A glut of dragons crowded the flat’s near edge, as if they, too, had been awaiting Abramm’s arrival. There were giant men, as well, lining the stair and pressed onto the landing below. Not a landing, exactly, but a platform overlook extending out from the stairway, which continued through it to a chamber below.
He eyed the circular expanse, the dark clot of mist, and the dragons, shimmering with exquisite jewel tones as they jostled for position. They bugled and roared and whistled their excitement, and occasionally one would leap up from the mass to fly over Abramm’s head and return.
This was the Central Plaza he’d been seeking?
My Lord?
For answer the path of light, which he had not seen since before he had entered the city, now flashed down the stair before him, disappearing into the landing and reappearing on the terrace below it, where it shot across the dragon-filled flat all the way to the smoking pit. It flared for a moment, then faded.
Dismay filled him. None of this made any sense. Maybe he was dreaming. Maybe he’d fallen in the desert and lay dying in the sand. . . .
Things are not always what they seem . . . my son. In fact, they are often not
what they seem. I am with you still
.
The thought drifted softly into his awareness as the men began to cheer, while the dragons shook the air with their roaring.
“Why are they so excited?” Abramm wondered.
He did not think Lema could hear him over the din, but the Ban’astori leaned close. “They think perhaps you are the Chosen One.”
“The Chosen One? I’m a Terstan. I serve Eidon, whom you’ve been reviling from the moment we met.”
“We hope your eyes will be opened.”
As they descended the platform, the Ban’astori continued to cheer, and Lema waved and grinned and nodded. Then they descended into the long dim-lit chamber under the platform, and Abramm understood what was happening.
He was surrounded by treasure. Golden shields lined the walls behind full-sized marble figures decked out in breastplates and helms of gold. Velvetlined boxes held artful arrangements of jeweled necklaces, bracelets, ear and nose rings. Silk-draped tables displayed golden plates and cups and tableware, candlesticks, vases, and silver chests overflowing with jewels. There were basins, lamps, carts, wardrobes, even tables and chairs—all of gold. There was even a collection of golden idols—fat-bellied Khrell, voluptuous Laevian, Aggos with his stern face and prodigious masculine endowments, as well as others he did not know. Jewels sparkled throughout: ruby, diamond, emerald, sapphire, amethyst. Waist-high ceramic jars piled with golden coins of many nations and denominations stood everywhere. Never had he seen such an accumulation of wealth. Never would he have even been able to imagine such a gathering.
The legends were true. And then some.
“I
knew
it was the treasure you sought!” Lema exclaimed. “And this is only the first room of it. Come. Let me show you the rest.” He started toward one of two doorways that—Abramm saw as he drew closer—opened into adjoining galleries whose far ends linked to another set and another after that, all filled with more of the same.
The amount of wealth was more than he could comprehend.
“Come,” Lema said again. “Let me show you.” He stood in the doorway beckoning.
Curiosity niggled at Abramm, but he resisted it. This was far too obvious a temptation, and he’d already seen enough.
“I did not come for the treasure,” he said firmly, continuing on toward the daylight opening at the chamber’s far end, where the stone terrace overlooked the flat full of dragons.
Lema hurried after him. “If you didn’t come for it, then, why are you here?”
Ahead a marble warrior loomed in Abramm’s path, backlit by the light from the terrace door. Just as he was about to alter course to go around it, a pink-orange light blazed from the ceiling above and he stopped, stunned by the sight of a golden breastplate above a kilt of gold, armbands of the same, a sword scabbard of scrolled gold, and on the faceless head, a crown—a filigree of rich yellow gold set with diamonds and rubies. Looking at it, he shuddered, for it was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.
“I think it is yours,” Lema whispered at his side.
Abramm shuddered again, then glanced at Lema. “I thought you said I’d not be able to leave the city with any of this.”
“Only if you intended to steal it. But if you are the Chosen One . . .”
“I’m not.”
“No one comes to this place save they who have been brought here. And there is only one who could have brought you to us. Our great father . . .”
“Moroq is not my father. He is my enemy.”
“Are you sure? For I have seen upon your arm his very mark.”
The words drove into Abramm’s soul with a jolt of shock—painful truth that spawned a host of doubts and questions.
