Farendol led the way across the Ebony Bridge and into the ruins of the once-mighty city of Yalura, and the Hand needed no encouragement to use all the cover that shattered walls and dust-drifted piles of rubble could provide. With this slow, methodical approach they took almost an hour to reach the former heart of the city, but did so without alerting their enemies to their presence. At the southern edge of the Great Square, from behind a particularly large section of standing wall pierced with the empty arches of three windows, they paused to take the lay of the land and decided on their course of action.

The Great Square was over 40 meters on a side, and completely clear of major rubble, if not of the ever-shifting dust. But even the dust was absent from a circle 15 meters in diameter at the center of the open space – a circle defined by the glowing yellow-red lines of a Greater Ward, made visible now by the power of the presumed Vularun sorceress, as was the Sigil of Power at the heart of the Ward. At the four cardinal edges of the Square were smaller blackened circles of scorched stone that represented the former Ward Seals that had held the Great Elemental Beasts.

The sorceress herself stood between the Great Ward and the northern-most of the broken Seals, the Great Sword on the ground before her, pointing at the heart of the Square. She had thrown off her dark traveling cloak, revealing dark red robes trimmed in silver and honey blond hair that fell to her waist. Her eyes were closed in deep concentration, and her hands moved in precise arcane gestures that made it clear she was attempting some spell… and probably not a small one.

To the southeast of her lay the giant form of the Iron Knight, face down and still wrapped about with the ropes and pulleys her minions had used to drag it from the Ebony Bridge. Near it could be seen the false Heart of Metal, it’s smashed and twisted form a silent testament to the rage the sorceress must have felt on learning she had been duped. Faerndol smiled faintly at the thought, but that faded quickly as he contemplated what her next move might be.

Scattered around other parts of the Square were at least 10 of the woman’s henchbeings, a mixture of northern barbarians, Tharkian mercenaries and Gül-Hovguvai, who seemed to have been looting amongst the ruins until very recently and were now either sorting through their booty or keeping a very loose watch on their perimeter. Near all of the breached Ward Seals were at least half-a-dozen variously disfigured or dismembered corpses of men and güls, apparently victims of the recently freed Elemental Beasts.

“I don’t know what the woman is doing,” Farendol whispered after they had all taken in what there was to see. “But I am disinclined to find out. The Great Sword is far too close to the final Ward, and if it should pierce that barrier then the Corruptor would be free again in this world.

“I wish we could get closer to the Iron Knight, so that we might animate it ourselves, and thus tip the balance of power in our favor, but it is too exposed and too far away. I am afraid we must fight, my friends.”

There was no disagreement from the Hand of Fortune, and as the warriors readied their weapons and otherwise girded their loins, Vulk began the ritual prayers to summon up Abon’s Authority, that the next words to pass his lips would carry the force of command from the Immortal Herself. Mariala and Korwin offered various suggestions as to what those words should be, generally along the lines of “stop what you’re doing!” The cleric just rolled his eyes and focused on his ritual.

The group left the shelter of their hiding place as stealthily as possible, but it didn’t take long for the Vortex minions to notice them. While Erol headed for the four looters across the Square, the others converged on the near group of four, between them and both the Iron Knight and the sorceress. Both men and gül drew their weapons and rushed to face the invaders.

“Listen to me,” Vulk bellowed, his commanding voice vibrating with the power of his goddess. “Drop your weapons, sit down, and you won’t be hurt!”

For an instant the two barbarians and the two gül-hovguvai stopped, as if they’d hit a wall; one of the men did indeed let fall his sword and drop cross-legged to the ground, looking confused. But the other three just shook their heads and snarled as they resumed their rush.

With a matching snarl and a roar that froze the heart of everyone who heard it, Devrik lunged forward to meet them, swinging his new holy battlesword in an arc that intersected the belly of the leading gül. Vulk and Toran blocked blows from the other two, while Mariala and Korwin dashed around the melee in an attempt to reach the sorceress.

Even as his first opponent’s guts spilled out onto the stones Devrik was whirling to attack another, but he was distracted by a cry from Farendol, several meters behind them. Looking to the west he saw that Erol was face down on the ground, defenseless. Hopefully just stunned, but with two gül-hovguvai looming over him, axes raised, and two barbarians close behind, that could change in an instant. Vulk blocked a blow from the nearest barbarian, allowing Devrik to disengage and sprint toward their fallen companion, muttering arcane words as he moved…

♦ ♦ ♦

As the group burst from cover Erol had felt confident he could take out the Vortex scum across the way while barely breaking a sweat, and Grover had leapt to his shoulder as he dashed forward, javelin in hand. He had felt strange – exhilarated and shaky at the same time, and slightly out of sync with the world – ever since the Telnori Druid had supposedly placed the soul of the Elemental Beast of Air into his head. And he could almost hear a voice… a voice, but no words… he tried to shake off the feeling and focus on the coming fight.

He hurled his first javelin as soon as he was in range, and he was sure the throw was true, aimed straight for the leading gül’s chest. When the creature zigged suddenly to the right, and the javelin flashed harmlessly by it, Erol was shocked. He barely had time to get his trident into position to block the beastman’s attack. And he almost dodged the second gül’s swinging axe, pulling back just enough at the last second to take only a glancing blow to the head instead of being decapitated.

Darkness crashed in around him, and the last thing Erol saw was Grover leaping from his shoulder into the face of the nearest gül-hovguvai…

… and then there was light. Erol found himself sitting in a wrought iron chair, next to a small matching table, on a white stone terrace overlooking a breathtaking vista of fields, forest and river under a perfect azure sky, the sun almost exactly overhead. Several wooden tubs nearby held orange trees, and the warm breeze brought the sharp scent of citrus to him.

“Drink your chocolate,” a deep, melodious voice said, and you could hear the smile in it. Suddenly Erol was aware of a man sitting across the table from him, pouring steaming deep brown liquid from a celadon porcelain pot into a matching cup. A similar cup, already full of the most fragrant chocolate he’d ever smelled, sat steaming in front of Erol.

