“Stand fast,” he said, although he had no idea how—if!—they could meet the danger…or what the danger even was.
Stars swirled about them and Axis, as Azhure and Caelum, were reminded of their experiences inside the Temple of the Stars. Then the stars had streamed and danced by them within the great cobalt beacon that had speared up from Temple Mount. Here they were locked, trapped within a blackness. Here the stars were malevolent, not benign.
“It is as though we are in a hall,” Caelum said softly, turning slowly to look about him. “A hall of stars.”
“A hall of stars,” Azhure repeated. “Is there any…can you feel the Star Dance?”
“I feel something,” Axis said, his senses desperately seeking the Star Dance.
But there was nothing.
Nothing but danger seeping all about them.
Axis’ frustration exploded. “Damn you!” he called into the starry void. “What are you? Where are you?”
“Look!” one of the men cried, pointing.
They all turned to follow his hand. From one of the constellations spinning about them a dark, cloaked and hooded figure had emerged. It was hard to say exactly how they could see it, but it was there. They could sense it, taste it.
Fear it.
“And there!” cried the captain.
Again they looked, and again they saw (sensed) another dark hooded figure moving towards them from a galaxy overhead.
“And there,” murmured Azhure. “And there.”
“How many?” Axis asked after a few minutes. They were surrounded by a circle of cloaked and hooded figures, slowly gliding towards them from among the stars.
“Twenty-seven,” Caelum answered. He slowly drew his sword from its scabbard, hearing the scrape of steel about him as the others did the same.
The circle tightened until the figures were no more than five paces away, and standing so close each to the other that passage through them would be impossible.
“My name is Axis SunSoar StarMan,” Axis called. “Who are you?”
One of the figures took a step forward, and they spun in its direction. A faint light glowed about its head, and they saw the pale shape of hands lift to pull down the hood, revealing the face.
Azhure gasped, and she heard the swift intake of breaths about her.
It was a young birdwoman, fine gold hair curling about her forehead, deep violet eyes filled with sadness.
“She is so beautiful!” Azhure whispered.
“Aye,” Axis said. “And deadly.”
“You are Axis SunSoar StarMan?” the birdwoman said. Her voice was strange, as if harsh from disuse. Whispery. All had to strain to hear her.
“Yes,” Axis said. “And you?”
She half-turned her face, the starlight catching a tear that ran down her cheek.
“My name is StarGrace SunSoar,” she said. “Murdered StarGrace. Betrayed StarGrace.”
She turned her face back towards them, and they saw her eyes glittered dangerously. “Lost StarGrace!” she hissed.
“Oh Stars!” Azhure said, and grasped Axis’ arm. “StarGrace was the niece of WolfStar, daughter of CloudBurst. She was one of those he—”
“Murdered,” StarGrace said. “Who are you, woman?”
Azhure tilted her chin but before she could answer, Axis spoke.
“Who stands with me does not matter, StarGrace. Why do you trap us here? Let us go!” Whatever else, Axis did not want to reveal that among them stood Caelum StarSon.
“You do not know the meaning of trapped!” StarGrace cried, and flung an arm behind her, indicating the starry universe. “Here is where we drifted a thousand wasted lifetimes. Here is where—”
“You betrayed this land of Tencendor to the Demons,” Axis said.
StarGrace cocked her head to one side, as if curious. “You are a fool, Axis SunSoar StarMan, and most physically deformed. You bear no wings. What has this come to, that a man who dares to bear the title of StarMan wears no wings? I can see that the SunSoar house has become ill-bred over the millennia. Corrupted.”
Go, Sheol whispered in StarLaughter’s mind. Go, and have your fun. But do not—
I understand, Sheol, and StarLaughter handed her child to the Demon to mind.
“It is more than time, then,” said a new voice, “that the true heir return and put things to rights.”
Axis snapped his head about so fast that his neck cricked in protest.
From somewhere beyond the circle a woman stepped forth. She wore no cloak, and no disguise, but was garbed instead in a robe that—Axis almost gagged—appeared to be made of blood. It trickled down over her breasts and belly, congealing over her hips at the juncture of her legs, then running in thick, ropy strands down to her ankles.
Axis instinctively knew who she was. “StarLaughter.”
She inclined her beautiful head, a lock of her dark hair dragging through the bloody shoulders of her robe, and laughed. “Indeed, Axis SunSoar. Now, will you introduce me to the others standing here?”
She stopped just past StarGrace. “Do it!”
“No!” Axis said. “There is no need to—”
StarLaughter’s face contorted in fury. She jerked her right hand, and the captain and the two remaining men-at-arms disappeared.
“They are pointless,” she said, swinging her eyes between Axis, Azhure and Caelum. “And eminently dispensable. Just as your swords are.”
And they too vanished, leaving only empty fists where once had been steel.
“Will you not introduce me to your wife and son, Axis?” StarLaughter said.
Axis silently cursed the fact that he had named himself in the first instance. Perhaps if he’d kept a still tongue, this woman would not have known that—
“Oh, I have always known!” she hissed, and swung to face Azhure.
“Bitch!” she screamed, the veins on her forehead and in her neck throbbing into knotted fury. “You are the fruit of my husband’s betrayal!”
