Koth’s hands went black, and the seams where his fingers bent glowed a bright red. He dived forward and plunged both hands to the elbows into the Phyrexian’s body, instantaneously melting through the thing’s metal framework of supports and bone shards. As he ducked the Phyrexian’s swings, Koth lifted it off its feet and hurled it into the other butchers who had begun to advance.
The path was clear to the meat hole.
“Let’s go,” Koth said.
But Venser was not moving. In a moment the crushers would be upon them. Even Elspeth had begun to walk toward the hole.
“Oh, artificer, sir,” Koth said. “You coming?”
At that moment Venser blinked out of existence to teleport to the bottom of the pit. Shrugging, Koth ran to the hole. The ground shook as the crushers advanced. They were just behind him, by the feel of it. Koth could smell their grim knuckles.
Elspeth was the first one down. Koth looked before he jumped. Darkness. The first crusher stopped and pulled back its huge fist for a punch that would surely have driven Koth back and into the metal wall. He jumped. The cushion of wind at the front of the punch whizzed past his head as he fell down into darkness.
Chapter 5
The landing was soft and wet. They lay in the dark, listening to the caterwauling screams echoing from the hole above them. When Elspeth struggled to her feet a voice broke the quiet.
“Be at ease,” the voice said. “We are many and you are few. Do not struggle or we will gut and leave you and the twisted ones will work through your skins. We need you as you need us to leave this dark place.”
“We are not leaving this dark place,” Venser said.
“Oh, you are leaving,” the voice said. “You are coming with us. Furthermore, you will like it very much. We will even take the vulshok, if he will agree not to run away.”
“Show yourselves,” Koth yelled, starting to glow red in the darkness.
“Loud as always,” the voice said.
But many forms started to appear in the darkness at the edge of Koth’s glow. They were of differing heights and sizes, but all carried weapons. There were thirty that Venser counted. An elf with etched copper arms stepped forward, with his bow half drawn and two cocked fingers holding an arrow in place. His skin was greenish, and the smell of him was odd, Venser thought. Perhaps it was the copper growing into his skin. But the elf’s hair, which seemed to be made up of segmented sections of cable or some close substance, was sweat sodden and pulled back. Deep creases surrounded both his eyes and mouth, as if he had frowned for years.
Behind the forms, vast boulders towered.
“Are we saved by the elves?” Koth laughed.
The elf at the front of the group held up one finger. “Not entirely,” he swept his hand back. The outline of a vulshok, with spikes at the shoulders and head, was clearly visible behind him.
“I am Ezuri and you are saved by Mirrodin. It is a place you may remember from the old days,” the elf said.
Koth was quiet.
Venser noticed for the first time that the elves in the group, and the leader in particular, had small circular parts of their arm and leg metal that glowed green.
“What do you seek?” Elspeth said, standing tall and white in the festering filth around her. Her sword was unsheathed and laid across her left arm. Venser was suddenly very glad that she was a part of the group. Koth was seething … getting redder and redder the longer he stood. There would be a fight if the situation continued.
It was the elf who spoke. “We are here to lead you out of this madness,” the elf said, “if you would come.”
Koth brightened. “Yes, please,” he said. Then he seemed to realize that he’d spoken too quickly. “Why are you helping us?”
The elf laughed a high, shrill laugh. “One, maybe two more rooms and you would be as this meat we are standing upon,” he said. He looked down at the rotting flesh. “Some of this is elf. Perhaps some of these elves were from my tribe.” He lifted his foot. “That might even be my wife.”
Nobody spoke. After a moment Venser stepped forward.
“I am Venser of Urborg.”
“It is I, Ezuri,” the elf said. “And these are raiders against the fiends.”
“Ezuri, we thank you for wanting to help us, but we must continue down from here.”
“Why?” the elf said. “We have been tracking you for some time, and at every turn you seem to be uniquely able to choose the most dangerous path, and to take it.”
Venser heard Koth stir next to him. He would hear from the vulshok later how they were not on the correct path, but it was time to make sure that the elf did not impede their progress.
“We search for a friend who was lost here.”
“Who is this friend? I might have seen him.”
“His name is Karn,” Venser said.
Ezuri stared at Venser for what seemed like a full minute. “No, I have not seen anyone by that name.”
“We must find him,” Venser said.
“If he is any deeper than the meat room, you may forget you ever heard his name.”
As if to prove the point, a chorus of gargled bellows cut the stinking air. Ezuri did not move his head, but his large ears pivoted slightly at the sound. His eyes never left Venser’s.
“I cannot let you pass this room,” Ezuri said. “You know this. I cannot let you stir those that tear flesh into a frenzy. We have been pressing them hard and making good progress against them. I cannot let you undo our work.”
“You think you have them on the run?” Koth said. “We were just at the Vault of Whis-”
“And there were some Phyrexians around there,” Venser cut in.
Sensing he was not getting the whole story, Ezuri cut his gaze from Koth to Venser, then after a quick glance at his troops, turned back to Venser before continuing.
“There are small pockets of the enemy there,” Ezuri said. “That is known.”
Elspeth picked up on the tone of the conversation. “Yes, some,” she said.
“But what we saw come out of that mountain …,” Koth began.
“Koth,” Elspeth interrupted. “Would you introduce me to your kin?”
Koth cast an eye at the vulshok standing behind Ezuri. “He is Shield clan.” Then to the vulshok, “Come forward, Shield clan.”
The vulshok stood where he was, and looked to Ezuri. The elf nodded and the vulshok stepped forward.
“Since when do the wrought follow the bidding of those of the forests,” Koth said.
“Since we lost most of our tribe,” the vulshok replied.
“Do you know Ranglif or Nagel?”
The man shook his head.
Venser seemed unconcerned. “You must surely know the Lyser?”
The vulshok nodded once. “He is dead.”
The small smile faded off of Koth’s face. “Is that so?”
“That is so,” the vulshok said. “A battle in the Tangle did him.”
“What was he doing in the Tangle, with the elves?”
Venser watched the vulshok shrug his shoulders. The shoulder shrug must be one of the worst expressions in existence, Venser thought. So meaningless and yet so insolent.
The artificer looked critically at the band of rebels, as Koth argued with the vulshok. They had spread their ranks as Ezuri spoke. They would be hard to flank or evade. Still, if they could get to the other side of that large rock behind Koth, it might be possible to run through the boulder field. With a little luck they might find an exit before Ezuri and his thugs caught up. It was worth trying.
But Ezuri had been watching Venser. When the artificer moved, three of Ezuri’s elves had their bows up and aimed.
“Do not move, friend,” Ezuri said. “You really are going to accompany us.”