Andral's grin did not hold an ounce of mirth. His bulging eyes exposed both the whites over his irises and the madness that lay beneath. "Thank you for your services, but you and your men will no longer be needed." He tossed a chain, it's great iron links heavy enough to sink into to the ground at Pronos' feet.

Pronos looked up, locking eyes with the drwg on the other end of the chain, seeing his own realization reflected in those bright amber mirrors. Pronos was free to run and it was free to chase. He knew it was too late even as he turned away. It had been too late for months, even before the ramp to Har-Tor had exploded and he had been forced to feed his men into its construction.

The drwg dropped him within two steps. A casual swat at his ankles with one giant paw and Pronos lay face down in the snow. The drwg pounced on him, its weight pinning his legs as it gnawed contentedly on his feet.

Pronos kicked and awoke. His feet stuck out from beneath the pile of old canvas serving as his bedsheets. It was only the cold gnawing at his feet, not that it couldn't do as much damage. Pronos gulped a sharp slice of frozen air and held it, trying to slow his racing heart. That future hadn't come yet. Perhaps he could avoid it for one more day. That would be good, as long as something worse didn't take its place.

Pronos rose, still wrapped in stiff canvas sheets, and stomped loudly on the wooden floorboards to wake his feet. His sleeping tacarchs lay curled on the floor nearby like a pile of frozen grub worms. "Hey! Wake up!" His breath misted the room's air. He warmed his feet kicking his men awake. "The sun is arriving and your time is fleeing. Get up. We've got work to do."

He escorted his tacarchs out each morning with dire warnings, should any of the prisoners escape or if they should fail to complete the work, the tacarchs would become part of the ramp as well. Under the direction of a former farmer named Tazo, the headless bodies of both dead reavers and dead prisoners were used like straw in clay bricks to reinforce the strength of the ramp. The heads themselves were set aside. The heads of the Har-Toran spearmen even had their own special pile.

Despite the daily increasing cold, Pronos' men finished the ramp within the fortnight. The big snow started as the final row was laid down. Within the hour, a smooth curved surface led directly to the main gate of Har-Tor. Once the blizzard started, however, everyone stayed holed up in whatever shelter they had confiscated until it ended.

On the evening of The Long Night, one of the reavers in Pronos' shelter had the nerve to ask if they were going to put out the fire in order to build the traditional New Year's fire. One of Prono's tacarchs rose, walked across the icy room and struck him across the face, then returned to his chair. The surprised reaver started to object, but the dark looks sent his way silenced him.

The beer had long ago run out. All they had to drink were a few small crates of chaia discovered in a charred warehouse. They brewed a large pot and sipped the dark bitter liquid well into the night as the New Year neared. Somewhere around that fateful hour, a heaviness fell upon the air. Pronos and his men sat up, looking around the room suspiciously and trading questioning glances. The strange sense of otherworldly presence, focused somewhere outside their door, grew stronger.

Ignoring the others' objections, Pronos rose, slipped on a cloak and stepped out into the biting cold. A strange acrid scent wafted through the still air, directing his attention to a dark figure shuffling up the street toward him. The shambling gate seemed somehow familiar. It became clear, as it neared, that it was headed toward Andral's building, but it turned a ravaged face to Pronos, giving him an over-the-shoulder look before it entered. Cold dead lights shone from its slack-jawed mouth and glowed in the pits where its eyes had once been.

Years ago, Pronos had watched Amantis slay his right-hand man, Ctonos, then watched the body rise again. He had no doubt this walking corpse was the same n'kroi ridden husk Amantis had summoned. Pronos slipped back inside, shut the door and nearly threw himself in their small smoky fire as he shivered over it.

<====|==|====>

Garanth dreamed he stood in an empty, dead, gray world. Below him, like a charcoal painting on a dark slate floor, lay the now familiar city of Nur. From the peak of what had once been the building of stairs, he looked toward the sacred mountain which rose like a faded gray ghost in the distance. This sight, once ominous and forbidding, left him with a wistful sorrow. Even his old nightmares felt strangely comforting next to what he now faced.

Recalling the curse, he looked for that hole in reality he thought of as The Wound, but could not see it. A deep thundering rush, as of an enormous waterfall, echoed around him. Realization struck Garanth as he stared into the swirling gray, The Wound was all around him. The entire world was but a fragile bubble surrounded by the consuming Void. The fear that had once tormented him snapped back into place.

A bright light pierced the sky. A creature of flame descended, its radiant wings flaring as it landed. Garanth recoiled, blinking until he could discern the woman of light standing before him.

"Wake up!" She punched him in the shoulder.