The man was tall, even sitting down, taller Erol suspected than even Vulk. Despite the silver hair that flowed past his shoulders, the man was clearly not old, his face as smooth and unlined as a youth’s and entirely unblemished. But the piercing blue eyes, the color of glacial ice, told another story – one of long years and deep wisdom.

“You’re Telnori,” Erol heard himself say, surprised at his own calm acceptance of this strange tableau.

“Yes,” the man replied, smiling and lifting his cup to his lips. He drank and set the cup back down. “I am Kiren Frostwind, and more latterly, Asakora, the Great Beast of the Air. Now, I suppose, I am also, in some part, Erol Doritar of Kildora.”

“Where are we?” Erol asked, lifting his own cup and sipping from it. He had never tasted chocolate so dark, so rich, and he smiled in appreciation even as some part of himself screamed that this was impossible.

“An interesting philosophical question, my young host,” Kiren replied. “In some sense, we are on the south terrace of my home in Xaranda, almost a thousand years ago; in another sense, we are merely in my memory of that place; and in what will likely make the most sense to you, we are simply inside your head.”

“Ah,” said Erol, taking another sip of the amazing chocolate. “Am I dead, then? Did that gül manage to knock my head off after all?”

“No, no,” Kiren assured him, waving a hand dismissively. “You are merely unconscious, laying on the stones of the Great Square of Yalura, surrounded by several enemies… four, I believe.”

“Um, then perhaps we could have this conversation another time? I think we might both be better off if I didn’t die just yet…”

“Oh, indeed,” the Telnori mage agreed, refilling both their cups, and offering a plate of golden, crispy almond cookies. Erol took one. It was delicious.

“But there will be plenty of time for fighting later on. Time moves differently here… more so for you than for many others, eh, what with that temporal displacement ability of yours. No, there is yet time for us to discuss more important matters.”

“More important than not dying?”

“Oh yes. We all die eventually, even we Telnori. And I suspect… no, I know… that my time is finally here. But what must not die with me is all the knowledge I have gained in over 600 years of life… and in the other 600 years of my half-life as Asakora.

“Since it seems likely that you have a few more years ahead of you, despite current appearances, I wish to ask a favor of you.” For the first time the serene Telnori frowned, if only slightly. “You would not be my first choice, of course, but it seems you are my only one… and so I must roll the dice and hope for the best.”

“What is it you want of me?” Erol asked, reaching for another cookie. “And why wouldn’t I be your first choice?”

Kiren paused for a moment, sipping his own chocolate and nibbling on a cookie, before answering.

“As to your second question, I would not have selected you simply because you have a pragmatic, dare I say it, simple, mind… one not well attuned to the esoteric. You have not quite believed in what many of your people insist on calling “magic,” despite your own psychic talents and the evidence of your eyes.

“And yet, you are not wholly unsuitable to the task I would ask of you… so, to answer your first question, I simply wish you to allow me to pass on to you my accumulated wisdom of the esoteric arts of Valuru, the knowledge of the power of Air. To put it another way, will you become my apprentice and heir?”

Erol said nothing for a moment, looking down at the almost black dregs of chocolate in his cup. Then he looked up into the glacial blue depths of Kiren’s eyes and smiled.

“Sure, why the Void not?”

The Telnori mage arched an eyebrow at this, but returned the smile. Then he reached into his own chest and pulled forth a glowing, pulsing sphere of translucent red energy…

♦ ♦ ♦

As Devrik loosed the fireball from his hand, hurling it towards the heads of the gülvini standing over Erol’s body, Grover leapt from the face of the one he’d been gnawing on, landing on his master’s back and burrowing down beneath one arm. The fireball exploded overhead, immolating all four of the Vortex mercenaries, but only lightly singing Erol. Grover escaped without so much as a crisped whisker.

As Devrik dropped to his knees next to him Erol began to groan and slowly rolled over. His eyes took a moment to focus on the grim features of his friend, who pulled his eyelids back, checking his pupils, and probed at the bloody gash on the side of head.

“Hrrm,” the fire mage rumbled in his grating voice. “ No concussion, I’d say, and the bleeder is just a scalp wound – gory, but not serious. You good to get back into it?”

He hauled his fellow fighter to his feet as Erol gave him a weird look, and smiled rather alarmingly.

“Yeah, I’m great!” Erol laughed, taking the trident Devrik had picked up. “Let’s go kill that bitch!”

♦ ♦ ♦

At almost the same instant that Erol had been struck down, Korwin was busy taking his own blow to the head as he struggled with one of the Tharkian mercenaries who had moved to block his way toward the still-chanting sorceress. While the powerful sword stroke had stunned him and driven him to one knee, it hadn’t knocked him out, and he was able to block the follow-up stroke with his cutlass.

Another thrust and parry, and Korwin summoned up the Azure Hand – his left hand turned blue, and he thrust it toward his opponent. A sudden wash of pale frost covered half the soldier’s right arm and side, chilling the man to the bone. He staggered back, almost losing his grip on his sword and cursing the Oceanian mage.

Korwin pressed his advantage, moving in slashing with his cutlass, but the Tharkian was both experienced and skilled. He switched sword hands suddenly, taking Korwin by surprise, and almost took him full in the chest. Instead, the blade grated off some ribs and slid into his arm. He staggered back as blood gushed forth, stumbled on a loose stone, and went down. Dark whorls began to overwhelm his vision as he slid into unconciousness…

…until the slap of salt spray in his face woke him with an exhilarated start. Korwin stood on the rolling deck of a sloop that cut through the white-capped waves of a blue-green sea like a dolphin. But the wind that whipped his hair about his face billowed no sail – though the vessel had them, they were furled tightly, the ship moved as if under its own power. White clouds piled up against the horizon to his left, and on his right the silhouette of land was made gray-green by distance.

