Strike Force,” said DragonStar, awed himself. “My vanguard.”
“What do you want us to do?” DareWing said. His eyes had not left the milling hue before him.
“I want you to fight for me,” said DragonStar softly, and a great cry went up from the massed warriors.
Qeteb leaned over the saddle of his beast and laughed. “It was that easy?”
StarGrace inclined her head.
“That tower will lead us straight to the huddled masses?” StarGrace waved a hand about languidly. “Almost instantly.”
“There must be a trap somewhere,” Sheol muttered. “It can’t be this straightforward!”
“The tower is a simple thing,” StarGrace said. “It does as it is bid.”
Qeteb sat and thought. It was too easy, but he wasn’t sure where the difficulty would be: in their use of Spiredore, or in their attempts to reach the crowd of souls awaiting their appetites across the chasm.
“There is something else,” StarGrace said, and Qeteb jerked out of his reverie.
“Yes?”
StarGrace told them of the two men she’d seen pass briefly through the tower.
Qeteb stared at her, then grinned. “We have them,” he whispered, and the whisper reached into every corner of the land. “Not this hour, or even this day, but we will eventually have them.”
He laughed, and then waved his fellow Demons through the door into Spiredore. As they entered, Qeteb turned and thrust his fist towards StarLaughter.
“Stay here, bitch,” he said, “because if you are not here when I return, I will hunt you down and stake your naked body out on the wasteland for the dogs and boars to couple with.”
“Stay here,” DragonStar said, “until I need you.”
DareWing raised one black eyebrow.
“Something is not right with Spiredore,” DragonStar continued, “and I would rather not risk you. You will be safe enough — more than safe! — within the Field of Flowers.”
“When will you call me?”
DragonStar shrugged. “When the time is right, my friend. What else can I say?”
“Be careful,” DareWing said, and DragonStar nodded, letting his eyes drift over the shifting throng of silvery bodies before him, before giving DareWing a perfunctory smile.
Then he turned to one side, drew the glowing doorway, and stepped through into Spiredore.
DareWing stared at the spot where he’d vanished, then furrowed his brow thoughtfully. Surely he would be able to move back into the wasteland in the same manner he’d moved into the Field? To imagine the environment, the sensations, the smells? Then, of course, he’d be able to transfer back here whenever the need arose.
In the meantime, his band of glinting warriors could be what they’d trained for in their previous lifetimes: a Strike Force.
“Let me prepare the way for you, StarSon,” DareWing whispered.
DragonStar knew the instant he stepped into Spiredore that he’d transferred into crisis.
When he and DareWing had come through previously, DragonStar had felt a wrongness within the tower, but it had been nothing compared to this.
And he knew precisely what it was, for he had felt this before.
Qeteb.
DragonStar felt both terror and perfect stillness at the same time. Terror, because that was what Qeteb dealt in and what his entire fabric of being was, and again terror because DragonStar knew that currently he was no match for Qeteb — not for a one on one confrontation. He needed further thought, a knowledge of Katie’s Enchanted Song Book, and far more experience before he could possibly confront Qeteb.
Qeteb was too malevolent for him right now.
And DragonStar felt a perfect stillness because he was almost relieved to at least know that the Demons could use Spiredore. He could not be trapped now that he knew.
Unless they trapped him right now.
DragonStar knew he should transfer immediately into Sanctuary, but he edged closer to the balustrade of his balcony and peered over.
Far below him a mass of black wound its way upward. As he watched, the leading figure stopped, and raised up his black metalled head.
StarSon!
DragonStar felt the power of a frightful malevolence (hate, envy, despair, pestilence) surge towards him.
“Spiredore,” he snapped, without any thought, “take that power and vent it elsewhere!”
And far to the north a group of icebergs exploded as Spiredore redirected the power.
Clever, StarSon, Qeteb whispered towards him. But how pitiful that you needed Spiredore to deal with that for you. Are you so weak?
DragonStar backed away from the balcony.
Are you so weak, StarSon?
He backed against a wall, and listened to the taunts flow upwards.
Are you weak that you need others to protect you, StarSon? DragonStar drew his sword —
Pitiful little StarSon. A chorus of laughter and howls echoed up the stairwell. Pitiful little StarSon.
— and drew the doorway of light, hating the relief that flowed through his body as he stepped through.
DragonStar stopped by the blue-feathered arrow that he’d earlier stuck in the edge of the chasm, letting his shoulders slump in relief — and a feeling that he thought might be self-disgust. Had he been afraid?
He sheathed his sword, then flexed his hand, trying to work out some of his tension.
He needed to get back into Sanctuary, think about —
“StarSon! How nice to see you again so soon!” A mocking laugh followed the words.
DragonStar whipped about and stared across the chasm. Six black beasts, gruesome in their constantly shifting, fluid forms, stood on the other side. Behind them stretched one of Spiredore’s blue-misted tunnels.
On the backs of the beasts were the Demons, as well the woman that DragonStar supposed was Niah reborn.
Qeteb — it could be no-one else — had edged his beast slightly forward. He was a vile creature, black metal armour encasing his entire form, and even plating his wings.
He was massive, at least half as tall again as the tallest man, and with a thickness of figure to match.
“Why
