JEMIDON felt a gentle touch on his forehead and forced open his eyelids. A bouncing glow of reddish light and strands of golden hair filled his view.
"Delia!" he said thickly. "It was you whom I came to rescue."
"With about as much forethought as when we raced into the presentation hall." Delia pulled away to give him room. "And your discussion with Melizar seemed to focus on other things. Even though bound by the animation, I recall most of what was said."
Jemidon rose to sitting. He felt stiff and sore. His mouth was dry and the taste rancid, as if he had been awakened from the middle of a drunken sleep. Hovering a few feet from his head was a large, glowing sprite, its bony arms crossed in front of a shallow chest and its legs coiled into a knot. The forehead bulged with bumps and mounds. Tufts of coarse hair protruded from tiny ears. The nose lay smashed across a broad and pockmarked face. Except for the whine of rapidly beating wings, it seemed like the well-preserved remains of a grotesque child.
Jemidon ran his hands over his leather vest, touching the reassuring smoothness of the coin about his neck and the lump of Benedict's changer underneath. He placed his palms down at his sides and felt a tingling from a surface that was glassy-smooth. As his senses returned, he detected the same vibration through his thighs. He looked around in the sprite light and saw rock everywhere. He and Delia were enclosed in a perfect sphere, centered on the small demon and showing no seam or exit. As if from the polished face stone of some great palace, specks of quartz and mica cast back pale reflections of the flickering luminescence.
"A rockbubbler," Delia said. "It can maintain a void several arm spans about itself in all directions, even at the greatest depths. One of the score or so that keep open a pit under Drandor's tent. And apparently I have some degree of control over this one. He responds to my bidding, as long as it does not conflict with his other instructions."
'The Law of Dichotomy," a small, squeaky voice radiated from the gentiy bobbing devil. "One of the two upon which wizardry is based. 'Dominance or submission.' There is no other choice." One small eye cocked to the side and stared at Delia. "I have a master and I must obey. I fulfill your request because it does not contradict and it is my choice."
"By whatever justification, the end result is the same," Delia said. "I instructed him how to trick two others of his kind with which he had a petty feud. And now he has kept his sphere just tangent to the others so that the manipulants could not find you, Jemidon, before you awoke." Delia stopped and shuddered. "Although with the fighting that will eventually happen above, they will have many from whom to pick."
"What has happened?" Jemidon shook his hands at arm's length to restore the circulation. Any excitement from being with Delia was muted by the remains of a deep lethargy. "Where are we? The last I clearly remember is Melizar casting some powder in my face."
"Torpordust," Delia said. "Something that can be made with the new magic. He uses it to slow prisoners for the manipulants."
"I thought it might have been a freezing."
"The cold does not come from Melizar. It is generated by the imps that circle his head. Without them, he would have to sleep with the rest, I suspect he can barely tolerate moving among us as it is. When he must concentrate deeply, he requires it to be even more frigid."
"Then where is he from?" Jemidon asked. "From what he has said, not across the sea or from another star in the sky."
"No, not another star." Delia shook her head. "Somehow, it is farther than that. I asked him once and he laughed. He said that on all our worlds the laws are the same. It was only through the demon's portals that one could journey whence he came."
"The realm of demons," Jemidon said. "It may well be the lands beyond the flame from which the djinn appear when they are beckoned."
"My master forbade me to speak of it, or I would tell," the sprite said. "But even in sleep, I must honor his will."
"These manipulants?" Jemidon asked. "Are they demons too?"
"No, I think not," Delia said. "Even demons would not behave as they do."
"But if not djinns, how can they exist behind the flame?"
Delia reached out and grabbed Jemidon's hand. "There is little else that I know. Little else except for some of the workings of Drandor's animations. Melizar has been teaching me the craft and has made sure that I remained unharmed. The cold one wants the trader to know he can he replaced if he does not continue to comply. There is nothing with which Drandor can bargain, not even the exercise of the new sorcery."
"And I?" Jemidon looked around the featureless sphere. "What do I have that is any better?"
"At least you are fully awake," Delia said. "For four days you have slumbered, while I kept the rockbubbler apart from the rest. Now you must use your wits to aid me as you have done before. Come," she said. She turned until she was on hands and knees. "Follow the sprite. You will see what else lies in the rock under Drandor's tent."
Jemidon frowned as the small demon turned in Delia's direction and began to drift slowly away. Delia's answer to his question was not what he had hoped to hear. But before he could say more, hefelt the sphere rotate beneath him, pushing with increasing firmness behind and then finally toppling him forward to sprawl by Delia's side. He looked up to see what appeared to be a tiny opening form in the curved wall directly ahead.
