The Seventh Sentinel

by Mary Kirchoff

  Bram’s hands felt warm and soothing against the wound as he replied. “I’ve prepared something to keep Lyim occupied. He’ll have more than enough distractions to keep him busy.”

  Gradually, the gash in Guerrand’s leg closed up and the pain receded. When Bram withdrew his hands, he revealed a jagged pink scar. It was still surrounded by a bruise and swelling, but the wound was closed. Guerrand found that he could stand and walk without difficulty, though not without pain. With the sword thrust before him, the mage nodded his approval, then ran after Lyim through the door to the studio.

  Lyim attacked immediately as Guerrand entered the room. The gauntlet smashed Guerrand’s sword to the side, never letting the razor edge past its defense. Where the fist crashed into a wall it obliterated tiles and plaster as if it were a spiked mace. Guerrand found himself backed against a wall, dodging and slashing to evade the mighty blows.

  With the quickness of lightning, Lyim’s hand slammed Guerrand against the wall. The hand in the gauntlet clutched and squeezed at Guerrand’s windpipe. Gagging, the mage clawed at Lyim’s hand and swung wildly at his head. Guerrand felt cartilage popping in his neck. His lungs burned, and his vision swirled. With clinical detachment Guerrand realized he was suffocating.

  This was not how their quest was supposed to end! Guerrand’s mind cried in protest. He swung his fist again, roundhouse style, at Lyim’s head and almost connected. Lyim squeezed his throat harder, but Guerrand was too far gone for it to matter. As the light faded, he found it odd that his last thought was to wonder what was moving behind Lyim.

  The squeezing stopped so abruptly Guerrand fell to the floor, clutching his bruised windpipe. He coughed until at last he could swallow again. Gasping, tears streaming from his eyes, Guerrand’s first thought was to look for Lyim. But the potentate was nowhere nearby.

  Guerrand’s head jerked around at the sound of Lyim’s anguished screams coming from the bedchamber. Guerrand scrambled to the door in time to see Lyim, a dun-colored blur, running the length of the chamber, followed by a black cloud.

  “Bees!” Guerrand rasped aloud. Bram was crouched by the door, a smile of triumph on his face, while Lyim dashed about like a madman, trying to escape the swarm of bees, hornets, and wasps summoned by Bram’s magic.

  “It took some time to gather a swarm of sufficient size,” Bram explained. “They will harry him unmercifully, and by the time they disperse, he may well be helpless.”

  With blind fury Lyim grasped and swatted at the stinging insects. Each blow killed several, but there were hundreds, all bent on just one thing: stinging Lyim to death. The potentate smashed into walls, rolled on the floor, yet there was no escape. Anger and pain were indistinguishable in his screams.

  Guerrand’s eyes searched the floor for his sword. He spotted it near the bed, where Lyim had dashed it with the gauntlet. He took a step and nearly toppled over from dizziness. Recalling the tile exercise from his days as Justarius’s apprentice, he focused past the pain to reach for the sword. He limped toward the weapon until it rested in his hand. Guerrand held it aloft, intending to run it through Lyim.

  Stepping up alongside Guerrand, Bram touched the sword. A bright red flame, so hot it made Guerrand’s face tingle, extended from Bram’s finger and raced along the curving blade. It swirled and hissed along the whole length of the sword, forcing Guerrand to extend the weapon farther in front of himself.

  Bram placed his hand over Guerrand’s on the sword’s grip. “Plunge that through Lyim’s chest,” he said gravely.

  The potentate, his face splotched with a hundred stings and welts, howled like a wild animal. He flailed his way through one of the blue velvet-covered archways that Guerrand assumed led outside to a balcony, like the one from which Lyim had addressed the citizens of Qindaras.

  Guerrand exchanged looks with his nephew before charging after Lyim. The mage crashed through the heavy velvet curtain, sword firmly in hand, ready for whatever lay beyond. Outside, a wind raged so fiercely that Guerrand was nearly knocked from his feet. He held fast to the curtains and blinked against the wind that dried his eyes in a heartbeat. The flames on the sword snapped tautly in the wind but continued burning.

  Lyim stood facing Guerrand across a wide balcony. He clung to the railing with his gloveless hand for support, his face red and swollen from insect bites. His tunic flapped like a white sail against the backdrop of black, whirling storm clouds. The potentate’s gauntleted hand was held high above his head, as if he threatened the sky itself.

