I was about to ask him what was going on when I saw the shadow of a large ball pass before the opening through which I had fled. The flames-save for the central tower from the broken Fount-began to subside, and a deep rumbling sound came from within. Moments later an even larger circular shadow passed, and I began to feel the rumbling through the soles of my boots.
A wall tumbled. Shortly thereafter part of another wall fell. I could see inside fairly clearly through the dust and smoke the image of the giant ball passed again. The flames were snuffed. My Logrus vision still granted me glimpses of the shifting lines of power which flowed between Jasra and Sharu.
Mandor extended a hand. A minute or so later a small metal ball came bouncing our way, and he caught it. “Let’s head back,” he said. “It would be a shame to miss the end.”
We passed through one of the many gaps in the fence, and sufficient rubble filled the ditch at one point for us to walk across on it. I spent a barrier spell then, to keep the re-forming troops of the premises and out of our way for a time.
Entering through the broken wall, I saw that Jasra stood with her back to the tower of fire, her arms upraised. Streaks of sweat lined her face zebra through a mask of soot, and I could feel the pulsing of the forces which passed through her body. About ten feet above her, face purple and head twisted to one side as if his neck were broken, Sharu hung in the middle of the air. To the untutored he might have seemed magically levitated. My Logrus sight gave me view of the line of force from which he hung suspended, however, victim of what might, I suppose, be termed a magical lynching.
“Bravo,” Mandor stated, clapping his hands slowly and softly together.
“You see, Merlin? I’d have won that bet.”
“You always were a better judge of talent than I was,” I acknowledged.
“…and swear to serve me,” I overheard Jasra saying. Sharu’s lips moved.
“And swear to serve you,” he gasped.
She lowered her arms slowly, and the line of force which held him began to lengthen. As he descended toward the Keep’s cracked floor; her left hand executed a gesture similar to one I had once seen an orchestra conductor employ in encouraging the woodwinds, and a great gout of fire came loose from the Fountain, fell upon him, washed over him, and passed on down into the ground. Flashy, though I didn’t quite see the point…
His slow descent continued, as if someone in the sky were trolling for crocodiles. I discovered myself holding my breath as his feet neared the ground, in sympathetic anticipation of the eased pressure on his neck. This, however, did not come to pass. When his feet reached the ground, they passed on into it, and his descent continued, as if he were an occulted hologram. He sank past his ankles and up to his knees and kept going. I could no longer tell whether he was breathing. A soft litany of commands rolled from Jasra’s lips, and sheets of flame periodically separated themselves from the Fountain and splashed over him. He sank past his waist and up to his shoulders and slightly beyond. When only his head remained visible, eyes open but unfocused, she executed another hand move went, and his journey into the earth was halted.
“You are now the guardian of the Fount,” she stated, “answerable only to me. Do you acknowledge this?”
The darkened lips writhed.
“Yes,” came a whispered reply.
“Go now and bank the fires,” she ordered. “Commence your tenure.”
The head seemed to nod at the same time it began sinking again. After a moment only a cottony tuft of hair remained, and an instant later the ground swallowed this, too. The line of force vanished.
I cleared my throat. At the sound Jasra let her arms fall and turned toward me. She was smiling faintly.
“Is he alive or dead?” I asked, and then added, “Academic curiosity.”
“I’m not really certain,” she responded. “But a little of both, I think. Like the rest of us.”