“Mycelle…” Her name was whispered in her ear. She was too tired to open her eyes. She knew the voice. It was Lord Tyrus.

“Are you ready?”

She nodded, beyond worry of the dagger’s bite.

“Mycelle…”

Be done with it already, she thought, flickering open her eyes.

Tyrus’ face hovered over hers. He stared into her eyes. She was surprised to see the tears in his eyes.

He was a hard man, a pirate who had slain thousands. His tears fell upon her face. “I release you from your duty. You’ve served our family well and long.”

She felt a small bit of comfort from his words and smiled, closing her eyes again.

A flare of pain burned up from her belly as he worked the blade. She bit back a gasp, but found the prince’s lips suddenly upon hers, pressing hard, holding back the pain with his touch. Time stopped for just that brief moment, stretched beyond the pain and blood. She found herself sobbing.

“I love you,” he whispered between their lips.

And in that final moment, she knew he spoke truly. The hollow-ness in her heart filled with warmth and love. Then, with the sweetest pang, the world let her free.

Nee’lahn watched Tyrus rise from his embrace of Mycelle. Her form had transformed while they had

‘kissed, changing from the d’warfish figure back to the familiar long-limbed Dro. He pushed up, crying, and silently turned with a large swath of flayed skin in his hand.

Tyrus half crawled to Krai’s discarded ax and cradled it in his lap. With his head hung, he wrapped the skin around the iron head of the weapon. “I’m sorry…” he muttered to no one.

Nee’lahn stood, giving him a moment of privacy.

“I think it’s working,” Meric said, staring across the throne hall.

Nee’lahn stared past the whirling wind and prayed Mycelle’s sacrifice had not been in vain.

Kral slouched naked in his chains, blind to all around him, deaf to the yelled orders. Some part of him knew the d’warves were grouping for a final assault on his old companions. But he found no part of him that cared. Any hope for freeing his ancestral home from the corruption here had died.

Then slowly, through the fog of his despair, he sensed a surge of energy, like a spark on dry tinder. Kral recognized this feeling. He rose with a growl to his feet while reaching outward to his ax.

Yes!

He felt the font of power, a new skin upon which to define the beast inside him. He touched the dark magick—and instantly recognized the skin that fueled the fire. Si’luran… shape-shifter. He glanced across the hall and saw his companions grouped together. Tyrus held his ax and stared back at him. The prince’s eyes were bright with tears.

“Mycelle,” he muttered to himself, understanding.

He stared down at the shackles that bound his wrists and ankles. With a flow of flesh, he stepped free.

Iron chains clattered to the ground.

The noise drew the eyes of the d’warf king, standing before the white granite throne. The squat creature’s eyes grew wide as Kral stepped away from the chains.

“I’ll have my throne now,” Kral said coldly. He willed his body back to the shape of a snow leopard, fur spreading in a tingling

James Clem i: n’s

ave, claws sprouting, injuries healing, muscles bunching into the lean and powerful form of a forest cat.

w

He chose this form in honor of Mycelle. She had been Dro, and the leopard was their heraldic symbol. It was only fitting that the mountain cat of the deep north rip the evil from this place.

Before the king’s guards could react, he leaped upon the old d’warf, tearing away an arm that was lifted in defense. The d’warf bellowed in pain and shock, tumbling back into the seat of the Ice Throne. “No!

We serve the same master!”

Krai’s lips pulled back in a feral grin, displaying long fangs.

“No!” the king cried.

Kral leaped again with a scream that roared throughout the hall and landed atop the d’warf, digging in his claws. The king cowered. Kral could smell his fear, hear the fluttering beat of his prey’s twin hearts.

“Please…”

Snarling his victory, Kral ripped out the throat of the d’warf king. Hot blood sprayed the white granite.

He tasted it on his tongue. His prey’s mouth opened and closed as if drowning; then the light of life faded from his eyes.

Satisfied at last, Kral kicked aside the dead body and mounted his throne, crouched, muzzle bloodied.

He stared around the hall, roaring again, claiming the Ice Throne for himself.

The remaining d’warves froze; then in a rush many fled, heartless with the loss of their king. Others, mostly the royal bodyguards, rushed forward with bloody vengeance in their eyes.

Kral met their charge, leaping and flying into their ranks. He used the full magick of the shape-shifter, flowing from one shape to another as he rolled through the axes and swords. He left a trail of broken and twitching bodies in his wake. He raced from one end of the hall to the other, no longer just satisfied with attacking those who threatened. He chased down fleeing d’warves, ripped out their hamstrings, then circled back to feed on their hearts.

Soon the granite floors were slick with blood. Nothing moved except the beast who stalked among the dead around the lone island of the living. A raging whirlwind protected these few. He lifted his muzzle and sniffed. The winds even kept their smells from him.

He edged toward these others, low to the ground, a growl flowing from his throat.

Once he neared, the winds died down. He found himself facing Tyrus. The Mrylian lord was flanked by Me’ric on one side and Nee’lahn on the other. Fardale and Mogweed hung back, near the sprawled body of Mycelle. ,

But Krai’s eyes ignored them all. His eyes were focused on the ax.

Tyrus ignored his challenging growl and tore the shape-shifter skin from his ax. Once again, Krai felt the magick ripped from his control. Flesh flowed back to that of a man again. Krai pushed up and stood naked before them. He held out his arm. “My ax.”

Tyrus lifted his sword between them. “First a promise, mountain man.” Krai lowered his arm. He knew he could not defeat Tyrus barehanded against steel. “What?” Tyrus swung his sword to encompass the room. “We’ve helped you win back your ancient throne and lands.”

Krai stared to Mycelle’s body. “I recognize your role. Ill’guard or not, I know the price in blood paid here. You’re all free to leave. I’ll not harm any of you.”

“It is not our lives that we bargain for.”

Mogweed squeaked behind him. “Not all we bargain for, that is.” Tyrus ignored the thin man. “I’ll return the ax only if you swear to use it first on the griffin.”

Krai glanced behind him. The monstrous black Weirgate still stood beside the Ice Throne. Its wings were spread wide, its jaw stretched in a silent howl of rage, revealing the black fangs. Krai stared at its red eyes. He could almost sense the Dark Lord staring back at him, raging at his betrayal, but he could not back down now. The Citadel would never be truly free, never be open to his people’s clans until this monstrous statue was destroyed. “I’ll do as you ask,” he said, turning back.

Nee’lahn stepped forward. “Be warned, Krai. Do not touch the statue yourself. It can tap into your elemental energy, draw the energy from your body.”

“I understand.” Again he held out his hand. Tyrus still hesitated. “Swear it.” Krai sighed. “I swear on the Ice Throne and on my blood as a member of the Senta Flame.” Grudgingly satisfied, Tyrus dropped the ax and slid it across the bloody granite to Krai’s feet.

Relieved, Krai bent and retrieved his weapon. He gripped the hickory handle. “What makes you believe I can succeed?”

Tyrus glanced to Mycelle, then back to Krai. “Prophecy.”

Krai’s eyes narrowed. He remembered the prophetic words of the prince’s dead father. Mycelle was to give her blood, and he was to win back the crown of his people. Together, they held the key to true victory. He nodded and turned toward the waiting griffin.

“Let this end now.”

Mogweed watched the naked man stalk across the hall, holding the ax in his arms. All eyes were on what was to happen next. But Mogweed had his own concerns. He cared not about Weirgates and old thrones. He had started on this long road to find a cure to the curse that bound him and Fardale.

Prophecy.

It seemed that old King Ry’s auguries were focused on this single night. Mycelle had died. Krai had won back his throne. But what of the prophecies surrounding the twin shape-shifters?

Two will come frozen; one will leave whole.

As the group watched Krai cross the throne hall, Mogweed turned his attention to Mycelle’s body. He touched the edge of her cloak, pulling it back. Clearly Mycelle’s prophecies had twined into Krai’s future. So it made sense that the same might be true for the predictions about Mogweed and Fardale.

The three predictions twining together—like a twisting snake.

Mogweed tugged the cloak from the dead woman’s shoulders, revealing the tiny striped viper. The paka’golo still lay snugged around her upper arm.

Here was the source of Mycelle’s shape-shifting, and she had no further use for it. Why not make it his own?

Cautiously, he reached for the small viper. A tiny tongue flickered in his direction. He let the snake taste the tip of a finger with its tiny fork, then slowly drew back his hand. The paka’golo followed, uncoiling from its perch, stretching toward Mogweed’s heat and scent.

It must know its prior master was dead.

The snake unwound and slid forward. Mogweed lowered his hand and shifted slightly forward, offering his palm.

The viper’s belly touched his skin, sending a shiver over Mogweed’s

»

flesh. But he kept his arm still. The paka’golo slid up his palm, tongue flickering at the strange landscape.

At last, its .tail dropped from Mycelle’s cooling flesh. With a tickling slither, it moved farther up Mogweed’s arm. The tail wrapped itself around his fingers.

Mogweed allowed himself a thrill of excitement. It was accepting him.

He glanced up and found Fardale staring at him. The wolf’s eyes glowed with the barest flicker of amber.

Sorry, Brother, Mogweed thought.

Then a sting like no other jerked Mogweed back. It was as if his hand had been thrust into the hottest flame. He opened his mouth but had no breath to scream. His chest was locked in pain. He stared down at his arm.

The open jaws of the paka’golo were locked onto his wrist. He watched its body spasm as it pumped its toxin into his veins.

Mogweed fell backward, shaking his arm. But the snake was latched by fangs and coiled around his wrist. The fiery burn spread up his arm.

Fardale leaped over Mycelle’s body, coming to his aid.

Begging with his eyes, Mogweed held out his arm toward Fardale. Then the flesh of his limb began to melt. The pain was still there, but Mogweed stared in shock as the frozen flesh began to flow again like a true si’luran. He remembered spying upon Mycelle in the grove.

Sweet Mother, it’s wording!

Then Fardale was there, lunging and snapping at the snake with a flash of teeth. He managed to grab it by its tail.

“No!” Mogweed gasped out past the pain.

The snake’s fangs released. It coiled around and struck Fardale on the tender flesh of his nose. The wolf howled.

Mogweed tried to grab up the paka’golo, but his flowing flesh would not obey. He struck Fardale in the nose as the wolf’s muzzle melted with the magickal poison. Their two fleshes mixed.

Frightened, Mogweed tugged, but he found himself unable to free himself. The transforming poison continued to spread through both their bodies, both figures melding together.

Mogweed suddenly heard his brother’s voice in his head, not in the wolfish images but plain words.

Brother, what have you done?

He had no idea. He found himself dissolving away. The world grew dark around him, fading. He sensed he was not alone as he sank into the burning darkness. He had no mouth with which to speak. Fardale, can you hear me?

There was no answer. The darkness grew complete. Mogweed cried out with his mind, pleading for salvation. Then he heard voices in the distance, sounding as if they arose from down a hole.

“What’s happened to them?”

“I don’t know. It looks like they melted.”

“Isn’t that Mycelle’s snake?”

“It’s dead.”

“What about Mogweed and Fardale?”

During this discourse, Mogweed tried to yell, struggling to let someone know he was alive. But was he?

This last thought terrified him. He stretched toward the voices as they continued to speak, using them like a hook with which to draw himself out of the darkness.

“We have more important concerns,” a stern voice said. Mogweed recognized Tyrus. With each word, the voices grew louder and the darkness lighter. Mogweed continued to focus. “Krai’s almost reached the griffin,” Tyrus continued. “But we can’t just leave them like this,” Nee’lahn said. “Wait,” Meric interrupted. “Something’s happening.” The darkness fell back away. Light flared again. Torchlight.

Mogweed opened his eyes. He had eyes! Hands rose to feel his face. He sat up and stared down at himself. He was back in his same body. He patted his form to make sure. Though he was naked and seated atop the clothes he had been wearing a moment ago, he was whole.

Conscious of the others’ attention, Mogweed stood up, covering himself with his hands.

“What happened to your brother?” Nee’lahn asked. Mogweed stared around him. Fardale was nowhere in sight. “I watched you two melt together,” Nee’lahn said. “One mass of flowing flesh.”

“Two will become one,” Mogweed whispered. He turned to the others. “The prophecy.” He lifted an arm and concentrated. He felt the bone inside turn to warmed butter. He willed brownish fur to sprout along its length. “I can shape-shift again! I’m free of the curse!”

“And Fardale?” Meric asked.

Wit’c11 Gate

Mogweed glanced around one more time. His brother was surely gone. He bit back a smile of triumph.

At last. He was free of his brother.

Tyrus spoke from a few steps away. His eyes were on the far side of the hall. “Krai is ready.” Meric and Nee’lahn swung around.

Alone, Mogweed studied the small twisted snake lying on the floor.

Two will come frozen; one will leave whole.

Mogweed smiled. He was that one.

Kral stood before the griffin. The towering Weirgate loomed over him, wings spread wide. The lion’s muzzle curled back from its curved fangs. Attuned to the dark magick, he felt the monstrous chunk of ebon’stone pulse with energy. He found his own heartbeat struggling to match. And deeper than his own heart, he felt the Dark Lord’s brand upon him burn brighter, a black rune charred into the rock of his elemental spirit.

Kral hesitated, arms trembling. He tore his eyes from the griffin’s ruby gaze and glanced to the white granite throne of his people. The blood of the d’warf king stained its pristine surface. Kral tightened his hold on the ax handle. He could not let this chance pass by. The Citadel, the ancestral home of his people, the throne of his own clan—it must be cleansed!

Stepping back, Kral raised the ax above him in a double-fisted grip. He knew his actions defied the very master who had granted him the power to win here, but he could not stop. He had crossed the line already, and there was no turning back. He made a silent prayer to himself. Once he was done here, he would do the bidding of the Dark Master. He would hunt down the wit’ch and burn her heart upon the Gul’gothal altar. He would pay back his debts in blood.

Kral turned once again to the griffin. He had been taught by his clan’s elders: Look a victim in the eye. If you are strong enough to take his life, then do not shirk from seeing him. Kral did this now. He stared into the fiery gaze of the griffin and slammed his ax down between those ruby eyes with all the force and energy in his body.

