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leadership, than our innocent Marxist
Falameezar!"
"This is absurd." Bribbens could still not quite believe it.
"Dragons do not fight with people. They are solitary, antiso-
cial creatures who..."
"Not this one," Jon-Tom informed him assuredly. "If anything, he's too social.
But I'm not going to argue his philosophies now."
Indeed, as the gleaming black and purple shape trudged nearer they could hear
the great dragon voice bellowing encouragingly above the noise of battle.
"Onward downtrodden masses! Workers arise! Down with the invading imperialist
warmongers!"
Yes, that was Falameezar and none other. The dragon was in his sociological
element. In between thundering favorite
Marxist homilies he would incinerate a dozen terrified insect warriors or
squash a couple beneath massive clawed feet.
Around him swirled a bedraggled mob of tiny furry support-
ers like an armada of fighter craft protecting a dreadnought.
The legions of Plated Folk seemed endless. But now that the surprise
engendered by the destruction of the wall had passed, their offensive began to
falter. The arrival of what
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amounted to a second warmlander army, as ferocious if not as well trained as
the original, started to turn the tide.
Meanwhile the Weavers and fliers from h-oncloud contin-
ued to cause havoc among the packed ranks of warriors trying to squeeze
through the section of ruined wall to reach the open plain where their numbers
could be a factor. The diminutive lemur bowmen fired and fired until their
drawstring fingers were bloody.
When the fall came it was not in a great surge of panic. A
steady withering of purpose and determination ate through the ranks of the
Plated Folk. In clusters, and individually, they lost their will to fight on.
A vast sigh of discouragement rippled through the whole exhausted army.
Sensing it, the warmlanders redoubled then- efforts. Still fighting, but with
intensity seeping away from them, the
Plated Folk were gradually pressed back. The plain was cleared, and then the
destroyed section of wall. The battle moved once again back into the confines
of the Pass. Insect officers raged and threatened, but they could do nothing
to stop the steady slow leak of desire that bled their soldiers'
will to fight.
Jon-Tom had stopped throwing spears. His arm throbbed with the efforts of the
past several days. The conflict had retreated steadily up the Pass, and the
Plated combatants were out of range now. He was cheering tiredly when a han6
clamped on his arm so forcefully that he winced. He lookeo around. It was
Clothahump. The wizard's grip was anything but that of an oldster.
"By the periodic table, I can see it now!"
"See what?"
"The deadmind." Clothahump's tone held a peculiar mix-
ture of confusion and excitement. "The deadmind. It is not in a body."
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Alan Dean Foster
"You mean the brain itself s been extracted?" The image was gruesome.
"No. It is scattered about, in several containers of differing
shape."
Jon-Tom's mind shunted aside the instinctive vision and produced only a blank
from the wizard's description. Flor listened intently.
"It talks to Eejakrat," Clothahump continued, "his voice far away, distant,
"in words I can't understand."
"Several containers.. .the mind is several minds?" Jon-
Tom struggled to make sense of a seeming impossibility.
"No, no. It is one mind that has been split into many parts."
"What does it look like? You said containers. Can you be more specific?" Flor
asked him.
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"Not really. The containers are mostly rectangular, but not all. One inscribes
words on a scroll, symbols and magic terms I do not recognize." He winced with
the strain of focusing senses his companions did not possess.
"There are symbols over all the containers as well, though they mostly differ
from those appearing on the scroll. The mind also makes a strange noise, like
talking that is not. I can
read some of the symbols... it is strangely inscribed. It changes as I look at
it." He stopped.
Jon-Tom urged him on. "What is it? What's happening?"
Clothahump's face was filled with pain. Sweat poured down his face into his
shell. Jon-Tom didn't know that a turtle could sweat. Everything indicated
that the wizard was expending a massive effort not only to continue to see but
to understand.
"Eejakrat... Eejakrat sees the failure of the attack." He swayed, and Jon-Tom
and Flor had to support him or he would have fallen. "He works a last magic, a
final conjura-
tion. He has... has delved deep within the deadmind for its most powerful
manifestation. It has given him the formula he
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THE HOUR Or THE OATE
ds. Now he is giving orders to his assistants. They are ringing materials from
the store of sorceral supplies. Skrritch watches, she will kill him if he
fails. Eejakrat promises her the battle will be won. The materials... I [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]