The Plane of Dreams

By William L. Hahn

In the southern empire of Argens just roiled by the rebellion of Yula, a band of adventurers returns from the Shimmering Mindsea bearing enormous treasure and minus one of its members. The Tributarians, unaware of the growing threat to the waking world, embark on separate plans. But the spirit of the hero lives on in all of them, as their good deeds have consequences beyond their original intention. Will it be enough to avert the peril they have unwittingly brought about?

This first novel-length tale set in the Lands of Hope features a complex world and intelligent, dedicated characters whose actions entwine over distances and beyond their own comprehension. Like any world worth living in, the Lands have humor, mystery, horror and action to delight and entertain the reader.

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• Language: English
• Publisher: William L. Hahn
• Release date: Sep 3, 2012
• ISBN: 9781476457093

William L. Hahn

Will Hahn has been in love with heroic tales since age four, when his father read him the Lays of Ancient Rome and the Tales of King Arthur. He taught Ancient-Medieval History for years, but the line between this world and others has always been thin; the far reaches of fantasy, like the distant past, still bring him face to face with people like us, who have choices to make. Will didn't always make the right choices when he was young. Any stick or vaguely-sticklike object became a sword in his hands, to the great dismay of his five sisters. Everyone survived, in part by virtue of a rule forbidding him from handling umbrellas, ski poles, curtain rods and more. Will has written about the Lands of Hope since his college days (which by now are also part of ancient history). His first tales include "Three Minutes to Midnight" a slightly-dark sword and sorcery novelette, as well as “The Ring and the Flag” and "Fencing Reputation", the first stories in the ongoing Shards of Light series. The first novel-length tale of Hope, "The Plane of Dreams" was published in September 2012. You can find much more about the Lands of Hope at the links below, including a Compendium of information about the Lands and a Facebook page on the History of the Lands. Check out other online authors at Independent Bookworm, where you can also find The Maps of Hope, a free resource for readers about the Lands.

Book preview

Prologue

All that was left of the adventurer named Meandar paused to look the desert sun eyes-on. It would have hurt much more, several weeks ago when those eyes still existed. But the searing sting which long since burned anything soft from his sockets left an echo, dull yet hot, and remembered agony still aroused some interest. Meandar did not need to see anymore, or to fear pain, or have any kind of independent thought since he put on the metal torc.

What could it want now, the voice in Meandar's mind wondered. How many days since he donned it, by moonlight and against his companions' advice. It took effort to remember them now, after so many miracles. Was it in that marble palace he'd wished for- at least, Meandar thought it had still been his wish- with the wine-fountain and the comfort-women on all sides. Yes, their last night together; he had shown them what the Fluxxband could do despite their dithering and warnings about chaos. The dwarf Solo with his pious imprecations about right and wrong (how he wished he could still be subject to those harangues); the big warrior, Spitz, human like him but ready to do as the dwarf and the wizard Zoanstahr wanted. And all the others, still wanting to talk more than anything. A real argument at least, not the usual pointless bickering about which corridor to take or who kept the ruby.

Those were the days, Meandar thought dimly as his steps wandered in vague parallel to Solar's heat. The sun on his naked neck burned down into his spine; he felt it with one hand and came away with crumbly pieces of roasted flesh. He had done as he wished, that night when they demanded he take the armband off. They finally came for him in anger, and he wished- his last wish, wasn't it- for a guard. The Fluxxband brought him Kaleg, and suffice to say they went their separate ways. Meandar hoped his comrades had survived the demon-statue's onslaught, but he was powerless to wish it.

Now, only the Fluxxband's wishes mattered. The unseen terrain stretched away to all sides, looking no doubt the same as it had forever. A flat, baked, iron-hard pan of the world, relieved in places by sand but almost never by elevation, and bereft of any living thing. Meandar staggered on, stumbling despite his blind care with half his left foot chewed away. Jackals, maybe a week ago, on a day the arm-torc became bored with his lack of imagination.

