The Gates of Night_ The Dreaming Dark - Keith Baker [8]
Dozens of rings floated around the central pillar, a myriad of metals and widths. The rings rose and fell, spinning in different directions and speeds.
And then there were the spheres: twelve crystal orbs drifted around the pillar. From the ground, it was easy to imagine them as a strange form of decoration. But Daine knew better. These were planar carriages, each one designed to carry passengers to another level of reality.
“One’s missing,” Lei said.
“Lakashtai,” Daine said. “And somehow, I don’t think she’s going to come back on her own.” He gestured at the tables scattered around the room, altars covered with glowing crystals. The magic exceeded his skills, but earlier Lei had used these to control one of the spheres. Daine could see her exhaustion, and he hated to make her exert herself, but there was no choice. “I need you to get this thing working again.”
“You want to know where Lakashtai went?” Lei said.
“For a start.”
Lei hobbled toward the bank of lights, leaning on her staff. Daine sprinted around the column, and what he saw made his heart sink. He’d brought two allies into the tower, and these warriors had helped them defeat the firebinders. One of these soldiers lay on the ground before Daine, the injuries so severe that it took Daine a moment to identify the corpse as that of the man, Shen’kar. Half of the dark elf’s body had been sheared away, and the rest of corpse was covered with cuts, as if he’d been caught in a storm of razors—or Harmattan’s whirling shards.
Damn it. Daine had spent more time fighting the savage dark elves than as their ally, but over the last hour he’d come to respect Shen’kar—and whatever their differences, no warrior deserved to die like that.
“Captain.” Pierce had a body in his arms. A woman, limp, her pitch-black skin covered with cuts. The other dark elf. “She is seriously wounded, but her condition is stable.”
Daine nodded. “Follow me. What did you find?”
“The gate remains open. The wards are in place. And the Sulatar elves are still camped at the perimeter of the magical defenses; I saw at least three of their flying sleds.”
“Wonderful.”
They found Lei working at the crystal consoles. “Status?” Daine said.
“I can’t recover the sphere that Lakashtai used to escape,” Lei said. “But she went to—”
“Dal Quor,” Pierce said.
“That’s right,” Lei said, surprised. “How did you—”
“Later,” Daine said. “Once we don’t have that trash heap on our tails. I was hoping we’d be able to leave out the front door, but that’s impossible.”
“I can deactivate the wards—”
Daine shook his head. “There’s an army camped out there, waiting for their high priest to return and lead them to the promised land. Even if we found some way to get past them we can’t just leave this place in their hands. Who knows what we’ve already unleashed by helping Lakashtai? Besides, if your rusty friend can’t lower the wards himself, we’re doing the world a favor by keeping him here.”
Lei frowned. “So you’re saying we just give up?”
“You know me … I love to give up.” Daine forced a grin. “Come on, Lei. You’re our resident magical genius. You’re the one who told me what these orbs are.”
“Carriages to other planes. You want to leave in one of the orbs?”
“Want to? No.” A vision of Shen’kar’s ravaged corpse flashed through Daine’s mind. “But it’s better than the alternative. Can you do it?”
Lei looked down at the panel. “I … I think so. But where do you want to go?”
“Since when am I an expert on other planes? I want to go home, Lei. For now, I’ll take anywhere that’s not, say, a pit of endless fire.”
“Even a plain of endless ice?”
Daine blinked. “That’s the only other option?”
“Well, it’s a possibility. I can’t access all of the spheres. It must have something to do with the current conjunctions of the planes. And