Part 13 (1/2)

83.

”I did hear him,” Gwen said softly. ”I did see his dream.

And, my lord...”

Rod couldn't help feeling that being on his guard was just the thing for the occasion. ”What's wrong?”

”Gregory's mind would not conjure up so mild a phan- tasm, nor one so threatening.”

The tension was building inside Rod. Anger began to boil up under it. Rod tried to hold it down, reminding himself that he and Gwen could probably handle any attempt to hurt them. But the mere thought that anyone would dare to attack his children, to plant nightmares in their sleeping minds...!

Magnus, Cordelia, and Geoffrey suddenly sat bolt-upright.

”Papa,” Cordelia gasped, ”what dost thou?”

”Is it that bad already? I'm trying to hold my temper.”

”Thou dost amazingly.” Magnus blinked the sleep out of his eyes and leaned closer, on hands and knees, to peer at his father. ”In truth, thou dost amazingly. I would never guess thy rage, to look at thee. Papa, what...”

The night seemed to thicken a few feet away from the children. Something hazy appeared, coalesced, hardened, and shot to earth, slamming into the ground a few feet from Magnus's hand. His head snapped around; he stared at a six-inch rock. Cordelia's gaze was rivetted to it, too, in horror; but Geoffrey leaped to his feet. ”Ambus.h.!.+”

The night thickened again, just over Magnus's head.

Something hazy appeared...

... and began to coalesce...

”Heads up!” Rod dove for his son. His shoulder knocked Magnus sprawling, and a foot-thick rock crashed down, grazing Rod's hip. He bellowed with pain-and anger at the monster who dared attack his children. His full rage cut loose.

”Ware!” Magnus cried. The children were already look- ing up, as their father had bade them, so they saw the rocks materializing-two, three, all plummeting to earth as they became real.

”Dodge ball!” Magnus shouted. Instantly, he and his brothers and sister were bounding and bobbing back and forth, Cordelia weaving an aerial dance that would've given a computer tracker a blown fuse, the boys appearing and 84 disappearing here, there, yonder, like signal lights in a storm.

Through their flickering pavane, Magnus called in sup- pressed rage, ”Art thou hurted. Papa?”

”Nothing that a little murder won't cure,” Rod yelled back. ”Children-seek! Discover and destroy!”

The children seemed to focus more sharply, and stayed visible for longer intervals.

Gwen was on her feet, still, her eyes warily probing the night above them.

Then Geoffrey hopped to his left, just as a small boulder materialized right where his chest had been.

Rod stood rigid with horror. If the boy hadn't happened to jump aside, just at that instant... ”Somebody's trying to teleport rocks into the kids' bodies!”

”'Twould be instant death.” Gwen's face was pale, but taut with promised mayhem.

Rod stood tree-still, his eyes wide open; but the night blurred around him into a formless void as his mind opened, seeking....

Cordelia seized her broomstick and shot up into the sky.

For a moment, all three boys disappeared. Then Magnus reappeared, far across the meadow, dimly seen in the moon- light. He disappeared again just as Geoffrey reappeared ten feet away, twenty feet in the air. Air shot outward with a pistol-crack, inward with firecracker-pop. The meadow re- sounded with reports, like miniature machine gun fire.

Geoffrey disappeared with a dull boom, and a treetop nearby swayed with a bullwhip-crack as Gregory appeared in the topmost limbs.

And stones kept falling, all over the meadow.

”Husband!” Gwen's voice was taut. ”This enemy will mark us, too, ere long.”

That jolted Rod. ”I suppose so-if he doesn't just pick on little kids. Better split up.”

Gwen seized her broomstick and disappeared into the dark sky.

That left Rod feeling like a sitting duck. He supposed he would be able to float up into the sky himself, if he just thought about it-but he'd never done it, and didn't want to have to pay attention to trying to keep himself up while he was trying to find and annihilate an enemy. Capture, he 85.

reminded himself-capture, if you can.

But he hoped he'd find he couldn't.

Magnus appeared ten feet away, shaking his head. ”He doth cloak his thoughts well. Papa. I cannot...” Suddenly, his eyes lost focus. Geoffrey's laugh carolled over the meadow, clear and filled with glee. Magnus disappeared with a pistol-crack. Rod leaped for Fess's back and shot across the meadow, a living missile with a double warhead.

He was just in time to see Geoffrey and Magnus shoot up out of the trees, carrying a young man stretched like a tug-of-war rope between them. He struggled and cursed, kicking and whiplas.h.i.+ng about with his legs and torso, but the boys stretched his arms tight, laughing with delight, and pulling with far more strength than their little bodies could account for.

The young man shut his mouth, and glared at Magnus.

Foreboding struck, and Rod sprang from Fess's back in a flying tackle.

He smacked into the young man's legs so hard they bruised his shoulder. Above him, the warlock yowled in pain.

Then it was daytime, suddenly full noon. The glare stung Rod's eyes, and he squinted against it. He could make out fern leaves closely packed above, and a huge lizardlike monstrosity staring at them from five feet away. Then its mouth lolled open in a needle-fanged grin, and it waddled toward them with amazing speed. Panic clawed its way up Rod's throat, and he almost let go to s.n.a.t.c.h out his knife- but the enemy warlock panicked first.

It was night again, total night. No, that was moonlight, wasn't it? And it showed Rod water, endless waves heaving below him. One reached up to slap at his heels, and its impact travelled on up to hit his stomach with chilling dread.

He could just picture himself falling, sinking beneath those undulating fluid hills, rising to thrash about in panic, claw- ing for land, for wood, for something that floated.... In- stinctively, he tightened his hug on the ankles.

Then sunlight seared his eyes, the sunlight of dawn, and bitter cold stabbed his lungs. Beyond the legs he clung to, the world spread out below him like a map, an immensity of green. Jagged rocks stabbed up, only a few yards below 86 his heels. It had to be a mountain peak, somewhere on the mainland.

Darkness again, blackness-but not quite total, for moonlight filtered through a high, grated window, showing him blocks of granite that dripped with moisture, and niter webbing the high comers of the cramped chamber. Huge rusty staples held iron chains to the walls. A skeleton lounged in the fetters at the end of a pair of those chains. Another held a thick-bodied man with a bushy black beard. His brocade doublet was torn and crusted with dried blood, and a grimy bandage wrapped his head. He stared at them in total amazement. Then relief flooded his face, and his mouth opened....

Limbo. Nothingness. Total void.

There wasn't any light, but there wasn't any darkness, either-just a gray, formless nothingness. Rod felt an in- stant conviction that he wasn't seeing with his eyes-es- pecially when colors began to twist through the void in writhing streaks, and a hiss of white noise murmured in the distance. They floated, adrift, and the body in Rod's arms suddenly began to writhe and heave again. A nasal voice cursed, ”Thou vile recreants! I will rend thee, I will tear thee! Monstrous, perverse beasts, who...”

Geoffrey cried out, ”Abandon!”