Wait. Did the branch on the tree ahead just move? He stopped dead, squinting into the gloom.
It wasn't a branch, it was..
A monster.
Its shape was like a large worm with glistening, blue-black flesh. Small tendrils or limbs branched from its body. It dropped from the tree, but stopped before striking the earth. Buzzing insectile wings beat at the dusky gloom, sickeningly small but large enough to hold the creature aloft. Three golden orbs projected from a blunt, bulbous thickening that served as the creature's body, or perhaps its head.
Another appeared, and Gage caught his breath. This one squirmed along the forest floor, with a rolling corkscrew gait reminiscent of a serpent. This one was closer, and Gage perceived its alien body in all its awful asymmetry. The horrid creature possessed three clawed legs, a ropy body, and three long whiplike tentacles, each divided at the end into stubby, strong fingers. Its head was a bulbous case atop its trunk, crowned by three stalked eyes. This one's three membranous wings folded tightly into its torso as it ambled along the ground. Its hide was slick and slimy, and mottled blue and black in color.
The monster slithered straight toward Gage.
The thief drew a dagger and hurled it. The blade plunged into the creature's flesh right between the stalked eyeballs. It screamed and reversed direction.
Gage drew another dagger, holding it ready. The hovering monster's tentacles writhed, and a searing blast of lightning leaped from its stubby fingers to ground itself in the space where the thief had stood a heartbeat earlier. How many more daggers did he have ready? Only three, he realized.
As Gage ducked out of his instinctual evasive leap, his brain realized what his body already knew; the damned things could wield sorcery! He raced around the wide bole of the closest silvery tree, eluding another blast of electricity that scattered wood chips in a dozen trajectories, followed by smoking trails.
He stood, his back to the trunk, breathing hard. He yelled, "Any chance you've made a mistake? I'm no threat. What say you go your way, I go mine. No harm-"
A blast of electricity shuddered into the tree, this time penetrating all the way through. Agony seared his upper back and shoulders.
Gage darted away from the thing, to duck behind the next tree he reached. He placed a dagger in his mouth and rummaged through the pockets on his belt. Lucky his maneuvers hadn't broken any of the vials. With practiced fingers he undid a clasp and pulled forth a glass vial labeled Inhalant. Dark yellow liquid sloshed within. He whispered a prayer to Akadi, crouched, and tossed the vial onto the path he'd taken.
He heard the vial smash and the hiss of the contents as they volatilized in the air. He waited a moment then leaned to peer back.
A yellow haze hung in the forest, and at its edge lay one of the creatures. As monstrously odd as it was, it still required breath. Its inert bulk showed it was as susceptible to alchemical poisons as he was. But where was the flying one?
Perhaps it fled when its companion succumbed to the gas. Or did it merely hide, lying in wait to ambush him should he reveal himself? No way to predict the psychology of a creature so alien; it only barely possessed something resembling a body.
He had to risk it. The longer he huddled unmoving, the colder the trail of his quarry. He glanced around the tree.
He looked again at the body of the fallen creature and shuddered. The elf hadn't mentioned such dangerous predators roamed her homeland-the creature was unlike anything he'd ever seen. He sniffed. At least it didn't have the stench of the Abyss.
Nothing swooped from the canopy; nothing rose from the forest floor.
He continued on, setting a comfortable pace-not so quick as to miss the trail, nor so slow that his quarry eluded him.
Nor did Gage forget about the monster that had peppered him with sorcerous bolts. As he advanced, a conviction grew that the creature hadn't fled. No, it had merely hidden, perhaps by magic. Perhaps it followed him, waiting for him to grow tired or drop his guard.
Something creaked above him and he rolled to the left as if evading another bolt of lightning. As he pulled out of his roll he drew daggers and glared upward. Nothing but a break in the canopy, through which a scattering of stars gleamed and winked.
His gauntlet chuckled.
He resisted the urge to smash it against a nearby tree. Instead, he sheathed his dagger and curled his hand into a fist, squeezing the foul-breathed mouth as tightly as he could. "Quiet, while I try to find all my blades," he told his gauntlet.
The demonic titter was muffled, but the unholy mirth could not be stilled.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Stardeep, Cynosure Prime's Chamber
Delphe rested, her back against a wide stone slab written with cramped, writhing script that glowed as if by starlight. A moment earlier, she'd been in the Throat staring anxiously down into the Well. All was well in the Well. .
She grimaced. So much for silly little superstitions. Activity in the boundary layer had seemed within normal tolerances, but how long would that last? How long could she continue to personally monitor the Well without Cynosure's never-sleeping cognizance? Cynosure was designed to be the first line of defense against the Traitor's escape; mortal Keepers were merely meant as fail-safes.
She had only spent a short time in reverie in the last couple days, and her brain fizzed with fatigue. Manually triggering Stardeep's useful but complex transfer function was exhausting. Add to that the stress of worrying about the Traitor while at the same time attempting to evaluate Cynosure's nodes for possible contamination, and the result was a Keeper a hand's span away from collapse.
Delphe mentally tallied her success. She'd checked twenty of the thirty-some partial and complete nodes through which Cynosure's mind normally resonated while he was in Stardeep's command loop. All seemed clean, with no sign of decay, corruption, or tampering. Likewise, Prime itself was a paragon of health. Good progress, but. .
It would take at least another day to finish checking the rest of the nodes.
She dropped her head into her hands.
"Are you well, Delphe?" Cynosure Prime's deep voice boomed from the darkness.
She lifted her head, tracking slowly up the immense, streaked, and stained form of the sentient idol, and looked into its dimly shining scarlet eyes.
"I fear I'm about to discover the limits of my competence," she admitted.
"Have you finished your trace?"
"No, I am two-thirds complete," she replied.
"Then our progress is positive-why so forlorn?"
"I don't have the strength to finish," said Delphe, slumping further.
"I have been monitoring your progress, and I agree," rumbled the idol. "I have a solution, if you wish to hear it."
She blinked. "Please, share."
"It is not necessary to bring me completely back into the loop in order for me to gain access to a majority of my previous functions. Many of my nodes are redundant. You could drop from the loop the nodes you are uncertain about, then reroute and reintroduce my consciousness to what remains."
Delphe blinked again.
"That… is not a bad idea." She considered Cynosure's words. It was true, now that she allowed her tired mind a moment's contemplation-every one of the focus points serving as nodes were not strictly necessary. She had checked out and passed more than enough nodes to do exactly what the idol suggested. Enough nodes were clean.
At least, clean as far as her abilities could trace. Which was the real worry-what if some insidious error or malign influence lay hidden from her yet, like a cyst in a piece of meat about to be eaten? What if she brought Cynosure back into the loop only to trigger that influence once again?