1.
Niall of the Far Travels reined in his big grey stallion, lifting his right
hand to halt the long column of riders who followed him across this
corner of the Baklakanian Desert. In front of him, and far away, he
could make out a dark blotch on the golden sands toward which he was
moving.

The blotch did not move.

Yet it had moved, for a brief second, just then. Niall, who had been
watching it as soon as he had caught sight of it, was certain of that. His
hand went to his side, loosed his sword Blood-drinker in its scabbard.

Niall was commander of the armies of King Lurlyr Manakor of Urgrik.
His robe was of saffron silk and it blew in the lazy winds that swept
across these stretches of bleak and empty sand. His mail was silvered
and bore the basilisk insignia of Urgrik. He was riding to make an inspection
of the desert forts which served his king, to replace the troops
stationed there with the men who rode behind him.

But now —

Caution was alive in him. Again and again he scanned these sands,
seeking some explanation for that dark blotch. The hairs on the back of
his neck stood up, and he sensed, with an animal awareness, that there
was danger here. Or—had been.

To the lieutenant who rode at his right elbow he said, “Keep the
men here.”

He rode slowly, the hooves of his mount kicking up little puffs of
sand. As he came closer to the blotch, it resolved itself into the shape of a
man, a man who had been cruelly attacked, wrenched about and tom
as if by gigantic bands. Sympathy touched Niall, made him snarl under
his breath and urge the big grey horse faster.

He swung down from the saddle to kneel above the dying man and
turn him over onto his back. The man was a grizzled veteran of Urgrik.
His face was scarred with old wounds, and his body was clotted with
blood from more recent ones.

The man opened his eyes.

“Death,” he whispered. “Death came in the night and —” He
choked and his eyes closed. Niall leaned closer, his arm about the man,
half lifting him as if to ease him of his pain.

The soldier smiled, nodded. His eyes opened once again. “Beware
the fort. They’re all dead, inside it. Only I got away. Crawled. Crawled
until I—could crawl no more.”

His hand closed on Niall’s wrist. “Beware the thing in the fort. It
cannot — be killed . . .”

The man shuddered and writhed as pain ate inside him. He gasped
at the hot desert air and stared upward into the face of the man who
bent above him.

“It began when they were di-digging . . . digging to find more water.
They — uncovered an old-tomb. And then . . ."

The man shuddered once more, violently, and then his body sagged.
Niall looked down at him with pity in his eyes. Pity and — admiration.
If this man had not struggled and fought to crawl out this far away
from the frontier fort, he and his men would have ridden into untold
danger.

He straightened and let the man down gently on the hot sand. He
stood up and waved his column forward.

When the lieutenant stood before him, Niall said, “This one came
from the fort. Apparently he is the only one left alive. His comrades dug
for water and seemingly uncovered a tomb — or so he says. Death
came out of that tomb and killed the entire company, excepting only
him.”

Niall scowled. His eyes ran along the column, studying the faces of
these men he led. He could not take them into the fort, not without
discovering what danger lay before them.

“Go back to Urgrik,” Niall said slowly. “Tell Lurlyr Manakor that I
have gone on alone to discover what this danger is. If I don’t return,”
here he shrugged, “then I would advise that he consult magicians to try
and learn what it is that has come up from the ground to slay his warriors."

The lieutenant would have protested, he would have urged that
the entire column go on with their commander, but Niall would have
none of it.

“I am one man. I may discover what the thing is that has killed. One
man may hide where many cannot. Besides, now that I command the
armies of the king, mine is the duty to protect them.”

He would hear no argument. He waited until the dead man was
wrapped in a blanket and slung across one of the pack mules. He stood
and watched the column as it swung about and headed back toward
Urgrik.

Only then did he mount up and urge the grey stallion onward. As
he rode, his eyes were forever busy, staring out across the sands toward
the low line of mountains in the distance, toward which he went.

What was this danger that could wipe out an entire detachment of
hard-bitten soldiers? Each man of them was used to weapons, used to
fighting the hill tribes, accustomed to swift forays or long battles. Yet
something had destroyed them.

Unease lay along his muscles. Niall had met many foes, he had
always defeated them, whether they were of the robber kingdoms that
lay along the shores of the Aztllic Sea or the trained legions that swore
allegiance to the Great Kham. He knew of nothing that could destroy an
entire garrison and leave wounds on its victims such as those he had
seen on the man who had crawled across the desert.

“By Emalkartha’s pretty toes,” he muttered. “I may be riding to
my death.”

Well, he had known that when he had sent back his troops. There
was no need for more than one man to die, if die he must. No sense in
condemning an entire troop to that method of dying.

He growled low in his throat and rode on.

In time he came to where he could sit his saddle and stare at the
high walls of the frontier fort. Nothing stirred there except for the flags
that bore the basilisk standards of Urgrik, limp in the still air. No man
walked the walls. The big wooden gates were wide open, affording him
a partial view of the parade grounds, but these were empty.

Sighing, Niall rode on.

He came up to those open gates and moved between them. In
utter silence, he swung down from the saddle and moved here and
there, studying the ground. Then he walked into the barracks.

There were bodies here, torn and mutilated as the dead man on
the sands had been. Niall let his eyes run over them, trying to imagine
what demonaic power could have done this to living men, to men accustomed
to fighting. A cold chill ran down his spine.

He heard a whisper in the air and his head snapped up even as he
drew his blade. Something was here in the fort. Something deadly,
something hateful.

Niall was about to take a step forward, to go in search of whatever it
was that quested through the halls and barracks of this frontier fort.
Something touched his wrist and held it.

Do not go, Niall: It waits for you!

Ah! That was Emalkartha the Evil, goddess of the eleven hells. Niall
grinned and felt himself relax. It has been some time since he had faced
death on the high altar in the temple to Korvassor, with pretty Amyrilla
beside him.*

(* = see THE DRAGON Vol. II No. 7: The Stolen Sacrifice)

Now Amyrilla was queen in Urgrik, being wedded to Lurlyr Manakor.
And he himself was commander of the king’s armies.