With every wish, it takes a piece of you. That was how your former friends had warned of the danger. The Fluxxband granted wishes, that much the wizards could tell without touching it. Meandar had volunteered, donned it and wished for food, since they were on last rations in the middle of the Mindsea. Success, and no apparent ill-effects. He had argued for more, but the wizards in their intellection efforts detected some warning, a condition. The torc seemed more powerful, now that it had been used. More powerful wishes, then! Meandar urged. An argument he deserved to lose- but the tug inside, to sneak back and try again, he had honestly thought that was his own weakness. Now he could not trust his memory, much less his honesty- Meandar didn't know which truth made him more guilty. But he could no longer resist it; to take it off meant immediate death, and Meandar was not sure he would have tried. The Fluxxband granted its own wishes now- whatever it thought worth experiencing, Meandar wished for at once. Otherwise, it would again take a piece of him, perhaps literally.

Meandar tired now, well beyond exhaustion from the curse of wish-power. The thrill of that first week, after he left the adventuring band and struck out on his own across the Shimmering Mindsea, barely stirred his memory. He had wished for piles of wealth, left it laughing behind in the dunes, drummed up battles between wish-called armies as he sat in shade for amusement. Women, of course, so many women- there he first realized he was not in command anymore. When the lovers became all of one face, and his encounters with them crueler and longer, ending in blood and terror; then Meandar knew the Fluxxband, not he, was trying on something original. Too late then to take it off. The torc had consumed his will, though their thoughts remained apart, a bit.

Meandar's feet encountered the slightest rise ahead, and he turned aside, simply because the flat earth was a bit easier, and he would see nothing atop a hill anyway. To the left, and then back to the right, still the land gradually rose; he could picture a slight dell to three sides of him, a rarity. But Meandar did not utter a wish to see it- that was not sufficiently interesting to the armband. He stood there, hoping for nothing beyond another moment not walking, as his master considered what it wanted next. A procession of gaudy grand spectacles paraded past his thoughts, as soon known as discarded, and inside his gut Meandar felt an itch growing stronger. The Fluxxband needed something new, his mortal mind no longer equal to providing it. The small and intricate, the delicate or orderly never held its attention; Meandar had already imagined every kind of bleeding and smashing ever recalled, and many he had never seen.

The last time the itch had gone un-scratched, he remembered all too well, was just before he stumbled into the oasis, a real place with a little water, some trees and a band of desert dwellers. Meandar could still see then, every moment of their ending and the blood-mud they all came to. Afterwards he had ridden a camel directly into the open desert, lashed it constantly until it fell dead, so that he would be as far as possible from other living beings. Strangely, he thought, the torc had allowed this, apparently sated by its massacre. Yet now the Fluxxband was growing bored again.

There is a pain that comes of helplessness, and Meandar was in its last agony. Standing there in the dell he recognized what it was to wish earnestly for death, though of course he could not bring that wish to the surface. No, the part of him that made the decisions was wondering how large the cities of the Empire had grown, in the many centuries it had lain under the sand-buried city of Jengesalamur. Meandar's mind brushed past the thought of the thousands in Argens, normal folk like those of his family, and he sobbed with sudden might.

Grasping at a straw of thought, he imagined how far into the Mindsea he must have made it. Surely his raw, sliced feet would give out, his crawling arms wear away before the torc could make it to civilized lands. But no sooner had he thought this then the armband imagined a mystic carpet, to fly the distance in only hours. Meandar wished for one as he sobbed, and flinched as the thick weave settled over his mangled foot, soft and strong and no doubt magnificently bright and decorous. After all, he had seen wondrous carpets in the bazaar, and idly thought of them flying for him as in the tales. Crumpling to the woven mat in despair, Meandar again felt so very, very tired. If only he could sleep, this time for good.

Sleep, came the thought from that part of his mind that was not Meandar. A question.

Yes, to sleep, to explore the wonders of rest and … and dreams.

Dreams, the word came back as an echo in a dark cave. Something new, as yet unheard-of. Meandar thought of the Fluxxband, artefact of ancient Despair, loose among the world. He thought of his brave friends, perhaps still alive, and the hero he once revered who scorned to flee any peril for so low a cost as his own life. And Meandar roused what was left of the hero in him. He shoved those fears down with a savage effort and thought instead about dreams as hard as he could.

Indeed- dreams, he thought, where life becomes more wondrous than it can ever be in waking. Like wishing constantly, only not under your own control. Everything happens in dreams, he thought, and nothing works as it should, all is new every moment. It would take great courage, to go there, to experience that. Dreaming is the very best part of being alive.

