A Dragon at Worlds' End (40 page)

Mot Pulk had mental fingers sliding into his brain, Relkin shuddered with the loathing of it and fought back with everything he had left in his heart. Still the elf lord bored in, his thought blaring brazen questions. Relkin struggled to deny the mental contact. Again and again he jerked at the nebulous power he felt was there, but still it would not respond.

It was too late, anyway. Mot Pulk's mental claws were now well embedded and they seemed to swell, crushing his own mind between them. Mot Pulk's strength was vastly augmented because now he drew on the power of the supermatrix of ten thousand interconnected minds that gave the Great Game its life.

An involuntary sob escaped from Relkin as he sagged in the shackles for a moment under the weight of the attack. Still he did not quite give in. When the forces clashed again, Relkin's lines were steadier, and he repulsed Mot Pulk once again.

Mot Pulk was amazed. There was something so determined in this impudent little wretch that it was quite uncanny. Relkin had survived beyond what any individual should have been able, even individuals like great Zulbanides. Mot Pulk himself was still shuddering from the huge effort he'd just made to control the flow of power from the mind mass.

And still the boy was defiant!

Mot Pulk ground his perfect teeth together. He would crush this wretch and he would crush him now. He gathered his strength and came on once more, grinding over Relkin's defenses, crushing all opposition. This time he would win and Relkin would be his puppet.

Relkin stiffened against his bonds. His head was pressed back against the wood. Backed to the wall, pressed down from every side, with no strength left in his body, facing the rape of his mind and utter enslavement, he gave a little scream and reached out into the void and let go, abandoning everything he'd clung to all his life. And in that moment the power in him awoke. Mot Pulk's mental claws were blown asunder. It was as if he were an arrow released. He soared too fast too think and then a lightning bolt seemed to go off in his mind and he felt something huge give way in the universe for a moment. It was as if reality had swung open on unseen hinges. For a second perhaps there was terrible disorientation, and then a sensation as of a freezing fog surrounded him in a marsh, and then he was pitched forward onto his hands and knees and found himself sprawling on a polished wooden surface.

The pergola of pain was gone. He was no longer on Mot Pulk's little world.

He was on a chess board for giants. Each square was two feet long on a side and the pieces were on an equal scale. Relkin stared up in the carved eyes of a white wooden Leaper, a three-foot winged elf in polished oak. Beyond the Leaper were a squad of Pawns, carved wooden soldiers in the same white wood.

Relkin got to his knees with a little sob of effort and pulled himself upright.

He had arrived. He didn't question where he had come to. He knew at once. This was the board on which the elves built their magic patterns. This was the very heart of their realm, the Game board of the Lords Tetraan.

He knew what he must do. Now he would summon up the servant, the trapped servant that made all this insanity possible. But how?

He had no idea. He gasped and clenched his fists and tried to recall what he had done when he'd suddenly translated from the pergola of pain to the board. How had he come here? What was that power that he had tapped?

Bemused, he called out in a hoarse croak. "Awake! Awake the sleeping dead, for their time has come!"

Awake the ten thousand immured in their tombs beneath the pyramid!

"Your time has come," he called.

But they had no ears and only eyes. They knew nothing and they knew everything. They could not feel his cry, let alone react.

And still he sensed them, sensed the huge gestalt, which in this place was spread out beneath him like a glowing sun. It hummed, it whispered, but it paid no attention to him.

Relkin tottered, unable to form cogent thoughts, let alone a plan of action.

Figures were approaching from all directions. He had to do something, but what? He could scarcely move after suffering from Biroik's attentions.

Suddenly into his mind floated a strange little verse.

Ripeness! Listening to the bell. Evening air. Above the hills.

He opened his mouth, but only a vague croak emerged.

Something was terribly wrong. This was the wrong place. The time was not ripe.

The gestalt being that he sensed all around him would not respond and he did not know how to awaken it.

Men with drawn swords were approaching. Among them he saw several elf lords, with their silver curls and perfect features.

There were many voices raised in anger.