As Jemidon scrambled into a crawling position, the circle grew, revealing a larger cavern beyond. Sliding his hands along the smooth surface and pushing with his feet on the slope behind, he managed to keep up with the slow rotation of the sphere.
In a moment, the opening had expanded to the maximum extent. The rear of the bubble became a hemispherical bulge on a larger volume. Like a sealed chamber in a dungeon, the void in the rock was heavy with damp air and the smell of decay. The floor looked like the crate for an array of eggs, a lattice of shallow depressions that matched a similar set of indentations in the ceiling above. In between, in a more or less geometrical precision, hovered other rockbubblers, eyes closed and arms and legs crossed.
Like a rag doll flung aside, Drandor lay in the center-most sphere. The trader's eyes were barely open and his chest heaved with deep breaths. Occasionally he lashed out with his good arm, swatting the empty air. Dots of light showed where imps, much smaller than the hovering rockbubblers, flitted above him, dropping a fine mist of sparkling sand.
"More torpordust," Delia said. "It keeps the trader in lethargy until Melizar requires his efforts." Delia paused and swallowed. "And except for those, the manipulants, it would not matter."
Jemidon followed the sweep of her arm. On a large sled with rounded runners that fitted the curves of the floor he saw six humanoid forms, dressed only with loincloths and all lying prone in apparent slumber. They were tall and slender, more suited for the dance than for wielding blades. Their skin was an almost translucent gray. Beneath the tough elasticity, Jemidon could see the course of the major arteries and veins. Half wore massive ornamentation, nose rings, necklaces, and anklets, their fine black hair coiled in elaborate swirls. Sharp planes of bone defined blocky faces. Filmy lids covered deep-set eyes. Below the bulge of the nose, each had large pinkish lips that looked like the suction cups of an octopus or squid. Cupped in each left hand was a can with holes in the lid. On a chain from the waist dangled small picks like those used in gemstone mines.
"I have seen them before," Jemidon said, "on Morgana, in Drandor's animation the night of the storm, the one that shifted the Rule of Three to the Rule of the Threshold."
"Too close," one of the nearest sprites interrupted Delia's reply. "First you move away, barely maintaining contact. Now you press in on my space, my innermost core. Back whence you came, prickly one. I would rather you not support my flank than push with so much pressure against my chest."
"Poxblisters," the sprite above Jemidon's head shot back. "For you there is no distance that pleases. You would be better off as a solitary. Always bickering, trying to force the swarm to your own natural harmonics. Never just accepting what resonates with the entire clutch."
"You are no better, mintbreath," the other replied. "Your wings must have been unbalanced in the egg. They have vibrated your brains to mush. You have no fre- quency that stands above the noise. You keep flitting like a djinn in heat around the soft and golden one-and not even your master."
"Vibration is what makes the lips quiver and the foolish noises issue forth," Delia said. "It is strange that you would be one speaking of balance."
A high-pitched whine bounced around the room. Jemidon guessed that the other sprites were twittering at what she had said. The demon directly ahead snapped shut his mouth and, except for the hum of wings, the pit plunged into silence.
For a moment, nothing more happened. Then one of the manipulants suddenly stirred and crawled from the sled, sluggishly groping over the dimpled floor. Like a newborn puppy, he seemed to flounder instinctively toward food and comfort. The manipulant bumped against Drandor. With uncoordinated jerks, it closed around the trader's boneless forearm. Drandor's eyes flickered and his face contorted into a mask of strain. With glacial slowness, he struggled to crawl away, but the manipuiant was slightly quicker and pinned him where he lay.
In staccato bursts of motion, the left hand with the shaker positioned over the trader's elbow. Jemidon saw a fine powder fall onto the pliant flesh, and then, after several misses, the large lips contacted the glistening surface. A loud slurping noise blended with the demons' hum. Drandor's entire body trembled; he opened his mouth with an ear-piercing scream.
"As Melizar would look without his hood," Delia said. "They suck the marrow through the skin after somehow dissolving the bone. That must be what keeps them alive as they wait. Apparently this place is so warm that they languish like lizards in a desert sun.
"Melizar let me remain awake so that I could avoid the manipulants," Delia continued. "He did not suspect that I would influence one of the sprites as well." Her voice shrank to a whisper. "I could have dragged the trader away, just as I did you. But each time I think of it, I also remember his crude sketches of my disfigurement, his tongs and pinchers, and the fact that it is because of him that I am here."