His arms jarred with the impact, shattering a small bone in his

]ames Clemens right hand. The crystal ring of iron on stone echoed throughout the hall.

Kral cried out, falling back, not from the pain of his injured hand, but as something vital was ripped from the marrow of his bones. He lifted the ax, but all that lay in his grip was its hickory handle. The iron blade had split into shards upon impact with the Weirgate, while the ebon’stone statue remained unharmed.

Behind him, he heard Tyrus. “He failed. The mountain man failed.” Gasping, Kral stumbled another step back. The broken pieces of his ax head lay on the dark granite. He felt as shattered inside, but at the same time strangely free, as if rusted chains had fallen from his heart. He stared at the remains of his ax. The hidden fist of ebon’stone was nowhere to be seen.

What had happened?

Kral searched inside him. The black rune that had been forged upon his spirit was gone. He fell to his knees. “I’m free… truly free.”

Where normally these words should have been shouted with joy, tears flowed down his face. The black rune was gone because the stone upon which it had been branded had vanished, too. He was empty. The Rock of his spirit had been sucked away, its elemental energy drawn fully into the Weir.

Kral knew from his battles with other ill’guard that without the fuel of an elemental fire, the dark magicks could not sustain. He touched his chest—both his elemental magick and the Dark Lord’s taint were gone—leaving only this hollow husk behind. He covered his face and began to weep, unashamed of who might see. He had won his freedom but lost his heritage.

And to what end?

He stared back up at the statue. It was unharmed.

A shout rose behind him. “Kral! Beware the statue!”

Through the tears of despair, Kral watched the griffin lean toward him, wings spreading wider, black lips pulling back to further bare its fangs. He knew now what his efforts had succeeded in doing.

He had awoken the Black Beast of Gul’gotha.

RUINS OF TULAR

JOACH WALKED TO WHERE THE SANDS ENDED AND THE DESERT LAKE BEgan. He stared across the strange landscape. Though small boats sailed across its smooth surface, it was like no lake he’d ever seen before. Instead of blue waters, an endless sea of black glass spread to all horizons. Joach tapped his toe on the hard surface to make sure it was real. The lake was named Aü‘shan by the tribes of the Southern Waste, “the Desert’s Tears” in the common tongue. It stood between them and Tular.

“It’s like a frozen sea,” Sy-wen said behind him. Kast stood at her side. The pair wore desert robes and cloaks, hiding their outlander features.

Nearby, a small skiff loaded with bales and crates glided past with its sails full of the afternoon’s breezes.

It ran across the glass sea on a pair of sharpened steel runners, whisking past them with the slithery sound of its blades. In the distance, other ships could be seen plying the lake, crossing from village to village.

Kesla stepped up to Joach at the lake’s edge. “We should continue on, if we are to reach Dallinskree by nightfall. The tithing caravan will leave at sunset.”

He nodded, rubbing the stump of his right wrist against his hip. Phantom pains still plagued him. Though his hand had been bitten off by the foul creature of Greshym, Joach still felt an itching and burning in his lost fingers.

Behind them, Hunt stood beside one of the giant desert malluks. His ward, the child Sheeshon, sat perched on the shaggy beast’s neck, vv IT CH Ij ATE

one hand tugging on her mount’s ear. “Klup, klup!” she called out, trying to imitate the drover’s nickering call to get a stubborn malluk to move. The beast simply ignored her, huffing out its blubbery lip in an s

expression of exasperation. *

Hunt patted her leg. “Leave the poor creature be, Sheeshon. It’s tired.” As were they all, Joach thought. They had traveled the entire night to reach Aü‘shan by morning and were still running short of time. The assembled children for this moon’s blood tithing were due to depart from the town of Dallinskree that night, and they still had to cross the lake.

Atop the malluk, Sheeshon gave her mount’s tufted ear a final tug, then settled back to her seat.

On the beast’s other side, Richald hobbled forward, leaning on a wooden crutch. The elv’in’s leg had healed rapidly. The recuperative powers of the elv’in, along with the medicinal magick of the desert healers, had mended the broken femur in less than half a moon. Still, Joach had tried convincing Richald to stay behind at the oasis of Oo’shal to attend his fellow elv’in, injured during the attack at Alcazar. But the prince had insisted on joining Joach on the journey to the Southwall. “I gave my word to see this through,” he had said. “I will not dishonor it. Whatever strength or magick I possess, I will use to aid you in the battle to come.”

Joach crossed to meet the elv’in now.

Richald wore a slightly pained expression. “Innsu returns,” he said, and pointed an arm to the west.

In the distance, a small plume of sandy dust marked the approach of a malluk running at full speed. It was followed by another.

“He’s not alone,” Richald added needlessly.

The group gathered around, waiting to discover what Innsu had learned in the small lakeside village of Cassus. They had been traveling overland for the past half moon and had had little contact with any but a few nomadic tribesmen. They were anxious for news.

Joach stared at the stretch of dunes and endless sand. Kesla moved beside him. He heard her breathing, the rustle of her cloak. Again he found it hard to believe the old shaman’s revelation that Kesla was no more than the Land’s dream given shape and life, brought into being to draw him to the desert sands.

From the corner of his eye, Joach studied Kesla: her hair shining like beaten gold in the bright sunlight, the deep bronze of her smooth skin, the twilight blue of her eyes. Even she did not know her true self. She thought herself as human as any other—and most times, he had the same problem himself.

Dream or not, he could not ignore or dismiss how his heart ached with the sight of her. Even now, he remembered the brief brush of her lips on his cheek as they fled Alcazar’s keep. How he longed to explore that unspoken promise to its end. But he clenched his fist against such foolishness. She was not real.

At last, the clopping tread of the approaching malluks drew his, attention forward. Innsu and the stranger drew their lumbering mounts up the low dune. Both beasts frothed and were damp with sweat. Innsu slid off his perch and landed lightly on his feet. The journeyman assassin shoved aside his cloak’s cowl, his face tight with concern.

Kesla stepped up to him. “What’s wrong?”

“Disaster,” Innsu said, running a hand over his shaved head. “Word in Callus is that winged demons arrived this past night, pale, vicious creatures who scoured Dallinskree for every child. Any who resisted were slain.”

“And the children?”

“They were taken, along with the tithing already gathered from the neighboring tribes.”

“But why?” Kesla asked, her eyes wide with shock. “The pact…” Innsu shook his head. “I don’t know the full story. Only that every child was taken this morning, emptying the city. A caravan set out upon the point of a whip, heeled by demons.” Joach cleared his throat with a scowl. “For them to take so many young ones, something new must be afoot in Tular.”

“But what?” Kesla asked.

“If only Shaman Parthus were here,” Joach mumbled.

The elder of the desert tribes had remained at the oasis of Oo’shal, insisting that his presence was needed to help heal Alcazar and Guildmaster Belgan from the taint of the darkmage’s occupation. But on the evening the group had set off into the desert, Parthus had pulled Joach aside. “I will watch for you in the dreaming sands. I will do what I can to help.” And he had proved as good as his word.

Every other night, the shaman had met Joach in the dream desert instructing him in the art of sculpting dreams into reality.

Joach wished he could share the shaman’s wisdom now. They had left the oasis so many days ago with a single plan in mind: to infiltrate this moon’s tithing by posing Sheeshon as one of the sacrifices. Under cover of the tithing caravan, the group could have snuck to the very steps of Tular without raising suspicion. But with the children already under way…

“What are we to do now?” Kast asked. Sy-wen hung on his arm. Innsu waved to the stranger, still seated on his malluk. “This is Fess a’Kalar, pilot of a skateboat in Cassus. He’s willing to take us to the far side of Aü‘shan. We might be able to intercept the caravan, overtake them as they travel the sands around the lake.”

“For a price,” the man said from his saddle, his voice dark. Innsu nodded.

“What’s this price?” Joach asked with suspicion. The man shook back his hood. His black hair was cropped close to his head except for two locks hanging in front of his ears. His eyes were as black and hard as the lake at his back. “I will take you all to the far side of Aü‘shan, but you must swear to bring back my young daughter.”

Innsu explained. “His child was tithed this past moon.” The pilot turned away, but not before Joach saw the pain in his eyes.

Joach spoke up. “We’ll do our best to free all the children.”

“No,” Fess a’Kalar said, turning back, his eyes sparking. “Innsu has already explained your plan to me: to hide under the cloaks of the children so you might sneak upon the ghouls unseen. I will not have my little Misha be a shield for your foolish attack.”

“We will not risk the children,” Joach said. “Their safety will be our foremost priority. This I swear.”

“Besides,” Innsu added, “the children are already doomed. Our presence will not add to their danger, but offer a chance of salvation. Once we reach the Southwall, we will send them fleeing under the protection of Hunt and the desert warriors.”

The skateboat pilot appeared little swayed.

Kesla stepped forward. “Already a full legion of desert warriors is en route along Aü‘shan’s other shore.

Once we’ve entered Tular,

James Llemp.ns they’ll lead a feinting attack on the Ruins. The ghouls will be too distracted to be concerned with the fleeing children.“

Fess pulled his hood back up. “Misha is all that is left of my wife. She died three winters ago. I cannot lose Misha, too.” He swung his malluk around. “I cannot.”

Innsu turned to Joach and Kesla. “He was the only pilot willing to travel to Aü‘shan’s far side. It lies in the shadow of the Southwall. None will sail their boats so close to Tular.” Joach sighed and stepped forward to block the pilot’s beast. “What would you have of us then?” he called up to the mounted rider.

The man’s eyes almost glowed from inside his hood. “I would travel with you to meet the caravan. Once you’ve commandeered it, I want Misha freed before you continue on. With so many taken from Dalhnskree, they will not miss one small child.”

Joach considered the man’s request. He glanced to Kesla. She gave him a barely perceptible nod. Joach returned his attention to Fess a’Kalar. Joach hated to be coerced in this matter when so much was at stake, but at the same time, he saw no harm in granting this man his demands. It was his child. It was his boat.

Joach answered the silent plea in the desert man’s eyes. “So be it. We will free your daughter.” Fess bowed his head. Words—a prayer of thanks—flowed from the man’s hood. “Reliqai dou aan.” Joach turned to the lake of black glass. The sun had climbed the sky to turn the lake’s surface into a blinding glare. It was as if the world ended here. But Joach knew it did not. Beyond its far shore, the Basilisk Weirgate awaited them all. Standing on this shore, Joach could almost sense its baleful gaze.

Even in the sweltering heat, Joach shivered under his cloak.

“So be it,” he mumbled to himself.

As THE SUN SANK TOWARD THE HORIZON, GrESHYM CROUCHED WITHIN

the shadow of the Southwall. He stared into the small pool of quicksilver and waved his hand over its mirrored surface, erasing the image of Joach and his allies. He used his staff to pull himself up. “So, boy, you still intend to put your head into the beast’s jaws, do you?” For the past few days, Greshym had been monitoring Joach’s progress, plotting and planning. It was a simple’thing to spy on the boy since the bonds between them went deeper than any suspected The blood spell to open a window on Joach’s doings was a simple thing—no more effort than reaching out and shaking a hand.

“Which is just as well.” Greshym glanced up to the Southwall towering behind him. He cared not to draw the attention of what lurked inside Tular. He had made sure his hiding place was many leagues from the crumbled ruins and that any spells he cast were minor ones.

With the final pieces satisfactorily falling into place, Greshym allowed a small smile to crack his dry lips.

Though he had been thwarted in Alcazar, the information he had gained was worth the loss. The boy is a sculptor. The shock of that revelation, more than any magickal assault, had sent him fleeing.

Greshym was well familiar with the magick of the dream. Long ago, he himself had been a member of the Hi’fai sect, a group devoted to studying prophecy and gleaning glimpses of the future through the art of dreaming. But since Ragnar’k, the stone dragon, had awoken and taken flesh, joining the wit’ch’s fight, Greshym had considered the boy’s elemental gift to be no threat. Now all that had changed.

Greshym turned his back on the black sea of glass and stumbled toward the wall of sandstone nearby.

The revelation of Joach’s true ability made a certain sense. Without a doubt, there was balance and symmetry in this.

But more than that—it was also a chance like no other.

Greshym approached the wall and heard telltale scrabbling and scraping coming from a narrow hole in the sandstone surface. He tapped his staff against the lip of the cave. The sounds stopped and a bulky shape backed out of the cubby. Its curled tail and hoofed hind feet came first, followed by its squat body and porcine head. Peaked ears swiveled in agitation and fear. “Mmmasster.”

“Out of the way, Rukh.” Greshym leaned down to peer into the hollow the animal had been digging. He frowned. It ended just a short way in.

The stump gnome must have smelled his displeasure. A stream of urine sprinkled into the desert as the creature groveled. “Stone… hard,” it pleaded and held up its gnarled hands. Its claws had been JAMES LLIMENS

ground to nubs from digging at the sandstone. Blood dripped from the fingertips.

Greshym sighed and straightened. Why was he always plagued by beasts of such ill use? Greshym waved Rukh away. “Night comes. I’ll be hungry with the moon’s rise. Fetch something to eat.”

“Yes, mmmaster.” Rukh scurried out of his way.

Greshym bent to the hole, then turned and called back to the gnome. “And no more desert rats!

Something with a bit of meat and blood!”

“Yes, mmmaster.”

Greshym ducked and pushed into the sandstone cave. As soon as his head passed the threshold, Greshym could feel the power flowing through the Southwall. He had chosen this spot since it was upriver from Tular. Here, the Land’s vein of power ran clean and untainted. Below Tular, the feeble, corrupted current would do him little good—not if he was to succeed in this first step.

Greshym reached the end of the excavated hole and slowly sat down, crossing his crooked legs in front of him and resting his staff on his knees. So near the heart of the true desert, the air almost glowed with energy, but Greshym knew it was just the sun setting, painting the desert in countless hues.

Settled, Greshym closed his eyes, waiting, patient. He touched the elemental gifts in his own body; they were long unused, almost forgotten, but still there. For any member of the Hi’fai sect, the dreaming was always just a breath away. Greshym sank into his trance, exhaling out the real world and willing himself into the dream desert.

Time drifted forward.

From a distance away, he sensed as stars began to shine and the moon’s full glow climbed the skies. And still he waited.