Meandar kept his mind still then, and quietly tilted to the ground as his flesh spat and shivered from its many wounds and burns, stilling them all with the force of his weariness. His last effort, all he could attempt. He pulled the carpet over his near-corpse and waited.

I wish I could dream came the thought unbidden and so earnestly awaited.

At once Meandar wished he could dream, and did. And the world lived on, thanks to the heroes who helped him.

Chapter 1: Of Heroes Known and Unknowing

Once, things were simple.

The usual crowd in the taverns of Wanlock seldom agreed on much- where was the fun? But no one denied, things had been easier to understand under Viridian the Twenty-Seventh.

No one denied it, not even the big blacksmith in The Mark's Inn who could naysay with the best, because hardly anyone wanted the emperor's name on their lips after the rebellion came. The slayer Yula with his cronies had exposed Viridian as a demon in disguise; that was a bitter pill, and the tavern crowd had no better answer than to wash it down with ale. After all, claimed the farmers in for market-day, weren't the high and mighty nobles to blame as well? Seven hundred years the Viridians had held the throne, or so they all thought. But now, people heard, it had been demons all along- the same demon, apparently, and all our brave Greatknights and Barons and Marks just standing about either ignorant or conspiring under Despair. Which of the two was worse, the potter responded, the dumb or the dastards- this brought a grinding laugh and a few slaps on the back. But the smith, like all elves so proud of his race, would have none of that. All were innocent in his mind, except that one demon on the top; and so blood-handed Yula (a dwarf, no less, what's the world come to) was hardly better for having slain him.

Yula the First, the smith's friends insisted; the Usurper, others called back; now there were more toasts, as politics descended on separate groups for a time. Before they were done, the wine-drinking elves of Wanlock looked near as red-handed as their new suzerain. But few would allow that things were actually better now.

Next year, the chronicles would tell this tale, and the tavern-goers agreed they would tell it all wrong. On the mid-day of the Hawk, late spring of the year 2001, Yula the Demonscald and his coalition smashed the Imperial forces at the Battle of Tor Perite and this once-penniless warrior took the Throne of the Sun. Our own Mark on the Usurper's side, muttered the tradesmen who always sat at the corner table. Good for him, the adjutant mayor insisted, to back the winning side. This brought a few grumbles of agreement, which only encouraged the little snip as he went on to praise the new emperor's program, enacted with lightning speed as soon as he sat the throne.

Unfair taxes remitted, the cult of the Healer Telhol redeemed into lawful practice as the Demonbenders were banned, the drug trade outlawed. But then a stroke of Hope- the announcement came to free all the slaves in the land. Think of it, the adjutant mayor urged his listeners; half a million souls lost their chains in a single day. Now it was as if the sun rose anew each morning, he claimed, and most agreed with a toast though some others muttered of lost property or clucked in horror at the blasphemies of shattered ceremony.

Fine, some in the ale crowd said, none of our money in slaves or drugs- but why the need for all these adventurers? First a rebel band to steal our throne, and now more coming from the woodwork, or off the desert sands in truth.

Less than one month after the battle, this band calling themselves the Tributarians entered the city, fresh from two months on the Shimmering Mindsea so they claimed. As if any Child of Hope could survive that furnace, the merchants scoffed. But they had the coin to go with their confident tales, the corner-tradesmen insisted. And the smith spoke knowingly of armor fittings and weapon repair (not his own work, but members of his trade). Yes, they had money to be sure, everyone agreed. And if they were paying for the drinks, why not- the tavern crowd had been more than happy to hear their tales.

That bard of theirs, Salinj'r- excellent voice, not strong but steady and his lyrics always good. A proper elven singer, the smith was always sure to remark. He sang with a constant smile, of ships on sand, a buried city called Jengesalamur and the lost, magnificent Hopeward where treasures from the ancient past lay imprisoned by Despair. The tavern crowd could all rehearse the tale, so many times had this Salinj'r sung it in The Mark's Inn and everywhere.

And they remembered too his companions, the enormous human warrior, the hammer-bearing dwarf, several wizards, and more. Once a listener piped up and asked Salinj'r about the stealthic any such party must have. Several in the tavern nodded in recall, for that was one question the bard refused to answer. His smile died, and he put his mandolin away to sing no more that night. Others whispered for him, dark things they had heard about a comrade lost. Wondrous side-dressing to a wondrous tale. But true? Knowing shrugs and meaty chuckles always followed the bard's applause.

