After all, his own greed had caused them to fall into this trap. His own greed- spurred on by Velika.

Velika!

Lan cast a swift glance over his shoulder and saw her cowering against the wall, crying openly. As he turned his attentions back to the fight, he witnessed Inyx in action and thought his eyes deceived him. She weaved a curtain of steely death in front of them, every third cut drawing blood, or so it seemed. The death count for her more than doubled Lan' s. He fought harder to match her; she shouldn' t have to bear the brunt of fighting because of him.

Behind her, Lan heard the clacking of Krek' s awesome mandibles. Once, a shower of blood rained down on him, forcing him to disengage and take a second to wipe sticky gore from his eyes. Krek had overenthusiastically severed a soldier' s head from his torso.

Lan Martak knew that no three had ever fought more valiantly against the soldiers, but with that same certainty came the ugly knowledge that they were tiring rapidly. Soon, the grey tide would wash over their dead bodies and leave Velika to their crude amusements. This gave added strength to Lan' s arm, more cunning to his blade, faster movements to his feet. But still the soldiers fought on, one immediately taking the place of a fallen comrade.

Krek screeched, " She comes! How did she find me? Oh, woebegotten spider, your end is near!"

" What' re you talking about, Krek?" gasped Lan, parrying a strong thrust barely in time to keep his arm and wrist connected. " Who' s coming?"

" Klawn has discovered where I am, and she comes to devour me! Why should she desire to consume a wasted spider such as myself? I am lost, lost, I say!"

The roar of the guards echoed throughout the castle. As an earthquake sunders the ground, so did Klawn split the ranks of the grey- clad soldiers in her headlong rush to finalize her nuptial arrangements with Krek. The huge female spider leaped along the ranks of the struggling, now- frightened soldiers, using her mandibles more as a slashing knife than as snipping scissors. A full two dozen fell before her savage, mindless attack.

Lan panted and yelled, " Stop the big spider before it' s too late!"

Whether it was the air of command in his voice, the confusion, or the red blood altering the remnants of the soldier' s uniform to give him the desired rank, he didn' t know, but the soldiers closed on Klawn, blades singing their death songs to little avail. The spider proved too powerful for even their combined might.

" Here, Lan, Krek, here' s our escape," cried Inyx, shouldering open a heavy door a short distance down the hallway. " Though we don' t find treasure, at least we keep our lives."

Lan pulled Velika through the door an instant before Inyx slammed and bolted it against outside intrusion. The scowl on her face told Lan that, to her way of thinking, she had failed by allowing Velika entry. But Inyx said nothing as she wiped the worst of the blood and gore from her tunic.

" Ah, my beauty, they have escaped. Amazing. I hadn' t thought the barbarians of this world showed so much determination. But are they really of this world? Or another? Can you tell?" Waldron held his gloved hand up level with the balcony railing so the huge raven perched on his wrist could peer down into the immense courtyard. A raucous caw was all the answer the conqueror received.

" Yes, I believe you are right. The spider is of this world. The flaxen- haired woman, possibly, also, but the dark- haired woman and the man who wields the sword so well cannot be."

Waldron leaned against the railing as he studied their movements so far below him in the convoluted maze of corridors he had ordered constructed. He peered into the darkness and sighted Klawn struggling against the door that Inyx had so securely latched. He reached down and scribbled a note on a piece of vellum, then tied it to the raven' s leg. With a casting motion, he sent the bird fluttering into the air. The black bird fell a few yards, then powerfully stroked against the humid air, cawed and soared like a shadowy bullet for the other side of the castle. Klawn would soon be neutralized by closing siege doors on each side of her, but the others presented a unique problem for Waldron.

A unique problem and a unique amusement.

Holding his wrist out and emitting a screech similar to that of the bird just flown, Waldron captured another airborne raven, wincing slightly as the bird' s metal- sheathed claws cut into his padded gauntlet.

" My beauty has been hunting again, eh? Would you like to become a herder of sheep? Or perhaps I should say people who can become sheeplike? You would? Excellent, my winged ally. Seek out those below and force them along the Chaos Path."

Waldron chuckled as he watched Lan, Inyx, Krek, and Velika dodge the plummeting death messenger. The raven' s talons slashed more savagely than any falcon' s. Soon, little knowing where they were being herded, the foursome fought and struck out against the raven, but inexorably they moved into the diabolical maze toward their deaths.

" Accursed black fiend!" screamed Velika. " Stay out of my hair!" The raven took a special delight in only plucking the strands of her golden hair away from her scalp. The others were decorated with red striations left by the raven' s steel talons.

" A door, Lan, quickly," called Inyx, holding the heavy wooden portal open for them. Velika raced for the safety offered by the door, and Lan followed in a rearguard position, still swinging his sword futilely at the darting raven. Only Krek hesitated on entering.

" Hurry, Krek, or we' ll be ripped to bloody shreds by that filthy creature."

" Friend Lan Martak, I feel an ominous presence lurking within. Are you sure we can cope with it better than the winged death? I am so weak from the fight and the encounter with lovely Klawn that I would be of little use to you."

" We' ll get by. Now, dammit, get in here!" Lan took one last stab at the raven as Krek lumbered into the darkness and Inyx swung the door shut. A resounding click told them all the door was selflocking. And, in the dark, none could find the freeing latch.

" What do we do now?" sobbed Velika. " It' s so dark."

Lan circled his arms around her and felt hot tears and breath against his skin. The curious effect of acid burning seized him once again, but he barely noticed. No matter what they' d been through, it was worth it for the moment. Velika needed him; that was something no one else could claim. Zarella had laughed at him, being too intent on her own pleasures to dare care for one such as he.

" Don' t worry, Velika. We' ll get through this."

" A fire! Let' s light a fire!" the woman cried out. Lan' s fingers hardened around her wrist to keep her from running blindly into the darkness. He pulled her closer to keep Krek from disemboweling her at the very idea of a fire so close.

" We don' t have fuel for a fire, Krek," he said hastily to reassure the spider. " We' ll find our way out of here without one."

" Out of here?" the spider asked, his voice curiously mild. " I rather like this place now that I have come to study it. There is a peculiar play between worlds, almost an eddy current, that amuses me. And Waldron' s gateway is ahead. I feel as if I can reach out to it, in spite of the thickness of the surging color."

" Color?" asked Inyx. " What color? All I see is blackness."

" Perhaps I tolerate this blackness, as you call it, better than a human. To me, this is a fine night, all the discarded objects glowing with an inner light."

" Objects?" demanded Lan. " Such as?"

" This." A clicking noise sounded. From the echoes, Lan guessed the area around them to be huge, walls and ceiling so distant he couldn' t touch them. Yet, curiously, he felt as confined as if the walls crushed him. His magic- sensing ability had left him like one blinded, and the only senses he had to work with were those of hearing and smell. And Krek' s hearing was far more acute than his.