Squee gave him no quarter. He scampered up Ertai's front and slid down his back. Fists pounded the mimetic spine as though it were a xylophone. Each blow sent jabs of rogue energy through Ertai's body.
He convulsed, flailing at the goblin.
"Run for it, Gerrard!" Squee shouted. "Squee save you again!"
"Not likely," Gerrard barked, fists held up before him. "How about it, Crovax? How about an honest fight for once? No angels, no devils. Just you and me."
Claws curling into fists, Crovax waved off Selenia and his guards. "All right, Gerrard. You were willing enough to mop the deck with me aboard Weatherlight. This is my ship. Now you're the mop."
"I'm looking forward to this," Gerrard said with a grin.
He faked with his left and swung a right hook.
Crovax caught the punch. Claws spiked Gerrard's fist.
Yanking him down to his knees, Crovax snarled, "All you have is bravado. Bravado is nothing in the face of death." With his free hand, Crovax grasped Gerrard's neck and hurled him toward the ceiling.
Gerrard soared upward. He wriggled like an airborne cat and slid just to one side of a brutal spike. Arms wrapped around the stalactite, and he held on. Legs lashed out to an adjacent corpse. With a wet sound, the body sloughed free and plunged. It spattered atop Crovax and made a sunburst on the floor.
"Bravado is everything in the face of death," Gerrard said.
Squee meanwhile proved it.
Still swarming over Ertai, Squee shouted to the moggs, "Get dis here stinkin' goblin offa me!"
The moggs converged on Ertai. Groping and pinching, their green arms were indistinguishable from Squee's. The canny cabin boy crawled from the fight as Ertai unleashed his first spells.
Fire burned a mogg's arm to ash. Lightning fried the nerves of another. A third withered into a black lump. A fourth liquefied into a puddle.
"He's killin' us. He's turned on us!" Squee shouted as he scrambled behind the moggs' legs. "Stop 'im! He's gone loony!"
As Ertai hurled spells out at his attackers, moggs hurled fists in at him.
Taking advantage of Squee's diversion, Gerrard dropped from the ceiling to stand, fists raised, before Crovax.
"You are a liar. Yawgmoth may have dominion over the souls of his own creatures, but he has no power over others. He has no power over Hanna."
The evincar of the Stronghold circled, just out of fist range. He still dripped the putrid fluids of the corpse that had landed on him.
"You are wrong, Gerrard." He gestured toward Squee. "I returned the soul to your friend here-brought him back to life."
It was true, but there had to be another explanation. "Squee died in your Stronghold, in your grip. Of course Yawgmoth could snatch his soul," Gerrard said. He punctuated the comment with a sweeping head kick. His heel caught Crovax's jaw, cracking loose two more teeth. "Yawgmoth had no hold on Hanna when she died."
Crovax smiled. The bleeding sockets that had held the two teeth folded closed, and the gums rolled outward. Two new teeth ratcheted into position.
"Didn't he? Hanna died of the plague, Yawgmoth's plague. She died in his grip."
Blood swelling his face, Gerrard swung a left hook.
Crovax caught his fist again and grabbed the right cross that followed. Hoisting Gerrard, Crovax hurled him across the throne room.
Gerrard crashed headfirst into the wall. His vision narrowed to a wavering tunnel. He slumped. The wall draped down on top of him. Black flowstone formed into bars that wrapped around Gerrard and solidified. He was trapped.
In that same instant, Squee's fight came to a horrible end.
Ertai slew the final mogg. Squee could no longer hide in plain sight. He dived away. Ertai snatched his ankle, hoisted him up, and swung him over his shoulder like a maul. Squee's head struck the floor. There came a bursting sound and a red spray. Squee's body lay utterly still. His life spread across the floor.
Ertai stared with haunted eyes at the slain figure. Was it hatred that twisted his face, or fury… or regret? Whatever it was, when a vampire hound loped up to lick the floor clean, Ertai kicked the beast in the chest, driving it off.
Crovax walked with slow relish toward Gerrard. Over his shoulder, he said, "Nice work, Ertai. Why don't you go recharge yourself? I know you can't resist the mana infuser."
"I'll stay," said Ertai. His voice was feverish. "I want to see this through."
"Suit yourself," Crovax said offhandedly. He reached Gerrard and crouched beside his flowstone cage. "Do you see what has happened to Ertai? Do you see what has happened to me? We have gone the way of all heroes. We have joined the winners."
"You aren't heroes. You never were. Flawed, weak, seduced by darkness-monsters. In your hearts you were monsters all along," snarled Gerrard.
"What do you think of Commander Agnate? Hero or monster?"
"Why do you care?"
A simple hand gesture from Crovax indicated the center of the throne room.
There, as solid as Selenia, stood Commander Agnate. Beneath his battered armor, his flesh was riddled with rot. Two axe clefts split the man's head, but still he gazed at Gerrard with seeing eyes.
"He made a bargain with death and then thought to cheat death of its due. Agnate was clever but not clever enough. He could cheat a lich lord, but he could not cheat Yawgmoth," Crovax said evenly. He cocked an eyebrow. "What do you think of Rhammidarigaaz? Hero or monster?"
"Don't tell me he-"
Suddenly, the red dragon was there beside Agnate. His figure was deformed as if clutched in a brutal fist. Burns covered his skin, but he too seemed solid and alive.
"He sacrificed hundreds of his own folk to become a god. He attacked Weatherlight and almost succeeded in ripping the power core from the ship. Your friend Karn paralyzed him with visions, and Rhammidarigaaz plunged down into this selfsame volcano-into the grips of Yawgmoth."
"They were heroes, both of them," Gerrard replied. "Yes, they had made bargains with death, but as soon as they realized the price of those bargains, they ended their own lives. They did everything they could to escape you. The fact that you hold them means nothing."
"What about Urza Planeswalker? Hero or monster?"
Blood fled Gerrard's face. "No, you are lying…"
"Am I?" asked Crovax. A final sweep of his hand indicated a nearby arch. A pair of thick doors slid aside. The scene beyond told that this was no mere doorway. It was a portal-a portal that led to a deep level of Phyrexia.
In floating blackness hung a coliseum. It was not hewn of stone but built up out of pure mind. Glowing lines were etched into the emptiness. They formed rings of seats up from the circular staging ground where the portal opened.
At the center of the staging ground rose a round dais. Its perimeter was ranked with countless weapons-polearms, scimitars, staves, axes, maces, daggers-all in fiendish design. Like the rest of the place, these weapons too were formed of thought, not of matter.
"What is this?" Gerrard whispered incredulously.
"This is the mind of Yawgmoth," Crovax replied. "All of Phyrexia conforms to his will, but on the ninth sphere, the thoughts and desires of the Ineffable are all that shape reality. To walk here is to dwell in the mind of a god. Your friend dwells there even now."