Two tall men in brown leather came up, seized him under the arms, and lifted him off his feet. At the harsh contact with the burns on his arms, he fainted with barely a scream.

They hurried him away, past the Strengths and Leapers, past the board players and the elf lords with drawn swords. Any would have liked to kill him, to slay the dreaded Iudo Faex, except that he was clearly not that fearsome demon. He was some pitiable wretch that had been scraped off the board after falling from the ceiling.

Or so it was said. The Iudo Faex would have been a flame-breathing monster ten feet high, at the very least. This half-dead youth was hardly worth the fuss.

The huge men carried him into a suite of rooms high within the pyramid, and placed him on a white table under the light of three lanterns. Around the table gathered the lords of the Ten.

"It's the same one I spoke to. The one Pessoba bought from the slaver Katun."

"That damned fool Pessoba."

"He wants reinstatement. To the ninth."

"He can't hold that place. He hasn't the skill. Worthless oaf."

"The child, fools, the child. Forget Pessoba."

"Forget Pessoba? What about Mot Pulk? He had him."

"Mot Pulk has tried to pull his secrets from him. The marks on the arms are sure sign of that."

The jowls of Repadro Toba quivered. "If this is the Iudo Faex, then I am a donkey."

There were murmurs of amused support for this idea from others.

"By the greatness of Zizma Bos, I declare an end to this foolishness. Put a sword to that wretch and end its misery and let's get back to the board. We have a gold to defend, gentlemen. We must get to work."

Finally Zulbanides came forward and raised his hands. "We obviously need not fear the Iudo Faex in this child. But before we dispose of him, we should question him. There is much we could learn. Then, when he is an empty vessel, we can dispose of him."

"There is also the matter of how he came to be on the board. I have an eyewitness that says the youth simply appeared there from thin air. He materialized, in other words."

"What the hell is Mot Pulk playing at?"

"He must be punished."

"I'd have him flayed."

"Where'd he keep the boy?"

"He has a hidden world, a minor hedonic."

"At a time of emergency like this, with an enemy at the gates? He deserves serious punishment."

"Oh, not so bad. There was nothing to fear from this so-called Iudo Faex, after all."

"We will revive the youth and question him. Then we can discuss the matter again."

"Can we stop wasting energy hunting for Mot Pulk?"

"He must be punished."

"We have our backs to the wall on the ninth gold and you're worrying about Mot Pulk."

"There's smoke all over the horizon. Haven't you looked?"

"Some Ardu robbers out in the fields? While the ninth gold is under siege?"

"The Game comes first!"

"By the strength of Zizma Bos, you are right. Let us forget Mot Pulk. He is of little consequence now."

The elf lords departed, leaving only Zulbanides and Lord Rasion.

Zulbanides indicated the prone form to the guards in brown leather. "Take this away. Tend to its wounds, revive it, and bring me word when it is capable of answering questions."

The guards put Relkin on a stretcher and bore him away.

Zulbanides turned to Rasion. "What is happening out in the Beharo?"

"Complete chaos, from what I understand. And there's trouble brewing in the slave city. Patrols are being attacked again."

"What has our response been?"

"We have mobilized fifteen hundred men to form a task force to go out and find these Ardu and slay them."

"The quality of these men?"

"Good troops, but in this situation, it is impossible to say. We know these Ardu rebels have a tame kebbold of some type in their midst. They have used it to terrify the militias up the river."

"Mmm, a tame kebbold could be a problem. But they are stupid things that would as soon eat their handlers as anything else."

"Indeed, which is why we have never bothered to try and employ them in any way whatsoever."

"What can be done about it?"

"We are making a new class of super-length spear, with heads larger than the conventional spear. They're being cast shortly. Then we equip a unit of pikemen with these and they will drill in kebbold killing methods."

Zulbanides was still obviously troubled. "This is a rare confluence of events, don't you think, my Lord Rasion?"

"You mean you think this is part of the prophecy?"

"The beast in the prophecy. What is it?"

"A kind of kebbold, I believe."

