"What are you doing here?" Darrick demanded of Raithen.

The pirate captain smiled, and more blood flecked hislips. "The same as you, I expect. I came to be free of the demon. Although, after hearing of your friend's death and knowing what's happened to me, I'd have to say that you appear to have gotten better treatment than any of us."

Darrick didn't say anything.

Splashing sounded in the sewer below.

"Those church guards aren't going to wait for you two to finish palavering," Palat said.

Raithen stepped back and pulled a barrel from the wall beside the opening. As he yanked on the heavy barrel, the skin covering his hands split and bled. Crimson stained the barrel as Darrick and Palat lent hands, pushing the barrel toward the opening in the floor. Yanking the lid from the barrel, the pirate captain revealed the dark oil inside.

"Pour," Raithen commanded.

Together, they poured the contents of the barrel into the sewer water and over the rocks below. Rats scampered from beneath the dark liquid, and the guards held their positions warily.

Two crossbow quarrels flew through the opening in the floor. One of them splintered through the side of the barrel, and the other sliced through Raithen's right calf. Cursing with the pain, Raithen reached back to the wall and yanked a torch from the sconce there. He tossed the torch through the hole in the floor and onto the pile of debris below.

Peering cautiously over the side of the hole, Darrick watched as the oil caught fire. Flames spread over the pile of rubble, chasing the rats from their hiding places and onto the guards and into the water. The oil floating on top of the water caught fire as well. Carried by the slow current of the sewer, flames floated toward the guards, forcing them to retreat.

"That will buy us some time," Raithen said. He turned to the left and hurried along the tunnel.

"Where are you taking us?" Taramis asked.

"To the demon," Raithen said. "That's where we've got to go." He ran down the tunnel, pausing only long enough to take another torch from a sconce farther on.

The passageway was smaller than the sewer below, only wide enough for three warriors to jog abreast. Drawn by the urgency that vibrated within him, Darrick took the lead position among the demon hunters, joined quickly by Taramis and Palat.

"Who is that man?" Taramis asked, eyes locked on the fleeing figure ahead of them.

"Raithen," Darrick replied. "He is-"

Was, Mat assured him.

"— was," Darrick amended, "a pirate captain in the Gulf of Westmarch. A year ago, Raithen worked with Buyard Cholik."

"The Zakarum priest who opened the gateway for Kabraxis?"

"Aye."

"What happened to him?"

"He was killed by the demon in Tauruk's Port," Darrick said, knowing how strange it sounded as they watched the burned madman racing before them.

"He's not dead enough to my way of thinking," Palat said.

At the same time Raithen was killed, Mat said, Kabraxis also cast the spell to raise the zombies an' skeletons to pursue us. The magic pervaded Raithen's corpse afterward, causin' him to rise again. After ye freed the sword, I was drawn here to him. I found I could talk to him as I talk to ye. The three of us are bound, Darrick, an' in our bindin', we present the way to end Kabraxis's reign here.

"He's dead," Darrick explained, giving the details that Mat had given him.

"The prophecy of Hauklin," Taramis said.

"What prophecy?" Darrick asked. They trailed after Raithen, following the pirate captain around a bend in the tunnel.

"It was said that Hauklin's sword would never be taken from his tomb except to unite the Three," the sage said.

"What three?" Darrick asked.

"One lost in death, one lost in life, and one lost in himself," Taramis said. "One trapped in the past, one trapped in the present, and one trapped in the future."

A cold chill of dread filled Darrick.

"Your friend Mat must be the one who is trapped in death, unreleased by his death in the past. Raithen has to be the one trapped in life, unable to die and doomed to live out the way he is through the present." He gazed at Darrick. "That leaves you."

"Why didn't you mention this earlier?" Darrick asked.

"Because not all prophecies are true," the sage answered. "All weapons and artifacts have stories that are told about them, but not all of those stories are true. When you drew the sword from Hauklin's body, I thought the prophecy was false."

Taramis's words hammered Darrick.

Aye, Mat said inside his head, ye've been the one lost in yerself. But them sad times is behind ye. Just like Hillsfar an' that stable behind yer father's butcher shop. Just ye keep that in yer head, an' ye're gonna be all right. I'll not desert ye.

"The prophecy goes on," Taramis said. "One will lift the sword, one will provide the way, and one will face the demon." The sage stared at Darrick. "You couldn't lift the sword at first because your friend wasn't with you then. You couldn't lift the sword till you heard Mat's voice."

Darrick knew it was true, and in a way it made sense with all the events that had transpired since.

"And he shows us the way," Taramis said, pointing atRaithen still running before them. "That leaves you to face the demon."

"Beside the sage," Palat snorted derisively.

Darrick's face flamed in embarrassment, knowing the warrior didn't believe him strong enough or brave enough to confront the demon even with Hauklin's enchanted sword. And truth to tell, he didn't feel strong enough or brave enough himself.

Worthless, his father's voice said.

Cringing inside, Darrick desperately wanted out of the course of action left before him. He was no hero. At best, he would have made a decent Westmarch naval officer; perhaps-but only perhaps-he might have made a decent ship's captain.

But a hero?

No. Darrick couldn't accept that. But if he left, if he walked away from this confrontation to save himself, what would be left of him? Cold realization flooded him, and his footing nearly faltered. If he backed away from the coming battle, he knew he would be everything his father had ever accused him of being.

And if he did that, he would be as trapped between life and death as Mat or Raithen.

There's salvation in this for us all, Mat said.

Even if I become a martyr? Darrick wondered.

"We got men behind us," Clavyn called from the rear of the warriors.

"It's the guards," Raithen said. "I told you they'd find us. This tunnel is one of the newer ones. They use it to bring supplies into the church. Secret passageways and tunnels honeycomb these buildings. Over the last few weeks, I've ferreted out most of them."

"Where are you taking us?" Taramis asked.

"To the central cathedral," Raithen answered. "If you want to face Kabraxis, you'll find him and Cholik there."

Only a few feet farther on, the pirate captain came to a halt under a slanted section of ceiling. The door was as slanted as the ceiling, fitting into it.

"Guards sometimes wait here," Raithen said. "But they're not here now. They went below to help trap you in the sewer, not knowing the way the tunnel overlapped the sewer as I did." He pulled himself up and peered through a slit.

Darrick joined the man, keeping his sword naked in his fist. Taramis stood on the other side of him.

Gazing out through the slit, Darrick saw Buyard Cholik standing on a platform on top of a huge stone snake with a flaming face. As Darrick watched, the snake bobbed and weaved above the expectant audience. The way the audience beseeched and cried out to the snake and the man atop it left a sick knot in Darrick's stomach. He knew a few of the worshippers might know they prostrated themselves before evil, but most of them didn't. They were innocents, praying for miracles and never knowing they were being preyed on by a hell-spawned demon.