he might hit Simon while the thing scrabbled about. He had to engage it head on.
He ran nearer, awaited its turn. The unearthly cries of the demon-spawned beast electrified the night. And now it turned at last—Saw him. Remembered.... Gonji could see the recognition in its eyes, the ophidian eyes of Mord that supplanted the monster’s own.
And it bore down on him, energized by its hellish hatred of the human that had brought it such pain.
“Damn you, Mord!” Gonji cried, sighting along the shaft. “Damn you to the foulest chamber of Hell....”
It lumbered near, spraying its burning saliva in a weak semicircle, unable to direct the stream of yellow death. Simon dropped off its back, and Gonji fired—
“Arrryeeeee—!”
The wyvern spun down with a heavy thump. Its great hind legs had gone totally numb. Black ichor spewed from between its snapping, curved jaws. Still it lived, though it bled from a hundred places. It pushed up on its wings and crawled toward Gonji.
Cholera, the thought harped. What if it can’t die? What if—? Gonji reloaded, sneered, pulled....
“Sado-war-aaaaa!” Roaring his clan’s mighty battle cry, he unleashed another arrow. It chunkered into an eye, sank six fists deep into its brain.
Its final cry choked off, the wyvern was stilled at last.
Gonji dropped his bow and drew the Sagami. Running up to the fallen beast in a crouch, he circled it once warily, heart pounding. He stopped when he had returned to its gargoyle’s head. Gasped in a shuddering breath.
He mopped the sweat from his eyes and assessed the girth of the sinewy neck: too thick. His gaze falling on the left outcrop of its strange antlers, he raised the katana high in a huge arcing strike, lopping the antler off cleanly. Bobbing his head curtly, he returned the Sagami to its scabbard.
In that instant he wondered at the meaning of what he had seen just before the final arrow had struck the creature’s brain: Mord’s evil obsidian eyes had departed, leaving the creature’s own volcanic red orbs to lance down at its attacker, feverish with animal fear.
But then Simon had moved up beside him, panting heavily from his valiant exertion. He was bloody and slashed, and in spots his clothes had been burned through, the skin beneath raw and blistered. But in his eyes Gonji could see the twinkle of triumph.
The samurai turned and bowed to him. “Shall we begin again?” Gonji advanced. “Simon Sardonis, I presume?”
Simon’s eyes narrowed, softened to a warm liquid gray. He nodded and extended his hand, which Gonji took firmly. Gonji smiled, and Simon’s lips became a fine line, unreadable. A moment later they sank to their knees, exhausted, each man dealing with the aftermath of the event in his own way.
But both in respectful silence.
* * * *
Still quaking, Mord lay on the stone slab, the minutes parading by in mockery of his helpless confusion. Frustration, loathing, and unwonted terror alternated across the arid climate of his bleak soul.
It had almost dragged him under. The wretched wyvern had resisted his efforts at departure as it twitched in its death struggle, clinging to him against the loneliness of the death experience like a frightened child to its mother’s skirts. And it had nearly pulled Mord’s consciousness into the gathering darkness.
But no.... No, that was impossible. He had been a fool to fear. Had not the Dark Master promised him immortality? He could not die. His fears were unfounded.
He collected his senses and laughed, finally, a throaty cackle that echoed in the dank dungeon chamber. Echoed hollowly as Mord recalled the intrepid attack of the meddling pair. That despicable, arrogant oriental. And the other. The powerful stranger, he of the superhuman abilities who had once dared to invade the castle fastness itself. He, who was likely the legendary Deathwind, that name which was whispered in the mountains and the conclaves of secret plotting. Toward him Mord felt a gnawing fear and perplexity. He sensed the contentious spirit trapped within the human frame, that shape of evil that cried out to its dark brothers in a nameless voice that pleaded for freedom. What allegiance could it possibly owe these cross-worshippers?
The simple resolve formed: Now both must die. Quickly, without fail.
The agonizing memory of the worm-venom welled up, infuriating him. How dare they employ his own effects against him! Puny mortals! But now they would know....
They’d piece it all together, reason that Mord worked at cross purposes to both the city and Klann. He hadn’t counted on their destroying both the worm and the wyvern. Now they’d be inspired by their accomplishments—which could work in favor of the Grand Scheme, if Klann could be moved to swift military retaliation against their future efforts.
But most vitally he must prevent the king from meeting with any citizens who might broach their suspicions of Mord’s treachery. Must prevent Klann from receiving any messages.
Soon. In three nights—the full moon, the faith rite, and a new imputation of power that would render him omnipotent. He would bleed the faithful of their life forces when they pledged him their belief on that night of nights, and he would additionally provide for the vital mana he would need by claiming the human sacrificial victims the effete king had denied him. Then the Plan would be complete, and the Dark Master glorified.
And the sorcerer’s centuries-old desire for vengeance would be satisfied.
He removed the golden mask, moved to the dingy silver mirror on the moss-and-slime-streaked wall. Gazed at what the ancient priests had done. Trembling, he smiled to think of what was now within his grasp.
When he had presently pondered the problem of the mysterious stranger, he gave thought to the ambitious invocation he had never dared consider before. Would there be power enough on that night? Almost unthinkable, yet....
Seductive. In that way only the challenging powers of evil can be. Yes, he was ready for it. Ready to call up a fragment of Hell itself.
But only—only after his powers had been revitalized in the full-moon faith rite.
CHAPTER TWO
“Traitor....”
The word hissed out of Simon like the escape of some vile thing, and Gonji was relieved that the dark mood it provoked in his outre companion was not directed at him.
The samurai was overwhelmed by the strangeness of his surroundings. He had awakened at mid-morning in the concealed cave after a fitful sleep that left him aching and un-rested. Simon had long since roused himself and prepared a meal of broth and rabbit meat—cooked over a fire beneath a natural chimney in the rock that acted as a flue—plus a coarse dried bread and a rather bland Hungarian wine with which they washed it all down.
They spoke as they ate, Gonji filling in Simon on the details of the Vedun situation. The cave-dweller revealed by stages a compelling curiosity about gaps he hadn’t been able to fill via his own clandestine investigations and actions. This apparent reversal of his declared disinterest he covered with alternating shifts between petulance and stoic blankness that Gonji read easily and found amusing despite the sense of danger in the man’s presence.
Simon was clearly at a disadvantage in social circumstances, his unease obvious. As a social outcast in his own right, Gonji entered into an easy empathy with him. Yet he carried it only to a point; Simon’s bizarre existence and the tale of his enchanted birthing and curse engendered in Gonji a shameful feeling of superiority on a human plane. Yet he intuited that the feeling was mutual: Simon seemed to take a perverse delight in Gonji’s infidel status among European peoples.
It was just possible, the thought occurred to Gonji, that he alone among all men might penetrate the barrier of Simon’s shame and enlist his powerful assistance.
Gonji sat sipping wine, cross-legged, listening to the ringing echo of that single word “traitor” the other had just spoken, gratified that Simon, too, held treachery insufferable.