The Crimson Legion (Prism Pentad) by Troy Denning

Author:Troy Denning [Denning, Troy]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
ISBN: 9780786961269
Publisher: Wizards of the Coast Publishing
Published: 2011-09-27T00:00:00+00:00

TEN

LIRR HUNT

A BEASTLY, DEEP THROATED ROAR BROKE THE NIGHT’S cold silence. The bellow rolled across the stony barrens for several seconds, wavering from one bass note to another in an eerie song that sent a shiver down Rikus’s spine. When the uncanny noise finally died away, it was answered by a similar wail far to the other side of the mul.

The cries hardly roused Rikus from his numb lethargy, and he did not even look up. Over the last few nights, the forlorn howls had become as much a part of the landscape as the stones that littered the parched ground upon which he walked.

The gladiator yawned and stumbled onward, every step a test of his determination. His good leg burned with such fatigue that he could hardly swing it forward. When he put the limb back down, the loose rocks turned beneath his foot. Inevitably, he had to catch himself on his makeshift walking staff, the headless shaft of a Urikite spear. Once his footing was secure, he dragged his injured leg, too numb and swollen to bend, over the rocks, then planted it besides the first. After bracing his crutch against his sore shoulder, he took a a moment to lift the heavy lids of his eyes, then started the process all over again.

So it had gone for the last four days as he tried to catch up to his legion. During that time, he had stopped only once, to fill his waterskin at an oasis. He had taken his meals along the way, catching snakes or locusts as he walked, then devouring them raw. Rikus had not even slept, for his legion had left such an obvious trail of churned sand and overturned stones that he could follow it by the light of Athas’s two moons.

Such exertion would have killed anyone else. In muls, however, the hardy constitution of the dwarven father enhanced the natural resilience of the human mother. When the need arose, such as now, they could drive themselves for days without sleep or rest. Still, as his eyelids drooped and a yawn rose to his jaws, it occurred to Rikus’s fatigue-numbed mind that he was dangerously close to collapse.

The sonorous notes of another morbid beast-song rolled across the plain, reminding the mul that he did not dare fall asleep. Less than a hundred feet ahead, the dark form of a lirr scrambled up a jumble of boulders and fixed its amber eyes on Rikus. As the mul watched, the saurian creature stood upright, using its thorny tail to cling to a boulder and balance its torso over its rear feet. The thing was about the size of a dwarf, with a tubular body armored by diamond-shaped scales as rough and hard as the stones upon which it stood.

Rikus altered his course so that it would take him directly toward the beast, calling, “Come on and fight!”

Though the mul had intended to shout the challenge, nothing more than a long croak escaped his swollen throat. He had run out of water two mornings ago.

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