He turned and at the tiller he saw a tall woman dressed in white, with night-dark hair, sea-gray eyes, and a regal beauty that was only enhanced by the obvious thrill she took at taming the wild waters. She looked to be no older than himself, but Korwin knew, looking into those eyes, that she was in fact very much older.

“You are Shaluzira, the Great Beast of Water,” he called to her over the wind. “Or rather, the Telnori mage who’s spirit animated Shaluzira.”

“Yes,” she laughed as he made his way along the sloping deck toward her. “I am Tarinas Searider, mistress of wave and water, and once the soul of the Elemental Great Beast. And now a guest within your mind, Korwin Seaborn of Oceania.”

“Then this is an illusion you have created?” he asked, grabbing a stay line to steady himself next to her.

“No, it is a memory, a fond memory of my youth – I was but 90 when I sailed alone around the isle of Iria, for the sheer joy of the water and the wind.”

“But we do not sail, my lady,” Korwin noted, nodding toward the mast and the furled sails. “Is this not one of the sun-powered and water propelled craft of your people?” He again nodded, this time toward the array of crystal panels set in gimbaled cases down the center of the deck.

“Oh yes,” she laughed again, a deep, throaty sound. “And for the moment the water jets propel us, but it is time to unfurl the sails and test ourselves against Father Sea! Will you sail with me?”

“It’s been awhile,” Korwin laughed in his turn, “but not so long that I’ve forgotten anything important!” And he turned to begin the work of lowering the sails.

For what seemed hours the two of them worked the small ship as the wind freshened and the waves grew higher, sailing before the gale coming up out of the east. The sun sank into the sea, breaking though the now-solid cloud cover only at the last moment to send a single ray of red-gold light to gild Tarinas’ face in almost supernatural beauty.

By midnight the storm had passed. Both moons shone through the scuttering cloud wrack, the Greater almost full, the Lesser newly waxing, dimming all but the brightest stars and the Skyway itself. Now they simply drifted for awhile, exhausted and at the same time full of energy. After a time of companionable silence, Tarinas stirred and spoke.

“You feel the power and the beauty of the waters, as I do Korwin Seaborn. My time is almost done, but I would gift you with the knowledge my long years have brought me, so that knowledge does not die with me.”

Korwin felt a sudden, and wholly unfamiliar, moment of abashment. He looked down and murmured almost inaudibly, “I am not worthy of such a gift milady.”

She reached over and lifted up his face with a firm hand under his chin.

“No, you are not,” she said seriously, her usual smile replaced by a look of deep compassion. “You have demons that drive you, and they may yet destroy you if you do not learn to control them. But you are also very young still, and there is a core of strength within you, if you will but trust it.

“I am willing to risk it. Are you?” She released his chin, settling back against the railing.

After a moment of staring into her sea-deep gray eyes Korwin nodded. She smiled and reached into her chest, pulling forth a pulsing ball of translucent blue energy…

♦ ♦ ♦

Korwin came back to his senses laying on the stones of the Great Square, with Farendol crouching over him and binding the deep gash in his arm. The Tharkian lay dead a few feet away, though what had killed him Korwin couldn’t tell.

“He was about to finish you off,” the Telnori explained. “I had to act, despite the risk to the Heart of Metal, for we cannot afford to lose the Spirit of Water you carry.”

“Thanks so much,” Korwin croaked dryly, reaching into his jerkin to remove the bottle of activated Baylorium he carried there. “Your concern for my health is most touching.” But he secretly agreed with the Druid that Tarinas‘ survival was far more important than his own.

Farendol shrugged unapologetically, but was distracted at that moment by sudden movement around the Vortex sorceress. A whirling cyclone perhaps four meters across was beginning to swirl around her, picking up dust and small rocks, and obscuring if not completely hiding the still-chanting mage.

Devrik, having got Erol back on his feet, had charged towards the sorceress from the west, as Mariala had rushed her from the east, but both were stymied by the wall of debris that threatened to flay the skin off anyone who tried to pass through it. Mariala cast Fire Nerves, and Devrik summoned another Orb of Vorol, but both spells failed to effect their enemy.

Toran and Vulk had both been disarmed by their opponents, but had also both managed to recover their weapons. Toran felled his enemy with a blow from his axe that took the man out at the knees, and even as he fell the Khundari Shadow Warrior was cranking his crossbow. His bolt and Erol’s arrow both pierced the wind wall at almost the same moment, only to both be whipped away in the cyclone.

Vulk, meanwhile, had his hands full with Barbarian 43, as he’d come to think of his opponent (the number was crudely painted on the man’s boiled leather chest plate for some reason – the one who had obeyed Vulk’s Command had a 55 painted on his). He was a shrewd and wily fighter, a decade older than Vulk, perhaps, but still in his prime. Once he had recovered his sword the cleric had managed to hold his own, but no more. His greater height and longer reach helped counter the older man’s skill and experience, but it wasn’t enough to give him the upper hand.

It was only when Devrik suddenly appeared at his side that Vulk felt the tables had finally turned – right up until the moment Barbarian 43 executed a brilliant double fake and managed to drop Devrik with a mighty clout to the head. Vulk gaped in shock as his friend collapsed like a puppet with the stings cut – but the barbarian seemed almost as surprised, and that gave Vulk the opening he’d been looking for.

In a crouching leap over Devrik he managed to hamstring 43, who collapsed screaming in pain and fury. A quick blow to the back of his head by Vulk’s pommel quieted him down and allowed the cantor to turn to his medical attention on his fallen comrade.

♦ ♦ ♦

If Vulk had been shocked at Devrik’s sudden departure from conciousness, it was nothing compared to the surprise Devrik felt at suddenly finding himself in a great cavern lit by a steady orange glow. The space was roughly circular, moderately large, and very warm.