Fifty thousand souls lived in Wanlock, minding their own business by day and swapping stories about everyone else's by night; and not a one truly thought the Tributarians were heroes then. No entry in the chronicles for them (who reads those anyway). Clear and simple, these Tributarians were just a brash pack of landless adventurers, who had found some treasure- admittedly, a large pile- and were here to spend it.

The talk of heroes began a week later, when Kaleg the Demonward attacked.

The bard had sung of Kaleg, this nine-foot iron monster in demon's form, stalking the treasure-vaults beneath Jengesalamur. A Despairing sentinel set over Hopeful relics captured by the evil thanes who built the lost city and then died out, centuries ago. It all made for a fine story, told by ale and lantern light. The adventurers claimed to have defeated him, barely, but then Kaleg returned, approaching Wanlock on the trace of the plundered relics it guarded.

That metal behemoth approached the walls, brushed off the knights and city guardsmen as lap-crumbs, fell into spell-wrought pits but climbed forth relentlessly, bearing down towards Wanlock's gates. Kaleg moved so slowly the people could see it coming for hours, that day in Serpent when the sun set so late. No tavern crowds that night. All fifty thousand souls were watching from the walls, as beyond all Hope the Emperor Yula himself arrived, like a child astride a black destrier, to try his mettle against the foe. Dismounting and disdaining his bodyguard, the plated dwarf dealt blow after massive blow with his enormous battle-axe at the advancing pillar of Despairing iron: it ignored his strikes, though neither could Kaleg touch the Son of the Sun (so quick and puissant was he in combat). Yet it strode on without heed of the Empire's greatest warrior. The fifty thousand watched, and lost Hope; until the Tributarians stood in.

Coming to line with the great Yula and matching their combined powers, the adventuring band did combat once more with their foe. Everyone saw something. Many noted the sorcerous bolts of the wizards Zoanstahr and Galethiel Nomenseer; others described the drumming blows of the dwarf Solo- not the Emperor, another stubby slayer- the hulking man Spitz and the elven noble-son Qerlak; one or two claimed to have heard the powerful prayers uttered by the preacher Cheriatte. The tales took all night, but the combat just moments; many attacks fell as if a single stroke upon Kaleg. Suddenly, it shattered into red-hot fragments, which sank burning into the raw earth. The preachers of the city cast cleansing miracles at once in the name of Argens, and the threat was finally banished.

Then the Tributarians entered Wanlock a second time, and the fifty thousand cheered them as heroes indeed. The taverns opened at once and had hardly closed since.

Now, when their bard Salinj'r sang of their deeds, he gained a rapt audience. And the money the heroes held, when they came for rest or drink, was no longer good, as grateful citizens crowded each other to offer them their board for free. They feasted, they trained, spoke apart into the long hours of their future plans. They were possessed of wealth, they were heroes, met in secret with the Emperor.

All things seemed well. Perhaps, some in the tavern dared to suggest, they were getting better after all. Even those who privately disagreed would usually drink to that.

Yet somehow, things ceased to be simple.

The causes were many, of course, and disagreement about their order became the nightly fare. Road-robberies went sharply up that summer, disagreements in town led to confusion in the courts. Nobles accused, feuds fought, trade upset like an apple cart on a sideways hill. Many claimed they couldn't sleep: not that Elves boast much about sleeping, generally. By summer's end in Ferret and Salamander, when that damned usurper sent all the slaves and riff-raff off to the East, those Tributarians had been taken down a peg or two. Put in jail, some insisted; killed, others claimed, and good riddance. No one knew for sure, hardly anyone had even heard a rumor. Not heroes, not anymore. More important things to argue about, surely.

Thus the Dreamquest began before anyone knew it, and would end the same way.

With less than an hour until the assassins attacked, the one woman who could stop them was shopping.

Oh, how lovely! Cheriatte exclaimed, feeling the carpet's weave as it hung in the vendor's rack. She dropped her hand when the stall minder looked at her so intently- better not to mislead the man. His neighbors on either side, also selling rugs, looked over with expectant faces; the bazaar near Wanlock's Gate of Sands sprawled away in all directions but the pocket around the elven preacher was too quiet. Cheriatte turned to her young wizard companion, Tell me, Zoanstahr, should we get it?

