Blades of the Banished - Robert Ryan Page 0,30

be done to get them out of here.

The serpent attacked. He drew his sword, but did not turn to face the creature. Instead, he took it by the blade and slipped it hilt first through the bars of the window. Assurah, long dead now, could not stop him as he once might have hindered any efforts of his victims. He lowered it until the crosspiece of the hilt fitted beneath the bent top of the bar and pulled upward.

He strained, but nothing happened. The bolt had rusted and centuries of dust and grime had clogged the hole. It held the bar fast.

Blue light flickered behind him. Foul liquid sprayed the nearby walls, and he braced his muscles in fear of the sudden sting of venom or fang. But Erlissa had saved them again, though he heard her groan behind him.

Once more he strained to lift the bar, and this time he felt movement. He tried again, and suddenly the bolt slipped up in the hole and he drew it high. The bar was heavy, and he took care that it did not drop again. When its bottom was clear of the hole he pushed against the door.

It opened with a screech. Rust and debris fell from the hinges. He continued to push and it swung more freely.

He let the sword drop to the other side with a loud clang, but his voice rang out louder still.

“Come through!”

Erlissa dived past him. He followed. Turning and pushing his weight against the door once more, he drove it back into a closed position. He saw vague movement through the barred window, and then heard a hiss and the rattling of bones. The serpent rose up, higher even than the door, and it was about to strike again.

He rammed home the bolt, grabbed his sword, and then rolled to the side.

It was none too soon. Venom sprayed against the door, and some splashed through the barred window to land on the floor. There it seethed and bubbled. Black smoke curled up from the stone.

They looked at each other in the near dark.

“Well, you took your time,” Erlissa said with a weary grin.

He winked at her. “When I take a girl out somewhere, I like to show her an exciting evening.”

“Exciting isn’t quite the word I’d use.”

“Exhilarating, then?”

“No. I think not. And just how many girls have you taken out?” She shook her head and then continued. “No. Don’t tell me. Anyway, I don’t think there is a word for what just happened back there.” She cast her gaze at the door. “At least we got past it in the end.”

Lanrik stood up. “Yes, but the problem is that we have to get past it again on the way back. And I fear it’ll be really angry the next time.”

Erlissa sighed. “First things first,” she said. “For the moment, we’d better find our way to Aranloth.”

Lanrik looked ahead as the blue light at the tip of Erlissa’s staff flared weakly.

The room was dark and shadowy. Dust lay over the ground and grime streaked the walls. There was very little here, the main feature being a winding staircase ahead of them.

They walked toward it. Though the floor was covered by what once had been well-fashioned flagging, the walls were of natural stone. They were still beneath the actual tower, and this area was either carved out of the living rock or else the tower was built upon a system of caves.

Erlissa confirmed his thoughts. “The tower straddles this bedrock,” she whispered. “And in both the bedrock and the tower foundations above I sense the striving of elùgai and lòhrengai. It seeps through the very stone, and some mighty spell, cast no doubt by Assurah when he raised the tower, binds the stones together. The elùgroths seek to unravel it and bring the tower down. Aranloth prevents them.”

Even as she spoke Lanrik saw the hairline cracks that ran through the walls. The staircase showed them too, for it also was carved from the bedrock.

“We’d better hurry,” he said.

He sheathed the sword of Conhain and took the lead up the stairs. They left boot prints behind in a layer of gray powder that covered everything. It was not the dust of time, but rather a fine film that had recently fallen from the ceiling. He saw it even now drift slowly in the blue light of Erlissa’s staff.

They circled several times, following the winding staircase. It was hard to tell when the natural stone ceased and the great