The stones of the floor were colored in shades of red, orange and yellow, cunningly shaped and fitted to make arcane patterns that seemed to hover just beyond Devrik’s understanding. It was also bisected by a chasm some five meters across, and it was from there that the orange glow, and the heat, emanated.

Standing at the edge of the chasm, near the foot of a narrow stone bridge that arched over the gap, silhouetted against the mellow light, was a figure. Not overly tall and solidly built, but those generous curves and flowing lines left no doubt as to gender. She beckond to Devrik, and he stepped forward to stand beside her.

Turning now to face him, he saw that she had thick, tawny hair, and golden eyes flecked with amber. Her unblemished skin was a deep honey gold , and though she looked no older than himself, Devrik knew she nothing of the sort.

“Welcome to the Fire at the Heart of the World, Devrik Askalan, son of both Kildora and Olvânaal!” She gestured at the chasm, and Devrik turned from her shining eyes to look down into a river of molten rock that flowed sluggishly a few meters below his feet. He felt the power of the fire thrum along every nerve in his body… but, he realized in surprise, no fear. Only in its sudden absence did he realize how pervasive his fear of the flame had been, even after the Mad God had taken away the  actual phobia.

“Yes,” the woman next to him said. “Fear had become a habit for you, my friend, and it has held you back. I would offer you true freedom from that fear, if you will take it.”

“Who are you, and how do you know my thoughts?” Devrik eyed her warily.

She smiled then, tilting her head to one side curiously. “You know who I am.”

And he did, he realized. And knowing that, he knew where they must be.

“You are the soul who gave life to Zhezekar, the Great Beast of Fire. And we are nowhere, except in my own mind.”

“Very good, beloved of the Flame! Yes, I was Zhezekar, and before that I was and will always be Yimara Goldentouch of the Star Children.”

“And why would such as you wish to help me?” Devrik asked suspiciously. Although he felt the great calm that lay over him, his ingrained distrust of the motives of strangers lay too deep to be completely quieted.

“You are wise to be cautious, my young mageling,” she replied, actually laughing this time. “For I can see in the Flames that you have a great destiny before you, you and your son after you… but it lies on the edge of a knife, balanced between the Light and the Dark, Order and Chaos. Will that destiny rage like a wildfire across the world? Or will it be the controlled fire of the forge, building rather than destroying?

“I know which I would prefer, and so I offer to impart to you what wisdom and knowledge I can, gained over a thousand years of existence, to tip the scales toward the Light. Not to mention helping to maintain the proper balance between Order and Chaos.”

Devrik frowned, despite that strange lassitude that strove to keep him mellow. “You are not the first to speak to me of this supposed ‘destiny’ of mine – or my son’s. No one is ever very clear about it all. I don’t suppose you’d care to be more specific? Actually shed some useful light on it?”

“Ah, well, no,” Yimara smiled ruefully now. “Prophecy is vague and uncertain for a reason, I’m afraid. The future is always in flux, you see, and although probabilities may be greater or lesser for any particular outcome, introducing another variable usually just complicates things. And, more often than otherwise, not in the way one would wish.

“Even for the Immortals, who have a greater vision and understanding of the probabilities than any on this plane, prophecy is more art than science. So you’ll just have to muddle through with what little has been revealed, I suppose. After all, most people don’t even get that much of a hint.”

“I figured as much,” Devrik sighed in resignation. “Never a straight answer; but I’ve learned to deal with the annoyance of it all.”

“Yes, that’s been your great strength,” Yimara agreed. “As a warrior you see the world as a very straightforward, linear place – do this, and that happens. But as one touched by the mystery and the power of the Flame, you must deal with the flickering uncertainties of Chaos. Very few mortals can hold such dichotomous world views in their head simultaneously and stay sane, but you are one such.”

After a few minutes of contemplating the glowing river of fire below them Devrik spoke quietly.

“You feel strongly that your gift would help me toward the Light?”

“I do.”

“Then yes, I accept.”

Smiling broadly, Yimara reached into her chest and drew forth a glowing ball of translucent orange energy…

♦ ♦ ♦

Kneeling over his fallen friend, Vulk quickly realized that Devrik was badly injured. He barked at Farendol, who stood nearby, to open his satchel and find the vial of Baylorium marked with Devrik’s sigil. Without bothering to see if the Telnori obeyed, he laid his hands on either side of his friend’s skull, and focused his healing energies outward.

Usually the healing put him in a mild trance, slightly removed from the world around him, but still fully aware of it. This time, however, he felt the world sliding completely away from him… for a dizzying moment he felt himself falling as everything went black…

…and he was standing in a beautiful sylvan glade, summer sunlight through the green leaves of immense oaks dappling lush grass under his bare feet. He was dressed in a simple knee-length tunic of pale green cotton, belted at the waist with a rope of silky, silvery strands woven together.

“Welcome, Vulk Elida, Cantor of the Immortal Kasira,” a deep, laughing voice called out from behind him. Vulk turned slowly, surprised at his calmness, to see a stocky man of middle height leaning casually against the bole of the largest oak tree he had ever seen. The man was strongly muscled, and hairy of chest, arms and legs, all of which were on display – he wore only a kilt of forest green and a belt of intricate gold links. He had curly chestnut brown hair cropped short, hazel eyes flecked with green, and deeply tanned skin. Laugh lines creased an otherwise ageless face, and Vulk recognized him almost at once.

“You are the Telnori who gave up his soul to the Great Beast of Earth, Ghoratok,” he said in a conversational tone that rather surprised him. Why wasn’t he freaking out? He needed to get back to Devrik, his life might hang in the balance…

“Yes, I am Dügora Oakheart, a Master of the Green,” the laughing man said, pulling up from the tree and gesturing to the ground at his feet. “Your friend will be fine, you are healing him as we speak… this is a moment out of time, and all in your head. So, won’t you join me, my young friend?”

Vulk saw then that there was a great feast laid out beneath the tree, set on a white cloth,  that he had somehow failed to notice earlier. He walked forward and sat cross-legged at one side of the spread, and Dügora seated himself similarly on the other. The Telnori mage reached for a massive turkey leg, and motioned Vulk to help himself.

