"Here is the place of Graz'zt," Iuz announced. That image was a Jumble. Only the bright, pearlescent gleam of Unbinder, the third Theorpart, was clear. By concentration the cambion cleared and ordered the scene, but then all was abstracted. "I make the whole comprehensible, but then there is no definition, and entities can be ascertained only by relative strength; thus the various henchmen serving the stu— Graz'zt: there Yeenoghu, that is the image which is Kostchichie, Palvlag, Vuron, and so on."
"What? All of the strong ones are with Graz'zt! Who sides with Demogorgon?"
Iuz sounded smug when he bawled his reply. "The mighty Demogorgon, his kith and kin trailing behind, has deserted the field. Feeling safer at home, no doubt, he has given up his fight against Graz'zt."
"What of Infestix?" The call came from Levithan, one still uncommitted.
"That frail one was bested thus. . . ." With a gesture, Iuz caused the Theorpart to recreate in abstract form the battle on iyondagur. The demons saw it, recognizing the figure that was its princess, the pawns of Abat-dolor, maelvis, dreggals, dumalduns, and the assorted demons that had taken part as soldiers. The image of the daemon-piece was tall, powerful, and it was made greater by the nimbus that was the Theorpart Infestix wielded.
Then from the ranks of the ebon demons came a triple-pronged figure. Its passage removed pawns to the left and right of its path, and the whole showed a multihued radiance around it. There — that is certainly the Eye of Deception," Iuz supplied for the benefit of those farther away. "The silvery-gold flash is a vile harp forged by the First Spellbinders. It is not as strong as the Eye, but it is potent. And what of the diamond and jet gleam of the middle tine there?" he asked, pointing a long, sharp-taloned finger with three joints at the abstraction. "None of us can say. It varies from dim to bright, so its true power is not possible to assess readily. . . . But seemingly it is a force of greater puissance than a Theorpart!" That last the cambion fairly roared after a dramatic pause.
"See? It pierces the figure which represents the daemon, and Infestix is gone from the field. Behind remains the glow of the Initiator. Now no demon gains the thing, for it becomes a part of the green piece, and that can be only the one championing Balance."
Iggwilv interrupted him, not by speaking but through her own manipulation of the scene that the Theorpart projected. The ancient witch tapped the relic, spoke a word, and the trident-like piece suddenly expanded to a huge image that towered above the second tier. Then it shimmered, and instead of the abstraction stood three ghostly images. "Hie small human is named Gord," she croaked loudly. "The drow is Eclavdra, once high priestess serving Graz'zt. The one-eye using the enchanted stone in place of his other orb is none other than our old enemy Gellor," Iggwilv spat.
The scene shifted once more, and it was Orcus who bleated out the next words. "The little fool gives the female his prize!"
"He has a penchant for passing out Theorparts," Zuggtmoy said.
"What was that?"
"She said that the interfering little shit has done that before!" Iggwilv snapped back to the ram-horned demonking.
"Why do you use so delicate a term to describe him?" The query came from the third tier, and the witch ignored it.
"He possesses still the violent aura of might. See? The drow holds the relic, and she shows its glow plainly. There is still another glow emanating from the little man. We must assume that he has a new object, a token of Balance, which we have heretofore been unaware of. I think it is the sword he carries."
"How did they come to our sphere?"
"We have scried that out — but only after the fact. When they came there was a veil hiding their arrival. The two men entered and passed along the Soulless Sounding, were joined by the female and with her the Eye, and then the three of them came into the lands of the Abat-dolor."
"The black ones must be exterminated for aiding those three!" The calls came from many of the assembled demons.
"Elazalag has the Eye of Deception now." Zuggtmoy boomed. "With its strength, she and her clans will not be so easily done for."
"Use Awakener. It will crush—"
"The Theorpart must remain countering the relic in Graz'zt's possession," Iggwilv shouted. "Save revenge for a time when it can be enjoyed fully and at leisure. We have a thorny problem to consider now, and we must not err in our judgment."
"Let us locate the whereabouts of those three petty beings and take their Theorpart," Cagrino chittered.
"I think it better we join together now, finish Graz'zt, and with two Theorparts seek out the intruders," Iuz huffed.
Marduk had a different course to suggest. "I can parley with Palvlag, and through him we can arrange a truce with the ebon one. Let all demonium conspire to destroy the agents from elsewhere first. Then we can—"
"Baah!" shouted Orcus. "We will then fight over who should gain the third portion!"
"Won't we anyway?" suggested another demonlord, with the ultimate rhetorical question.
"At least now we have fewer who can claim to have a right to a Theorpart," came the booming voice of Zuggtmoy. "To treat with Graz'zt means we have added more voices to the clamor. Let us crush him, take the relic he has, and then gain the third."
"We could add the Eye of Deception and perhaps those two other objects of power to our booty," Baphomet speculated, thinking of what he could possibly gain if a Theorpart did not fall to his lot.
"Yes. We must diminish the number of claimants to nobility and reshape power and territorial holdings in the Abyss anyway," said Abraxas, who hungered after the realm of Yeenoghu. "Many will be the lesser prizes which will accumulate in our boodle as we sweep away our enemies."
