Paul Thompson - Nemesis

"We should go back," Medd said, moving away from the others.

"Stop!" Eladamri said. "You'll be taken as well."

"But Sivi-"

"He's right," said Takara. "She's already dead."

Silence ensued. Medd slammed a fist against the skeletal arch. "She stayed behind so we could escape!"

"It was her choice," Garnan said, putting a hand on his comrade's shoulder. "We should honor her sacrifice by staying together."

"It's my fault," said Eladamri. "I thought I was being clever by changing what regiment we came from. I didn't know we were in the midst of the Tenth Company."

"If you're all through taking blame, I suggest we move on," Takara scolded. "There are a lot of passages to cover, and now that we've been discovered, they'll flood the corridors with troops hunting for us."

Eladamri agreed. The direct route-around the factory and out the grand causeway-was likely to be thick with alert enemy soldiers. Takara suggested they ascend into the palace and go around the factory at a higher level.

"There are flowstone pipes and braces branching out from the factory to the crater wall," Takara said. "We can follow those."

"Are there openings to the outside?" asked Shamus.

"Oh, yes," she said. "There's all sorts of vents, blowholes, and exhaust channels perforating the crater."

With heavy hearts, the four rebels went on, climbing the circular ramp into the palace quarter.

Taking up the rear, Eladamri turned to Takara. "What do you think our chances are?"

She avoided his eyes. "Few or none. Frankly, it's astonishing we've gotten this far. There must be something else going on here, something vital and diverting."

Eladamri explained what he knew about Crovax and his claim to the throne. Takara actually smiled when she heard this.

"What's amusing?" he said.

"You speak of this Crovax as if his elevation were a foregone conclusion," she replied. "Nothing is certain, especially in the Stronghold."

Above and ahead, a clash of steel meant the rebels had encountered another hostile patrol.

Eladamri hurried as hard as his battered legs would take him. One whole turn of the ramp revealed the rebels hotly engaged with six palace guards. Takara hung back, flattening herself against the wall. Eladamri drew his sword and entered the fray.

Slipping in beside Shamus and Garnan, he awkwardly traded cuts with a heavily armored guardsmen. Shamus landed a telling blow to the man's shoulder, who dropped his spear. While stooping to retrieve it, Eladamri rapped him smartly on the face with his sword hilt. The guard rolled down the ramp, out cold. He slid to a stop near Takara. She tugged the ornate dagger from the guard's belt and with both hands shoved it through the unconscious man's throat. Eladamri saw her do it, and when she stood up, their eyes met. Takara shrugged.

Another guard fell, the victim of a stop thrust by Kireno. The remaining four began to withdraw, but the rebels kept the pressure on them. One man tried to run. Garnan sprang after him, but in his haste he forgot the guard's nearest compatriot. The Rathi guard swung his heavy spear sideways, the shaft taking Garnan in the gut. The Dal warrior doubled over, shocked by his sudden reverse, and the fleeing guard turned and speared him through the back. His triumph was as short lived as he was, for in the next instant Medd drove his sword through the guard's chin. The other guards were boxed in against the wall and cut down by the hard-fighting rebels.

Sweat pouring down his face, Eladamri knelt with Medd beside Garnan. Medd tried to find a pulse, and failing to find one, shook his head. Eladamri gently pulled his hand away.

"He was a gallant comrade," said the elf. "Now we must hide his body."

"Why?" said the anguished Medd.

"We can't let the Rathi know we're losing numbers. We couldn't help them taking Sivi, but we must disguise our losses so they don't know how few we are."

They dragged Garnan to the top of the ramp and pushed him into a small oval opening Takara identified as a warmair duct from the flowstone factory. Kireno and Shamus carefully wiped away all traces of blood between the duct and the place where Garnan had fallen.

"Where are we?" Eladamri asked.

"Below the courtiers' apartments," Takara said. "Over there are the Dream Halls."

Reduced to just four, the rebels hurried on. The passages already echoed with the sound of massed soldiers. The sweat on Eladamri's neck began to go cold. This was the sort of end he feared most-hunted, dying by inches, like a beast at bay. Compared to this, even the torture chamber was preferable. He'd resigned himself to death the moment Greven and his moggs had chained him to the wall. That he survived was a great victory, and for a while he allowed himself to hope they might escape. Now the coils of Rathi power were slowly enveloping them. His brave fighters were dying one by one, and the end seemed inevitable.

Like an animate hedge of spears, a wall of guards blocked the passage in front of them. Refusing several calls to surrender, the rebels retraced their steps to the top of the spiral ramp. Even as they reached the landing, they could see a stream of armed men surging up the ramp from below.

"Not good, not good," Medd kept repeating.

"We need another place to go-now," said Kireno.

Takara pointed. "The only place left is the Dream Halls, but the doors are sealed, and only the evincar can open them!"

Eladamri urged his friends to follow. "If I'm to die, I'd rather do so in a place called the Dream Halls than in a common, crowded corridor like this."

Shamus, the fastest of the group, overtook the elf chieftain and reached the enormous double doors first. He slammed his shoulder against the right panel, and to his surprise, the door yielded.

Two hundred soldiers and guards pursued the rebels to the very doors of the Dream Halls. Some paused to cast spears at the fleeing party, but all missed. Kireno, Medd, Takara, and Eladamri slipped through the open door. When their leader was through, the warriors threw themselves against the door. When it was shut, Medd slammed the massive foot bolt into the floor, locking it. Shamus and Takara slid a huge horizontal bolt into place as well.

Kireno and Medd laughed at their near escape. Shamus paced back and forth in front of the doors. Takara slumped to the floor.

Eladamri alone walked deeper into the Dream Halls. The vast dimensions, the frowning pilasters decorated with busts of Volrath-it all somehow reminded him of a strange forest clearing lined with lofty black trees.

He fingered the wooden fetish hanging from his neck. His instincts were right again. This would be a good place to die.

She vanished in the wink of an eye. Even against the constant stabbing brightness of the energy stream, the flash of Crovax's departure with Belbe was intense. Ertai felt the displaced air and excess power lap over him, a whisper against a roar.

He rolled onto his hands and knees and began to crawl. It was a long way from the edge of death to the theater of the living.

The crowd did not dare leave the convocation hall. Restless but also afraid of what might happen to them if they didn't bear witness to the ascension of Crovax, they remained in the hall, sweating and itching in their uncomfortable finery. An hour passed, then another, and a third was underway when a silent stroke of lightning blinded everyone, and a hot wind stirred the robes and gowns of the assembled court. Crovax had returned with Belbe in his arms.

The Corps of Sergeants, who had been at ease, snapped to attention. Courtiers old and young struggled to their feet or smoothed their heavy ceremonial robes. Without a word of explanation, Crovax sat down on the throne. The emissary of the overlords leaned on the arm of the great chair, a hand over her tightly shut eyes.