“Well? What am I to do?" he asked softly. “Wait here for that thing
to come and kill me?”

Anger was in the voice that whispered in his mind.

Do you think I would let you be killed? I felt your trouble and I
came as swiftly as I could, to help you. I do not know what it is you are to
face and so I must be — careful.

“I’d like it better if you became Lylthia, if I could see you,” he
growled.

You would only want to kiss me.

“What’s wrong with that? I love you.”

The anger was gone from that inner voice, it held only tenderness
now. Perhaps. In a little while. After I learn what it is that quests for you.

The whispering in the barracks grew louder. Niall swung about,
almost forgetting Lylthia. The danger that had killed an entire garrison
was after him, now. Would he be wrenched about and twisted, cut up as
those others had been? Would even Emalkartha herself be able to save
him?

It came slowly, whispering more loudly. Through the passages of
the barracks and the fort it made its way, hunting him. Niall’s band was
fastened tightly to his swordblade, but of what use was a sword against
something like this? Those dead soldiers had had swords and had undoubtedly
used them.

Niall gasped.

A ball of blue fire hung above the floor, motionless. It had moved
out of the hallway and into this larger room, and now that it sighted its
prey, it paused, seemingly to gloat over him.

Even Emalkartha was silent, as though stunned by what she was
seeing through his eyes. Then he heard her whisper very faint.

It cannot be! I dream! This thing was destroyed five thousand centuries
ago!

The bluish ball moved forward, whispering more shrilly, as though
already it were tasting the blood of this man who stood before it.

Niall! Let me!

He felt something run along his veins, felt it slip out of his hand.
Instantly the steel blade of Blood-drinker blazed with crimson light. It
was as though a million tiny fires blazed within its hardness.

Fight now, Niall! Fight and — destroy this thing!

He hurled himself forward, and harsh laughter-eager laughter —
rose up from the blue ball to gloat at him. The blueness rushed, even as
Niall swung his sword.

Into that blue ball he drove his crimson steel, felt it bite. He
wrenched it out and drove in forward again, barely aware that the blueness
was screaming as though in mortal anguish.

Into the ball he stabbed his blade and heard again that keening cry
of wild despair. Before his eyes it seemed to shrink, sought to turn and
flee.

Do not let it go, Niall! After it!

He ran as swiftly as any Thort deer and as he ran he swung Blooddrinker
again. Through the blue ball he drove his crimson steel, again
and yet again.

The blue ball wailed. No longer did it whisper so hungrily, for now it
was shrinking, as though it were losing shape. Its roundness disappeared,
jagged edges came into view. Niall stabbed again.

Suddenly the blue ball was gone.

From somewhere far away, something screamed.

2.
The crimson faded from his blade as Niall lowered his sword and
stared around him dazedly. Where was the thing? Had he really destroyed
it? He grew aware that sweat ran down his back.

He heard a patter of feet and swung about.

Emalkartha ran toward him, wearing those same ragged garments
she had worn in Angalore. * Into his arms she threw herself, to be
clasped and kissed more hungrily than Niall had ever before kissed a
woman.

*please see: THE DRAGON #2, vol. 1: The Shadow of a Demon.

For a long time he held her, caressing her, whispering words of love
into her ears, half hidden by her long black hair, as dark as Corassian
ebony. Then her bands were on his muscular shoulders, pushing him
back and away.

Green eyes gazed up at him fondly.

“So. You have not forgotten Lylthia?”

“How could I forget you? Don’t you know I dream of you, night
after night?’

“You are a very foolish man, you know,” she chided him. “You
rush into dangers the way a bull rushes at a red flag.”

He grinned down at her. “I always have you to protect me.”

“That is only because I like you very much. But you must not
expect me to be around you all the time.”

“Only when there is nobody to see you. Like now.”

“And because you are in trouble.” She pouted. “Much trouble, if I
am not mistaken.” Her eyes went up to stare into his. “Do you know
where you are, right now?’

“Of course. In a frontier fort that belongs to the kingdom of Urgrik.”

She nodded. “Yes, of course. But it is something more. I did not
realize it myself until just a little while ago. You are standing where once
bloomed the ancient land of Pthest.”

Niall turned the word over in his mind. “Never heard of it.”

“You would not. It has long since been forgotten by mankind. But
five thousand centuries ago, it was famous all across the world. Sosaria
Thota lived here, where it was a garden world.”

“Oh? And who was Sosaria Thota?”

“A most famous witch. Some said she was the daughter of a demon,
She ruled this part of the world with cruel fingers. Kings and emperors
paid her fortunes to have her cast spells for them.”

“Well, she’s dead now.”

“Is she, Niall? I begin to think she still lives — or hopes to.”

He stared down at her. It was on the tip of his tongue to tell her that
this was nonsense, but he was remembering other times when he had
encountered magic and the effects of magic. But why would this Sosaria
Thota come alive again? How could she?

It was as if Lylthia read his mind when she murmured, “Because
she has made a bargain with the wicked ones who dwell in megaspace,
who wait outside the world you know, seeking a way to enter it.”

Niall shrugged his brawney shoulders. He did not care overmuch
for demons, he had a wholesome regard for them and their powers and
if it were up to him alone, he would avoid them. As commander of the
armies of Lurlyr Manakor, it was his duty to put this frontier fort into
operation, however. He could not do that if this demonaic witch were to
send her powers outward to destroy the men who inhabited it.

His eyes touched Lylthia. She was staring at the door through
which the glowing blue ball had come. Was she expecting another manifestation
of the powers of this Sosaria Thota?

“Well?’ he asked softly. “What now?’

She turned her head and smiled at him, yet deep within her green
eyes there was worry. “By rights, I ought to go back to my eleven hells.
But I dare not leave you unguarded.” She sighed, “You are a worry to
me sometimes, Niall.”

