by Gary Gygax
"In all the multiverse, nothing is free, and all must bear some cost," Timmil countered. "Come, then; let us see who shall handle the reckoning!" So challenging, the priest loosed one of his most potent spells against the demon, as Shabriri cast forth his own power to sunder the enchantment that protected Timmil from his fangs and talons.
Allton had not fared quite so well as his comrade. Pazuzeus had leaped into the air, circled at blinding speed, and struck with a blast of air that took the archmage from the rear so unexpectedly as to knock him sprawling on his face. The potent staff Allton held was knocked from his grasp and sent rolling away in the course of the attack. The spell-worker was not so dazed, though, as to be powerless, and as the demon plummeted down for a killing attack. Allton released a barrage of energy at the winged beast. There came a half-dozen or more little bolts, shining streaks of positive energy that struck the arched chest of the demon with snapping cracks as each took its toll.
Pazuzeus swerved and faltered momentarily, giving Allton enough time to roll and scramble erect. He stood in time to face a pair of lightning bolts from the angry demon's outstretched arms.
Pazuzeus grinned evilly as the electricity shot out and took his foe just as the human's little darts of burning energy had struck him. His malign glee was quickly transferred into a hawklike shriek of pain and rage, however, as much of his own lightning arced back from the mage to play around his multiwinged body.
The mage was protected against his powers, Pazuzeus knew, but not well enough. In the blow and return, the human had suffered much, while the innate force of the elder demon had dissipated most of the harmful effects of the encounter. Pazuzeus would be more circumspect in his applications henceforth, but in a battle of attrition, the mighty netherbeing knew that he would prevail. Just as Shabriri sought to use brute force to slay his opponent, so too Pazuzeus now rushed to seize and destroy Allton.
From his distant but magically close vantage point, the demonurgist contentedly watched the initial and subsequent exchanges with relish. Gravestone was content that his demon-thralls were suffering punishment from the two humans. Let both understand just how deadly even such lesser men as those could be in mortal combat. Shabriri and Pazuzeus would both be more obedient after this.
The priest-wizard had little doubt that they would triumph. But if the unlikely happened, and the so-called heroes who had thought to confront him personally began to get the upper hand, Gravestone would intervene directly. He had a carefully stored reserve of dweomer prepared. It could be tapped instantly, and then there would be no contest at all. "Let us see something exciting!" he shouted. That statement was simply meant as general encouragement to all concerned. Gravestone was rewarded with a ferocious melee between the many-eyed Shabriri and the staunch Timmil.
It was painful, even damaging, but Shabriri broke through the screen that hedged the high priest. As the demon sought to grab the man who stood unflinchingly before him, there was a nasty surprise, for the staff held by the cleric did more than send forth magical forces. Its metal-shod foot caught Shabriri squarely on his massive, horny knee with such force that the demon was toppled backward and sent into convulsions of writhing agony. Despite that, one of his massive hands swiped out, and as Shabriri fell, the razor-keen talons sliced crimson tracks across the face of his opponent. The demon concentrated, expending some of his power to ease the pain and repair the damage caused by the magically enhanced blow he had suffered.
Timmil had nearly lost both eyes. He was wounded seriously, and blood from the wounds caused by the demon's raking nails was making him virtually blind. Thus the high priest was unable to take advantage of the opportunity presented to him when Shabriri broke off the attack. Instead, he too expended some of his forces to cast a healing upon his own flesh. It was an easy enough thing to do, and it required no effort and little time.
When he finished and could see clearly again, Timmil was greeted by the sight of his monstrous adversary erect and grinning a fiendish grin. "Blow and return, it would seem, you dark dungheap of perdition," the cleric said calmly. "But your breaking the protective ward cost you more dearly than you know!" The last was said with triumph, and to punctuate the claim. Timmil loosed a combination of word and rune, the one spoken as the other was etched in the air in green-gold with the clerics talisman bearing right hand.
