Escalla flew up from behind the monster, poised beside its front roller, and jammed a broken chair leg between the roller and the axle fork. With a sudden flash and bang, the monstrosity pitched onto its face. The stone horse gave a screech of tortured stone as it slid along the floor, crashing and banging against the walls. It finally came to a halt in a heap of rubble right at the Justicar’s feet.
Jus stood, breathing hard and staring at the wreckage. The juggernaut spun its wheels and rollers, unable to turn right way up.
Curious, Escalla flew down to inspect the damage.
“Hey, I do good work! That thing really had you running!”
Jus growled, settling Cinders back into place atop his head.
“Say, did that bust up your sword?”
“No.” The Justicar inspected the fallen juggernaut anddecided to leave it as it lay. “I told you it’s enchanted.”
A voice drifted from behind them, somewhere in the dark. “Interesting…”
The Justicar whirled with a snarl, his black blade poised to ram through any enemy. Floating in the gloom there hung a huge apparition: the face of the librarian now painted half black and half white. The image of the sorcerer bobbed slowly up and down in the air.
“Interesting.” The sorcerer’s voice echoed down thepassageways. “Yes, you are worth encouraging onward. Strong. Disciplined.You might well make a good contribution to the physical form of the new Overman! Come and take the test of Keraptis! As it once was, so again it shall be! Come to my halls and retrieve the three!”
Hovering in midair, Escalla looked sourly at the librarian’sghostly face.
“Hey two-tone, you call that poetry?” The girl made a rudenoise. “You know, if I was powerful enough to project images of my swelled headall over the universe, I think I’d spend a bit more time in polishing my prose!”
The image turned hungry, knowing eyes upon the faerie and seemed… pleased.
“You too, little one. Take the test of the mountain. Retrievethe three prizes. Who knows? Even you might provide worthy substance to the new lord of space and time.”
The face faded away, leaving nothing but darkness, a thrashing juggernaut, and a growing drip and hiss of water. Escalla blinked into the gloom.
“‘Contribute to the Overman’? ‘Provide worthy substance’?”The faerie bit her lip. “I really wish he’d phrased those invitationsdifferently.”
A section of wall beside the juggernaut suddenly collapsed. Above the monster, a stone block fell from the ceiling, and river water streamed onto the tunnel floor. Jus grabbed for Escalla’s hand and towed her rapidly downthe passage, accelerating to a run as more and more stones could be heard collapsing far behind.
Escalla tried to look back “What about those maps?”
“We’re leaving!” Jus broke into the main corridor that ledback to the library. Allain the lawman still stood waiting in the door. He saw Jus running toward him, and an instant later he saw the river water spilling out of the passageways. As a distant ceiling collapsed inward with a watery crash, all three explorers fled back into the room beneath the blazing library. Jus held Cinders’ pelt up as a shield for his companions as they struggled out ofthe secret room and up into the flames.
The library shelves were burning in earnest now. Fire had spread to the ceiling and the tapestries, the window shutters, and the walls. Jus led his companions through the heat and sagging doors out into the sun.
Soot stained, blood-spattered, and near exhaustion, Jus stumbled to the bottom of the steps and leaned upon his sword. The library burned behind him while big bubbles rose from a new whirlpool out in the river shallows. Cinders wagged his tail, happily basking in the heat of the burning building.
Drawing the stares of a shocked crowd, Escalla fluttered down to land upon the Justicar’s shoulders.
“Hey, troops! We’ve had breakfast, we’ve fought a demon, andwe’ve burned your library down.” The faerie gave a tired sigh. “What now?”
Allain cleared his throat. “We should see the baron. Tell himabout your mission.” The young man looked back at the burning library. “He’llknow what to do.”
Jus sheathed his sword and shrugged. For the moment, there might be advantages to cooperating with the law. The Justicar settled Escalla on his shoulder, dusted ashes out of Cinders’ fur, and led the way down into amarketplace still streaked and smeared with blood.
11
Over the past twenty years, the county of Urnst had survivedinvasion by Iuz, raids from the Bandit Kingdoms, strifes internal and external, and a hundred other problems big and small. The countess-an old, sharp-tonguedwoman with little patience for fools-kept her capital in the west where shecould keep a sharp watch upon her taxes.
The great headache of her realm was Trigol, a city governed in the countess’ name by a baron. The post had little to recommend it. Banditraids, refugees, and civic riots were rife. The baron’s daily life was anythingbut restful.
The central keep of Trigol served as the administrative center for the entire southeastern marches. There was a constant traffic of couriers and patrols. Military scouts and sorcerers came in to file their reports while squads of crossbowmen patrolled the walls. As darkness fell over the city, the keep sheathed itself in light. With new wars gathering on the borders, nighttime brought no rest to the hard-worked garrison.
The keep’s main hall had been cleared of its usual clutter ofmess tables. A heavy bench stood in the middle of the hall, and here sat the throne of the baron. The baron himself-a surly, thickset man with a neatlypointed beard-sat sternly in place, leaning his elbows on the table andglowering at a dozen arguing, shouting men. To give himself patience, the man drank wine-and had apparently been drinking ever since the riots a dozen hoursbefore.
Soldiers sat along the table beside priests, scholars, and sorcerers. Cinders lay like a rug in front of the hearth. Two large hunting dogs sat nose to nose with him, staring at him in puzzled amazement and anxiously wagging their tails. As silent as the baron, the Justicar crouched beside the great hall’s hearth and fed hot embers to his hell hound skin.
Having set up shop on a side table all her own, Escalla had gathered a choice selection of wines, glazed fruits, and other sticky treats. She ignored the arguments behind her and stuffed her face, occasionally casting an eye at the baron’s silver cutlery.
A civil war of apocalyptic proportions was about to grip Trigol. The temples of Geshtai and Bleredd, with their thousands of worshipers, were preaching holy war against each other. The baron had heard their first screams of outrage as each had decried the other’s crimes, and now he made alast attempt to enforce a parley.
At the conference table, a high priest of Geshtai faced a high priest of Bleredd, each man staring at the other with a look of unremitting hate. Both men were wealthy refugees from the lost Duchy of Tenh. Fat and gorgeously decked out in robes, rings, jewels, and vestments, they left to their underlings the tasks of screaming threats, hurling invectives, and demanding justice from the baron. Instead, the two priests stared at one another in silence, the air between them shimmering with half-formed spells.
So far, the meeting had been utterly futile. The heralds of the two temples roared at each other almost continuously.
Slamming at the tabletop, the Bleredd representative turned scarlet with outrage and shouted, “War! This time we will wipe Geshtai’ssacrilege from the face of the city!” Gold rings encrusting the herald’s fistsleft scars upon the table. “The hammer Whelm has been stolen by agents ofGeshtai’s temple! We have eyewitnesses who saw Geshtai priests fleeing with thesacred hammer!”