He gave a bull bellow of laughter and dragged her in against him,
almost smothering her in his embrace. Lylthia tinkled laughter, but
there was an undertone of concern in her throat.

“You must not take things so lightly, Niall,” she scolded. “No matter
if I am here to guard you. There are those in the megaworlds with
powers as great — if not greater — than my own.”

“The thing to do then is find out how strong this witchwoman is.
We’ll go exploring.”

His hand caught hers and like that, with Lylthia tripping lightly
along beside him, he moved from the big barracks room out into the
corridor and walked past the doors of other rooms, rooms in which
weapons and other gear were stored.

Silence lay like a pall on this fort which usually resounded to the
curses or laughter of the men who were stationed here. It seemed to lap
about them, surrounding them with menace. Niall grumbled and shifted
his shoulders restlessly, and his hand was never far from his swordhilt.

They came out upon a wallwalk and stood with the hot wind off the
desert brushing them. To the south lay the vast expanse of the Baklakanian
Desert, and beyond that the cultivated lands of Urgrik. Westward
were the vast steppes between Urgrik and the lands of Noradden. Niall
had never been to Noradden, but he had heard tales of its bazaars and
the ships that fled across the waters of the Pulthanian Sea. He turned
and stared eastward, and could make out, dimly enough, the Mountains
of the Sun, that marked the boundary of Urgrik.

Lylthia touched him with a shoulder, and he put an arm about her.
The winds were cool up here, and he felt her shiver.

He swung about and looked northward toward the high hills.
Whatever evil had come upon this fortress had come from those hills,
where the men of this fort had been digging for water.

“I have to go there,” he muttered.

Lylthia stirred. “No. It is certain death. I know that much, Niall.”

“It is my duty.”

She drew back and stared up at him. “You men, with your ideals of
duty and what you must do!” She sighed and laughed. “Perhaps that is
why I like you so much, though. But you shall not go alone, my love. I
will walk with you.”

“First we will eat and sleep.”

They turned — and suddenly froze.

In the long shadows of this late afternoon, they heard a strange and
eerie keening. It was like the wail of a lost soul, rising and falling. The
sound came from the north, in among those hills.

Niall swore and half drew Blood-drinker. Lylthia listened, eyes wide
and head up, as though something in that sound touched a chord of
memory deep inside her. After a moment, she shuddered.

“She has strange powers, that one,” she whispered. “Ancient
powers, long forgotten by this world.” Her lovely face twisted in a
grimace. “Indeed, I myself had forgotten all about them — until now.”

Niall glanced down into her face. “Are you telling me that you’re
afraid?”

Her green eyes glowed. “You would be well advised to know fear.
Such a woman as Sosaria Thota has never been known since she died.”

With a hand at his fingers, she drew him down off the wallwalk.
They found a commissary room equipped with freezer units and with
stoves. In moments, Niall had two big steaks roasting over the flames
while he poured red Kallarian wine into two big goblets.

They ate without a thought for anything but the food. When they
were done and sipping at the wine, Niall grinned. Lylthia eyed him
suspiciously.

“Last time I took you to bed with me —in Angalore, you’ll recall —
you mesmerized me.”

Laughter twinkled in Lylthia’s eyes. “I did not know you so well,
back in those days. To me, you were only someone who was interfering
with my vengeance on Maylok the magician.”

“And now?’

The girl shrugged. “We’ll see,” she muttered, and laughed. “I
have a fancy to know something of this emotion you humans call love. It
might not be amiss . . . ”

Nial lifted to his feet, reached for his winecup and drained it. Then
he reached out for Lylthia. He put an arm about her slender waist and
hugged her to him. Like that, they walked out of the commissary room
and up a short flight of stairs to the bedrooms of the post officers.

The room was dark, but Niall found tapers of yellow wax and
lighted them. In their light, he saw a big, wide bed, together with a
bureau and a desk and chair Lylthia was staring around her with wide
eyes, almost as though she had never before seen a bedroom.

“Now you shall dance for me, as once you danced in a dream,” he
said softly.

She shook her head. “I do not feel like dancing, Niall. There is
danger here — great danger. I can feel it, inside me.”

“What sort of danger?’

“I know not. But it is here. Somewhere. Just —waiting.”

She turned and walked toward an open window, without glass,
with only a leather curtain on a rod drawn back, freeing that opening to
the winds. It was a still night, no breeze stirred, and there was a heaviness
in the air.

Niall stared at this woman he loved. It was not like Lylthia to be
given to worry. If she were concerned, there was reason for him to be,
too.

He moved toward her, stood beside her looking out into the night.
High above, the ring of shattered matter that encircled their world reflected
back the brilliance of the sunlight that touched its edges.

It was a beautiful sight, and on more than one occasion Niall had
looked up at it, wondering what it was, where it had come from.

“If you—”

“Wait!”

There was urgency in her, and he could feel the tenseness of her
body where he touched it. Her eyes were wide, her arms were by her
side, yet rigid. It was as if she searched with senses unknown to him
somewhere out there in the night.

And then —

A beam of light shot skyward. It was pure white, almost blinding in
its brilliance. For a moment it paused, as though seeking, and then it
flashed downward, straight at them.

Lylthia gave a little cry.

She whirled and thrust at him with both arms, driving him backward
and into the darkest shadows. Then the pale light was all about
her, enveloping her.

Niall shouted, with agony in his soul. 


The blazing whiteness was all around Lylthia, eating at her, dissolving
her. From where he stood as though paralysed, Niall could see her
shimmer, glow with unearthly brilliance, then fade out.

Only the whiteness was left.

That whiteness sang joyously. It whispered and laughed, or so it
seemed to Niall, and then —slowly, slowly — it withdrew, back into the
night from which it had come.

Lylthia was gone.

Eaten.

Niall lifted his head and bellowed out his grief, his rage.

3.
Dawn found the Far-traveler moving upward along the slopes of
the hills that lay north of the fort. He felt frozen inside him, dead. Lylthia
was gone. So too, was her other self, Emalkartha of the Eleven Hells.

