Skull Gate (24 page)

Gel nodded.

The wizard closed his eyes, said to Frost, “Draw the dagger."

“What?” Kimon and Tras Sur'tian shouted simultaneously and started for her.

“Stop!” Her voice was a thunderclap that echoed loudly in the sanctum. She fixed them with her gaze. “Don't interfere. Just do exactly what he tells you.” She glared at Tras. “You want to save Aki? Then obey him.” She shifted her attention to Kimon. “If you value my life, obey. Nothing else."

Both men looked properly chastened. She called over her shoulder to Onokratos, “Let's get on with it."

The demon's hand touched the nape of her neck. His taloned fingers made brief, gentle, massaging strokes. He bent close and whispered so only she could hear, “Thee has my admiration, woman."

“I could care less,” she answered, not bothering to pitch her voice low. Sweat beaded in her palms as the worms of doubt and fear ate away her resolve. “It's your insanity that's made this necessary."

“Not mine,” whispered the demon. “I am but a tool for Onokratos to use.” He took his hand away. “But it is necessary if thee wishes to save the children. I see no other course."

Nor did she, and that embittered her. She could taste her own anger like a black, choking bile. The demon claimed he was a tool, but he was not the only one. Onokratos was using them all, using them to save his Kalynda. She gripped the hilt of her sword and swore. However this adventure turned out, she would make him pay. If she had to come back from hell, back from the very pit of darkness, she would make him pay.

Her grip shifted to Demonfang. She heard the breathing of her comrades, saw Tras Sur'tian's eyes widen ever so slightly. They knew the dagger's power and feared it. She shared that fear. But there was no turning back. She gritted her teeth and jerked the blade free.

Shrieking filled the chamber, long, horrible screams that froze the blood in her veins, made her skin crawl. Never had the sound seemed so shrill, so chilling. Demonfang shivered in her grasp, demanding its due.

“The point!” she heard the wizard call, his words barely distinguishable over the din. “Turn it toward you! Look at it!"

A new sound rose faintly amid the screaming, and she realized it was herself, whimpering and moaning like a frightened child. She bit hard on her lip to stop it, and the salty warm taste of blood filled her mouth. Slowly she rotated the dagger, holding it at arm's length. The point glittered wickedly in the candlelight.

The dagger writhed. Its screeching rang louder, more intense. She'd never felt its power so strong before! Something flowed into her mind, dominating her will.

Blood! It senses my blood!
She licked the crimson trickle that ran down her lip.

A red glaze descended over her vision. Through it, she saw a bearded, aging soldier. His chest offered an inviting target. Dimly, she realized that she was moving, turning, for next she looked on the wizard, the cause of all her troubles. Then the demon; his inhuman blood would make a feast for Demonfang. Finally, she faced Kimon, the insolent whelp who'd come like a shadow in the night to kill her.

So much blood! So much blood to quench the dagger's thirst!

Demonfang twisted in her hand, rose high to strike. She no longer controlled her movements, but part of her mind knew what must happen. With the last of her fading will, she cried out, barely aware of her streaming tears, “Onokratos!"

The wizard's voice exploded over the dagger's screaming: one word, the demon's name.

A new power surged through her. She could see energy, like a nimbus of scarlet radiance rushing around her, freeing her from Demonfang's entrancement. Her will was her own again. The shrieking diminished, faded, unsatisfied. The room was silent except for the raspy breathing of her uneasy friends and the pulsing blood that roared in her ears.

She turned to face Onokratos. It gratified her to find him pale and sweating as much as she. He swallowed hard. “Gel has control of it,” he announced. She smiled at the trepidation in his voice. “Now, gaze at the point. Turn it toward you."

She turned it toward him, and her smile broadened. But Gel was there between them.

She recalled the first time the demon had stilled her unholy weapon. The effort had taken a toll on him. How long could he hold out this time before the dagger's power reasserted itself?

A thousand doubts and fears tormented her. All too late. There was nothing but to go on. The dagger was drawn. It must be used. It turned, this time at her willing. Firelight danced along its keen edge.

