"They will become air also," Pakal assured him, "and will return to solid form after."
"All right," Arvin said. "Do it."
The dwarf uttered a prayer, moving his hands in a fluttering pattern. He started at Arvin's feet and moved up his body, standing on tiptoe to finish. Arvin felt a prickling numbness spread upward as Pakal cast the spell. Looking down, he saw his feet, legs, hips, and hands dissolve into individual motes of matter, then disappear. His body did not fall to the floor but remained standing upright. His heart lurched, however, as his arms and torso became fully gaseous. He felt a moment of panic as he realized he could no longer feel his heart beating. His breathing, too, had halted. Then his head became insubstantial as well. He floated, a detached awareness inside a swirl of air, somehow still able to see and hear but unable to feel. The only time he had ever come close to such a sensation was when he was deep in meditation-so deep, he feared he would lose his sense of self.
Beside him, Pakal cast another spell. He raised a fist and rapped once, smartly, on the stone face, then stepped quickly back. As the mouth groaned open, he rendered himself gaseous as well.
Follow me, a voice whispered.
Arvin felt the air next to him shift. It flowed toward the gaping mouth, leaving a swirling void where Pakal had been a moment ago. Arvin strained to follow it, but his legs wouldn't move-and he remembered he no longer had legs. Fighting down
his fear, he concentrated on where he wanted to go-through the mouth-and felt himself drift in that direction.
Pakal hovered next to him, a swirl of coherency that Arvin could sense but not touch. They entered the mouth one after the other. As they did, the trap sprang to life. Tontacles uncoiled violently and lashed out at them, thrashing through the space that Arvin and Pakal occupied. Arvin instinctively recoiled as ono of the tentacles whipped around his face, but the tentacle passed right through his gaseous form. His thoughts spun crazily as the gas that was his head swirled in its wake, then became coherent again. He concentrated on his objective-the chamber beyond- and drifted in that direction.
Once inside, his body solidified the same way that it had become gaseous: from the feet up. Blood rushed through his veins, sending a fierce tingle through his body from feet to head. He gasped and fought to keep his balance. As soon as the dizziness cleared, he reached over his shoulder to touch his pack. It was still there, the net inside it still weighing it down. Arvin heaved a sigh of relief.
The chamber was circular, its walls carved in the by-now familiar scale pattern. Against one wall lay the skeleton of an enormous snake, coiled in a neat loop where it had died.
"More bones," Arvin muttered.
He nudged the tail of the long-dead guardian with his foot, but the skeleton didn't react.
A simple wooden box sat on the floor; its hinged lid didn't appear to have a lock. Pakal materialized beside it-his feet, legs, torso, then head coalescing from air-then squatted to study the box. He pointed forked fingers at it, whispered something under his breath, and said, "The Circled Serpent is inside."
He reached for the lid.
"Careful," Arvin warned. "It's certain to be trapped."
"I sense no traps," Pakal said. He lifted the lid. Arvin winced, but nothing happened.
The box was lined with black velvet. Inside was a silver tube twice the thickness of Arvin's thumb, bent in a half-circle. At one end of the half circle was a snake's head, its fanged mouth open wide and its eyes set with gems. The other end was tapered slightly; that would be where the other half of the Circled Serpent would join with it. Arvin held his breath, waiting for something to happen-for the mouth-door to close, for an alarm to sound, even for the snake skeleton to suddenly rear up and attack. Nothing did.
Pakal looked up at Arvin, a concerned expression on his face. "Only half? We thought that Sibyl had both pieces."
"Perhaps she does," Arvin said, thinking of Dmetrio's disappearance. "Perhaps that's why she decided that leaving this half in an easy-to-find location would be worth the risk; whoever found it would be tempted to waste time searching for the other half. Sibyl knows there's a spy in her lair; this is obviously part of a trap to catch that spy." He shrugged the backpack off his shoulders and began unfastening the straps that held it shut. He nodded at the door; the writhing tentacles that had filled the mouth were gone, but the mouth was still open. "Odd, don't you think, that the door hasn't shut yet."
Pakal tapped the half-circle of silver with a fingernail, making the metal ring faintly-probably making sure it was real and not an illusion-then closed the lid. He picked up the box and rose to his feet. "The other half of the Circled Serpent-"
"Will still be inside its lead-lined box, where your
magic can't locate it," Arvin said. He rose to his feet as well, holding his pack, ready to toss the net inside it at the door the moment Sibyl came through it. A musky floral smell rose from its fibres. "Go," he told Pakal, "while you still can. You've got half of the Circled Serpent; be content with that."
"You are not-?"
"No," Arvin said. "I'm staying. Sibyl's bound to arrive soon."
Pakal nodded and said, "May Thard Harr guide your-"
The dwarf grunted and staggered forward, crashing into Arvin. Tho box tumbled from his hands as he fell, spilling Sibyl's half of the Circled Serpent onto the floor. Arvin heard a rattling noise: the sound of bones moving swiftly across the floor.
He swore and leaped backward. The skeleton- animated after all-reared up with its mouth open, ready to strike again. It had already bitten Pakal, and the back of the dwarf's left arm leaked blood. Empty eye sockets stared at Arvin across the dwarf's rigid body. Then the serpent began to sway.
Arvin dropped his pack and flung his hands outward toward the skeleton. Silver sparkles danced in the air between them as long strands of glistening ectoplasm shot from Arvin's fingers, coiling themselves about the undead snake. They looped through the ribs, and with a twist of his fingers Arvin knotted them there. Another yank pulled the cords of ectoplasm tight, cinching together the coils of the skeleton's body. Its head and neck, however, continued to sway.
A fog crept into Arvin's mind. He stared at the snake across Pakal's body, unconcerned about whether the dwarf was alive or dead. He felt dazed, thick-headed, as if he'd drunk too much wine. He
could feel his body moving in time with the serpent's swaying motion.
The skeleton opened its mouth wide to bring curved fangs into play. Head and neck still swaying, it hunched toward Arvin, awkwardly dragging its ectoplasm-bound body behind it.
Arvin meant to take a step back but took a step forward instead. His foot struck something that skidded across the floor with a metallic rasp. Glancing down, he saw it was the upper half of the Circled Serpent.
The interruption gave him a heartbeat's respite from the skeleton's mesmerizing motion. Arvin sank into one of the poses Tanju had taught him, raising his left arm as if to fend off a blow. He imagined himself in the Shield form, whirling to protect himself on all sides. As he did, energy exploded outward from the power point in his throat in a loud drone. It formed a protective barrier around him-one that helped him fend off the effects of the skeleton's swaying dance. His mind cleared.
Knowing that most of his psionic powers would be useless-the skeleton had no mind to attack-Arvin yanked the stone rope out of his backpack. Whipping it through the air, he shouted its command word. The rope stiffened into a pole of stone. It struck the skeleton just below the head, shattering the uppermost vertebrae. The head clattered to the floor, followed by the rest of the bones. Whirling a loop of the stone rope up and over his head, Arvin brought it crashing down into the serpent's skull. Bone exploded across the floor as the head shattered. The stone rope smashed as it struck the floor, and pieces skittered across the room.