Chapter Eleven: MOTIVE AND MADNESS

"Why?" The old sorcerer's voice cracked with painful regret as he stared down upon his blood kin. Poseidon writhed on the floor in the grasp of the magical field, his features twisted with madness. "Poseidon, why?"

"It should have been me!" The man rolled onto all fours and snarled into the face of his uncle. "I'm your blood. It should have been me!"

Clarion shifted his gaze for an instant to Clairvoyant. His apprentice leaned against the stone wall of the dungeon-like chamber, clutching the arm that had been scraped by the chimera's fangs. The boy's attention was fixed on the captive with a mixture of pity and disgust.

"You don't have the power to be my successor, Poseidon."

Poseidon, crouched on the floor like an animal, faced the mage with insane fury. His once-handsome features were distorted by an angry sneer. "You replaced your uncle when your time came, Clarion. It is my birthright!"

Clarion's voice was hoarse with deep regrets. "I inherited the magic that was needed, son. Fate did not determine that role for you."

"I have the power now!" The madman lunged against the restricting shield. His body rebounded off the force with a bone-shattering crack. He landed on his back and scrambled, panting, to his hands and knees. Rigel watched in horror as Poseidon tried to transform himself. Face twisted with bestial insanity, the clouded image of the monster that had attacked a few moments before appeared like a veil around Poseidon. He screamed in mad agony as the specter faded once again, leaving the man on the floor defeated.

"A man who sells his soul for power's sake does not deserve to hold the position of High Mage, Poseidon." Disgust colored Clairvoyant's words as he watched the pathetic display.

Rigel clutched Aury to him as the trapped man aimed a second attack toward the apprentice. An animal growl surged from Poseidon's throat as he battered the shield with his body. The impact sent a network of sparks racing along its perimeter, and the air within it crackled electrically.

Clairvoyant never flinched, never changed his expression. He observed the madman's actions with serene confidence, trusting his mentor's magic field to reflect the assault. Voy shook his head in disdain as once again Poseidon hit the floor.

A parched voice snatched Rigel's thoughts from the violent scene before him--so faint that the sound barely reached his ears. "Rigel?"

The boy looked into the face of his Princess. Her eyes struggled to open; long lashes fluttered against her pale cheeks. She shifted in his arms. Her frail body's feeble attempts at movement brought his heart to his throat.

"I'm here, starshine," he whispered, and his voice cracked with emotion. "I've got you."

Clairvoyant tore his gaze from the pitiful figure trapped in the field, and moved toward Rigel and Auria. He still clutched the wounded arm, and his steps were sluggish.

"Are you all right?" Rigel asked in alarm. "You're hurt."

Rigel's words grabbed the attention of the ancient wizard. Clarion turned toward the trio as his apprentice knelt to examine the Princess. "Clairvoyant?" His tone was tinged with tender concern.

Voy laughed ruefully. "Our injected poison, Master, was actually venom." The teen glanced toward the scratches on his arm and reached his good hand to stroke Aury's pain-stricken face. The injured arm was paralyzed, and Rigel could see that it was starting to swell and discolor. "The punctures on the necks of his victims are the marks of the chimera's fangs."

"Venom . . . No!" Clarion gasped in shock and rushed to the young sorcerer's side. "Son, how much got into your blood? Let me examine you."

A roar from Poseidon shredded the air of the chamber as he took advantage of Clarion's distraction. He lunged against the restraining shield. It shattered in a blinding flash of light. As he raced for the door, the man's body shifted and transformed. It was the lion-head of the chimera that battered the ancient oaken portal and rendered it to splinters. The dragon-like tail trailed it into the hallway at blurring speed.

Rigel's instincts took over. He thrust the Princess into the stunned Clarion's arms and raced for the door in the monster's wake.

"Rigel, no!" Voy shouted after him and tried to rise to his feet.

The stable boy grabbed Clairvoyant's discarded wizard's staff and rushed from the room. "Take care of Aury. We can't let him get away," he shouted over his shoulder as his body pierced the darkness of the hallway. The staff in his hand flared to brilliant golden life as his thoughts touched it with an instinctive command. He did not take time to be surprised as the magic responded to him. His heightened senses picked out the sound of hooves on the stone floor in the darkness ahead. The eerie glow from the staff forged a path as Rigel followed the sounds.

Footsteps far behind him and a touch of deep magic told him that Clarion had followed. "Go back to Aury!" Rigel sent to the mage, his thoughts carried on a dart of angry magic.

"Clairvoyant is tending her. He will be all right. Very little venom entered those scratches, and his body is already fighting off the effects. Rigel--you cannot face a power like Poseidon alone!"

"I can't let him get away!" The boy cut off the mind of the ancient wizard as Clarion tried to protest. The last emotion that touched Rigel's thoughts as the connection snapped shut was shock. Clarion had not expected the youngster to be able to block his thoughts.

The distant sound of the monster moving through the hallways led Rigel to the foot of a steep stone stairwell. Shimmering light from the wizard's staff in his hand lit the passage that rose above him, and without hesitation he bound up the steps two at a time. Rigel never stopped to test the lock of the door at the summit. With his final leap he struck it with the staff, and it shattered.