“Gel will release the blade's power very gradually until an equilibrium is struck between its magic and his.” Onokratos spoke rapidly. A sign of his own fear? Or his own doubt in the demon's ability? “You'll hear the screaming again, the dagger demanding blood. But Gel won't let you strike. It should happen then."

“What should happen?” Kimon questioned.

“Your presence is all that's needed,” the wizard chided harshly. “That, and your silence."

The first scream, faint and far-sounding, touched her ears. She shivered, or was it the slightest tingle from Demonfang? The scream sounded again, not one but many voices, the cries of souls in torment. Yes, it was Demonfang that trembled in her hand. She felt it slowly trying to bend her will. Suddenly the shrieking swelled louder than she had ever heard it; a scarlet haze blocked her sight, and she feared Gel had failed completely. Black thoughts crept to the fore of her mind, and she considered again the dagger's potential victims.

But she did not strike. The point remained hovering before her eyes. It swayed rhythmically, a steel serpent mesmerizing its prey. It commanded, begged for satiation, but was denied.

She felt caught in a vise: ordered to kill, but unable to obey. She cried out. It was tearing her apart. Pain racked every part of her. Tears scalded her cheeks, ran in rivulets down her face and throat.

Then, the pain ended.

She stared at her own body. Her face was still contorted with the agony of soul separation. Her knuckles were white and bloodless from clutching Demonfang. Veins and muscles showed livid beneath her straining, sweat-drenched flesh.

She studied her new body, identical to her mortal casement, but surrounded by a silvery glow. A slender thread of purest light stretched from her new navel to her old one, linking body and soul.

She had experienced this marvel once before. She had achieved astral form and was ready for travel where human flesh could never go.

She looked at the dagger's point, sensing something there. A tiny ebon gleam rippled, caused by no earthly light. It grew as she watched, became an oval of shining darkness. From that darkness came the screaming.

This was the gate Onokratos had hoped for and she had dreaded. The screams were the tortured souls of the damned calling to her. Beyond, Orchos waited. She could feel his presence in the dark.

She knew the gate would close when Gel's strength began to wane. She turned to her friends to bid them a silent farewell. They did not move. Some spell held them suspended in time.

There was no time to waste.

She leaped into the void.

 

 

 

 

Chapter Twelve

 

She flew through an infinite night, trailing the tenuous silvery band, the lifeline to her mortal body. Its elasticity seemed as limitless as the darkness. She flew aimlessly, without reference points, guided by some preternatural instinct. Sometimes she felt a piercing cold; sometimes incredible heat seared her astral form. Neither radiated from an obvious source. Once, she thought she felt the leathery brush of unseen wings that paralleled her flight.

Most of all, she felt a growing loneliness. She would glance over her shoulder to reassure herself the soul-thread remained unsevered. She would strain for a glimpse of the dimly perceived portal through which she'd come. Then, she saw him waiting. Enormous beyond imagining, his eyes shone like furious emeralds in a dispassionate face. His hand reached out to enclose her. She swerved, but the hand was there, fingers opening, engulfing her in a mighty fist.

She expected the fingers to squeeze, crush out her life. Instead, they began to glow. Tiny flames sprang up, swelled, licked at her. She felt the heat, though her astral Body seemed immune to pain. She heard a scream, then more screams, long and protracted shrieks of despair that grew louder and more anguished as the moments passed.

Demonfang was in another world, she realized. She knew where these sounds originated.

Something solid materialized beneath her feet. Through the fire images began to form. Sulfurous rocks near at hand; in the distance, black mountains reared rebelliously against a burning sky. All she could hear was screaming. It rose around her like a wave of despondency. She couldn't shut it out. It bombarded her senses. She stared frantically left and right, trying to penetrate the fiery veil that blurred her vision.

When her sight cleared, she clapped a hand to her mouth to stifle the cry that bubbled in her throat. The mountains she glimpsed were twisted, fantastic shapes, unearthly. Far worse sights assailed her eyes.

She stood on a narrow, stony path. On either side stretched vast shallows of liquid flame, dotted by small islands and stalagmite formations. Horrible, malformed creatures splashed and thrashed. Dark smoke whirled in eddies over the surface, choking them. Fumaroles erupted with sudden, explosive power, spewing steam and lava.