As they ate, they talked, and it all felt as natural and easy as if they’d known one another for years. Vulk found himself laughing at the man’s stories, and even made Dügora laugh twice with stories of his own, especially the one concerning his and Draik’s escape from the giant rats of Tekolo following the affair of the fanatic priest of the Faith, the apple-seller and the one-armed courtesan.

This led naturally to a discussion of Baylorium, and its miraculous healing effects, and Dügora was impressed. He questioned Vulk closely about how Draik, and to a lesser extent himself, had gone about refining, testing and improving it, questions Vulk answered without hesitation.

“You are clearly a man of learning,” Dügora said at last, pouring them both wine from a silver carafe. “And you have the power of the Green within you… you are a healer. If only you weren’t burdened by your Umantari “religious” superstitions…”

Even through the preternatural calm that surrounded him, Vulk bristled at this. “My beliefs are not superstitious! You can hardly deny the Lady of Luck exists, and –”

“Well of course she exists,” the Telnori waved a hand dismissively. “Indeed, I’ve met her myself occasionally over the centuries. Like all her kind, she is vastly powerful, with a mind and a wisdom deeper than even we Telnori can easily fathom. But neither she, nor any of the Immortals, are gods… not in the way so many of you Umantari worship them.”

There followed a rather lengthy philosophical debate about the precise nature of the Immortals and their relationship to the younger races of Novendo, which ended eventually in an agreement to disagree.

“But in any case, what do my beliefs have to do with anything?” Vulk asked, somewhat sulkily, when the other man had stopped laughing at him.

“My time on this plane is finally drawing to a close,” the Telnori answered seriously, all humor dropped in an instant. “And not before time, if I’m being completely honest. I would like to pass on the knowledge and the power of the Green, that it not die with me… but I am reduced to only a single choice of heir now – you. But I wonder if you can accept my gift if I choose to offer it.

“You believe that your manipulation of the T’ara comes to you as a gift from Kasira, and that in itself is fine – all mental structures we mortals create to harness and control the Power are artificial, so whatever works, works. But can you accept, at the same time, a second way of controlling the Power within you, one that comes only from yourself? It will change you, and your relationship to your “goddess,” inevitably. But not necessarily for the worse…”

Vulk knew that there were temple sorcerers in every cult of the Eldar, men and women who learned the spells of the T’ara Kul, but who used that power only for the work of the Church Eternal. But could he become one of them? As he considered the vast knowledge of healing that was being offered to him, he realized that he could not refuse it, even if it challenged his faith. He would trust in Kasira to know what was in his heart.

“If you offer this gift to me, Dügora Oakheart, than I can only accept it.”

The Torazin mage nodded solemnly, then broke into a wide grin. He reached into his chest and withdrew a glowing, translucent sphere of roiling green energy…

♦ ♦ ♦

Vulk returned to the battlefield to find Devrik staggering to his feet, apparently entirely healed of his injuries and grappling for his battlesword. The others stood arrayed before the swirling wall of wind and debris that protected the Vularun mage in postures of frustrated fury.

“She’s summoning an air elemental!” Farendol cried out. “She must plan to use it to wield the Sword, in place of the Iron Knight!”

Even as the words left his lips, a form began to take shape out of the whirlwind – vaguely humanoid and 5 meters tall. Toran leapt forward to land with both feet on the Great Sword of Taharazod, gesturing and muttering the words to a spell. It was a long shot, but he was attempting to modify the Joining of Merkünon, so that instead of locking him to a metallic or mineral surface, it would lock the Sword to the ground.

Yellow-white light flared from his hands and feet, engulfing the great weapon in strands of energy that dove into the ground around it, the net of power flaring for an instant before fading from sight. Toran felt the power anchoring him and Sword to the ground. The now fully formed, if only partially visible, air elemental reached for the hilt of the Great Sword…

For a moment Toran was sure he had succeeded, as the Sword failed to move. But then, with a great cracking sound, the blade lifted free of the ground, Toran’s feet still firmly attached to it! With a snarl of fury he released his spell and somersaulted away from the rising Sword. He landed in a crouch three meters away, pulling his battle axe from its sheath on his back.

At Mariala’s urging he retreated with the others to the dubious safety of the eastern ward circle. Farendol, who had been standing on the back of the fallen Iron Knight, was the last to join them. He turned to watch grimly as the Sword rose slowly into the air, and his shoulders sagged as the blade fell.

As it bisected the circle of the Great Ward, there was a flare of brilliant white light which seemed to leap out and then rush back together, drawn to the blade of the Sword like lightening. The elemental seemed to implode, vanishing with a boom that shook the very ground, while the Sword went spinning through the air to land a few meters from the Iron Knight. The blade glowed whitely for a moment, the light slowly fading as if the light were drawn into the metal.

The Vortex sorceress had been knocked back by the implosion, and momentarily stunned. But she quickly staggered to her feet with a cry of triumph, drawing everyone’s attention back to the Great Ward. In the center of the etched circle, directly over the sigil of locking, a pinprick of darkness had suddenly appeared, and as they watched in horrified fascination it began to grow… slowly at first, then faster and faster, until it filled the former ward circle with a dome of utter blackness.

After a few seconds the blackness began to fade away, revealing a dark, vaguely humanoid figure perhaps 5 meters tall standing within. The form was veiled by a flickering aura of intense blackness, which seemed to cling to it, obscuring the details of the blackened, cracked skin… but not enough. It was a horror, a nightmare made flesh.

The Corruptor was returned to the world.

“Quickly!” cried Farnedol, regaining his momentum. “We have little time. You must all give of yourselves to animate the Iron Knight. It is our only hope!”

