Richard Knaak - Scales of the Serpent

A gasp arose from many in the forefront as the edyrem beheld the awful sight. More than one of Uldyssian’s followers fell back in fear. Uldyssian tried to boost their confidence with his own, but it was a difficult task in the face of such monstrous foes.

The Peace Warders made up the Triune’s first lines, but they were not the bulk of the threat. That fell to the morlu, seen in such numbers as even Uldyssian could not have believed. He could not say what was worse, that so many existed or that they all looked and moved like the same beast replicated hundreds of times over. Even more than the Peace Warders, the unliving warriors were driven by one urge…to soak their weapons in the blood of their victims.

But neither they nor the Peace Warders were the first to strike. That dark honor went to the priests. Uldyssian sensed their spells and gave warning, but even then, some of his people were not strong enough. Their wills—and thus their shields—were broken. Peace Warders, obviously alerted by the priests, immediately leapt at those vulnerable. For the first time came the clash of arms.

Uldyssian sighted two Peace Warders who had broken through the wall of edyrem. At his command, the first warrior’s weapon turned on its wielder, gutting the man. Uldyssian sent his second foe flying back over his followers and into the vicious throng from which he had come, using the Peace Warder as an effective missile that bowled over a dozen other fighters.

The edyrem were being assailed on all sides, but they were, for the most part, holding their own. The morlu had yet to join the combat, but would so very soon. Still, Uldyssian had expected more from Lilith—

And at that moment, the ground to his left erupted in a mass of horrific tentacles that reached out and grabbed people in every direction. Two of the victims were immediately squeezed to death with such force that they nearly snapped in two. Another was raised up and thrust hard to the ground again, his bones cracking audibly.

Cursing, Uldyssian had to abandon the front lines. He knew that he played into Lilith’s hands, but had no choice. He was not even certain himself how to handle the beast, but his powers were the best hope of defeating it before it killed again.

Rather than seek to deal with every individual tentacle, Uldyssian focused on the area from which they had sprouted. The demon—for what else could it be?—had to lurk just below the surface. He could not imagine its size based on all the tentacles and their length, but it had to be enormous.

Lilith had outplayed him yet again. Each of her attacks had been shrouded well. The effort had surely cost her and the priests, but it had served her. He had noticed the one, been warned of the other…but those two had kept him from ever conceiving of an attack from underneath .

Uldyssian had no notion as to the demon’s weaknesses, but he attacked with the one most sensible. Raging flame suddenly burst at the point nearest to where he thought the tentacles originated. The fire burned not only above the surface, but also directly below.

It had effect. The sinewy appendages flailed, flinging the creature’s victims everywhere. Uldyssian instantly spread his powers as wide as he could, creating an invisible net that caught each and every one of them. The effort left Uldyssian panting. Sweat poured over his body as he sought to lower the edyrem to safety.

Just as he was nearly able to accomplish that, something jerked him from his feet. Uldyssian yet managed to keep his net working until he was certain that his followers would not be injured by the remaining drop, then ceased that spell.

One tentacle had his left leg, another seized his waist.

In his head, he heard Lilith.

If you no longer desire my embrace, dear Uldyssian, perhaps you will enjoy that of the Thonos …

She ended the comment with a throaty chuckle. Uldyssian swore at her, but the demoness had already severed contact. He felt the tentacle crushing his leg and focused on his adversary. The Thonos was obviously an instinctive thing, not a cunning being such as Lilith or her brother or even the demon Gulag. What fought with Uldyssian was truly a beast, which gave him hope that he could outthink it.

But first, he had to free himself. As more of the savage appendages turned his way, Uldyssian noted that at least one had, at some point in the recent past, been cut off. The stub was still dangerous, but lacked the tapering end. That gave him a desperate idea. Uldyssian reached with his free hand to his side—where he kept a long knife—only to have the knife snared by a smaller tentacle. That did not stop him, though. Instead, Uldyssian’s mind seized the weapon of the dead Peace Warder, raised it high in the air, and flung it at the foremost tentacle.

Energized by his will, the curved sword made short work of the Thonos’s limb.

There came a deep roar and a tremor that sent both edyrem and Peace Warders toppling. Not only did the ruined tentacle go flying back below the surface, but so did the rest .

Exhaling, Uldyssian started to rise—

The entire area around him—nearly a quarter of the area of the encampment—exploded as a giant shape shot up from the depths. Screams arose as those nearest fled.

The Thonos did not merely have many tentacles…it was tentacles. They all originated from an oval mass at the center, a mass equal to perhaps a dozen Uldyssians. From every part of it sprung limbs of various sizes and lengths, more than a hundred, if Uldyssian could believe his eyes.

And in terms of eyes, the Thonos was also nightmarish. Over those parts of its body that were clear of tentacles were eyes , very human eyes. Most were larger than a man’s head and all were not only fixed upon Uldyssian, but doing so with deep malice.

A score of limbs shot at him. Uldyssian shoved his palm forward and deflected most, then had to leap out of the way when two others nearly caught him. He summoned the Peace Warder’s sword to his hand and slashed at one, but the Thonos moved it out of reach.

The gargantuan demon rushed him, moving swiftly on more than twenty other tentacles. From somewhere, it emitted another deep roar. Uldyssian could spot no mouth and hoped that he would never come near enough to find it.

Lilith’s face suddenly formed before the Thonos’s macabre body.

All is lost, my love… she mocked. Look about! Your precious followers are falling to my puppets! See?

He would not have even deigned to look, for certainly it sounded as if the demoness sought to distract him further, but the Thonos stilled as if hypnotized. A simple-minded thing of destruction, it no doubt lived simply to obey what it thought was Lucion. Uldyssian wished he could have revealed to it otherwise, but even then the creature might not have ceased its rampage.

Lilith continued to hold the Thonos in check. Uldyssian finally did as she suggested…and saw that, for once, his former lover did not lie. The Thonos’s rise to the surface had set into motion chaos among the edyrem, who thought—perhaps rightly—that they now had to fear a terrible danger looming behind them as well as the relentless threat still flowing in from the jungle.

Serenthia’s position was the most stable, but even she was hard-pressed. He dared not distract the merchant’s daughter by contacting her, for already she fought against more than one Peace Warder herself.

Those battling Lilith’s second army were in the most dire straits. The morlu had reached the struggle and were shoving past their living allies in their hunger for edyrem blood. In the face of such evil and aware of the terrifying fiend in their midst, the edyrem were not only losing ground, but losing faith in their own abilities. More and more were resorting strictly to physical weapons and defenses, weapons and defenses that, against morlu, put them at a severe disadvantage.