The pain increased. It bubbled and boiled through him.
Drago felt himself explode as if in slow motion. He thought he actually saw bits of his tissue and organs spray about the chamber until the Questors and StarLaughter were covered in it. The children – the black-winged and visaged Hawkchilds – were clinging to pillars, writhing on the floor, sucking and licking, their hands clawed and scrabbling. Some of them, he observed with dying clarity, seemed to be growing beaks.
Well, too late for curiosity now. He was only a disembodied mind, watching with casual interest the disintegration of his body.
Had all the men and women and creatures who had died so his father could attain his dream of a reborn Tencendor suffered the way that he did now?
“I am so sorry. I wish I had been a better man.”
We regretted. We were consumed with regrets. It is nothing unusual. Use your grief and regret, Drago.
How?
You will help Caelum and Tencendor?
Yes, yes, yes.
In any way you can?
Yes, yes, yes.
Then listen to the Song we make.
And Drago opened his eyes, and blinked, and the Questors were gone, and the children and StarLaughter and her abominable baby were gone, and in their place stood a group of five people, three men and two women, their faces kindly and caring. One of them, an old, plump man with wispy white hair, reached out a hand in a farewell gesture.
“Farewell, Pilgrim,” he said. “Remember us from time to time.”
StarLaughter licked the blood off her fingers, tipped back her head, and screamed with joy. All were coated in blood, all licked, scraped, slurped in their efforts to consume as much of what had once been Drago as they could.
It tasted good.
More importantly, it tasted of power.
Sheol lifted her head. Her chin was slippery with blood. “We are here,” she said tonelessly.
They looked about. All traces of the chamber had gone. The orchard had gone. Any semblance of a world had gone. They stood surrounded by darkness, their feet standing on cold, flat nothingness. But over them, pulsating with energy, hung the Star Gate.
Through it they could see four or five faces staring down at them.
As they watched, the emerald and silver warding sighed, shimmered, and died.
“What time of day is it?” asked StarLaughter.
“Just gone noon,” Sheol whispered. “Not long now. Prepare yourselves.”
She clicked her fingers, and whistled to the flock of children swarming to one side.
“Come, come, my chicks. Spread your wings, taste the feel of the air. Soon you will be free to quest.”
Axis gagged, partly at the sudden cessation of the Star Dance – he had felt this only once before when he had “died” in the ice fields north of the Murkle Mountains -and partly in horror at what he could see through the Star Gate.
Pitch darkness, but there was a something within that darkness.
It bulged.
“It’s over,” said Adamon, just behind him. “It’s all over.”
Axis looked away from the horror in the Star Gate and gazed about the chamber.
The Circle of Star Gods were here.
Useless.
Some fifteen Enchanters, including StarDrifter, were here.
Useless.
Even Wolf Star was still here.
And he was as useless as the rest of them.
“What can we do?” Axis said, desolate. Azhure moved to his side and put her arms about him. She buried her face in his shoulder. She could not yet believe that all they were, all they had fought for, was teetering on the brink of absolute disaster.
“It is my son who has brought this on us!” Axis cried, and Azhure’s arms jerked tighter about him.
“My son!” And he screamed, arching his body back, the scream reverberating about the now pale, shadowed dome.
“No,” WolfStar said, stepping forward. “Blame the ancient ones who left us these repositories of misery. Blame them if you must blame anyone, Axis.”
“But-”
“WolfStar is right,” StarDrifter said tiredly from his corner. He had never thought to witness the day when he would support WolfStar. “Drago was only a means. The Demons would have found a way to get through eventually.”
“Then damn all stars in the universe that it had to be during my lifetime!” cried Xanon.
That drew a shaky laugh from Adamon. “Beloved, our lifetimes were – were – once forever. Of course they came during our lifetimes.”
“But not forever any more,” Azhure said, lifting her head and wiping the tears from her eyes. She’d only had forty years to live with immortality, but forty years had been enough to develop an affection for the everlasting.
“No,” Axis whispered. “Not forever at all. Mortal once more.”
He looked about the chamber, and laughed bitterly. “All of us! Mortal! Plain men and women. No power. No magic. No enchantment. No Star Dance! What shall we do in this new world, Azhure? Crawl about roofs replacing thatching to make ourselves feel useful?”
“Axis,” StarDrifter said, finally moving forward to look into the Star Gate. He grimaced, swallowed, and looked away. “That is enough. What we must needs discuss now is what we do now. These Demons ready themselves to break through. What do we do about it?”
“We can do nothing,” Wolf Star said.
“We must be able to do something!” Axis protested.
WolfStar shook his head, and looked at Adamon.
“Axis,” the once-God of the Firmament said, “they will slaughter us when they break through. They will want to ensure that we never, never rise again. They will want free rein through Tencendor.”
“But the Sceptre!”
“We will find another day to snatch it back,” Azhure said. “Adamon is right. If we are all bunched into this chamber when the Demons break through, then they will slaughter us all. Better to flee now so we can live to aid Caelum in his quest.”
“Caelum,” Axis suddenly said. “Gods! I asked Caelum to ride for the Star Gate!”
“You cursed fool!” WolfStar cried. “He’s our only hope, and you told him to ride here’)”
“I thought an army would be useful… I thought… oh, damn it! I did not think! We’ve got to warn him.”
“How?” StarDrifter said dryly. “Do you suggest we run or fly to him? Will we have time?”
“Enough!” Adamon said, taking charge. “We all need to get out of here, fast. I do not know how we are going to counter these demons, but I do know that we will be more useful alive than dead.”
“True,” WolfStar said. “We must leave. Now.” And he took a step towards one of the archways.
“WolfStar!” Adamon grabbed him by the arm. “I do not particularly care where you go, but for the moment you go nowhere near Caelum! With these Demons come over two hundred raging souls questing for your personal destruction. I do not want to risk them finding you with Caelum although, by the Stars, I truly don’t care whether or not they find you at all!”
“Oh,” WolfStar said, “I have enough to keep me busy for the moment without bothering Caelum.”
Axis took Azhure’s hand. “Azhure and I will go to him, Adamon. He is our son.”
Adamon nodded. “Be careful.” He grinned wanly at the stupidity of that remark. “Be careful, all of you. Run to whatever place you think safe. Later… later I will send word to you. We will regroup. We must, if Caelum is to prevail. Now, I suggest that we start to move. Now!”
The chamber of the Star Gate lay empty. Outside the sun dipped towards the west. The afternoon winked and woke.
Shadows suddenly started to shimmer over the dome of the chamber again.
But they were not blue – rather, black.
Beyond the Star Gate lay only blackness. But it was a blackness that rippled and writhed. Faces and hands and claw-tipped wings pressed against it, seeking to create the rent through which to enter.
Despair waited.
The two white donkeys, in their own indefinable way, accomplished more than any horse or even birdman could. As the noon-day sun faded into afternoon, the little blue cart pulled up at the edges of the Minstrelsea forest just above the Ancient Barrows.
“Faraday?” Zenith said. She sat uncomfortably, more afraid than she’d ever been in her life. She felt only emptiness where once had been the Star Dance. She was useless. A husk instead of a living entity.
“Hush, Zenith. We will be safe within the forest.” Faraday climbed down from the cart and unhitched the two donkeys, leaving them free to browse about the undergrowth. She patted their necks and whispered to them, then turned back to Zenith.
“I want you to stay here with the cart and donkeys,” she said.
Zenith blinked. “But I thought… at the Star Gate… you’d need me.”
She stopped, thought, and then smiled sadly. “But I am somewhat useless, am I not?”
Faraday took her hand between both of hers. “You are not useless, but you would be dead there, Zenith.”