Garanth awoke in Har-Tor and sat up in bed.

"It's time," Eiraena said.

Garanth rubbed at his face, uncertain if he were still dreaming. "Huh?"

"You must take the underground road."

"What's going on? What are you saying?"

"Andral has summoned a guide to the source. You must reach it first." Eiraena leaned close, her shining amber eyes stared intently into his. "Only you can claim the seat of power now. If you do, all else ends."

Garanth swallowed. To surrender his humanity... All of Karux's old fears suddenly rose up within him. If only someone else could...but they had no more time. Garanth thought of Corha and a sharp pang of grief pierced him. He rose and grabbed his tunic with a shaking hand. "Give me a minute..."

Somewhere in the distance a beetle urgently chirped his name.

<====|==|====>

The next morning did not dawn so much as suffuse the cold gray sky with a dim light. Andral left N'shia-Potoma eager to find the source. He took an escort of angorym and drwg who, like him, didn't seem to mind the cold. He also brought along a gang or two of gob-bocari who, if they minded the cold or not, never let on. The gob-bocari drifted across the landscape in a shadowy wave. The angorym trudged along behind the drwg plowing through the thick snow, clearing a path for him. The drwg charged ahead like excited puppies, except for those nearest to their guide. Those dire wolves walked with heads and tails lowered, scurrying away with a whimpering yelp whenever they drifted too close it. The dead Ctonos walked in the lead. Unencumbered by the snow, he seemed light enough to float across each drift.

Though the snow slowed their progress, at least Andral did not feel the need for sleep. The spirits' eagerness filled him with nervous energy. He couldn't have slept, even if he wanted to. By the evening of the second day, Ctonos stopped beside a small hill topped by a copse of evergreen trees that casually screened the entrance to a narrow ravine. One would not have even suspected the ravine's existence until one stood at its mouth.

"The entrance to Ogofdinas lies at the end of the ravine." Ctonos' rumbling hiss even made Andral cringe. "If they see you coming, they will seal it and not even your angorym could smash a way through."

Andral glanced at the blinking gleam of eyes and flashing teeth in the shadows. His gob-bocari disappeared and a stream of darkness flowed into the ravine. Andral fiddled with a long angoran knife as he waited. Everything was proceeding just as the spirits had shown him in his dreams. He sometimes felt as if he were still dreaming, or as if he were back in Mari, sitting by the gates, listening to one of the tales old man Naeux would trade for stray kerma that the young boys brought him to buy drink. Andral gave his orders and marched along, feeling as if he were watching someone else perform those actions. After a few minutes, a faint pull of the spirits told him it was time to go.

A slight bend in the narrow ravine hid a dark cave in the mountainside from view. Even passing the bend, the cave appeared as no more than a long shadow of projecting stone. Now, however, streaks of blood and mauled dwerkan corpses marked the entrance of a wide smooth passage which sloped gently downward. The drwg pulled at their chains, growling at the smell and whimpering to be set free. At intervals, the group passed a series of massive stone doors set on rollers resting in deep floor grooves. A mangled pile of dwerkan corpses lay behind each one.

A horn sounded in the distance. The angorym broke into a trot and Andral rushed along with them. At the passage's end, scores of dwerka raced about a large square room, chasing gob-bocari who scampered off in all directions. Seeing the angorym, the dwerka cried out something in their language and every dwerka, warrior or not, rushed at the attackers.

The angorym unleashed the drwg and set about impaling dwerka on spears and beating them with swords. The drwg pounced on the dwerka, biting off heads or breaking spines with a vicious shake of their jaws. Even the metal-armored warriors could not stand against a drwg alone.

A group of dwerka in the back of the room fled down sloping ramps into the main cavern, drwg and angorym chasing behind.

"To me!" Andral roared as his numbers began to thin, stopping most of the angorym in their tracks. They turned, giving him curious looks over their shoulders before shuffling back. He turned to Ctonos. "Lead on."

Ctonos took a different passage into the main cavern and followed narrow side streets along the eastern wall moving southward. This area seemed to have been largely uninhabited even before the gob-bocari swept through with their stone knives. The attackers still surprised occasional pockets of dwerka, though gobos leaping from nearby roofs gave them little chance to either run or fight before being pulled down. Twice, squads of armed and armored dwerka caught them at cross streets, their resistance failed to slow Andral and his angorym, even without the drwg.

In the southern districts, they encountered fresher diggings which included a series of ramps carved into the high stone walls. A hand that nearly spread the width of his back grabbed a fistful of both Andral's cloak and the tunic beneath and flung him away from the wall. Andral caught sight of the angoran behind him just before he hit the ground and slid to a stop, too stunned to even grow angry.

