Free The Fifth Dawn by Cory Herndon Page B

of Krark sometime—you see the real talent.”

    The lower half of the lacuna took a while longer to traverse than the upper half, but then again, Glissa and Slobad were no longer plummeting. The elf girl was surprised to see smallanimals dashing and hiding amongst the brill moss and razor grass. She wondered if they’d been spontaneously summoned by the magic that still hung thick in the air, or if the little creatures had overcome fear of the unknown to colonize this strange new home. Some she recognized immediately, but a few were peculiar. Denizens of the interior, perhaps.
    Odd to think of the ground she had walked and hunted for so many years was only a silver eggshell surrounding a very large yolk, and she was reminded of the flare-vision that had struck her when they first arrived at Viridia.
    “You know,” Glissa said, “I think we might be paranoid after all. We’re almost through. If he doesn’t try something soon, we won’t be cornered anymore.”
    “What, you trying to get us killed?” Slobad hissed just ahead of her. “Don’t crazy elves know anything about bad luck, huh? Jinxes?”
    “Sorry,” Glissa said. “Just thinking out—”
    She froze in mid-sentence when a tall, humanoid figure materialized from thin air at the edge of the lacuna, maybe twenty feet in front of them. The glare from the mana core—what Slobad’s people, especially his friends in the Krark cult, referred to as “Mother’s Heart”—obscured the figure’s features and face, but a corona of silver outlined the shape. Slobad skidded to a halt and had his mandible-dagger drawn before Glissa could say a word.
    “It’s him, Glissa!” Slobad hissed.
    Glissa brandished her makeshift scimitar. “What do you want, Malil? You’re in my way, and you don’t want to be, trust me.” She hoped the stolen leveler’s scythe blade looked menacing as she added, “I’m here for Memnarch.”
    The metal man’s response was unexpected as it was perplexing. He tossed his head back and laughed. The sound was tinny, and betrayed something that bordered on mania.
    “Oh, you’re ‘here for Memnarch,’ is it?” Malil sneered, and stepped a few feet into the lacuna toward Glissa and Slobad. “You are right. Just not the way you think.” Memnarch’s lieutenant raised his right arm with a clenched fist, and flicked his silver hand at the wrist. In less than a second, a blade that rivaled Glissa’s stolen weapon slid into place, extending from the metal man’s forearm. The quicksilver blade glowed faintly in the dim light of the lacuna.
    It seemed like ages since someone had challenged her to a fair fight, and Glissa was sick of battling armies, judges, and mindless machines. She twirled her weapon and grinned. “Well, why don’t you correct me, then?” With her empty hand she threw a subtle wave to Slobad, hoping he would get the message: Stand clear.
    Artificial being though he might have been, Malil was easily goaded. With a metallic roar, he charged, the blade that his right arm had become raised high.
    Glissa once again focused on the spark. Malil was as much an artifact as the levelers. He didn’t know what he was getting into. Glissa’s inner eye saw the spark, saw magic dancing around it in her heart, and willed destruction at Memnarch’s charging lackey.
    Nothing happened. Again.
    Malil’s sword arm whistled through the air at Glissa’s skull, and she was able to raise her own weapon in time to deflect most of the blow, though the metal man drew first blood when his blade clipped Glissa’s shoulder on its way past her head. The powerful strike threw Glissa off-balance, but she recovered quickly and danced back, tossing her blade back and forth in her hands, taunting her foe. She hadn’t wanted to destroy this one quickly, anyway. And it would be good practice for fighting her true enemy.
    Glissa waited for Malil to relax slightly then swung in withan uppercut that her enemy blocked easily. She slashed back with