‘They’ll help now, Sparhawk,’ Aphrael told him.
‘You lied to them,’ he accused.
‘No, I lied to you. I wasn’t talking to them.’
He could not help but laugh.
He crossed the fifth terrace. The idol was much closer now, and it loomed large in his sight. He could also see Otha, sweating and straining as he and Sephrenia engaged in that duel which Sparhawk knew, could he but see it, was far more titanic than the one he had fought with Martel. He could see more clearly now the stark terror in the face of Annias and the near-collapse of Arissa and her son.
Sparhawk could sense the gigantic presence of the Troll-Gods. They seemed so overpoweringly real that he could almost see their gigantic, hideous forms hovering protectively just behind him. He stepped up onto the sixth terrace. Three more to go. Idly he wondered if the number nine had some significance in the twisted minds of the worshippers of Azash. The God of the Zemochs threw everything to the winds at that point. He saw death inexorably climbing the stairs towards Him, and He began to unleash everything in His power in a desperate effort to ward off the black-armoured messenger carrying His glowing blue death to him.
Fire burst from beneath Sparhawk’s feet, but before he even felt its heat, it was quenched in ice. A monstrous form lunged at him, springing from nothingness, but an even more intense fire than that which the ice had just vanquished consumed it. The Troll-Gods, unwilling certainly, but left without a choice through Sparhawk’s adamantine ultimatum, were aiding him now, beating aside the defences of Azash to clear his path.
Azash began to shriek as Sparhawk stepped up onto the seventh terrace. A rush now was feasible, but Sparhawk decided against it. He did not want to be panting and shaking from exertion when the climactic moment arrived. He continued his steady, inexorable pace, crossing the seventh terrace as Azash unleashed horrors beyond imagining at him, horrors instantly quenched by the Troll-Gods or even by Bhelliom itself. He drew in a deep breath and stepped up onto the eighth terrace.
Then he was surrounded by gold – coins and ingots and lumps the size of a man’s head. A cascade of bright jewels spilled out of nothing to run down over the gold like a river of blue and green and red, a rainbow-hued waterfall of wealth beyond imagining. Then the wealth began to diminish, great chunks of it vanishing to the gross sounds of eating. ‘Thank you, Ghnomb,’ Sparhawk murmured to the Troll-God of feeding.
An houri of heart-stopping loveliness beckoned to Sparhawk seductively, but was immediately assaulted by a lustful Troll. Sparhawk did not know the name of the Troll-God of mating, so he did not know whom to thank. He pushed on to step up onto the ninth and the last terrace.
‘Thou canst not!’ Azash shrieked. Sparhawk did not reply as he marched grimly towards the idol with Bhelliom still in one fist and his menacing sword in the other. Lightning flashed around him, but each bolt was absorbed by the growing sapphire aura with which Bhelliom protected him.
Otha had abandoned his fruitless duel with Sephrenia and crawled, sobbing in fright, towards the right side of the altar. Annias had collapsed on the left side of that same narrow onyx slab, and Arissa and Lycheas, clinging to each other, wailed.
Sparhawk reached the narrow altar. ‘Wish me luck,’ he whispered to the Child-Goddess.
‘Of course, Father,’ she replied.
Azash shrank back as Bhelliom’s glow intensified, and the idol’s burning eyes bulged with terror. Sparhawk saw that an immortal suddenly faced with the possibility of His own death is peculiarly defenceless. The idea alone erased all other thought, and Azash could only react at the simplest, most childish level. He lashed out, blindly hurling elemental fire at the black-armoured Pandion threatening His very existence. The shock was enormous as that incandescent green flame struck the equally brilliant blue flame of Bhelliom. The blue wavered, then solidified. The green shrank back, then pushed again at Sparhawk.
And there they locked, Bhelliom and Azash, each exerting irresistible force to protect its very existence. Neither of them would – or could – relent. Sparhawk had the unpleasant conviction that he might very well stand in this one place for all eternity with the jewel half-extended as Azash and Bhelliom remained locked in their struggle.
It came from behind him, spinning and whirring through the air with a sound almost like bird-wings. It passed over his head and clanged against the idol’s stone chest, exploding forth a great shower of sparks. It was Bevier’s hook-pointed lochaber axe. Berit, unthinking perhaps, had thrown the lochaber at the idol – a foolish gesture of puny defiance.
