The news left them speechless.
Sparrow was the first to react. “You mean Prince Bandiou, the empress’s uncle? The man who served as her tutor after her mother died? Are you kidding?”
The gnome turned a serious face to them.
“That was also the empress’s reaction when I told her about our terrible predicament. I also imagine that the hunter-elves were not very thorough because of their respect for the prince. But that is not the case with you, is it?”
You could hear terrible anguish in Buglul’s voice.
But Manitou didn’t like being manipulated.
“We’re citizens of Lancovit,” he said coldly. “If we’re caught snooping around Prince Bandiou’s house or grounds, we could be executed as spies. You were very careful not to tell us this minor detail—that the wizard was Bandiou.”
Fabrice gulped, but Cal whistled derisively. “Well, we’ll just have to not get caught, that’s all. There are only two guards outside, and probably not many more inside. Given the prince’s personality, he must not be the kind of guy to have many people around him.”
“You’re right,” agreed the gnome. “With too many servants, someone might discover what he was up to and tell the empress. And he would be immediately executed, uncle or no uncle. So he compensates by using magic as much as possible: he has cleaning spells, maintenance spells, anti-pest and anti-insect spells, and spells for food and drink. His staff amounts to a team of six guards who work in rotation, a cook, two maids, and two handymen, one of whom mainly looks after the garden and the prince’s ball orchid greenhouse. So you are not likely to run into many people. In addition, when searching his palace, we were able to steal copies of his accreditation cards and forged new ones. Which means that the spells will ‘see’ you only as ordinary servants going about their work.”
“Okay, got it,” said Cal. “I have a pretty good idea of the palace’s general layout. Let’s go!”
While they were talking, Tara was thinking. There was something in all this that didn’t add up, but she couldn’t put her finger on it.
With the accredi-cards affixed to their clothes, fur, or feathers, they went back up the tunnel and took the branch that led to the house itself. They emerged in one of the palace cellars, where they were able to prepare their search discreetly.
Cal held a very handy crystal that could display the building’s layout in three dimensions. It could also show the location of all sentient beings within a hundred-yard radius. Their little group appeared in blue, and the palace servants and guards showed up in yellow. This made it easy to keep track of where both groups were—and to make sure they didn’t meet!
Cal was the only one with the skills to locate the hidden portal. Since the others couldn’t share the task, they obediently followed him around. When the coast was clear, the little thief would slip into a room while they stood watch outside. He would measure, touch, look, touch again, smell, and then come out as quickly as possible.
It got late, and the servants eventually went to bed. The guards’ patrols outside the building were pretty casual, which offended Robin.
“That’s really no way to guard a place,” he griped. “You need soldiers in teams of two inside and out, on irregular schedules to throw off possible attackers, and constant communication between the teams!”
“Well, if you don’t mind I’m just glad the guards are incompetent,” whispered Sparrow. “In fact, if they wanted to go to sleep I would be even happier. So there!”
“What I’d like,” interrupted Cal, who had just sifted through a half ton of dust in the library, “is for somebody to tell me how to find that blasted portal. This is the twentieth room I’ve been in, and I’m getting the depressing feeling that the gnomes were right. It isn’t here!”
Suddenly Tara stopped in her tracks. “What did you just say, Cal?”
“That the portal isn’t here?”
“No, not that. Before that.”
Cal looked at her with concern. “All right, what part of this sentence don’t you understand? ‘I’d like somebody to tell me how to find that blasted portal. This is the twentieth room—’”
“Yessss!” she interrupted, barely stifling a shout of glee. “That’s it! Because we do have someone who can tell us how to find that blasted portal. Someone who can show us the way!”
Under the incredulous and somewhat dubious eyes of her friends and the gnome king, Tara bowed gracefully, put her hand a pocket of her robe, and pulled out the magic map.
“Well, it’s about time!” the parchment snapped as Tara unfolded it. “I was beginning to feel positively musty, deep in that pocket. So, where do you want to go this time?”
Tara put on her friendliest manner and crossed her fingers. “Hello, map. I’d like to ask you something, but I don’t know if you can do it.”
“What you mean, can I do it?” asked the map huffily. “What kind of snippy remark is that? You just tell me where you want to go, and I’ll tell you how to get there in less time that it takes to say, ‘Here it is.’”
“All right, fine. We’re in a palace. Every palace has a Transfer Portal. We’d like to know if you can locate a second one.”
