[3]

It was truly dark. Banks of stormy clouds filled the sky entire, stretching from horizon to horizon, but there was not even the faintest glimmer of sunlight or starlight from beyond. The mountainside was not quite stark, steep as it was, for scraggly clumps of stubborn vegetation clung to its flanks. Jutting boulders and scree were all there was to see nearby, and the vista ahead was full of hills and baby mountains with little to adorn them.

The strangest thing was the silence. There was no sound of animal life, no rustle of leaves. The light breeze was a knife edge of cold.

“Just lovely, eh sweetness?” Maia’s voice was bitter. “Can’t you just find this Nansheen and teleport us there directly? I don’t think we really want to meet the natives.”

“Can’t argue with you there,” the black clad sorceress nodded sharply, “but it’s just not possible. I tried to scry, and there was just nothing. I need more information to teleport, something beyond just a name. As well, I think we’re better off not advertising our presence by using any greater magics. There’s a reason we appeared where we did, and there’s a reason we were granted so much power. Where there’s power, there’s always a greater power. Even if we can go through these natives of yours like a hot knife through butter, we’re better off playing it slow and easy. I’m more of a battle mage than a diviner, really,” she sounded annoyed, “and there’s only so much I can do. Miracles are for priests.”

“So we just pick a direction in random… might as well go straight ahead, if the location we appeared in really is significant, and fly?” Maia asked.

“I think it would be wiser to stick close to the ground,” Lyralis shook her head in negation. “Listen to the silence. We can expect attack from god knows what… make that gods know what,” she smiled ruefully, “at any moment. Over anything groundborn, we’ll have the advantage of flight. Anything flying will likely be faster, and blasts of power will show further. Makes sense?”

Maia considered the matter for a moment, and nodded. “Thataway, then,” she pointed between the hills that rose to face them. “Ahem.. your wings?”

“I don’t need wings to fly,” Lyralis smiled, and the vampire realized that she was standing on air.

For near half an hour, they skimmed the ground and darted betwixt hills, heading in a specific direction that was nothing more than a shot in the dark. The hills were mostly bare, and the vegetation they noticed was not the green of plants that depend upon the sun, but more gray or brown. Clumps of fungus and mushrooms, with nary a scraggly tree in view. The conclusion that the world was quite literally shrouded in night was inevitable, and left both concerned.

From one such clump of growth emerged a huge beast, a six-legged rhinoceros-like sickle-clawed monstrosity with dark pebbly scales, charging with a speed that seemed too great by half for something of its size.

Lyralis was instantly twenty meters above, well out of reach. Maia’s automatic reaction was the exact opposite.

Long platinum hair streaming behind her, the vampire ran, for once touching the ground, directly at the charging monster. A blurring silhouette of movement, Maia caught the great horn, her gauntlet protecting her from the razor sharp edges. She used her hold to raise herself in a somersault that brought her feet down, with all her strength and the momentum she’d acquired, upon the creature’s skull.

The sound of impact was thunderous. Maia was thrown into the air, and spun instantly, arrowing down upon the wounded thing. While her blow had not sufficed to crush the skull, it had stunned the thing, and it lay on its side with a large dent imprinted upon the head. Somehow, it seemed diminished, shrunken despite its enormous size, the scales darker and darkening further yet as shadows seemed to creep on them.

One carefully placed blow of her fist was enough to slay it, and Maia looked down at the corpse, her entire posture radiating contempt.

“Well,” Lyralis blinked into view, just beyond arm’s reach of her, “now we know why it’s so very quiet. With nasties like this, it’s no surprise that the average local is either quiet or nonexistent. Could you just smash the next one, instead of draining its life and vitality like that? If we do find any locals, we could use the meat and all for trade. It’ll also be the clearest ‘don’t fuck with us’ I can imagine. And before you erupt,” Lyralis hurried her speech in the face of the frown on Maia’s face, “you would have been equally insulted if I’d offered any help against a mostly mundane creature. It did have some magic, mostly camouflage for ambushes, added speed and impact. That horn carries some residual power, too. But there is a simple reason I use magic as little as possible. Do you remember what I told you?”

