Mercedes Lackey - Elvenborn

:A strong back, strong legs, strong arms. It's got to learn, I suppose,: she ventured.

:Well, this one's learning! It's figuring out it shouldn't chase after the decoys we've been tossing. Don't bother throwing

things. Just yell, and run,: he replied. :What else, do you think?:

:Kyrtian's already figured out we aren't fooling it anymore. Um. It would need good balance. Not easy to tip over, no mat­ter how heavy the thing is it has to pick up —: she suggested.

:So much for my idea of tripping it: The monster was defi­nitely getting more nimble as it moved. There was less blunder­ing into things now, more picking them up and tossing them aside. Why was it chasing them if it was supposed to be a cargo-mover? Could the enemies of the Ancestors have some­thing to do with that, or had the thing just gone—well—crazy in all the centuries of inactivity?

:You likely wouldn't want it to cut things up, so those pincers must be blunt.: She was trying to think of anything useful.

:Yes. It didn't have to cut that Elvenlord in half, only crush him,: came the sardonic reply. .-Whoever he was and whatever his business was.:

:Following Kyrtian, at a guess. Maybe the Great Lords didn 't trust him as much as he thought they did.: She shook herself to get rid of the distracting speculations. It was her turn. She got out of her shelter, picked up a flat piece of 'glass' and chose an­other hiding place. Maybe if she threw it in a different way than just tossing it anyhow, it might still distract the monster.

"Hey!" she screamed, sent the thing spinning off like the saucers that the children played with, and dashed for cover.

She reached it just in time, and was alarmed to see that this time the construct aimed for the center of the arc, not the place where the glass landed. Too close!

:Keman! Can that thing reach behind itself, do you think?:

She sensed Keman's head popping up cautiously, and got a brief glimpse of what he saw before he dove back down into hiding. .7 don't think it can!: he replied with excitement. .7 don't think it can see behind it, either!:

So. That was one weakness. No, two!

:Ifyou took dragon-form —: she hardly dared suggest it, and Keman would need time to take the form—but in dragon-form Keman was just as big as the monster was. Could he be a match for it?

.7 could leap onto its back and keep it occupied,: Keman

replied firmly. -.Then you get to Kyrtian, and both of you get into the tunnel. I'll follow once you're gone. I'll be right on your heels.:

.But —: she protested—she hadn't intended that at all!

:You might as well, since I'm going to do what I want to any­ way.: And he closed his mind off to her.

Damn him! she thought with a flare of anger—and shook that off, too. No time, there was no time for anything now but action.

She sensed where Kyrtian was, and waited.

"Ha!" the Elvenlord shouted hoarsely, and made his move. She did the same as soon as the monster was out of sight, plan­ning her run to end near his.

The monster came to a halt almost directly between them, and she froze, holding her breath. Light swept over her hiding-place. Once. Twice.

Did it guess? Were dim senses waking up, becoming keener as its movements grew surer? Instinct shrieked at her to shrink back, further into hiding; sense told her to keep absolutely still.

"Ho!" Keman shouted, and the thing lurched off. Before Kyrtian had a chance to move, Shana did, diving under the wheeled vehicle that concealed him.

She found herself nose-to-nose with the Elvenlord, whose white face held an expression of utter shock at seeing her. "We need to get it to turn as soon as it's on top of Keman," she whis­pered without preamble. "He's going to take dragon-form and jump on it from behind."

"And do what?" Kyrtian asked, aghast.

"How should I know?" she snapped. "He's decided that's what he's going to do so we can get out the way your two men did. He says he's going to follow—"

"Well I think I can drain that thing if he can get it immobi­lized—" Kyrtian began, and the crashing footsteps stopped.

Before Kyrtian could do anything, Shana rolled out from un­derneath the construct and stood up. "Hey!" she screamed, waving her arms this time. "Hey! Stupid! Over here!"

35

Barking his elbows on the stone floor in his haste to get out, Kyrtian scrambled from under the construct just in time to see the monster turn towards them.

It was not an encouraging sight. And it got rapidly worse.

Shana just stood there, waving her arms at it, and the two bright spots—far too much like glaring, angry eyes—on its square, flat front panned over the space between them and pinned her in a circle of white light.

His mouth went dry, and fear ran down his backbone like a trickle of icy water. The thing emitted an angry whine, and lurched forward.

But before it had taken more than a single step, something moved in the darkness behind it, a shadowy form he barely made out against the glare, that wavered and surged upwards all in an instant—and then lunged.

Keman!

Monster of flesh against monster of metal. The dragon landed squarely on the construct's back, claws shrieking against its sides. The monster's legs buckled beneath the dragon's weight as Kyrtian stared in frozen fascination—

And that was all he had time to see, as Shana grabbed his wrist and wrenched him around, pulling at him. "Run!" she shouted, showing her heels as a good example, and he didn't need a second invitation. The monster might be encumbered, but it certainly wasn't defeated, and behind them the sounds of it thrashing about and Keman's claws scrabbling to take hold were proof enough of that.

Fear gave him a new burst of energy. They sprinted across the cave floor with Shana slightly in the lead—not because Kyrtian was playing the gentleman, either. The girl must have

spent her childhood scrambling across rough ground like this; where he stumbled, she skimmed over obstacles like a fright­ened deer.

She must have a separate set of eyes in her feet.. . .

Behind them, crashes and earth-shuddering impacts testified that Keman was still in the fight. Ancestors bless you, dragon. But get yourself out of it as soon as we're clear!

She reached the ledge first and vaulted up onto it like an ex­pert acrobat, turning just in time to offer her hand to help him scramble up beside her. Her hand was hard and tough, with sur­prising strength in it.

Keman — A quick glance over his shoulder showed him that the dragon still clung tenaciously to the back of the construct-monster, and nothing the monster could do was shaking him off.

He grabbed Shana's hand and hauled himself up beside her, turning immediately to face the fight, hoping that Keman had somehow gotten clever enough to outwit the thing.

And his heart leapt. Although the monster's "arms" flailed desperately, it couldn't reach the dragon with them, and those pincers were, next to its feet and weight, its best weapons. Ke­man had his hind claws lodged firmly all over the thing's back half, and his foreclaws clamped over the front edge. Kyrtian felt a smile as he saw what the dragon had done—wisely, he was not making any further offensive moves. Instead, he was content to let the monster wreak further damage on itself as it blundered about, trying to dislodge him. Keman had his tail curled tightly between his legs and out of harm's way, his wings folded tightly across his back, and his legs all tucked in so that the construct couldn't scrape him off without first scrap­ing protruding sections of itself off as well.