The Howling Delve - Jaleigh Johnson [101]
"Might I have the pleasure of knowing you?" Balram asked when she said nothing.
Certainly, sir, she replied, but Balram could not hear her voice. He could only follow the movement of her lips to make out her words. She tipped her spear horizontal and threw. A soft, singing chime filled the ballroom. The spear impaled the man standing just to Balram's left, one who'd been taking slow steps toward the base of the stairs.
Keeping his eyes trained on the woman, Balram bent to see that the man was dead. As he did so, his eyes fell on the druid's spear. Tied among its decorations was the emerald-stone symbol of Motel. When Balram's fingers brushed it, the woman spoke again. This time her voice rang out cleat across the hall, making Baltam startle.
I am Cesira of the Starwater Six, Quiet One ofSilvanus, and the lady of this house-she inclined her head stiffly-and the doom of Balram Kortrun. She glided back a step and pressed her hand to the banister rail in a certain spot.
Balram's eyes widened in shocked recognition. Gods, she couldn't know the locations of the…
"Fall back!" he cried, much too late.
The floot tiles funning down the center of the hall creaked from years of lying stationary, but the trap still functioned.
Spikes exploded from the floor, catching the men behind him in a deadly hedge. Two went down as the sharpened edges burst through the backs of their legs. The rest managed to leap away, but the trap had cut them off from the exit.
Balram turned to the stairs, but Cesira had climbed back to the top. She stood behind the balcony rail, a second spear resting on her shoulder.
"You won't get out of here alive, bitch," he snarled at hef. He motioned to one of his men, who began moving along the outer wall, smashing lanterns and spilling oil in streams across the floor. Fire licked up in tall pools. "You'll burn with this house, if we don't get to you first."
Then by all means, Cesira said, holding out her arms, Come to me.
The fire beast exalted in his find. Magic raged wildly above his head, fueled by the mad wizard and theif mental link. The mortals were scattered throughout his domain. He could smell them leaving their imprints on the Delve in a complex web, moving, trying to find each other.
The woman of fire and one other-they were closest to his former prison. The beast dismissed them at once as too easy. Let them have a start on the game. He relished the challenge of two well-prepared magic wielders.
His senses drifted outward. Two more were near the thoroughfare, and a larger party was across the bridges-but wait. The beast picked out the scent, distantly, in the Howling burrow. Four fighteis, moving stealthily-deeper into the mazelike tunnels construcred by the dwarves.
There lay his hunt, a chase through the labyrinth to claim the fitst of his prizes.
The beast rumbled in satisfaction. He stretched his lean muscles and began to run, tracing the faint scents to their source.
Meisha felt as if her bones had been dashed over rocks. Perhaps they had been. She felt a hand prod her shoulder and hadn't even the strength to fight it off.
"Meisha."
Dantane's face swam into focus. The wizard leaned over her with a vial in his hand identical to the one he'd given her in the portal room. "Drink," he said, putting the glass to her lips.
Meisha drank, and gradually felt the strength returning to her aching arm and leg. The magic faded, leaving only a dull pain. "Where are we?"
"We came through a second portal," Dantane said. His voice sounded odd, uncertain. "The chasm in the floor. I found you not far from where I appeared. I don't know where we are, but you need to see something."
"What is it?" she asked.
Dantane hesitated. "I believe it's you."
"What?" Meisha sat up, gazing over the wizard's shoulder.
She recognized where they were immediately. The circular chamber was crowded with pedestals of rock rising up four, six, sometimes ten feet into the air, separating the chamber into various levels. Two exits lay at opposite ends of the room. At the ends of those tunnels would be similar testing chambers.