To Khisanth's utter shock, the pieces not eaten by acid had begun to reform into many, many more creatures. They seemed angered, even in their silence.
The grotesque beings suddenly darted back from her, though she had made no move, nor spoken a word. Then Khisanth saw the reason.
Rising up behind the last row of creatures, silhouetted against the glowing red sky, were much taller, winged beings. Perhaps half Khisanth's height, they were thin with wiry muscles. They stepped closer, kicking the trembling blobs from their path. These new creatures looked reptilian, with long, prehensile tails-though eight feet tall, they reminded Khisanth strongly of the much smaller stone gar shy;goyles that were poised on the corners and turrets of Shal-imsha Tower, meant by its builders to chase away evil spirits. These were not made of stone, but leathery flesh, like her own underbelly. Six of them were black as night, and two were vivid green.
"Who are you?" Khisanth demanded, repeating her last words to the newcomers. She pointed at the quivering crea shy;tures who had worked so hard to tear her flesh from her bones. "And what are they?"
Lemures-mindless spirits. They can't answer. Khisanth looked around, startled. The voice had spoken inside her head. She spotted a red reptilian creature staring closely at her and decided it was the one that had answered her telepathically.
"We're abishai, sentries on the Abyssal plane," it said, its tone very low-pitched and slow, like stone would sound if it could talk.
"The Abyss?" Khisanth squealed, a sound she'd never heard from her own throat.
Without answering, the creatures snapped into formation, boxing Khisanth in with two abishai on each side of the dragon, save for the front. She began to walk forward, feeling a strange tug at her thoughts. Dimly she realized she must be under a spell, to respond without complaint or contest. Only after the spell faded was she able to resist.
Khisanth dug in her heels. The black and green creatures stopped in their tracks. Even eight creatures, large by any other standards, could not hope to budge a dragon who did not wish to move.
The red abishai extended its tail toward her and revealed the small stinger at its tip. "Poison," it said. The creature looked around anxiously, as if something would emerge and slay it for communicating with the dragon. Nothing did.
The warning was enough for Khisanth. For now. They started forward again.
The sentries stopped marching abruptly, though their des shy;tination looked not a whit different from their departure point-dark red, glowing sky, like a fire the size of the world burned in the distance. The shifting sand made it difficult to tell up from down. "Wait."
The small battalion of abishai disappeared into the dark red sky as mysteriously as they had arrived.
Khisanth detested mystery of any sort. Where did they go? Did their absence mean the lemures would return? The thought of those brainless creatures clawing at her relent shy;lessly made her feel more trapped than the escort of abishai had. Every nerve tingled at the tips of her scales.
But the lemures did not return. Nor did anyone-or any shy;thing-else. She waited. And waited. Khisanth thought it nearly possible that an entire cycle of seasons could have passed while she waited, for what, she didn't know.
Then, to Khisanth's utter amazement, a wall of fire shot up out of the sand like a geyser. Through it stepped a creature
she would have mistaken for another abishai, if it hadn't cor shy;rected her thoughts.
"Cornugons are the Abyss's greater baatezu," it said in a sepulchral tone. "The distinctions between them and lesser baatezu like abishai are obvious."
Looking more closely, Khisanth began to notice subtle dif shy;ferences-the flesh-covered horns, the slightly more human-looking face, deeply slanted eyes, and protruding tusks instead of rows of equally jagged teeth, like the abishai. And this one gripped a large barbed whip in its talons; the abishai were armed only with claws.
"I am instructed to take you to your meeting." The cornu-gon nodded its horned head once toward the wall of flame.
"Meeting? With whom? Why was I brought to the Abyss?"
The cornugon simply stood, looking toward the blazing wall.
Khisanth felt something pulling at the corners of her confi shy;dence, until she noticed the beginnings of a most unfamiliar sensation-fear. Most oddly, she was developing an irra shy;tional fear of staying where she was. Not that a trip to the Abyss shouldn't inspire terror, she told herself. Still, fear was totally alien to Khisanth's nature. There was no new reason for it to rise at that moment.
Except if it were magically inspired. Dragons were natu shy;rally resistant to magic. The cornugon's magic must be pow shy;erful indeed for a fear spell to affect her so. The dragon felt another unfamiliar twinge of fear.
Before Khisanth could step toward it, the fire wall came to her. She felt its flames tickle and lick at her hide, but the fire didn't burn, wasn't even very warm. The white-orange flame slipped down her back and over her tail and left her standing in a place that looked exactly the same. The sky and sand glowed red as before.
Yet, it felt very different. The cornugon was gone, but Khi shy;santh had the distinct and unshakable impression that she wasn't alone. Cutting through the strange dimness of the bar shy;ren landscape was the long, spiny back of a dragon. Huge, and very close, but very dim.
"Who are you?" Khisanth began, but the momentary relief she felt at the sight of something familiar was knocked away, along with her breath. The area seemed to grow darker, though it was more a darkness of the mind, since the sky's faint redness didn't change. Struggling to breathe, Khisanth could see the dragon's long, unusually thick neck start to swing around to the left.
Like a tightly coiled spring, the neck unwound, and five heads completed the turn, snaking and writhing and hissing softly. Khisanth dropped to her knees in reverence and awe. She cringed before one of the three creators of the world.
In the Dark Queen's present form, the name She of Many Faces seemed most appropriate. Each head represented a type of evil dragon: white, black, green, blue, and red. The colors ran the length of each neck and into the forepart of the dragon's body. They blended into three strips of gray, blue-green, and purple over her back and hindquarters, and merged into a muddy brown tail.
Takhisis's black head slithered closer to the trembling black dragon, hissing softly. You have displeased me greatly,
Khisanth.
Takhisis's lips didn't move, but Khisanth heard the queen's even, almost sensuous voice directly in her head.
"Then I am dead," said the black dragon.
Not yet. Five sets of dragon eyes all bore into Khisanth's, their message unmistakable.
It is my belief that you are yet useful to me, especially now that you have slain three of the only five black dragons worthy of being in my service.
"Worthy!" cried Khisanth. "But you don't under-"
Silence! the Dark Queen's voice cut in sharply. You are clever enough to know that everything happens with my knowl shy;edge, if not consent.
Khisanth, for once, was struck speechless.
Of course I knew of their betrayal with the knights. Black drag shy;ons are the greediest and most solitary of the evil dragons and must be watched accordingly. The tongue of Takhisis's black head darted out, as if to acknowledge and accept the evaluation of its brethren.
"They betrayed you and exposed your entire Black Wing to decimation. Why didn't you strike them dead?"