  Guerrand realized in a flash that Lyim, in fact, did. The stinging bees were gone now, driven off by the wind Lyim had summoned with the gauntlet.

  Guerrand gripped his sword, finding reassurance in the solid feel of it. Gritting back the pain in his throat, he charged Lyim before his fear had time to find voice.

  But as he lunged, Lyim also sprang and grabbed the flaming sword with his gauntleted hand. There was a sizzle and a burning smell, but Lyim’s grip held firm. Yanking hard, he sent Guerrand sprawling forward off balance, then released the sword. The mage crashed into the railing at the edge of the balcony, and his momentum carried him over. His left hand locked onto the railing while his right held doggedly to the sword.

  Lyim watched Guerrand cruelly for a number of heartbeats, obviously enjoying the sight of his enemy kicking and struggling for a better handhold on the rail. The mage refused to cry out, but his grip was slipping. He couldn’t hold on long. He clung tenaciously, refusing to give in even as his fingers burned when the flesh tore away from the muscle.

  Lyim’s gauntleted hand flashed out and grabbed Guerrand by the left wrist. His grip was unbearably strong, his grin unbearably malignant, as he pried Guerrand’s hand from the railing. Still grinning, he held his arm straight out, suspending Guerrand over the edge of the balcony.

  Feeling strangely weightless, the mage risked a glance over his shoulder. He dangled at least three stories above the flagstone courtyard where Lyim had addressed his subjects. Startled citizens of Qindaras began to gather and look up in bewilderment.

  The view was not entirely new to him, Guerrand realized with neither surprise nor fear. He had been witness to a similar scene in the darkness of the Dream, when the citizens of Palanthas watched a mage give his life for his Art.

  “Both of you stay back, or I drop your beloved Rand,” Lyim threatened above the gale that still raged.

  But Guerrand could see that behind Lyim, Bram was already preparing another spell. They had agreed beforehand that if Lyim could be maneuvered outside, Bram would unleash one of his most powerful spells. By Bram’s description, the balcony and everyone on it would be incinerated. Until this point, Guerrand had doubted that Bram could go through with it. Clearly there was no escape from this situation for Guerrand, but he knew the anguish Bram would feel over being the instrument of his uncle’s death.

  “Do it, Bram,” Guerrand rasped from over the edge. He recalled with great comfort the vial Dagamier had prepared on his request, hidden inside his tunic since leaving his study in Thonvil. Now he only hoped it would survive long enough to fulfill its purpose.

  The wind died abruptly. “Drop the sword, Rand, and I’ll pull you up,” Lyim offered, his tone cool, slick even. Still he kept his back turned to Bram, standing near the curtained doorway.

  Before Guerrand could respond, he heard Kirah shout. She had grasped Bram’s staff and was trying to wrestle it from his grip. “You’ll kill Guerrand, too!”

  “Which one of them are you really trying to save?” With a mighty tug, Bram wrenched his staff free, then grabbed Kirah and pinned her arms to her sides. He tried to hold her, but she broke free and tumbled to the floor near the railing of the balcony. Guerrand saw the look on Bram’s face and knew that the spell was now hopelessly ruined, impossible to cast.

  Kirah looked upward at the stony-faced potentate. “Please, Lyim. You promised to release them. Nothing that’s happened here has to change that. I’ll stay as long as you want if you’ll just do
as you promised and let them go!”

  Lyim didn’t respond, just looked at the elaborate gauntlet on his hand with an odd mixture of loathing and lust. Guerrand knew as well as Lyim that everything had changed. Lyim had been betrayed in spirit by Ventyr. Guerrand considered the sizable crowd below. There was no turning back for any of them.

  Lyim’s silence brought Kirah’s pale, tear-streaked face to the rail. “Please, Guerrand, do whatever he asks. Is this really worth giving your life for?”

  Through the haze of pain and unreality, Guerrand realized that stopping Lyim was worth his life.

  It’s still not too late for both of us to benefit from this unfortunate situation, the soft voice of Ventyr said. Agree to his terms, and another opportunity to slay him will arise. I will help you.

