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enabled Tyrus to maintain the glamour about them far more tightly than he
could if he must allow for an ordinary fire with its stinging smoke and fumes.
They gobbled half-frozen grain cakes and leathery dried motge meat, all that
was left of their stores. The horses ate their rations of meal and whinnied
for more. Uncertain of the future, their masters kept the brutes on short
supply. Water was running low, and the Cou-redh-yan warned
Tyrus and Erejzan not to eat snow. They filled waterskins with the eerie
flakes and laid the bottles beside the fire to melt the snow into drinking
water. Outside the glamour, beyond Tyrus' power to control, the howling went
on unendingly. They could not see the Death God's creatures, but the
sound was a burden as terrible as the cold. Exhausted, the men slept poorly,
jolted awake again and again by the bloodcurdling yowls in the darkness. Some
men seemed half-crazed with futile anger. Jathelle sat stiffly, her eyes
closed, as if she were trying to blot out the noise.
Within the glamour, there was warmth and life, but it had no power to keep out
the sound of the Death God's creatures, beasts immune to such sorcery.
Erejzan squatted beside Tyrus and whispered, "Vraduir would laugh at our woe
if he saw us thus. We cannot sleep while that clamor goes on. And you must
marshal your skills and hoard your strength."
"I think I can keep them at bay," Tyrus said absently, distracted by the many
demands on his magic.
"How long? There is no need." Erejzan flexed his hands and Tyrus began to
sense what his friend intended to do. "I have a way to deal with them, and
Vraduir will not know it is an invader, merely another beast."
"You should not& " Tyrus protested.
"Are they all true beasts?" Erejzan asked, his mind set and refusing to hear
arguments.
"There is a monitor, at the end of the valley, an illusion left there when
Vraduir came this way earlier," Tyrus said uneasily.
"Then you keep watch on that one. I will take care of the others."
"No!" Tyrus cried softly. "You do not even know how many there are."
Erejzan grinned slyly. "You underestimate me. There are four." He stared into
the blackness beyond the glamour, scratching his ice-fringed red beard. Then
he shrugged out of his cloak. He was eyeing Jathelle sidelong as he said, "I
need only kill two, and the others will feed on them and bs content. You& will
make sure LaRenya does not& "
Nodding, Tyrus still pleaded against the scheme. "It is too cold. Do not go."
"Open the glamour for me." Without heeding Tyrus' last warning,
Erejzan scuttled into the dark.
Picking up the discarded cloak, Tyrus held it tightly. Erejzan's body heat and
the smell of his sweat permeated the rough wool, aiding Tyrus'
sorcery. He felt Erejzan pressing lightly against the boundary of the glamour;
with a little sigh Tyrus separated its fabric a crack to let the shape-changer
through.
His will went with Erejzan, following his friend. Tyrus did not delve deeply
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into Erejzan's mind. Nevertheless, he was one with him, enduring as he had in
their shared cell on the outer island. His own body tensed with shock as
Erejzan took on another form, one far more powerful than any ordinary man. The
acrobat had no knife or sword, but he was weaponed with deadly fangs and
claws, his clothes replaced by thick fur.
He had become a man-ecar, a killer animal dangerously endowed with human
cunning.
Peculiar sensations twisted at Tyrus. He was Erejzan, running on all fours,
now slowing, stalking. He could see incredibly well, helped by the strange,
glowing snow. Ahead of him was a tusked abomination. The thing twisted to fend
off attack&
Too late! Tyrus, with Erejzan, was leaping, pouncing! Teeth and claws rent
scales and alien skin. Bones cracked between his jaws, and he was tasting&
Tyrus recoiled back into himself with a rush, shoving his knuckles against his
mouth to keep down his vomit. Out in the snowy darkness, one source of the
keening bubbled away in a death agony. For an instant, the other cries stopped
also. Then, smelling blood or ichoi, the other three creatures began yelping
eagerly.
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