The Dark Remains - Mark Anthony [193]
At last Travis forced himself to turn away from the grisly spectacle. Davis was vomiting on the pavement, and Mitchell was holding his shoulders with strong, gentle hands.
Footsteps on asphalt. Travis jerked his head up, fearing that he would see gun-wielding guards. Instead, the pistols were gripped in familiar hands.
“Deirdre.” He said the word like a prayer, then caught her in a tight embrace.
Farr lowered his gun, gazing at the now-still heap of fur and flesh that had been the sorcerer and the gorleths. “That was a lucky shot, Deirdre.”
She stepped back, her dark eyes serious. “No.” She gripped the yellowed bear claw that hung around her neck. “I think maybe it was fate.”
Davis was standing upright, although his face was pale. Mitchell kept an arm around him.
“I don’t see any more of the guards,” Mitchell said. “I think they’ve run off. Can’t really say I blame them.”
Farr shook his head. “No, they’ve retreated, that’s all. They’re waiting for backup from Duratek. And it will be here in minutes. We’ve got to—”
A crystalline chiming drifted on the air, along with silvery light. They gazed up at the open back of the truck. Grace stood beside a slender gray being, not quite touching it, as it raised a hand to shield its eyes from the last remains of the daylight.
“Good Lord,” Davis said softly. “What is that?”
The awed stares of Mitchell, Deirdre, and Farr echoed the question.
“It’s a fairy,” Travis said simply.
Beltan appeared behind the fairy. With a groan, he set something down on the edge of the trailer. It was a small box made of dark stone, its sides etched with symbols.
Vani drew in a sharp breath. “The artifact of Morindu.”
“The fairy showed it to us,” Grace said. “We never would have seen it in the mess.”
Grace climbed down from the truck, and Travis and Farr helped Beltan to follow. The fairy stretched forth slender arms. Davis and Mitchell gazed at each other, then they reached up strong, rough hands and lowered the creature to the ground. It tilted its head, then touched Davis’s face. He laughed, then hugged Mitchell as the fairy drifted away.
It drew close to the stone box.
“Is that it?” Farr said, his eyes solemn. “Is that the gate artifact?”
Vani knelt beside the box. “No, this is new—it is merely a container. I would guess it was made by the Scirathi to protect the artifact.” She ran her hands over the smooth surface of the top, the sides, then shook her head. “It is bound with spells of blood sorcery. I do not know if I will be able to—”
The fairy bent, like a sapling before a wind, and touched the box. The lid fell aside. Vani hesitated, then reached into the box and drew something out. It was a small piece of perfectly black stone.
From his vantage, Travis saw there was a kind of angular writing on the artifact. It was pyramid-shaped, with a total of four sides. However, the shape of the artifact was not perfect. The top of the pyramid was flat, as if it had been lopped off, and Travis could see there was a small reservoir in the interior. With the flat top, it seemed incomplete. Where was the rest of it?
Even as he thought this, Vani reached into her pocket and drew out the small, triangular piece of stone she had showed them before. The prism. She started to bring it close to the artifact, to complete it.
The fairy touched her hand, staying it. Vani frowned, her expression one of confusion. Travis was confused as well. What was the fairy doing? It lifted a finger to its breast, pressed the tip against its gray skin—
—and into its body.
The fairy’s mouth opened in a silent circle of pain. It dug another finger into its body, and another, pushing them deeper. Blue-white light seeped from the wound. Then, with another cry, the fairy pulled something out of the wound in its chest. The creature held it forth, wet and glistening.
It was a stone.
No, not just a stone. Travis approached the fairy.