  Her words rang so familiar to the mage. At what cost? he asked the voice in his mind.

  Only that you remember the help I have given you to achieve your goal.

  Guerrand felt a rare flash of crystal clarity; he knew where he had heard such words before. The mage could almost feel the heat of Nuitari’s thumbprint on the hem of his tunic. If he listened to the gauntlet and killed Lyim to become potentate, he would be repaying Nuitari by increasing the influence of evil on Krynn. It would mean the prophesy of the Dream had come true—he would have taken the final step toward evil.

  At last Guerrand understood the purpose of the Dream.

  “You don’t have a choice, if you want to live!” cried Kirah.

  Guerrand looked straight up into Lyim’s eyes as he said, “Everything in life is a choice.” With that, Guerrand summoned strength born of righteous purpose and slashed upward with the hot-bladed sword.

  It sliced clean through Lyim’s wrist above the gauntlet.

  The potentate howled with rage and pain, but Guerrand had moved beyond hearing. Weight returned to the mage instantly. He tumbled downward, still clutching the stump of Lyim’s hand in the gauntlet.

  For the brief flight toward the cobblestones, Guerrand felt freer than he had since his youth, before magic, before the Dream, since before he’d been marked by Nuitari’s thumb. Today he had settled every question and thwarted every enemy. He finally understood the mind of Rannoch, the mage who had thrown himself from the Tower of High Sorcery for love of the Art.

  All in all, as the barbarians said, it was a good day to die.

  The horrified citizens of Qindaras who witnessed Guerrand’s plunge to his death were undoubtedly puzzled by the smile that lit his face to the last.

  As if in a dream, Bram saw Lyim’s gauntleted hand fly away against a faint spattering of stars over the city. He watched as the severed stump of Lyim’s arm gushed with every beat of his black heart. For a blackguard, Lyim screamed like a woman.

  Bram staggered to the rail of the parapet and gasped. His uncle had already hit the ground. The gathered crowd was swarmed around Guerrand’s crumpled body, obscuring Bram’s view. He closed his eyes. There was no way a man could have survived such a fall to hard flagstone.

  Bram’s heart filled with rage. He spun around for the man responsible, but Lyim was gone from the parapet. Bram dashed through billowing curtains. The bedchamber beyond was empty; bloody footprints were everywhere. Lyim had taken Kirah with him as a hostage. Bram recalled the palace’s endless corridors and chambers, and his heart constricted. It could take him days to find them.

  His mind leaped to an image of Guerrand out on the flagstones. Perhaps there was something he could do for him first. The least he could do was to keep the crowd from desecrating his uncle’s body.

  Yanking down the curtains, Bram quickly stripped away the coils of decorative sash cord. He knotted one end to the railing and tossed the rest over, noting that it reached within easy dropping distance of the ground. The crowd noted it, too, and closed in.

  Bram waved his staff across the plaza. A ball of light formed at the staff’s tip and raced away from the balcony. Above the crowd the light split into dozens of tiny lights. Each streaked toward a different person, surrounding its target in shimmering, soft fire. Bram knew that the simple faerie light was harmless, but it was more than the magic-wary citizens of Qindaras were willing to risk. All those immediately near Guerrand fled in panic. Bram stepped over the railing and slid down the sash cord to the courtyard.

  Guerrand lay on his back in a splash of red blood that was slowly spreading along the narrow canals between flagstones. Both of his legs were clearly twisted and broken, as was his sword.

  Bram expected to see his uncle holding the gauntlet, but Guerrand’s hands were empty. Several small bits of broken glass spilled out from beneath his tangled cloak; something he carried there must have smashed upon impact.

  “I vowed to stay until the job was done, with or without you, and that’s what I intend to do,” Bram said solemnly, his throat thick. He reached out a trembling hand and gently closed his uncle’s eyes for the last time.

  Find the gauntlet, he told himself, trying desperately to focus his thoughts. He scanned the nearby area, but saw nothing. Enough time had passed that someone in the crowd could have already grabbed the glove containing the potentate’s severed hand. Perhaps it bounced farther afield than Bram anticipated. Or it could have landed under Guerrand’s body.

  Bending down again, Bram reached out tentatively to move his uncle’s broken body. Suddenly, the ground started to rumble gently beneath his feet. He glanced up toward where people had been fleeing the courtyard, but those who remained, at a safe distance, seemed in no hurry to leave.

