"Sea of Death" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gygax Gary)

Chapter 25

THE ALABASTER DEMON LORD stood on a circle of ground that appeared as bright and fresh as a morning meadow. The grass was green and sparkling with dew; little flowers tipped their faces toward the sun overhead. No sign of struggle, blood, or death was visible upon this unspoiled disc. Beside the tall, thin being from the Abyss stood Leda. At least it appeared to Gord to be her, for her garments were those that Eclavdra's clone had worn just today, and her sword was the very one she had taken from the dead Yoli warrior what seemed like an age ago. The demon merely regarded the four warriors with his red-pink eyes, and the dark elf spoke.

"Gord! You live! You have actually slain Obmi?" she cried, smiling and coming toward him as she spoke, her arms opening and then embracing him as she got close.

Gord was tempted to return her embrace. But instead, he remained stiff and unresponsive. "Yes," he said without emotion. "I killed the dwarf." At his cold reaction and toneless words, Leda released her grip on his torso and stepped back from him, her face showing hurt. Gord disregarded that. "What of Eclavdra?" he inquired in the same emotionless voice.

"Eclavdra is gone – finished! Only Leda lives."

"Is there a difference?"

Now the dark elf's beautiful face showed both hurt and anger. "How can you, of all who know me, ask such a question?"

"Much has occurred since last I thought I knew you… Leda. How am I, a poor, simple man, to know the truth of anything?"

Vuron laughed a musical, silvery-cold laugh at that. "Well put, Gord of Greyhawk. Yet even demons must often labor under the same burden which you claim. Allow Me to assure you that this is indeed Leda, not the one from whom she sprang – and there is a difference."

Truth from the mouth of a demon?"

Again Vuron laughed. "Yes. Stranger things occur frequently. And there is yet more…"

Delver, Shade, and Barrel had been close to their friend when the strange appearance of demon and drow occurred. Each was clasping his weapon, prepared to fight a hopeless fight to the last against this supernatural enemy. Now they were confused and uncertain, just as Gord was. Delver growled a warning, which was supported by Barrel's advice to "Beware the words of demons, cap'n!" Shade merely shook his long-haired head and took a step closer to the young thief, his weapon pointing at the snow-white Vuron.

Without any apparent offense taken at the reactions of the four, the demon lord slowly lowered his head to gaze at the sward at his feet. With a slight gesture and a soft series of sounds, Vuron caused a chest of beaten brass to appear at his feet, out of thin air. "The Final Key, Gord, lies therein," the demon said, indicating the container. "Perhaps you will allow Me to explain what has happened before you decide to do what you must do."

"Explain? Or do you mean, tell me what I am to do?" Gord shot back with contempt.

"Oh, no. I can by no means tell you what to do, Gord of Greyhawk. Your course is very much your own, and even a demon lord of My power is unable to alter that fact. Still, I can alter a few things," and as he spoke this the alabaster being looked away from the four who stood staring at him to the place a few paces away where the body of Post lay.

"I heal you, man," the demon pronounced. Post's chest heaved, he groaned, and then the lean man sat up, rubbing his eyes as if just awakening from a night's sleep. Vuron turned his glance to the injured pair. Smoker and Dohojar. "You two have likewise fought bravely. Be whole." Smoker rolled over on his side and began snoring peacefully, while the brown-skinned Changa sat up and looked at his friends with a white-toothed smile, not knowing what to say.

Gord did have a reply to these acts. "You use demon-powers to bribe me, to bemuse and befuddle my mind. I am unmoved, Vuron."

"That is exactly as I thought," the pale creature said. "The gesture was simply meant to take concern for your comrades from your mind. It must be free of such worries, Gord of Greyhawk, if it is to properly absorb what I now ask your permission to relate."

After a few seconds of consideration, Gord nodded. "I will hear your words, Vuron, with as much disinterest as is possible for one such as I."

"That is considerable, I assure you, but your attention is all I ask. Now I will relate what has transpired," the demon lord said, sinking to a sitting position on the long grass. The four disliked doing so, but they too sat warily when Leda followed Vuron's example, taking a position between the demon and the group of men and demi-humans. "Now, pay full attention," said Vuron in a contented tone. "What I have to say is rather lengthy.

"When the contest for the Theorpart commenced, I brought Leda into being. She is not and never was a true clone of Eclavdra, for never would I replicate such a one as that drow was. If ever a mortal creature could have visited ruin upon My liege lord, that one could have. I altered Leda – as you named her, Gord – and did what I could to aid her. Being as I am, a demon, I could not place any goodness within her, not even any balance or neutrality. She now possesses some modicum of both, and that is because of you, Gord of Greyhawk."

"Do you state blame or proffer some credit toward me, Vuron? Your words make no sense."

"Oh, but they do! As for blame, I just might harbor that against you for many reasons, but I also balance that with much credit for what you did, Gord. The clay of the almost-clone was molded by you – even if just a little. This version of Eclavdra, this Leda, can never act as the original did. There is no longer any threat to My lord."

"Perhaps I rue those words, demon! Why should I be interested in what benefits the denizens of the Abyss?"

