Luck in the Shadows

twin lights he still carried to increased brilliance andhurled them before him, charging over the maimed bodies of his companions. The obscene specterswelled in his vision and was gone, taking the awful pile of corpses with it.
    Before him stood the possessor of the Voice, and Nysander's grief crystallized into stony terror.The huge figure was shrouded in shadow except where light fell across one perfect, golden-skinned shoulder.
    He stared at it, trying to see his foe in spite of his mounting dread. He could feel the cold powerof its eyes upon him; it burned his flesh numb like the water of a winter stream.
    Then it raised its hand in greeting and the shining skin of shoulder and arm and hand split likerotten cloth, hanging in dulled shreds from the putrid flesh swelling beneath it.
    "Welcome, O Guardian," it said. "You have been most faithful."
    Lurching out of the shadows, the thing smashed a fist through the smooth stone wall as if it were a paper screen, reaching into the cavity beyond—
    Nysander leapt up from his chair, panting and drenched with sweat. The fire was nearly dead and the room was full of shadows.
    "O Illior!" he groaned, pressing a hand over his eyes. "Must I be the one who sees the end of it?"
    To Be Continued.
    About the Author
    Lynn Flewelling grew up in presque isle, maine. since receiving a degree in english from the University of Maine in 1981, she has studied veterinary medicine at Oregon State, classical Greek at Georgetown University, and worked as a personnel generalist, landlord, teacher, necropsy technician, advertising copywriter, and freelance journalist, more or less in that order. She currently lives in Bangor with her husband, two sons, and other assorted mammals.
    About this Title
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