“The only portal in this palace is the one on the third floor,” answered the map in a tone of disdain.
Tara grabbed her white forelock and chewed on it savagely. Okay, that wasn’t the answer I was hoping for. So, if the second portal isn’t in the palace . . .
“Show us the way to the portal that isn’t in the palace, but near it.”
“Hmpf! What kind of challenge is that?” said the map. “You could’ve asked for something more complicated. It’s here!”
The parchment displayed the palace, the guards patrolling outside, Tara’s little group, and a dotted line that led across the garden to a big blue cross—smack in the middle of the ball orchid greenhouse!
Fabrice, who had been holding his breath like the others, put an arm around Tara’s shoulders and gave her a resounding kiss on the cheek.
“Bravo!” he exclaimed as she blushed. “You’re a genius!”
Then he grinned at Robin, who was looking daggers at him.
Score 1-1, Fabrice thought.
Like tropical flowers on Earth, ball orchids need warmth and humidity, and they’re delicate. They can’t handle Tingapore’s occasional temperature extremes and the drought that can hit despite the weather wizards’ spells, so the prince had a greenhouse built to house his passion. Constant humidity and ideal temperature had produced a riot of colors and shapes. The ball orchids’ fleshy petals emerging from the large green-and-yellow root balls that give the plant its name glowed in the shadows. Flowers hung from the ceiling in voluptuous cascades of heavy pink, blue, black, and red clusters. The air was so full of perfume and pollen that the group had trouble breathing.
Like most Omoisian buildings, the greenhouse was vast, and it took them a good hour to completely explore it. But they didn’t find Transfer tapestries anywhere.
Fafnir, who like all dwarfs wasn’t especially patient except when it came to blacksmithing, began showing signs of annoyance.
“There isn’t anything in this lousy greenhouse,” she grumbled. “It’s hot and damp, and there’s nothing here except these stupid flowers dangling everywhere.”
Robin, who is still smarting over Fabrice kissing Tara, scanned his surroundings very carefully, using his elf senses to probe the invisible. Suddenly he smiled. The wizard was clever—very clever—but not as clever as an elf, even a half human one.
Robin cleared his throat loudly, attracting his friends’ attention.
“I think I found it!” he said, trying to look modest.
Buglul stared at him, full of hope.
“You found the portal?” he asked eagerly.
“Yes. It’s all around us.”
“What do you mean, all around us?” snapped Cal, who was supposed to be the expert. “What’re you talking about?”
“You see these flowers?” asked Robin.
“Yeah,” said Fabrice. “What about them?”
“Look at the patterns they make.”
“By my ancestors, you’re right!” exclaimed Manitou. “I can see unicorns and gnomes, giants and spellbinders!”
Delighted, Sparrow and Tara both kissed Robin on the cheek, which annoyed Fabrice no end. Rats! Two points for the half-elf.
It was true. The orchids around them formed the patterns of Transfer Portal tapestries. It was like a giant Arcimboldo, that sixteenth century Earth painter who composed portraits by arranging images of fruits, flowers, and other objects. Here a vine formed a unicorn’s head, there a flower represented a spellbinder’s body, and the plants as a whole faithfully reproduced the five tapestries.
Just then Sheeba growled and emerged from a bush with something in her mouth.
“The Transfer scepter!” cried Sparrow. “Sheeba, you’re the best!”
The panther received their joyful caresses with dignity.
Fafnir set the scepter on its vegetable image, the greenhouse lit up . . . and the group suddenly had a problem on its hands.
“What do I say?” asked the dwarf.
“What you mean, what do you say?” asked Cal with annoyance, still irritated at not having found the portal himself.
“Where do we want to go? This is a Transfer Portal; it can take us wherever there are other portals. So the question is, what destination do I give it?”
“Good grief,” muttered Manitou, “I haven’t the slightest idea.”
“Oh?” said the dwarf. “In that case, let’s try this.” She shouted: “To the places where the gnomes are being held prisoner!”
Cal snickered. “That’ll never wor—”
The blinding light seized them, and they found themselves somewhere else.
Somewhere that seemed strikingly familiar to Fabrice and Tara. On seeing an astonished face, the two shouted:
“Dad?”
“Count Besois-Giron?”
Standing in front of them was the count, holding a watering can in one hand and pruning shears in the other.