He would never see her again, never know her laughter nor the
touch of her body. A rage burned inside him, cold and deadly. As he
walked, his big hand fondled the hilt of his sword.

He would find this witch-woman, this Sosaria Thota, and he would
run cold steel into her flesh. Lylthia would be avenged! He cared nothing
for what might happen to him, nor did he pause to reckon at any
odds.

He was a barbarian sellsword. All his life had been given to using a
sword in battle. He was walking toward his last battle, now. If he could
avenge Lylthia, if he could kill this witchwoman, he would be satisfied.
Even if he himself found death.

Life meant nothing to him any longer. Not without Lylthia. Or
Emalkartha. He loved that woman who was also a goddess in her demonaic
worlds. He would revenge her death. Then he would die, himself.

He plodded on and upward, his great muscles rolling under his
sunbronzed hide. He felt no tiredness, no weariness, though he had
been walking since early dawn. Up there in the hills, the men of the
frontier fort had been digging for water, to make a stone pipe which
would bring water into the fort.
 

And they had unearthed — Sosaria Thota.

He would search and find that tomb where she had been buried.
He would run his steel into her body and destroy her. Nothing else
mattered.

Sometime after high noon, he rested on a flat rock and ate the food
and drank the wine he had brought with him. His eyes searched the
tree-covered heights toward which he climbed as he ate, striving to discover
where it was the men had been digging.

He sighed and rose and began walking again.

Toward evening, he sighted an open gap in the ground where it
had been dug up, and several tools lying there, neglected. Niall moved
forward.

He came to the opening, and stared down into it.

He saw rockwork and bricks, part of a subterranean chamber. Yet
much dirt and rocks lay there, hiding any way in or out of it. The first
thing he must do was to dig out that rubble, find a way into that structure.

But not now, not tonight. Tonight he must eat and sleep, to be
ready for the morrow.

He stood before that opening, grieving. Never to see Lylthia again!
Never to hear her soft laughter or be aware of the brightness of her
green eyes, staring up into his with so much love! It was not a burden he
could carry for the rest of his life.

No! As soon as he had killed the witchwoman he would leave this
place and walk westward. He would walk until he dropped of exhaustion,
and there he would die. Niall of the Far Travels no longer wanted
to live.

He sat down and ate the remainder of the food he had carried with
him, and finished the wine in the skin. He lay down and drew his cloak
more tightly about him. In a moment, he was asleep.

When he woke in the early morning, it was to a brilliant sun that
covered him with warmth. Niall lifted off his mail shirt, his other garments,
until he stood almost naked, with just a bit of cloth about his
loins. Then he reached for a shovel.

He began to dig.

Apparently there had been a landslide here, for the dirt was loose.
Shovelful1 after shovelful1 rose upward, and as he worked, Niall saw that
he was uncovering the door of the tomb.

It was a bronze door, covered over with strange signs and sigils.
Niall stared at it a moment, scowling. There was an aura of evil about
that door that was almost tangible. He scowled blackly, shrugged and
put out a hand to it.

The door opened slowly, its hinges creaking. He had to apply all his
strength to opening that door, for it had been closed for uncounted
centuries.

When it was open, he waited for air to go into that dark chamber
which lay beyond it. As he stood there, he bent to lift up his sword and
draw it from the scabbard.

Then Niall stepped into the tomb.

His attention was caught by what seemed to be a glass case. under
which lay a body. The case was on a table of ebony with carven legs.
about which were entwined the bodies of demons. Niall stared at it a
moment, before turning to look around him.

His eyes wandered here and there, seeing strange and unusual
objects of metal, objects the purpose of which he could not understand.
There was something that resembled a great glass globe mounted on
golden balls, and to one side of it there was another object which consisted
of slender rods and golden stars. Not far away was a great metal
square with antennae rising upward from its top.

Niall turned back to the glass case.

He moved forward and caught his breath. He stared downward at
the body of a woman with long golden hair. a women so beautiful that
something inside him choked up at the sight of her. Her eyelids were
blued, yet were closed, and her golden lashes lay like tiny fans against
her cheek.

She wore a single garment, something of diaphanous silk through
which he could see the gleam of pale flesh. Her breasts pushed upward
into this cloth, and for a moment, Niall thought to see those breasts
move.

But no, that was merely an illusion.

This girl — or woman — was dead. There was no doubt of that. But
— could this be the Sosaria Thota whom Lylthia had mentioned? How
long ago was it she said the witchwoman had lived? Five thousand
centuries?

Ha! If that were so, then this could not be she. This woman looked
as though she had just fallen asleep.

He put a hand on the case. It felt warm. and seemed almost to
quiver under his touch. Niall drew back, scowling.

There was wizardry here. He could almost smell it.

Niall waited. He could not believe that a woman as lovely as this
could be as dangerous as Lylthia had suggested. Yet if she were Sosaria
Thota, she had killed the woman he loved. With some sort of magic in
this tomb.

He eyed those strange objects warily.

Maybe he ought to lift out Blood-drinker and use the flat of his
blade to smash those queerly glittering things. There was evil in them,
and a strange power which he could sense.

His hand lifted out the blade and he took a step forward.

“No!”

The word exploded inside him. There was strength in that word,
spoken by a tremendously powerful will,

Niall whirled around.

The woman lay as she always had, motionless. The chamber was
quiet, with his breathing making the only sound. The hair rose up on the
nape of his neck. More sorcery!

Niall growled low in his throat, swung back toward the strange
objects. His huge hand tightened on his sword. By Emalkartha of the
Eleven Hells! He was going to smash those things, destroy them
forever.

He took another step, and froze.

Behind him he heard a whisper of sound. He did not know what
that sound might be. he had never heard it before. With it came a sharp
scent to his nostrils.

Niall wanted to swing around, to look behind him at that ancient
catafalque, but he could not move a muscle. Yet his every sense
strained to hear, to listen to those sounds which were like nothing else
he had ever heard. And with the sounds, came that sharp acrid smell.