But it worked.
The idol flinched involuntarily from something which could not possibly hurt it, and its force, its fire, momentarily vanished. Sparhawk lunged forward with Bhelliom clutched in his left hand, thrusting it like a spear-point at the burn-scar low on the idol’s belly. His hand went numb in the violent shock of contact.
The sound was deafening. Sparhawk was sure that it shook the entire world.
He bent his head and locked his muscles, pushing Bhelliom harder and harder against the shiny scar of Azash’s emasculation. The God shrieked in agony. ‘YE HAVE FAILED ME!’ He howled, and writhing, tentacle-like arms whipped out from either side of the idol’s body to seize Otha – and Annias.
‘Oh, my God!’ the Primate of Cimmura shrieked, not to Azash, but to the God of his childhood. ‘Save me! Protect me! Forgive –’ His voice rose to an inarticulate screech as the tentacle tightened about him.
There was no finesse in the punishment inflicted upon the Emperor of Zemoch and the Primate of Cimmura. Maddened by pain and fear and a hunger to lash out at those He considered responsible, Azash reacted like an infuriated child. Other arms lashed out to seize the shrieking pair, and then, with cruel slowness, the undulating arms began to turn in opposite directions in that motion used by a washerwoman to wring out a dripping rag. Blood and worse spurted out from between the God’s eel-like fingers as He inexorably wrung the lives of Otha and Annias from their writhing bodies.
Sickened, Sparhawk closed his eyes – but he could not close his ears. The shrieking grew worse, rising to strangled squeals at the very upper edge of hearing.
Then they fell silent, and there were two sodden thumps as Azash discarded what was left of His servants.
Arissa was retching violently over the unrecognizable remains of her lover and the father of her only child as the vast idol shuddered and cracked, raining chunks of carved rock as it disintegrated. Writhing arms solidified as they broke free and fell to smash into fragments on the floor. The grotesque face slid in pieces from the front of the head. A large piece of rock struck Sparhawk’s armoured shoulder, and the impact quite nearly jarred Bhelliom from his hands. With a great cracking noise, the idol broke at the waist, and the vast upper trunk toppled backwards to smash into a million pieces on the polished black floor. A stump only remained, a kind of crumbling stone pedestal upon which sat that crude mud idol which Otha had first seen almost two thousand years before.
‘Thou canst not!’ The voice was the squeal of a small animal, a rabbit maybe, or perhaps a rat. ‘I am a God! Thou art nothing! Thou art an insect! Thou art as dirt!’
‘Perhaps,’ Sparhawk said, actually feeling pity for the pathetic little mud figurine. He dropped his sword and clasped Bhelliom firmly in both hands. ‘Blue-Rose!’ he said sharply. ‘I am Sparhawk-from-Elenia! By the power of these rings I command Blue-Rose to return this image to the earth from which it came!’ He thrust both hands and the Sapphire Rose forward. ‘Thou hast hungered for Bhelliom, Azash,’ he said. ‘Have it then. Have it and all that it brings thee.’ Then the Bhelliom touched the misshapen little idol. ‘Blue-Rose will obey! NOW!’ He clenched himself as he said it, expecting instant obliteration.
The entire temple shuddered, and Sparhawk felt a sudden oppressive sense of heaviness bearing down on him as if the air itself had the weight of tons. The flames of the huge fires sickened, lowering into fitful flickers as if some great weight pressed them do
wn, smothering them.
And then the vast dome of the temple exploded upward and outward, hurling the hexagonal blocks of basalt miles away. With a sound that was beyond sound, the fires belched upward, becoming enormous pillars of intensely brilliant flame, columns that shot up through the gaping hole that had been the dome to illuminate the pregnant bellies of the clouds which had spawned the thunderstorm. Higher and higher those incandescent columns roared, searing the cloud mass above. And still they reared higher, wreathed with lightning as they burned the clouds away and ascended still into the darkness above, reaching towards the glittering stars.