Cheriatte could see him measuring her enthusiasm against the practicalities. The woven monstrosity was two body lengths on a side if it was an inch: deep within its pattern of red diamonds and blue chevrons she could see mystical beasts in combat. Zoanstahr smiled and said gently, It is beautiful beyond compare, dear preacher. The perfect adornment for a gracious home- if only you had one.

Cheriatte felt a momentary pang, then relaxed into an accepting smile. Shading her eyes against the strong sun of Argens' central Mark, she saw another of the party drifting through the outdoor aisles in their direction. Like the preacher and the wizard, this dwarven warrior was marked by that sunburned look, sign of recent sojourn in the blazing desert to the northeast. Their meeting today would be decisive, Cheriatte knew; this bit of shopping might be the last relaxation for some time. Still, she sighed, turning away from the carpet, it seems quite unfair. We have all this wealth, and yet-

Solo the dwarf stepped over to see, and barked in either amusement or impatience. Zoanstahr is right, Cheriatte, and besides, if your goal is to spend money, this won't do. The merchants here still recognize us.

The trio moved on in silence, into the stalls with food and drink, and Cheriatte noted that each seller tracked the sight of them as if the adventurers themselves were good enough to eat. The aroma of roasted meat-sticks, savory fruits and spices in bulk nearly overwhelmed her. The preacher slowed a bit, wondering if she should select a morsel, just for the diversion and as a reward from her usual ascetic regimen. The snap of coins to either side distracted her attention- Solo had snagged two meat sticks and was already chewing contentedly while continuing to talk with Zoanstahr- himself the captor of a roll of honey-bread. Leaving silver behind allowed them to escape with just thanks; the rich citizens of Wanlock also did not bother with change in silver bits. Cheriatte shook her head and decided to abstain, just to set the example. Someday soon, they would be low on food again, as they were before that first wish. Another pang, this time of regret, and the preacher returned to their previous conversation.

I know. If I ask a price from a merchant, they will all cluster round, bidding each other down into poverty to be the one that supplied the Tributarians. That would not be justice, Solo, I agree.

More than that, Solo pursued, clearing his mouth hastily, it would be nibbling bread crumbs when there's feasting ahead. The price of any normal thing cannot be high enough to dent the wealth we have now.

That's what happens, when you sell a golden skeleton! came the booming voice, accompanied by a looming shadow overtaking the trio from behind. Cheriatte whirled to see a human warrior well above six feet, broad-chested and lethal, with a two-handed blade strapped in a shoulder-draw over his leathers. She thought this was a man of war, if ever one was born; but she smiled for he was a comrade too. The human Spitz reached to both sides, his arms encompassing the slender human, female elf and dwarf in a sweeping embrace that would prove just short, four minutes later. He laughed and dropped a careless palmful of coins on a counter while making off with more food than Cheriatte would eat for supper, which he casually wolfed down without even losing pace. I say gambling, Spitz declared, with plenty of drinks, and perhaps some, eh, companionship. In whichever order. Of course his suggestion shocked her, but Cheriatte found she liked the strength of Spitz's arms- and he was only joking, at least about her accompanying them. Though of no religious bent himself, Spitz was respectful of the preacher of Aballe. With time, she had gotten more used to the rough ways of all her comrades. The big warrior tapped the mystic shield on Cheriatte's back in a short drumbeat and everyone laughed.

As the quartet moved in a group, the crowded mall created a slip of room around them; shoppers and haulers moved out of the way ahead and gathered again behind. Points, whispers and mutters; here and there a smile or cheer, some hardened scowls but most faces just staring in shock. Cheriatte had seen this reaction all the past week, and in her heart thought it proper. At first the group was taken for liars, at least about the enormity of the threat they fled. If not for the money they spent, their reception would have been cold- and there always lurked a threat of robbery when they did. When Kaleg approached, many knights and guardsmen were hurt or slain, and some in Wanlock blamed the Tributarians for that. But in the end, she and the others risked their lives- in public, for once, instead of at the bottom of some ruined well or the end of an abandoned cave. Imperfect, surely worthy of some blame for creating the problem- but heroes now, as uncomfortable as that made her feel. At least they should be safer among the common crowd.

