‘Indeed, my Lord. Djarian and his fellows are increasingly discontent with the leadership of Zalasta. They have all come to expect no true comradeship from their leader. There is no longer common cause among them, and each doth seek to wring best advantage to himself from their dubious alliance. Overlaying all is the secret desire of each to gain sole possession of Bhelliom.’
‘Dissension among your enemies is always good,’ Vanion noted, ‘but I don’t think we should discount the possibility that they’ll all fall in line again after what happened here today. Could you get anything specific about what they might try next, Anarae?’
‘Nay, Lord Vanion. They were in no wise prepared for what hath come to pass. One thing did stand out in the mind of this Djarian, however, and it doth perhaps pose some danger. The outcasts who surround Zalasta do all fear Cyzada of Esos, for he alone is versed in Zemoch magic, and he alone doth plunge his hand through that door to the nether world which Azash opened. Horrors beyond imagining lie within his reach. It is Djarian’s thought that since all their plans have thus far gone awry, Cyrgon in desperation might command Cyzada to use his unspeakable art to raise creatures of darkness to confront and confound us.’
Vanion nodded gravely.
‘How did Stragen’s plan affect them?’ Talen asked curiously.
‘They are discomfited out of all measure,’ Xanetia replied. ‘They did rely heavily on those who now are dead.’
‘Stragen will be happy to hear that. What were they going to do with all those spies and informers?’
‘Since they had no force capable of facing the Atans, Zalasta and his cohorts thought to use the hidden employees of the Ministry of the Interior to assassinate diverse Tamul officials in the subject kingdoms of the empire, hoping thereby to disrupt the governments.’
‘You might want to make a note of that, Sparhawk,’ Kalten said.
‘Oh?’
‘Emperor Sarabian had some qualms when he approved Stragen’s plan. He’ll probably feel much better when he finds out that all Stragen really did was beat our enemies to the well. They’d have killed our people if Stragen hadn’t killed theirs first.’
That’s very shaky moral ground, Kalten,’ Bevier said disapprovingly.
‘I know,’ Kalten admitted. That’s why you have to run across the top of it so fast.’
The sky was cloudy the following morning, thick roiling clouds that streamed in from the west, all seethe and confusion. Because it was late autumn and they were far to the north, it seemed almost that the sun was rising in the south, turning the sky above Bhelliom’s escarpment a fiery orange and reaching feebly out with ruddy, low-lying light to paint the surging underbellies of the swift-scudding cloud with a brush of flame.
The campfires seemed wan and weak and very tiny against the overpowering chill here on the roof of the world, and the knights and their friends all wore fur cloaks and huddled close to the fires.
There were low rumbles off to the south, and flickers of pale, ghastly light.
Thunder?’ Kalten asked Ulath incredulously. ‘Isn’t it the wrong time of year for thunderstorms?’
‘It happens,’ Ulath shrugged. I was in a thunderstorm north of Heid once that touched off a blizzard. That’s a very unusual sort of experience.’
‘Whose turn is it to do the cooking?’ Kalten asked him absently.
‘Yours,’ Ulath replied promptly.
‘You’re not paying attention, Kalten,’ Tynian laughed. ‘You know better than to ask that question.’
Kalten grumbled and started to stir up the fire.
‘I think we’d better get back to the coast today, sparhawk,’ Vanion said gravely. The weather’s held off so far, but I don’t think we’ll be able to count on that much longer.’
Sparhawk nodded.
The thunder grew louder, and the fire-red clouds overhead blanched with shuddering flickers of lightning.
Then there was a sudden, rhythmic booming sound.
‘Is it another earthquake?’ Kring cried out in alarm.
‘No,’ Khalad replied. ‘It’s too regular. It sounds almost like somebody beating a very big drum.’ He stared at the top of Bhelliom’s wall. ‘What’s that?’ he asked, pointing.
It was like a hilltop rearing up out of the forest beyond the knife-like edge of the top of the cliff – very much like a hilltop, except that it was moving.
The sun was behind it, so they could not see any details, but as it rose higher and higher they could make out the fact that it was a kind of flattened dome with two pointed protuberances flaring out from either side like huge wings. And still it swelled upward. As they could see more of it, they realized that it was not a dome. It seemed to be some enormous, inverted triangle instead, wide at the top, pointed at the bottom and with those odd winglike protuberances jutting out from its sides. The pointed bottom seemed to be set in some massive column. Since the light was behind it, it was as black as night, and it rose and swelled like some vast darkness.
Then it stopped.
And then its eyes opened.
Like two thin, fiery gashes at first, the blazing eyes opened wider and wider, cruelly slanted like cats’ eyes and all ablaze with fire more incandescent than the sun itself. The imagination shuddered back from the realization of the enormity of the thing. What had appeared to be huge wings were the creature’s ears.
And then it opened its mouth and roared, and they knew that what they had heard before had not been thunder.
It roared again, and its fangs were flickers of lightning that dripped flame like blood.
‘Klæl!’ Aphrael shrieked.
And then, like two rounded, bulky mountains, the shoulders rose above the sharp line of the cliff, and, fanning out from the shoulders like black sails, two jointed, batlike wings.
‘What is it?’ Talen cried.
‘It’s Klæl!’ Aphrael shrieked again.
‘What’s a Klæl?’
‘Not what, you dolt! Who! Azash and the other Elder Gods cast him out! Some idiot has returned him!’
The enormity atop the escarpment continued to rise, revealing vast arms with many-fingered hands. The trunk was huge, and flashes of lightning seethed beneath its skin, illuminating ghastly details with their surging flickers.
And then that monstrous presence rose to its full height, towering eighty, a hundred feet above the top of the escarpment.
Sparhawk’s spirit shrivelled. How could they possibly – ? ‘Blue Rose!’ he said sharply. ‘Do something!’
‘There is no need, Anakha.’ Vanion’s usurped voice was very calm as Bhelliom once again spoke through his lips. ‘Klæl hath but momentarily escaped Cyrgon’s grasp. Cyrgon will not risk his creature in a direct confrontation with me.’
‘That thing belongs to Cyrgon?’
‘For the moment. In time that will change, and Cyrgon will belong to Klæl.’
‘What is it doing?’ Betuana cried.
The monstrosity atop the cliff had raised one huge fist and was striking at the ground with incandescent fire, hammering at the earth with lightning. The face of the escarpment shuddered and began to crack away, falling, tumbling, roaring down to smash into the forest at the foot of the cliff. More and more of the sheer face crumbled and sheared away and fell in a huge thundering landslide.
‘Klæl was ever uncertain of the strength of his wings,’ Bhelliom observed calmly. ‘He would come to join battle with me, but he fears the height of the wall. Thus he prepares a stair for himself.’