“You could be the one to return and conquer, Alaric. With all of us at your back. What has Eidon ever done for you save wound and steal from you? With us you could rule the world.”
Temptation struck him like a lightning bolt. For a moment he could hardly breathe. Possibilities tumbled through his mind. He could overthrow the Esurhites, drive the Gadrielites out of Kiriath and retake it for his own. Even Chesedh would fall under his sway. He would kill that handsome eastern lord who was lusting for his wife and take her back once and for all. And who could stop him? No one! Not with this kind of wealth. Not with these kinds of warriors.
Lema grinned at him, his eyes bright and cold with that metallic sheen, as if he knew all that went through Abramm’s head. Outside the dragons roared and bugled, their voices enflaming his imagination. Lema lifted the crown from off the marble head. “This is yours, my friend. Made for you to wear . . . You will be king of all. . . .”
Yes. King . . .
He stared at the gold crown with its jewels.
I will rule the
world. There would be no more wars, no more famines, no more persecutions. . . .
I will . . .
He stopped.
What am I thinking?! These are horrible ideas. Arrogant
ideas. And this creature is lying to me. I would never rule. That is reserved for his
master
.
He wrenched his eyes from the crown and looked at Lema. “Your king, you say? Or merely king of the termites?”
Gratified to see the Ban’astori’s eyes widen in surprise, he started around the golden armor before his treacherous inner Shadow could get hold of him once more.
“Wait!” Lema gripped his shoulder, and a vision of Gillard kneeling before him filled his mind. He saw himself touch the fine white hair of his brother’s head, saw the other man flinch as he did so, felt his brother’s fear and shame and remorse. “Consider what we offer you.”
“No.” Abramm shook free of him. “It will never be like that with Gillard. And I do not want to be king of the termites at the behest of your master.”
He strode around the armor and headed for the doorway, where the men on the terrace and the dragons beyond them had fallen silent.
“You cannot go that way,” Lema warned. “The dragons will kill you if you try. . . .”
Abramm kept walking, out the door and onto the terrace, following the light path as he recalled it.
“Stupid termite,” Lema said at his back. “You could have everything.”
He kept going, right for them. The dragons piled upon the stair, watching him come, some half standing on their fellows. They were big as draft horses, with heavy, thick chests, powerful wings, and mighty tails—compared to these, Tapheina was small and feeble. Their teeth were uncountable, white, sharp, dripping with drool. Their eyes, a myriad of metallic gleams, were as cold and hard as any he had ever looked into. Images crowded into his mind of the silver dragon torn asunder.
He glanced down at his feet, but the path of light did not show itself. His knees trembled. Fear congealed in his belly, and the compulsion to turn back pressed him strongly.
When he had drawn within five paces of them, the dragons erupted, screaming and hissing and bellowing, lashing one another with their tails, climbing up one another’s backs, filling the air with their roaring. Sheathed with sweat, he looked again at his feet, begging the lane of light to lead him, aghast at how badly he was shaking, trying to quell a terror that would not be quelled. If he could have closed his eyes and still walked, he would have. Already he smelled the acidic odor of their exhalations, which no doubt would be as poisonous and seductive as anything Tapheina had breathed on him. He’d have to hold his breath as far as he could—at the rate he was panting, he wouldn’t get very far.
Oh, my Lord, I don’t know—
He cut off the thought and, focusing fiercely on the Light within him, held his staff waist-high, at the ready, and stepped among them. The din shook the organs in his chest, and his heart was hammering so fast he didn’t see how it could even pump his blood.
He braced for the first of them to seize him, but to his surprise, they drew back, as if he had some margin of personal space they could not penetrate. So the Light really was with him. This really was the way he was to go. He strode on, confidence rising giddily. It was just another test. How could he ever have doubted?
As soon as he was completely surrounded with no hope of ever fighting his way back to the stairs, they attacked, lunging as if of one mind, jaws snapping, gouts of breath burning into his face and eyes. Reflexively, he flipped the stick down, striking a nose, then up to strike another, whirling to bat this one and that away. They were far too fast for him to get in any solid blows, and far too many for him to keep them at bay. His robe jerked at his left shoulder, then gave way as he whirled, while another pull came at the back hem. A sleeve tore, and then his ragged, poorly wound turban was pulled off. . . . They had him spinning and dodging in an increasing frenzy, and as he saw how helpless he was, he wanted again and again to bolt, as if he could run fast enough to evade any of them.
