No time did they have to rest. They were in the back of the mouth, and the heat billowing upward from the Scourge’s heart was like standing too near a fire.
Maddek ran across the pitted volcanic tongue, where wind whistled through the closed jaw. Aezil had not opened the cavernous mouth, but it was no cage. The huge teeth had gaps that even warriors of Maddek’s size could slip through.
He looked out now, bracing himself against the slow swaying of the head. Below, the Parsathean army had regrouped against the brainless soldiers. The Scourge was not yet advancing on them, every movement it made ponderous, careful.
He looked to Danoh. “Where was Aezil standing?”
“Between the eyes.”
Maddek looked up. Far above, in the ceiling of the mouth, a crevice opened up to the sky above—the nasal cavity, like a vent through the face.
“Perhaps we might climb up the inside of the mouth to reach that, and up to the face,” Ardyl said, “but I do not think we want to linger here for long.”
Maddek did not think so, either. An orange glow lit the back of the throat. “Kelir, Fassad, and I will climb up the cheek.” They rose like cliffs against the flat, broad nose. “Ardyl will lead Toric and Danoh around the back of the head and come down from the horns. We will approach Aezil and any guards he has from two directions.”
Ardyl knew these ruins as well as Kelir and he. “It will take us longer.”
“We will wait on the cheek.”
Nodding, she headed for the teeth. Maddek followed, then the others. The wolves wriggled through, surefootedly making their way along the edge of the jaw and back to the hinge, where Maddek, Kelir, and Fassad would climb the slope of the cheek toward the eye, and Ardyl would lead the others behind.
Wind buffeted the face of the Scourge, whipping at his linens. Still the sorcerer made no swift movements. Likely for the same reason Maddek feared that those swift movements would begin.
Climbing beneath the eye socket, he glanced over at Kelir. “Aezil is afraid of falling off.”
The other warrior grunted with amusement. “The whelp didn’t think this through.”
“Maddek.” Fassad’s grim voice pulled his gaze farther down. “The teeth.”
Molten rock dripped out between the gaps. The heat from within the mouth had not penetrated the rock they climbed, but the liquid fire steamed the air and fell to the ground, where flames sprang up amid the grasses.
These plains would not burn again.
Jaw set with determination, Maddek climbed higher. The bulge of the eye socket hid them from view of the face. A chirp nearby turned Maddek’s head. That sound he’d heard from Danoh countless times. Yet this one was not hers.
An infant drepa.
Maddek froze. Seeing the raptor, the other warriors followed suit. No fear did he have of the small reptile—but if that chirp became a squeal, an adult drepa would appear.
It chirped again, turning its angular head back and forth, the thin feathers around its neck waving with the movement. A full set of those thin feathers it would have when it grew. Just as its little claws would become razor-sharp sickles to tear open a gut.
The drepa hopped closer, then hopped away. Into the cavity of the eye socket it disappeared.
The molten stone dripping from the jaw had become a thick stream. The mouth was filling up with the fiery liquid. Steam poured from the vents above.
They had to cross those vents to reach the broad plane of the face. Ardyl could not be in place yet, but no longer could they wait, or they might be cooked while leaping across.
He gestured to Kelir, who nodded. Fassad and the wolves readied.
“I will jump across first. Then follow.”
During that jump, they would be exposed to any guards that Aezil might have waiting. So the others would cover while each one crossed.
Drawing his sword, Maddek gave the signal. As one, they surged up over the edge of the cheek, onto the flat plane of the face. He heard the shouts from Aezil’s guards as he sprinted a short distance, then made a flying leap through a blistering wave of heat.
He landed, then was pushed forward by an explosive burst of flames through vent.
“Steel!” Fassad shouted from the other side of the curtain of fire.
The wolf had jumped with Maddek. “He is here!” he shouted to the warrior, then met the charge of a Rugusian soldier with his sword. His curved blade was made for slicing through flesh when mounted, and Maddek had no frequent reason to use a sword against an armored man. Yet every armor had weaknesses and joints, and his blade swiftly tasted the soldier’s blood and flesh.
He heard Kelir’s roar, and then the warrior’s axe flew through the flames, slamming into another guard’s armored chest. With a snarl, Steel leapt for another, teeth slashing open the softest part of any man. The soldier’s screams abruptly ended when he doubled over and the wolf ripped out his throat.
Maddek grabbed up Kelir’s axe and raced to meet the next charge. Only a dozen guards. Those were fair enough odds. Snarling, he sliced open a gut, then met the next guard with silver claws through his neck. The heated glass stone beneath his boots grew slick with blood.
The red haze of battle filled his vision. All the guards he seemed to see, knowing as they came close, when they would move past each other to strike. Well trained, they were, but trained they would always be. Against the untamed viciousness of Maddek and the wolf, they fell.
The battle took them nearer the eye, the wolf at Maddek’s side when the guards’ dwindling numbers made them regroup and, instead of charging as one, join up into concerted attack. Chest heaving, Maddek defended against one sword and narrowly avoided the swing of another. With an upward slash, he split the guard’s arm from his body and kicked him back, then charged the next. The Rugusian died swiftly, and Maddek booted aside his head to meet the weakened swing from the guard’s remaining hand. Only one left, and Steel was on him.
A pained yelp brought Maddek racing, where the wolf wrestled wildly with the soldier, teeth clamped on the guard’s arm—and both of them dangling over the eye socket. With an angry grunt, Maddek cut off the guard’s head and lurched forward to catch the wolf by the ruff before he fell into the drepa’s nest.
He hauled back, and a streak of pain crossed his thigh. A crossbow bolt clattered against the stone. Teeth gritted, he dragged the wolf up, pivoting to face Aezil. The one-eyed sorcerer stood at a distance, watching Maddek with a curious gaze, and lowered his crossbow.
Maddek gave him a feral grin. “You have not your sister’s aim.”
“I have no need of it,” Aezil said.
Adjusting his grip on the bloodied handle of his sword, Maddek advanced on him—and staggered on the first step.