“You fool!”

The words were sharp, bitter. They had been spoken by a woman.
Niall gave a rumbling growl. Was that corpse behind him — alive? Was
that woman he had seen breathing? Could she have spoken to him?

Slowly, slowly, the rigidity went out of his muscles. Now he could
move, and he swung about, staring.

The transparent covering was gone. Melted away? Evaporated
into nothingness? The woman was sitting up and looking at him with
calm grey eyes, very wise eyes and very old, or so he thought. She was
beautiful. More beautiful than any woman Niall had ever seen.

Those grey eyes went over him from his worn war-boots to his kilt
and fur kaunake that covered his mail beneath the saffron silk cloak,
upward to his face. The grey eyes widened at sight of his rugged good
looks, his mop of thick yellow hair.

"Who are you, who come blundering in to disturb my sleep? From
whence do you come?”

“I am the commander of the armies of Lurlyr Manakor, king of
Urgrik,” he growled. Then he asked, with a snarl in his voice, “Are you
the one who killed Lylthia?”

Mocking laughter rose upward into the air as the woman on the
spotted furs of the catafalque threw back her head. Amusement was
written plainly enough on her face. “And if I were? What is that to you,
man? Do you not know who I am?”

She paused and stared at him. In a softer voice she went on, “No,
perhaps you don’t. Something tells me I have been asleep for a long
time. A long, long time. Even your speech is different from the way
people talked when I lived before. What is the year?”

“The fifth year of the Bear in the Cycle of the Twelve Sigils.”

“All of which means absolutely nothing to me.”

Niall remembered what Lylthia had whispered in his mind.

“You have been dead for five thousand centuries. If you’re who I
think you are.”

The woman gasped and sat up straighter. “You lie! So much
time could not have elapsed.”

“What would I gain by lying?”

She considered him, her head tilted sideways. Those eyes seemed
almost to weigh him, to look deep inside him. They made Niall uncomfortable.
He still held his sword in his big right hand, and he told himself
that if he could get close enough to this woman, he would bury its steel
in her throat.

“Do you know who I am?” she asked softly.

“Sosaria Thota.”

Alarm and amazement came into her features. She swung her legs
forward off the catalfaque and stood upon the stone floor. Her breasts
rose and fell as though to deep emotion.

“How could you know my name?” she whispered. “If what you
tell me is true — that five hundred thousand years have passed since I
was last here — no man could possibly have remembered me.”

Niall shrugged. He was not about to admit that it had been Lylthia
who had whispered that information into his mind.

She moved forward, as graceful as the hunting leopard, and — or
so Niall thought — as deadly. She was beautiful as Lylthia, but there
was something about this woman that chilled Niall, deep inside him.

He stood waiting, his hand still holding his sword. As though she
sensed his thought, Sosaria Thota laughed softly.

“Would you kill me, man?” she asked.

“Aye. I would.”

She laughed gleefully and clapped her pink palms together in an
almost childish glee. She was close now, and despite the hate he felt for
her, he was aware of her as a desirable woman. The garment she wore
was revealing, being woven of some silken strands that seemed almost
transparent.

“You are an honest man. Good! I like that. And you are a brave
one. I like that, too. It will make your subjection that much sweeter.”

She paused, the green eyes laughing up at him.

“Do you think you can buy your sword in my flesh, man? Do you?
Try it.”

He could not look away from those eyes which seemed to hold him
in thrall. His knees grew weak, suddenly, and he groaned, unable to
move his swordarm. She was a witchwoman, all right, this Sosaria
Thota. In her hands he was like a helpless babe.

“There now,” she smiled, speaking in a soft voice. “You appeal to
me, whoever you are. I need a companion, a living companion. I have
been too long — asleep.”

She sighed. “I would look upon the world again, see it as it was, so
long ago. Come you with me, man.”

Sosaria Thota turned and without looking back at him, made her
way out of the tomb, climbing over the loose rubble and the rocks, the
wind blowing her drapery about her flesh so that at times it seemed she
was almost naked.

Niall went after her, sheathing his sword. No sense in carrying
Blood-drinker in his hand, if he could not use it. And he knew he could
not, against this woman.

They came out upon the lip of the diggings, and the woman stood
as if frozen, staring out across the desert sands. Her eyes went this way
and that, as though seeking something that had been here, and was
here no more.

Niall stood beside her, so close that her bare arm touched his. From
her flesh rose up a sweet, stirring fragrance.

“Gone. All gone,” she whispered. “No longer is there a land of
Thilmagia. Instead — only dead sand.”

She whirled and stared up at him with those disturbing grey eyes.
“Is it like this all over the world?”

“Of course not,” he growled. “This is the desert. Out yonder,” and
here he flung up a hand, “are the wild hordes of Pugarsk. To keep them
at a distance, Urgrik has built these forts.”

He turned and now his arm swept northward, toward Urgrik.
“There are cities that way, and to the east and the west. There live men
and women. No one but soldiers stay in such places as this.”

His mention of soldiers made him think of the men this woman had
killed with her devilish lights. She must have caught the anger in his
throat, for she smiled faintly and nodded.

“Yes, I slew all life around me, once I was—disturbed. I lay asleep
and dreaming for many centuries, it seems. Yet when men came and
began to dig, I became aware of it, and sent out my messenger to kill
them.”

“As your messenger was slain.”

Her hand stabbed out and caught his arm, her long red fingernails
biting into his flesh. “Aye! Something destroyed Messarib. Was it you?
No, no. You have not the power. Then —who was it?’

Niall shrugged. He was not about to tell this woman anything,
though it could make little difference, since Lylthia was dead. At that
thought, a fierce anger began to burn inside him, until it became a rage
that made him tremble.

Her eyes were wise, they saw the fury in him, and she laughed
softly. “I sent the vilaspa light to search the barracks when Messarib was
destroyed. That light touched a living person — ate him. Who was that
person, Niall?”

