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.Surrounding the both of us, a black, white, and brindle light pattern began and ended in the outline of aDreel.Dropping the flashdrakes, I grabbed a flailing bone tentacle and heaved on it.Tacorzi spilledforward off his coils.Hauling for all I was worth despite the sharp pain in shoulder and hip I pulled Tacorzi along with meas I dove into the Dreel and the world of the Elven circus translatio.I do not know how long it actually took for us to complete the journey to the grove east of Jarudin.Wepassed through hills and mountains, lakes, towns, and vales, as we flew through that opposite-landscape.I saw no one, as I had before, but my attention remained focused on Tacorzi.I do not know if anyonesaw us as a ghost on our journey, but I had no doubt that if someone had, a bard would be singing aboutthe sight soon enough. Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.htmlAt some point during the journey it occurred to me that the premise upon which I had based my plancould have been wrong.Before my death I would have been willing to trust my hunches, but that hadgotten me dead once before.If this journey did not kill Tacorzi, I had managed to transpecate him fromthe frozen north to within a day's ride of Jarudin.I had no idea how fast he could travel, configured as hewas, but inflicting that sort of danger on the kin of folks I'd known generations before struck me as apoor way to announce my return to the land of the living.As we arrived in the grove, I realized the one huge mistake I had made.Having dived into the Dreel, Idived out at the other end of the trip.I landed on my left shoulder, sending pain through me, then I rolledand kept rolling.I rolled on out of the grove and in doing so saved my life.Tacorzi did not land in much better shape than I did, but I was much smaller than he was.As his bodycame into the grove, it bounced off the ground and slammed into trees on the other side of the grove.That collision sheered limbs from both trees and Tacorzi.Bits and pieces or bones pelted me as they flewout from between the trees.Those that hit me tumbled on after leaving my coat stained with whitepowder, and a blizzard of bone dust filled the grove itself.I let things settle for a minute and made certain I had not been hurt.Because I had no indication Tacorzistill lived, I got to my feet and walked back to the grove.A black puddle, looking like the corrupted yolkof a giant egg lay near the edge of the tree circle.Stulklirn walked around the perimeter, shaking whitedust from his coat.His fur now bore a white cross on his chest, but he seemed not to have noticed thechange.I shrugged off my coat and massaged my shoulder."Are you hurt, Stulklirn?"The Dreel shook his head."Hurt I am not.""Are you certain?" I rubbed my chest reflexively."I know what that spell did to me a long time ago.""Dreel-friend you are, so know this you may." He pointed at what had once been Takrakor."The godsmade men to kill men.To the Dreel for prey Bok gave sorcerers." He exposed his teeth in a feral grin."Magick they have, magick we are.This is why lifeblack has pooled."Chapter 37The Hero as a ManEarly WinterA.R.499The PresentMore than the stitch in her side and the throbbing pain on her cheek, Gena felt the cold as she slowlyawakened.She found herself slumped in a corner between an ice wall and the cavern floor.The fire herspell had made out of a zombi still guttered a bit, holding the azure shadows at bay, but it produced littleheat.She shoved her hands into her mittens again, then found her hat and made sure to tuck the numbtips of her ears beneath the woolen band when she pulled it on.Even though her toes and parts of her legs felt numb, she was able to move around.Her ribs ached on Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.htmlthe right side, and her right eye had already begun to swell half-closed, but she resisted using a diagnosticspell on herself.She knew her injuries were not bad and that the greatest threat to her welfare came fromthe cold.Her magick could do something to ward off the cold, but if she used all her strength healingherself, she might freeze to death afterward.She staggered to her feet and felt surprised when the little cry of pain she uttered echoed back to herthrough the silence.Am I alone? Panic rippled through her, but she fought it down."This is no time to bejumping to any sort of conclusions about anything."Gena looked first toward where the thing had been.She shivered, but less from the cold than from thememory of what Takrakor had become.She had always used the name Takrakor as something thatdefined evil in her mind, but Tacorzi superseded the worst.Takrakor, as she had heard in many stories,had been ambitious, and that she could understand.Tacorzi, on the other hand, remained alive whiledead, maintained by a hatred for a Man he himself had slain five centuries previously.It was malignantand insane.She saw neither the creature nor Neal, and that worried her.The Dreel appeared to be gone as well, soshe drifted off to her left toward a mound in the midst of a bone-strewn mire.The stink of rotted meatalmost overwhelmed her as she approached, but the struggling gasp for breath that emanated from thetwisted lump in the center drew her on.Berengar lay in the midst of what had once been a zombi or two.Viscous black fluids saturated hisclothes.Deep down, where great rents had been opened in his clothes to his flesh and beyond, she sawhis blood frozen bright red in his wounds.A bone-spear poked through the left leg of his thick leathertrousers.One of his ears hung half bitten off, his right shoulder looked dislocated, and his left eye hadmore red than white in it.Without a second thought Gena cast a diagnostic spell on him and got some added information
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