Finally, Greshym felt a familiar tug and allowed himself to be drawn away from stars and moon. Night had come to the Wastes. The path to the dream desert opened, and Greshym flowed into it, ripe with power. He had tested entering the dream desert over the past several nights. From a long distance, he had spied upon Joach in the glowing sand, watching the boy practice his new talent.

But this night was different. He had no intention of merely spying from a distance. This night he would take his first step on the path to ridding himself of this decrepit husk of a body, returning youth to his bent bones and ravaged flesh. And to take this step, he needed power.

Greshym opened his eyes. The cave had vanished around him. He now sat in the sands beside a bright silver river. He climbed slowly to his feet. The skies overhead were as blank as an empty slate, while around him the desert shone with a soft light. Greshym glanced back to the flat river. In its bright surface, he saw the Southwall reflected. He could even see the small cubby bored into its surface, so close he could reach out and touch it.

Smiling, Greshym leaned a hand over the great expanse of silver. The power here flowed like a raging river, but its surface was as still as a quiet pond. He passed his arm over the Southwall’s reflection, resting his hand over the entrance to the tiny cave.

“Come to me,” he whispered in the old desert tongue. As a member of the Hi’fai, Greshym had long ago studied the dreaming arts of the desert shamans. He knew their ancient tongue. He knew secrets lost to the ages. “Return to your master.”

Slowly, a long thin object rose from the silver river. Once it was within reach, Greshym closed his fingers around his familiar staff. As flesh met petrified wood, the silver river turned momentarily black. As if sickened by its foul touch, the river shot the staff out with a blast. Greshym was knocked back by the force of the expulsion, landing hard in the soft sand, but he managed to maintain his grip on his prize.

Relieved, Greshym hugged his staff to his chest for a few breaths before moving.

Finally, he rolled around and shoved to his legs. He still had one more chore to complete this night.

Turning his back on the river, Greshym set out into the desert. He moved swiftly, casting out his elemental senses, honing in on a single target in this vast desert. So far, there was no sign. But after spying here these many nights, Greshym knew where to go.

With the boy taking sail this evening across the dead glass sea, Joach would be unable to enter the dream desert. Greshym could not pass up this chance. Leagues of sand vanished under him. In the distance, vague shapes arose from the sand as sleepers throughout the Wastes accidentally slipped into this plane.

Greshym ignored them all. He knew it would only sap his energy to give them attention. So he continued on toward the rendezvous.

(At his own dream ttemp ted to ofthe dream with a sigh.

Behind him, the blackened bit of sand faded away, erased by the endless desert sands. But he knew that in the middle of the oasis of Oo’shal, someone would soon discover the burned remains of Shaman Parthus, melted into a patch of black glass—what the tribesmen of the desert called nightglass, a miniature version of that great barren lake of Aü‘shan.

As Greshym headed back over the sands to return to the silver river, he wondered if Joach was already sailing atop Aü‘shan’s midnight surface.

He smiled and glanced down at the form he had stolen from Shaman Parthus and laughed. No matter where Joach traveled now, when it was most important, he and Joach would meet again.

Kesla walked up to Joach as he sat on a crate and stared out at the black lake of Aü‘shan. She stepped to the rail. The night sky was clear, and stars shone both overhead and in the glassy surface of the surrounding sea. The wind remained swift over the smooth, hard surface, filling the sails of the skateboat and speeding them toward the rising full moon.

“How much longer?” Joach asked, not turning.

“The pilot says we’ll reach the far side before the moon reaches its zenith.” She glanced behind her. Fess a’Kalar stood by the tiller, face bare to the winds, his eyes on the stars and his sails. Up and down the boat, his four-man crew worked lines and cranked winches at his command.

Joach nodded. “Is everything prepared?”

“Kast and Sy-wen are ready to take flight as soon as we dock. Innsu and the tribesmen have their weapons sharpened, arrows fletched, and they are dressed in sand gear. Hunt and Richald oversee Sheeshon, who rests belowdecks.” Kesla could not help but smile, even with the tension. “Hunt truly has a sweet voice when he sings her to sleep.”

Joach glanced at her, a shadow of a smile on his face. She settled beside him, sharing his crate. He made a motion to stand and move away, but she gripped his arm. “Stay… please.” After a pause, he sank back to his seat with a sigh. Kesla remained silent, just appreciating this quiet moment. Fi-nally, she felt Joach relax beside her, leaning ever so slightly against her. She slid an arm smoothly around his back.

Neither spoke; neither acknowledged the simple gesture.

As the boat glided across the lake, the whisper of its steel runners on the glass surface created a continual haunted music, echoing eerily across the night.

Finally Joach spoke. “Tell me about Aü‘shan.”

“What do you want to know?”

“Earlier you mentioned that the lake was formed during the ancient battle that first drove the ghouls from Tular, some magickal cataclysm that melted the sands to this black glass.”

“Nightglass,” she whispered, “like the dagger.”

“Tell me more about this legend.”

“It’s not legend, but history. I’ve read books in Master Belgan’s library—texts and scrolls stretching into the distant past of the Southern Wastes.”

Joach glanced at her, their faces only a handspan apart. “You read ?”

“Do you want to be pushed off this scow?” She smiled at him and stared into his eyes a moment. It was good to hear him tease. But there was a sadness in his gaze that she could not touch. It had been there since they had escaped Alcazar. He turned away. “So tell me about this place.” She sighed. “This region was once just desert, except for Ka’aloo at the foot of the Southwall, a sprawling trading port beside the desert’s largest oasis. Silk merchants, spice traders, and dealers in wares would come from all over. Their tents would stretch for leagues into the sands around Ka’aloo.”

“So what happened?”

“As the ghouls grew in power and perversity, fewer and fewer would make the trek, fearing for their lives. Tales began to spread of children disappearing, of strange cries echoing over the sands from Tular, of beasts that would come with the night to attack and pillage. So the flow of riches trickled away. This did not please the ghouls. They had grown to enjoy the varieties of wines, spices, and out-lander wares at their doorstep. An order was sent out, demanding a certain tithe of goods be delivered to their representatives in Ka’aloo.”

“The beginning of the tithing?”

Kesla nodded. “And as the ghouls grew ever more bold, so did their demands. Soon a tithing of blood was being demanded: cattle, malluks, goats… and… and eventually—”

“Children,” Joach finished.

“Upon reaching manhood or with the first bleed of womanhood, the firstborn of every family was required to serve two winters in Tular. Most never returned. Those that did were crippled in the mind, unable to speak. Many had turned savage, more beast than man.”

“Why did the tribes submit to them?”

“If a village or tribe refused, the basilisk was sent to them in the night and all were killed. Nothing could slay the beast. So as winters passed, slowly the tithing grew to be a custom of the Wastes, another harshness of the unforgiving desert.”

“How horrible.”

Kesla stared out at the glass sea. “Such was life under the ghouls.”

“So what happened?”

“Occasionally there were assaults upon Tular, uprisings, but they were all beaten down and swallowed by the sands. None could resist the ghouls. Then one winter, a child was born whose eyes glowed with the shine of the dream desert.” Kesla glanced to Joach to see if he understood.

He nodded.

“He was named Shiron, after the first star to rise each night. His family lived alone in the desert and immediately knew him to be special. It was said that hundreds of stars fell from the skies on the night he was born. Since the parents were isolated nomads and called no place home, they decided to risk defying the ghouls and keep their child hidden. It was only their own lives at risk. But soon, other tribes heard of the child and took up the family’s cause. The family was spirited from tribe to tribe, from village to village. The child grew up to know the entire breadth and spread of the desert. All who laid eyes upon him knew he was the one to free them from the tyranny of the ghouls. Rumors spread of his ability to call water from the sands, to tame a sandstorm with the wave of his hand. All declared Shiron to be the chosen one, the child of the desert itself. Some questioned whether he had even been born of man and woman, but born out of the desert itself.”

J A M K S SIEMENS

T

Joach suddenly stiffened beside her. She glanced to him, but he waved for her to continue, his expression slightly pained.

“So when he grew to manhood at the age of thirteen, no one in the desert wanted him tithed to Tular.

Everyone whispered his name. But little happened in the desert of the Wastes that did not reach the ears of the ghouls. On the night of his passage from boy to man, the basilisk itself appeared in the sands outside the village where he was staying. It did not attack, but simply took up silent watch, warning all that the child must be taken to Tular. That night plans were made to whisk Shiron away, but the boy refused. Instead, after the celebrations of his passage to manhood, Shiron left the village and walked to where the basilisk was rooted. It is said that Shiron spoke to the ghouls through the beast and swore to bring himself to the Southwall.”

“Why?”

“That’s what the villagers asked him. They tried to convince him to flee, but Shiron left with the morning’s light and made the long trek to the Wall. Each night of the journey, the basilisk would come to make sure he kept his promise, its baleful eye watching over the boy. But he did not try to run. He reached Ka’aloo in less than a quarter moon. There, with the moon shining as bright as it does this night, he found a ghoul named Ashmara waiting for him.”

“Ashmara?”

“Every desert child’s nightmare. It was said his skin was as pale as milk and his eyes glowed with red fires. He was the most corrupt of the ghouls, sick in his depravity and wild in his blood lusts. Some said his wickedness came with his birth. Born with skin that could not tolerate the sun’s touch, eyes that could not withstand its brightness, he grew to hate the desert, only coming out at night to wreak his terror upon those that could walk the day.”

“And this Shiron… did Ashmara take him to Tular?”

“No, in the center square of Ka’aloo, beside the pool of the oasis, Shiron finally refused and spat at the toes of the leader of Tular. He told Ashmara that from this day forward the reign of the ghouls would end, that his own blood would slay them all.”

“What happened?”

Kesla turned from her study of the lake back to Joach. “Here is where texts vary on what happened.

Some say Ashmara drew a dagger and attacked Shiron, while others say Shiron pulled a magickal sword from the sand and drove it through the ghoul but failed to kill him. But no matter the story, a great battle was fought between them. Dire magicks lit the night skies. Those in Ka’aloo fled into the desert with only the cloaks on their backs. The battle raged between Shiron and Ashmara throughout the entire night, and by sunrise those that had returned found only a lake of steaming and running glass. Aü‘shan, it was named—’the Desert’s Tears.‘ It took a full moon’s time for the lake to cool.”

“And what of Shiron and Ashmara?”

Kesla shook her head. “Both were gone, consumed by their own magicks.” Joach stared at the smooth, dark lake. “And Tular?”

“Once word spread of Shiron, the tribes rose up once again. Not just a handful, as in the past, but the entire desert. Tular, though leaderless now, was not defenseless. The basilisk still lived, as did hordes of other wicked beasts. But Ashmara had been the strongest of Southwall’s ghouls. With his loss, the others barely resisted the attack of the desert’s tribes. A siege began that stretched for two winters.” Kesla faced Joach. “Until one day, a woman came and instructed the artisans of the desert to sculpt a dagger from the glass of the lake.”

“Sisa’kofa?”

She nodded. “The Wit’ch of Spirit and Stone. She spilled her own blood upon the blade, and on the night of the full moon, she walked naked into Tular and slew the basilisk. With the death of the ghouls’

monster, the tide was turned. In less than a moon, Tular fell, the walls were pulled down, and the place was scoured of all living things. It became a cursed place avoided by all.” Joach sighed. “Until it all started over again.”

Behind them, Fess a’Kalar called from the tiller. “We near the South wall! Ready yourselves!” Joach and Kesla both stood. Squinting her eyes, Kesla spotted where the gleam of the glass lake ended and the sands began once again. Beyond the sand, the far horizon lost its gentle curve as the stars of the night sky were sliced away by a straight, unyielding line. Though it was unseen, Kesla recognized the silhouette of the South-wall, dark and imposing.

Around her, the crew of the skateboat began to scurry in prepara-JAM

tion of beaching on the sands. Despite the activity, Kesla found her eyes fixed on the Wall. For a moment, two images lay atop each other. Ghostly in the moonlight, glimpses of pavilions and trees and a pool of midnight blue appeared around her.

“Ka’aloo,” she mumbled.

“What was that?” Joach asked.

As the images faded away she shook her head and touched the nightglass dagger hidden under her cloak, seeking reassurance. It was just her imagination, the old stories come to life in her mind’s eye. She turned her back on the lake, but she could not escape the feeling that for that brief moment she had been staring through Shi-ron’s eyes, seeing ancient Ka’aloo as the boy must have seen it.

Joach touched her arm. “Is something wrong?”

She reached to his fingers and simply clutched them, fighting the sense of doom. “Let’s get everyone ready. We’ve much to do before the dawn comes.”

Joach waited for the signal. He and Richald leaned their backs against the outcropping of sandstone.

Both of them were covered in cloaks that matched the sand and stone. Neither of them breathed. Across the shallow valley, Innsu hid with his ten warriors among the scrabble of rock. Between them, in the valley’s center, Hunt and Kesla sat around a fire, with Sheeshon sleeping in a bedroll near the flames.

Bait for those that approached.

After disembarking from the skateboat, it had been difficult in the flat sands to find an adequate place to ambush the children’s caravan without being seen. Even at night, the stars and setting moon were enough to cast the landscape in silver. But as much as it made their task difficult, it also made the approaching caravan easy to spot.

Even before the skateboat had beached, Kast had found the caravan with a spyglass. The long train trundled with wagons and mewling malluks, winding along the shores of Aü‘shan as it headed toward Tular. Lamps swung from poles on both beast and wagon, a glowing snake splayed across the dark desert landscape. Kast had lowered his spyglass with a worried look. “I count six skal’tum stalking around the edges of the caravan.”

With this dire news, they needed as much time as possible to ready the trap.

Fess a’Kalar had proven his skill as a pilot, gliding his ship well ahead of the caravan and finding a shelter in which to keep his boat hidden. Once landed, they had quickly set out and chosen this point along the shore road in which to set up their ambush. Framed by sandstone boulders, it offered plenty of shelter and deep shadows. “Here comes the scout,” Richald said, ducking down. The heavy tread of an approaching malluk grew closer, coming from just over the next dune. Joach lay unmoving as the great beast shambled by. The musky scent of its passage swept over him. Once it was past, he shifted enough to watch the malluk crest the dune and head down the far side.