He shook his head, knowing that those eyes were on him as
though they might read his mind. Let her look, let her try to discover
what he knew. He would not tell.

Sosaria Thota sighed and turned away, her stare going over the
desert lands once again. She stood as though she did not feel the desert
winds that touched her lone garment and blew it about her. Niall wondered
what she might be thinking.

At last she said, “These lands where men do live in these days —
be they far?”

“Then lead me there, man.”

“Not I, lady.”

She turned and looked at him, haughtily. Her lips opened as if she
would speak, but then they only curved at their corners into a grim
smile.

“Go and fetch horses, then. One for you, one for me, and two
more to carry those things I shall need. Go now.”

Niall turned and walked toward the fort. In the stables there would
be horses. Yet he told himself he would not take the witchwomen into
Urgrik City. He would lead her out upon the desert, but in a direction
away from the populated places.

There in that desert, without water, she would surely die. Of
course, he would die with her, but what was his death compared to the
lives of the people he would save? Sosaria Thota would kill and slay all
who stood in her way. She would not rest content until it was she and
not Lurlyr Manakor who ruled in Urgrik.

Aye, and in other cities as well, until with her wizardous arts she
controlled all men and their lives. His big hand clenched into a fist. He
would not permit it. In some way, he would find a way to kill her.

He saddled two horses, one of them the hig grey stallion he had
ridden here. He also selected two pack animals. He fed them and the
other horses which would be left behind, and made certain they had
plenty of water.

Then he brought the mounts toward where Sosaria Thota waited.
He might not be able to draw and use steel against her, but she would
not suspect that the desert sands might kill her.

It was his only chance.

4.
They began their march at a walk, with Niall out in front on his grey
horse. He set the pace, it was an easy walk, for he was in no hurry.
Apparently Sosaria Thota was content with that, for she made no
comment.

All day they moved across the hot sands, until the sun sank in the
west and a breeze sprang up. Only then did Niall turn and glance back at
the witchwoman who sat her saddle with the ease of olden days.

Her eyes were very bright as they studied him.

“Always you move westward, man,” she said softly, and her eyes
were narrow and angry. “I ask myself if you are trying to trick me.”

Niall shrugged his broad shoulders. “Now why should I do that?”

“Because you are loyal to this king you serve, because you don’t
want to lead me into this city of Urgrik.” Her lips curved into a cruel
smile. “I will play your little game with you, for a time.”

She leaned forward in the saddle, her hands clutching its pommel,
and her eyes blazed at him. “Think not to fool me, man. I am Sosaria
Thota!” She moved back then, and let her laughter ripple on the air.
“You take me westward, and I want to go north. Am I such a fool that I
cannot see the sun?”

Niall swung down from the kak. “We’ll make camp here.”

The woman stared around her, brows wrinkling. “One spot is as
good as another, I suppose. One can eat and sleep here.”

She came onto the sands and walked back and forth, kicking little
sand-puffs at every stride. From time to time she threw back her head
and stared upward at the darkening sky. Then, as though making up her
mind about something, she moved toward one of the pack horses and
began to fumble with the straps.

Her hands lifted down an apparatus consisting of many slender
rods, each of which was surmounted by a golden star. This she set down
very carefully on the sand and stood a moment, brooding at it.

She turned and stared at Niall.

“I have had men flayed alive for lying to me, man. Others I have
had my torturers spend a week over, making certain that the manner of
their dying was extremely slow and painful.” She sighed. “I should not
care to order you to die in any such manner.”

“In those days, you had many serants. Today you have only me.”

She laughed at him. “Fool! Do you think I cannot summon up
help? I can call on the denizens of the outer darknesses, which are all
familiar to me, who obey my slightest whims.”

Niall shrugged and turned back to the little fire he had made and
over which he was cooking meat he had brought from the fort. Inside
him was a coldness that seemed to stretch inward to his very bones.
How did a mere man deal with such a witch? From what Lylthia had
hinted, this beautiful woman who stared at him so coldly had strange
and mighty powers.

Her hands did something to the rods and stars, and instantly Niall
saw a dark cloud spring up about them. It was dark at first, as black as
the fabled pits of Aberon, yet slowly that ebon tint faded, was streaked
with brilliant scarlet—then faded.

Now he stared at a dead world. Dark were the cinders on which he
crouched, lifeless and sere, while above him was a sky shot with crimson
fires. It seemed that he heard a whisper, very faint, yet one which grew
louder she listened.

It was the beat of wings.

The thing came on widespread wings, fluttering a moment, before
it settled down near Sosaria Thota. Its three eyes were brilliant with evil,
and Niall shuddered when he saw that this demonaic being eyed him
hungrily.

“Can it be Sosdria Thota?” the thing croaked.

“None other, Alphanor. I am awake again, you see. I have slept a
long time. Now I appeal to you for help.”

“Leave the man-thing for me, and I shall be at your service.”

“Na, na, Alphanor. This one I need — for a time, at least. Yet you
shall be paid. This I vow.”

The bird-being took its beady eyes from Niall to glance at the
witchwoman. For a moment it seemed to hesitate, then its armored
head nodded.

“What is it you seek?”

“Long ago —in my other lifetime —the gods of the outer darknesses
promised me their aid. Yet at that time they were unable to help me
— and so I waited. Now my time of waiting is at an end.”

She stood proudly before that black bird-beast, her head flung
back, and Niall had to admire her at that moment. She was a human
being, or had been, and she trafficked with demons in their own lands.
Great must be her powers, great her courage.

Alphanor hesitated. “There are other powers,” he grumbled.
“They too, are powerful, mayhap even more powerful than we dark
beings. Over the years when you have been sleeping, those others have
extended their abilities.”

“Are you saying you cannot help me? Or will not?”

“It is not easy. If those other powers were to guess — ”

It seemed to Niall that the bird-thing shivered.

“Enough,” Sosaria Thota snapped. “If you fear to aid me, there
are others upon whom I can call.”