They are playing with you
.
The thought burst into his chaos and brought him to a stop. He let them come at him, and soon saw that they attacked only his clothing, never quite reaching his flesh. It was all a deception. Empty threats. He took a deep breath to calm himself—and realized in dismay that was the last thing he should have done. Not that it mattered, since in his panic he’d long ago forgotten to hold his breath. Now he realized that even so, he’d not felt the least bit sick. It must be a more subtle sort that didn’t hurt, didn’t sicken. Indeed, now that he sought for it, he felt the faint tingly burn in his nose and throat and brought the Light up to meet it, burning it off, holding it back with every breath.
You must keep going, my son
.
And so he settled himself, brought the stick up, set his eyes on the Light within him, and walked forward. Not really sure where he was headed, he just put his head down and walked.
The dragons tugged and tore at his clothing, spit and breathed their poison upon him, roared and screamed with all their might, as if they hoped to slay him with sound. His ears throbbed with the pain of it, but he shut that out. Shut out even the mental voices he realized were shrieking in his head. Again and again he forced his thoughts back to Eidon, releasing the Light through his flesh to purge the spore as he placed one foot after the other. Repeating verses and promises memorized as a Mataian acolyte, he walked and walked and walked. . . .
And then it was over.
The sound cut off abruptly, and the beasts withdrew. Glancing back, he saw them returning to the foot of the stair, snapping and biting at one another sulkily. Then, as if desperate to kill
something,
a black dragon crested with silver seized a smaller blue and scrubbed it along the ground. A gray one jumped in to help and the feeding frenzy began.
Abramm turned away and walked on across the barren slope toward the smoking pit at its midst.
As Abramm headed toward the curtain of black mist, he began to feel strangely disoriented. Though his eyes assured him he was heading downward, his feet and lungs kept insisting he was climbing upward. Perhaps it was a result of all his trials—he’d been shaking awfully hard in that gauntlet and had been without food and adequate water for uncounted days.
Barely had he strode into the outer fringes of mist, than it thickened into a dense black fog that stymied even his night sight. He walked on, trusting in Eidon’s unseen, unfelt guidance. Gradually a sense of aversion and resistance arose in him—an irrational fear of going forward that reminded him of a griiswurm aura. But after what he’d just endured, a little unfocused anxiety was nothing, and he pressed on.
Ahead, a soft glow suffused the mist, and with each step it grew appreciably brighter. His disorientation increased as he looked at feet angled downward with the terrain and felt as if they flexed up. To say nothing of heart and lungs that labored as if he were climbing one of the peaks back in the Aranaak.
Then, in a single step, he burst free of the darkness into the intense glare of the sun in a clear blue sky, and the brightness nearly knocked him over. Once he was able to see again, he discovered that his sensations had been correct: He stood on a steep, rocky hillside just below a small domed hall of white marble. It perched at the top of the peak, its dark doorway looming directly in his path.
Once he’d caught his breath, he climbed the last bit of slope to the porch, where the doorway’s impenetrable darkness gave no hint of what lay behind it. An inscription tumbled across its lintel in the odd squiggly symbols of the Old Tongue:
“No other shall come before me.”
It was from the Second Word. Reassured, he stepped over the threshold into a moist-smelling chamber every bit as black as the cloud he’d just endured, the doorway having vanished as soon as he’d passed through it. The chuckle of running water sounded at his feet, echoing in what seemed a much larger space than should have been possible for a temple as small as this had appeared from the outside.
He conjured a kelistar and gasped in amazement. The chamber in which he stood was bigger than the great rotunda of the library back in Springerlan— save there were no books, no shelves, and only a single pedestal in the room’s center surrounded by a great dome of dark walls sprinkled with stars. A trough of running water ran like a moat between the outer walls and the inner floor. To get to the latter he’d have to wade. Which, from the folded towel and small bench that stood on the other side of the channel, he guessed he was intended to do.