Richard Knaak: Legends of the Dragonrealm, Vol. III

THE EMPTINESS WITHIN which Valea’s spirit drifted became stifling. She did not need to breathe, but the heat threatened to burn her to nothing. She struggled to find a way out, but there was none.

Desperately, she called out, seeking the only one she thought might hear her.

Galani! Galani!

But instead, a far different presence touched her own.

You are . . . Valea . . .

With each passing moment, the heat grew more intense. The enchantress knew that she would not last much longer. Please! The stone! It’s-

But the other presence had already vanished.

There had been few beings that Cabe had ever truly wanted dead. The lead necromancer had joined that select band and the wizard knew that in a few more moments the monstrous sorcerer would see the afterlife as it truly was. Nothing would stop Cabe from avenging Valea.

Nothing, that is, save the hard blast of pure force that tossed him several yards to the side.

The flames instantly faded. Ephraim stumbled back, recovering.

Shade hovered over him. He grabbed at the necromancer’s waist.

At which point, a black hoof capable of shattering walls nearly crushed the warlock into the floor.

“Traitor or friend, friend or traitor, one can nevermore tell with you, Shade!” rumbled Darkhorse. “A base attack on one who was ever your comrade!”

“You’re being a fool!” gasped the ragged figure.

“I am being observant!”

Shade managed to shield himself enough to turn. “Then be-be observant of the pattern! The Lords are-are regrouping!”

“Eh?” Sure enough, six of the necromancers had pulled themselves together enough to reform part of the pattern. Two others looked near to joining them.

“I can save Cabe Bedlam’s daughter, but they must be stopped! Look! In the center! That crystal!”

“What of it?”

“Smash it! Go now!”

The eternal laughed. “And turn my back on you?”

Shade lifted his blurred face toward his oldest companion. “Darkhorse . . . would I ever desire the Lords of the Dead to triumph?”

Darkhorse started. The ice blue orbs glittered. “No . . . good or ill, you never wanted that.”

“Then, please . . . go!”

With a laugh, the black stallion whirled about. Letting out a gasp, Shade stumbled away from the still-stunned Ephraim.

In the hand pressed against his chest dangled the chain from which swung the piece of the Wyr Stone.

The body lay motionless. The chest did not rise and fall. A chill coursed through Shade like none he had ever experienced.

No . . . he had. When another who was the same as this one had died. Died because of him.

Just as Valea Bedlam had.

She looked so much like Sharissa, like the elf maiden Galani, like the witch Tyrnene . . . like so many others. Yet, she also was in herself distinct.

For reasons he could not explain to himself, Shade hesitated, lost in the spectacle of her face. He finally reached a hand to her cheek.

Her eyes abruptly opened. A slight, sad smile crossed her lips. Even though her chest still did not rise, her throat did not move, from her mouth came a single word.

“ Forgiven . . .”

The warlock pulled back, stunned. Valea Bedlam’s eyes closed again and her body went limp.

“No!” He brought the stone to her chest, placing it gently there. Shade knew no words would do what he sought, but trusted that the stone would do what it should.

The bit of the Wyr Stone, a thing he had once coveted more than love, briefly glowed.

At that moment, Ephraim’s voice echoed throughout the chamber. “The pattern is still set! Focus your wills through me!”

Shade rose, knowing that if the Lords of the Dead had organized themselves, then all could yet be lost. Where was Darkhorse?

There! The shadow steed sought to reach the crystal, but the necromancers had already steeled themselves enough to keep him at bay. Cabe Bedlam aided his good friend, but although with time they might have won, such a precious commodity was not theirs.

He saw Ephraim come alive with the power the others fed him. All the lead necromancer needed was a moment more.

Shade glanced down at the figure by his feet. Her chest now rose and sank and he caught the gentle movement of her breath at her mouth. The warlock sensed the life rushing within her, a life so very young and yet, as he well understood, so very old-like his own.

Without hesitation, he turned and charged the Lords.

Caught up in their battle against the wizard and the eternal, they did not at first focus on the new threat. Zorane was the first to notice his approach, by which point Shade had reached the edge of the pattern.

“There! Stop him!”

Leaping, Shade collided with the necromancer. A monstrous shock went through him as he touched the ghoulish figure. Shade bit back a scream. Zorane clutched at him, but the warlock struck him a solid blow. The fleshless figure wobbled back, somehow maintaining his place, but now unable to grab at his foe.

Pushing past the Lord, Shade summoned all the strength he had and plunged toward the crystal.

Off to the side, he heard Ephraim cry out to Cabe and Darkhorse, “You will be ours! Your world will be ours!”

And then Shade fell upon centerpiece of the necromancers’ work, pouring every bit of power he could against it.

The pain, when the crystal exploded, was mercifully brief.

The heat ceased abruptly, giving Valea respite. She sensed something else happening, but knew not what.

Then, an incredible urge to drift forward filled her. She did not fight it, the sensation feeling so right. Like a siren’s call, it pulled her on.

As she neared what she felt her goal, Valea noted other presences, as familiar to her as her own family-and yet even more so. She sensed Galani among them. The elf’s spirit comforted her. With the others surrounding her, the enchantress completed the last bit of her journey-and realized that she entered her own body.

But even there she was not alone. She felt the elf maiden and others stay around her, guide her.

And they were all her.

But there was one that did not join, instead receding. That one most of all Valea wanted to stay, but such was not to be. The enchantress felt a caress where her cheek should have been . . . and then the other departed.

Sharissa was gone.

“Cabe! Beware!” Darkhorse immediately enveloped the wizard, possibly the only thing that saved his human friend.

Cabe had only a moment to acknowledge the vision of a very battered Shade falling upon the crystal. Then, the faceless warlock vanished in a searing explosion of energy.

The entrails of the explosion spread throughout the pattern, catching each of the necromancers in turn. They screamed.

But if their suffering was terrible, it compared little to that which filled Ephraim. Set to accept the power offered him by his compatriots, the lead sorcerer now became the ultimate vessel in which the unleashed forces of the pattern spilled.

The ghoulish figure swelled, his armor groaning. His skeletal form burned bright from within. His fleshless jaw swung wide as he cried out the loudest and most agonized.

Ephraim vanished, still wailing. A thin trail of ash was all that marked his memory.

The castle, long held together by the will of the Lords of the Dead, began to crumble. On one side, the ceiling collapsed. The remaining sections groaned ominously.

Still caught, the rest of the Lords continued to scream. The floor containing the pattern began to buckle as it, too, lost cohesion.

“We must flee!” Darkhorse roared.

“Valea! I’ll not leave her body here!”

The eternal snorted. “As if I would!”