Jhesrhi plunged into her corporeal form in much the same way she'd exited it. For a moment, her flesh felt heavy as lead. As she halted her droning repetition of the ritual incantation, she caught a foul smell and peered around.
Six of her Red Wizard collaborators sprawled on the ground, their bodies so decayed that it looked as if they'd been dead for days.
The next instant, demons and devils appeared, their various blades and claws poised to strike. It was plain that their controller's will had snatched them out of combat unexpectedly, and, hideous as they were, their surprise might have seemed comical had the situation been less grim.
Or at least Jhesrhi found it droll, but, like most mages, she had some familiarity with such entities. Nevron's human bodyguards cried out and lifted their weapons, and the spirits, evidently happy they still had something to fight, rounded on them.
"Enough!" Nevron barked, and all his servants, mortal and infernal, froze.
The zulkir looked at the dead men on the ground and sneered as though their failure to survive made them contemptible. Then, his crimson robes flapping around his legs, he strode in the direction of the Dread Ring, no doubt to see how the rest of the battle was going. Jhesrhi followed.
It soon became apparent that the men who'd attacked the south face of the stronghold were retreating. When she saw how many of their number they were leaving behind, torn, tangled, and trampled on the ground, Jhesrhi felt sick all over again.
CHAPTER SEVEN
14–17 Mirtul, The Year of the Dark Circle (1478 DR)
Aoth, Bareris, and Mirror stood at the edge of camp, gazing at the approach to the Ring and the fortress itself. Mirror was invisible, a mere hovering intimation of wrongness, and hadn't spoken since the griffon riders had fled. Evidently his great evocation of holy power had addled and diminished him for a while.
Perceptible to Aoth's fire-infected eyes, even in the dark and even at such a distance, necromancers chanted on the battlements, the sound a counterpoint to the wailing of the wounded soldiers the retreat had abandoned. Responding to the magic, dead men lurched up from the ground to join the ranks of the castle's defenders.
That was unfortunate, but Aoth doubted it would be the worst thing to happen this cool, rainy spring night. He was sure the Ring had defenders he and his comrades hadn't even seen yet, vile things that couldn't bear daylight. They'd come out now and make quick strikes at the fringes of the camp, forcing men in dire need of rest to defend themselves instead, doing their best to undermine the besieging force's morale.
Or what was left of it.
"By the Flame," Aoth said, "this is why I balked at coming back. I like war-parts of it, anyway-but I hate fighting necromancers."
At first, neither of his companions answered, and he assumed that, as was so often the case, neither would. But at length Bareris said, "I know I should apologize."
Aoth shrugged. "I accept."
"When I saw Tsagoth, it drove me into a frenzy. Made me stupid. Everyone could have come to ruin if you and Mirror hadn't risked yourselves to save me."
"Maybe so, but what's important is that we did get away."
"So I know I should feel sorry and ashamed, but I don't. All I am is angry that Tsagoth got away."
Aoth didn't know what to say.
"It's all I have," Bareris continued. "Undeath has stripped other emotions away from me. Tammith told me it was like this. Told me how broken and empty she was. Told me that even when she seemed otherwise, it was just because she was trying to feel. But I didn't want to understand." He paused. "Sorry. I didn't mean to stray into that. This is my point: I at least remember how people are. I had to act the way they do, over the past ninety years, to make the rebels trust me. And I promise, I'll behave that way now. I won't let you down again."
Aoth sighed. "You still are 'people,' whether you believe it or not. Otherwise, you wouldn't have the urge to unburden yourself this way."
"No, that isn't it. I'm going to propose a plan when we confer with the zulkirs, and I want you to trust me enough to support it."
Malark crouched at the top of the stairs and studied the chamber below, particularly the arched doorway in the north wall. The hunting party would enter that way.
He didn't know exactly who or what the hunters were. He had yet to get a good look at them. But as he'd murdered the folk he surprised here in the depths, despoiled repositories of treasure, conjuration chambers, and the like, and done anything else he could think of to vex the other inhabitants of the Citadel, each team had been more formidable than the last, and this one would likely continue the trend.
The thought didn't dismay him and wouldn't have even if he'd feared to die. He'd shrouded both the stairs and himself in a spell of concealment. It likely wouldn't fool a Red Wizard for more than an instant, but that ought to be enough.
Intent as he was on the space below, there was still an unengaged part of his mind that wondered how his simulacrum was faring at the Dread Ring. Then, peering this way and that, the hunters stalked into view.
In the lead strode two walking corpses, not the usual zombies or dread warriors, but something deadlier. Even if Malark, favored with Szass Tam's tutelage in the dark arts, hadn't been capable of sensing the malign power inside them, the superior quality of their weapons and plate armor would have given it away. A greater danger, however, floated behind them, a vaguely manlike form made of red fog, with a pair of luminous eyes glaring from the head. And bringing up the rear were, most likely, the greatest threats of alclass="underline" a trio of necromancers, their voluminous black-and-crimson robes cut and deliberately soiled to resemble cerecloths, glowing wands of human bone in their hands.
Malark decided to kill his fellow wizards first. Without their masters' spoken commands or force of will to prompt them, the undead might not even choose to fight.
Feet silent on the carved granite steps, he bounded downward.
One of the necromancers glanced in his direction, looked again, goggled, and yelped a warning.
It came too late, though. Malark reached the foot of the stairs, leaped high, and drove a thrust kick into one mage's neck, snapping it. He twisted even as he landed, reached out, and stabbed the claws of one scaly, yellow gauntlet into a second necromancer's heart.
Two wizards down, one to go, but the third was quick enough to interpose the crimson death, as the fog-things were called, between himself and Malark. The creature reached for him with a billowing, misshapen hand.
Malark ducked and raked the crimson death's extended arm. He didn't encounter any resistance but knew that the talons of the enchanted glove might have cut the entity even so. Or not, for that was the nature of ghostly things.
He felt danger behind him and lashed out with a back kick. Armor clanged when he connected, and rang again when one of the animated corpses fell backward onto the floor.
The other dead man rushed in on Malark's flank and thrust a sword at him. Malark pivoted, caught the blade in his hands-the demon-hide gauntlets made the trick somewhat easier-and twisted it out of the corpse's hand. He reversed the weapon and, bellowing a battle cry, rammed it through its owner's torso. The creature toppled.
Malark whirled, seeking the next imminent threat, but was a hair too slow. The crimson death's hands locked on his forearms and hoisted him into the air. Pain stabbed through him at the points of contact, and a deeper redness flowed from the entity's fingers into its wrists and on down its arms. It was leeching Malark's blood.