Where is the bard, Solo growled, clapping one hand atop his belted hammer. Supposed to bring us back to a meeting with Yula.

I still cannot believe, Cheriatte mused, that we have been in the presence of the Son of the Sun. Even though-

-he was once just like us, Zoanstahr continued for her a landless adventurer? Once maybe; but Yula has plenty of land now. More than I would ever want to worry about.

The group neared the city council building while talking, on the outer edge of the bazaar, and as they took the first steps up, the doors opened to reveal Salinj'r their bard, alone. He riposted the wizard's thought in near-verse as usual.

Mayhap, mage, but this excellent Emperor has decided we may be permitted to puzzle over a small plot of his land, for a period. If, that is, we are willing to do his bidding.

A mission! Solo barked, and the elven bard held one hand up for calm.

Let us use my rented room to discuss it, back above the inn.

Where is Yula? Spitz asked, I thought we were to see him again.

And how can we take on any mission of his, without a stealthic? Cheriatte added, stepping up to Salinj'r's side. Where are Qerlak, Galethiel, the others?

The bard threw up both hands in surrender- a gesture that would do him no good in two minutes- and cried, A volley of questions and I with no armor! Good friends, to my room, learn our doom. And meet a new comrade, perhaps. Salinj'r paused to flash his habitual self-pleased smile, so at odds with his airy speech. Such a look said he knew more than the rest of the group, and enjoyed the thought. He gestured the way back across the bazaar and took the lead. Qerlak and Galethiel, Trilien and Engurra he added over his shoulder, have been informed.

Fifty silver the sorceress does not come, Spitz muttered to Solo, who nodded.

She's been completely absorbed since we returned. Studies without end, I hear.

As long as she's not ill, the warrior rejoined, pragmatic as ever.

They entered a section of the outdoor mall where animals of various kinds were housed for sale. Cheriatte ducked under rods where colorful birds perched and cawed, and looked sadly at the cages of monkeys, ferrets and more kept for pets. Conversation dwindled beneath the racket. There was flagstone underfoot here, and a large raised dais where slaves had once been sold was now covered with the stalls of animal vendors. Zoanstahr, stumbling on a down-step, careened into a net-enclosure screening off some game-fowl, who clucked piously at him. The wizard caught his sleeve on some of the netting and had trouble getting loose- though not as much as he was destined to have in moments.

As the group turned a corner towards the opposite side of the mall, the preacher stopped short at the sight of a row of wood-ribbed cages, each housing a mastiff standing and facing in her direction. Cheriatte cried out, unheard in the rising din, but the gaze of the dogs was surely a happenstance. Unusually quiet, with all the noise on both sides of them, the pack looked to be of a litter, with training. The man behind the cages was standing congenially enough, with hands in sleeves as if waiting. Edging around the row on the other side of the narrow alley, Cheriatte turned to catch up. A few steps ahead, Salinj'r squeezed past a small elephant moving in the opposite direction, and turned back to the group, pointing and announcing something in din-drowned verse.

—mperor has —duce us — steal —ny.

As the elephant dawdled thunderously past, Cheriatte saw behind the bard's shoulder a slim, nearly naked form. The human was clad only in strap-sandals and a loincloth, and his skin held the same weathered hue. Looking up past the brace of daggers crossed at his waist, Cheriatte met the eyes of the most deadly person she would ever see. Her sense of danger rang loud as a chapel bell, and without thinking she tried to slough her shield down to defensive position. The middle-aged human was splinter-thin but in excellent condition, his face set into a grin that seemed to say ‘where is the mortal danger I can face, before I die of boredom’. He met her gaze, and his brow contracted a shade, as if puzzled his intent had been so obvious.

Zoanstahr was closest to Salinj'r and cupped his ear, shouting for a repeat from the bard. But it was too late. The deadly man tensed at no cue whatever from the benign bedlam around them, and moved as quickly as thought in her direction. Assassins grew from the crowd, everywhere around them. Cheriatte tried to keep her eye on the deadly man, but the thrown knife distracted her.