  That would change drastically in a heartbeat, when the crowd would clear like smoke on a windy day.

  The quaking continued, growing to the point where it couldn’t be ignored. Bram clambered to his feet and spun around in time to see jagged slabs of rock sliding down from the upper floors of the palace. He was too stunned to flee with the few remaining citizens who ran screaming from the courtyard as the palace began collapsing in upon itself.

  The unbelievable scene reminded Bram of Guerrand’s description of the destruction of Bastion. His uncle had described in vivid detail how the magical mortar that held the great nave together had vaporized, only to coalesce as living vapors. Those monstrosities streaked through the air, shrieking and wailing and attacking whatever they encountered. In a short time they had torn the building down until no two stones were stacked on top of each other.

  Were the gods of magic destroying the Palace of Qindaras, just as they had their own stronghold? Or had Lyim gone completely mad and was killing himself, taking everything nearby with him? Including Kirah.

  Then Bram remembered Justarius’s admonition: the palace would not survive if the gauntlet were removed from it without the potentate. Guerrand had found a way to make that happen.

  If he hoped to find the gauntlet, Bram would have to search fast, before the courtyard was covered with rubble. Rocks were tumbling dangerously close. With an eye toward the crumbling palace, Bram frantically hauled up on Guerrand’s shoulders and groped beneath his body. There was nothing but blood under the dead mage.

  Bram’s gaze was caught by a small plume of strange, purple smoke rising slowly from his uncle’s cloak. Bram watched as the smoke spewed out faster, accumulating above Guerrand. The swirling smoke took shape and became solid. It was a winged creature, larger than Bram, with massive arms and red, glowing eyes. Its skin was dark and rough, its hands large and clawed. Tusks protruded between thick, cracked lips.

  The creature glanced down at Guerrand’s shattered form and grunted. Its red eyes fell next on Bram; the creature snatched him up in its hot, scratchy arms. Bram barely managed to hang on to his staff as the hideous beast’s wings spread wide and it raced across the courtyard, away from the disintegrating palace.

  Bram struggled against the creature’s hold, but his strength was like a child’s next to the massive sinews of the animal. It ran several paces, then hopped into the air with its wings spread. Gusts of air from the beating wings rushed past Bram’s f
ace. He kicked and punched against the unyielding hide until his knuckles bled. He strained to grasp his staff and cast a spell, but the creature seemed to realize the staff’s importance; the wooden rod was wrested from Bram’s grip. Then the creature balled up its melon-sized fist and, with a small rap, knocked its cargo unconscious.

  * * * * *

  Bram awoke with a start, instantly aware that he was no longer being carried. He sat up and looked around, surprised when he recognized his surroundings. The creature had unceremoniously deposited him at the doorstop to Bastion. Bram saw no sign of the winged beast against the breathtaking panorama of pine trees and majestic rock cliffs. The magical creature had obviously flown with its unconscious burden a great distance at someone’s behest.

  He had a growing notion who was responsible for his premature departure from Qindaras.

  Bram’s guess was confirmed when the great mirrored door behind him opened. A leg clad in black silk robes stepped out, followed by the rest of the woman. “Hello, Bram,” Dagamier said calmly.

  “Hello?” he repeated, his head pounding. “What am I doing here, Dagamier? That creature dragged me away before I could kill Lyim!”

  “Lyim’s not dead?” she asked, startled.

  “No,” he rasped, “but Guerrand is!” Dagamier showed no surprise at Bram’s revelation. He explained the situation that existed when he was dragged from the courtyard beneath Lyim’s palace by the winged creature.

  The wizardess pressed slim fingers to her lips and turned away briefly. “Guerrand must have fallen on the vial I prepared for him,” she muttered.

  “What vial?” Bram demanded. He recalled the broken glass he had seen on the flagstones by Guerrand’s body.

  Dagamier paused to form her thoughts. “Guerrand pulled me aside just before you both left when you agreed to the Council’s request. He asked if I could think of a way to draw you safely from Qindaras, something he could activate himself when he deemed the moment right. I suggested a crystal vial, stoppered with lead, containing a creature with instructions to bring you here, much like a homing pigeon delivering a message.”