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.He clenched at the empty air.Landing in a natural ditch formed between two gentle hills, Rofellos pulled up sharply and tested the air.He scented only the perfume of nearby flowers, grenades and poison mothers, their fragrance belying what would eventually be a dangerous effect.He heard no sound of pursuit, nothing but the distant echo of a felled tree and some birdsong overhead.He crouched to place one hand against the earth, feeling for vibrations of silent movement, and searched the nearby shadows for Yavimayan elves.Nothing.Even Yavimaya had retreated from his mind, for now, the forest’s language forgotten in his mad dash.It would be back, slow and insidious, taking root again within his mind.Rofellos had hoped that somehow Multani would help him-explain how the nature spirit coped with such a pervasive presence.The Llanowar should have known better than to place trust in anyone not of his home.If the forest spirit had tried, if there had been some hidden meaning in their discussion of the grenade, the elf did not understand it, so he had fled.It was the second rule of a potentially hostile situation, the first being immediate violence.Yavimaya had not allowed him that, so he ran and escaped Yavimaya.For a moment he was simply Rofellos, though already he felt the insinuating return of Yavimaya, felt it reaching into his mind, calling him.Soon it would simply be there, but for now the choice remained.The Llanowar ran.Chapter 10A large fire blazed over the hearth in Gatha’s main laboratory, holding at bay the freezing air outside.Snow drifted against the northern window, protected by stone and shadow far longer than the drifts that had begun to melt last week with the thaw.The labs smelled of smoke but were otherwise kept spotless by the slaves assigned to Gatha.The slaves were courtesy of the more influential warlords who were in the mage’s debt.Keldons always paid a debt, whether for good or ill.So far, in better than forty years of experimentation, Gatha had balanced out the good over the ill.It was not that he hadn’t made mistakes, just none lethal to date.It was a simple matter of counterbalances.If he made an enemy of a warlord, he simply had to befriend a more powerful one.As he’d noticed early on, the pecking order was well established in Keld.Body language could tell you at a glance who was dominant between any two warlords or any two doyenne, except that those positions could change at any time through design or simple misfortune.Gatha knew that one of these days he might choose wrong, but that was something to worry about later, when it happened, not now.Now was for his work.The voices of his slaves rose in the hall, interrupting him as he placed a tray of colos muscle on the table and reached for his sampling tweezers.There was a heavy thud, no doubt the body of one of them hitting the wall, and then the door was thrust open.Trohg stomped into Gatha’s lab kicking snow and mud from his thick leather boots.Seven feet plus, the Keldon dwarfed the mage by a good sixteen inches and over one hundred pounds.Immune to such size differences anymore, Gatha did not flinch from the hard stare.He scowled at the interruption to his work but nodded for a slave to remove the tray he had been about to sample from.There would be no work while Trohg remained inside.The Keldon grabbed one of the chairs near the fire and pulled it farther back into the room, away from the warmth.He sat then nodded toward the hearth.“You put it in a good place,” he said, speaking in the low Keld tongue for Gatha’s benefit.It was a language relying more heavily on words, fit for ordering around slaves and non-warrior Keldons.He pointed to the ripped standard that hung down from the large iron spike driven in between the mortared stones.The other half hung in Trohg’s manor near the Necropolis, and a second banner of the same kind also decorated the council hall.Trohg had shared the standard he’d brought back for himself from a victorious campaign.Such was a sign of rare admission that a warlord or witch king owed someone a debt for that victory.Grandson of Kreyohl, the Keldon warlord who had saved Gatha’s life, Trohg had been brought to the mage at the age of ten for augmentation.A runt birth-as the smaller Keldons were often called-Trohg had no chance of selection for the warlord trials.His father preferred to see his son dead in the frozen northland wastes or by the mage’s unpredictable magic-and said as much to Gatha-than be bypassed for selection.For most Keldons this would not be so disastrous, but as the first son of a mating between a strong warlord and an influential doyenne, Trohg’s failure would directly affect the position of both his progenitors.His son would not be passed over and indeed hadn’t been.Trohg not only responded to the genetic alterations, but he was also one of the rare warlords now referred to as a witch king.In battle he excited his troops to a furious, fanatical pitch and could then draw off their combined strength to legendary effect.Young as he was, Trohg sat on the highest tier in council, a warlord with few peers.Moving over toward the fire, Gatha took the more comfortable and therefore weaker position.Familiarity only went so far in Keld, and he never forgot the delicate niche in which he lived here.His mastery of their language and the Keldon cut of his clothes would never make up completely for his lack of a warrior’s background.A warlord could take his life at any time, provided Gatha could not first maneuver a stronger one into his path.“I am honored to share in your victory,” he finally said, staring at the torn standard rather than be tempted to make eye contact with Trohg.Argivian-his birth nation.The witch king grunted in agreement.“I take strength from the warhost,” he said, voice strong and deep.“Nothing hurts me.I stomp out the lives of my enemy as if they were snowbound, slow and weak.” His dark eyes sought out Gatha.“You did this for me, and I remember.” He paused.“You will do same for my son.”Gatha glanced back to the warlord, courtesy forgotten in the shock.What he had thought would be a social visit, such as they passed for in Keld, had turned suddenly to business.The magical ability of the witch kings created incredible demand for Gatha’s work, no matter that fewer than one in ten survived the process in any shape to fight.He had even begun cutting Phyrexian genetic material back into the Matrix, using it as he used colos genes-the adaptable material working to fill in the “gaps” his own work left behind.Still, a stable process had yet to emerge [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]