Sparhawk, implacable and unrelenting, held the Sapphire Rose against the body of Azash, the skin of his wrist crawling as the God’s tiny, impotent tentacles clutched at it as a mortally stricken warrior might clutch at the arm of a foe slowly twisting a sword-blade in his vitals. The voice of Azash, Elder God of Styricum, was a tiny squeal, a puny wail such as any small creature might make as it died. Then a change came over the little idol. Whatever had made it adhere together was gone, and with a slithering kind of sigh it came apart and settled into a heap of dust.
The great columns of flame slowly subsided, and the air which flooded into the ruined temple from the outside once again had the chill of winter.
Sparhawk felt no sense of triumph as he straightened. He looked at the Sapphire Rose glowing in his hand. He could feel its terror, and he could dimly hear the whimpering of the Troll-Gods locked in its azure heart.
Flute had somehow stumbled back down the terraces and wept in Sephrenia’s arms.
‘It’s over, Blue-Rose,’ Sparhawk said wearily to the Bhelliom. ‘Rest now.’ He slipped the jewel back into the pouch and absently twisted the wire to hold it shut.
There was the sound of running then, of frantic flight. Princess Arissa and her son fled down the onyx terraces towards the shiny floor below. So great was their fright that neither appeared to be even aware of the other as they stumbled down and down. Lycheas was younger than his mother, and his flight was swifter. He left her behind, leaping, falling, scrambling back to his feet again as he bolted.
Ulath, his face like stone, was waiting for him at the bottom – with his axe.
Lycheas shrieked once, and then his head flew out in a long, curving arc and landed on the onyx floor with a sickening sound such as a dropped melon might make.
‘Lycheas!’ Arissa shrieked in horror as her son’s headless body fell limply at Ulath’s feet. She stood frozen, gaping at the huge, blond-braided Thalesian who had begun to mount the onyx terraces towards her, his bloody axe half-raised. Ulath was not one to leave a job half-completed.
Arissa fumbled at the sash about her waist, pulled out a small glass vial and struggled to pull the stopper free.
Ulath did not slow his pace.
The vial was open now, and Arissa lifted her face and drank its contents. Her body instantly stiffened, and she gave a hoarse cry. Then she fell twitching to the floor of the terrace, her face black and her tongue protruding from her mouth.
‘Ulath!’ Sephrenia said to the still-advancing Thalesian. ‘No. It isn’t necessary.’
‘Poison?’ he asked her.
She nodded.
‘I hate poison,’ he said, stripping the blood off the edge of his axe with his thumb and forefinger. He flung the blood away and then ran a practised thumb along the edge. ‘It’s going to take a week to polish out all these nicks,’ he said mournfully, turning and starting back down again, leaving the Princess Arissa sprawled on the terrace above him.
Sparhawk retrieved his sword and descended. He felt very, very tired now. He wearily picked up his gauntlets and crossed the littered floor to Berit, who stood staring at him in awe. ‘That was a nice throw,’ he said to the young man, putting his hand on Berit’s armoured shoulder. ‘Thank you, brother.’
Berit’s smile was like the sun coming up.
‘Oh, by the way,’ Sparhawk added, ‘you’d probably better go and find Bevier’s axe. He’s very fond of it.’
Berit grinned. ‘Right away, Sparhawk.’
Sparhawk looked around at the corpse-littered temple, then up through the shattered dome at the stars twinkling overhead in the cold winter sky. ‘Kurik,’ he said without thinking, ‘what time do you make it?’ Then he broke off as a wave of unbearable grief overwhelmed him. He steeled himself. ‘Is everybody all right?’ he asked his friends, looking around. Then he grunted, not really trusting himself to speak. He drew in a deep breath. ‘Let’s get out of here,’ he said gruffly.
They crossed the polished floor and went up the wide terraces to the top. Somehow in the vast upheaval of the encounter at the altar, all the statues encircling the wall had been shattered. Kalten stepped on ahead and looked up the marble stairs. ‘The soldiers seem to have run off,’ he reported.
Sephrenia countered the spell which had blocked the stairs and they started up.
‘Sephrenia.’ The voice was hardly more than a croak.
‘She’s still alive,’ Ulath said almost accusingly.
‘That happens once in a while,’ Sephrenia said. ‘Sometimes the poison takes a little longer.’
‘Sephrenia, help me. Please help me.’
The small Styric woman turned and looked back across the temple at Princess Arissa, who had weakly raised her head to plead for her life.
