neetha Napew - Spellsinger

were motionless, paralyzed by the sight of M'nemaxa, whose countenance

transfigures continents and whose hoofbeats can alter the orbits of worlds.

Within the inner ellipse was a ferociously burning shape. The form M'nemaxa had

chosen to appear in was akin to all the horses that had ever been, and yet was

not. He showed himself this time as a stallion with great wings that beat at the

air more than sixty feet from tip to body. Even so the spirit shape could not be

more than partially solid. It was formed of small solar prominences bound

together in the form of a horse. Red-orange flames trailed from tail and mane,

galloping hooves and majestic wings, to trail behind the form and flicker out in

the night.

Actually the constantly shed shards of sunmeat vanished when they reached the

limits imposed by the double ellipse, disappeared harmlessly into a

thermonuclear void only Clothahump could understand. Though wings tore at the

fabric of space and flaming hooves galloped over the plane of existence, the

spirit stallion remained fixed within the boundaries of sorceral art.

There was no hint of fading. For every flaming streamer that fell and curled

from the equine inferno, new fire appeared to keep the shape familiar and

intact, as M'nemaxa continuously renewed his substance. A pair of fiery tusks

descended from the upper jaw of the not quite perfect horse shape, and pointed

teeth burned within jaws of flame.

Among all that immense length of horsehell, a living stallion sun whose breath

would have incinerated Apollo, there were only two things not composed of the

ever regenerating eternal fire-eyes as chillingly cold as the rest was

unimaginably hot.

The eyes of the stallion-spirit M'nemaxa were dragonfly eyes, great black

curving orbs that almost met atop the skull. They were far too large for a

normal horse shape, but that was only natural. Through the still angry cyclone,

Jon-Tom thought he could see within those all-seeing spheres of black tiny

points of light; purple and red, green, blue, and purest white that stood out

even against the perpetual fusion that constituted the body shape.

Though he could not know it, those eyes were fragments of the Final Universe,

the greater one which holds within it our own universe as well as thousands of

others. Galaxies drifted within the eyes of M'nemaxa.

Now a long snake tongue flicked out, a flare frora the surface of a living horse

star. It tasted of dimensions no puny creature of flesh could ever hope to

sample. It arched back its massive flaming head and whinnied. It stunned the

ears and minds of the tiny organic listeners. The earth itself trembled, and

behind the clouds the moon drew another thousand miles away in its orbit. Rarely

was so immense an eminence brought within touch of a mere single world.

"ONE WHO KNOWS THE WORDS HAS SUMMONED!" came the thunder. Great red-orange skull

and galactic eyes looked down upon the squat shape of an old turtle.

But the wizard did not bend or hide his head. He remained safe within his sun

symbol. His shells did not melt and crack, his flesh did not sear, and he looked

upon the horse-star without fear. It dug at existence and its hooves burned

time, but it moved no nearer.

"I would know the new magic that gives so much confidence to the Plated Folk of

the Greendowns as they ready their next war against my peoples!" Clothahump's

most sonorous sorceral tone sounded tinny beside the world-shaking whisper of

the horse.

"THAT IS OF NO CONSEQUENCE TO ME."

"I know," said Clothahump with unbelievable brashness, "but it is of consequence

to me. You have been summoned to answer, not to question."

"WHO DARES...!" Then the anger of the stallion spirit faded slightly. "YOU HAVE

SPOKEN THE WORDS, MASTER OF A HUMBLE KNOWLEDGE. YOU HAVE DONE THE CALLING, AND I

MUST REPLY." The spirit seemed almost to smile. "BEWARE, LEADER OF AN IGNORANT

SLIME, FOR THOUGH THEY KNOW IT NOT THEMSELVES, I FORESEE THEM DESTROYING YOU

WITH MIRRORS OF WHAT IS IN YOUR OWN TINY MIND."

"I don't understand," said Clothahump with a frown.

Again the whinny that frightened planets. "AND WHY SHOULD YOU, FOR YOU HAVE

NOTHING TO UNDERSTAND WITH. THE DANGER TO YOU IS NOTHING TO ME, AND YOU CANNOT

IMAGINE IT."

"When will this take place?"

"THEY ARE UNCERTAIN, AS I MUST BE UNCERTAIN, AS IS EVER THE FUTURE UNCERTAIN.

LET ME GO NOW."

Suddenly the flaming hooves were another ten feet above the surface. Yet it was

not M'nemaxa who had moved, but the earth, which had pulled away in fear at the

spirit's rising fury. "Stay!" Clothahump threw up his hands. "I am not

finished."

"THEN BE QUICK, LITTLE CREATURE, OR, WORDS OR NOT, I WILL MAKE OF THIS WORLD

WHITE ASHES."

"I still do not understand the Plated Folk's new magic. If you cannot describe

it to me any better, at least tell me how to counter it. Then I will let you

go."

"I WILL GO ANYWAY, FOR WORDS CAN HOLD ME BUT SO LONG AND NO LONGER. I CAN TELL

YOU NO MORE. I CHOSE NOT TO ARBITRATE THE FATE OF THIS WORLD, FOR I HAVE MY OWN

JOURNEY TO MAKE AND YOU CANNOT STOP ME." There was a vast, roaring chuckle. "IF

YOU WOULD KNOW MORE, ASK YOUR ENEMY YOURSELF!"

A violent concussion shook Jon-Tom loose from the tree root. Bark came away in

his bloody fingertips. But he was blown only a few feet downslope when the wind

began to fade from hurricane to mere gale force.

The thermonuclear stallion spirit vanished in an expanding ellipse of brilliant

light. As the light faded, it left behind a three-dimensional residue. He saw a

wavy image of some huge, sinister chamber. It was decorated with red gems, blue

metal... and white bone.

Within the bower stood an insect shape ten feet tall. Chains of jewels and cloth

and small skulls of horribly familiar design draped the chitin. The nightmare

stood next to a throne with a high curving back decorated with larger jewels and

skulls. Some of the skulls still had flesh on them.

It was talking to someone out of their view. Then something made it turn, and it

saw them. A high, vibrating shriek filled the glade, and made Jon-Tom shiver. No

dentist's drill could have made a more excruciating sound.

A far smaller flash, an echo of M'nemaxa's blinding passing, obliterated the

awful sight.

And then there was no longer anything within the glade save one very tired

wizard, wind, and grass.

The gale had become a breeze. As if confused by its presence, the wind-cloud

vortex that had hung above the glade simply dispersed. Silver phosphorescence

shimmied down trunks and branches to run like water back into the soil.

A light rain began to fall. Hesitantly, the moon peeked through the intermittent

clouds, filling the glade with healthy light.

By the time the panting Jon-Tom and the others had reached the center of the

glade the ellipses and suns and arcane symbols and formulae no longer glowed

against the ground. Though he sought Clothahump, Jon-Tom's mind still saw the

face of the towering praying mantis, heard once more the grating scream that had

issued from it just before it vanished.

Pog was hovering nervously above them. The rain was steadily washing the powders

and rare essences back into the soil from which they'd been extracted. This

corner of the web of the world had held.

They found Clothahump sitting on the grass, his glasses askew on his horned

beak.

"Are you all right, sir?" Jon-Tom spoke with a mixture of anxiety and respeet.