"Rest assured that the influence of the departed drow would have been baneful in many ways, Gord of Greyhawk. She would have brought destruction to your world, ruin to Mine own realm, and all the others of demonkind too."

"Yes, Gord," Leda interjected urgently. "It was Vuron's work which gave me the telepathic power to influence Eclavdra without her knowing it. Without such an advantage, she would have taken the Final Key but for a brief time, only to lose it to Obmi and his mistress."

"One demon or another, what does it matter? All humanity loses either way."

"Be not so quick to decide, Gord of Greyhawk," Vuron said in his clear, sexless voice. "What I tell you now centers on that very matter, on the Final Key, and certainly on the fate of all we know as the multiverse."

"I am to decide this?" Gord uttered a mocking laugh in disbelief.

"When I intervened in Eclavdra's actions," Vuron said without commenting on Gord's utterance, "she had violated the compact regarding the Theorpart, and I could take it from her. Once this was done, I could use its power for but a moment to undo what the foolish drow had wrought. Despite those facts, I have no power to claim the Final Key. You, or Leda, must decide what is to be done with it."

"You mean- "

"Yes. You could take it now and in an instant present it to the Demiurge. Basiliv might even accept it____________________

"

Leda spoke then, her voice heavy with emotion. "One thing is sure, Gord. I will not be the arbiter of this. I yield my right to you."

"What she is saying, Gord of Greyhawk," the pale demon explained, "is that she could challenge you for the Final Key. Whichever of you survived would then possess the right to dispose of it. But Leda gives you her right. She will not fight against you, and that is evidence of the effect you have made upon her persona."

This placed Gord in a terrible quandary. Basiliv, and Rexfelis the Catlord as well, had charged him with the very same responsibility. Long, long ago, at the time Gord had first set out on the quest for the last portion of the artifact, both of his mentors had said that the ultimate decision would be his, should he actually succeed in gaining possession of the Final Key. Now Leda, once his beloved, now a distrusted uncertainty, and Vuron, a hated foe, a demon lord of unknown power and certain evil, both placed the same decision squarely upon his head.

"I could give the thing over to Basiliv?" Gord said. Vuron nodded affirmatively. "Mordenkainen? The Cabal? Iuz? The Brotherhood? Anyone?" To each question the alabaster demon indicated a positive answer. Finally the young thief asked, "Myself? I could keep and wield its power for myself?"

"You could hold the Theorpart for as long as fate allowed, Gord of Greyhawk. Whether you could employ it is unknown to Me, but I think that somehow you would manage…"

"What am I to do with the cursed thing?"

"Being nothing more nor less than a demon lord," Vuron said without force, "I cannot say."

Gord looked at Leda. Now she seemed again like the beautiful dark elf he had grown to love as they adventured across the Barren Plains and onto the Ashen Desert – no longer a stranger, a drow, and a priestess of demons. Her return gaze was warm. Her violet eyes were deep pools of emotion that he could only interpret as love for him. "And you, Leda? Have you any words for me on this matter?"

"If you will truly hear them, Gord – with your heart as well as your mind."

He gave a tiny shrug, a little gesture of hopelessness. "I am what I am. I can hear only as I can, but I will try, Leda, to listen with all of my being."

"Then I will speak to you, love, even though what I must say is so painful that I would rather die now than say what I believe… Good can never possess the artifact – no part of it, not even its essence. Should those who stand between Good and Evil and between Law and Chaos obtain the Theorpart, it will at least corrupt and change them to suit its nature. The possessor of such a thing must surely come to be like the one to whom it is linked – or else, the Theorpart will bring ruin."

Gord cocked his head at that. "Ruin? How so?"

"The power of the artifact flows through each of its parts. Each calls to the other, each seeks to place itself into the hands of those attuned to its nullity. It will be united, or it will bring destruction on any being preventing its conjoining."

"Then either whomever I bestow the Final Key upon is doomed, or I bring doom to all the world!"

Vuron responded to that. "Not exactly, but Leda's words and your understanding are almost perfect in this matter. The artifact must always exist, and if it remains in its separate parts, there must always be tension and conflict as the portions exert their influence. Only one force can now be used to keep them from being joined, Gord of Greyhawk, but the selection must be yours. More cannot be said."

"Quite a lure – the temptation to employ evil to overthrow evil," Gord murmured in observation.

Vuron said nothing to that, but Leda came close to him and placed her arm around his hunched shoulders. "Even the greatest and wisest of the minions of Good would fall to such a lure, Gord."

"So if any faction of Good or Evil holds two parts, the third part would be subject to the other two, and the whole artifact would conjoin… But yet is there not the force of Concordance?"

"Is there?" Leda asked softly.

"No… I am not reasoning properly," Gord admitted. "Those who hold to the necessity of all and seek balance are too weak to oppose the others. They would be assailed from all sides, by Good and Evil alike. The key would fall into other hands soon enough, and the inevitable would then result."

"I think you should destroy the blasted thing, cap'n," Barrel ventured weakly.

