Dave Duncan – The Living God – A Handful of Men. Book 4

“Let me go!” Kadie screamed, struggling wildly in her brother’s clumsy embrace.

Rap’s heart was being torn apart. A God’s prophecy rang mercilessly in his ears: You must lose a child! This was what had been foretold. The fate of Pandemia swung in the balance now, and this was why the God had spoken. This was where duty led.

“Let her go!” he barked.

“But, Dad!” Gath protested, trying to avoid Kadie’s kicks. She was squirming and clawing like a wildcat. Thaile’s howl was a knife in the eardrums, her flames blazing ever brighter. “Let her go, I said!”

“But, Dad—”

“I know! Let her go!” Rap grabbed the pair of them. For a moment all three of them wrestled together, until Rap hauled Kadie free from her brother’s gasp.

And released her.

She ran. Gath tried to follow. Rap hung on to him, and then it was Gath who was the wildcat, fighting, kicking, screaming warnings. Inos, also, dived forward, and Rap somehow won a hand free from his other struggle to grab her arm. Again there was a three-way tussle.

Kadie raced across the empty floor, skirted the towering triumph of the Almighty, and hurled herself upon the blazing demigod. Inos screamed and turned her back. Rap still struggled with a son frantic to go to the rescue of his twin. Gath was taller, but all bone and sinew, and he could not break free of his father’s muscle. There could be no rescue.

For a moment princess and pixie clung to each other in incandescent embrace. White inferno roared in the Chapel. Clothes, hair, flesh dissolved in brightness greater than the sun. Sobbing, Gath slumped limply to the floor.

There was nothing left. They had gone. The vision faded, except for green after-images. Darkness flooded back into the Chapel, stillness and sorrow.

“You knew!” the boy howled, staring up at his father in disbelief.

Rap turned away, unable to meet the awful accusation in his son’s face.

He had known ever since Gath came safely back to him that Kadie was the one he must lose, and he had been fairly sure how it must happen.

“Yes, he knew!” Inos said, and her glare was worse. “I hope he thinks it is worth it.”

Kadie, Kadie!

The sorcerers were scrambling to their feet and bowing to the obscenity that rejoiced in the center, the exultant mirage of the Almighty. They were all votaries now. The ice on Keef’s grave had melted.

The battle was over. Zinixo had won.

His monstrous image turned to look at the mundanes. Especially at Rap.

5

Dawn had long since reached Hub. Lord Umpily had not the faintest idea how long he had been crouching in his seat in the Rotunda. His limbs were cramped, his clothing clammy with sweat. He could guess that the decisive struggle of the war was being fought and that he was trapped in the middle of the enemy’s army. He suspected he was liable to be destroyed with it if his own friends won; he would certainly be executed as a spy if he were detected, but the worst part of his torment was that he had no idea how the battle was going! Ignorance was driving him crazy.

Ever since the Almighty had stopped the standing ovation with a single gesture, the Rotunda had been eerily silent. Everyone but Umpily had remained locked in a trance. Once in a while an involuntary sigh or murmur would rustle through the great hall, but that was all. He felt like a blind man watching a gladiatorial contest with his head in a bag. At first most of the Covin had looked south, then northeast. Then their faces had swung around to the southeast, but every eye had stared blankly at things he could not see.

To begin with, he had stared where the others were staring, but eventually his neck grew agonizingly stiff and he just crouched down low, as if somehow that position might hide him from so many sorcerers. Once in a while one of the congregation would cry out, and sometimes one of the older ones would crumple as if overcome by too much effort; most of them revived in due course and joined in the struggle again. He had wondered often whether he might try to slip out unnoticed, but he had never found the courage to try.

Besides, in his humble fashion he was one of the players, so he may as well stay and see the ending. He might be saved if Shandie won. Otherwise he would die forgotten, but that was any soldier’s duty.