The bird-god shook himself. “Look around you,” he croaked.
“Once this land was fair, with trees and grass and animals abounding,
all over it. That was before you called on me and I — aided you.

“Those others came then and destroyed my world, even as they
forced you into an eons-long sleep. Do you care to risk their wrath a
second time, Sosaria Thota?”

“I do. I shall”

Her hand touched the rods and stars and instantly the dark, dead
world was gone and there was a moment when Niall swayed while all
about him madness cracked and thundered. Then the ground under his
feet settled, and he saw that he stood in a massive hall, so large it
seemed to stretch away almost to infinity.

There were tiles underfoot, and a warmth everywhere. Niall swung
about, stared at a great throne upon which — something —stirred and
seemed to rise upward from slumber. He could not make out its form,
there was something alien and non-human about it.

“Who comes?” a voice whispered. “Who dares disturb the dreams
of Xinthius?”

“I dare, great one. Long ages ago, I worshipped thee in the lands I
ruled. I am Sosaria Thota!”

There was silence, then something rustled like dry leather. “I remember
you. Aye. But that was long, long ago.”

“And now? Are your powers so faded you cannot aid me again?’

“What is it you wish of me?”

“Help me attain to my old powers! Help me rule the world of my
birth as once I ruled it?”

“Na, now. Things have changed while you slept, girl. We dark
worlders are not so powerful as once we were. There are those who
would contain us.”

Sosaria Thota sneered. “And you fear them?"

“I do, and rightly so. I am content here in my halls, where my word
is supreme. Here I sit and dream, and I enjoy my life. If I were to aid you
in your plans, all this might be taken from me.”

“Must I seek out Abaddon himself?”

“Go seek him, woman. I will not help. I am content with my dreamings."

Angrily, Sosaria Thota stabbed out a hand, touched the rods and
stars. They glittered and gleamed and gave off a faint music. Niall
swayed to the dizziness that touched him, and then he stood on rocky
ground riven by great fissures. Upward from those fissures came white
steam.

Yet in the near distance, Niall could make out grassy slopes and
trees heavy-hung with fruit. His head turned as he stared about him.
This land was like a paradise. The air was sweet, it was filled with
birdsongs.

“Carry that,” snapped Sosaria Thota, gesturing at the rods and
stars.

She turned and walked away from the rocky ground, moving
steadily toward the nearest grass. Niall bent and lifted the rods and stars
and carried it easily in his muscular arms. Only when Sosaira Thota
halted did he set it down.

“Who intrudes on Abaddon in his domains?”

It was a whisper from the very air. There was no shape around,
nothing which could have spoken. Yet the words rang in his ears, and
he knew that the witchwoman heard them too, for she stiffened and
glanced around her.

Was it his imagination, or did her beautiful face mirror an inner
fear? No matter. She flung back her head and cried, “I come for help,
Abaddon. I am Sosaria Thota, who worshipped you long and long ago
as the father of all demons!”

“I remember.”

“Then aid me now, great one! Restore to me those lands which
once I ruled.”

There was laughter all about him, Niall realized, as though the very
air itself were amused. Slowly that mirth died away and there was a
silence.

Then: “If I do this which you ask, what is to be my reward?”

“Anything you ask.”

“Then this is my demand: that all men shall adore me, on your
world. There is to be no temple to any other god or goddess. I alone —
Abaddon! — am to be sole god.”

“It shall be done.”

Niall stirred restlessly. Was this to be the end of his world as he
knew it? He had heard of the powers of Abaddon, they were whispered
of by priests and initiates of other gods and goddesses. He was The
Black One, the Dark Destroyer. All power was his, he was supreme
among the evil ones.

His hand touched the hilt of his Orravian dagger and he half drew
it. Yet he knew that he could never use steel against Sosaria Thota. It was
an order that was impressed upon his very brain by her wizardous arts.

Around Sosaria Thota the air seemed to glow, to brighten intensely.
Swiftly that brightness shrank until it encompassed her body
and then seemed to merge with it. She turned her head and stared at
him, and now it seemed to Niall that another was inside that body,
looking out at him.

“Come, man,” said the witchwoman, and gestured at the rods and
stars.

Obediently, Niall lifted the contraption. There was an instant of
intense cold and darkness, and then they were standing again on the
vast stretch of sand that formed the Baklakanian Desert.

Sosaria Thota was looking around her, as though considering.
Niall watched her closely, then reached for his dagger. Could he throw it
at her? An old warrior with whom he had served in the forces of Sensenall
to the south, had taught him the way of it. Still, he was long out of
practice.

He hefted the dagger in his big hand. Should he risk it?

Na, na, Niall. That is not the way.

Niall of the Far Travels froze. Nis heart leaped and thudded inside
his great chest. Was that Lylthia? Or — to give her her true name —
Emalkartha of the Eleven Hells? But — Lylthia was dead!

Sosaria Thota turned and stared at him and at his dagger. Her lips
curved into a grim smile. “Are you thinking of using that against me,
man? You cannot, remember. I have forbidden it.”

Niall said, “Our meal is done. I was about to slice off steaks.

He knelt about the flames and lifted off the piece of meat he had
brought from the fort. He sliced off pieces and handed one to the
witchwoman. She accepted it, her grey eyes grave on his face, as
though she weighed whether or not to let him live.

You shall live, Niall. Neither Sosaria Thota nor Abaddon himself
know this world. It has been eons since they were here. You do know it.
You are invaluable to them.

Niall hunkered down, chewing his steak. He was at peace, within
himself. Now that Emalkartha was back with him, nothing else mattered.

When he was done eating, he wandered away from the little camp
to attend to the horses. He fed them, he gave them to drink from the
waterskins he had brought from the fort. Then he turned and looked
back at his campfire, where the witchwoman sat before it. staring into its
flames.

“What shall I do?” he whispered.

Nothing. Only — wait.

Niall came back to the fire, stretched himself out and wrapped his
cloak about him. Sosaria Thota glanced at him, but her eyes were lidded
so that he could not see their great depths

Niall slept.