The boy burst through the flying splinters, and into muted daylight. He found himself in a ground-floor room of an ancient mansion. Its high ceilings were shrouded in shadows, and cobwebs hung like tapestries in corners that had not been dusted in centuries. The sparse furnishings in the room were age-worn and faded--dry wood appeared ready to splinter with the least pressure; cushions were tattered with time and usage. Grayed paintings hung on the walls, so ancient that the faces in the portraits could no longer be distinguished. A hallway stretched away to his left, and a once-elegant stair wound upward at the boy's right hand.

Rigel swerved his senses in all directions. He hesitated for no more than a heartbeat, and raced up the stairs in the wake of the monster-man. He could feel Poseidon before him. Terror gripped the man's heart and moved the monster's body forward at an impossible pace. The dark youth followed the trail of fear, obsidian eyes fierce with power.

His senses led him upward, to one stairway and the next. He sprinted down a hallway whose hardwood flooring was polished slick with centuries of use, magic staff raised high before him. A small door at the end of the corridor hinted of attic stairs on the other side, and Rigel's psychic sense of touch could feel the echo of the chimera's passage through it. The ancient wood yielded easily to the strike of the boy's hand, and up the narrow stairs he raced. He burst through the door at the top of the stairs and found himself in a circular tower room.

Rigel lowered into a defensive half-crouch and looked around him. In the center of the room, fangs dripping venom, face contorted with maddened fear, was the cornered monster. Caution whispered into the boy's mind as he faced the beast, staff raised like a shield before him.

The oppressive aura of twisted magic saturated the air of the room. It closed in around the boy and made it difficult to breathe. Poseidon had fled to the very center of his potency. This was the place that he would be strongest--the focal point of all the dark energies he had amassed in his demented quest for power.

The chimera wasted no time. It gathered itself and lunged at the boy with a horrific roar. Rigel aimed the staff and sent a concentrated beam of energy toward the pouncing beast, knocking it backward with a pain-filled scream. The shock of the boy's force-filled defense immobilized Poseidon. His body twisted in pain, his face in confusion.

"You hurt Aury!" Rigel's fury drove him on in a rage-blind attack. He gathered all the magic that had been released from the depths of his spirit into a single concentrated force. His mind surged with incredible power as it grabbed the monstrous facade that covered Clarion's nephew, and wrenched it away.

Poseidon screeched in agony as the boy transformed him against his will. The beast persona separated from the human with a deafening shriek that shattered the air and rocked the very foundations of the ancient mansion. He gaped in shock at his young assailant. His body convulsed violently--rigid muscles flung him spread-eagle on his back and then snapped him into a tight fetal ball.

Rigel raised the wizard's staff high. The air around him glowed crimson with his rage.

"Rigel! No!" Clarion's voice brought him up short. "Son, you're bringing yourself down to his level. Never strike an enemy in thoughtless fury. Always temper your anger with humane control. Strong powers need to center in goodness--or else they will become like Poseidon."

The ancient wizard's words settled like a vapor into Rigel's subconscious. They massaged and soothed his heated spirit. The red aura that surrounded the boy softened to magenta . . . violet . . . blue, and pity tempered the anger that raged through his soul. As the young warrior lowered the staff, his gaze fixed on the squirming wretch at his feet, the sound of distant trumpets met his ears. Yrren was arriving, his armies in his wake.

Clarion touched the stable boy's arm. The master wizard's expression was soft with respect and understanding as he held something out to him. Rigel looked at the objects in the wizard's hands--it took a moment for his battle-dazed mind to grasp their meaning. Painful memories cleared his thoughts and forced him to comprehend. Rigel took the crystal restraining cuffs from the mage. He turned to Poseidon, whose face went white with insane fear at the sight of them.

"No!" the man screamed as the boy approached, and tried to wriggle backward out of his reach.

Clarion held his nephew fast with a grip of power. Intense sadness dulled the glitter in his eyes, and his face looked old and worn. The shame that rose from the innermost parts of the old mage's soul floated like a mist around him and saddened the very air of the room.

Rigel hovered over Poseidon for a moment, and then leaned forward, restraints held forth in steady hands. First one bracelet and then the other were touched to the wrists of the criminal, and they snapped into place. Poseidon screamed and clawed at the manacles, gnashing at them with his teeth like an animal caught in a trap. Bestial growls rose from his throat as he writhed upon the floor in the tower room. Rigel turned away in disgust.

A thousand hooves churned the air outside the mansion to rumbling thunder. Rigel could feel their vibration through the souls of his feet as Yrren's forces approached. Shouts and trumpet blasts came to a halt at the foot of the tower. The clang of harness, the creak of leather, the neighs of the excited horses rose up like a victory cry to the stable boy's tired ears.

Clarion threw open the only window in the room with a blast of magic.

"Sire!" The wizard's voice boomed with echoing power through the air, and fell upon the armies below with a force that silenced them at once. "Your daughter is safe! The criminal is in chains."

A deafening shout rocked the mansion as battalions of faithful soldiers rejoiced.