Jemidon hesitated, wondering what he should do. Drandor had released the beasts after them on Morgana. He had abducted Delia to this oppressive tomb. Jemidon looked again at the trader's mutilations. He felt the line of his own jaw and then the reassuring firmness of his forearm. He saw Delia shudder and instinctively drew her close. She did not resist, but rested her head on his shoulder. The touch of her cheek was cold.
While Jemidon wavered, the manipulant suddenly released its grip with a loud pop, like that of a bursting bubble. Drandor struggled away to collapse in the bottom of an adjacent sphere. His eyelids snapped firmly shut. His chest resumed its slow and steady cadence. The manipulant groped over the cupped floor, bumping into Drandor a second time and then one of the walls. Eventually it found the sled and crawled sluggishly back into its space.
"Their needs are minimal," Delia explained. "It will be another week before that one ventures forth again. Drandor is safe until the next arouses in perhaps the length of a day."
Jemidon let out his breath and patted her reassuringly on the shoulder. "Do not build a pit of guilt in which to trap your thoughts,"he said after a moment. "Believe me, they can be a stronger master than any other."
"I am in command of my own spirit. Nothing would be served by succumbing to despair."
Jemidon looked into Delia's eyes and then back around the entombing rock. "That is a spirit I must admire," he said. "There are few who could keep their minds intact when faced with such as this."
Delia rubbed his hand on her shoulder. "And when I was summoned above and saw it was you, I felt the first real hope since I was confined."
Jemidon smiled. "It has been an eventful quest," he said. "Let me tell you what I have learned while we were apart."
Quickly he related all that had happened. To his surprise, he found that mentioning Augusta made him feel awkward. With a wave of his hand, he passed on to talk in more depth about meeting Melizar and the discovery of the two metalaws.
Somehow as the words came out, the driving force of his quest seemed to be more for Delia and less because of his hunger for the robe. But she listened quietly and did not contradict. With an intense concentration, she absorbed everything that he said.
"And now that you have rejected Melizar," she whispered when he was done, "how can you hope to achieve what you truly seek?"
Jemidon shook his head to calm the rattle of conflicting thoughts. He had wanted the mastery of a craft above all else. And yet, when faced with the choice, he could not submit to the one with the power to guide him to his goal. A few months ago, such an act would have been unthinkable. The quest for the robe was everything; his entire life had been bound up in it. But now there were other goals, other values that tugged on which way he should go.
Jemidon sighed. He should have followed his original instincts all along. There was no doubt Melizar must be stopped. The cold one admitted that no less than complete control of everything was his plan. The universe, he had called it-this world and all the others in the sky. And if he succeeded, the oppressions of Kenton and the other nobles would be nothing compared with what could transpire. As Jemidon had first decided in Pluton, he must aid the forces opposing the changer of the laws.
"We must escape and convince the masters the world over," Jemidon said at last. "Convince them to exercise the remaining laws to their fullest extent. Melizar has to be prevented from changing any more."
"I agree. Melizar must be thwarted," Delia said, "but that is not the answer to my question."
Jemidon frowned. He clutched the coin about his neck. What was it he truly sought? Saving a world from the domination of one such as Melizar was far more important, to be sure. But still, if not a master, what could he possibly-
Suddenly a flicker of light near the ceiling broke Jemidon out of his reverie. He watched one of the small imps appear through the solid rock and the rockbubbler in the center of the cluster rise to meet it.
"Curse the binding," it grumbled as it rose. "With any normal master, my decisions would be my own while he slumbered. But no, I am to bounce like a ball every time an imp flits into view. Such was his last command before he drifted into slumber."
Jemidon watched a column of rock seem to rise beneath the ascending bubble and a hemispherical void push into the ceiling. At the apex, a tiny iris of black widened into a larger, circle. Through it, Jemidon caught glimpses of stacked crates and flickering light beyond.
"Another compartment of the tent," he mumbled as he recognized some of the contents. "The one behind the counter where we first met. This pit was beneath it all along and I did not suspect."
Delia grabbed his arm and pointed at the opening. Jemidon saw two boots drape over the edge to dangle into the void and then the rest of another body crash down into the sphere. The sprite increased the beat of its wings in response to the load. Slowly it reversed its direction, settling back to the same level as the others.
Jemidon shook himself out of what remained of his lethargy. He groped his way from one circular depression to the next, reaching the slumped form and turning him face up. "Burdon," he said over his shoulder as Delia followed. "One of the lords at Kenton's castle when I was there. Melizar grows bold indeed if he can snatch away the nobility as well as bondsmen."
Jemidon looked down at the sleeping lord and rubbed his chin. "He may know something of value. If we secure him away as you did me, how long until he can speak?"