“Fabrice? Tara? What in the world are you doing in my rose garden?” he asked. “Are you back from OtherWorld? Where you went without my permission, I might add.”
Fabrice, who could feel a huge headache and a huge punishment coming on, suddenly felt awful.
Seeing the count’s impressive eyebrows frowning and Fabrice turning to jelly, Manitou intervened.
“We’re on a secret mission,” he said quickly. “We can’t tell you about it, but as soon as it is over, you’ll get all the details. In the meantime, we need your help.”
Then he waited, trying to look as self-confident as possible, given the fact that he was only two feet high, and a dog. Fortunately, the count had too much respect for high wizards to argue when one of them asked for his help. He bowed to the black Labrador.
“With pleasure, High Wizard Manitou. I’ll do anything in my power for you, and I can wait to get the explanation later.”
“Thank you, Guardian. I have a question: Does Prince Bandiou visit you from time to time?”
“Yes, he does,” said the Guardian with a smile. “A delightful man, who has developed some very effective cutting techniques. He has one of OtherWorld’s most beautiful collections of ball orchids, in fact. He often comes to look at my roses, and thanks to him I have achieved results I couldn’t have dreamed of.”
“I understand. Is he in the habit of visiting any other places when he’s here?” asked Manitou casually.
“He’s also an ardent fisherman. He often wets a line in the river down by the dock. He finds our fish less aggressive than those on OtherWorld.”
The friends exchanged looks. A river? What did a river have to do with anything?
“Very well,” said the Lab. “We’ll go take a look at those fish too. Goodbye for now, Guardian. Lead the way, Fabrice.”
With the count looking on suspiciously, they left the rose garden. Fabrice sighed. “I think I’m going to spend the next century locked in my room!”
“I’ll tell your father what happened,” said Manitou. “What we’re doing is important, and he’ll be very proud of you if we succeed.”
“Yeah, but his being proud won’t keep him from punishing me because I disobeyed him.”
“You didn’t disobey him,” remarked Cal. “He didn’t specifically forbid you from going to OtherWorld.”
This didn’t seem to console Fabrice, and they walked on in silence. Barune was quite surprised by the rather monochrome color of earthly vegetation and tried to sample everything. He eventually swallowed a big clump of nettles and got prickles in his tongue, and they had to cast a Healus to fix him up. From then on, he wouldn’t touch anything and followed Fabrice so closely he kept stepping on his heels.
Fabrice sighed again. Between his too-strict father and his overly affectionate familiar, the coming months were going to be pretty lively. And he dreaded the prospect of their inevitable meeting.
“Here we are,” he said. “There’s the dock.”
Silhouetted against the blue of the river, a long brown dock extended out over the water. Fabrice and Tara had enjoyed good times there, jumping into the chilly water. Having left sleeping Tingapore and now standing in the hot afternoon sun, they had trouble associating the image of the monstrous wizard with this peaceful landscape.
“You see any gnomes around?” asked Cal sarcastically.
They searched the vicinity with a fine-tooth comb, but found no secret entrances and no hidden dungeons.
A despairing Glul Buglul fell to his knees, blue tears in his eyes. “My sweet Mul, my beautiful love! I’ll never see you again!”
Manitou put his head down and started sniffing carefully, walking up and down the dock.
“I smell sniff . . . I smell him sniff, sniff. . . . I can tell that he came here. Yes, for sure. His scent is strong. But he didn’t stay very long.”
Robin was scanning the river with his elf vision.
“I wouldn’t swear to it, but there seems to be something in the water,” he said.
The others gathered around, peering into the depths.
“Yes,” agreed Sparrow. “I can see something too.”
“I’m the thief here, so I guess I’m elected,” said Cal with a sigh. “Too bad; we already have a dwarf and a gnome, we’re just missing a mermaid. Good thing I can breathe underwater!”
Tara gaped at him. “What? You can breathe underwater?”
“It’s dangerous to use magic in an unknown environment,” said Cal loftily. He pulled off his spellbinder robe, revealing a T-shirt and underpants in a matching camouflage pattern. “At best, it warns the potential victim that you’re robbing them. At worst, it activates defenses that are often disagreeably deadly. So I try to avoid doing it. And no, don’t look at me as if I’m about to grow gills. I just kept the oxygenator King Buglul gave me. I figured it might come in handy.”
“I’m going with you,” the gnome broke in. “I actually can breathe underwater, and I’m not leaving the job of freeing my people to anyone else.”