"But a human! Surely those three must be considered our principal foes, the greater threat! Demon can understand and deal with demon, but the champion of Balance is—"
"Enough maundering, Marduk it is time for a vote." So saying, Iuz posed the two possibilities to the assembly. Those favoring an immediate search for the three invading humans were told to stand (or raise their torsos upright), those seeking immediate and complete destruction of Graz'zt were to remain seated (or as they were). All not in accord with one course or the other were given time to leave the amphitheater. Surprisingly, only a handful of the demons did leave. Marduk was at the head of those deserting the alliance.
"Excellent! One fewer to claim a chance at a Theorpart," noted Iuz, and that was a statement that none of the remaining demons challenged.
"Twenty-seven only," said Iggwilv, counting the number standing. "Do you bow to the greater number's wishes, or will you leave the assemblage?"
The ones who had favored hunting down Gord, Eclavdra, and Gellor were by no means ready to leave. They all sat down without undue commotion, and the leaders then began to make their plans to crush Graz'zt. Although he now had only a one-front war to fight, what with Demogorgon's desertion of the struggle, there was now more arrayed against Graz'zt than ever before. "He no longer has the power of the Eye of Deception, either," noted Szhublox.
"Unless that bag, Elazalag, decides to throw in with him," quipped Iggwilv. "She is almost human, and that worries me," the witch continued with a serious note in her voice. "The clans under her rule might be sufficient, what with the Eye, to enable that oversized dog-turd to conduct a long defense. Perhaps we should have . .."
"What is that you mumble about?" Iuz made the demand an insult as well.
"Tend to the strategies," she countered. "I'll be heard loud enough when I so wish!" Yet something nagged at the back of iggwllv's mind. Did she allow her own hatred for Graz'zt to cloud her judgment? Impossible! But . . . "Now, Iuz, I think we must consider the division of the hordes into battles, and which of these great demonlords will be in charge of them!"
Chapter 10
THE TRANSITION FROM COLD and windswept rock desert to the steamy verdure of Mezzafgraduun was sudden. There was no demarcation, no clue that they were about to leave the inhospitable barren of an unnamed tier of the Abyss and find themselves suddenly traversing the jungle frontier of Graz'zt's own domain.
The three had actually entered the Soulless Sounding where its portal stood in the midst of Elazalag's massive castle. They did so unceremoniously, without any leave-taking whatsoever. They simply strode into the place while the ebon-hued warriors watched closely but stayed well clear of such ones as they were now known to be. They were in the ghastly passage one moment and out of it the very next, barely treading the insubstantial and shifting stuff of the Sounding.
Leda took them to the gate that was at hand, but it entered a deep and wild region of the Abyss. Six thousand kinds of beasts existed in demonium, six hundred brutes, things worse by far than the bestial fauna of the place. She knew this place, for it was one where the demonlords hunted for sport. It was wild. harsh, and sparsely populated. The things that did inhabit the region were vast, ferocious, deadly. Unlike the swarming menagerie that had greeted Gord and Gellor on their arrival upon the uppermost portion of demonium, the brutes of this region were silent killers who stalked prey in stealth with relentless determination.
Often the hunters from elsewhere became the hunted here, and lesser demons were prone to become morsels in the belly of one or another of the lurking things, as their demonlord masters laughed and despoiled at the amusement thus provided, each safe in armor, armed with beast-slaying weapons, ringed round by their huntsdemons holding sawedged pikes in nervous grips.
Gellor held his ivory harp ready, fingers poised to pluck the silver wires and send out fear and death to the predatory things that slunk just out of sight. Leda now bore the Theorpart, knowing the use of such a thing from her experience with Graz'zt's own great relic. But Gord was not willing to risk her use of the terrible relic that was called Initiator. He attuned Courflamme to the Theorpart, drawing dark force from it into his sword. Leda wielded the relic still, and its force was greater than that channeled by the Eye of Deception, but thanks to Gord's efforts she was not in peril of becoming a mere zombie possessed by the terrible instrument.
The three sped across the cold wastes, moving with strides which would have left the swiftest courser behind, yet moving without exertion as if they merely strolled at a leisurely pace through a pleasant parkland. Even at such a rate of travel, a few of the hunters of the tier managed to stay on their trail as hounds would track a stag.
"Our blood is to such monsters as gold is to a miser's eyes," Leda said in response to the bard's query about the phenomenon. "The scent of it will draw beast and brute from leagues distant to get at us."
"Mezzafgraduun knows no such monsters?"
"No, Gord. The swamps and tangles of the jungle which rings the place have many ferocious things within, but none so fearsome as the brutes here."
Gord actually grinned. "I know you told me that before, and it isn't that I doubted you. I just had to have your second assurance after seeing this desert. It is exactly what I had hoped for."
"An icy waste of rock and nightmare scrub populated with such creatures as would make dragons flee gibbering in fear? I confess my absolute amazement," Gellor said in a tone of disgust. "My nerves are as taut as the strings of the kanteel."
"How long will such things survive in a warmer clime, lady?" Gord asked the beautiful little dark elf, ignoring Gellor.
"There are a dozen or so beasts in the demonking"s menagerie — even a monstrous demon-brute was caged therein for a short time. Graz'zt used it in his games, though."