open, bleeding wounds.
He spat out the last syllable just as agony suddenly coursed through his body.
The sun exploded within his tiny sanctum.
Tentacles melted away like ice caught in a furnace. Light so brilliant it blinded Krasus even with his eyes
shut tight filled every corner and crack. The wizard gasped and fell to the floor clutching his maimed
hand.
A hissing sound assailed his ears, sending his already heightened pulse racing more. Heat, incredible
heat, seared his skin. Krasus found himself praying for a swift end.
The hiss became a roar that rose and rose in intensity, almost as if a volcanic eruption were about to
take place in the very midst of the chamber. Krasus tried to look, but the light remained too
overwhelming. He pulled himself into a fetal position and prepared for the inevitable.
And then . . . the light simply ceased, plunging the chamber into a still darkness.
The master mage could not at first move. If theHungerhad come for him now, it would have found him
without the ability to resist. He lay there for several minutes, trying to regain his sense of reality and, when
he finally recalled it, stem the flow of blood from his terrible wound.
Krasus passed his good hand over the injured one, sealing the bloody gap. He would not be able to
repair the damage. Nothing touched by the dark spell could ever be regenerated.
He finally dared open his eyes. Even the unlit room initially appeared too bright, but, gradually, his eyes
adjusted. Krasus made out a couple of shadowed forms— furniture, he believed—but nothing more.
“Light . . .”the battered spellcaster muttered.
A small emerald sphere burst into being near the ceiling, shedding dim illumination across the chamber.
Krasus scanned his surroundings. Sure enough, the shapes he had seen were his remaining bits of
furniture. Only the chair had not survived. As for theHunger,it had been completely eradicated. The cost
had been great, but Krasus had triumphed.
Or perhaps not. So much catastrophe in the space of a few seconds, and he did not even have anything
to show for it. His attempt to probe the chateau of Lord Prestor had ended in defeat.
And yet . . . and yet . . .
Krasus dragged himself to his feet, summoned a new chair identical to the first. He fell into the chair
gasping. After a momentary glance at his ruined appendages to assure himself that the bleeding had
indeed stopped, the wizard summoned a blue crystal with which to once more view the noble's abode. A
horrific notion had just occurred to him, one that, after all that had happened, he believed he could now
verify with but a short, safe glimpse.
There!The traces of magic were evident. Krasus followed the traces further, watched their intertwining.
He had to be careful, lest he reawaken the foulness he had just escaped.
Verification came. The skill with which theEndless Hungerhad been cast, the complexity with which its essence had been altered so as to make his first counterattack unsuccessful—both pointed to knowledge
and technique beyond even that of the Kirin Tor, the best mages humanity and even the elves could offer.
But there was another race whose trafficking in magic went farther back than the elves.
“I know you now. . . .” Krasus gasped, summoning a view of Prestor's proud visage. “I know you now,
despite the form you wear!” He coughed, had to catch his breath. The ordeal had taken much out of
Krasus, but the realization of just whose power he had confronted in many ways struck him deeper than
any spell could have. “I know you—Deathwing!”
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