The shadow of the Perilous Halibut passed over Teldin as the ship shot by overhead, just missing the giant's head. Teldin saw a cloud of debris fall from the ship's stern and strike the titan in its grotesquely muscled chest.
A flash of sparkling light enveloped the giant on the instant, hiding it entirely from view. A moment later, soundlessly, the giant vanished.
Later, when the paralysis spell had worn off Teldin, everyone tried to sort it out as they gathered in the grass outside the Perilous Halibut. Now missing its tail fin, the ship was easily able to land on the grassy plain, though it was tilted a bit on the rough ground. Ropes had to be used to climb down from the upper deck to the ground. The loss of the tail had changed the ship's gravity plane slightly, but the ship was still airworthy, despite Dyffed's jests to the contrary long ago.
"Sylvie sent me to the jettison when we heard the giant in the woods, and we took off after you in a flash," Gaye recalled, unconsciously winding a lock of her hair around a finger as she spoke. "When the gnomes yelled to fire, I just pulled the lever, and thunk! the jettison threw everything out. Then I looked out the back and said, 'Wow! Where'd the giant go?' and that's all I know. Do you think the gods got mad at him? That happened on Krynn once, you know. The gods got mad, and boosh! They dropped a whole flaming mountain on this one really mean country, just flattening it! It was really wild! You know about that, Teldin, right? Could the gods blow up the giant just like that? Could the gods have made the jettison flatten him? What do you think, Teldin?"
"Oh, no, id wasn'd the gods, nod ad all," interrupted Dyffed, waving a bandaged hand in dismissal. "I exabined the area and found no elebendal drace of the bonsder ad all. Id was cobplede disindegration of badder on an adobic level, exacdly the kind of thing I did by thesis on ad Lirak's Cube the year thad the dweoberfusion alchebical laboradory dook off and landed in Inediblegreensludge Bay. Thad was also the sabe year by advisor bisdook his giand habsder for his wife when he cabe hobe frob class, and the poor fellow was-"
"The thingfinder," Teldin interrupted. "Gomja threw the thingfinder in the jettison. Could that have done it?"
"The thingfinder?" Dyffed said, blinking. "Whad a sdrange idea. I forgod all aboud id. Id was durned on when I had by accidend, and there always was sobe concern aboud the resulds of a promixidy-induced feedback loop through the liddle blue widged, although I personally said the plasba flow was sdable enough do allow-"
"Was it possible that the thingfinder did it?" Teldin said, his patience gone and his voice just shy of a shout.
Dyffed appeared taken aback at Teldin's vehemence, "Well, now thad you bention id, I suppose so, bud I sdill feel-"
"Teldin!" Aelfred called. All heads turned to see the brawny blond warrior waving a hand from the ship's stern. "Gomja's coming around. You'd better get back here."
Teldin nodded and waved back once. "This isn't getting us anywhere," he said to the group. "Let's just drop it. The giant's gone, we're alive, and I've got to see a giff about a little problem and hope he's going to enlighten me. Then I'm probably going to be tempted to throw him off this damned giant animal and let him think about things for a thousand miles or so on his way down."
Teldin felt a gentle hand on his arm. He pulled away from it. "General Gomja wouldn't betray us," Gaye said softly, looking up at him with wide dark eyes. "I can't believe it. He really cares about you, Teldin. He-"
"He was feeding the elves information on us!" Teldin shouted back in a red rage. "Only the gods know how he was doing it, but he kept the elves right behind us, every step of the way, just so that they could try to kidnap me! That big son of a bitch was working for them! He's another Rianna Wyvernsbane, eager for some cash and ready to sell a friend out! I was a blind, gods-damned fool not to have seen it! Damn you, Gaye, what do you know, anyway?"
Gaye looked up at him as all the color drained from her face. Her mouth was barely open, but no words came out. She suddenly looked down and let go of her curl, her hands falling limp at her sides.
"Teldin!" Aelfred called again.
Teldin knew he had gone too far, but he was too angry to take it back or think about it. With a last look at the silent kender, he left the group and walked off through the grass. "Coming," he called to Aelfred, his voice cracking. He felt very tired. What was the point to all this? Who cared about the cloak at all? If he could have given his cloak away at that moment to just anyone, he would have done so, and gladly. He was sick of this whole quest and everyone in it. He just wanted to leave.
But first, he promised himself, he would have some answers.
Chapter Sixteen
"Ease it in," said General Votr. His face was solid, eyes focused on the flying pyramid only five hundred feet away. Only three other scro were out, two of them on the forecastle deck with the general. The general slowly drummed his thick fingers on the railing, stifling a sudden yawn. He looked away from the pyramid ship just ahead and glanced at the distant shape of the one-horned world-monster where Teldin and the gnomes had gone. He shrugged. It was an hour away, but it could wait. An interesting sphere, this was, and worthy of a closer look after the elves were crushed.
He turned to the scro to his left, the first mate of the Tarantuk's Trident. The pale-skinned scro appeared almost fat, his girth straining against his spiked black armor. The general knew that all of that "fat" was muscle. The first mate glanced back, his huge boar's tusks shining dully in the bright sunlight overhead, and he winked, Vorr gave a curt nod. The first mate looked back at the pyramid, seemingly relaxed, his hands open and hovering near the hilt of the broadsword and the handle of the axe that hung from his thick belt.
Almost there, thought the general. Almost there. The false lich didn't seem to suspect a thing about the request for a short conference before making the dose assault on Teldin and his allies. Usso had done her work well with only hours to spare; she'd get a nice reward out of this one, even if she was a bitch otherwise. The Trident coasted toward its unknowing prey, only seconds away from the gravity plane of the deceptively small stone pyramid. The ziggurat had twice the mass of the much-larger squid ship, and a miscalculated move would smash the two ships together, leaving the squid ship sitting in front of several batteries of catapults and ballistae at dead-zero range, its ram jammed into stone.
But there would be no error. Vorr slowly took a breath through his nose, held it for a few moments, then slowly let it put through his lips. No error at all. It was good to be back at war again.
The Trident jerked and shifted. They'd hit the pyramid's gravity plane dead on.
Vorr grasped the railing with one hand and turned to the speaking tube that led to the helm. "Roll over!" he shouted. Then he threw his head back, drew a swift breath, and roared at the top of his lungs at all the universe. He felt his power go put as he screamed, unstoppable, born into fire and death.
Dozens of muffled screams answered his own, and pounding feet thundered three steps at a time up from the ship's cargo deck, where Usso had hidden the scro and ogre warriors after teleporting them in from the other ships, Howling soldiers in full battle gear, black leather gleaming, poured out from their hiding places. Weapons clanged against spiked armor; eyes glowed green with rage.