Sephrenia’s tone was as cold as death itself. ‘No, Princess,’ she replied. ‘I don’t think so.’ Then she turned again and went on up the stairs with Sparhawk and the rest of them close behind her.
Chapter 31
The wind had changed at some time during the night, and it now blew steadily out of the west, bringing snow with it. The violent thunderstorm which had engulfed the city the previous night had unroofed many houses and exploded others. The streets were littered with debris and with a thin covering of wet snow. Berit had retrieved their horses, and Sparhawk and his friends rode slowly. There was no longer any need for haste. The cart Kalten had found in a side street trundled along behind them with Talen at the reins and Bevier resting in the back with Kurik’s covered body. Kurik, Sephrenia assured them as they set out, would remain untouched by the corruption which is the final destiny of all men. ‘I owe Aslade that much at least,’ she murmured, nestling her cheek against Flute’s glossy black hair. Sparhawk was a bit surprised to find that in spite of everything, he still thought of the Child-Goddess as Flute. She did not look all that much like a Goddess at the moment. She clung to Sephrenia, her face tear-streaked, and each time she opened her eyes, they were filled with horror and despair.
The Zemoch soldiers and the few remaining priests of Azash had fled the deserted city, and the slushy streets echoed with a kind of mournful emptiness. Something quite peculiar was happening to Otha’s capital. The nearly total destruction of the temple had been completely understandable, of course. The only slightly less severe damage to the adjoining palace was probably to be expected. It was what was happening to the rest of the city that was inexplicable. The inhabitants had not really left the city that long ago, but their houses were collapsing – not all at once as might have been expected, given the explosive nature of what had taken place in the temple, but singly or in groups of two or three. It was somehow as if the decay which overcomes any abandoned city were taking place in the space of hours instead of centuries. The houses sagged, creaked mournfully and then slowly fell in on themselves. The city walls crumbled, and even the paving stones of the streets heaved up and then settled back, broken and scattered.
Their desperate plan had succeeded, but the cost had been beyond what any of them had been prepared to pay. There was no sense of triumph in their success, none of that exultation warriors normally feel in a victory. It was not merely the sorrowful burden of the cart which dampened their mood, however, but something deeper.
Bevier was pale from loss of blood, but his face was profoundly troubled. ‘I still don’t understand,’ he confessed.
‘Sparhawk is Anakha,�
�� Sephrenia replied. ‘It’s a Styric word that means “without destiny”. All men are subject to destiny, to fate – all men except Sparhawk. Somehow he moves outside destiny. We’ve known that he would come, but we didn’t know when – or even who he would be. He’s like no other man who’s ever lived. He makes his own destiny, and his existence terrifies the Gods.’
They left the slowly collapsing city of Zemoch behind in the thickly swirling snow slanting in from the west, although they could hear the grinding rumble of falling buildings for quite some time as they rode southward along the road leading to the city of Korakach, some eighty leagues to the south. About mid-afternoon, as the snow was beginning to let up, they took shelter for the night in a deserted village. They were all very tired, and the thought of riding even one more mile was deeply repugnant to them. Ulath prepared their supper without even any attempt to resort to his usual subterfuge, and they sought their beds even before the light had begun to fade.
Sparhawk awoke suddenly, startled to find that he was in the saddle. They were riding along the brink of a wind-swept cliff with an angry sea ripping itself to tattered froth on the rocks far below. The sky overhead was threatening, and the wind coming in off the sea had a biting chill. Sephrenia rode in the lead, and she held Flute enfolded in her arms. The others trailed along behind Sparhawk, their cloaks drawn tightly around them and wooden-faced expressions of stoic endurance on their faces. They all seemed to be there, Kalten and Kurik, Tynian and Ulath, Berit and Talen and Bevier. Their horses plodded up the winding, weather-worn trail that followed the edge of the long, ascending cliff towards a jutting promontory that thrust a crooked, stony finger out into the sea. At the outermost tip of the rocky promontory stood a gnarled and twisted tree, its streaming branches flailing in the wind.
When she reached the tree, Sephrenia reined in her horse, and Kurik walked forward to lift Flute down. The squire’s face was set, and he did not speak to Sparhawk as he passed. It seemed to Sparhawk that something was wrong – terribly wrong – but he could not exactly put his finger on it.
The Sapphire Rose Page 54