A cloud of intense black appeared instantly around Shabriri as the demon understood what was occurring. He knew that in his desire to rend the hated priest into bloody bits, his impetuous action in forcing himself through the guarding magical globe had stripped him of his own protections against dweomers sent by the cleric. "Korb! Haklo! Meemgul!" He shouted, even as the inky darkness surrounded Shabriri.
The power of the syllables spoken by Timmil made the ebony obscurement vanish, to be replaced by a storm of silvery motes. Those nearest Shabriri attacked the demon as if they were wasps. The priest smiled grimly as he saw the demon dance and howl as the thing tried to beat away the fiery tormentors. The glowing glyph he had drawn was likewise still extant. That saved the cleric's life, for in the next moment appeared a trio of ghastly, chimerical demon-things.
These lesser beasts were thralls of Shabriri, just as the elder demon had been forced into servitude to Gravestone. They had been brought to their master's side by the utterance of their actual names. Terrible indeed were these three, and their numbers would have served to finish Timmil then and there; but the symbol that hung in incandescent glory in the air struck them as they appeared. The lesser demons were frozen into agonizing immobility by its force.
"Banished forever. Korb. Haklo, and Meemgul, too! Torment and dark doom upon you eternally in the stinking cesses of your home!" The high priest too had their true names, given to him by the very cry of their master. Shabriri. There was a hideous sound as the exorcising magic seized the three and jerked their life forces back to the lowest portions of the abyss.
"You fecal-headed pig fornicator!" That was a mild thing for Shabriri to shout, but the raging fury that filled him spoke volumes. He belched a cloud of poisonous gas as he came forth, leaping and roaring, to grapple with his hated foe. Long and long had the three chimerical ones been his. Now, stripped of their vassalage, humiliated, weakened in imagined and real power, Shabriri had only one choice. He must kill the demon-baiter, Timmil, and return to his own plane with the corpse of the priest or else be forever consigned to lesser status and ever-shrinking power.
"Much better! Much, much better!" The words sounded as if they were spoken in his ears, but Tim-mil knew that they came from the distant form of Gravestone as the demonurgist lay back in obscene relaxation, ministered to unspeakably as he watched the spectacle. Ignoring his tormentor's words. Timmil met the elder demon's rush with the full might of his blessed, glory-filled staff. Although the great monster was twice the priest's height and ten times his weight, Timmil wore magical armor of finest make. His determination, weapon, and plate mail made the match an even contest. Demon and cleric sparred, struck, cast spells and circled in a dancelike routine of deadly intent.
Pazuzeus had attempted to change his own opponent's flesh into stone, force the mage into submission by sheer mental strength, rot the man's eyeballs with a sickly green ray, as well as to wound Allton by blows from his taloned feet and iron-nailed hands. In turn, the battered mage had somehow not only managed to resist but actually serve out more punishment to the demoniacal foe than he took.
Both archmage and elder demon knew that certain of their powers would not function on this demi-plane of Gravestone's creation, so rather than take the chance of wasting critical energies and precious time with something that would prove fruitless, both kept to basic assaults. Allton sent forth spells and struck blows with his mage's thick staff. Pazuzeus used his innate powers, both mental and magical, to assail the human, occasionally meleeing with the fellow so as to prevent the employment of some greater dweomer by the spell-binder.
The demon was now aware that Allton could see and k
now energy sources and uses. This ability put the mage at an advantage here, and the four-winged monster began to feel unease, fear. No mere human should be so puissant in the face of one as mighty as Pazuzeus!
"You two lumps of shit disappoint me!" The rebuke was clear to men and demons as well. Gravestone was again speaking, this time clearly disturbed that the gladiatorial combats were taking so long and still hanging in the balance. "Show me that you have testicles, both of you! Finish the fart-smudges; stop playing with them. Do it now, Shabriri, Pazuzeus, or else…" The demonurgist let his angry warning fade into what both of his thralls knew was no empty threat.