In the center, the Almighty sat motionless, glaring southeastward. Apart from that one change of direction, he had not moved for an hour. The vast bulk of the Opal Throne could make even an imperor seem small; Zinixo looked like a child in it.

Suddenly he came alive. He jumped down and raised his arms overhead, waving his fists in triumph. The audience recovered at the same instant—it surged to its feet and roared. They were back into standing ovation again.

That one probably did not last more than fifteen minutes. Of course Umpily knew then who had won and who had lost, but he banged his bruised hands together and screamed with the worst of them. Why? he wondered. Why bother to hide any longer? Why not just cock a snoot at the little horror and die with honor?

Again the Almighty gestured for silence. Again it came instantly. His votaries resumed their seats, grinning and panting with excitement.

Three seats away, the young faun turned to Umpily, smirking and raising an eyebrow. Asking a question?

“Oh, yes! Marvelous!” Umpily said, forcing his mouth into a rictus of smile.

The rustic frowned, puzzled. Then threateningly. His gray eyes widened in astonishment. Power had nothing to do with age or employment—quite likely the kid was capable of analyzing the fat imp’s enchantment and seeing that it was not a loyalty spell, that the man inside it was not a sorcerer . . .

Then everyone’s attention flicked back to the center. Zinixo had risen, and now he spoke for the first time all night. “Bring them in! Welcome your new associates!” His voice was the deepest Umpily had ever heard.

The floor of the Rotunda shimmered and was suddenly crowded. Towering blond jotnar, hulking trolls, dozens of tiny gnomes, elegant elves. In sorcerous wars the losers were not necessarily destroyed. Sometimes they joined the ranks of the victors, and this must be Shandie’s army.

He had done very well, Umpily decided. There were hundreds of them. But in the end the odds had been impossibleZinixo had gathered four or five times as many. So now the rebels were kneeling to him. Probably every sorcerer in all Pandemia was here, loyal to the Almighty. The war was over. Never in the history of the world had anything like this happened before.

Who in the Name of Evil were those pointy-eared people? Umpily shot a nervous sideways glance at the young faun, but he was entranced by the spectacle unfolding on the floor and had apparently forgotten the mysterious mundane. How long until he remembered? The three dwarvish women were muttering excitedly together.

A rustle of movement . . . The defeated sorcerers had risen to their feet. They bowed once to the throne and were dismissed. They vanished from the floor. The seats between Umpily and the faun groaned in protest as two enormous halfnaked jotnar appeared on them; a pair of silken-garbed elves flickered in on his left. All over the Rotunda, places that had been empty were now filled. And down on the floor their departure had revealedWarlock Raspnex and an elf, who must surely be Warlock Lith’rian. Those two were kneeling. A group of others stood nearby—Shandie! Impress Eshiala and the child. And King Rap, with a blond woman who must be his wife—Umpily could recall seeing her at court many years ago, back in Ythbane’s time. And a gangly jotunn youth in sailor breeches. Was that the boy Shandie had seen in the pool? Umpily did not know and probably never would.

A slight disturbance amid the seats at the far side and Witch Grunth appeared on the floor alongside the other two wardens. She knelt, also.

Ex-wardens.

Zinixo had resumed his seat and was leering joyfully at this ragtag collection of captives. An eager hush settled over the Rotunda.

“We are merciful toward those who were misguided.” The usurper rubbed his massive hands. “But We draw the line at wardens. You three We shall deal with at Our leisure! We wish to be entertained. You will devise the program yourselves. You will propose for Our consideration the longest, most painful deaths you can imagine!”

Lith’rian bent over in obeisance. “We shall be honored,” he announced in an elf’s sweet tones, “to provide Your Godhood with any amusement we can.”

Raspnex and Grunth proclaimed their agreement together. Umpily shivered. They meant it! As votaries they would cooperate fully in their own executions if ordered to do so. “Stand aside now!” Zinixo commanded with a wave. ”Let us see what other fish we have caught in our net.”