“Which ‘told’ is that?” Maia asked sarcastically.

“Concerning the fact that I am magic. Carry that through to its logical end,” Lyralis replied calmly.

Maia breathed deeply, noting how much easier it was to become annoyed with her companion when she was not in her true form, where her mere physical presence proved such a terrible distraction. “Logical end? What are babbling about? Please, no riddles. I’m sure we’ll face a few soon enough, you don’t have to torture me. Unless you want to find a convenient cave?” she asked slyly.

Lyralis flushed slightly, the thought of another timeless session of pure pleasure sending a tingle down her core. “We’ve barely made any headway. Be serious,” she shot her lover a pointed look.

“Very well, I will explain. As I don’t use magic so much as I am magic, every spell and bit of energy I throw diminish me. It’s the price I pay for being so much more than the ordinary wizard. Oh, it would take a great deal before the batteries run dry, but I figure that I should save it for when it’s really necessary. Sometimes you only get one chance, and we need to be ready. Makes sense?”

“Sure,” Maia grinned, “you’re a lawyer. It always makes perfect sense for you when others do the dirty work.”

“Very funny,” Lyralis sniffed, “and please stow the lawyer jokes. Or I’ll start on blondes, or torment you with riddles.

“Anyway,” Maia very deliberately changed the subject, “the thing should be edible, drained of life or not. Can you use the horn? How do we carry it? I have a few extradimensional stores, naturally, but none are large enough for even one of these.”

“Easy enough,” Lyralis said, and the corpse vanished. “I only have one storage space, but it’s plenty big enough. I can probably use the horn,” she shrugged, “if we really need to make something. I do lug around a full lab. That’s what the sleeves are for,” she gestured like a stage magician, and a wilted flower appeared in her hand. “What?” she said in dismay. “Let’s see what we can find on you,” she plucked at Maia’s ear, producing a large centipede. “Eew, gross. Something eating you up?”

“Oh please,” Maia groaned, “enough stunts. I thought you were saving your magic for blowing mountains up? Anyway, we’ve wasted more than enough time on the critter. Which raises another point,” she pursed her lips as she floated up, and the two resumed their flight. “Is there a time factor? Most of these quests incorporate one. If the others get to this Brazen Portal without us..”

“They’ll simply have to wait,” Lyralis shrugged. “They’ll need the burning shard, whatever that might be, to move on. At least, that’s how these quests usually go,” she grinned.

It wasn’t terribly long before they encountered signs of cultivation. The masses of strange growths were not only more widespread, but assumed a semblance of organization. A brief discussion of why everything was on the hillsides instead of the narrow gorges ended with agreement – the area flooded regularly. Without a sun, it was very cold, and the clouds doubtless delivered prodigious amounts of rain.

Both turned invisible, and they proceeded even more cautiously. They’d noted a number of small hare-like creatures that fed upon the growths and in the distance, a great winged creature of some sort.

Finally, they chanced upon a party of locals.

“Minotaurs!” Maia spoke, startled.

“No need to speak out loud,” Lyralis’ voice spoke in her mind, “I’ve established a telepathic connection. They may not speak English here, but they have magic. I may not be a diviner, but I can read minds and memories. Let us get closer, and I’ll feed you what I find.”

The party of hunters were bringing in a large carcass of a many legged lizard with a narrow, pointed snout. “Probably spits acid or something cute like that,” Maia remarked.

The hunters were humanoid, standing well over two meters tall, but they were not quite a cross of bull and man. Their bodies were covered with dark brown or gray fur which obviated the need for clothes beyond a harness to hold tools. The faces were more canine than cow-like, with curled ram horns, their eyes dark pebbles. They gave an impression of ferocity and immense physical strength, and struck the two observers as bestial. All the fourteen hunters were most manifestly and proudly male. With them were a trio of pony-sized hound-like creatures, with protruding sabre-tooth fangs.