The rider called to those gathered around the fire. “Ho!” Kesla acted surprised by the appearance of the scout. She stood quickly and spoke in the desert tongue. Joach did not understand it. The man was clearly questioning her, and she pointed an arm at Sheeshon bundled in her blankets. Joach knew what she was explaining to the man. She and her uncle were heading to Dallinskree with her niece, a tribute for this moon’s tithing.

The scout stared around the small camp, clearly suspicious. Sheeshon awoke from all the noise and rubbed her eyes. Sleepy, she leaned closer to Hunt. He comforted her while motioning her to stay silent.

It would ruin the ruse if Sheeshon should speak. Her Dre’rendi accent would certainly mark her as an outlander.

From his perch, the scout eyed the child. Joach prayed for him to rise to the bait. He seemed to sniff the air. The campsite had been ringed with malluk urine, a common warding against the sand sharks and other burrowing predators. Its strong musk also helped mask the presence of the hidden men. Fess a’Kalar had warned them that the guards for the caravan were desert outlaws who had been bought with gold for this foul duty. They were as cunning as they were savage.

Finally, the scout lifted a horn from his saddle and blew a long slow note, a signal that it was safe for the caravan to come forward.

The signal given, Hunt whipped back his cloak and swung his hidden club. The man turned in time to take the brunt of the blow to the side of his face. He tumbled from his perch and struck the sand hard. Kesla flew to the malluk’s side to keep it calm. Silently, Innsu slid from his hiding spot and raced to the mount and up into the high saddle.

Without a word, Innsu ambled the malluk to the crest of the hill, back in direct sight of the caravan. He lifted an arm and waved for the wagons to continue forward along the shore road. In the meantime, Kesla quickly bound and gagged the limp guard, then she and Hunt dragged him to where the desert warriors still lay hidden.

The plan was to allow the caravan to swing into the valley before beginning their attack. With the caravan’s attention on the small roadside camp, Joach and his group would attack the flanks.

In the shallow valley, Kesla and Hunt returned to their positions around the campfire. Joach bit his lip against the tension. What occurred next depended on perfect timing and expert execution.

In short order, the forefront of the caravan wound over the rise and down into the valley. Malluks with solitary riders led the way; behind them came open wagons hauled by pairs of malluks. The wagon beds were loaded with baled hay and crates of goods sacked from Dallinskree. Behind them came cart after cart of barred cages. Inside, lit by torches, the scared, pale faces of children stared out at The surrounding sands. Their cries and sobbing echoed over the dunes. Flanking the children’s wagons were outriders, scouts on leaner malluks.

But as Joach watched, the worst was yet to come. He saw the first skal’tum climb over the rise. Framed in firelight, it stood as tall as any malluk, and the folded wings on its back twitched as its black eyes stared across the valley. Joach prayed that the musk would continue to mask the hidden party. As the creature descended into the valley, its white flesh stood out starkly against the shadowed sands, like a corpse floating on a dark sea.

Joach held his breath as another of the beasts appeared, this time closer. It crawled along the sands on his side of the caravan, low, claws scrabbling on the rocks. It paused, perched like some winged carrion hunter atop a large boulder, no more than a stone’s throw from Joach’s position. It lifted its head and drank in the night’s scents. Joach watched pale lips curl back, exposing its sharp fangs. Eyes, so dark that they appeared holes in a skull, gazed at the tiny camp below. A long, forked tongue slithered from its throat and tasted the air.

Muscles tensing, Joach studied the dark rocks on the valley’s far side. The noises of the trundling caravan grew deafening to those who had been hiding in silence for so long. What was Innsu waiting for?

More of the caravan rode into the valley. Another two skal’tum appeared, one riding atop a cage of children who whimpered in mindless terror.

Below, a pair of outriders swept over to Kesla’s campsite and slid from their saddles. The glint of ankle irons flashed in their hands. Sweet Mother, what is taking them so long? Joach’s fingers wrapped around the sword hilt in his hand. Finally a flicker of silver flashed from the dark rocks. At last— the signal!

Joach tossed aside his cloak and burst into the open with Richald. The skal’tum perched on the rock swung toward them and hissed, clearly surprised. Joach lifted his sword, and Richald raised his arms, shining bright with elemental power.

High-pitched laughter flowed from the skal’tum’s throat. “Ssso the desert hides some ratsss.” It wheezed, snapping its skeletal wings open. Clawed legs tensed as it prepared to leap. What did the monster have to fear? At night, the skal’tum were protected by dark magicks that made them impervious to swords and blades. In a burst, it hurled itself at them.

Joach rolled backward, and Richald scrambled to the side. As it flew at them, a larger, darker shape flashed overhead, snatching the skal’tum in midair, like an eagle upon a sparrow. Then it was gone, leaving behind it a roar that deafened the entire valley. Ragnar’k had drawn first blood this night. The broken body of the skal’tum tumbled from the skies to crash atop a wagon, shattering its wheels with the impact.

The dragon’s roar could strip the dark protections from the skal’tum, making them vulnerable. With the way clear, Joach hurried down the hill.

Below, a battle raged. Innsu and the desert warriors attacked the riders and drovers of the caravan with arrows and long, curved swords. Some outlaws, though caught by surprise, were quick to regroup, while others raced past Joach and offered no challenge. It seemed gold did not buy the most stalwart hearts.

Unimpeded, Joach ran down the slope to the campfire. Kesla and JAM E S l.LfiMtNS

Hunt had already dispatched the two scouts and now guarded Sheeshon.

“What took you so long?” Hunt asked as Joach skidded to a stop.

Richald answered. “We were blocked by one of the Dark Lord’s monsters.”

“Ragnar’k killed it,” Joach added, then scooped Sheeshon up under his free arm. He was no skilled swordsman, especially with his left arm. He had one duty this night: to whisk Sheeshon away from the fighting with Kesla. Hunt and Richald would join the battle.

Kesla led the way toward the rocks, while Richald and Hunt headed into the fighting. Joach glanced behind him. Across the way, he saw an outlaw lay a torch to one of the children’s cages, clearly trying to divert the ambushers into rescuing the children. But before the wood could take the flame, the man collapsed, his back feathered with arrows. His torch fell to the sand and went dark.

Closer, a skal’tum fell from the sky to land, broken and bleeding, among the rocks. Joach glanced up.

Ragnar’k continued to pick off the monsters while ensuring none escaped by wing to alert Tular.

Kesla suddenly tugged on his elbow. “Run!”

Joach swung around. A pair of wild-eyed malluks thundered toward them, dragging a smashed wagon behind. Joach ran with Sheeshon in his arms and managed by a single step to escape being trampled.

They reached the rocks and climbed into their safe embrace to sit out the bloody storm.

In a shallow cave, they found Fess a’Kalar waiting. He sprang to his feet. “Did you find Misha?” he asked hopefully, looking to the bundled form in Joach’s arms.

“Not yet,” Kesla said. “We must first rid the caravan of outlaws and monsters; then we’ll search for your daughter.”

The skateboat pilot’s face was pale with worry. “I saw those monsters.” He hid his face in his hands.

“My little Misha…”

Joach settled Sheeshon down. She sucked her thumb and stared wide-eyed at all around her. Joach placed a hand on the pilot’s shoulder. “We’ll get your daughter safely back into your arms.” Fess turned his face to hide his tears, then moved away. “I cannot sit idle and wait. I must offer what help I can.” Fess stumbled away, a dagger in his hands.

“Don’t.” Joach stepped after him. “You don’t have to fight.” The man stared at Joach, an incredulous look on his face. “It is my daughter out there.” Joach opened his mouth to argue, but found no words. He watched Fess disappear into the shadows.

Joach turned away with a shake of his head. “Fess is no warrior.” Kesla nodded. “But he is a father.” She pulled Sheeshon into her lap and gently cradled her, rocking ever so slightly.

Joach took up watch with his sword. Among the rocks, the sounds of battle were muted, but he could still hear the screams of terrified children. It was an awful sound. He could only imagine how much worse it must sound to the father of one of these children.

Kesla sighed behind him. “We might rescue the children from what awaits them in Tular, but we can’t ever rescue them from this night.”

Joach understood and remained silent. The horrors here would last a lifetime. Even Sheeshon stared wide-eyed into the night, cringing whenever the sounds of battle grew closer. Kesla met his gaze over her head.

Joach sought some way to distract the child. He ran a finger over his sword, slicing a tiny cut. He leaned over the floor of their little cave and squeezed a thick drop from his finger into the sand.

“What are you doing?” Kesla asked.

“Shhh…” Joach sat back and sighed out his breath, extending his senses. On the long trek to Aü‘shan, Shaman Parthus had taught Joach how to pierce through the veil between the real and the dream desert by focusing on the magick in his blood.

Joach stared at the red drop resting atop the sand. As he watched, it slowly sank between the grains.

Joach allowed his thoughts and a bit of his spirit to follow the blood down into the sand. From the corner of his eye, he noticed the rocks vanish and the dream desert open up around him, glowing softly into the distance. As he stared, the drop of blood grew brighter, becoming more real. Shaman Parthus had told him how one’s attention could give substance to what was figment. Joach did that now, feeding a small bit of himself into the drop of blood and willing it to change.

Distantly he heard a small gasp from Kesla. Joach continued to work in silence, concentrating. Once done, Joach pulled himself back to the world of rocks and wind. At the entrance of the cave, a rose of sculpted sandstone stood mute watch. Joach waved a hand over it, touching the threads of power that still linked him to the dream desert. The rose’s petals slowly bloomed open in the moonlight.

Joach heard Sheeshon giggle. He turned and saw her eyes bright upon his creation. “Pretty,” she whispered, and reached out to it.

“Careful, honey,” Kesla warned.

Joach waved to Sheeshon. “It’s all right.”

Sheeshon reached and plucked the rose from the sand. As the stem broke, the rose fell back to sand, falling away. She stared wide-eyed at the trick, then looked up at Joach with a twinge of guilt.

He patted her hand, dusting the silt from her fingers, then kissed their tips. “Don’t worry, Sheeshon.

Dreams aren’t supposed to last forever.”

She grinned at him, then snuggled against Kesla, who wrapped her arms around the girl.

Joach met Kesla’s soft smile of appreciation. Maybe dreams aren’t supposed to last forever, he thought as he stared at her, but while they’re here, maybe you should appreciate and cherish them.

Slowly he sank back and joined Kesla. Together they watched over Sheeshon. And sometime during that long night, Joach found his fingers wrapped in Kesla’s, the child guarded between them.

Finally, the scrape of heel on rock sounded. Joach jerked up, sword in hand. Hunt pushed forward. His cloak was stained in blood. He leaned on a rock. “Sheeshon?”

“She sleeps,” Kesla said.

“Have we won?” Joach asked.

Hunt nodded. “The caravan is ours.”

Joach and Kesla walked back out of the rocks, while Hunt picked up Sheeshon. She woke sleepily, smiled at Hunt, and hugged him tight around the neck. Joach noticed the hard man soften, saw the pain in his eyes mute. As a group, they continued back to the sand.

Joach stared at the carnage below. Both men and beasts lay bleeding in the sand. Across the valley, Ragnar’k landed and perched on the ridge. The moans and sobs filled the valley.

“The children are free,” Hunt said.

Joach shook his head. These children would never be truly free after this night. He stared at a group of them cowering beside a broken wagon, bleeding, crying, and terrified.

^ i u WlT’CHCJATE

“What about Misha, the pilot’s daughter?” Kesla asked. “Was she found safe?”

“Yes,” Hunt said.

Joach recognized the pang of sorrow in the Dre’rendi’s voice and turned to face him.

Hunt hung his head. “Her father was killed. Fess attacked one of the skal’tum as it tore into a cartload of children. He died before Ragnar’k could come to his aid, but his death was not in vain. His attack managed to delay the monster long enough for the dragon to save the children.” Kesla turned away, a hand over her mouth.

Hunt continued. “One of the skateboat’s crew has promised to take the child to her aunt and uncle.” Joach closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. He pictured the man’s haunted face as he strode into the darkness.

Innsu strode up to them. “The outlaws have been either slain or driven into the sands. Once we regroup the caravan, we should be under way for Tular by daybreak.” Joach sheathed his sword. “No.”

Eyes swung in his direction.

He faced them with a deep frown. “These children have suffered enough.” He turned to Hunt. “I want you and the warriors to take all the children away from here. Now. Keep them safe.” Innsu protested. “But we’ll need the caravan to hide our approach—”

“No. I won’t hide behind these children. Fess a’Kalar spoke truly. We have no right to do this.”

“But we saved them,” Innsu continued to argue.

Joach laughed, but it was a pained sound even to his own ears. “We saved no one here.” He moved away. “Hunt, gather the men and head out as soon as the sun rises.”

“It will be done,” Hunt said.

“Then what are we going to do when we reach Tular?” Innsu asked angrily.

Kesla answered. “We’ll find a way inside without being seen. We’re assassins, are we not?” Her words shamed Innsu into silence.

Kesla strode to Joach’s side.

He turned and stared into her twilight eyes and knew his decision was the right one—not because she represented the dream of the desert, but because her eyes glowed with the simple compassion and concern of a woman.

Joach bent down and kissed her deeply. He felt her flinch in surprise for a moment, then wilt into his embrace. They clung to each other, a simple acknowledgment of life—and maybe even of love.

As TWILIGHT SPREAD OVER THE DESERT, Sy-WEN RODE ATOP HER DRAGON, sweeping along the deep shadows of the Southwall. The immense sandstone structure stretched higher than Ragnar’k could fly, but its surface was far from smooth. Sections lay crumbled into a rocky scarp at the base, while countless sandstorms had pitted its face. In addition, old scars from ancient wars had burned the red rock black for large swaths. These signs of old battle grew in number as they swept toward the ruins of Tular.

We come to city, my bonded, Ragnar’k sent to her. The dragon’s vision was keener than hers. But she closed her eyes and shared his sight.