“Oh, great, now he’s on a hero kick,” grumbled Manitou. “We’re off to a bad start.”
“By the way,” murmured Sparrow to Cal, her hands joined in a pose of total admiration, “speaking of heroism . . .”
“Yes?” he said, puffing out his chest.
“Your camouflage underwear, is that for nighttime attacks on your teddy bears?”
Cal made a face at her, and Tara and Sparrow burst out laughing. Out of male solidarity, Fabrice and Robin kept from laughing, but their eyes shone with amusement just the same.
Cal rolled his eyes. He put the oxygenator on his face and winced at the twinge he felt when the little animal began to feed.
“We’re just going on a scouting trip,” he explained in a slightly muffled voice. “See you soon.”
He jumped into the water, followed by Glul, whose greater density made him sink right away. The two gradually vanished into the depths.
Cal had no trouble swimming. Glancing up, he could see his friends anxiously watching him. He waved and concentrated on going deeper. Luckily the river was shallow there, just a few yards deep.
Glul started waving excitedly. He had spotted a large rectangular outline on the riverbed, a shape much too regular to be natural. Swimming over to it, Cal realized that it was shaped like a door. They had found the portal! He signaled to Glul to go back up, but the gnome refused, preferring to stay on the river bottom. Opening a gigantic mouth to take in oxygen from the water, he seemed completely at ease.
Cal was about to swim up when he felt a slight current press against his mask and push it sideways. Somewhat surprised, he put it back in place, but the current pushed it again, harder this time. Frowning, Cal jammed the oxygenator back in position.
At that, the water became demented. Out of nowhere, seemingly solid tendrils of water attacked, trying to rip his mask off. Buglul was swimming over to help when other tendrils grabbed his throat and began to squeeze. Buglul struggled and Cal screamed with terror in his mask. Something was trying to kill them!
Above them, Tara and the others were scanning the water and quickly guessed something abnormal was going on. The water had become like a living thing and seemed to be attacking the two swimmers.
With no time to cast a spell, Tara cut to the chase.
“Bring my friends back here!” she commanded her power, stretching her hands toward Cal and Buglul.
The spell shot out, but the water merely glittered and absorbed the magic harmlessly. Then Sparrow tried with Robin’s help, but was no more successful.
Suddenly, a loud splash! was heard. Axe in hand, Fafnir had leaped into the water to go save Cal and Buglul. Unfortunately her steel blade had no effect on the water, which let it slip harmlessly by, the better to attack again.
Despite all their efforts, their friends were drowning!
The way the water was behaving reminded Tara of something, and it suddenly came to her. The last time she’d seen a normally inanimate element come to life was when a fire elemental nearly burned down her grandmother’s manor house. So this one must be . . .
“By the Elementus you are hereby bidden to let us see those forces hidden!” she screamed.
The water immediately gathered itself into a huge water elemental. A good fifteen feet tall, its body glittered in the sun, crowned with a wavy green thatch of weeds. On either side of the elemental the river stopped flowing, to the great surprise of a bunch of trout who bumped into an invisible barrier.
“Well, I’ll be splashed!” thundered the elemental. “A little spellbinder! What can I do for you, cutie?”
“Good morning, Mister Water Elemental,” said Tara with a polite bow, unfazed to be chatting with an entity made entirely of H2O. “Would you mind not drowning my friends, please?”
“Sorry, but I agreed to guard this section of the river in exchange for a nice thunderstorm that fed me and helped me grow,” the elemental gurgled with a touch of regret. “Drowning intruders is part of the agreement.”
With that, it started to flow back, threatening Cal, Fafnir, and Buglul, who were on the dry river bottom, helplessly gasping for breath.
“Wait!” shouted Tara. “We mean you no harm. Why don’t you help us instead of fighting us?”
The elemental heaved a deep sigh. “I’m terribly sorry, but a deal is a deal. If we water, wind, fire, and earth elementals don’t keep our word, no one would ever call on us.”
“If I can prove that my power is greater than yours, would you let us pass?”
“What can you do against me, little girl, given how much more powerful I am?”
“That’s not the issue. Here’s the deal I’m suggesting. If I can defeat you, you will let us pass and hold back the river long enough for us to free the wizard’s prisoners. If you win, I promise to create a beautiful thunderstorm that will have you overflowing your banks.”