"It took you four days," Delia said. "For someone older, who knows how long it would be?"
"We can ill afford to wait." Jemidon frowned. "How deep is the sleep?"
"If you stimulate him enough, he might respond," Delia said, "but only in snatches and they will be incoherent, at that."
Jemidon reached down to roll Burdon over, but felt a numbing twinge in his shoulder. He looked up to see one of the dusting imps hovering overhead and quickly sprang aside.
"Drag him back into my sprite's sphere," Delia said. "We will withdraw from the rest."
Jemidon grunted and pulled at Burden's bulk.
"Rebellion," the lord mumbled. "The archmage, wizards, and wine."
Jemidon ducked to the side as the imp made another pass and then heaved Burdon from one sphere to the next. In a few minutes, he had crammed the lord into Delia's globe. Awkwardly, he squeezed in beside her and tried to keep his balance as the giant ball of emptiness rolled away from the rest.
"Thirty years," Burdon mumbled. "Who would have thought of treachery by my steward after thrice a decade? They have all lost their senses. Drugs in the wine. Swinging scythes like madmen, not caring whom they struck down."
"Where is the high prince?" Jemidon shook the man's arm. "What did Kenton do after the battle in the pass?"
"Kenton, Kenton." Burdon's eyes flickered open for a moment in a glassy stare. "Of his, I am not surprised. So hard. He pressed them so hard. But my own. My very own, along with the rest. As if ensorcelled, although that can no longer be.
"And now it is full rebellion. There are thousands up on the slopes. No matter how many the high prince and the others muster, they will not easily storm these cliffs against the flails and rakes. They have even taken the cages and dragged them up the mountainside for all the plains to see. They are a symbol, a measure of their defiance, and a taunt for the high prince's men to mount an attack."
"Another battle!" Jemidon exclaimed. "I would think the high prince would move with caution after what happened at Plowblade Pass."
"The pass. The battle," Burdon wheezed. "This is far graver than the skirmish of a few companies. Far graver, no matter which side you believe was the final victor. Now all the baronies, and all their minions, are drawing together to put down the insurrection. But what if they fail? Yes, what then? Everyone is afraid to uncover what he knows to be true. If the leather vests carry the day, there is nothing standing between them and the palaces in Searoyal.
"And I saw the gravity of the situation, even if no one else did." Burdon waved his arm, suddenly more alert. "I sent for the archmage. It is not only catapult and shield that we are dealing with. The wizards and alchemists and all the rest whom he can muster will be needed as well. I rode with an escort of six to where he had agreed to meet at dusk. A few swallows of wine from the flagon on my saddle horn quenched my thirst. There is something wrong. I feel dizzy. I must sleep."
Burden's face relaxed. His arm fell to his side. Eyes snapped shut; lips vibrated with the beginnings of a snore.
"The archmage is nearby," Jemidon said. "He would listen for sure. Far better than Kenton or the high prince."
Jemidon looked up and surveyed his surroundings in a new light. "Exactly where are we now? How far to the archmage and in what direction?"
Burdon did not answer. Jemidon shook his arm and then both shoulders with more vigor, but nothing happened. Frowning, he let the lord slip back into the bottom of the sphere.
"Each passing moment is time in Melizar's favor," he said. "We must be away." He looked around the small bubble again, this time more critically, searching for some clues that would lead to an escape. He studied the walls in the hope of seeing a fissure and then stared up at the ceiling, trying to imagine exactly where they might be.
"Delia, your sprite," he said suddenly. "How can it be that you can order him about? Certainly you are no wizard. And I know the basics of the theory. There is no gratitude or courtesies with the likes of an imp or a sprite."
"I do not dominate him as would a wizard," Delia said. "He already has a master." She shrugged. "And despite whatever you say is the theory, he states he has done what he has for favor received."
"You were able to persuade him to pull this sphere away from the rest," Jemidon said.
"It is not truly separate. To tangency was as far as I could persuade him. And for that, even in his misshapen face, I could see the struggle not to comply. He says he can act only insofar as it does not conflict with the instructions of his master."
"But to give him instructions at all, somehow you must-"
Jemidon halted and snapped his mouth shut. He frowned as he felt his thoughts begin to race off to solve a new riddle. There was no time for that now. Their escape was the important matter at hand. Resolutely, he forced his concentration back in the proper direction.
He turned his attention to the walls, judging distances in the featureless surroundings. "The void seems larger in area than the tent that rests upon it," he said. "Did you try sending the imp upward as well as to the left and right?"
"To what purpose?"
"We might not be that far beneath the surface."
"I thought of that myself," Delia said. "Even if the sprite were to break through to free air, there would be no way for me to climb. The curved walls are too smooth."