Ahead, it looked as if some giant had taken a hammer and struck the Southwall a great blow. Boulders and huge chunks of sandstone lay jumbled at the base of the wall. The pile climbed halfway up the immense wall. Only as they swept closer did it become clear that the tumbled boulders were in fact once a great city. The remains of a half-circle curtain wall enclosed the debris. One watchtower still stood near the front, but its crenellated top had been worn by winds into a rough nub, and its base had been burned as black as the Aü‘-shan sea. Within the walls, the remains of immense buildings and spires could be seen poking from the sandy dunes that had blown into the ruined city. It was as if the desert were trying to erase these scoured ruins.

“Keep to shadows, Ragnar’k,” Sy-wen whispered into the wind, but she knew the dragon heard her thoughts. “We don’t want to stir this nest.”

Sy-wen studied the ruins of Tular. She saw no sign of movement, no sign that anything still occupied the city. But she also spotted the worn wagon trails that led through the broken gates and wound through the city. The trail of the old caravans crossed the city and disappeared into the yawning maw of a tunnel in the wall itself. From this height, Sy-wen could make out the carved figures of a man and a woman, done in relief at the tunnel’s entrance, arms linked over the entrance in a clear gesture of welcome. Sy-wen imagined it was one of the last gentle images the children of the deserts ever saw before being swallowed away into the darkness.

She leaned closer to Ragnar’k to share the heat of the dragon, but still could not suppress a shudder.

The desert squirms, Ragnar’k said. He directed their shared sight below.

At first, Sy-wen did not understand what he meant—then she saw it, too. Around the base of the outer wall and stretching a good quarter league into the surrounding desert, the sands churned and roiled like living flesh. She silently urged the dragon to circle lower.

Tilting on a wing, Ragnar’k angled in a steep glide that swept them lower, almost to the heights of the tumbled ruins. As they coursed by, the source of the strange phenomenon became clear. The sands around Tular churned with the thrashing bodies of hundreds— no, thousands—of desert sharks. Sy-wen remembered the small school that had attacked them near the crash site of the Eagle’s Fury and felt her limbs go cold.

There were so many. How could anyone hope to cross this treacherous moat?

She guided Ragnar’k up into the sky. No wonder there were no eyes on the walls. The sands themselves would shear the flesh from your bones if you dared approach without permission.

“Hurry. We must complete our duty and return.”

Ragnar’k grunted his understanding and climbed higher and away. The two had been sent forth with the sun’s setting to spy upon the ruins, to gain as much insight as possible into its defenses. Meanwhile, the others rested amid a crumbled section of the wall about three leagues from Tular.

vv i l c h UATE

But the reconnaissance of Tular was not her only duty. After sending Hunt off with the children at dawn, the group had set a hard pace around the shores of Aü‘shan, reaching the Southwall as the sun set. The plan was to enter Tular at midnight—but once inside, a distraction would be needed to buy them time to find the Basilisk Gate and destroy it.

The original plan had been to coordinate a simultaneous attack on Tular. Desert warriors, numbering over a thousand, marched around the far side of Aü‘shan, approaching Tular from the opposite direction.

Their forces would attack when the moon reached the highest point in the sky. It was Sy-wen’s duty to play pigeon this night and deliver the detailed plan to the commander of the desert warriors. Fires in the desert, Ragnar’k sent to her.

She turned her attention back outward. Far ahead, in the shadow of the Southwall, a hundred fires could be seen, spreading out as far as the shore of Aü‘shan. It had to be the encamped desert forces. Ragnar’k sensed her urgency and swept more swiftly toward the gathered men.

But as they neared the site, what had appeared to be campfires were in fact massive bonfires. With Ragnar’k‘s keen vision, she could make out men staked within the flames, bodies contorted by the searing heat. By the glow of the bonfires, she spotted pale, winged creatures—skal’tum—and other strange beasts crawling among the dead. Desert scorpions the size of small dogs skittered atop the corpses. From the sands, snakes as thick around as her waist writhed up, bellies bulging with their swallowed prey. And here, too, sand sharks dove and gnashed in the blood-soaked sands. Throughout the carnage, rats and carrion birds feasted on all that was left, covering bodies from head to foot, fighting for a bite of flesh.

Without being told, Ragnar’k swung away and swept far out over Aü‘shan on the way back to join their party. There would be no other attack on Tular. They were on their own this night. Wordlessly, Ragnar’k glided back in a wide circle as tears clouded Sy-wen’s eyes. The image of the slaughter would live long in her heart, but she allowed it to steel her, too. The horror that roosted in Tular had to be destroyed.

In silence, they flew the final leagues and dove to land in the sands near where the group was hidden.

Innsu rose from his hiding place, bow in hand. He whistled to the others.

From the rocks, Joach, Kesla, and Richald appeared. Sy-wen stared at their numbers. Six. How could so few win where a thousand warriors had failed?

Sometimes the smallest fish escapes between the teeth of the sharks Sy-wen patted the neck of her large companion, hoping he was right.

Kesla must have sensed her despondency. “What’s wrong? You’re back much earlier than we expected you.”

Sy-wen climbed from the dragon’s neck. She sent her love to the great heart inside, then lifted her hand away. The magick reversed itself amid a flurry of scale and cloud, and Kast stood beside her once again.

He stepped and wrapped an arm around her, pulling her tight.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered in her ear.

She sank against him, needing his warmth and touch.

Kast faced the group. “The desert legion has been destroyed. Carrion eaters and worse feed upon the remains.”

Innsu moved nearer with a cloak for Kast. “How could that be? They were a thousand of our fiercest warriors.”

Sy-wen answered. “The evil here has grown stronger, fed on the blood of your own children.” She explained in detail what she had seen, including the sharks encircling Tular. “It was as if the desert had turned against them.”

Kesla’s face paled in the rising moonlight. “Then how can we hope to succeed? If the desert is already corrupted, we’ve lost before we’ve even begun.”

Sy-wen pushed out of Kast’s arms. “No, if we lose heart, we give the evil power over us. We must not give up hope.”

Joach stepped forward and touched Kesla’s arm. “Sy-wen is right. We’ll find a way.” Kesla knelt in the sand, unmoving. The ruins of Tular lay a half league away, but it seemed much closer.

The tumbled pile of sandstone filled the world ahead of her. With the moon full overhead, it was nearly as bright as day.

Kesla squinted and made out the line where the sharks roiled in the sand. She had spent half the night searching for some break in the ring of death, circling the entire curtain wall. It seemed impossible.

They had considered having Ragnar’k ferry them over to the city, but judged this option only as a last choice, since the presence of a dragon flapping back and forth over the walls might draw more attention than they wanted.

Then, a short time ago, from out of the desert, a possible answer had appeared. Innsu had spied a single rider, racing atop a frothing malluk. From the black sash across his red desert robes, it was clearly an outlaw, most likely one of the cowards who had fled the caravan. Innsu had strung an arrow on his bow, meaning to take him out before he alerted Tular, but Joach had pushed his arm down.

“If he’s heading to Tular,” Joach had argued, “perhaps he can show us a way through the sharks.” They had all agreed it was worth the risk and had sent Kesla to spy upon him. She had sped after the rider on her lithe legs, sliding from shadow to shadow with her assassin-trained stealth.

She now knelt beside a boulder, no more than the length of five malluks from the rider. He had slowed his mount at the edge of the roiling sands. The road to the open gates ahead was blocked.

As Kesla spied, the outlaw tossed back his hood. His dark hair was unkempt, and a pale scar shaped like a spider blazed on his left cheek. From his cloak, he tugged out a small object. It hung from a braided cord around his neck. He slipped it over his head and held it at arm’s length ahead of him. Kesla squinted but could not make out what swayed at the end of the cord. But whatever it was, it cast off a poisonous greenish light.

The rider lifted his object higher. Was it some signal to unseen eyes? But Kesla noticed his attention was not on the crumbled watchtowers flanking the city gates, but upon the sands ahead.

She heard him mumble a prayer of protection under his breath. But it was no spell, only a simple desert supplication taught all children.

The outlaw urged his mount another step forward, but it balked at the churning sands, its nostrils scenting the danger there. The rider took a whip to his mount and got it to take a small step forward. He again lifted his glowing talisman.

As the sick light spread over the deadly sands, the sharks fled from it, diving away with a frantic flip of their leathery tails. A path opened.

Encouraged and clearly relieved, the rider whipped the malluk again and slowly drove the beast forward.

Ahead, the sharks fled from the glow of his talisman and extended a safe passage toward the waiting gates. The gait of the malluk increased as it sensed the sharks to either side. The lumbering beast shuffled forward while the sand sharks swept up behind it, closing in once again after the green light had passed.

Kesla squinted at the phenomenon. The outlaw’s pendant must act as some protective ward, aglow with black magicks.

In his small island of safety, the outlaw continued to work his way toward Tular.

Kesla rose from her hiding spot and hurried forward. She knew she would have only this single chance.

With a flick of her wrist, she loosed her climbing line and spun the trio of trisling hooks at the end of the braided silk rope.

She took careful aim, adding her own silent prayer, then cast out her line. The hooks flew as swift as any arrow, flying past the rump of the malluk. Once they reached her target, Kesla snapped her wrist. The hooks latched onto the cord from which the glowing talisman hung and snatched it from the outlaw’s surprised fingers.

With her catch hooked, Kesla flung her arm backward and cartwheeled away, dragging the line back over her in a smooth arch. Rolling to her feet, she lifted a hand and caught the flying talisman in her palm.

She shook free the trisling hooks and clutched the prize in her fingers.

Across the way, she saw the outlaw swing around in his saddle, a curse on his lips. Outlaw and assassin stared across at each other. Then the realization of the danger struck the rider as his mount suddenly reared, its neck stretched in a silent bellow of agony.

With the glowing protection gone, the sharks swamped back over the little island of security. The malluk’s hind legs began to sink into the sand, devoured from below. The outlaw pulled his feet higher up in the saddle and scrambled away from the bloody sands. He crouched atop his mount’s shoulder, his eyes wide with terror, his face pale.

At the last moment, he leaped from the beast’s shoulder, aiming back for the road. But the malluk spasmed in death, throwing his balance. The man tumbled into the sands. Without a pause, he shot back to his feet, trying to spring away once again in a mad leap. But as he sailed upward, a monstrous bull shark shot out from the sand and caught him in midair, clamping his midsection and snapping him in half.

Blood fountained as his severed torso flew. Other sharks burst up, snatching, biting, ripping. By the time his carcass landed, it was unrecognizable as a man. Behind him, his mount fared no better.

Kesla turned away, remembering the caravan of terrified children. She felt sorrow for the death of the poor, mindless malluk behind her; but for the outlaw, she felt nothing.

Kesla glanced down and stared at her glowing prize.

From the cord hung a large, serrated tooth of a sand shark.

Joach followed Kesla through the gates of Tular, crouching in a watchtower’s shadow. Joach studied the arrow slits and parapets for any sign of movement. Nothing. It was as if the city were as empty as it appeared. He squinted beyond the gates. The moon shone directly overhead, full and bright. The ruins of the ancient castle ahead were a mix of silver and shadow.

Behind him, the others hurried past the threshold, panting. Richald was last, leaning on his crutch. He glanced with a scowl as the sharks ate away the path behind them. Joach followed his gaze. The way back was again a sea of churning sand. “What now?” the elv’in asked.

“We forge on,” Kesla said. She lowered her arm from which the stolen talisman hung and hid it back under her cloak.

Though the night was cool, everyone’s faces shone with nervous sweat. The path through the sharks had frayed at their nerves— especially with the stripped bones of the malluk poking up from the sand. Innsu took the lead from here, running lightly on his toes as he guided them to the deeper shadows.

Weapons appeared in everyone’s hands. Last night, the blades and arrowheads had been dipped in the blood of the skal’tum killed by Ragnar’k. By fouling their weapons, they had given the edges the ability to slice through the dark protections of the skal’tum, offering some defense against the monstrous beasts.

As they worked through the ruins, Kesla kept to Joach’s side, while Kast and Sy-wen flanked Richald behind them. They all moved silently, watching for hand signals from Innsu to move from shelter to shelter.

Joach stared at the toppled spires and scorched walls. He could only imagine the old war that had wrested Tular from the ghouls. In his head, the boom of catapults and the strident wail of battle horns echoed. He pictured the flaming arcs of dire magicks, the screams of the dying. For a moment, he could almost smell the balefire in the air. Joach’s fingers tightened on his sword’s grip, remembering the thrill of magick coursing out from him, tied to his spirit and focused through a poi’wood staff. The stump of his wrist suddenly itched with the phantom memory of gripping Greshym’s staff. He rubbed the smooth wrist on his hip with a pained expression, trying to erase the flare of desire.

Kesla glanced at his movement, her eyes asking if he was all right. He waved his sword tip forward.

With a worried nod, Kesla crept around the broken bust of a huge statue, lying on its side in the sand, half buried. Joach hurried under the gaze of its sand-scoured eye, unable to escape the feeling of being watched, studied like a scurrying bug. But as much as he searched, nothing threatened.

Slowly, as the moon crossed above them, they worked through the ruins without incident, aiming in a zigzagging pattern toward the opening in the Southwall that led into the inner chambers and tunnels. At last they found Innsu crouched on his ankles beside a low wall, his back against the stone.

He waited until they were all lined up beside him, then motioned around the corner of the wall. His voice was the whisper of sand over rock. “The way lies unguarded.” They all readied themselves, steeling their resolves.

“An open yard lies between us and the opening. We must move swiftly. I spy several openings in the wall’s face.”

“Watchers?” Kesla asked.

Innsu shrugged.

Richald half crawled toward them. “I can help. Sand lies thick all around. A slight breeze should cough up a bit of dusty cover.”

“Could the magick alert those within?” Joach asked.

“Not if I ply the winds with care. The night winds are already sharp and gusty. It would not take much to guide its flow here for a brief moment.”

Innsu shrugged again. “It’s worth trying.”

Joach nodded.

Richald leaned back against the sandstone wall, his eyelids lower-WlT’CH (j ATE

ing as he touched his power. A bit of elemental fire danced along his fingertips, but it was a weak trickle.

“Be ready,” Richald said. “On my word.”

Kesla leaned a moment against Joach, a silent gesture of support. She raised her desert scarf across her mouth and nose. The others followed suit, waiting, tense.

“Now!” Richald whispered.

