Call of Kerberos: Twilight of Kerberos, The - Jonathan Oliver Page 0,27

sound like the heart of a thunderstorm and a hole started to open up in front of Belck.

Silus saw Kelos rush past him. The mage reached into a pocket in his jerkin and threw a handful of glittering shards into the air. These raced towards the barrier and began stitching lines of fire across the gap that was rapidly widening there.

Belck raised his hand and the arcane threads crumbled.

From behind the ancient creature, a Chadassa twice as wide and at least a foot taller than he stepped in front of Belck and thrust a misshapen, trunk-like arm through the hole in the barrier. The warped limb ended not with a clawed hand, but with a hole from which dripped strands of green slime. Two fleshy sacks on the underside of the arm collapsed as something erupted from the barrel of the creature's limb.

Kelos staggered back under the force of the impact and looked down at the thing that was now embedded in the flesh of his chest. It pulsed there for a moment - emitting a sound like a small animal being tortured - before it suddenly contracted, hundreds of thread like filaments whipping out of its body and around the screaming mage. Dark red lines crisscrossed Kelos's torso as he fell, the threads seared into his flesh. Dunsany and Father Maylan rushed over and started to tug at the thing attached to their friend.

As the two of them struggled, Silus watched with only mild interest.

In front of Belck the hole in the barrier continued to widen and he began to speak, his gaze fixed on Silus.

"The Chadassa have long awaited your coming, Silus. Stories of you were told to me when I was barely a hatchling, tales that I have told my own broodkin. We all know of the half-breed. And you know, Silus, that your place is amongst us. You know that it is your seed that will produce the Land Walkers. You know that this reality needs to be bathed in the waters of the Great Flood. Only then will we be able to swim the oceans of time and space together."

Katya stepped into Silus's line of vision and he smiled briefly at her - as though he were imparting a greeting to a passing friend on the street - before returning his attention to the Chadassa ancient.

Silus remembered the vista that had greeted him through the transparent tunnel walls, how the ocean there had seemed so endless, stretching away into the midnight blue of the distance. He wondered what it would be like to swim there.

"You could swim forever with us, Silus."

And he would swim forever with his brethren. Entire worlds would turn, suspended in the waters of the infinite ocean. They would be masters of all life, all matter.

Katya was shaking him now, but he barely felt her touch. Beyond her Dunsany had begun to pry the strange creature free of Kelos.

The hole in front of Belck was now almost big enough for the creature to step through, or for Silus to step out of.

"Come to us Silus. Be with us."

Silus could see tears running down Katya's face. The words that she was saying failed to reach his ears. All he could hear was Belck.

Kelos sat upright, pulling the last of the vicious tendrils from his flesh. He was pale, sweating and covered in blood but he still managed to regain his feet with Dunsany's help.

And even though Belck's words began to fill his mind once more, Silus didn't fail to notice Kelos's finger pointing his way.

A cacophony of sound rushed in on him and Silus flailed back at the aural assault.

There was Katya screaming his name as she repeatedly pummelled his chest with her fists; Kelos's words of power pounding through his consciousness; the growl of rage from Belck as he realised that his hold had been broken, and a sound like a thousand summer storms as the barrier surrounding the island began to fail.

Silus's hand went to his sword as he looked at Katya's frightened face. She stepped back from him, as though expecting him to lash out, but when he put a hand on her arm she saw that he had come back to her.

With a gibbering scream something leapt through the hole in the barrier. It was smaller and faster than any of the Chadassa Silus had seen so far, and it launched itself at Katya with a feral cry. Silus was quicker, however, and the edge of his blade caught