‘You’re being just a bit childish, Sparhawk,’ Martel sneered.
‘Of course I am. We all do that sometimes. It’s really a shame the sunset was so uninspiring this evening, Martel, since it was the last one you’re ever going to see.’
‘That’s true of one of us at any rate.’
‘Sephrenia.’ It was a rumbling, deep-toned gurgle more than a voice.
‘Yes, Otha?’ she replied calmly.
‘Bid thy witless little Goddess farewell,’ the slug-like man on the throne rumbled in antique Elene. His pig-like little eyes were focused now, though his hands still trembled. ‘Thine unnatural kinship with the Younger Gods draws to its close. Azash awaits thee.’
‘I rather doubt that, Otha, for I bring the unknown one with me. I found him long before he was born, and I have brought him here with Bhelliom in his fist. Azash fears him, Otha, and you would be wise to fear him too.’
Otha sank lower on his throne, his head seeming to retract turtle-like into the folds of his fat neck. His hand moved with surprising speed, and a beam of greenish light shot from it, a light levelled at the small Styric woman. Sparhawk, however, had been waiting for that. He had been holding his shield in both bare hands in a negligent-appearing posture. The blood-red stones of the rings were quite firmly pressed against the shield’s steel rim. With practised speed he thrust the shield in front of his tutor. The beam of green light struck the shield and reflected back from its polished surface. One of the armoured guards was suddenly obliterated in a soundless blast that sprayed the throne-room with white-hot fragments of his chain-mail.
Sparhawk drew his sword. ‘Have we just about finished with all this nonsense, Martel?’ he asked bleakly.
‘Wish I could oblige, old boy,’ Martel replied, ‘but Azash is waiting for us. You know how that goes.’
The hammering on the heavy door Tynian and Ulath were guarding grew louder.
‘Is that someone knocking?’ Martel said mildly. ‘Be a good fellow, Sparhawk, and see who it is. All that banging sets my teeth on edge.’
Sparhawk started forward.
‘Take the emperor to safety!’ Annias barked to the barely-clad brutes squatting near the throne. With practised haste, the men inserted stout steel poles into recesses in the jewelled seat, set their shoulders under the poles and lifted the vast weight of their master from the pedestal-like base of the throne. Then they wheeled with the litter and trotted ponderously towards the arched opening behind the throne.
‘Adus!’ Martel commanded, ‘keep them off me!’ Then he too turned and herded Annias and his family along in Otha’s wake as the brutish Adus pushed forward, flogging at Otha’s spear-armed guards with the flat of his sword and bellowing unintelligible orders.
The hammering at the locked doors became a booming sound as the soldiers outside improvised battering rams.
‘Sparhawk!’ Tynian shouted. ‘Those doors won’t hold for long!’
‘Leave them!’ Sparhawk shouted back. ‘Help us here! Otha and Martel are getting away!’
The soldiers Adus commanded had spread out to face Sparhawk, Kurik and Bevier not so much to engage them as to prevent their entering the arched doorway that led back into the labyrinth. Although he was in most respects, profoundly, even frighteningly stupid, Adus was a gifted warrior, and a fight of this nature, involving as it did a simple situation and a manageable number of men, put him in his natural element. He directed Otha’s guardsmen with grunts, kicks and blows, deploying them in pairs and trios to block individual opponents with their spears. The concept implicit in Martel’s command was well within Adus’s limited grasp. His purpose was to delay the knights long enough to enable Martel to escape, and perhaps no one was better suited for that than Adus.
As Kalten, Ulath, Tynian and Berit joined the fight, Adus gave ground. He had the advantage of numbers, but his Zemoch soldiers were no match for the steel-clad knights. He was, however, able to pull the bulk of his force back into the mouth of the maze where their spears could serve as an effective barrier.
And all the while the rhythmic booming of the batteringrams continued.
‘We’ve got to get into that maze!’ Tynian shouted. ‘When those doors give way, we’re going to be surrounded!’
It was Sir Bevier who took action. The young Cyrinic Knight was bravery personified, and on many occasions he had demonstrated a total disregard for his own personal safety. He strode forward, swinging his brutal, hook-pointed lochaber axe. He swung not at the soldiers, but at their spears, and a spear without a point is nothing more than a pole. Within moments he had effectively disarmed Adus’s Zemochs – and had received a deep wound in his side, just above the hip. He fell back weakly with blood streaming from the rent in his armour.
‘See to him!’ Sparhawk barked to Berit and lunged forward to engage the Zemochs. Without their spears, the Zemochs were forced to fall back on their swords, and the advantage shifted to the Church Knights at that point. The armoured men chopped the Zemochs out of their path.
Adus assessed the situation quickly and stepped back into the archway.
‘Adus!’ Kalten bellowed, kicking a Zemoch out of his way.
‘Kalten!’ Adus roared. The brute took a step forward, his pig-like eyes hungry. Then he snarled and disembowelled one of his own soldiers to give vent to his frustration and disappeared back into the maze.
Sparhawk whirled about. ‘How is he?’ he demanded of Sephrenia, who knelt over the wounded Bevier.
‘It’s serious, Sparhawk.’
‘Can you stop the bleeding?’
‘Not entirely, no.’
Bevier lay, pale and sweating with the breastplate of his armour unbuckled and lying open like a clamshell. ‘Go on, Sparhawk,’ he said. ‘I’ll hold this doorway for as long as I can.’
‘Don’t be stupid,’ Sparhawk snapped. ‘Pad the wound as best you can, Sephrenia. Then buckle his armour back up. Berit, bring him along. Carry him if you have to.’
There was a splintering sound behind them in the throne-room as the booming continued.
‘The doors are giving way, Sparhawk,’ Kalten reported.
Sparhawk looked down the long arched corridor leading into the maze. Torches were set in iron rings at widely-spaced intervals. A sudden hope flared up in him. ‘Ulath,’ he said, ‘you and Tynian bring up the rear. Shout if any of those soldiers breaking down the doors come up behind us.’