The Druid had already explained to the Hand what would be wanted, should it come to this crisis, and though it galled the fighting instincts of some, they had all agreed to the plan. So, as the Corruptor acclimated to its sudden release and the stunned sorceress re-gathered her wits, the six friends lay down on the dusty stones within the charred circle of a lesser ward.

“I have already placed the Heart of Metal within the Iron Knight,” Farendol explained as he positioned each person precisely, their heads toward the center of the ward circle, their bodies like six spokes of a wheel – or the wedges of the Thalurian hexagram. “Now I must place each of your astral forms within the correct elemental slot…”

The Druid’s eyes grew unfocused as he stood in the center of the circle, spreading his arms wide and began chanting in a language none of them recognized, but which seemed hauntingly familiar. As the chanting grew stronger, more insistent, a wave of vertigo overcame each of the Hand… the world seemed to spin, faster and faster…

…and suddenly it was dark. Each person had the feeling that they floated in an endless void, neither cold nor warm, indeed, with no sensation at all except their thoughts. Slowly a faint light began to grow, and each person became aware of the others in a way they had no words for. They felt connected, yet still separate, singular parts of a unified whole.

“This must be what it’s like when we die, and out souls rejoin the All,” Mariala thought, “One with everything, and yet still somehow ourelves,”

“Indeed, I’ve often thought so myself,” a deep, resonating voice answered her thought. And suddenly Mariala found herself standing in the Great Square. But it was a far different Square than the one she had been fighting in a few minutes before – it was alive, it’s multicolored stones glowing in late afternoon sunlight, the white walled palaces, towers and arcades surrounding it gold-washed, trees everywhere, and ten thousand pots, planters, baskets and rooftop gardens full of flowers that made a riotous and yet harmonious explosion of color amongst the green and white.

Standing next to her was a man she instantly recognized, for she had seen this very face a day earlier, in the – well, not living – flesh. King Taharazod. He was dressed in a simple long white tunic and hose, with white leather shoes and belt, both trimmed in silver. The face that had been beautiful in the stillness of his death-like stasis was almost unbearably more so when animated by the power of his personality. His dark hair was bound by a thin circlet of gold, set with a single diamond that shone like a star on his forehead. His eyes were a deep emerald green, and Mariala felt she could become lost in those depths…

‘Your Majesty!” she gasped, managing to pull her thoughts together with an effort, and she curtsied deeply.

“No need for such formality here, Lady Mariala,” the King smiled, taking her hand. “For all are one here… can you not feel it?”

And she could, now that she tried. She could sense not only her friends, but the the four Telnori elemental spirits they bore as well… and two others…

“Those would be Kelohir the Gray and Zhedorum of Storm Peak,” Taharazod answered her thought. “Or more accurately, the echo of them, retained here in the Matrix Crystals that once housed their souls. For unlike the five of us Telnori, their souls returned to their bodies after our great battle against the Corrupter. Because they are only copies of the originals they cannot manifest themselves as I and the other Telnori spirits do, but you can hear their voices, perhaps…”

She listened carefully for a moment, and did indeed hear a voice… a man’s voice, lighter than the King’s, but strong and commanding in its own right. It seemed to speak of the mysteries of the mind…

“Kelohir and I will guide you in your task, but the task is truly yours – we cannot do it without you.” Taharazod drew her eyes back to his, and she read the question there.

“I’m ready, sir, for whatever is required,” she answered it, firmly and without hesitation. “Um, what exactly is my task though?”

“You are the binding mind through which all the others in this… array… are brought together. It is not control, for each remains himself, but it is focus you must provide. And you must begin now! For see what transpires outside this comfortable shell…”

With a wave of his elegant hand the city around them vanished, to be replaced by the reality of its long-dead corpse. The view was from a vantage that momentarily distracted Mariala, and through her the others, for it seemed they hovered far off the ground. Then she/they realized that she/they were seeing through the eyes… or visor, or whatever… of the Iron Knight, which now stood at its full 14 meter height.

But there was no time to admire the aerial view, for the Demon Khanaribas still stood at the center of the shattered Ward Circle and seemed to have overcome its initial confusion. It also appeared to be slightly larger than before.. and was its aura of Corruption slightly larger as well?

“It is already drawing energy from the corpses in the area,” she heard Kelohir say. “Next it will seek to drain and Corrupt the living… the Druid will protect your mortal shells, for a time, but if we do not shove this monster back into its cell…”

Yes, there’d be no bodies to return to. Everyone understood the stakes.

“We must not allow the Corruptor to leave the Ward Circle,” the voice of Taharazod added. “It will be very difficult to drive it back in, if once it leaves, and it is only there that I can rebuild the locus of its prison.”

Before any move could be made, however, their attention was drawn once more to the Vularun sorcress, who stood within her own Circle of Protection, and was calling out to the dark figure before her. In her hand she clutched some sort of talisman, a disturbingly shaped construct of bone, ivory, crystal and silver, that glowed red at its heart.

“I have freed you from your long imprisonment, Khanaribas!” she cried out. The words were in a language none of the Hand knew, the secret tongue of the Necromancer; but Taharazod, at least, knew it and in the communal understanding of the merged mind the meaning was clear to them all.

“Now, by the power of he who created you, through this [untranslatable], I abjure and command you!”

The great form slowly turned towards the woman, and its glowing red eyes fixed on the object in her hand. It took a slow step forward, and then another, and then it was outside of the old Ward Circle. Thirteen disembodied souls cursed as one. The demon reached the edge of the sorceress’ own active Ward and went to one knee.

The sorceress’ face split in a savage smile of triumph, and she pointed at the Iron Knight. “There stands your ancient foe! Together we can destroy them, and you  shall take their imperishable body for your own. And then nothing will stand in my way, not even the Golden Man!”

In the brief stillness that followed, Devrik/Iron Knight reached for the Great Sword that still lay at his/their feet. But the Corruptor did not turn to attack him/them. Instead it reached out toward the blond woman. As its blackened hand touched the sphere of protective energy around her a darkness flared and for an instant the ward was visible in a crackle of red energy, before disintegrating into quickly dying sparks.

