Foster, Dean - Spellsinger 02 - The Hour of the Gate

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Alan Dean Poster

"You know this dragon?" Bribbens tended to a wounded

leg and eyed the distant fight with amazement. It was the first

time Jon-Tom had seen the frog's demeanor change.

"We sure as hell do!" Jon-Tom told him joyfully. "Don't

you see, Caz, it all adds up."

"Pardon my ignorance, friend Jon-Tom, but the only

mathematics I've mastered involves dice and cards."

"This army of the downtrodden, of the lowest mass of

workers. Who do you think organized them, persuaded them

to fight? Someone had to raise a cry among them, someone

had to convince them to fight for their rights as well as for

their land. And who would be more willing to do so, to

assume the mantle of leadership, than our innocent Marxist

Falameezar!"

"This is absurd." Bribbens could still not quite believe it.

"Dragons do not fight with people. They are solitary, antiso-

cial creatures who..."

"Not this one," Jon-Tom informed him assuredly. "If

anything, he's too social. But I'm not going to argue his

philosophies now."

Indeed, as the gleaming black and purple shape trudged

nearer they could hear the great dragon voice bellowing

encouragingly above the noise of battle.

"Onward downtrodden masses! Workers arise! Down with

the invading imperialist warmongers!"

Yes, that was Falameezar and none other. The dragon was

in his sociological element. In between thundering favorite

Marxist homilies he would incinerate a dozen terrified insect

warriors or squash a couple beneath massive clawed feet.

Around him swirled a bedraggled mob of tiny furry support-

ers like an armada of fighter craft protecting a dreadnought.

The legions of Plated Folk seemed endless. But now that

the surprise engendered by the destruction of the wall had

passed, their offensive began to falter. The arrival of what

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amounted to a second warmlander army, as ferocious if not as

well trained as the original, started to turn the tide.

Meanwhile the Weavers and fliers from h-oncloud contin-

ued to cause havoc among the packed ranks of warriors trying

to squeeze through the section of ruined wall to reach the

open plain where their numbers could be a factor. The

diminutive lemur bowmen fired and fired until their drawstring

fingers were bloody.

When the fall came it was not in a great surge of panic. A

steady withering of purpose and determination ate through

the ranks of the Plated Folk. In clusters, and individually, they

lost their will to fight on. A vast sigh of discouragement

rippled through the whole exhausted army.

Sensing it, the warmlanders redoubled then- efforts. Still

fighting, but with intensity seeping away from them, the

Plated Folk were gradually pressed back. The plain was

cleared, and then the destroyed section of wall. The battle

moved once again back into the confines of the Pass. Insect

officers raged and threatened, but they could do nothing to

stop the steady slow leak of desire that bled their soldiers'

will to fight.

Jon-Tom had stopped throwing spears. His arm throbbed

with the efforts of the past several days. The conflict had

retreated steadily up the Pass, and the Plated combatants were

out of range now. He was cheering tiredly when a han6

clamped on his arm so forcefully that he winced. He lookeo

around. It was Clothahump. The wizard's grip was anything

but that of an oldster.

"By the periodic table, I can see it now!"

"See what?"

"The deadmind." Clothahump's tone held a peculiar mix-

ture of confusion and excitement. "The deadmind. It is not in

a body."

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"You mean the brain itself s been extracted?" The image

was gruesome.

"No. It is scattered about, in several containers of differing

shape."

Jon-Tom's mind shunted aside the instinctive vision and

produced only a blank from the wizard's description. Flor

listened intently.

"It talks to Eejakrat," Clothahump continued, "his voice far

away, distant, "in words I can't understand."

"Several containers.. .the mind is several minds?" Jon-

Tom struggled to make sense of a seeming impossibility.

"No, no. It is one mind that has been split into many

parts."

"What does it look like? You said containers. Can you be

more specific?" Flor asked him.

"Not really. The containers are mostly rectangular, but not

all. One inscribes words on a scroll, symbols and magic

terms I do not recognize." He winced with the strain of

focusing senses his companions did not possess.

"There are symbols over all the containers as well, though

they mostly differ from those appearing on the scroll. The

mind also makes a strange noise, like talking that is not. I can

read some of the symbols... it is strangely inscribed. It

changes as I look at it." He stopped.

Jon-Tom urged him on. "What is it? What's happening?"

Clothahump's face was filled with pain. Sweat poured

down his face into his shell. Jon-Tom didn't know that a turtle

could sweat. Everything indicated that the wizard was expending

a massive effort not only to continue to see but to understand.

"Eejakrat... Eejakrat sees the failure of the attack." He

swayed, and Jon-Tom and Flor had to support him or he

would have fallen. "He works a last magic, a final conjura-

tion. He has... has delved deep within the deadmind for its

most powerful manifestation. It has given him the formula he

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ds. Now he is giving orders to his assistants. They are

ringing materials from the store of sorceral supplies. Skrritch

watches, she will kill him if he fails. Eejakrat promises her

the battle will be won. The materials... I recognize some.

No, many. But I do not understand the formula given, the

purpose. The purpose is to... to..." He turned a frightened

face upward. Jon-Tom shivered. He'd never before seen the

wizard frightened. Not when confronted by the Massawrafh,

not when crossing Helldrink.

But he was more than frightened now. He was terrified.

"Must stop it!" he mumbled. "Got to stop him from

completing the formula. Even Eejakrat does not understand

what he does. But he... I see it clearly... he is desperate.

He will try anything. I do not think... do not think he can

control..."

"What's the formula?" Flor pressed him.

"Complex ... can't understand..."

"Well then, the symbols you read on the deadmind

I containers."

"Can read them now, yes... but can't understand..."

"Try. Repeat them, anyway."

Clothahump went silent, and for a moment the two humans

I were afraid he wouldn't speak again. But Jon-Tom finally

managed to shake him into coherence.

"Symbols... symbols say, 'Property.' "

"That's all?" Flor said puzzledly. "Just 'property'?"

"No... there is more. Property... property restricted ac-

cess. U.S. Army Intelligence."

Flor looked over at Jon-Tom. "That explains everything;

the parachutes, the tactics, the formula for the explosives to

undermine the wall, maybe the technique for doing it as well.

Los insectos have gotten hold of a military computer."

"That's why Clothahump tried to find an engineer to

combat Eejakrat's 'new magic,' " Jon-Tom muttered. "And

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he got me instead. And you." He gazed helplessly at her.

"What are we going to do? I don't know anything about

computers."