Gellor brought forth his ivory kanteel, adjusted one of the golden pegs, and gently stroked the silver strings of the little harp. A ripple of beautiful notes washed outward, and the demon-beasts reacted as if they had been struck by a tldal wave.
When the sounds from the enchanted strings of the instrument struck, fully a dozen of the massive monsters were bowled over, while a half-hundred of the lesser scavengers were blown away, some actually torn to pieces in the process. Gord saw that, noting that already fresh bands of these creatures were being attracted to the scene by what was occurring. Down and wounded horrors were being torn and devoured by those of their fellows not so disabled.
Courflamme seemed to spring from its scabbard as the young champion drew the sword's glittering blade to confront the onrush. Somehow Gord knew that this was the correct thing to do, even though the marvelous weapon seemed a minuscule defense in the face of such an attack. The pommel of Courflamme flashed heat, then chill to his hand, and the whole sword shimmered and pulsed.
As this occurred the blade sundered itself into two portions. Gord held a bright band of silvery hue with an ebon-flamed core while its counterpart, a sword of Jet with a coruscating heart of diamond radiance, sprang forth to hover before him.
Gord knew instinctively what he had to do. "Go!" he said aloud to the dark blade as if it were a living entity. "Seek the demons out — spare none!" As he uttered that command, Gord willed the weapon to arrow toward the monstrous pack that still came ahead. Many of the demon-beasts had escaped the effects of the kanteel's music, and these things still thundered on, bent on devouring him and his companion.
The sable-hued sword sped out as if it were a bolt. Straight through the leading behemoth it shot, passing through the demon-beast from front to rear. The thing shrieked in agony at the passage, gouts of gore fountained from it, and it collapsed into putrid jelly an instant later. That was hardly the end of it, however. The long blade arced and spun in the foul atmosphere of the uppermost layer of the Abyss as if it were a faicon after a flock of doves. Back it came, sliced through a saurian neck chopped tree-trunk legs from under another of the chimerical demons, gutted a fourth, lopped the outstretched pincers of a fifth — all in the space of as many heartbeats.
Gellor found it difficult to play his ivory harp. After the initial chords had been struck, the kanteel seemed to turn and twist as if it wished to escape his fingers. The troubador knew it was the evil of the nethersphere resisting the music, not the magical instrument. Bringing forth power from within, Gellor controlled it by building a mental image of the little harp held steadily. He pictured his hands grasping it firmly yet gently, and then thought of his long fingers touching its silvern strings. The forces bent on preventing its playing were pushed back dispelled. With a grim look of satisfaction at the success he had thus achieved, Gellor placed his fingertips upon the row of argent wires and once again sent out the sweet, ascending ripples of sound from the kanteel. Predatory demons a mile distant turned away from the wash of music he brought forth.
Initially Gord had concentrated on the ebon twin of the bright blade he clasped in his right hand. Its attacks upon the pack of great demon-beasts had been envisioned by him, and the sword seemed to respond as if it were an extension of the young champion's will. The herd of ringing lesser monstrosities no longer surrounded the two men. Those nearer to Gellor had been slain, wounded, or driven off by the music the bard brought forth from his magical harp. Before Gord, though, there was still a horde of howling horrors, and three or four of the towering demon-beasts were nearly upon him. Letting the dark brand do its work as it would, Gord prepared to face the onslaught with the shining portion he still held.
A leering thing with a froglike mouth splitting its wolverine head was almost upon the young champion. Despite its porcine body and flipper legs, the monster moved fast. Gord raised the diamond-bright part of Courflamme, aiming at the demon's outthrust head. The sword's tip suddenly spat forth a black bolt of force. The crackling ebon dart sheared off the top of the fiend's head, and the impact of it actually flipped the demon's massive body over in a somersault.
Without pausing to view his work Gord turned and faced his next foe, now aiming the long blade as if it were a wand. Again the inky core of the weapon sent forth a blast of dark power, and another of the charging demons died. It became almost mechanical thereafter Gord pointed the blade, willed destruction. and another monstrous beast crashed down dead. Again, again, yet again. Soon a half-circle of twitching demon corpses formed a barrier in front of him, a wall so great that the young champion could see nothing but its stinking height.
In desperation, Gord moved backward, readying for yet more of the terrible things to come pouring over the barrier of corpses. "I'll blast you all!" he shouted defiantly, cutting a semicircle in the air before him with the bright blade. The gesture brought a withering geyser of soot-tongued flame from the sword's crystal tip, and the inferno of black fire disintegrated the reeking pile of demon-flesh. A dozen of the smaller beasts, busy feeding on the bodies of their larger kin, were caught by the torrent of destruction and likewise made into corpses. A handful of the massive fiends, the slowest of the pack, suddenly floundered to a halt at the sight of what had occurred. Even such minuscule brains as theirs could discern the fate that awaited, should they come closer to the small man who had seemed such easy prey. They flopped and rolled and turned, seeking escape.
Gord didn't allow that. Even as his comrade sent forth fresh ripples of sweet sound to play havoc among those demons who still opposed the troubador, Gord leaped through the breach in the massive wall of dead fiends, and with arm outstretched brought his blade into play again. It was as if he were skewering tied fowls. Black radiance sped from Courflamme's point, and a lumbering thing convulsed in its death agony. Another elephantine demon shot yards into the air as the burning ebon force struck and slew it. Foul thing after even more disgusting one yammered and went into nothingness as the weapon sent its destruction through each in turn. Straight as arrows the bolts of force sped, well beyond the range of the best bows. In minutes not a single living demon was anywhere in sight before Gord. Then the young man turned to see how Gellor was faring.
A rippling peal of harmony greeted Gord's turning. "Most impressive, my young friend," Gellor told him with a second little run of the kanteel's silver strings as an accent to the compliment. "My little harp sent the demons tumbling and breaking well enough — but that blade of yours spits out magical bolts as if it were Cabbac's own Baton of Blazes."
"Not an impossible inspiration, Gellor. After all, the Uncaring One is of neutral disposition," Gord said dryly. Both men chuckled, for they knew that the god of all magics was indeed uninterested in affairs of any sort except those that pertained directly to dweomers and their spinning. Cabbac did not prevent his lieutenant from siding with Balance, but the father of magics himself remained purposely unaware, aloof. "Seriously, though, I do think that one of the Twelve Great Magicks of Cabbac was set within the sword."
"Quite possible," Gellor concurred as he eyed the desolate, dun landscape that stretched into infinity around them. Leprous ochre growths and lIvid gashes of terra cotta were the only relief to the dull, decayed brown that colored this part of the plane. "Ugh!" the troubador added, noticing the ground that squished under his feet for the first time since the two had trod upon this tier of the Abyss. "Nothing in this place is right or clean!"