Margaret Weis - The Seventh Gate

Haplo gripped the sword tightly, waited for the blood-red tinge to fade from his eyes so that he could see his prey . . . and nearly dropped the weapon when he felt the quick swipe of a wet tongue.

There came a reassuring whine, a paw on his knee.

Haplo reached down his hand, stroked the silky ears. The dog’s head pressed against his knee. He felt the hard bone, the warmth, the soft fur. And yet he wasn’t surprised to find, when he opened his eyes, that no dog stood beside him.

Haplo threw down his sword.

Sang-drax laughed in derision. The serpent reared up. It would smash the helpless Patryn, crush him. But in its eager rage, the serpent miscalculated. It grew too big, soared upward too far. The gigantic head crashed through the marble ceiling of the Chamber of the Damned.

The runes traced on the ceiling crackled and flared; arcs of blue and red flame surged through the serpent’s body. Sang-drax shrieked in agony, writhed and twisted, attempting to escape the jolting flashes. But the serpent couldn’t pull itself out from the wreckage of the ceiling. It was trapped. It flailed wildly, furiously to free itself. Cracks in the ceiling started to expand, splitting the walls.

The Chamber of the Damned—the Seventh Gate—was crumbling. And there was only one way out—Death’s Gate.

Haplo took a step. The serpent’s tail thrashed out. Even in its agony, it was intent on killing him.

Haplo twisted to one side, but could not avoid the blow. It caught him on his left shoulder, already aching from the reopening of the wound over the heart-rune. He gasped with the pain, fought the blackness of unconsciousness stealing over him.

Slowly, he raised himself to his feet. His hand had, inexplicably, closed over the hilt of his sword.

“Fight me!” the serpent urged. “Fight me . . .”

Haplo lifted the sword, sent it crashing down upon the white stone table. The blade broke in two. Haplo raised the hilt for the serpent to see, then tossed it away.

The serpent tried desperately to free itself, but the magic of the Seventh Gate held it enthralled. Arcs of blue flame danced over the slime-covered body. It lashed out once again.

Haplo made a dive for Alfred, who lay bleeding and dazed on top of the white table. The serpent’s tail smacked into the table, cracked it. But the serpent was in its death throes. Blind, in terrible pain, it could no longer see its prey. In a last desperate attempt to free itself, the serpent lunged against the forces of magic that bound it in place. The ceiling began to break apart under the strain. A large chunk of marble fell down, missing Alfred by only inches. Another block landed on the serpent’s now feebly twitching tail. A wooden beam crashed down, smashing the white table into two complete and separate halves.

Stumbling through the raining debris, choking on the dust, Haplo managed to reach Alfred. He grabbed hold of the first part of the Sartan that came to hand—the back of Alfred’s velvet coat—and pulled him up on his feet.

Alfred flopped and staggered, limp as a maltreated doll. Haplo peered through the dust and ruin. “Jonathon!” he shouted.

He thought he could see the lazar, still sitting calmly at one half of the broken table, oblivious to the destruction that was soon going to encompass it.

“Jonathon!” Hap to called. No answer. And then he couldn’t see the lazar at all. An enormous slab of marble smashed down between them.

Alfred slumped to the floor.

Haplo hooked his hand firmly in the Sartan’s coat collar, began dragging him through the tumult. The runes tattooed on the Patryn’s skin burned red and blue, protecting him from the falling debris. He expanded the aura of his magic to include Alfred. A glowing shell of runes encompassed them. Blocks of stone hit and bounced off. But each time something struck the shell, a sigil weakened. Soon one would give. And the unraveling would begin.

Haplo counted fifteen, maybe twenty steps to reach Death’s Gate.

He didn’t say to himself to reach the safety of Death’s Gate, because for all he knew, once inside, they faced worse odds. But death was a possibility there, here a certainty. Already, he could see one sigil in the shell start to go dark . . .

He hauled Alfred across the floor, heading for the doorway, when suddenly the floor that had been in front of him wasn’t anymore.

A gaping hole opened into endless nothing. Chunks of marble and splintered white wood slid into the crack and disappeared. Death’s Gate glimmered on the other side.

The crack wasn’t wide. Haplo could have jumped across it easily. But he couldn’t jump across it and carry Alfred with him. He dragged Alfred to his feet. The Sartan’s knees turned inward; his body sagged.

“Damn it!” Haplo shook the Sartan, hauled him to his feet again.

Alfred was conscious, but he was staring around him with the befuddled expression of one whose wits are wandering.

“So what else is new,” Haplo muttered. “Alfred!” He smacked the Sartan across the face.

Alfred gasped, gargled. His eyes focused. He stared around him in horror. “What—”

Haplo didn’t let him finish. He didn’t dare give Alfred time to think about what he was going to have to do.

“When I say ‘jump,’ you jump.”

Haplo spun Alfred around, positioned the muddled Sartan on the very edge of the gaping crack in the floor. “Jump!”

Not fully cognizant of what was happening, numb with terror and astonishment, Alfred did as he was told. He gave a convulsive leap, legs jerking like a galvanized spider, and flung himself across the crack.

His toes hooked the opposite edge. He landed flat on his stomach, the breath knocked from his body. Haplo cast a swift glance down into the abysmal darkness beneath him; then he jumped.

Landing easily on the other side, Haplo caught hold of Alfred. Together, the two stumbled out of the Chamber of the Damned and into the opening of Death’s Gate.

Haplo, looking back, saw the Seventh Gate collapse in on itself.

And with the sickening sensation of sliding down a chute, Haplo felt himself falling into the chaos.

“What the devil’s happening?” Haplo cried, scrabbling to hang on. His hands could find no purchase on the slick, listing floor. “What’s going on?” , Alfred, too, was slowly sliding downward. The corridor that was Death’s Gate had become a cyclone, whirling and spiraling, a vortex whose heart was the Chamber of the Damned—the Seventh Gate.

“Merciful Sartan!” Alfred gasped in shock. “The Seventh Gate is collapsing and taking the rest of creation with it!”

They were sliding right back into the Chamber of the Damned; Death’s Gate was sliding back into the Chamber, and after that, everything else. Frantically, the Sartan tried to stop his fall, but there was nothing to hang on to; the floor was too slick.

“What do we do?” Haplo shouted.

“I can think of only one thing! And it might be the right thing and it might be the wrong. You see—”

“Just do it!” Haplo bellowed. He was very near the door.

“We’ve got ... to shut Death’s Gate!”

They were falling into the ruined Chamber with a rapidity that made Alfred sick to watch. He had the horrible impression that he was sliding into the serpent’s gaping maw. He could swear that he saw two red eyes, burning with hunger . . .

“The spell, damn it!” Haplo yelled, trying vainly to halt his fall.

This is the moment in my life I’ve been dreading! Alfred thought. The one I’ve tried all my life to avoid. Everything depends on me.

He shut his eyes, tried to concentrate, reached forth into the possibilities. He was close, so very close. He began singing the runes in a trembling voice. His hand touched the door. He pushed on it ...