“Hey!” protested Fabrice. “This is my father’s land! Don’t be so quick to make such a high school dance + start of Istanbul = prom + is = promise!”
“Fabrice, shut up!” cried Sparrow and Tara together.
“Prisoners?” The elemental’s foam brows knitted in a frown. “He didn’t say anything about prisoners. I was just to keep intruders from diving here, and if they persisted, to drown them. That’s all.”
Buglul, who had gotten his breath back after being choked by the water tendrils, yelled up from the river bottom: “I am Glul Buglul, King of Gnomes, Compensator of the Imperial Court of Omois, and representative of the Truth Tellers. The wizard with whom you made your agreement kidnapped my people. I came here to free them.”
The elemental seemed to be thinking this over. Then it shrugged its wavy shoulders.
“All right, I accept the new agreement: my power against the little spellbinder’s. But if you try the slightest dirty trick, I’ll drown you without pity. Is that clear?”
“As clear as spring water,” Tara said.
The elemental smiled, its teeth of solidified water gleaming like so many diamond daggers in its huge mouth. Then it moved aside, so the three victims could climb back up the bank.
Cal glowered at the elemental, spit out a final mouthful of water, and struggled to his feet on the muddy river bottom, leaning on Fafnir. The dwarf grabbed Buglul by the collar and lifted both of them onto the dock.
Everyone cautiously backed away, and the duel began.
The elemental filled its cheeks and squirted a waterspout at Tara. Anticipating this, she conjured a strong wall that easily deflected the jet of water.
The wall disappeared, and Tara now shot a blast of fire. The elemental avoided it by making a hole in its body through which the fire passed harmlessly.
First set. Score 0-0.
The elemental then created a gigantic tsunami wave high enough to overtop any wall. Tara countered by conjuring a huge funnel that sent it flooding back at its creator. The elemental didn’t have the time to dodge, but stumbled and fell, hit by its own wave. When it arose, it was clearly displeased.
With a gesture, it raised an enormous hammer that came crashing down on Tara. To her friends’ distress, she didn’t budge. The hammer splashed apart when it hit the waterproof protection bubble she had improvised.
Tara was now thinking furiously. My first jet of flame wasn’t enough, but if . . .
Giving her opponent no time to react, she skillfully conjured a gigantic magnifying glass that focused the sun’s rays on the elemental. Taken by surprise, it started to evaporate in the burning heat. It countered by splitting its body to avoid the glass’s hot beam. But as it did, icy rays shot from Tara’s hands, freezing it under the rays of the sun. It was trapped! Concentrated by the magnifying glass, the sunlight was so strong that the elemental started to sublimate, going directly from a solid to a gas without passing through the liquid state. Under those conditions it was unable to launch any kind of attack.
With a gesture, Tara suspended the action of the magnifying glass, but without making it disappear. The sublimation stopped for a moment, long enough for the elemental to melt a little, and its face and mouth to reform.
“Do you admit defeat?” Tara asked harshly.
“Yes, yes, but stop that torture!”
“Do you agree to let us pass?”
“Yes! I swear it by the Great Elemental of the Four Elements. And may my spirit return to the Great Ocean if I’m lying. But please, release me!”
Tara glanced questioningly at Manitou, who nodded. The formula was correct. She made the magnifying glasses disappear and unfroze the elemental. Half of it had evaporated and its attitude was now much more accommodating.
“Ow,” it lamented, “I’m back to my original weight! I should never have made that deal!”
Cal grinned. “Good! Let’s go open that door on the river bottom.”
Fafnir kept a wary eye on the elemental as they clambered down the slippery banks. Prince Bandiou clearly hadn’t imagined that anyone would find the portal, much less open it, because Cal located the lock without any trouble. It wasn’t a magic seal, and he was able to pick it using his tools like any earthly lock. The door opened with a creak of rusty hinges, and they found themselves in an airlock from which the water was draining. A second door also yielded to Cal’s skilled fingers.
The opening led to a row of jail cells in which King Buglul’s people were imprisoned. He rushed to them with a joyous shout. But the moment he touched the bars, a brilliant spark crackled, and he was flung against the opposite wall, unconscious.
A pretty blue gnome cried: “Don’t touch the bars! They’re protected by a magic spell! Glul! Glul! Answer me!”
“He’s okay,” Robin informed her. “He’s just been knocked out and burned a little. I’ll take care of him.”