"Would that such an option existed," Vuron said with such emotion that it amazed all. "Not even the greatest of deities could safely do that. To try is to bring ruin, for the thing would then unite as all other forces became disrupted in sympathy, and He-Who-Must-Sleep-Forever would then awaken!"

"Evil alone can possess these Theorparts," Gord said in amazement, realizing the final truth of the matter. "Each of the keys had been resting with those of malign sort, although none knew it… at that time."

That is correct, Gord of Greyhawk," Vuron said, again without expression in his voice.

"But only the chaos of the Abyss seeks to keep the artifact disjoined, for the proud and independent rulers of demonkind would not willingly bow to any."

"Again, you relate the facts as they exist," Vuron observed unemotionally.

"Then you, Vuron, must accept the Final Key!" It was a demand, not a request or statement.

"Perhaps," the alabaster-hued demon lord said slowly. Vuron nodded, looking squarely at Gord with his red eyes. "Yes, perhaps. But even one who wields the might of a Theorpart cannot force that object upon another if that one is unwilling."

"You're telling me that you – and your master too – are unwilling to possess the thing?"

"I am willing only under certain conditions, Gord of Greyhawk. As for My liege, I must serve him as best I am able…"

"But the devil-serving Brotherhood holds one, and Iuz the other! If either of them should gain this portion, then all are doomed!"

That is correct – but what difference if My acceptance spells eventual doom anyway?"

Gord stared at the pale, being in bewilderment for a moment, then asked, "The conditions. What are they?"

"Leda must accompany the Final Key. She must go with it as Eclavdra, High Priestess of Graz'zt. You must agree to this first. Then you must willingly give over the Theorpart to her. And then she and I will depart with it," Vuron said slowly and clearly.

"Never! I will never, never consign the one I love to the Abyss!"

Leda embraced him, kissing him tenderly, holding him as she murmured words of endearment. The pleasure lasted all too brief a time; then she spoke. "But you must, my love. I am willing, for if I were not, then all of Oerth would be ruined! Think of all, not of me or yourself. The price we each must pay is nothing in the balance of all."

Gord pushed her away in a fury of disbelief. "What is this demon's trick, Vuron?"

"No deception, Gord of Greyhawk. Leda speaks as must be spoken. As Eclavdra – an Eclavdra with more than selfishness and lust for power within herself – she alone can mitigate against the force that the Final Key will assert. My liege will accept such influence, I think, If any help is possible in this matter. Possession of the Final Key will bring woe upon us, but My rede is that it will not ultimately destroy him or the whole of the Abyss if this drow is there to assist Me. She must come, or else I must refuse the Theorpart."

For minutes Gord sat in stunned silence, his mind reeling, frantically seeking some different solution. Leda seemed to realize the instant when he finally gave in.

"You know what you must do, my dearest one."

"Yes, I know, Leda," Gord answered. There is an inescapable conclusion, and I understand I must now face it."

"I will love you always, Gord, even when I must become more and more Eclavdra and less and less myself."

"I know…"

Then you must do as Vuron says."

"But I am not ready to give you up yet! Can we have time for a proper farewell, at least?"

There is no time, love. Even the power of the Final Key cannot maintain this static condition for long. Unless it passes to me soon, and I to the deeps of the Abyss, there will be what was here before – all alignments contending in a struggle of doom."

Gord bent and kissed her then, a long, lingering kiss of farewell. It had to last him forever, and he knew it. Then he stepped back, holding her shoulders at arms' length. "You are free to act, Leda, my loved one. Do as you must. I do not resist your decision, be it as it may. I freely give you the Final Key." There was no feeling in his voice as he uttered those words, no light in his eyes as he spoke.

Leda took his hands briefly, then allowed hers to trail slowly from his grasp in a last, unspoken goodbye. "I am ready now, Vuron," she told the pale demon lord as she picked up the brass coffer.

"Eclavdra, High Priestess and Champion of Graz'zt, declares victory in his name and commands you to carry Me and the prize I have won to him!"

Vuron said not a word, but he looked at Gord with what might have been sympathy. His gaze moved aside, fixing on a spot not far from where the young adventurer sat. Then Leda-Eclavdra stepped to a position beside the demon, and the two disappeared without a sound.

His friends looked at him in stunned silence, none daring to speak. Gord didn't notice. He sat slowly, bowed his head, and remained that way in silence, eyes open but not looking at anything. He sat this way for so long that the ones who waited for him might have thought him dead, except for the shallow breathing that was barely discernible to those closest to him. Finally, Shade sat down next to him and spoke.

"You did as a hero would do, Gord. I speak for all when I tell you that none of us would have had the wit or the will to do so brave a thing as you have done."

The young man lifted his head and turned his gray eyes toward the half-elf, but Shade could detect nothing within their depths. The gaze was flat and bore no hint of what lay beyond the windows of his mind.

Then Barrel approached deferentially. Tour sword, cap'n… I found it just layin' in the grass and figured you'd be wan tin' it soon."

Gord accepted the proffered weapon without comment. Then he looked down again, his eyes still dead and his face a mask. Everyone else simply waited as the sky turned a leaden gray and a drizzle of cold rain began to fall. Gord didn't seem to notice. It would be a long afternoon… and a longer night.