"Not the walls, but my shoulders," Jemidon said quickly. "I saw the distance Burdon descended. It cannot be far. Yes, that is it, Delia. We must burst through to the surface and then run for the archmage as best we can. Tell your sprite to rejoin the rest and then to ascend above them as the one in the center did."
"A moment." Delia grasped at Jemidon's arm as he squirmed to turn around. "You act no differently from the way you did at the presentation hall. All inspiration, but with no plan to see the idea through. Suppose I were to get to the surface. What then? More likely than not, I would find myself in the middle of some armed camp. And even if I could escape and flee to the opposition, what tale would I tell? How could I do better than you at Kenton's feasting?"
"We have no time for detail," Jemidon said. "I will think of more as we go along."
"As no doubt you did before charging into the vault in the grotto?"
Jemidon opened his mouth to rattle off a rebuttal, but then stopped and frowned. "Those are hard words for one whose intent was to save you from your fate. Despite what I said to Melizar above, the quest was at least in part for you."
"You are like the raw elixir of the alchemist, Jemidon." Delia reached out and stroked his arm. "I mean no disrespect of what you say. The power of your thoughts fumes and sparks. You show a great talent for seeing the solution where for others the goal is unclear. But as for means, you dash forward, grasping the first thought that comes, without a hint of a plan."
"I cannot help how I think." Jemidon pushed her arm away, suddenly irritated. "And it has served you well on more than one occasion already. It was not detailed instructions that slew Drandor's pets. A carefully reasoned treatise did not misdirect Erid's blade in the presentation hall."
"Nor was it your forethought that brought the dagger when the second of the beasts was at your throat. Your inspiration did not list all the props that made Farnel's glamour possible in such a short time."
Jemidon scowled and grabbed at the brandel dangling about his neck. He ran his tongue over his lips, formulating what to say. He looked deeply into Delia's eyes.
She moved her hand forward a second time, but stopped short of placing it on his arm. Palm upward, it rested on the curve of the sphere halfway between where they knelt.
Jemidon looked aside and let out his breath. He rubbed the brandel stiffly between his fingers. The hint that she was a piece of the puzzle ricocheted through his mind.
And she must have some feelings for him. Why did she not express them instead of dwelling on irrelevant faults? Why couldn't she be more like Augusta, warm and friendly, rather than carefully meting out favors only in exchange for some gain?
Jemidon looked back at Delia and saw her patiently waiting, her face a pleasant mask. For a long moment there was silence.
"You are right in that the solution to any puzzle can be improved if it is studied again," he said at last. "The number of steps until the pieces disentangle can be lessened, or the beauty of how one manipulation logically follows another enhanced. It is Burdon we must free from this pit. Burdon, more so than you or I. He was the one who has called the archmage. And failing that, it is he to whom Kenton and the other nobles might listen. We must wait until he awakens-until the right time when he can make good his escape."
"So it would seem to me as well," Delia said softly. "We must stimulate his recovery as best we can and then tell him everything we know. Give him a plan, something he can carry back and put to work against the magics Melizar will employ. We can use the time while we wait to explore all the details of what we will do."
"Then let us begin with formulating the message to the archmage." Jemidon released the coin about his neck. The tension was gone just as suddenly as it had come. He looked down at Delia's outstretched hand. "Anything else?" he asked.
Jemidon watched impatiently as the ceiling dissolved. Under Delia's direction, the sprite rose slowly, creating a void above its head. As the sphere drew farther away, the intersection with the bubble in which he was standing became less. He saw a circle of rock squeeze in from the sides, restricting the view into a smaller and smaller area. When the diameter had shrunk to barely three feet across, a beam of light burst through at the apex, outshining the feeble glow of the imps dancing over the manipulants. An incoherent mixture of excited voices tumbled through the opening and filled the den with sound.
"A little bit more," Jemidon said. "We can still squeeze through the constriction between your sphere and the one below, if you separate them somewhat farther. But we need at least the length of a forearm for the diameter of the one at the surface of the ground."
The sprite halted at Jemidon's words and folded his bony arms across his chest. "You are not the one who took my side against the mushbrains who babble so," he said. "It is to the golden curls that I choose to show my favor."
Jemidon waved his arm in exasperation and motioned Delia to come forward. In a few moments, using words hardly different from his own, she molded the passage to the surface in the proper proportions.
Without saying more, Delia placed her foot on Jemidon's intertwined fingers and boosted herself into the upper sphere. Jemidon wriggled his torso after until he stood erect between the two globes. Delia climbed on his shoulders and cautiously raised her eyes above the level of the ground. She paused a moment to look in all directions and then stretched to full height, scrambling out of the hole.
