Phoenix Rising by Ryk E Spoor Page A

ten feet to go. But time was passing. Had it been five minutes? Seven? He’d been able to rig the clockwork, but no time to be sure of the exact timing. He thought he’d given himself ten minutes, but he couldn’t be sure . . . and there were no clocks in here, so he wasn’t sure how long it had been. I feel like a Newleg, stuck between the Swimmer and the Leaper.
    Five feet . Finally he could relax a little. A giant stalagmite now obscured him from the guards. He slid the rest of the way and landed gingerly on the cool stone. Now I just have to get over near the doors . . . not too near, though.
    He scuttled from rock to rock, trying to keep from jarring the bags too much. Still, they should be okay with a little banging around.
    One of the mazakh suddenly loomed up, pacing slowly around the perimeter of the room. Duckweed froze, pressing himself against the rock, trying to look like a lump of brownish stone.
    Either it worked, or—more likely—the demon-snake never looked down. The little Toad waited, fidgeting. He has to get far enough away so he won’t hear me. I think I’m close enough to the doors, but if I try this and I get caught, it’s not going to work! And I’m almost out of time!
    The green and gray-scaled creature paused, sniffing suddenly, and Duckweed swallowed nervously.
    It shook its head slightly and turned, moving away. Almost . . . almost . . . now!
    He unslung one of the bags, opened the top, and carefully judged the direction and angle of the floor. Then he emptied the bag with a single crescent-shaped movement that sent its contents rolling across the floor towards the two doorways. The second he spread between the doorways and the pentacle, the chanting approached a new crescendo. Oh, snakes and fisher-birds, I hope I didn’t set everything for too long, it would suck bottom-mud if I—
    The entire cavern shuddered, and there was a thunderous echoing blast that sounded like the rage of an awakened Dragon. A blaze of orange fire spurted from the little tunnel he’d just exited. Oh, ow, that would have hurt!
    Hisses and chittering screeches of consternation echoed through the room, the ritual movement and chanting now ragged. A loud voice— human, I think! They’re everywhere, those creatures— shouted, “Keep going! Dhokar morred zshenta vell . . .”
    A second concussion rocked the cavern, sending fragments of stone sifting down from the ceiling. A huge stalactite suddenly plummeted down like a divine spear, crushing one of the insectoid creatures.
    That was enough for the rest. Abandoning such a ritual was dangerous, but it was clear that something worse might happen if they didn’t. The three circles broke and ran for the doors.
    As they did, some of them stepped on the tiny, blackberry-sized glassy spheres the little Toad had scattered in their path.
    A series of fierce detonations erupted, shattering bodies, incinerating limbs, scattering corpses left and right as the compressed fire essence was liberated by the impacts and unleashed the quintessence of devouring heat upon all around it, just as had happened in the alcove rooms moments before when the Zachass Duckweed had rigged had fired one of its razor-edged missiles directly into one of the cases of fire-essence warspheres.
    A third case must have detonated just then, because the first door suddenly bulged inward as another blast echoed through the cavern’s very bedrock, sending a cascade of larger stone fragments raining down. Shrieks and roars of consternation filled the air, and Duckweed hopped desperately forward, dodging falling rocks and moving between running legs. No one was looking down now at all. I haven’t seen anything but mazakh and those insect-things, which means . . .
    And then, just behind him, half the cavern roof caved in with a rumble and a juddering roar that dwarfed even the explosion that triggered it. The blast of air and dust and pebbles from the impact blew him off his feet, and smoke and flame