An enormous wheeled container toppled over sideways, dumping a load of massive boulders, catching many of his angorym by surprise. On the ledge where the container had been, a group of dwerka cheered and shook long poles with which they had tipped the container over.

The angorym made a point of catching the dwerka alive. They peeled the small men from their clothes and, without the usual ceremony of a long meal, quickly ate them alive. The angorym took turns digging out their fellows while gobbling their meal whose screams were answered by the distant roar of hunting drwg.

Andral rubbed at his bruised shoulder, staring at the angoran who had tossed him, unsure of how he felt about that. Most of the angorym had survived the attack. Those who had died were left behind without regard. Once the group was again moving, it did not take long to reach their destination. Ctonos stopped and pointed at a smooth rock face which looked no different than anywhere else. "The passage is through there."

Andral gave his angorym a commanding glance and they started pounding on the wall using nearby boulders as hammers. Large chips of carefully painted plaster fell away from a section of newly cemented stone. The angorym made short work of it. "Lead on," Andral told Ctonos.

"I can go no further. The source would destroy me."

Andral scowled into the dark opening. "Is it much further?"

"No. It is straight ahead. You'll find it in an alcove at the far end of a small cavern."

Andral gave the angorym a dismissive nod. "Go and kill dwerka. Leave the gob-bocari to guard this entrance. Spreading grins bared sharp and bloody teeth. The angorym stomped off. Ctonos left they way he'd come. Alone, Andral stepped into the boulder-strewn passageway and followed it until a dimly glowing cavern illuminated the passage's end. The humid air trembled with the sound of rushing water. Pockets of glowing multi-colored phosite gems provided the cavern's light, but the greatest source came from the far end.

This is it, Andral thought. The power of life itself. Soon, not even the Void can threaten me. He climbed down a ladder into the cavern, crossing it with growing excitement. The air nearly crackled with power. He ascended a natural stair on the far side and paused on the ledge before a circular tunnel that opened into a brightly glowing chamber. Millions of quivering black beetles filled the passage as if trying to guard it.

"Move aside!" The beetles scuttled apart at his roar, clearing a path. They waited, trembling. Andral crouched to peer through to the far side. A curious empty stone chair waited on a small peninsula surrounded by a pool of glowing water. To him, it looked small.

<====|==|====>

The underground road ran smooth and straight with only an occasional rise or fall or gentle turn. Garanth could not even begin to comprehend how the dwerka could dig such a passage, much less how they directed its course while underground. He'd heard the workers had begun at each end and, impossibly, met together in the middle. Holding Corha's glowing phosite gem in one hand and his short spear in the other, he traveled at remarkable speed along the road.

Growing tired, he stopped in a sort of underground way station, where he bartered for a cot, a bowl of soup and a little bread. The cot was clean and the soup was savory, if somewhat mysterious. The bread was small since all dwerka held bread dear. His fellow wayfarers asked many questions about the happenings on the surface. They had heard the humans had again gone mad and now fought each other. The dwerka were hiding in their underground cities, waiting to see what came of it. They hoped the humans would settle their differences soon since trade had suffered greatly and things like bread were becoming very expensive. Garanth assured them he was doing all he could to end things quickly and, after a brief rest, hurried away in the direction of Ogofdinas.

The road ended in a strangely empty square room. A sound that might have been the clash of metal and the roar of great beasts echoed in the far distance. Garanth ran up a curving ramp to the city's main entrance where a scattering of mauled dwerkan corpses littered the ground and trails of bloody footprints fanning out into the city.

Sliding his shieldstrap around to ready it and gripping his spear tightly, Garanth followed the footprints. They faded out after a while, but more dwerkan corpses marked the attackers' path. He even noted with grim satisfaction a few angorym corpses among a pile of boulders not far from the newly re-opened entrance to the source.

Eiraena's warning echoed back to him. He had hoped another would claim the seat in his stead, but if Andral were to become the lord of the land, only disaster could result. He stepped into the passage's shadowed entrance and passed his spear into his shield hand. He drew the phosite gem from a belt pouch, already gathering the abundant karis to increase its light. A foot scuffed behind him, followed by a muffled gobble that somehow carried a sarcastic note. With panicked certainty, he pulled the karis to him and empowered the stone. Blinking, he shifted his perception back to the world of light but saw no shadows. The phosite gem flared in his hand, many times brighter than the noon-day sun. The horde of gob-bocari fell back screaming.

Garanth ran blindly, leaping boulders or sliding under them, trusting the dim memory of his previous passage. Attempting to put as much distance behind him as possible before the gob-bocari recovered, he slipped the shield strap over his head and tossing it, keeping only his spear and the glowing gem.