They barely had time to appreciate the utterly shocked look on the sorceress face as the hand closed about her head and lifted her off the ground. Her shriek was cut off before it could fairly begin, and her kicking feet went limp. In seconds her body, clothes, jewelry and all, were turning gray, and then black. Only the talisman seemed unaffected, dropping from her hand to be lost amid the rubble.

As they watched in horror her clothes turned to dust, her body shriveled and twisted and quickly began to crumble. In less than a dozen beats of a heart none of them currently possessed the demon had tossed the lifeless husk aside. When it hit the ground 10 meters away it burst into dust, which was quickly scattered by the wind.

Now the Corruptor rose and turned toward its ancient enemy. It was noticeably taller now, perhaps seven meters high, and bulkier. The aura of flickering blackness flowed around it at a distance of almost a foot. Despite the fact that they towered over twice the creature’s current height, none of the Hand felt the slightest inclination toward overconfidence.

Then there was no more time for thought as a blast of Corruption suddenly erupted from the demon’s hands – the battle instincts of Devrik, Kelohir and Taharazod brought the Sword up to block it. White light flared along the blade, scattering the darkness into fading shards; the battle was joined.

The power of the land was the first attack the Iron Knight made, as Vulk/Dügora unleashed a bolt of green energy that cracked the ground beneath the demon’s feet, lifting great slabs up at sharp angles and driving the creature back towards the circle of the Great Ward.

The next blast of Corruption Mariala/Iron Knight dodged, and the demon seemed wary of closing with them. Erol/Kiren next released a ruby blast of energy that caused a cyclone to form around the demon, lifting it from the ground and sending it another few meters back. A blast of Corruption shattered the cyclone, and Khanaribas dropped to the ground with enough force to crack the paving for three meters around it.

With the demon momentarily on all fours, they aimed a kick at its head, but it was faster than expected – it caught the foot with both hands and heaved upward. The Iron Knight went over backwards, crashing to the ground – the few walls still standing around the edges of the Great Square collapsed.

Before she/he/they could recover the demon was upon them, grappling in an attempt to pin the Iron Knight and keep it in constant contact with its Aura of Corruption. The touch on the foot had been bad enough – though the Corruption could not penetrate the spells and the metal, it nonetheless send a chill through each of their souls. In full body contact, it was much worse, and a despairing cold began to seep into the collective mind.

Devrik/Yimara sent a surge of Yalvan energy through the metal shell of the Knight, and it began to glow red-hot before a ball of flame erupted forth to send Khanaribas flying… unfortunately, at right angles to the direction they wanted it to go. The Knight staggered to it’s feet, and raised the Sword, as the demon prepared to charge them again…

♦ ♦ ♦

When his mind/soul/consciousness/whatever had been sucked out of his body and settled into its temporary (he fervently hoped) new home, Toran was perhaps less disoriented than his companions. His training in the Kahar-ün-Tem by the monks of Areth-Mar had included more than one out-of-body experience on the so-called Astral Plane, and this seemed much the same.

He had also been immediately aware of another presence there with him… not next to him, or behind him, but all around and through him. As soon as he heard King Taharazod’s explanation to Mariala, he realized who it must be.

“Zhedorum? Is that you?”

There was a laugh, and for an instant he had an image of a Khundari with dark honey blond hair, a beard tied in a triple braid and strung with amber beads, and hazel eyes flecked with gold.

“Yes, it is I, cousin,” a deep voice resonated through Toran. “Or perhaps just my echo, if you believe the Fairy King.”

“You… he… you were always one of my heroes,” Toran said almost shyly. “I studied your battles closely, and all your adventures with Kelohir the Gray. I often imagined myself at your side…”

The voice laughed again, this time longer and deeper. “You imagined a great deal more than being at my side, young Shadow Warrior. And here you find yourself, inside me… or me inside you, I’m not really just sure which!”

Toran blushed, but the voice chuckled again, not unkindly.

“We are in a space of mind and memory, cousin, and there are no secrets here. And I assure you, I am flattered.”

Toran’s embarrassment faded as he realized this communion ran both ways, and he could “see” memories of the long dead warrior-hero… some of them deeply personal. He struggled to bring his focus back to the task at hand, and the echo, ghost, revenant – whatever it was – of Zhedorum aided him by showing him how to channel his Tykizu energies, the energy of Metal, through the crystal that was their physical locus.

“Let me show you a few tricks I learned over the years, young cousin…”

By the time Devrik/Yimara had unleashed their fireball, Toran/Zhedorum was ready with their own attack. As the demon charged them, he/they sent a specific frequency of Tykizu energy up and out through the Sword, causing its already razor-honed blade to sharpen to the width of a single molecule.

Khanaribas reached out a hand for them, and the Sword came down, slicing through aura, flesh and bone at the wrist, as well as the arcane energies that held all together, like the proverbial hot knife through butter. Even as the severed appendage flew off, trailing an arc of black ichor, it began to shrivel and shrink, and it hit the stones as no more than a spray of dust.

The Corruptor leaped back with a roar of pain and rage, unleashing a mighty blast of light-sucking Corruption as it did. Again the Knight deflected and dissipated the corrosive energies, and moved in for another attack. Step by step, second by second, it/they drove the demon back toward the Ward Circle. But even as it retreated they could see a new hand beginning to grow from the stump of the old one.

It was wary now of the Sword, and sent blast after blast of Corruption at them… many were blocked by the Sword, buy some splashed against the armor itself, and sent chilling waves throughout the composite mind, slowing them just a bit more each time.

But in the end they succeeded in driving Khanaribas back to the heart of the Great Ward. There, driven to its knees by a kick that came straight from Toran’s Areth-Mar training, Devrik/Kelohir/Mariala brought the Great Sword down in a blinding arc that split the demon from the crown of its horned skull to the bone spurs of its sternum.

