Thieves World 4 – Storm Season by Asprin, Robert

whipped by his adversary’s black winds. Howls from the foreign Stormbringer’s

cloudy throat pummeled eardrums; people rolled to their stomachs and buried

their heads in their arms as the inconceivable cloud creature enveloped their

god, and blackness reigned. Thunder bellowed; the black cloud pulsed

spasmodically, lit from within.

In the tempest, Tempus shouted to Jihan, grabbed her arms in his hands: “Stop

this; you can do it. Your pride, and his, are not worth so many lives.” A

lightning bolt struck earth beside his foot, so close a blue sparkling

aftercharge nuzzled his leg.

She jerked away, palmed her hair back, stood glaring at him with red flecks in

her eyes. She shouted something back, her lips curled in a flash of light, but

the gods’ roaring blotted out her words. Then she merely turned her back to him,

raised her arms to heaven, and perhaps began to pray.

He had no more time for her; the god’s war was his; he felt the claw-cold blows

Stormbringer landed, felt Vashanka’s substance leeching away. Yet he set off

running, dodging cowerers upon the ground, adepts and nobles with their cloaks

wrapped about their heads, seeking his Stepsons: he knew what he must do.

He did not stop for arms or horses, when he found Niko and Janni, but set off

through the raging din toward the Avenue of Temples, where the child the man and

god had begotten upon the First Consort was kept.

Handsigns got them through until speech was useful, when they had run west

through the lawns and alleys, coming to Vashanka’s temple grounds from the back.