stands in my way."
CHAPTER 9
The early morning dew made the grasslands a jeweled vista, the sun's rays glittering off the small droplets. The rider nudged the sides of her steed and set it through the tall grass.
The woman looked alertly over the landscape, the slight fold of her eyes hiding some of the intensity of her observation. Her black hair trailed down her back, bound in a long rope by silvered ornaments. One arm rested on her saddle pommel, encased in leather and steel. The bracer's ancient power was temporarily quiescent. A tall asymmetric bow tilted forward in its case, the fine wood of the box repelling the morning moisture.
The unicorn ran easily, its gait almost gentle but covering ground faster than a horse could run. Its horn glinted, the delicate spiral supported by steel laminated and magically bonded to its skull. The mount's saddle was a tangle of straps, and the rider's legs were half-enclosed by the stirrups.
The need for such careful securing was obvious as the unicorn turned at an incredibly sharp angle, altering its run in response to a nudge from its rider's knee. Dirt showered as the steed accelerated, its enchanted hooves casting pebbles and dirt clods up into the air like slings.
The loudest sound was the jingle of the woman's scale mail and the slap of the long cavalry sword against her back. A field of tall wild flowers lay in a depression, and she directed the steed toward them. The tension was obvious in her first strokes as she tried to loosen her muscles. The first cuts took great swathes of flowers as she struggled for precision. She turned the unicorn in a tight circle almost peeling her out of the saddle. Again she went through the flowers. Now the sword strokes took single blossoms, and she nodded in satisfaction at her skill.
"If only the forest beasts were as easily understood and directed," Pianna, Captain of the Order, whispered to herself. For weeks, animals from the west appeared and acted unpredictably. Solitary beasts that naturally subsisted alone now roamed in large groups. Skittish herd animals became insanely aggressive. Beasts plowed through the fields and villages of man doing destruction but only sporadically, leaving some settlements completely alone while only a few miles away numberless herds destroyed everything. She sent messengers to druids and other holders of wisdom, but no answer issued from the forest, only more animals that pursued some unknown path or goal. The purposeless attacks were becoming the Order's crucible.
For years she had extended the Order's message of new unity, and now it was being put to the test. Unfortunately, it was a test the organization was failing. The raids continued despite her best efforts. There seemed to be no plan or direction to the strikes. Animals and monstrous plants appeared at villages and struck out in frenzy. Sometime the attacks stopped before much was destroyed, even if a hamlet had no real defenses. Other times the assaults continued until all was destroyed and the inhabitants were dead.