An instant later, a crude rope made of belts and torn clothing snaked back into the pit. Jemidon pulled himself up and out. Together, they hoisted out Burdon and the still slumbering Drandor.
Jemidon looked quickly about. His pulse began to race. They were on a flat ledge on the slopes of one of the mountains. The folds of Melizar's tent stood immediately to the left, quietly flapping in a midmorning breeze. The excited shouts came from a second ledge immediately below. Much wider, it ran out of sight around the curve of the mountain in both directions, All along, its length was packed with men, some dressed in leather, some with helmets of horn, others in bare-sleeved tunics, waving flails in the air.
With hoarse shouts and cheers, they rained abuse and taunts down on the valley below. Everyone's attention was turned away. No one bothered to watch what was happening in the vicinity of the tent.
Below the lower ledge, the ground fell rapidly away. Like a blanket covered with crumbs, the slope was littered with boulders. Cracked rocks and gaping fissures laced the slanting ground in intricate patterns. Halfway down the slope, Jemidon saw tangled masses of steel bars and dented plates. Next to them, still undamaged cages sprawled to the ground. In twos and threes, they formed a line of demarcation that divided the high slope from the plain.
Sweeping to the horizon were the wheatlands of Arcadia, all scoured black and sending wisps of smoke into the air from still smoldering flames. In the near distance, the humps of thatch and precise lines of stone marked the village of Kenton's barony. Approaching the very foot of the slope was a vast army of armored men. Squares of marchers, their mail gleaming brightly in the sunlight, stood ten rows deep. For every four companies on foot, there was a squad of richly decorated cavalry. Even from the distance, Jemidon could hear the nervous whinnies of the horses as they approached. In the very center flew not one royal standard but two. The rebellion had become far too grave for the high prince to handle without the presence of his father.
Behind the front ranks were arrayed rows of catapults and ballistas. Pressed closely together, they looked like the wall of some huge fortress that kept the mountain from creeping further onto the plain. In contrast to the slow and stately march toward the slope, Jemidon saw robes of black busily flitting among the throwing machines, adjusting their tensions and making ready the arsenals of stone arrayed by each.
The first contingents of the army were already climbing the slope, breaking precise formations and picking their way among the loose jumble of rock that littered the surface. Jemidon looked again at the thaumaturges, who were preparing their weapons, and then back at the rock-strewn slope. "You must convince them to use the engines without any magical aid," he said to Burdon. "Otherwise, it will only make it easier for Melizar to break the coupling."
''But without the aid of thaumaturgy, they project no more than blind missiles, hardly worth the effort to have dragged them across the plain."
"Nevertheless, you must do as I say," Jemidon snapped. The sense of urgency within him began to boil. He had little patience for delay. He looked at the slope and then at the army slowly making its way uphill. "Come along," he decided suddenly. "Throw off your cloak so that they will not know you are a lord. We must reach them before they come any closer."
Without waiting for an answer, Jemidon broke for the edge of the cliff and began to scramble to the one below. "But our plan," Delia shouted as Burdon started to follow. "We were to wait until the first skirmishes had started, so there would be a better chance to pass unnoticed. You will arouse Melizar, What about Drandor?"
"Not now, Delia," Jemidon shouted back as he bumped into the rearmost row of peasants watching the royal advance. "There is not time for debate." He turned the man in front aside and worked his way forward, barely offering apologies to those he pushed away. Burdon followed immediately after. Delia hesitated a moment more, then scrambled to catch up before she was permanently cut off. In a moment, they were in the front line.
Jemidon did not pause. He vaulted the edge and plunged down the mountainside, raising a billow of dust. Delia called out, and he reached back to grab her wrist, pulling her after. Burdon, puffing from the effort to push through the throng, awkwardly clambered over the edge into the cloud that marked Jemidon's path.
Down the slope Jemidon dodged, dislodging small streams of pebbles that cascaded in front and bounced off the larger boulders in the way. Barely in control of his motion, he careened between two rocks and then cut sharply to avoid another directly ahead. Delia stumbled and tripped. For a moment, only Jemidon's grip kept her from tumbling to the ground.
A small stone whizzed past Jemidon's ear, and then a shower somewhat farther away. The throng on the ledge was not sure who the runners on the slope were, but the targets were much closer than the ones at the base of the cliff.
"Why so fast?" Delia managed to pant. "Their aim is not all that good, and none come in pursuit. We can reach the royal army without the haste."