Khanaribas collapsed, and in seconds its physical form began to disintegrate and crumble away. But through the eyes of the Knight they could all see its spirit form, the raw essence of demonic chaos, rise from the dust like smoke and coalesce into a twisting confusion of bodies and faces – all of the Umantari, Telnori and Khundari souls it had consumed over the years, that gave it structure in the world of Order that it could not, by its nature, make for itself.

The spirit form seemed unable to assume any single shape for long, but it was clearly looking for some new host… and only Farendol and Barbarian 55 still lived as possible targets. If you didn’t count the six bodies arrayed on the ground nearby, of course… bodies currently bereft of their native spirits…

But before the demonic spirit could do more than look in that direction, the Great Sword began to glow with a white light that quickly became too bright to look at, even for spirit eyes. The resonating voice of King Taharazod could be heard chanting in that same language Farendol had earlier used, so hauntingly familiar… he was rebuilding the Great Ward, and again opening the portal to the prison dimension. As his chant reached a crescendo a black dot appeared behind the physical remains of Khanaribas, growing quickly to a window, and then a doorway, into an empty, gray void.

The shifting faces of the demon-spirit took on looks of terror, rage and desperation, and it tried to flow away towards the living bodies that could anchor it in the world of matter. But the pull of the gate was irresistible, and it began to flow backward through the opening, faster and faster… and then it was gone, and in a white-hot flash of light the door slammed shut and the Locking Sigil beneath it flared briefly to life, sealing it once again.

The Knight then stepped back out of the circle of the Great Ward, and touched the Sword to it. White light flared along the blade and flowed into the carved circle, and for a moment a lattice dome of white light could be seen over all. But it quickly faded, and half of King Taharazod’s soul was again bound into the Great Ward that would keep the Corruptor sealed away from the world.

They communal mind then walked the Iron Knight back to its post on the far side of the Ebony Bridge, at Farendol’s request. He himself stayed behind with their still bodies to prepare the ritual that would return their souls to them.

“Leave the Sword there, with the Knight, at least for now,” he had called out as it/they strode away. When they had positioned the Knight at the edge of the bridge, Sword held upward before it in two hands, they felt again the sudden dizziness and disorientation, as the world turned to black…

…and they were each again in their own bodies. And alone in those bodies, for the souls of the Telnori elemental mages had not come back with them.

“Tarinas!” Korwin called in sudden distress at finding her gone from his mind. “Farendol, did she remain behind, in the Iron Knight? She –”

“Has moved on,” the Telnori Druid answered him calmly and not unkindly. “It is what we all will do someday, and her departure to whatever comes next has been too long delayed already, my young friend. I suspect she was anxious to be gone…”

“But we… I… I didn’t even get to say good bye. I thought…” he trailed off and shot an embarrassed glance at his companions before turning to rummage in his pack. But no one was inclined to give him chaff; they were all feeling the sting of separation to some degree, for all that their symbioses’ had been so brief. Short, but intense, and none of them would be unchanged by the experience…

Farendol, knowing what they were going through, kept them all busy gathering up the looted treasures of the dead city that the Vortex scavengers had stolen. There was a variety of items, including armor, weapons, jewelry, clothes, gems, books and potions, besides a miscellany of trinkets and gee-gaws. Farendol agreed that they could take what had already been looted, with the exception of one piece.

When he saw the crown that Korwin held up for inspection his mouth dropped and he openly gaped. It actually took him several minutes to regain his full composure as he reverently took the construction of gold and seven gemstones into his own hands.

“By Ariala’s Blessed Stars, this is the Crown of Therin-Sar, the crown of the Kings of Serviana and of the Lost Realm before it! We had thought it lost in the last mad retreat from the city that day… how did that fool of a woman ever find this? Where did she find it?”

But a thorough examination of Helara Karis’ surviving possessions (for that was the sorceress’ name they quickly learned) revealed no clue as to how her minions had decided where to look for loot. What few scraps of writing related to their searches seemed to suggest no more than random shots in the dark.

What they did find, though coded in a fairly simple cipher, were her notes on the Corruptor, the Iron Knight and her plans for both. A spell of confusion had been placed on the writing, its true protection obviously, but Farendol had dispelled it with an annoyed wave of his hand. When no hint of the Crown was found he lost interest and allowed Mariala to stow the papers away in her own pack.

The sun was sinking into blood-red clouds in the west as they prepared to leave the dead city for the last time, with one new addition to the party. Vulk had refused to allow Barbarian 55 (whose actual name turned out to be Therok Drogsun, of the Uska Ethmoniri) to be killed or left behind to die on his own. And the fighter, who seemed to find the cantor enthralling, had agreed to sign on as a bodyguard. The others were too tired to argue about it.

The wind, which had been gusting sporadically since the fight, was building steadily in intensity, and coming increasingly from the east.They were all grateful once more for the goggles and face wraps Farendol had supplied them with.

“I was afraid of this,” the Druid said grimly as a particularly strong gust whipped up the dust around them, making the mules bray plaintively. “All the elemental power released here today, the air elemental, the demonic energies… all have combined to create a tremendous low pressure cell over us. We have sown the wind, I’m afraid, and now we are going to reap the whirlwind.”

At there exhausted, blank looks he clarified. “There’s a storm coming. And a storm on the Blasted March is something to fear… I’d say we have no more than two hours before it really hits. I had hoped to travel during the cool of the night, but we must find shelter soon, and there is none nearby… however, I may be able to guide us to a place that will serve…”

“And to top it all off, there’s that,” Devrik rumbled in his most grating tone. They all turned to see him pointing towards the eastern sky. A scattering of stars had already appeared in the deepening blue, and a few degrees above the horizon hung a smudge of baleful red light, trailing a faint tail, clearly visible even through the growing dust haze.

“Gendor’s Comet,” Farendol sighed, rubbing his forehead. “Always a harbinger of disaster in the past… I can only imagine what it portends this time around.”