They saw her, those execrable souls of once living men. They began to lurch, wade, swim toward her, arms outstretched and begging, blackened fingers grasping and dripping, eyes imploring.

The eyes were unbearable, filled with suffering, haunting and ghastly, reflecting things and visions she could not dream of or imagine. She tried to avoid them, but wherever she turned she met those eyes.

She ran, following the only path, a low and treacherous ridge made more dangerous by streams and puddles of fire. She leaped each obstacle as she encountered it and ran. Everywhere, the creatures looked up and saw her and followed, screaming, tears of fire burning their charred faces. She heard the sloughing of the scalding lake as they pursued, the scrape and rasp of scorched and crusted meat as they dragged themselves over incandescent rock, around steaming boulders, always reaching for her. She grabbed for a sword that wasn't there, bit her lip, and ran.

In frustration, some of the creatures seized the shining thread of her lifeline. They pulled, trying to break it; when that failed they chewed it.

She felt no pain. Yet, could she take the chance they might damage the cord and doom her to this place forever? Though swordless, she was not without skills. They repulsed her, and she feared to touch them, but fear of spending eternity among them drove her. She spun, determined to combat.

Turn not away.

She whirled again at the sound of another voice. She knew him at once. Orchos, death god, huntsman, lord of the nine hells. He stood on the path, blocking her way. His green eyes flickered with hints of fire. They held her with hypnotic power.

Welcome, daughter.

His lips did not move when he spoke, yet she heard him. He gestured to the creatures closing around.
My minions work to no avail. They would sever thy soul-thread and keep thee here to share their suffering.

She found herself in control of her body once more. “Can they break it?"

The closing of yon portal may snap it. Naught else.

She swallowed, recalling her reason for traveling here, searching for words to win a god to her cause. “Lord Orchos—"

He interrupted.
The athame thee calls Demonfang brought thee to this lowest, most vile of all hells. Thee need not remain where only the worst of man must dwell.

From his eyes a thick mist exuded, swirling around her. The lake of fire and its miserable denizens vanished. Streaming damp fog, cold and cloying, obscured everything. She checked the soul-thread. She could no longer see its end or the portal to her world.

Orchos stepped out of the mist. No longer did flames twinkle in the green of his eyes. They were smoky jade.

“Lord of worms, where are we?"

His thoughts were gentle in her head, so unlike what she'd expected from the dread deity.
Thee numbers it hell's third level. Above are the levels of reward. Below, of punishment. To this plane only I occasionally hold court for selected souls from other regions of my kingdom.
He bowed deeply; mist eddied around his arm as he made a grandiose gesture.
And daughter, thee has done me such honor, heaped souls on my altar of steel, that I am bound to honor thee with pageantry!

At Orchos's beckoning, another figure emerged from the mist. She peered as the newcomer drew nearer. Suddenly, she cried out.

“Burdrak!” She flung her arms wide to embrace her friend and weapons master.

Daughter, nay!
Thunder in her brain. Her muscles locked; she couldn't move.
Thee are yet living, but they are dead. They may not answer thy speech; thee may not touch them.
Her body was her own again.

Burdrak's shade bowed, moved on, disappearing in the mist as another took his place.

Her heart broke. Astral tears spilled from astral eyes. “Oh, gods, my father!” A trembling seized her as she gazed on those familiar, grizzled features and the sword wound that still gaped in his chest. She clenched her hands tightly against her sides, yearning to feel those arms holding her once more, to kiss those lips that used to smile and tell her stories. “Father, forgive me!” she implored him. Like Burdrak, he bowed and stepped wordlessly past her, vanished.

The shrouding mist parted for a third time. She knew even before she saw the face. “What game is this, corpse-maker?” she called bitterly as she regarded her brother's spirit. A sword wound also scarred his chest. She'd carved it there.

No game, daughter.
Orchos's voice was a soft whisper, a distant echo of a dying wind.
Thee it was dispatched these souls to hell. Their greatest torment is to see thee lives after. Only a small part; not all suffer alike.