"They are almost all on the slope." Jemidon pointed ahead. "I think that Melizar will not wait much longer. We have to convince them to turn back before the cold one acts."
Almost in answer, Jemidon felt a sudden rumble in the ground. He missed his step and skidded to his knees. A large rock on his right began to pitch back and forth in its shallow depression. The shower of pebbles from Jemidon's feet was joined by additional rivulets across the entire face of the cliff. A stone the size of a child's head skittered down to follow.
Bigger rocks began to move, crashing into those in front and dislodging them from their rest. Two large boulders rumbled from their moorings on the left and plowed smaller debris down the cliff to augment the cascade.
The quaking increased in intensity, so much that Jemidon could barely move forward. Like a drunken man, he stumbled down the mountainside, tripping on the obstacles thrust suddenly in his way. He gritted his teeth to ignore the sharp snaps of pain, as small missiles hurled into his ankles and legs.
"Avalanche," Delia shouted, finally realizing what was going to happen. Her cry was drowned out by the one on the ledge, as truly massive monoliths began to lumber down the slope.
Jemidon looked over his shoulder to see a dense wave of dust mask the shouting rebels. The hillside was alive in a fusillade of hurling death. For a moment, he watched the cloud gather momentum and then turned to judge the distance remaining to the bottom of the slope. Instinctively, he swung to the side with the thought of moving out of the way before the avalanche roared past, but then halted, realizing the length of the line was too great.
He scanned the downslope, desperately looking for some natural feature that would give them a place to hide. But except for the moving boulders, the terrain was smooth.
"To the cages," he said at last. "Farther down the hill. It is the best we can do."
With a snap, he spun Delia after and scampered down the slope toward the wreckage of Kenton's machines. He heard Burden trip behind him, but now there was no time to turn back. Without thinking about how he would stop, Jemidon vaulted a stone in the way and skated on a wave of pebbles for a good thirty feet. Regaining his balance, he twisted past a boulder bounding by on the left, savagely whipping Delia to the side.
The roar of the falling rock became deafening as they reached the first of the cages. Without dwelling on how close they were falling, Jemidon thrust Delia inside and snapped shut the belt around her waist. "Keep your arms and legs inside the bars," he yelled. "Hope that the chains prevent you from slamming into the sides."
He turned to grab Burdon's tunic as the old man tumbled past, completely out of control from the motion of the dancing mountain. "Into the next," he shouted, jumping out of the way as a large rock sailed past his shoulder and then bounced off the bars of Delia's cage. Without looking to see how the lord fared, Jemidon dove for the last cage in the cluster. Fingers suddenly numb and unresponsive slid on the belt. He curled into a ball as best he could.
Just as he did, the wave of dust engulfed him completely. Small pebbles and rocks sailed through the bars and struck his head and back, producing painful welts. Larger rocks clanged off the bars and continued down the slope. A huge boulder crashed into one end of the cage and spun it around. A second hit broadside, bending the bars with a shriek of protesting metal.
The hail of crashing rock became a torrent. Like a tropical cloudburst, the tap and clang merged into a continuous stream of sound. The larger stones shook the cage with gut-wrenching jolts. Twice more, the metal box jarred from where it was poised and then, under the nudge of a boulder, it joined the stream tumbling end over end, another piece of debris in the sweeping storm.
Jemidon gasped from the tugs of the belt. He shut his eyes to block out the dust and the swirl of rock. All sense of orientalion vanished in the dizzying tumble. He was barely aware of the cries of men and shrieks of horses as the avalanche roared through their lines.
Then, as suddenly as it had began, the tumbling stopped. A sudden quiet replaced the roaring cascade. Jemidon opened his eyes and peered through the dust. His cage was upended in a pile of granite, one end crushed within inches of his head and the steel ceiling plate dented with pits a foot across. He reached out and grabbed a bar to steady the whirl in his eyes. After a few moments, he was able to release the grip of the belt and scramble out onto the mound of stones.
He blinked in dust-sprayed sunlight. Where there once had been an army was now an area marked only by a few shards of mail scattered amidst the piles of rubble. To his left, Jemidon saw what remained of the rows of catapults. Half were splintery rubbish; on others, thick-beamed spars dangled like broken limbs. All were immersed in a sea of stone that extended farther back onto the plain.
One or two of the machines had survived unscathed. Jemidon saw the thaumaturges hastily cranking back the great arms to release their flights in retaliation.
"Wait, wait," he heard one yell. "The incantation. Something is wrong. The small sliver is not still bound with the whole. Sympathy and contagion. They no longer seem to work."
