Read Online Falconfar 03-Falconfar by Ed Greenwood - Free Book Online
Authors: Ed Greenwood
Tags: Falconfar
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noticing that it didn't look like any metal he recognized, being somewhat like the old chrome trim on the first car he'd driven, gleaming something like silver... but silver that was the bronze color of vintage champagne. "Guess I am a Lord Archwizard after all. Or a mad idiot. All happy over a frikkin' flashlight."
He cast wary glances up and around, to see if any greatfangs were gliding nearer. He hadn't heard anything nearby, but...
No. No huge dark bulk with wings or jaws. Good. He reached for the nearest of the small, unrecognizable items the spindle had been lying among, wondering what it would turn out to be. A dishmop, perhaps?
"I have no particular liking for wizard's gates that whisk you far away at a single step to somewhere unknown, either," Talyss Tesmer snapped at her brother, "but the alternative is walking across the entire damned Raurklor. With all its bears, and snakes, and—and worse. Day after day, fighting our way through dagger- sharp thornbushes and under leaning trees that could fall on us and through swamps full of lurking things and dung-reeking mud. Don't be a fool, Belard!"
"I HAVE NO particular liking for wizard's gates that whisk you far away at a single step to somewhere unknown, either," Talyss Tesmer snapped at her brother, "but the alternative is walking across the entire damned Raurklor. With all its bears, and snakes, and—and worse. Day after day, fighting our way through dagger- sharp thornbushes and under leaning trees that could fall on us and through swamps full of lurking things and dung-reeking mud. Don't be a fool, Belard!"
"Sister," came his cold reply, "I've spent more than enough years acquiring a hearty distaste for being called that. 'Fool' is a name I got tired of ten-and-six summers ago. Care to choose another word?"
"Stonehead?"
"That will serve, yes," Belard replied evenly—and grew a sudden grin. "So where's this gate, then?"
AROUND HIM, EVERYTHING shuddered again, and a wall crashed down in a thunderous roar of falling stone. At least one greatfangs was still tearing Malragard apart.
Hidden—he hoped—in the shadows of two fallen ceiling-beams under a tangle of split and splintered boards, Rod peered at the meager collection he'd retrieved. Most of the cupboard had been full of things that were now broken, and some of them didn't look as if they'd ever been interesting. Six objects, however—the spindle-flashlight one of them—he'd kept, and carried across the room to his newfound refuge to get a better look at.
There was a hexagonal mottled brown stone that filled his palm, worked to a glossy-smooth finish and graven with some complicated-looking runes or designs. It certainly looked magical, and it had been wrapped in what had once been an opulent- looking cloth, and stuffed into an ornately carved coffer that was now so many shards of polished purple-white bone.
And there was a—
Something that was half-roar and half thunderous gurgle of hunger rang out suddenly, from above and behind him.
Rod Everlar didn't wait for the world to turn darker as the great bulk of a surging greatfangs blotted out the sky again. Cradling his loot against his chest, he flung himself across the littered floor in a stumbling, slipping run, put his shoulder to a door he'd looked at on his way to the corner, and kept right on running.
Behind him, walls that no longer had a roof over them, and bared, sagging beams that had once been part of that roof, were driven aside in a loud, approaching thunder.
Crashing into half-seen furniture and hoping by all the fiends in Hell that Malraun hadn't left any traps waiting just ahead, the Lord Archwizard of Falconfar sprinted on into the unknown, fresh fear clutching coldly at his heart.
What would it feel like, to be bitten in half by teeth longer than you were?
THE WINGLESS AUMRARR blinked at a bedchamber ceiling she'd seen before, wondering why it seemed to waver so much.
"Taeauna," she murmured, after a
He cast wary glances up and around, to see if any greatfangs were gliding nearer. He hadn't heard anything nearby, but...
No. No huge dark bulk with wings or jaws. Good. He reached for the nearest of the small, unrecognizable items the spindle had been lying among, wondering what it would turn out to be. A dishmop, perhaps?
"I have no particular liking for wizard's gates that whisk you far away at a single step to somewhere unknown, either," Talyss Tesmer snapped at her brother, "but the alternative is walking across the entire damned Raurklor. With all its bears, and snakes, and—and worse. Day after day, fighting our way through dagger- sharp thornbushes and under leaning trees that could fall on us and through swamps full of lurking things and dung-reeking mud. Don't be a fool, Belard!"
"I HAVE NO particular liking for wizard's gates that whisk you far away at a single step to somewhere unknown, either," Talyss Tesmer snapped at her brother, "but the alternative is walking across the entire damned Raurklor. With all its bears, and snakes, and—and worse. Day after day, fighting our way through dagger- sharp thornbushes and under leaning trees that could fall on us and through swamps full of lurking things and dung-reeking mud. Don't be a fool, Belard!"
"Sister," came his cold reply, "I've spent more than enough years acquiring a hearty distaste for being called that. 'Fool' is a name I got tired of ten-and-six summers ago. Care to choose another word?"
"Stonehead?"
"That will serve, yes," Belard replied evenly—and grew a sudden grin. "So where's this gate, then?"
AROUND HIM, EVERYTHING shuddered again, and a wall crashed down in a thunderous roar of falling stone. At least one greatfangs was still tearing Malragard apart.
Hidden—he hoped—in the shadows of two fallen ceiling-beams under a tangle of split and splintered boards, Rod peered at the meager collection he'd retrieved. Most of the cupboard had been full of things that were now broken, and some of them didn't look as if they'd ever been interesting. Six objects, however—the spindle-flashlight one of them—he'd kept, and carried across the room to his newfound refuge to get a better look at.
There was a hexagonal mottled brown stone that filled his palm, worked to a glossy-smooth finish and graven with some complicated-looking runes or designs. It certainly looked magical, and it had been wrapped in what had once been an opulent- looking cloth, and stuffed into an ornately carved coffer that was now so many shards of polished purple-white bone.
And there was a—
Something that was half-roar and half thunderous gurgle of hunger rang out suddenly, from above and behind him.
Rod Everlar didn't wait for the world to turn darker as the great bulk of a surging greatfangs blotted out the sky again. Cradling his loot against his chest, he flung himself across the littered floor in a stumbling, slipping run, put his shoulder to a door he'd looked at on his way to the corner, and kept right on running.
Behind him, walls that no longer had a roof over them, and bared, sagging beams that had once been part of that roof, were driven aside in a loud, approaching thunder.
Crashing into half-seen furniture and hoping by all the fiends in Hell that Malraun hadn't left any traps waiting just ahead, the Lord Archwizard of Falconfar sprinted on into the unknown, fresh fear clutching coldly at his heart.
What would it feel like, to be bitten in half by teeth longer than you were?
THE WINGLESS AUMRARR blinked at a bedchamber ceiling she'd seen before, wondering why it seemed to waver so much.
"Taeauna," she murmured, after a
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