Azhure reeled back, one hand half-raised before her. “I am not responsible for WolfStar’s faults—”
“You are his flesh and blood! You carried his blood into power, not my son.”
StarLaughter abruptly stopped, still staring at Azhure, her face contorted in fury, her hands clenched at her sides.
“Where is she?” she growled.
“Who?” Azhure shot Axis a stricken look, and he moved closer to her side.
“The bitch WolfStar lay with. Your mother.”
Azhure managed to keep her composure. “She is dead. She died when I was six. Burned to death by—”
“Then why is it that I can feel her?” StarLaughter said, her voice quieter now, but her gaze no less intense. “Why?”
Her nostrils flared, almost as if she could scent her rival. “She is here,” she said. “Somewhere. Niah. Even if I have to hunt her beyond the gates of death, Azhure, be sure that I will do it!”
Now Azhure was visibly shaken, not only at StarLaughter’s venom, but at her knowledge of Niah’s name. “How did you—”
StarLaughter shook her head of hair, and smiled. “How did I know Niah’s name? How do I know anything?”
She paused, and shifted her eyes to stare directly at Caelum. “Drago told me. Drago told me everything.”
The tip of her tongue flicked out between her teeth and ran over her top lip.
“He was extraordinary in bed, Caelum. The SunSoar blood, I suppose.”
She smiled and took a step towards Caelum. “I would beg him to take me. I would grovel on the floor before him. Do you know what I mean, Caelum?”
He paled. “Drago is a traitor,” he managed.
“As are you!” StarLaughter erupted into a frightful fury. “You claim the Throne of Stars when it should be my son who claims that right!”
StarLaughter took another step forward until she was so close to Caelum she could thrust her face in his. “And do you know what, StarSon?”
She spoke the title as a curse.
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“He will come to get you. He will kill you.” She smiled. “And nothing you can do will stop that now. Look at you, you pitiful lump of mortal flesh. You dare to name yourself heir and ruler of Tencendor. Ha! You were bred beyond the bonds of marriage. The legitimate heir, my son, will come to kill you!”
The entire circle of robed watchers broke into agitated whispering.
“He will revel in your pain and blood,” StarLaughter continued, triumph and laughter replacing the fury in her voice.
“See.” The circle of Hawkchilds broke into howls of laughter, and they parted so that there was an unrestricted view of the part of the universe to which StarLaughter pointed. “See!”
Axis grabbed at Azhure and Caelum, pulling them into a tight group. Stars! What could they do! Even though he had no power himself, Axis could feel the power that vibrated from StarLaughter, as from each and every one of the robed children about them.
It must have taken unimaginable strength and skill to create this hall of stars. Had StarLaughter and the children done that, or had it been the TimeKeepers?
Of what use were swords against such enchantments as this?
“Look!” Azhure whispered, but both Caelum and Axis were staring anyway.
Caelum shuddered, then wrenched himself out of his father’s grasp. “No!”
“Caelum—” Axis began.
“No!”
“Yes!” StarLaughter whispered. “Here comes DragonStar to drink your blood, fool boy!”
Wheeling out of a galaxy of swirling stars came a figure as black as the others that had circled the three. Save this one rode a horse, and brandished something in his hand that caught and reflected the starlight.
Caelum screamed, a thin wail of utter terror, and turned to flee.
But the circle of children—now hawks—crowded in about him, wrapping him in their wings, pecking at his face, his eyes.
Axis jumped to help, grabbing at legs and claws and wings, trying to free his son.
Azhure would have tried to help as well, except at the very moment that Axis leaped, Azhure felt cruel hands grab her arms and hold her back.
“No,” StarLaughter whispered in her ear. “Why not let them both die together? They will only stand in the way of the true heir, DragonStar.”
Azhure struggled, baring her teeth in a desperate attempt to bite her way free, but StarLaughter countered every move Azhure made with power and mirth.
“Damn you!” Azhure cried.
“Nay,” StarLaughter said. “You are the one who is damned. Can you not feel it?”
Caelum was completely enveloped in feathered wings and bodies. Struggling to battle his way in, Axis still managed to wonder in one corner of his mind how the children had transformed themselves. They were as dangerous and powerful as StarLaughter and the Demons. He managed to get a good grasp of one wing, and used his entire strength to tear it back.
Something screamed, and a body fell away from the writhing black pile that contained Caelum.
Axis grabbed at another wing, but this time a horrific head rose up and pecked violently at his face so that he was forced to stumble back, his arms covering his bleeding forehead and cheeks.
“Axis!” he heard Azhure scream. “Look!”
Axis raised his head, wiping blood out of his left eye—and felt his heart falter, and then thud violently.
Thundering towards them was a massive black horse. Atop him was a man clad in enveloping black armour, and wielding a sword in his right hand such as Axis had never seen before.
The rider swept it through the air in great hissing arcs.
Caelum.
The word blasted through his head, and Axis saw Azhure clutch at her own skull and cry out.
Caelum!
The horse and rider drew nearer, and Axis, even though he could see no floor where he stood, could nevertheless feel the vibrations of the beast’s approach.