Jemidon clutched his arms around his stomach and turned his attention back up the mountainside. After the harvesting had stopped, Kenton's throwing engines were all that remained of thaumaturgy. For Melizar, that had been enough for the uncoupling. Now even they were stilled.
Jemidon looked across the slope through the haze and saw what he thought was Burdon climb out of his cage and limp off into the distance. He searched the rubble for signs of Delia and sucked in his breath when he glimpsed a few twisted bars poking out from beneath a boulder the size of a small hut. He ran to examine the wreckage, not daring to think of what he might find.
As he drew closer to the monolith that must have crushed flat whatever stood in its way, he heard a faint, high-pitched hum and the squeak of a tiny voice.
"The time has already been many seconds. At this distance, I can remain no more. I must return and fulfill the obligations to my master. I am to maintain the void under the tent. Little else do I have leave to do."
Jemidon ran around the rock and blinked at what he saw, Delia was huddled in a small ball inside a shimmering transparent sphere that was centered around the rockbubbler sprite.
"Nevertheless, you have saved my life," Delia told the demon. "You see where the cage came to rest in the monolith's path. There was barely enough time to get out and call for your aid before it hit."
"Your thoughts were compelling and clear." The sprite unfolded its arms from its chest. "I do not understand truly what made me come. But no matter. In a few heartbeats more, I must-"
The imp stopped, and then a spasm ran through its body. "The packing of the spheres has shifted. The others have told. My true master calls. He has been awakened and commands that I return." The demon closed its eyes and slowly pivoted, pointing a thin arm up to the ledge from which it had come. "See, he walks among you mortals and has summoned another to do his bidding as well."
Jemidon looked up the mountainside. The rebels were quiet, stunned by the awesome power of the avalanche. He saw a small flash of white-hot flame that suddenly cut through the swirling dust and then a blur of motion, fiery oranges and burning reds. As he watched, the patch of color soared up into the air. In a breathtaking glide, it arched down to where he and Delia stood.
"A djinn!" the rockbubbler shrieked. "Master, have pity on one who has honored the letter of your law. I have kept open the void under the tent. I left only when the others were so positioned that I contributed nothing to the total volume."
Jemidon watched as the dance of color formed into a large demon. Unlike the sprite, its limbs were full and bulging with muscle. Thick, overlapping scales covered its entire body, except for the tenuous membranes of bat-like wings and the pockmarked cheeks and forehead. Without effort, it descended from the sky, its long tail dangling far below its cloven hooves, testing the ground for a place to land.
Jemidon followed the trajectory with a mixture of fascination and dread. "Not since the agreement between the archmage and the demon prince has one been summoned," he muttered. "The wizard who conjured him is a fool or a true master indeed."
As it grew closer, Jemidon saw that the djinn carried a bundle in each arm. One was dark-cloaked Melizar, the other a manipulant, now fully alert.
"Have him release me." Melizar coughed as they settled to the ground. "A moment of heat will not destroy you. For months, you have been peacefully resting. It is only fair that you should carry some of the hardships as well."
The manipulant motioned with his arms and then collapsed to the ground as the djinn released its grip. Melizar momentarily staggered, but quickly regained his balance and drew himself to full height. He looked at the cowering sprite that had moved away from Delia and then pointed at Jemidon.
"In the grotto, at the pass, and now even one of my manipulant's sprites you have subvened," he said quietly. "Your persistence begins to mark you as a captive of some quality. Perhaps I judged too quickly in placing you in the pit. Your marrow should touch the lips of no less than the first among the pilots."
Jemidon grabbed Delia and closed his fist defiantly. "Numb us again if you will," he heard himself say. "Somehow, we shall escape as we did before."
"Apparently the torpordust is insufficient for one such as you," Melizar said. "That you have already demonstrated." He waved his cloaked arm through the air. "But now there are only alchemy and wizardry left. I will meet this so-called archmage of yours, and then the victory will be complete. You will be the first I will savor when I have gained control of them all. In the meantime, I will place you where I can be more sure you will stay."
Melizar kicked the manipulant huddled at his side. "Send them away. Back whence we came."
Jemidon tensed as the figure on the ground somehow managed to start a small fire from implements tucked into the waist of his loincloth. He tried to ignore the sense of helplessness that welled up within him. He faced no less than a long-tailed djinn that could slice him in two with the snap of its claws. No mortal who was not its master could stand against one. There was no point in even trying to resist. With round eyes, he watched the demon step forward and spread its blood-red wings. As its arms closed around him and Delia, the smell of burning sulfur made him gag.
"Elsewhere," he heard Melizar's muffled command. "Send them through the flames to elsewhere. Let him see if he can fare in my domain as well as I have in his."