He woke in the early dawn, when the sun was tinting the desert
sands a reddish hue. Sosaria Thota was standing beside the dead embers
of the fire, her body rigid, arms by her side, her head flung back.
Beside her was the machine with the tall, thin rods.

Her hand touched it.

All about them there was a shifting of light, of vision. No longer was
there any sand but instead green grass grew, and at some distance, Niall
could see a great white wall and behind it the tops of buildings.

Yet this vision lasted only a few moments. It shifted then and faded
away, and only the desert remained. Sosaria Thota sobbed.

“What is it? What’s wrong?” she wailed.

“I do not understand. Always the amanathor has performed as you
requested. It has great powers, has the rod-thing.”

That had been the voice of Abaddon.

“I saw my little city, I did. And the lands that were wont to surround
it when I lived —before.”

“Yet now they will not stay. Some other power is making them
disappear, setting at naught the power of the amanathor.”

Anger touched the witchwoman, distorted her features. “You are
the father of evil, the grandfather of all devils! Help me!”

“I — cannot. There is great power here allied against us. I am
seeking for it, but it is hidden.”

Soft laughter rippled through Niall’s mind.

They search for me, yet they do not suspect you hold me within
you, as Sosaria Thota holds Abaddon. Nor shall they. 

Sosaria Thota began to pace up and down, kicking sand with her
feet at every stride. Confusion and fear touched her face. She halted at
last and stared down at Niall where he sat on the sand.

“What power rules this desert, man? Answer me!”

“No power I know of. It is only a desert.”

The witchwoman shock her head. “No. There is something here.
Some great and tremendous strength, against which I am helpless.”

Her hands clenched into fists. Her green eyes blazed. “It shall not
defeat me. Nothing shall do that. I will not permit it.”

She turned and walked away, toward the pack horses and their
burdens which Niall had put upon the ground last night She walked up
to the metallic thing that held the huge glass globe mounted on golden
balls. Her hand touched it, set the balls in motion.

Faster those golden balls rotated. Faster, until they seemed almost
to disappear. And as they whirled, the interior of the glass globe darkened,
then brightened. Tiny lightnings shot outward from it.

Break it, Niall!

Sosaria Thota stood with her back to him. Niall lifted out his Orravian
dagger, balanced it a moment, then hurled it with all his strength.
Straight for that glass globe hurtled the steel blade.

claaanngg

The sound of breaking glass was loud in the desert stillness. Niall
saw pieces of that globe fly to and fro through the air.

Sosaria Thota whirled and screamed.

Raw was her fury, black her rage. Her arm lifted and she leveled
her fingers at him. From the tips of those fingers flaring blue light sped at
him.

Sped at him and —

Parted as that light was about to touch him! On either side of him it
went, and faded out.

The witchwoman stared, mouth open and eyes wide.

“Who are you?” she whispered. “What are you? No human could
so turn my power.”

Niall found himself saying —knowing that Emalkartha was making
his lips and tongue fashion those words, “It is useless, Sosaria Thota.
Even your evil gods cannot help you. Can you, Abaddon?”

Her last three words were bugled, ringing clearly and loudly.
Sosaria Thota shrank back as if hit, and fear lay written on her beautiful
features, distorted now by terror.

“You are a demon, a god,” she breathed.

Niall said, this time in his own voice, “I am only what you have
named me. A man.”

She shook her head so that her long golden hair flew about her
head. “No! You are more than that. You have driven Abaddon from
me. He has fled away, back into his own lands. He has left me to face
you alone.”

In a broken voice she asked, “What seek you of me?”

“Your death, Sosaria Thota.”

She leaped at him, fingers curled to claw at him. With one sweep of
his arm, he hit her, drove her reeling backward until she fell and lay
upon the sands.

“You struck me,” she breathed. “You lifted your arm and struck
me. You could not. I had forbidden it.”

Niall lifted out his sword. Her eyes went to it, to his face. There was
insane terror in her eyes now.

The witchwoman whimpered, “No. You cannot. Look at me,
man!”

Look you, Niall, as she commands.

Those grey eyes fastened on his, as though they would devour
him. Had not Emalkartha been inside him, he would have done what
those eyes were bidding him to do: lift out his sword, put its point to his
chest, and fall on it.

Yet he did nothing more than stand there, staring back at her, his
sword in his right hand.

And then Sosaria Thota whimpered. Her eyes grew bigger, as
though something within his own eyes were speaking to her. Slowly she
rose upward, to stand before him.

As she did, Niall lifted his sword and pointed it at her, as an inner
voice commanded. His blade began to glow whitely, so brilliantly that its
glare blinded him.

That brightness gathered in the steel, focussed at its point, became
a ball if incandescent luminescence. Sosaria Thota shrieked, the agony
of death alive in her throat.

From his sword that blazing radiance leaped forward, straight at the
witchwoman. It hit her, seemed to burst so that it enveloped Sosaria
Thota. For an instant, her body was outlined within that shimmering
refulgence.

A voice inside that brightness wailed.

Then the whiteness was gone, and the witchwoman with it.

Niall stood alone upon the sands, with only the horses to keep him
company. He lowered the sword, and was aware that there was wetness
on his forehead. He shook himself, like a great bear newly wakened
from his winter sleep. Then he sheathed Blood-drinker and looked
around him.

Emalkartha was gone from inside him —

Yet even as he turned, he saw Lylthia standing a dozen feet away,
laughing softly.

“I thought you — dead,” he whispered.

“And so did Sosaria Thota. I wanted her to think that, Niall, for she
had sent one of her messengers to slay someone whom she suspected
of being in the fort.”

She strode toward him and he opened his arms and caught her to
him, kissing her soft red lips hungrily.

When she could, she said, “We shall spend a few days together in
the fort, Niall. Before you return to Lurlyr Manakor and tell him that the
danger here is done with. Eh? Would you like that?”

Niall gave a great roar of laughter, lifted her high on his chest and
began to kiss her even more hungrily.