The rider now stood in his stirrups, slowly waving the sword above his head, and Axis heard a scream of triumph tear through his mind.
He screamed himself, battling the gut instinct to fling himself out of the way, and instead leaped for Caelum, still struggling with the bird-children.
As Axis leaped, they all rose in the air, leaving Caelum writhing on the floor, covered in a thin layer of blood from a myriad of scratches.
At first Axis thought it was because of his own precipitous leap, but at the moment he gathered his son into his arms, he felt the horse’s hooves slam down next to his head.
Instinctively he rolled closer to Caelum, gathering him into his arms—
Caelum…
“No,” Axis gasped. “Don’t listen to him! Don’t look at—”
Look at my face, Caelum.
And Caelum had to. He had to. He had to see the face of the being that was about to kill him.
He twisted about in Axis’ arms, and looked up.
The rider slowly lifted the visor of his helmet.
“Drago!” Caelum screamed, and then the rider’s sword arm was flashing down, and Caelum felt the tip of the sword slice into his chest, slice deep into his chest, and he choked on the blood and pieces of sliced tissue that filled his lungs.
The rider leaned down from the horse, leaned down his entire weight, and twisted the blade.
“No!” Axis screamed, reaching around Caelum to grasp the blade in his bare hands. “No!”
“Yes,” whispered StarLaughter.
Yes! whispered the voice of the rider through their minds, and he twisted the blade again, and now Axis screamed, but still he held on to the blade, even though he could feel it slicing his fingers away, trying, trying, trying to wrench it out of his son’s chest.
“A foretaste of the hunt,” StarLaughter said conversationally, and then she, the children, and the black rider disappeared.
The instant she felt the restraining arms vanish, Azhure fell down on top of her husband and son. The blade was still embedded in Caelum’s chest, and Axis still had his hands wrapped about it.
Stricken, Azhure looked into Caelum’s face.
“Drago!” he said, through a mouthful of clotting blood, and died.
Azhure blinked, and her son lay dead before her.
She blinked again, and her husband writhed screaming as he clutched his ruined hands to his chest.
She blinked once more, and she found herself kneeling on the hard black surface of the tunnel, staring at her husband and Caelum lying before her.
Perfectly whole.
The sword, the blood, the horror, all had disappeared.
StarLaughter took a deep breath, and opened her eyes back to awareness of the horse beneath her and the cold winds of the Skarabost Plains whipping past her.
She turned her head slightly to look at the Demons.
They were all watching her with expressions half-ecstasy, half-wild amusement.
“He is weak,” StarLaughter said, “and filled with hopelessness. If the StarSon can let a vision impale him, then think what will happen when the real thing hunts him through the Maze!”
There was silence as the Demons and StarLaughter smiled at the thought.
It would be a good hunt.
“Those were the three,” said Mot, “who, if there had been any power remaining, could have wielded it.”
Barzula smirked. “The Mage-King of the Avar was useless.”
“Everyone is useless!” cried Rox.
“Tencendor is ours,” Raspu said.
“Forever and ever and through all time,” Sheol said, and looked reverently at the child in her lap.
They had, for the moment, forgotten about the two worrying magicians to the west.
27
Drago’s Ancient Relics
“Did you not live in southern Skarabost, Faraday?” Drago asked one night, idly stroking the lizard as it cuddled against his thigh.
They were crouched in their cramped tent on the shores of the Nordra as it sliced through the Western Ranges and the Rhaetian Hi
lls. Drago had spent the best part of the day looking for a boat, but had found none. In the morning they would continue their northward journey to Gorkenfort on foot, crossing the Nordra when they found a ford or a boat. Faraday had remained silent when Drago had mentioned Gorkenfort; he knew all too well of her need to go directly north to Star Finger, and she knew it would be of no use to tell him yet again.
They sat shoulder by shoulder, with space not even for a fire. The terror raged outside, and while they knew it could not touch them, the confinement of the tent was still preferable to sitting outside by a fire with the Demons nibbling at their minds…why? why? why? During the day they continued to travel through the Demonic Hours, ignoring the cold fingers of the grey miasma as best they could, but at night they rested, both physically and spiritually, within the warm comfort of the tent’s interior.
Faraday took a long time to answer, and Drago was surprised that she finally did.
“Yes,” she said. “On an estate called Ilfracombe. But it is far to the east of where we will travel.”
Her voice had a decided edge to it, but Drago ignored it. He also dreamed of the girl, but he found his need to get to Gorkenfort greater, and he hoped that the answers he would find there would also help solve the riddle of the girl.
“Do you still have family there?”
“Why these questions?” she said, and raised her face. “Will whether or not any of my family survive or be damned, save or damn Tencendor in its turn?”
Drago was horrified to see the brightness of tears in her eyes. “Faraday…we will get to the girl soon enough.”
She was silent a long time, wiping the tears away with the back of a hand. It was not only the fretting for the girl that made her irritable, but her growing feeling for this man now so close to her.
Faraday didn’t like that…she didn’t like it at all.
“It is not just the girl,” she whispered. “There is another wound which will not close.”
This, at least, she would tell him.
Drago was silent, willing to let her tell him at her own pace.
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