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Which door? Cadderly wondered, looking around at the e circular roores He noticed, too, the many symbols carved into the walls, tridents with sular fields holding three teardrops, the oddess, Talona

"We must be near the chapel," Cadderly whispered to Danica As if in confirmation, the door across the way opened and a horribly scarred reen robes of a Talonan priest, hopped into the circular rooht his crossbow level with the h, and a moment later all the doors of the circular roo a horde of ores and goblins and evilly grinningthe robes of Talonan priests Both friends looked back to the trapped corridor, the only possible escape, but the walls were tight against each other by this point and showed no signs of opening

For some reason, the enemy force did not i from Cadderly and Danica to the first priest who had entered, apparently the leader

"Did you think it would be so easy?" the scarred man shrieked hysterically "Did you think to sih our fortress unopposed?"

Cadderly put a hand on Danica’s aret to hi thisin his thoughts, had a strange feeling that so hi him to hear the harmony of the music

The evil priest cackled and clapped his hands and the floor in front of hiantic, humanoid shape

"Ele Cadderly’s attention Indeed, two creatures from the plane of earth had arisen to the evil priest’s beckoning, and Cadderly realized that this man must be formidable indeed to command such powerful allies

But Cadderly shook the dark thought away, fell back into the song, heard the lorious crescendo

"He is spellcasting!" one of the other priests cried out, and the warning sent the whole of the eneed, weapons waving, lips wetted with eager drool An archer took up his bow and fired, and the clerics went into their own spellcasting, soical spells to assault the intruders

Danica yelled for her love and reflexively kicked out, barely deflecting an arrow that was soaring for Cadderly’s chest She wanted to protect Cadderly, knew that they were both surely doole word, if it was a word, escaped the young priest’s lips A trumpet note, it seemed, so clear and so perfect that it sent shivers of sheer joy rushing along Danica’s spine, invited her into its perfect resonance and held her, trancelike, in its lingering beauty

The note created a much different effect over Cadderly’s enemies, over the evil men and monsters who could not tolerate the holy har Goblins and ores, and sorabbed at their bloodied ears and fell dead or unconscious to the floor, their eardruth stolen by the bared glory of Deneirian truth, and the ele-mentals fell back into the stone of the floor, fled back to their own plane of existence

For , her eyes closed, and then, when the last lingering echoes of the perfect note died away, she realized the folly of hesitation and expected that the horde would be upon her But when she opened her eyes, she found only three ene: the first priest who had entered the roo their ears, and a third lancing about in absolute confusion

Danica leaped forward and kicked the man’s sword from his hand He looked up at her, still too perplexed to react, and the rabbed him by the front of his tunic and threw herself backward in a roll, planting her feet into his belly as he caainst the wall beside Cadderly, where he cruers coiled for a deadly strike

"Do not kill hi priest realized that if this man had escaped the pains of his most holy spell, if the man could withstand the purely harmonious note, then he was probably not of an evil nature Cadderly glanced at hi shadows atop the man’s shoulder, the s, like the ones the young priest had often witnessed when vieickedin Cadderly’s judgment, put the man in a defensive lock, and Cadderly turned his attention back to the still-standing priests

"Darowled in a loud voice - and the aard volume of that response revealed to Cadderly that his holy utterance had probably deafened the man

"Where is Aballister?" Cadderly called out, and theCadderly’s suspicions

Both evil priests began chanting frantically, beginning new spells, and Danica slammed the soldier to the floor and started forward

"Get back!" Cadderly warned, and theat the spellcasters before they could complete their enchants

With supreainst the priests of an evil god, Cadderly fell back into the flow-, ing y as the priest to the side hurled a paralyzing spell at him, but within the protective river of Deneir’s music, such a spell had no hold over Cadderly

The scarred leader lifted his aries it contained Danica leaped in front to block it, as she had blocked the arrohile Cadderly pointed to it and cried out

The glow in the gemstone disappeared, and on a sudden inspiration (a silent telepathic ht the stone