Invisible or not, they took further precautions. Lyralis changed her physical shape, turning completely translucent, while Maia skulked through the shadows of boulders, not hiding from any source of light – of which there were none – but from the three Lyralis identified as capable of seeing through the relatively simple illusion that masked them, as she had identified the function, form, activation conditions and limits of each and every item of magic they carried. For seeming near-primitives, carrying obsidian tipped spears, heavy maces and axes as weapons, there was a surprising number of such, though the power they represented was limited at best.

As the group came closer, the stream of information Lyralis poured at Maia grew like waters pouring through a shattered dam. The memories and images left the vampiress disoriented and she begged off.

“Give me the fucking synopsis when you get done, witch, unless you want me to give us away!” she screamed mentally, “I’ve never practiced mind raiding!”

“I’m a sorceress, not a witch,” was Lyralis’ amused response, “and if you call me a witch again, I’ll give you the technical explanations of the differences.”

Maia’s mood was not thereby improved, but she steamed in silence.

Once they were alone once more, they relaxed somewhat.

“These aren’t nice guys, which is not much of a surprise,” Lyralis communicated, her mind-tone hesitant. “The race is called Vardani, and fascist would be too weak a word to describe these guys. They’re all utterly convinced that might makes right, and it’s strength they respect and nothing more. There’s a town a few kays down south, in the foothills of what they think of as ‘the mountains’, so I didn’t really get a name. None of them have any idea what Nansheen or a dragoloth might be. They do most of their trade with two races, we’re lucky in that the leader of the hunting party is a local authority. He’s actually been there and done that, he’s about eighty years old. They live to three hundred or so, but conditions are such that sixty plus is an elder. Real patriarchal types, the females bear children and do the menial work. One race they deal with is a humanoid lizardfolk type, who practice hereditary selection to create a noble and servant caste. Their nobles are almost human-like in appearance. They’re the Ss’ren, and very bad news. The chosen race of the god of darkness, in fact. The other race is something of a satyr-centaur cross, somehow related to these folk, but diverged a long time ago. They can shift between four legged and two legged form. The only humans these folk met are slaves,” her mental voice grew sharper, “and I know where they keep most of them. Mining, naturally.”

“Let me guess,” Maia responded, “we’re going to get all heroic and free them from oppression.”

“Quite. They’ll have information and contacts for us, since they must come from yet further south. But don’t think I’m getting all tender hearted. There are only dark gods here, remember? The humans are the necromancers of the bunch, and have their own god. There’s also a god that is obsessed with conquest and such, which these Vardani venerate. Their town is part of a small coalition of such, and they go viking every few months. Mixed in are the descendants of demons of various sorts, known as Dverfolk, and at least four or five other races. It’s a real nightmare of a world. Worse than Midnight. No great elf queen here. No elves at all, in fact.”

“Midnight? Never mind, I don’t want to know. If the humans are as nasty, in likely a more clever fashion, than this bunch, why help them? The most we’re likely to get in return is a nicely sharpened knife in the back,” Maia inquired, “and all you have to do is get close enough to read a few minds.”

“Perhaps so, but I’m still me. Remember civilization? Lyralis has an interesting set of values, but I have my own moral compass. I’m not going to let slavery pass by when I can do something about it. It’s so strange, talking about myself as two different people,” she shook her head violently, “but there you have it. If they are a bunch of necrophiliacs, we don’t have to help them any further. They’ll be free to starve or die on their on merits, but at least they’ll be free. Think about it for a moment,” Lyralis suggested gently, “and don’t listen to Maia. Keep Kim fresh in your mind.”

Maia stared into the clouds for a moment, the set of her shoulders showing her tension. Gradually, she relaxed.

“Very well then. How do we get there?” Maia asked.

“Teleport. Fiat justitia, ruat caelum. Let justice be done, though the sky falls,” Lyralis replied grimly. With a burst of golden light, they were gone.