As a group, they rushed around the corner as a sudden gust raced through the ruins, coughing up a small sandstorm before it. Joach and the others disappeared within it. They ran toward the black tunnel entrance, sand stinging their eyes and winds whipping their cloaks.

Kast half carried the limping Richald with him.

Joach glanced up at the Southwall. Lost in the sandstorm, its heights were barely discernable. Ahead, a slightly darker shadow in the blank wall of swirling sand marked their goal. Innsu was first through, followed closely by Kesla.

At the entrance, Kesla spun around to urge the party forward, waving an arm. Joach urged his legs to move faster, his vision blurred by stinging tears. But he was not too blind to miss a pale shadow burst from deeper in the tunnel.

Innsu suddenly flew backward into the sandy yard, his curved sword sailing away. As the man landed on his back, Joach saw the bloody claw marks strafed across his chest.

Kesla dove out of the tunnel after him, moving with an assassin’s speed.

Behind her, on her heels, skal’tum boiled out of the tunnel. The lead beast snatched at her but only caught her cloak. Kesla fought to shed her garment.

In the yard, Innsu rolled to his feet in the face of the onslaught. Daggers appeared in both hands, but he was too late to save himself. His body spasmed as the poison in the claw wounds struck his heart. His arms jerked as he fell. The daggers flew from the dead man’s hands and buried themselves in the eyes of the skal’tum that clutched Kesla. The beast fell backward with a wail.

Kesla rolled free and raced to join Joach and the others gathered in the yard. “Innsu.” She sobbed. But now was not the time for mourning.

From the tunnel, more skal’tum poured into the yard, while underfoot, monstrous scorpions shook free of their subterranean nests and danced toward the group, poisoned tails raised in threat.

“Behind!” Kast yelled.

Joach glanced over a shoulder and saw the sands roil and churn, driving toward them. It was the sand sharks again, closing off any retreat, driven to a thrashing fury.

A trap.

Sy-wen moved closer to Kast. “We can flee with Ragnar’k. Carry everyone away.” Joach backed away. What choice did they have? He began to nod when Richald threw down his crutch.

“No!” he said coldly, and shoved back the sleeves of the robe. “Flee now, and all is lost. I won’t allow it.” He jammed both arms toward the rushing monsters. Back arching, he drew upon all the energy in his body.

Energy cascaded brightly along his bared forearms, and a fierce gale slammed into the yard. Sand blew up with a scream of winds and struck the skal’tum with the force of a hammer. Beasts tumbled against the wall. Scorpions flew in the grip of whirlwinds and cracked against the unyielding stone.

“Run!” Richald said, driving his arms apart and blowing a way clear to the tunnel. “I can’t hold this wind for long.”

“Richald…” Joach began to argue, but he knew the elv’in was right. If any chance to destroy the Weirgate existed, it had to be now. Whatever evil had rooted here was already close to consuming the desert. He remembered his journey to the silver stream in the dream desert and the sight of the black whorl of disease consuming and spreading.

Richald met his eyes. The elv’in prince’s face was hard and proud, but behind the sharp features, Joach saw the trembling strain as he reined the winds, and also a twinge of fear: a brave man who knew his death had come. “Go,” Richald said between tight lips. “ ‘As long as we live, there’s always hope.’ ” Joach recognized his own words, spoken to Richald as the elv’in fought to hold his burning ship together.

He understood the unspoken acknowledgment behind the prince’s words. Richald would not lose heart this time. “Thank you, Richald.”

WIT C H liATE

The prince nodded, then turned his full attention forward, shoulders hunching as he fed all his power into a final gale of sandy winds “Hurry!”

Joach led the way, bent against the winds that tugged at his cloak like a maddened dog. He rushed down the narrow path as scorpions and winged monsters fought the full assault of the wind. The tunnel ahead lay empty.

He dove into it and was followed quickly by the others. He stopped at the entrance and turned to face Richald. The elv’in’s arms trembled. He stumbled backward.

Kesla grabbed Joach’s sleeve and tugged out the shark tooth pendant to light the dark tunnel behind him.

“We must be off, lose ourselves in these tunnels before they break free.” Joach frowned. Her plan was shortsighted. As soon as Richald was overwhelmed, the skal’tum would hunt them, scour the tunnels for their blood. Another plan was needed.

Joach shook free of Kesla and bared his forearm. He drew his sword across the flesh of his arm.

“What are you doing?” Kast asked, sheltering Sy-wen behind him.

Wincing at the sharp pain, Joach held out his arm and dribbled a solid trail of blood across the entrance.

He intoned words to draw himself away, slipping into the dream desert, drawn easily by the amount of spilled blood.

As he concentrated on the red line in the sand, focusing his attention, a scorpion pounced to the tunnel’s entrance. He barely saw it, lost between the dreaming and the real. The poisoned creature raced toward his leg, but before it could strike, a dagger impaled it between its stalked eyes, pinning it to the sand.

Kesla retrieved her weapon from its twitching body, then kicked it aside. “Hurry, Joach. Richald weakens.”

Ahead, Joach saw a skal’tum scrabble out of the sandy gale, crouching. But its prey was not Joach.

“It’s going for Richald!” Kast said.

Joach fought to keep his attention focused. A moment more. Then new movement caught his eye—not out in the courtyard of Tular, but in the dream desert itself. Someone rose from the sands off to his left.

The visitor had been sitting near where the bright silver river wound through the empty sands. Even from the distance, Joach recognized the familiar figure. It was Shaman Parthus.

“Let me help you,” Parthus said. The shaman stepped forward with the unnatural speed of this landscape, closing in swiftly, but Joach knew he had no more time.

Even as Parthus reached his side, Kesla cried out, “Richald!” Beyond the tunnel’s entrance, the screaming winds died.

Joach snatched at the lines of power between the two worlds and fed his spirit into the dream sands. “Do my will!” he urged, and flung his arm high.

At his command, a wave of sand swept up to fill the tunnel’s entrance, closing off the yard.

Though he had willed it, Joach still stumbled backward, stunned as he snapped back into the real world.

Kast caught him, but Joach struggled back up. “We must hurry,” he said, eyeing the sculpted structure. “I don’t know how long this pile of sand will hold them back.” Kast touched the wall as Kesla held her glowing talisman higher. “It’s not sand,” the large man said. “It’s rock.”

Sy-wen ran her fingers along its surface. “Sandstone.”

Joach felt the wall himself. It was solid. “Must be the flow of power here,” he mumbled, remembering how the energy of Greshym’s staff had transformed his first dream sculpture into rock—but he was not entirely convinced. He recalled the figure that had shared the dream desert and frowned. “Or maybe it was something Shaman Parthus did? He said he could help.”

“Shaman Parthus?” Kesla glanced at him.

Joach shook his head. “It’s not important. Let’s find where they hid this cursed basilisk and end this horror.”

Kesla nodded and turned with her talisman toward the dark tunnel, her face cast in a sickly green glow.

“But where do we begin to search?”

Greshym kicked Rukh out of his way as he stalked from his lit-tle cave out into the moonlight desert.

“Curse that boy’s rashness!” He thumped his staff into the sand. “He’s going to get himself turned into fodder for those bloody beasts before he’s served his purpose.” Leaning on his staff, Greshym sighed and shook his head. Deep inside, though, he was impressed with Joach’s abilities. The boy grew quickly in skill. It had taken only a little of Greshym’s dark Witch Uate magick to fortify Joach’s sandstone wall. He would make a great sculptor one day—that is, if he lived long enough.

“Mmmaster,” Rukh grumbled, nose close to the ground. “I kill meat.” Turning, Greshym eyed the gutted trio of burrow dogs. “Rodents. I’m burning away my energies waiting for that boy only to have him slip out of my grasp, and the gnome brings me burrow dogs.” Rolling his eyes, Greshym held out his palm.

Rukh, ever obedient, rushed to fill his hand with one of the carcasses. Greshym sniffed at the bloody and raw meat, then glanced back to his tunneled cave. “It seems we are what we eat.” He used the few teeth still rooted in his gums to tear the flesh from the tiny bones, chewing thoughtfully.

“But at least the boy’s here, so close,” Greshym said, wiping his lips on his sleeve. “And we know where he’s heading.” Filling his stomach with more meat, Greshym felt fueled enough for the final battle. The time of waiting and planning was over.

Tossing aside the bones, he swung back to the cave. “This time I’ll be ready.” Kesla crept down the corridor, ears pricked for any noises. With her assassin training, she could identify a mouse’s pittering footfalls and tell you if it was a male or a female. But with the furtive whispers and sudden scrape of a boot heel on rock echoing from the others behind her, it was hard to concentrate.

She cringed at their noises, sure it would attract whatever other monsters lurked in the darkness.

She held her shark tooth talisman higher, but it shed little light to guide their way from here. Three paths branched out from this hall. But which to take? Since entering the tunnels, the way had been a straight shot into the heart of the Southwall, but now a decision had to be made.

Kesla turned with her pendant in hand. “I don’t know,” she whispered. “I could explore each on my own and try to determine the best path.”

“And how would you know?” Kast asked. “I doubt you’ll come upon a sign with an arrow, saying Basilisk^ lies this way”

Kesla opened her mouth to argue, but Joach gripped her wrist and turned her to face him. “We stay together,” he insisted. His eyes seemed to grow brighter in the gloom.

“Wait!” Sy-wen pointed to the shark’s tooth.

Kesla glanced at it, not understanding.

Sy-wen took it from her, then quickly marched to each tunnel and held up the talisman. Upon reaching the third tunnel, it flared brighter. “I noticed it,” Sy-wen explained, “when Joach turned Kesla around.

For some reason, its light shines more boldly when pointed this way. This must be the correct path.” Kast frowned. “But the path to what? More sharks?”

“If it’s somehow attuned to the monsters here,” Kesla said, “Kast may be right.”

“No,” Joach said, “it grows in power as it nears the source of its energy—the Weirgate.”

“How can you be so sure?” Kast asked.

“I can’t, but what other choice do we have? We have one out of three odds of choosing the correct tunnel. I say we follow the magick.”

Kast shrugged. “So let’s follow the magick.”

Kesla retrieved the pendant and set out down the side tunnel. The path from here was as convoluted as a fire ant’s nest: tunnels twisting and turning, crossing and undercutting, passing through chambers both small and large. At one point, they were even forced to crawl. By now they were thoroughly lost. Kesla insisted she could find the way back, but when Kast kept asking, her answers became less and less assured.

“Follow the magick,” Kast grumbled. “We might as well follow a blind rat.”

“There’s a light ahead,” Sy-wen whispered, drawing them all to a halt.

Kesla closed her fist around the talisman. With the glow so close to her own eyes, she had missed it. She lowered the shark tooth into her cloak’s pocket. Far ahead, past a turn in the tunnel, a fiery light flickered, casting a bloody tinge on the sandstone walls. As she stared, Kesla realized the glow was not flickering, but rather pulsing, like the beat of some massive heart.

The four glanced at each other. Then Joach moved forward, taking the lead. They proceeded slowly, stopping often to listen. Not a sound whispered. It was as if they had the entire Southwall to themselves.

Joach crept along the wall, sword pointed forward, until they reached the curve. He paused and motioned f6r the group to hang back while he went ahead to investigate. Once they had gathered, Joach took a deep breath, regripped his sword, and slipped around the corner.

Kesla leaned against the sandstone wall, biting her lip against the tension, imagining the horrors ahead.

Joach reappeared almost instantly. “The tunnel dead-ends into a chamber. It’s empty.” Relief was thick in his voice. “The Weirgate?” Kast asked.

“It’s there. The Basilisk Gate stands in the room’s center.” Joach swung around. “Let’s go.” As a group, they hurried around the tunnel’s turn and indeed a room lay at the passage’s end. It was circular in shape, with four torches hanging on the wall. The flames seemed to ebb and flow, causing the pulsing glow.

Joach noticed her attention as they approached the room. “It must have something to do with the Weirgate.”

Kesla nodded. His answer did not calm the tiny hairs on her arm from quivering. She had the oddest sensation of having walked this path before. It was as if an old memory were trying to surface with each step she took. She had a sudden urge to flee. Something waited for them in there—and it wasn’t just the Weirgate.

Kesla reached the room’s threshold and held back. She could not bear to move inside. She studied the chamber from her vantage.

In the room’s center, a monstrous black sculpture rested atop the sandy floor. Its surface, rather than reflecting the firelight, seemed to eat the torches’ glow. Even the room held a chill so unlike the desert, as if the black stone had sucked all the warmth from the space.

Kesla stared at the beast that had plagued their people both now and in ages past. It had the front parts of some foul carrion bird: sharp black beak, a ruffle of ebony feathers, and talons dug deep into the sand.

But the rest of its body was that of a serpent, scaled and coiled behind it. It appeared bunched, as if it were poised and about to strike. Its ruby eyes glowed with a baleful light, seeming to stare only at her.

Joach turned from where he stood. “The nightglass dagger,” he hissed. “Let us be done with this.” She swallowed hard, dreading to enter the room, but she knew JAMES Ll.F.MF.NS

she had no choice. It was a path she was born to walk. And as she stepped into the room, an old memory buried deep inside her swelled. She stumbled as images spun across her vision: swaying trees in the evening’s breeze, the reflection of the moon on still water, a tumble of sandstone homes stacked like a child’s toy blocks—and something else, something wrapped in a dark cloak moving toward her. She closed her eyes, gasping, suddenly dizzy. She never felt herself swoon, but found her knees striking the sand.

Joach was already at her side. “Kesla!”

She stared around her. Only a few spans from her knees, below the hooked beak of the basilisk, she spotted something she had missed. A pool of black glass, as if the monstrous beast had drooled blood into the sand at its feet. It was nightglass like her dagger, like the lake of Aü‘shan. She felt herself grow weak at the sight of it. The small pool seemed more terrible than the beast that towered over it.

“The nightglass dagger,” Joach urged.

She nodded, too weak to stand, and slipped the shard of glass from its sheath. She held it out to Joach.

“Do it. I cannot… Something… something…” She shook her head and could not make eye contact with Joach.

“It’s all right,” Joach said, taking the dagger.

“Hurry,” Kast said somewhere behind her. “We don’t know how long we’ll be alone here.” Kesla knew the Dre’rendi warrior was mistaken. They were not alone now. She knew eyes spied on them, laughing eyes, the same eyes that had glowed from the dark-cloaked figure from her dream.