In a moment when things seemed to slow, the beautifully revolving stiletto approached her only as two glints of sunlight, otherwise invisible to the eye until it buried its blade in her left shoulder up to the hilt. Cheriatte heard the slap of its crosspiece against her clavicle, felt the searing jolt of pain, and sensed her knees popping forward as her legs lost all connection with standing. Her shield- that would have stopped the blade. If she had limbered it down in time; if she wore it at battle-ready every second, the preacher reproached herself even as she slid to the stones and felt the side of her head bounce hard. The magnificent shield won back from the vault of Despair in fabled Jengesalamur, with the power to summon protective force for herself and her comrades. Useless now, laying halfway down her arm in the dust of the mall, and its owner already starting to thrash from the poison in her veins.

There were three, or perhaps five figures moving at the group through the crowd of man and mammal, dark-robed with flashes of red and a horrid show of discipline. From the ground, Cheriatte could see very well the swirling, black-iron net settle over Zoanstahr's head and torso while he was still considering his options. Biting back the pain and the sun-flare of venom, she struggled to sit and watched him stumble, cry out and try to cast. The metallic fibers frayed the mystic energies and tangled his fingers; Zoanstahr fell to one knee and shouted in frustration. Even as he started to tear at the cords, driving the hooks into his clothing and skin, the assassin who had dropped the net now plunged to the ground next to him, and swung a mace into the back of the wizard's skull sending him down like a sack.

Cheriatte's vision was beginning to blur, and the fire raced throughout her upper body. Meandar, she thought, he was good at field aid like this, though only she could draw the poison with her miraculous power. If she could focus her tongue, before she passed beyond the veil of sleep and death. Where, she thought irrelevantly, was the deadly man, their leader? Gone: not moved beyond her vision, simply disappeared. Near where he had stood, Salinj'r turned to confront another robed assassin, and lacking his rapier, threw up both hands. A vicious punch to the jaw, another sap-blow to his head, and he too was down. Spitz's roar was audible even over the rising screams of panic from all around. His blade whirled to his hand and he brought it down against a foe in his path, who twisted just out of its incredible reach, where the edge chopped halfway into a tent-pole and stuck momentarily as the wood burst into flame. The assailant closed with a dagger in hand, and Spitz released his weapon to grapple the wrists and keep its green-tinged edge away from his neck.

Grab the hilt, Cheriatte ordered herself. The pain, the lateness, your previous mistakes, all of no account now. Try. Touching the pommel and crying out from the renewed pain, the preacher gulped a breath and ripped it free, as the mortal thing clattered to the stones. Her head turned with the effort, and she caught a glimpse of the death-man leaping behind the row of mastiff-cages, forcing the innocent minder to step back and revealing a flash of red beneath his cloak. If there was any chance to cast the miracle, it needed to be now; but even as Cheriatte set her breath, she could not take her eyes from the slim form, as he joyously flipped the minder's cloak over his head, tripping him and exposing the assassin's daggers he wore. Sinking back down, Cheriatte marshaled her last energies and spoke the words she learned from the curates of her youth- so often invoked to save Solo, or Trilien, now of need turned upon herself instead.

Trahari vituprandor

Success, with the grace of Aballe; Cheriatte felt the burning numbness start to recede at once. Though the wound still bled and she felt in no wise sprightly, the preacher levered up on the edge of her shield and stood. Solo, blocked by some bundles, was maneuvering with an assassin, bearing him back with repeated swings of his hammer and dodging the blades in return. Spitz still held his assailant locked by the wrists, and now his height and reach were beginning to tell; the attacker's arms were bowing back, and his feet were already up on point. The weakness of blood loss blended inside the preacher with the spiritual tax imposed by casting a miracle. But now three more figures appeared through the retreating mob of flesh and fur; the elephant behind her was panicked and crushing everything wooden in its path as it trumpeted all other sounds away. To cement her despair, Cheriatte heard the flap of cage doors falling open and the growl of the mastiffs now set loose. Too frightened to look back, she froze and waited, expecting to be crushed by paws and teeth at any moment.

The animals, evidently attracted to movement, raced baying past her and plunged into the remaining assassins, who were caught unaware by the sheer chaos. Cheriatte started to breathe again, but gulped it back as the deadly man appeared right next to her, still with no weapon drawn. Laughing gustily, he clapped her lightly on the back and shouted, Who let these dogs out! Then he charged in to engage the one circling