He had nearly made it to the end of the tunnel when the rapid thudding of gob-bocari feet neared from behind. He paused and turned about, giving them a second blast of light. They fell back cowering, throwing tiny arms across squealing faces, but they were not as surprised as before. Garanth grabbed the ladder behind him and slid down the poles.

In the distance, Andral shouted, "Move aside!"

"Stop!" Garanth's command echoed back and forth across the cavern.

Andral rose from his crouch and scowled at him. "Who are you? What are you doing here?"

Garanth sprinted across the chamber and bounded up the steps, landing on the platform beside Andral. "Don't you recognize me, brother? I'm here to stop you."

"Too late!" Andral shouted gleefully and lunged forward, shoving Garanth off the ledge.

Garanth hit the steps halfway down, bounced against the wall and slammed to the floor. Groaning, he picked himself up, grabbed his spear and hurried back up the steps.

Bent nearly double, Andral scuttled through the tunnel. He reached the far side and knelt, scooped up a cupped handful water and raised his hand to his lips.

Garanth burst into the chamber and jabbed the broad head of his spear through Andral's hand.

Andral roared, snatched the spear from Garanth, and snapped the thick oak shaft across his knee.

Garanth drew his sword, but before it could leave his scabbard, Andral spun the top half of the spear around and thrust it at his belly. The sword tip still in its scabbard, Garanth tried a downward block with his weapon's hilt. The spearhead sliced through his thigh just below his crotch. The sharp sting of its bite told him the wound was severe. Garanth pulled his sword free and tried to assume a fighting stance, but his back leg started to collapse from only a portion of his weight.

Andral backed up in a defensive crouch, half of Garanth's spear raised in each hand. Seeing Garanth's difficulty, he smiled. "Looks like I hit something important."

Garanth looked down. Blood gushed from his thigh and pooled at his feet. He'd seen enough wounds to know this was fatal. His head already felt light. He took a deep breath. "It's no matter. I'm still going to stop you."

Andral straightened and took another step back, his smile broadening. "I think not. I think you're already dead."

Garanth's front leg trembled. He tried to shift his weight and almost fell. He grew dizzy and cold and the color drained from his sight. He staggered again as the ground seemed to shift under his feet. A rushing sound, like the fall of water in the cavern beyond, thumped rapidly in his ears, rising and falling with the chirping of distant beetles.

Ga...ranth...Ga...ranth...

"Still," Andral smiled. "I can't have you bleeding into my water."

Andral rushed forward. Garanth swung, but Andral easily caught the blow on a spear shaft. Andral dropped the other spear and punched him in the gut.

Garanth folded over his arm. His legs buckled.

Andral caught him, lifted him overhead and slammed Garanth to the ground next to the chair.

An enormous gong reverberated in Garanth's head. The world disappeared for a moment then returned on a wave of nausea. Thinking he was going to be sick, he tried to roll over on his stomach, groaning as the pain caught up to him.

"You hurt me." Andral stared at his wounded hand a moment, then licked the blood. "I had planned to play with you, my half-brother, before I killed you. But it looks like you are not long for this world."

Andral knelt on all fours and stuck his head in the water for a time, then rose with a satisfied gasp. He stood dripping life-giving water just a foot away. "I think I'll leave you like this, mere inches from your salvation. Your rotting corpse will be a warning to anyone else who should think to find this place."

Garanth could think of nothing to say, nor find the breath to say it. His failure had overwhelmed him as had the inevitability of Andrals' horrific victory.

How? he wondered. How could it have come to this? We worked so hard...

Andral leaned over Garanth yet his voice seemed to recede into a vast distance. "If I have to personally kill every man in your soreav, I will catch the man who killed my father."

The pain had faded with the light. The cold had settled in, but it was not uncomfortable. His body rocked. He barely felt the hard kick to his ribs.

"Hey! Don't go yet!" Andral shouted in his face. "I'm going to kill your foster father!"

Garanth slowly opened his eyes. His eyelids seem to weigh hundreds of pounds each. Even his chest was too heavy to bother lifting. At least his lungs did not ache for air.

"I cannot now be killed, but be assured, he will die most slowly." Andral straightened, smirking. "You can pass into the Void with that assurance. I'll leave you now to die, alone in your defeat."

Andral walked away laughing.

A dim insect-like scuttling sound approached in the darkness. His numb body tickled as if thousands of bugs crawled around his body. I wonder if they'll eat me, he thought slowly as the last of his consciousness faded. I'm sorry. I tried. Garanth felt himself floating upwards, leaving the world and its grief behind.