"Well, it is probably just a coincidence, but nonetheless we shall have to watch our step here. This child is probably nothing of consequence. It's all Lady Tschinn's fault for stirring up this Iudo Faex business. Really, those females are a meddlesome, troublesome lot."

"They have not improved since we left Gelderen."

"By the greatness of Zizma Bos, we left Gelderen two aeons ago. And still we are saddled with them."

"This is our nature, Zulbanides. We were made male and female, like all the other forms."

"It was completely unnecessary. We have never needed them. We are immortal; why should we need to breed? We have never given them any power or any work. They have been a mere ornament for our glory."

"Damned expensive one, too—heh, heh."

"Well, we'll interrogate this youth and you'll see to dispatching this troublesome kebbold."

"We should speak again tomorrow."

"Same time?"

"Yes."

"Then here, for I will be at the board all day tomorrow. We must hold that gold."

"You don't think he is the Iudo Faex, do you?"

"No, of course not, Rasion, but there is something strange here. He appeared out of thin air right above the board. No one is capable of projecting like that. One moment he wasn't there, the next he was. We can do that in the Game worlds, but not here, not on this world. Before he dies, I will find out how this happened. If my suspicions are true, then great treachery has been unleashed on the Sphereboard of Destiny."

Rasion nodded very slowly, considering the possibilities. They parted and went their separate ways.

Mirchaz was built on an awesome scale and defended with massive walls and towers. Bazil understood that direct assaults were out of the question for a force of one hundred Ardu and one battledragon. As they learned more about the city through reconnaissance, so Bazil became pensive and withdrawn. No good plan seemed to offer itself. All options were speculative and dangerous. Chances of success seemed very slim. During the day he sought the hilltops, the better to survey the walls and structures of the city of the lords. Sometimes he stared so hard, it was as if by mere intensity he might stumble on a plan to unlock the gates and recover his dragonboy.

One thing was soon clear. While the place was built on a huge scale, the population was not commensurate with the size of the buildings and avenues. Two structures dominated everything else. The statue of Zizma Bos towered over the western promontory. The Pyramid of the Game, faced with white marble that shone in the afternoon sun, filled the eastern end of the lake.

Around the pyramid were clustered other huge buildings. Clearly that was the ceremonial center of the city. Along the southern shore of the lake was the bulk of the city, laid out along straight east-west avenues and protected by the ridgeline that ran parallel to a lake a mile inland. All of the populated part of the city was surrounded by defensive walls thirty feet high.

At the southwestern end of the lake, the grand city of the lords confronted another city, fenced in by even higher walls and a massive gate complex. This other city was the City of Slaves, a warren of tenements and shanties packed with the mentally damaged survivors of the mind mass, escaped slaves, ferals—the children of slaves who had avoided enslavement themselves—and a polyglot population of slave takers, thieves, gangsters, and even honest merchants from the south coast cities. This last group were a distinct minority, since Mirchaz was cut off from the southern coast by two mountain ranges, the Mindor Ath and on the coast the mighty Ath Gahut. Few were they who were prepared to travel that arduous route to risk trade with the strange city of the Lords Tetraan.

From that densely packed world of tenements to the distant white palaces glittering on the ridgeline above, there was a seeming infinite distance. And yet they were inseparably linked by the evil of slavery. The few who inhabited the palaces consumed the many, burning their minds out like candles in the magical furnace of the Great Game.

The Ardu reconnaissance soon showed that the north side of the lake was rocky and sparsely populated. Here were several monuments and cemeteries, but none were enclosed in a protective wall. The western end of the water was open and lightly populated as well. A series of round hills filled the plain. There were winding roads with vineyards and olive groves and just a scattering of villas and small farming villages. Along the western shore was a promenade interrupted only by a few warehouses and manufactories built by the waterside.

Around the Ardu campfire in their hideout just north of the city, they exchanged the day's information with all the other scouting parties. They were close enough to see through the northwest passage to the lake and the city beyond. The looming statue of Zizma Bos held out its huge arms to the city while the setting sun turned the walls of the pyramid into triangles of gold. Bazil listened to all the reports and, over many days, built up a composite and detailed picture of the situation.