“We’ve got to hurry,” said Sparrow anxiously. “The wizard could come back at any moment! Let me try something.”
Shape-shifting into the beast, she grasped the bars. She resisted the pain as long as she could, but it became too strong, and she let them go with a howl of suffering. When she opened her paws, they could see they were badly burned. Tara immediately chanted: “By Healus, let the pain be gone, and Sparrow’s wound be cured anon!” The burns disappeared.
“It won’t do any good to cast a spell, either,” explained the pretty gnome. “Bandiou has made the whole prison magic proof.”
“All right!” huffed Fafnir. “None of that blasted magic, eh? In that case, make way for a pro!”
Ignoring the walls, she lay down on the ground and promptly melted into the soil without tripping the protection spell. In a few seconds she had vanished.
Fafnir reappeared inside the cell, popping up among the astonished gnomes. Cal stared at her, angry at himself not to have thought of that. Obviously, the spell protecting the ground had to be different. Otherwise the gnomes wouldn’t be able to stand on it. The wizard was so confident of his defenses that he’d simply cast a spell to make the stones too hard for the gnomes to eat—but nothing that would stop a dwarf!
“All right, gnomes, let’s go!” ordered Fafnir. “Grab hold of me. Whatever you do, don’t let go! By touching me, we’ll be able to melt into ground together. But if you let go you’ll die instantly and your body will be stuck forever. Got that?”
The gnomes understood perfectly. Fearfully clinging to her, they heaved a sigh of relief when they emerged on the other side of the bars.
It took Fafnir only a few minutes to empty the first cell. In half an hour they freed 233 imprisoned gnomes and their children. They crowded around their king, who was still a bit groggy, but thrilled to have found his people. The pretty blue gnome hugged him lovingly, and they figured she must be Mul, his fiancée.
“Let’s get out of here!” ordered Manitou. “We’ll celebrate when we’re beyond that sinister individual’s reach.”
In single file, they all followed the dog to the open air. The elemental was astonished when it saw them emerging onto the river bottom.
“By my birth waters, where did all these people come from?” it breathed.
“I told you,” Buglul explained proudly, “that monstrous wizard imprisoned my people. And he made you their jailer!”
The elemental’s foam eyebrows came together fiercely.
“Hey, that’s not right at all! And I won’t stand for it! Spellbinders aren’t supposed to use us to do their dirty work.”
The elemental seemed honestly outraged. Buglul asked if it would be willing to bear witness before the empress, and it said it would. An elemental can’t be “read” by the Truth Tellers, but it could testify against Prince Bandiou.
After promising to meet them on OtherWorld whenever they called, the elemental returned to the river, which resumed its peaceful flow. Very quickly, the group headed for the Transfer Portal. Not Bandiou’s secret portal, but the official one in the castle tower. As they were passing by the rose garden, they heard a sudden howl of fury.
Standing in front of them was Count Besois-Giron and a small, skinny man, stooped with years. A gold band held his long gray hair, which was carefully gathered in a complicated braid that lay across his right shoulder. He was dressed in an elegant white robe with a repeating pattern of the purple hundred-eyed peacock. It perfectly matched his white and purple sandals.
“By all the demons of Limbo!” the man roared, as his hands lit up with a dangerous purple glow. “How did you scum manage to get free?”
As the astonished count looked on, Glul Buglul proudly stepped forward, heedless of the danger.
“We do not fear you, Prince Bandiou, and will never obey you again! Our friends have enough power to protect us. Face the fury of the powerful Tara’tylanhnem Duncan!”
“The powerful who?” murmured Tara. What is he saying? He’s crazy!
Fabrice shot a dark look at the gnome, signaling to Tara that he agreed with her.
“You aren’t Magister!” she said to the wizard, putting her finger on what had been bothering her since the beginning. “You don’t have his stature, or his style.”
“And you’re the little girl spellbinder who managed to stand up to him,” cackled the prince. “You should have seen him! I thought he was going to blow a gasket. I practically died laughing.” Bandiou paused. “And speaking of dying, I’m sorry to be doing him this favor, but your time has come.” With a lightning-quick gesture he fired a Destructus at them.
Tara and the living stone were ready, raising a shield that brutally deflected the spell, sending it to shatter the rose garden greenhouse.
The count started to complain, but suddenly realized he was in the middle of a spellbinder duel and dove behind the edge of the well.
