His first words were about what Lan expected.
" You caused this, you, you insufferable meddler!"
" How' d I cause the ledge to fall off?"
" Those spells. You kept me away from Claybore. He cast a single spell and caused the ledge to fall, and you clouded everything so much I couldn' t stop him."
" You' re putting a lot onto Claybore. You admitted his powers were weak. How could he chisel off all that rock?"
" It was already weakened. It' s not a difficult spell, just an obvious one- if you hadn' t given him cover to hide behind."
" Let' s worry about all that later, when we' re safe. In case you hadn' t noticed, we' re still thirty feet away from safety." Lan pointed upward across the rock. As exhausted as he felt, it might as well have been thirty million miles.
" Claybore! He tries again!"
Lan Martak felt rumblings deep within Mount Tartanius. As the quaking increased, he was treated to a shower of rock from above. Even worse, the tiny ledges he clung to for dear life began to break. He' d rescued Abasi- Abi; the respite seemed temporary.
Both of them now were threatened with death. The rock under Lan' s left foot broke free. He clung desperately, waiting for the other foothold to crack, too.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Both of his feet dangled above infinity. Lan Martak refused to look down. If he did, he knew vertigo would seize him and spin his head beyond recovery. He looked up, at his hands, at the fingers slowly slipping away from the hard face of the cliff. He concentrated on the fire- making spell. It had worked against the walls of the ice crevasse; it might work here.
It didn' t.
The man' s concentration faded as pain washed through his body. His fingers began to jerk and twitch with muscle spasms reaching all the way into his forearms. His elbows felt as if someone had taken hammers to them. Worst of all, his breathing mask had been pulled away. He gasped for air and found none. The exalted, stately elevation of Mount Tartanius now robbed him of his life by slow measures.
Claybore would win. He' d never again see Inyx, never rescue her from the whiteness between worlds. She was doomed to wander as Zarella wandered. Claybore would win, he' d spread his insidious influence across every world along the Cenotaph Road. Those thoughts jumbled and repeated constantly in his head.
Lan' s fingers hardened into steel spikes as determination gave him the strength he needed to hang on.
He almost slipped when a heavy weight descended around his neck. Abasi- Abi had fallen free and now clung in desperation.
" Y- you' re choking me," gasped out Lan. " I: I can' t breathe!"
" Now you can," came the quick words. And Lan found that he could. The sorcerer had expanded whatever spell enabling him to breathe without the mask to cover Lan, also.
" Get us out of this," begged Lan. His feet swung free. No foothold could be found. " Use your magic. Do something! I can' t hang on like this forever."
" There' s no magic to fly."
" I' ve seen the flyers in Melitarsus. What do you mean there' s no magic?"
" No magic I know. Damn Claybore!"
" Yes, damn him. Now help me!" The sorcerer said nothing, but Lan Martak felt tingles pass along his arms, spreading from his shoulders and expanding downward through his body. His once- leaden legs came alive. He kicked; his foot dug into solid rock. He kicked with the other foot. A new foothold.
Strength pouring through him, he began to climb.
He felt the sorcerer still clinging around his neck, but the burden no longer hindered him. He had the strength of ten men, a hundred. He climbed with almost arrogant ease. He experienced in that moment the freedom Krek must feel swinging in the center of his web.
And as quickly as the newfound strength had entered his body, it began to fade. Fully a score of feet remained between him and safety above on a new ledge.
" What' s wrong?" he cried.
" My power, it' s being interfered with. Claybore' s countering my spell." Abasi- Abi' s voice sounded eons older. When Lan felt the arms circling his neck begin to slip, he knew that the sorcerer had reached the limits of his endurance.
They were still more than fifteen feet from safety.
Panic seized him, only to be replaced with a coldness and a calm he' d experienced before. His mind turned over the sensations he' d felt when Abasi- Abi' s spell had begun. The effects had been similar to the healing spells he knew; similar, but not identical. Working this over and over in his mind, he began itemizing the small differences, incorporating them, experimenting, altering slightly the spells he already knew until the strength again flowed through him.
He climbed briskly, no longer tired. Lan tried to expand his spell to include Abasi- Abi but felt his control slip. He decided the sorcerer was best served by reaching the ledge above as quickly as possible. When he twisted over, he heaved and Abasi- Abi gratefully collapsed onto the firmness of solid rock.
" You know that spell, also," the mage said. " And Claybore could not block you. You fight him and win. You counter his best spells. Who are you? I should have detected you sooner."
Lan Martak' s entire body went numb with shock.
He felt frostbite on his nose and fingers and toes. He gasped for air that never reached his lungs. His head spun wildly, causing him to cling to the rock for support. He passed out.
The last sight he had was Abasi- Abi sitting beside him, shaking his head, looking disgusted.
": and I solemnly tell you he knows little magic," came Krek' s voice. Lan Martak shook his head and felt as if everything inside had come loose. He groaned and tried to push himself erect. Krek said, " I believe his current condition proves my point."
" Impossible." Abasi- Abi' s voice cut through Lan' s mind like a razor. " He uses spells too proficiently. He lies back, waiting for the proper moment. He pretends to be an ignorant lout. No clod- buster bests Claybore as he' s done."
" Will you please shut up?" Lan moaned. " I hurt. All over."
" An effect of the spells he' s been using," said Abasi- Abi, a smugness to him that irritated Lan. He knew that the spider wouldn' t tolerate being proved wrong, either. He let Krek answer. The effort for him was too much.
" He heals. Witness my leg." Krek wiggled his damaged leg, showing the returning mobility. " And he uses that horrid flame spell of his to make campfires. He knows nothing else." The spider paused, then added melodramatically, " Sometimes I believe that last statement of mind is the literal truth."
" He combines spells in ways only a mage can. But it matters little if his powers are a hundred times greater if we fail to reach the summit before Claybore." Abasi- Abi hunkered down and pulled his robe in around his body.
" How many of us are left?" asked Lan. He looked around and saw Krek, the sorcerer, Ehznoll, and one other.
" Just this small band," said Krek. " The rest, alas, are gone." He rose up on all eight legs and peered over the rim downward to the earth, as if trying to figure out the paths already taken by those lost.
" The good earth has reclaimed them, one and all," said Ehznoll.
" They' re dead, is what you' re trying to say." Lan closed his eyes and tried to remember the spell he' d used on the face of the cliff to restore the strength to his limbs. The use of power took too much from him physically. He might be a superman for a few moments, but he' d quickly burn out his entire body if he tried to maintain that pace. He' d come perilously close to doing so already.