The effect was quite the opposite of what Gravestone had desired. The words he had grated out distracted both of the elder demons. A tiny distraction was all that either of their adversaries needed. The archmage was hurt, bloody, near exhaustion, but from somewhere deep within himself, Allton managed to draw up a reserve of energy. Flashing into supernormal speed, he struck Pazuzeus a stunning blow with his magical staff, then dropped it and jerked forth an egg-shaped thing of iron. With an exclamation of desperate hope, Allton hurled it squarely at the proto-demon's feather-crested head. "Die, dark-spawn!"
Pazuzeus's reflexes were superb. He ducked his head with a motion too quick for a human eye to see, shrieking his own glee as he did so. The missile would have no chance to strike him, and the dolt had tossed his deadly staff aside, too!
The glee turned to stark terror in the next instant, for the sphere suddenly froze in mid-air. From it shot thick tongues of metal, iron bands that caged and held Pazuzeus. The unyielding metal was proof against the demon's power, and the bonds constricted to crush him into helplessness.
Simultaneously, the high priest employed his most potent weapon against Shabriri. As the red-orbed elder demon had his attention drawn by Gravestone's threatening voice, Timmil spoke a word and his own staff sprang into two. Each portion was a rodlike weapon. The one that was held in the cleric's left hand sent forth a blinding beam of hot, golden radiance brighter than the sun itself. The right-hand portion shed a cone of cool, soothing dimness. Each seemed a living thing unto itself.
With sweeping motions, Timmil plied the solar rod as if it were a broom. The palpable touch of the brightness sent Shabriri cringing and scurrying back. The demon was being moved inexorably into the umbral cone projected by the second rod held in the priest's now-confident grasp. Timmil knew that in a second the confused demon would retreat into the dimness, and once shaded therein, Shabriri would be helpless. He would diminish, grow weak, and come to his end as a tiny, doll-like monster unable to resist being sealed into some specially prepared container and condemned to some perpetual prison evermore.
"You are mine!" All ton gasped as he reeled and panted from fatigue. Pazuzeus, being slowly compressed by the deadly bands of iron, could make no reply to the claim.
"Minimus!" The thundering cry sprang triumphantly from Timmirs throat as he caught Shabriri in the demon-band cone and began the process of disabling and diminishing the fiend. Shabriri ranted and beat against the dimness that surrounded him, but no sound came out of the gray haze of the dweomer, and the ancient one of demon-ilk grew measurably smaller before the satisfied gaze of the high priest.
With a word Timmil ceased the brightness that radiated from the leftmost portion of the staff. The other demanded his full concentration, as the ancient precursor of demonkind struggled to get free. Soon now Shabriri would be no larger than a halfling and as powerless as a chattering monkey to free himself. There were weaknesses in the device, but as long as the wielder of the rod knew how to move the dim cone of diminishment, the demon or other netherbeing entrapped in it had but small chance of escaping. The high priest and demon-exiler had no intention of allowing his mighty foe to win freedom. Here and there he moved the rod, first with a slow motion, then a sharp twist followed by a series of jerky lateral motions. The shrinking, raving demon was foiled, bounced, battered, and confused. Just a little more time and it would be all finished.
"Your cage is a fine one, Pazuzeus?" Allton inquired sweetly. A thick band of magical iron clamped fast the demon's jaws, encompassing Pazuzeus's head and chin in a viselike grip. Other straps of enchanted metal wrapped shoulders, chest, abdomen, legs, and taloned feet. The great wings were flattened and there were cracking sounds initially when the iron clamped fast. The elder demon's wings were surely broken.
"Later, perhaps. I shall have you sing a little song for us… then you'll have nice seeds to eat." Allton couldn't restrain a little laugh after that. He glanced around. The cleric was just finishing his work. Shabriri was but a foot and a half tall. Where was Gravestone? Gone? No, the mage detected a cloaking screen of energies that had to indicate the place where the demonurgist sought to hide himself.
"Bring your little demonling here. Timmil," the spell-binder called. "I'll need your help with my caged fowl… foul? Heh! Heh! Heh! Ha… Then we'll spy out the hidey-hole which the cowardly Gravestone has dug for himself and keep him corked there until the others arrive."