The prince screamed with fury. While keeping pressure on Tara’s shield, he raised one of his hands above his head.
Down in the well a powerful glow began to pulsate. Suddenly something burst out of it, in a kind of black halo: a hideous statue representing a demon that had seen too many science-fiction movies about unnatural mutations. It was a monstrous mix of hyena, octopus, and moray eel. The friends shuddered just to look at it.
“The artifactum!” murmured Buglul. “The repository of his power. We must destroy it!”
“Leave that to me,” whispered Fafnir, hefting her axe. “Try to distract him, Tara.”
Tara was finding it hard to maintain the shield protecting everyone. She merely nodded, as she drew power from the depths of her being.
Seeing that the girl was struggling, Buglul yelled to his people: “Gnomes, into the earth! Dig your way clear!”
Within seconds, the gnomes had dug themselves out of sight. This relieved Tara of some of the effort she was expending. It greatly displeased Bandiou, who saw his prey escaping.
Suddenly, he tottered. A huge hole had just opened beneath his feet, pulling him off balance. Dozens of gnomes emerged from it and grabbed at his clothes.
Grimacing at the contact with the little creatures, he tried to brush them off, but without stopping his assault on Tara.
Suddenly, she had a brilliant idea of how to unnerve him.
“Vomit!” she yelled to the gnomes. “Vomit dirt onto him, quick!”
The gnomes obeyed. All together, they spat up what they had swallowed in digging. Howling with indignation, the wizard was submerged by a flood of sticky mud and rocks. His attack faltered. Quick as lightning, Tara dissipated her protective shield, and Fafnir rushed forward. She reached the artifactum in a few steps and raised her axe. Bandiou looked over just as Fafnir was bringing her axe down, and his scream mixed with the thonk! of the blade hitting the statue.
To the dwarf’s great surprise, the artifactum didn’t shatter. Instead, Fafnir felt as if she had struck a steel anvil, as the vibrations shook her from head to foot. Then the black light climbed up along her axe and enveloped her hand. In a few moments it covered her completely, and Fafnir disappeared from her anguished friends’ sight. Meanwhile, the gnomes were facing bolts flashing from the wizard’s fingers and had to let go and seek refuge underground.
Tara seized the opportunity to attack savagely, casting a paralyzing Pocus at Bandiou. But the black light surged forward, and her sparkling spell was stopped and dissipated.
The wizard’s mud-spattered face then emerged from the black cloud, looking jubilant. “You and your friends don’t measure up against my power. Yield or die!”
Cal answered him with a gesture. It wasn’t an especially elegant one, but it meant the same thing on all worlds. The wizard cursed and his black light rolled over the little group like a monstrous cloud.
Tara and her friends battled with all their might. They created a terrible thunderstorm that lashed the cloud, but couldn’t dissipate it. They conjured rain and hail that pounded the ground, but the wizard was able to protect himself. Neither fire nor lightning seemed to affect him.
The evil cloud approached and touched them, ripping through their shield with a sharp screech. In spite of her beast strength, Sparrow was the first to succumb, smothered as she tried to protect Sheeba. Cal collapsed in turn, followed by Manitou and Blondin. Fabrice clung to Barune, who was unable to fight. The cloud slammed into Gallant, who crashed in a cloud of feathers. Robin was the last to yield.
Seeing her friends fall one after the other, Tara unleashed all her power. Her eyes turned completely blue and she rose majestically into the air, calling on the living stone to help her. Speechless, Prince Bandiou felt a spasm of fear. This wasn’t some girl spellbinder facing him, but power, raw power. And when she spoke, her voice hummed with magic: “Stop this instant, wizard! Our patience is at an end. We won’t allow you to hurt our friends.”
“Give up! Give up, or I’ll kill your allies right now!” he screamed. “I have their hearts in the palm of my hand. Look!”
Like unconscious puppets, Manitou, Robin, Sparrow, Sheeba, Cal, Blondin, Fabrice, and Barune emerged from the cloud, carried by its black tendrils. A black filament was stuck in each of their chests, right over their hearts. The wizard wasn’t lying. He literally held the life of Tara’s friends in his immaterial hands.
Tara hesitated, and Bandiou used the chance. His cloud struck like a snake, swallowing her. When it retreated, seemingly with regret, Tara lay on the ground, defeated.
A deathly silence permeated the battlefield. It was over.