Iron Tongue

" Lan, no! I' ll go with you and Krek. We shouldn' t split up like this."

" I wish it were possible to stay together, but someone has to stay with Noratumi, if we want his people to fight alongside us. You are the only one in our small rank that they find totally acceptable. They brand me a sorcerer and Krek, well, it is obvious about him. Rally support, find their weaknesses so we may strengthen them, find their strengths so we may best use them against Claybore."

" We should stay together," she said.

" Time is of the essence. It is dangerous dividing our forces while Silvain still patrols this area. He will not accept his defeat lightly. He will return with reinforcements- and he has probably informed Claybore of his encounter at the oasis. Claybore might decide to eliminate Bron in one quick stroke. Any such attack weakens our position."

" It hardly seems fair."

" Nothing has been fair since I first encountered Claybore' s minions." Lan paused, then smiled, almost shyly. " The only good from this battle is meeting you." He bent and kissed her gently.

" I do not like Inyx going off with that brigand," Krek said petulantly. " She is one human who understands me."

" You mean I don' t?" Lan Martak trudged along, forcing himself to put one foot in front of the other and not think of the heat or his own bone- jarring tiredness.

Krek didn' t answer him directly. " She is a rare one, that Inyx. A true warrior. She displays a bloodthirstiness that is almost spiderlike. Admirable. Most admirable."

" That' s one topic on which we agree fully. How much further is it to the foothills?" They had left Inyx with Noratumi' s band of traders the day before. Lan' s vision misted slightly as he watched the dust cloud stir and surround the departing humans while he and Krek struck out at right angles and started a shorter trip to the mountainous region paralleling the desert.

" If I were not in such a debilitated and pathetic condition, a mere hour' s travel. As it is, who can say? I might die in this miserable place, far from my web and loving mate. O Klawn, can you ever forgive me for my dalliances?"

Lan thought the spider was going to begin crying. He placed a hand on the nearest bristly, thick leg. Krek jerked away as if touched by a firebrand.

" Sorry," said Lan. " We' ll get into the mountains, you can find some decent food, we can rest, and then it' ll be about ten days before we rejoin Inyx."

Krek stumbled and fell, legs tied into painful knots.

The man hastened to aid his friend, but Krek couldn' t stand under his own power.

" Time to stop for the day," Lan announced, as if he were the one too exhausted to continue. " Let' s get camp set up and then we can rest until sunset. A good start at twilight when it' s cooler will get us into the mountains before midnight."

" Leave me, friend Lan Martak. I am a shadow of my former self. A weakling always, I now pull you into death, also. That is something I cannot have on my conscience."

" You' ve saved me from worse, old spider. This is an easy way for me to even the score."

Lan stretched out the canvas canopy in the form of a lean- to and began using his chilling spell to generate a mouthful of drinking water for himself. The spell required little of his precious energy and supplied a product he desperately needed. His mouth felt as if it were filled with cotton and swallowing became a painful chore. Jacy Noratumi hadn' t allowed Lan any of the water from his casks, claiming they' d need it more and that a single day' s travel without water wouldn' t harm the young sorcerer. Lan' s pride had prevented him from arguing the point. Now his cooling spells proved useful.

Two mouthfuls of water; then he fell into an unconsciousness closer to a coma than sleep.

With the trance came visions, dreams, nightmares. And superimposed on all was a fleshless death' s skull with gleaming ruby beams lancing forth from sunken eye sockets. Those beams turned and twisted and sought Lan' s body until the skull smiled and began to laugh.

Lan Martak awoke with a start, his body drenched in sweat, a single name on his lips: " Claybore!"

He sat, legs pulled up and arms circling them, until it was twilight and time to push on toward the mountains.

" They will be all right. The spider is stronger than he lets on and the man, well, the man is a sorcerer. They can walk through walls. No harm will come to them." Jacy Noratumi placed his hand lightly on Inyx' s shoulder. The woman flinched away.

How could he possibly know how she felt about Lan Martak and the big, ugly, furry, gentle- savage spider?

" I do not wish to see them leave like this. Splitting our forces only invites trouble. Alberto Silvain still patrols the area."

" Silvain, ha!" cried Noratumi, making a flourish in the air with his free hand. " He dares nothing after we so soundly defeated him at the oasis." In a different tone, almost crafty, he asked, " What do you know of this Silvain? Of all Claybore' s assistants, I have never seen him before."

" We chased him along the Road. He had almost complete power on another world, and we drove him off."

" You did?"

She looked sharply at the man, seeking any sign of mockery. She didn' t find it.

" I helped. Much of it was Lan' s doing. For all his protestations, he is becoming a fine mage. Claybore had trapped me between worlds in a ghostly whiteness. Lan rescued me, something others claimed impossible." She didn' t elaborate, telling Noratumi she believed the task had become possible due to her love for Lan reaching out and finding him at the proper instant- and Lan' s love for her powering the spells needed to lever her free of the white nothingness.

" You do battle on a grander scale."

Again she sought even a hint of irony and found nothing but simple statement.

" We have tracked Claybore across three planets. In the Twistings, we defeated him. On top of Mount Tartanius, the victory was a bittersweet one. We prevented his expansion into that world, but he regained torso and heart."

" You' ve seen him?"

" Aye." She shivered in spite of the heat beating down upon her. " When first we crossed swords, he was nothing more than a fleshless skull toted about in a wooden box. Now he has joined head to torso and heart, can travel at will between the worlds, and even has a magically powered mechanical acting as his legs."

" Then the myths contain more truth than any of Bron imagined." Noratumi and Inyx walked side by side, hips brushing. " We have heard how his body was scattered along the Road, but who could give credence to such a wild tale told to amuse and frighten children?"

" It is all too true. It has come down to Lan, Krek, and me to stop him. Somehow, we find ourselves uniquely suited to the task, though none of us really wanted to become involved in such madness."

" It is a dangerous goal. Claybore' s troops overrun this world and have destroyed all but a few small cities. Wurnna- curse all sorcerers!- survives, as does my Bron. But the others? Gone. We were traders. There is no one left to trade with. We mine ores and work the metals. The mines are closed to us by the spiders, except when a Wurnna mage enslaves one of us and forces us into their mines."

" You and the others ought not to fight among yourselves. Unite and fight the common threat, then work out your differences when Claybore is no longer interested in this world."

Noratumi laughed, the bellowing laughter coming from deep inside. He shook his head, wiped at tears and sent rivers of sweat cascading off his sallow face.

" You make it sound so easy. Iron Tongue would torture me with a thousand hideous spells, should he trap me unawares. And the spiders? I' d sooner give myself gladly to Iron Tongue rather than enter their valley. I have no liking for your puppet- mage, but I do not envy him accompanying the spider into those hills." He looked up and away at the rocky ridge toward which Lan and Krek had started.