"I hear." Timmil replied, drawing Shabriri's little form with him in the cone as he came over to stand beside Allton. "It was a hard fight, but easily enough accomplished in the end. Need we await Gord and the others?"
"Here is a flask of dweomered glass shot through with webbing, filaments of spun metal from a falling star." As the high priest took the bottle from his hand Allton added. "Lock up your atomic and then pray shrink yon buzzard-king into a tiny mockery of itself, too. I have yet another of these Jars for Pazuzeus."
"Are you gravely hurt?"
"Nay, although that bastardly demon fought stoutly and delivered many blows. Your ministrations would be appreciated."
"As soon as we have dealt with the winged one, then, you shall have them — my own self too needs some healing, mage. What of the bounding bands of iron which constrict Pazuzeus so well? Do they too shrink?"
Allton shook his lionlike mane as he looked at the demon. "No need of concern, my priestly friend," he told Timmil. "Turn that bird into a little wren, and the enchanted bonds will remain unaffected. With a command I can return them to their relaxed state, and thereafter they'll appear as naught but an iron egg of curious sort."
"In you go, Shabriri!" The high priest shooed the protesting little monster into the waiting bottle with a reed-thin beam of brilliance from the lefthand portion of his staff. "And now we have jugged Shabriri," Tim-mil said with a droll smile as he sealed fast a special stopper and set the container down to admire his handiwork. "Now for you, clip-wings," he added, turning to Pazuzeus and playing the cone of dim radiance upon the encaged demon.
"That's splendid, Timmil, splendid!" the archmage said with enthusiasm as the four-winged monster shrank slowly, giving forth two barely audible squawks of protest under the effect of the power. "Better still, our chiefest foe still cowers away behind his thick walls of magic. Methinks that the loss of these two demon servants has unmanned him!"
"Don't become so cocky, Allton," the cleric cautioned with a stem anxiety. "We managed the demons easily enough, I grant, but they were but slaves serving a greater master."
"Greater?" The mage's face showed a look of incredulity. "You can summon a storm, Timmil, but does that make your power greater than the fury of the winds and flash of lightnings? I think not, not at all, sir! The two of demon-ilk were undoubtedly the greatest of all the many vile servants of the demonurgist. He sent them against us because he himself was unable to face the combined strength we possess. Now he cowers."
"Are you sure? Perhaps the screen hides his next attack. Perhaps he is readying it now, while we preen ourselves here." Timmil was very concerned as he spoke.
"Perhaps," Allton agreed slowly. "Yet dealing finally with the two demons is necessary; and we both must restore ourselves as much as possible if we are to face Gravestone, don't you agree?"
"It will take but a short time, so I concur. Make ready the other flask now, and I'll insert the prisoner therein."
The latter task accomplished, Allton quaffed a draught of an elixir of restorative sort, while the high priest used healing powers first upon his own body, then on the wounds of his comrade. "Thanks, good priest," Allton said sincerely. "The mesh of forces yonder seems to be growing thicker and more active. Perhaps we should investigate."
"Wait a bit. Some hidden bane might still lurk within us from the foul touch of those netherbeings. I'll use some curatives and antitoxin workings to see us whole and sound. Then we can go and deal once and for all with the demonurgist."
Allton hefted his staff. "Yes, I think we must. I don't know where our champion is, but we should be derelict of duty if we tarried awaiting his eventual appearance."
"Where could he be?" Timmil said as he rummaged through his pack.
"Don't be concerned, priest." The voice sounded like Allton's, but as if the mage was speaking from a long distance away. "He is mired in a maze which will entertain him and the three who accompany him for hours — perhaps days or weeks. There is also the distinct possibility of him not getting through it alive!"
"Just how do you know that?" asked the cleric without glancing up.
"He doesn't." said the same voice. Then it changed to a deeper, more threatening tone that was also familiar to Timmil. "It is I, Gravestone, who speaks to you. Rest assured I know where the reputed champion is, and what he must overcome to arrive here at all."