But Joach was not deterred by her misgivings. He rushed the statue with the dagger, aiming for its heart with the blade. With the weapon raised high, the vein of wit’ch blood glowed brightly through the dark glass.

Hurry, Joach, she silently prayed. End this horror.

Joach drew back with all the strength in his shoulder, then plunged the dagger into the beast with a shout of triumph.

Kesla heard a bright shattering sound, followed by a gasp from Joach.

He stepped away, glancing to her, then back to the basilisk. It was unharmed. The nightglass dagger lay in a thousand brilliant shards in the sand, half its length shattered. Joach held the jagged hilt in his hand, stunned.

Shock drove Kesla to her feet. “It failed!”

Joach stumbled away. “I don’t understand.”

As they all stared in silence, a tinkle of dark laughter rose from the basilisk. The torches dimmed, then blew brighter, flickering toward the ceiling.

“We must flee!” Kesla yelled, sensing the approach of the lurker. They all raced for the door, but the sand would not let them escape. Sandstone claws grew out of the floor and grabbed their ankles, holding them tight.

Kast hacked at the stone with his sword, but the cleaved wounds healed as fast as they formed. Finally, another clawed hand rose from the sand and slapped the blade from his hand. Still, Kast was not to be beaten. He swung to his mate. “Sy-wen, the dragon.”

She reached for him, fingers spreading to touch his seahawk tattoo. “I have need—” Before she could make contact, her legs were yanked out from under her by the claws. She struck the sand hard and was dragged away by her ankles to the far side of the room. Once well out of reach, she was allowed to stand again. Kast yelled to her. “Sy-wen!”

“I’m all right,” she called back.

All the while, the laughter grew in volume, as if that which opposed them was amused by their efforts.

Their attentions returned to focus on the basilisk. Kesla, closer than any of the others, realized the true source of the sick laughter. It was not the basilisk. The laughter rose from the small pool of nightglass at its feet.

Again a swirl of images rushed around her, dizzying her. Words now rose from the black pool. “It struggles to remember.” Her vision blurred. It seemed as if a dark cloud were rising from the pool, mists on the water. But gasps behind her helped her focus. It was not an illusory figment. Something was rising from the pool in a haze of smoky mists—something cloaked, something dark.

Kesla remembered the brief image from a moment ago. Moonlight on water, trees, and a blacky cloaked figure coming toward her.

Before her now, the cloaked figure grew more solid as it pulled fully into this world. She knew it was the same as in the dream.

He spoke from beneath his cowl, bending toward her, his deep voice full of mischief. “A girl, this time.

How amusing. No wonder you hid from me for so long.”

J AM

Kesla found herself answering. “I… I don’t know what you’re talking about.” The cloaked figure straightened. “Of course you don’t. That is the way of the desert. It likes its little secrets.”

“Who are you?”

The stranger shook back his dark hood to reveal a surprisingly handsome face. It was as if white ice had been carved by the most skilled artisan, framed by hair as white as newly fallen snow. Only his eyes burned with the fiercest red fire—and Kesla knew it was a fire more likely to burn with frost than with the heat of a true flame.

“Have you forgotten your old friend?” he offered gently. “Do you not know me?” Kesla did indeed recognize the face, both from ancient texts and old stories. But it could not be. He was long dead.

“Come. Enough with these games. Name me as I name you.”

“Ashmara,” she whispered with a numb tongue. “The ghoul.”

His bloodless lips smiled. “Now, Shiron, was that so hard?” Joach recognized the two names from Kesla’s tale of Aü‘shan, Shiron and Ashmara: the two combatants whose magickal battle had melted the sands below the Southwall into black glass.

Kesla stared in horror at the pale figure wrapped in a dark cloak of mists. “How… ?” The figure waved a hand. “After our battle so long ago, my bones rested deep under the lake you’ve named Aü‘shan, frozen in black glass. But when Tular was taken by the Burning Master, my shade was drawn back here, to guard over the new basilisk.” He brushed his white fingers across the dark feathers of the monstrous statue, then turned to Kesla. “But it appears the desert sensed I had escaped its glass prison. It birthed another dream, breathing life again into another of its creations—another scion to bring its battle to Tular.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Ashmara beckoned with a hand, and the sands under Kesla flowed, drawing her closer to him. Joach tried to grab her, reaching out instinctively with his right hand, but only a stump touched her cloak.

Unable to escape, Kesla was dragged before the small black pool upon which Ashmara stood.

The shade bent and stared at her face. “You really don’t know what you are, do you?” He straightened, laughing deep and long.

Kesla stared boldly at Ashmara, but Joach saw her shoulders tremble. Was she more scared of the ghoul or of what the monster was about to reveal? He longed to protect her—but how? She had a right to know. His only regret was not telling her earlier. Maybe he could have spared her this pain, a pain Ashmara was clearly enjoying.

The shade smiled. “You are the desert’s child, my dear. This age’s Shiron, born again from the sands.

Nothing more than a dream given substance. A clever desert mirage.” He pointed to the sandy hands that gripped her ankles. “In truth, you have no more life than one of my creations.” Kesla shook her head. “It cannot be.”

“Come now. In your heart, you know I speak truly. I can hear it in your voice.” Kesla swung away. “No…” She stared back at Joach for help.

He glanced down to the sand. “What he says is true, Kess. Shaman Parthus knew the truth from reading his bones.” He glanced back up and saw the hurt and fear in her eyes.

“Wh-why?”

Joach knew there were so many questions behind that single choked word: Why had he not told her?

Why had he kept this secret? Why had he made motions as if he loved her, a woman who was not real?

Joach had no answers.

She covered her face and turned away.

A cruel laugh flowed from the shade of Ashmara. “It seems the desert never changes. Sending a child to do its battle.” A sand-sculpted hand rose from the sand, picking up a shard of the shattered dagger in its fingers. “And it seems the desert never learns any new tricks. This stone basilisk is stronger than my old sand-sculpted original. Nightglass has no power over it.”

Kesla lowered her hands, half sobbing. “If… if you are truly Ashmara, why are you doing this? How can you help poison the desert? As wicked as you were, these are still your lands.” Ashmara cocked his head. “There must be an echo in this room. You spoke the same words when we met last, attempting to appeal to my heart.” He laughed again, a darkly cruel sound. “My bones are forever frozen in glass, put there by the desert itself when last we battled. Why should I care if it’s destroyed?”

“Because it’s still your home!” Kesla lunged out with a hidden dagger, moving as swift as a desert snake, stretching out from where she was held—but the blade merely passed harmlessly through the misty shade.

Ashmara simply smiled. “You don’t seem to be having much luck with daggers this night.” A spear of sand jutted out and knocked the blade from her hands. The dagger flew and buried itself in the sands.

“Now let’s end this once and for all. If you are so in love with your desert, then let me help you return to it.” Ashmara waved a hand.

The sandy fists that held Kesla sank down into the floor, dragging her down with them.

“You buried me once,” Ashmara said. “Now it’s my turn to return the favor.” Kesla struggled to free herself, but to no avail. Her legs disappeared into the sand.

“We have to help her,” Kast hissed, fighting to pry his own bonds with his sword.

But Joach did not move. He knew another course was necessary. He remembered the words of Shaman Parthus, that Kesla’s mission to A’loa Glen may not have been solely to wet the nightglass dagger in his sister’s blood, but also to draw him—another sculptor—to the desert. And now Joach knew why: he was brought here to fight Ashmara. One sculptor against another. But how could he hope to win here—a novice against a master? It was futile.

Still, Joach watched Kesla sink slowly into the sand and brought the jagged edge of the broken nightglass dagger to the stump of his right arm. He dug its tip deep, and blood flowed heavily into the sand at his feet. Joach winced, eyes closing, and sank with his blood into the dream desert.

The chamber walls around him grew misty. The glowing sands of the dream desert shone through them now. The two worlds merged, one atop the other. His blood flowed into both, bright as spilled wine.

Joach stared around at the dream landscape. Though the dunes in the distance glowed brightly, the sands under his feet were stained dark. He turned, and with his vision split between the real and the dream, he saw the basilisk statue perched atop the silver river, its talons dug deep into its substance.

In the dream desert, he watched the Land’s energies slowly churn, sucked away into the whirling pit known as the Weir, the darkness feeding on this vein of power like some monstrous black leech. But that was not all he saw. He watched as the dark stain spread out from here into the desert, corrupting all it touched.

Joach suddenly understood the Dark Lord’s goal here. The GuP-gothal monster must have grown tired of twisting the little bits of

J A M I.

L’t M’t

.-S

elemental power found in the Land’s people. In the past, the Black Heart had used shards of ebon’stone as a focus in which to twist an elemental’s energy, forging each one into an ill’guard. Now he plied the same dark magick on a much larger scale. Using the giant statues, he sought to corrupt the world’s energy directly, to forge the very Land into an ill’guard creation—and he was close to succeeding!

A cry drew Joach’s attention back to the real world. Kesla was waist-deep in the sand, fighting to hold herself up with her hands. But new pincers had risen from the sand, clamping on her wrists. Kesla writhed in their grip.

Again, with the two worlds merged, Joach was able to see the dark strands of power that linked Ashmara’s sculpted creations to the dream desert: a tangled black web. Instead of a link by blood, Joach realized the power came from the Weir itself, arising from the black stain.

Joach cringed from the power here but knew their only chance to fight it lay in his own elemental blood.

He concentrated on the spilled pool at his feet, touching the dreaming magick there. He lashed out with his own energy, slashing at the threads of power, severing them instantly.

In the real world, Joach watched with satisfaction as the sandy fists created by Ashmara fell away to plain sand. Kesla broke free and pushed from the sands. Ashmara grabbed for her, but his fingers had no substance. She rolled away from him.

Kast also broke free, rushing up to Sy-wen, who immediately placed her palm on his cheek. “I have need of you!”

Ashmara, initially startled by Joach’s assault, was quick to realize the source of the new magick. His red eyes flared with anger as he swung to face Joach. “A sculptor!” The ghoul’s arm shot up, and new sandy creations grew into existence—not only clawed hands, but also monstrous beasts, climbing right out of the sands.

Joach gasped at the play of power in the dream desert. Black threads twined and raced, feeding the new creations. Joach slashed at these, too, but he no longer had the advantage of surprise. Threads re-formed as quickly as he hacked at them. Still, Joach continued his assault. He had no choice.

In the chafnber, Kesla dodged the sculpted creatures, moving across the sandy floor with the skill of an assassin.

Behind the basilisk, Ragnar’k had appeared with Sy-wen perched on his shoulder. The dragon ripped into the sandy beasts and hopped about the sand, making a difficult target.

Ashmara, his eyes glowing like two coals, crouched atop his black pool and cast out his attacks. He pointed to Joach. “Kill him!” he directed his new creations.

A beast, a muscled cross of a lion and a bear, scrabbled across the sands toward him.

Joach stepped back, but he had no way to defend himself, not while concentrating on fighting in the dream plane. He attempted to raise his own sculpted creature to battle the beast, but Ashmara’s beast tore through his creation with no more effort than Sheeshon had used on his tiny rose. He was too untrained, his efforts too divided.

Kesla appeared at his side. “Give me the dagger,” she said breathlessly.

“What?” he managed to squeak out.

She took the broken mghtglass dagger from his fingers and swung around just as the lion creature leaped with a silent snarl. Kesla sliced through its throat as it lunged past. Its form dissolved back to sand, washing harmlessly over Joach.

Half crouched, Kesla lifted the nightglass dagger. “It might not work against the basilisk, but as in the past, it can slay dream beasts.”

Understanding dawned in Joach. The basilisk of old had been a dream-sculpted creature, slain by the same dagger. So the dagger must, of course, work against any dream creation. It did not matter its shape.

Kesla slashed through a hand that tried to grab her. The sandy fingers crumbled away as she straightened.

In the dream desert, Joach watched the dark connection that linked the sculpture explode away with a flash of bright light. Joach remembered a similar sight, long ago, when Elena had tried to grab his poi’wood staff aboard Flint’s ship. She had been thrown back with a similar blinding flash of light. The two magicks were deadly to each other: dark and light.

Kesla spun and planted the dagger into the eye of a monstrous snake. It fell away to sand. “Your sister’s blood has proven as potent as Sisa’kofa’s.” She glanced over her shoulder. “I’ll protect you. Do what you can to fight Ashmara.”

r

|AM1S UHMENS

He nodded.

Before she turned away, her eyes met his. “You should have told me.” He swallowed, knowing what she meant. “I… I couldn’t.”

“Why?” She stared hard at him, not allowing him to turn away from this question a second time.

He faced her and spoke rapidly lest he lose heart. “We’re all just dust and ashes. What difference does it make if you come from sand? To me, you’ll always be a woman.” He turned away. “A woman I love.” Joach looked back to her, his heart in his throat. Tears welled in Kesla’s eyes. Without a word, she whirled away and slashed the head off some twisted beast.

Joach returned to his own battle, leaving her to defend him. What had finally been admitted between them could never be acted upon unless they first won here. From the dream plane, Joach slashed the ghoul’s cords of power. But even aided by Kesla’s attacks, no real gains were made.

Ragnar’k tried to attack Ashmara, but the dragon had no more luck than Kesla’s dagger. How could you kill a ghost?

As Joach continued his attack, he knew that this stalemate would end in their defeat. Even now, he felt himself weakening. His spirit was not endless. The nightglass dagger would also eventually exhaust its small supply of wit’ch blood. So while Ashmara tapped the bottomless well of the Weir, their energies were limited.

Unless some change tilted the balance, they would be defeated. A voice spoke at Joach’s shoulder—not in the real world but in the dream. “Maybe I can help.”

Joach glanced behind him in surprise. The figure seemed to float within the stone of the Southwall, as the real world overlapped the dreamscape. His features were vague as Joach stood twixt the two planes, but he would know the thin man anywhere. “Shaman Parthus!”

Leaning on his old crutch, the elder smiled at Joach. “It seems you could use an extra hand.” Greshym allowed a true smile to shine. Joach showed no sign of suspecting the darkmage hidden behind the sun-bronzed face of the old shaman. He had hurried here once he’d felt the boy pierce the veil between the two planes. Timing was critical.‘He could not risk the ghoul killing the boy, at least not until he was done with Joach.

