Suddenly Chasm stopped. The gargoyle hissed and began running in a circle.
Tyranos ordered him to stop, and stepped into the center of what had been his servant’s circle of running. To his right began the gradual rise of another peak. To the left and ahead, a narrowing path led to a jagged gap between high rocks.
“You see or sense anything, cleric?”
“Nothing.”
The wizard snorted. “By our reasoning, we should almost be on top of whatever is supposed to lead us to the Grand Khan and the artifact.” He held the staff forward. “Tivak!”
The strands of silver energy crackled above them and about the area. Tyranos quickly whirled, scanning the vicinity with the aid of his staff.
A moment later, he dismissed the magic, however. Turning to Stefan, he growled, “As you say, nothing! Absolutely-”
A golden bubble swept up out of the ground, passing through the hard earth like a phantom. It rose high, swelling in volume at the same time.
It also swallowed up Tyranos.
“No!” Stefan shouted, reaching to grab for the wizard. But the cleric had been too slow to react. As fast as the bubble materialized, it sank back down into the ground and vanished, taking the unsuspecting spellcaster wherever it went.
And leaving Stefan and Chasm.
The gargoyle immediately pounced on the spot, scrabbling desperately, trying to dig through the hard rock with his thick claws. The cleric stepped up next to him, thinking furiously.
From the direction of the shadowed castle came the sound of flapping wings. Many flapping wings.
The knight turned in that direction. He readied his sword.
Powerful paws grabbed him under his arms. Before Stefan knew what was happening, Chasm had lifted him up and was carrying the fully armored human through the air. Tyranos’s winged servant veered away from the rising sound of a monstrous flock.
And as the gargoyle bore him away, all Stefan could do was stare at the ground below, where the spellcaster had disappeared.
Stare and pray to his patron.
The guards wasted no time rushing to the palace, with fear as much as duty pressing them urgently. At their head ran the captain on duty, an ogre warrior certain that he was about to lose his head, or worse.
They arrived to find an oddly contemplative Wargroch peering out over Garantha from one of the many balconies that were favored by Golgren. The bulky ogre did not even turn around when his own guards presented the four warriors to him, instead seeming to find something of interest far, far away.
The captain gestured his underlings down on their knees and waited. When Wargroch finally turned to acknowledge them, the kneeling officer banged his fist on his breastplate and waited for permission to speak.
“You I know,” Wargroch muttered. “You are assigned to the stockades.”
The other ogre swallowed. On the one hand, it was good for those most favored by the Grand Khan to know their subordinates. However, under the present circumstances, the stockade officer would have preferred Wargroch’s complete ignorance. If the Grand Khan’s chief aide knew him, that meant he had marked him-perhaps as one having potential, perhaps for another, more dubious reason. What the captain had come to tell Wargroch would almost certainly endanger his standing, as well as his life.
“I am in charge of the stockades, yes, Khan Wargroch,” the captain answered in his best Common.
“I am no khan,” Nagroch’s brother corrected him brusquely. “Commander, yes, but no khan.”
“Commander,” the captain acknowledged crisply. “Great commander, there has been terrible-Skee anoch-magic!”
“What magic?”
“The forest dwellers gone! All gone!”
The officer described matters as best he could. Both his incomplete knowledge of Common and his confusion about the event forced him to take longer than he would have liked. He had just come on duty and had been setting the guards in place, he explained. The captives had been placid, more manageable than a herd of goats. They had been fed not all that long ago, and so the captain had not had to concern himself with that job.
Since being assigned to the great pen, the elves and their ogre guards had come to a silent understanding. The elves had realized their fates rested in the hands of the Grand Khan. No one wanted to offend Golgren. The elves were generally submissive because they preferred to nurture their faint hopes for freedom, and the ogre guards were generally tolerant, without anxiety about their captives’ welfare or escape. Neither side fully understood the intentions of the Grand Khan.
So the changing of the guards was ceremonial, almost tedious, usually. The officer made certain everyone was at their post, and proceeded to prepare for the next shift.
Barely an hour had passed when there came shouts from not just one guard, but several under his command. The officer had come running up the wooden walkway to the top of the stockade to see what had alarmed his guards, the captain reported, only to discover some of them were actually shivering.
He had reached for the nearest, intending to shake the story out of him, when his gaze had drifted down into the stockade’s interior.
An empty interior.
At that point, Wargroch angrily cut the captain off. “Gone? All elves are gone?”
“Ke-Yes! All! Much magic!” the guard officer hesitated before growling, “Titans, maybe.”
Mention of the sorcerers brought a hiss from the Grand Khan’s pet meredrake, which was curled up in its customary spot on one side of the chamber. Wargroch let out a similar hiss, and looked as if he were ready to strike the ogre officer giving his report. However, he finally lowered his hand, turning to the warriors behind the captain. “All true? No sign of escape?”
They shook their heads. One dared answer, “Gates bolted. Meredrakes all around.” Golgren had commanded that handlers with the giant reptiles should patrol the perimeter around the wooden structure at all hours. Not so much because he thought the elves might try to escape, but to stop his own people if they were tempted to show their hatred for the forest dwellers by rushing the stockade to burn it down. “And bows above to watch all,” the warrior added.
The archers were another precaution which Khleeg had suggested to the Grand Khan. More than two dozen archers stood atop the roofs of the nearest structures surrounding the stockade. Golgren had emphasized to Khleeg and Wargroch that the slaves were vital to his planned deal with the Solamnians.
Wargroch’s eyes narrowed imperceptibly.
“Magic,” he finally agreed with the stockade officer. “Titan magic, maybe.” He waved away the captain and the others. “Go!”
Surprised, but also pleased not to have been rewarded with their heads rolling around on the floor, the captain and his staff rose to bowing positions and backed out of the chamber. As they departed, Wargroch ground his yellowed teeth in thought.
“Safrag,” he finally muttered.
Safrag was on the minds of the Titans too, for their leader had been absent far longer than any of them had anticipated. Morgada urged the others to be patient, aware that more than one was already measuring their future against hers.
Their long-checked attitude toward her being only female couldn’t be tamped down for long. Even the pair who had assisted her with the spell transporting the elves to the sanctum acted as if she had been of little importance to the accomplishment; she had only been the conduit for Safrag’s magic.
But Morgada was used to the others belittling and underestimating her; so did Safrag himself. Safrag thought he was more clever than Dauroth, whom she had bewitched first. True, Safrag’s cunning coup over the master had caught Morgada by surprise. But the dim-witted Safrag had chosen her to be his apprentice, and all had gone as the female Titan had planned.