Allan Cole: The Gods Awaken

Safar stopped at the throne and said loudly, for all to hear: "Are you queen to this mewling lot?"

"Yes, I am queen. Queen Charize." As she answered she couldn't help but raise her royal head, carefully keeping her eyes shielded. "I command here."

"You command nothing," Safar replied, voice echoing throughout the chamber, "except what I, Lord Timura of Kyrania, might permit."

Queen Charize said nothing.

"Do you understand me?" Safar demanded.

He made a motion and the light became brighter still. The creatures shrieked as their pain intensified.

Even the queen could not stop a low moan escaping through her clenched lips.

"Yes," she gasped, "I understand."

"Yes, Master," Safar corrected her. "You will address me as a€?Master.a€™"

The queen gnashed her fangs in protest, but she got it out: "Yes … Master!"

Tap, tap. Tap, tap, tap.

The sound brought Charize back to awareness. It was just in time, because as her great head jerked upward she sensed danger.

Not from without, but from only a few feet away where Tarla was sidling closer. Charize could smell the hate musk on her rival's breath. Hear the faint clatter of talons reaching for her throat.

The queen slashed with her mighty claws. There was a cry, the sound of a falling body; then the heady scent of death filled the chamber. And Tarla was no more.

Excited whispers came from her subjects as word was passed on what had happened.

"Are there any others, my sisters," came Charize's deadly voice, "who wish to challenge me?"

The whispers died.

Silence.

Except for the tap, tap, tap from the Other Side.

And then the remembered humiliation of the incident with Timura combined with the shock of Tarla's recent bold attempt at regicide to force a decision. Charize had to show them who ruled here. A raw display of power was required to silence those who had favored Tarla.

"Let him in, sisters," she said. "And we will feast!"

Palimak pressed an ear against the wall, listening as he tapped with the haft of his dagger. Tap, tap, tap.

All his senses were focused on the hollow echo that came back to him. The space behind the wall was quite large, he guessed. More of a chamber than just a rift in the rock's surface. Also, it was obviously a place that was quite warm. Witness the steam rising off the stone.

Getting ready to make another sounding, he shifted and felt a scratch against his cheek. He drew back, noticing a raised ridge on the otherwise smooth wall.

"What's this?" he asked.

On one shoulder, he felt Gundara shiver. "I don't like this place, Little Master," he said.

"Maybe we should leave," Gundaree added.

"Is there danger?" Palimak asked.

Frightened as he was, Gundara could not help a snort of derision. "We said it was hungry, Master," he pointed out.

Gundaree's teeth were chattering. Still, he managed to add, "And it wants to eat us!"

Palimak ignored their fear. "Make the light brighter," he said.

"Are you deaf, Little Master??" Gundara said. "Didn't you hear us tell you to leave as fast as you can?"

"Do as I ask," Palimak said. Then added, "Please."

"All right, if that's what you want, Little Master," Gundaree said. "But don't blame us if you end up in the belly of some nasty thing."

"I won't," Palimak said.

The two Favorites muttered a little chant, the ball of light grew brighter and Palimak was able to see the raised area of the rock more clearly. It was a carving of a winged snake with two heads, its tongues flickering out to taste the air.

"The sign of Asper," he whispered.

At that moment the Favorites cried out in unison: "Look out, Master!"

There was a low rumble, then a loud grating noise, and as Palimak stepped back the wall began to shift in its moorings. Palimak drew his sword-double-arming himself by readying a defensive spell. But then the wall stopped moving. Foul-smelling steam hissed through an inch-wide opening between the wall and its stone frame.

He waited, whispering a spell to turn the awful odor into something more bearable. The Favorites were silent, which he supposed was a blessing. But the lack of their usual chatter was unnerving.

Palimak had rarely seen them so afraid before. During grave danger to himself their usual attitude was a cheery resignation that they'd receive a new master if the danger proved fatal to Palimak. Sure, they'd miss him. Perhaps even mourn him a little. But the fact was that after a thousand or so years they'd become fatalistic about the many short-lived creatures who had been their masters. What would be, would be. In this case, however, their attitude was far from indifferent.

Palimak probed the darkness for some sign of the danger that was worrying them. He didn't doubt its existence. Gundara and Gundaree were never wrong about such matters. But all he could sense was the spoor of the long-dead magic he'd encountered when entering the tunnel.

Once again he looked at the twin-headed snake symbol of Asper. Unconsciously he reached out to touch it. But as he did so he had a quick mental flash of something-a horrible something-leaning forward in anticipation. Its enormous fangs exposed in a wide grin.

At that moment the ball of light sputtered and died and all became darkness. There was a subterranean rumble, then the heavy grating of stone against stone: he sensed that the door was opening wider.

Palimak took a deep breath and stepped through.

And then there was a loud, echoing boom! as the door slammed shut behind him.

Oh, how he danced. Danced, danced, danced. Danced to the beat of the harvest drums…

Safar fought against the spell's fierce grip. He groaned with effort as the cosmic puppeteer manipulated the strings, forcing him through another performance on the doomed stage that was Hadin.

All around him his eternal companions pranced and sang, giving themselves over joyously to the harvest queen's song: "Lady, O Lady, surrender/ Surrender…"

Smoke once again columned up from the volcano that formed a backdrop for the dancing queen.

Showering sparks flitted through the black smoke in seeming time to the music.

Any moment now history would repeat its terrible cycle and Safar would once again experience the soul-searing death of flesh, bone and spirit.

But now there was a difference. And with that difference came hope. It seemed to him that he'd regained awareness more quickly than the other times he'd been resurrected in the eternal hell that was Hadinland.

And now he was armed not only with the words of Asper's spell, but also with the memory of Palimak charging out of the mist of some Spellworld on the muscular back of Khysmet.

Of course, it could all be merely another awful manifestation of the eternal damnation that he'd been flung into when he'd first cast the spell back in Esmir. In fact, he had no proof that the original spell had worked. He had only a vague feeling of success. For all he knew the poisons might still be pouring through the magical portal that linked Hadin with Esmir.

Another worry-what about Iraj? What had happened to him? Safar had a skin-crawling suspicion that his old enemy lurked nearby. Perhaps not exactly in the Spellworld of the doomed Hadin. But close.

Very close.

He tried to concentrate. Tried to push his magical senses into places where he thought Iraj might be hiding. But he was so caught up in the spelldance that he could only keep prancing like a naked clown.

"Lady, O Lady/ Surrender…"

Slapping his palms against his chest. Pounding time with his bare feet in the hot sand.

For a frightening second he nearly lost control-and with it his will to cast the spell that he prayed would free him.