Cadderly grabbed the back of Danica’s tunic and pulled her behind hih his thoughts with every note He saw the very fabric of the area about him, the relationships and densities of the different y flowed from the torches set into sconces on the walls, and aforce which held everything in place, was clearly revealed

The evil priests began chanting again, stubbornly, but noas Cadderly’s turn The young priest focused on that binding force, replayed equations and changed their factors, forcing truth into untruth

No, not untruth, Cadderly realized Not chaos, as was the enchant equations, Cadderly found an alternate truth, a distortion, not a perversion, of physical law By sheer willpower and the insights the song of Deneir had offered to hi force, turned it in on the scarred eneravity

For every unsecured ite place

Dead and downed soldiers "fell" at their leaden they did not slide along the floor, but actually toppled and plunged, as though the floor was now a vertical slope A desk froainst his back, all its itenet Two of the torches within the area of warped reality leaned toward the evil priest and slowly slid along the sides of their sconces, coled rest in a precarious perch, their fla out to the side away from the cursedat the side of the rooht out, his feet toward hisdesperately at the doorjamb

Danica couldn’t prevent a chuckle at the ridiculous sight A ball of bodies and ite hi hard against a dead ore And then everything had settled onceunattached or unsupported within fifty feet of the evil priest had come to rest atop hiroans came from within that confused pile, mostly those of the battered leader, buried somewhere far beneath the ju on the outside layer of the confused pile, looked at Cadderly with sheer hatred and began again his stubborn chant

"Do not!" Cadderly warned him The priest did stop, but not because of Cadderly’s warning Out of the saiant hitting the pile with such tremendous force that those bodies on the opposite side of the pile, near Cadderly and Danica, bounced out to the side, then fell back and settled on the pile once more The scarred leader went quiet then for the first tiiant had probably crushed the h It roared and thrashed, launching bodies far to the side, then s them apart as they inevitably fell back into the pile

"How long will it last?" Danica asked Her darting eyes revealed her fear, for their was no apparent way for her and Cadderly to get out of the area Many of the , and that ferocious giant had not been badly wounded

Trepidation welled up within Cadderly, dark fears for what he must do to complete this battle He searched his spells, listened carefully to the song, seeking soh without further bloodshed But what of his friends? he wondered If they came out behind him, and the spell was no ain the raging priest atop the pile chanted; a soldier to the side of hier Cadderly’s way, but it was as if he were throwing up the side of a cliff, and the knife dropped back to the juiant clie face

Cadderly looked to Danica, to the gemstone, a hunk of a priest would ever face, none would be so agonizing as this trial of conscience He could not fail now, though, could not allow his oeakness to threaten his ion He waved his hand over the geain, teey

"Toss it," he instructed

"At theed as though it did notto the doorja

Danica still seemed not to understand, but she tossed the enchanted stone It followed a normal, expected course for a few feet, then crossed into the area warped by Cadderly’s spell and fell in an arcing, unerring curve to strike at the pile

With a blinding flash, all the jumble was aflaiant thrashed wildly, but had nowhere to run, could find nothing to roll in that was not also burning It went on for what see time, but was in reality ry flah another angled doorway and fell fifteen feet to hit the corridor floor with a resounding "Oof!"

Dazed, and unable to find his balance, the dwarf turned his gaze to the side and saw Vander - Vander’s furred boots, at least - stuer boots iant, probably, along with the dirty, naked feet of yet another ogre

Pikel knew that Vander needed hirunt and started to pull hi Ivan hit him squarely in the back The yellow-bearded dwarf bounced up fro Vander’s desperate situation The hill giant had Vander wrapped in its huge ar about theiant bellowed once more

Vander butted with his forehead, splattering the giant’s nose With a roar, the giant swung about and launched Vaft-der into the ith such force that it shook the whole corridor Vander bounced back a step, trying to get his sword up, but the ogre rushed in at his side and hit hiht into the side of his head