While crossing here, Greshym had used his dark arts to spy upon the first skirmishes of the two sculptors. Joach had some innate skill, but he was no match for a fiend with Ashmara’s cunning. He now wished Shorkan had not been so skilled at drawing the shade here. Ashmara was a deadly warden, and one who might vanquish Greshym’s one chance at regaining his youth.

“How can you help me?” the boy asked. “I thought you had no skill at sculpting.” Joach’s form was misty and insubstantial, like the shimmers of heat seen floating above the desert at a distance.

“You are most correct,” Greshym said, speaking with the voice of the shaman. “You hover between the dream desert and the world of substance and life. Only a true sculptor can travel that path.”

“Then how can you help?”

“I can lend you my strength. Two are stronger than one.” Joach hesitated. “I’m not sure strength is the problem when fighting the shade of a dead man.”

Greshym shook his head. “Ashmara can be defeated.” He coaxed. “There are secrets I can teach you, from the old texts. Ways to defeat the ghoul.”

Joach’s form became more substantial as his interest grew, drawing nearer to Greshym in the dream desert. “What old ways?”

Greshym took a step back. For his spell to work, he needed the boy’s spirit to enter the dream plane fully. Being no sculptor himself, even he could not reach Joach where he was now. Greshym beckoned with a wave. “It is not something that can be spoken in words. I must teach you, show you.” Joach’s form grew crisper. “Then show me.”

“I need you to pull yourself fully into the dream plane, where I can share with you.” Greshym took another step back, invitingly.

Joach began to step toward him, then paused, almost taunting.

“What are you waiting for? Come to me, boy.”

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you, Greshym}” Joach’s mask of naive openness fell away. Under it was a face hard with suspicion.

Greshym frowned in surprise. He opened his mouth to argue, but the boy’s eyes shone slyly. Joach would not be so easily tricked.

J A M

“Show yourself,” Joach said. “Enough with these false faces. You tricked me once with Elena’s form and now think to do so again?”

With an exasperated sigh, Greshym cast away the illusion of Shaman Parthus, returning to his own age-worn body. The small brown cane transformed into his gray stone staff. “Is this better?” Joach scowled. “What did you do to Shaman Parthus?”

“I needed a new cloak to wear.”

“So you killed him?”

Greshym shrugged. “But how did you know it was me?”

“You mentioned Ashmara. Shaman Parthus knew nothing of the ghoul’s shade. He could not even see into the dream-sculpting plane. Your knowledge gave you away.” Joach began to grow more insubstantial. “Now that you’ve been caught, begone with your tricks.”

“Wait!”

Joach turned away. “We have nothing else to discuss.”

Greshym knew he was about to lose the boy completely. If Joach returned to his battle, he was surely doomed. Ashmara would eventually wear the boy down and slay him. That must not happen. “I can tell you how to defeat him.”

Joach glanced back, eyes narrowed. “And trust you?”

“It is not my trust that will matter, but yours.” Joach turned around. “How is that?”

“I offer you a trade. I’ll give you the secret to defeating Ashmara, in exchange for your promise to return here to the dream desert.”

“Why do you want me there?”

Greshym smiled slyly. “I’m only selling one secret here. But I promise you this: if you honor your word, I will not kill you, trap you, or darken your spirit in any manner. This I swear.”

“As if your word has any value,” Joach mumbled, but he did not turn away.

“Take my offer or leave it.” Greshym gripped his staff tighter. “Save your friends… or die here. It’s no matter to me.

Joach hesitated. His one hand formed a fist. “Tell me,” he said with a tight voice.

“First swear on your sister’s life that you’ll return here to me.” Joach bit his lip, then reluctantly nodded. “I so swear. But only if your secret truly helps us in defeating Ashmara.”

Greshym grinned, relaxing. “Oh, don’t worry. If I’m wrong, Ashmara will kill you all.” James Llemens

“Tell me,” Joach snapped. “What’s the ghoul’s secret?”

Shrugging, Greshym used his staff to draw a‘ circle in the dark sand around his feet. “Have you not noticed how Ashmara never steps from his little black glass island?” Joach’s eyes glinted. “What of it?”

“It is his physical link to this plane.” Greshym smudged out the scrawled line with the staff’s butt end.

“Shatter it, and the shade will again be imprisoned with his bones under Aü‘shan.” Joach’s surprise dissolved the veil between them. He almost snapped fully into the dreamscape, but at the last moment, he drew away again. “It is that simple?”

“Most magick is,” Greshym said with a disappointed sneer.

“You’d better not be lying.” Joach turned and grew misty again.

Greshym leaned heavily on his staff and called out to Joach. “Be careful, boy. Don’t get yourself killed.” Spinning, Kesla jabbed the jagged end of the nightglass dagger into the back of a sand-sculpted scorpion, then whirled on her heel to slice the throat of a clawed salamander. Forms blew away into puffs of sand around her. She leaped and rolled as a spike of sandstone shot upward under her.

Gasping, she crouched. She had been trained to run for leagues through a midday desert, but this constant assault wore on her. She had to protect both herself and Joach.

Her only allies were Sy-wen and her dragon. Ragnar’k roared through the chamber, keeping Ashmara busy. Its wings shattered creatures on all sides, while silver-clawed talons ripped through the sand.

But still, the pale ghoul stood on his little pool of nightglass, wrapped in his cloak of dark mists. He seemed little worn by the battle here. In fact, his amusement had grown and he laughed often as he forced Kesla through her paces.

He’s playing with us, Kesla realized, ht$e a cat with a mouse. She was sure the ghoul could call all manner of real beasts to harry them: the skal’tum, the burrowing black scorpions, sand sharks. But he didn’t. He continued to chase them with his dream-sculpted creations, enjoying the challenge, amused by their efforts, immune to any direct assault himself.

“Kesla,” Joach said behind her.

She spun and raked a sand serpent’s belly. “What?”

He spoke rapidly, while motioning her closer. “I know a way to destroy Ashmara.”

“How?”

“The pool of glass under his feet. Destroy it, and his shade will be drawn back to Aü‘shan.”

“Are you sure?”

He hesitated, then spoke. “No, but it’s worth attempting.”

“How do we destroy it?”

“I don’t know.” Joach frowned. “Try using the nightglass dagger.” She nodded. It made a certain sense. The ghoul had remained atop the circle of dark glass. He seemed unable to leave it. “I’ll try. But you’ll have to defend yourself from here.”

“Don’t worry about me. I’ve sent a message to Ragnar’k. He and Sy-wen will keep guard. Just shatter the pool.”

Kesla glanced to his face. Their eyes met briefly. So much was still unspoken between them. She spun away before anything else could be said. She slashed and hacked her way through the sand beasts, dropping, rolling, whirling on hand or foot.

She noted Ashmara’s attention turn toward her. His red eyes glowed in his pale face. The attacks on her grew fiercer. Her momentum forward slowed. She was fought to a standstill. Did the ghoul sense her new knowledge?

“You move well,” Ashmara said from a few paces away. “Much better than that sallow-limbed thing that met me in Ka’aloo.”

Kesla kicked out, bouncing off one sand-sculpted creature and impaling another. The creatures attacked from all sides, a blur of claws and teeth. “It was Shiron that killed you last time, ghoul!” Kesla called back at him.

“No,” he answered, his voice bitter. “It was my own foolishness and desire that doomed me. Shiron claimed his blood could cleanse Tular—and I believed him. I could not let the boy escape. I cast out my magick recklessly, drawing off the shared energy of the other sculptors in Tular. But the desert protected the boy. Instead of harming Shiron, our magicks washed over and through him, burning the desert around us, melting it to glass. Only when it was too late did I realize my mistake. I had cast my magick so far and wide that I

could not escape the molten desert. My physical form sank into the glass, while my spirit was held tight by Shiron in the dream desert. I could not escape.“

Kesla continued to slash and jab with her broken dagger.

All amusement had seeped out of the ghoul with the telling of his tale. “But I will have my victory, my revenge.” He glanced over his shoulder at the looming basilisk. “I will see the entire Southern Wastes destroyed.”

With the attention of the ghoul momentarily distracted, Kesla leaped atop the back of a scorpion, dodged its sandstone tail, and dove at Ashmara.

He swung around, instinctively lifting an arm in warning, but Kesla flew through his form as if it were air and crashed to the hard nightglass surface.

Ashmara laughed, lowering his arm with a shake of his head. “Still trying to slay the dead?” Reaching out, Kesla lifted her arm and slammed her dagger into the center of the black pool. Glass fractured in a loud tinkling shatter. Pain flared in her hand. She stared down. The nightglass dagger had shattered completely away. The black pool beneath remained unharmed, not even scratched.

A sinking feeling of despair welled in her chest. “No.” She moaned. Not only had she failed, but she had destroyed their only means of slaying the ghoul’s dream beasts. Laughter wafted down from atop her.

Kesla lifted her hand. A chunk of broken nightglass was pierced through her right palm. She yanked it out, and blood flowed freely from the wound. Though hopeless, she pushed off the hard glass surface, ready to fight with the last breath in her body.

The ghoul’s taunting voice seemed to whisper at her ear. “I’ve enough of this game-playing. It is time to end this.” Triumphant laughter flowed.

Kesla shoved up, ready to spring away, but her balance was thrown off as her left hand sank into the loose sand.

The ghoul’s laughter cut off abruptly with a sharp cry.

Staring down, Kesla saw that her left hand had melted through the black glass to the soft sand beneath.

She lifted and studied her wounded palm. Blood flowed thickly down her wrist. She remembered Ashmara’s story: Shiron claimed his blood could cleanse Tular.

Understanding dawned in her. Again whispery images of swaying palms and blue waters grew around her. She glanced up and saw the look of horror in Ashmara’s red eyes.

“Please… don’t…”

Kesla leaned back to the nightglass pool and swept her bloody hand over its surface. Where her blood touched, the hard glass slowly dissolved back to plain sand.

A howl of agony and terror rose from Ashmara. “No, don’t send me back!” Kesla ignored his screams as surely as he had ignored the terrified cries of all the children bloodied at his feet. She scrubbed her blood across the entire surface. Once the entire pool was covered, she rolled away. Her blood bubbled on the hard surface, transforming glass back to sand.

Standing, Kesla stepped away. Like the glass, the pale face of Ashmara was eaten away. He had no mouth with which to scream, but his eyes shone with agony and despair; then those, too, were consumed by the magick in Kesla’s blood.

Soon only empty sand lay before her.

Kesla clenched her bloody fist. Magic’t of the desert. She could no longer hide from the truth spoken from the lips of the ghoul. She was not a woman, only some construct of the desert, a magickal tool used to stab at the evil in Tular.

Though victorious, tears rose in her eyes.

JOACH HURRIED TO KeSLa’s SIDE. He DID NOT NEED THE TEARS TO

recognize the grief in her eyes. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

She shook her head and stepped away from him.

Before he could question her further, Sy-wen called to them. She hopped from her dragon’s neck, and Ragnar’k roiled back down into the naked figure of Kast. “What happened?” Sy-wen asked. “How were you able to drive off the ghoul’s shade?”

Kast pulled the shreds of his cloak from the sand and joined them.

Joach explained about his visit with Greshym in the dream desert and about the darkmage’s revelation.

“Why was the fiend so helpful?” Kast asked with clear suspicion.

“I made a pact with him,” Joach said. “I promised I’d return to the dream desert.”

. n vjt A 1 t.

“It’s surely a trap,” Sy-wen said.

Joach nodded. “No doubt.”

“And what of your promise?” Kast asked.

“I’ll honor my word,” Joach said. “I’ll return to the dream desert, but I never promised when I’d return.

Certainly not today, certainly not tomorrow, maybe not for many, many winters.” Kast grinned. “The darkmage will be waiting a long time.”

Joach shrugged. “He’s lived five centuries. What’s a few more decades?” Sy-wen glanced over to Kesla, who still stood near where the black glass pool had been. “But what of her trick? Did Greshym reveal that, too?”

“No.” Joach stepped toward Kesla and touched her shoulder gently. “What happened here?” She finally turned, wiping at her eyes. Her voice was as shattered as the nightglass dagger. “The ghoul and Shaman Parthus were right. I’m not real.” She shrugged away from his hand. “Like Shi-ron, my blood contains the magick of the desert, potent enough to heal what’s corrupted.”

“But you are real,” Joach said, reaching out and clutching her arm. He squeezed her wrist. “You’re flesh and blood. What does it matter if you weren’t born of a man and a woman?” She stared up at him, fresh tears in her eyes. “It matters to me.” She reached down and peeled away his fingers. “And it will to you… eventually.”

“Never,” he said. He sought some way to ease the despair in her voice.

But she had already moved away, stepping toward the basilisk. “I now know how to destroy the Weirgate. My blood will rid the sands of its evil.” She stood before the large carved stone, staring up at its baleful red eyes. “I know my role here.”

Joach hurried toward her. “Kesla, don’t. The Weirgates—”

She lifted her bloody hand and placed it against the feathered stone breast of the basilisk. Her hand sank into its form as if it were only shadow, not solid rock.

“Kesla!”

She glanced over her shoulder, her face a mix of shock and horror. “Joach!” He leaped at her, grabbing for her cloak. His fingers twisted in the heavy cloth. But Kesla fell forward anyway, as if yanked by the arm. She tumbled into the Weirgate and was gone. Her scream trailed back out, fading farther and farther away, as if sailing down some bottomless well.

Joach still held her cloak in his grip. The rest of her clothes lay in a crumpled pile at the bottom of the statue. He threw aside her cloak and reached to the stone, ready to go after her. But his palm found only cold stone. He ran his fingers over it, searching for a way inside.

The basilisk just stared down at him, cold and menacing.

She was gone.

Joach sank to his knees in the sand. “Kesla!”

A slithering sound of shifting sands drew his attention back up. Sy-wen gasped. Joach watched the ebon’stone serpent slowly begin to uncoil, stretching and curling in the sand. Ruby eyes fueled by darkfire turned in Joach’s direction.

The basilisk of Tular lived again.