DragonStar fought to keep both his face and mind blank, but his thoughts were working far too furiously to be successful at either.
"You think," Qeteb said, "that you will use love to confound me, joy to confuse me, and forgiveness to emasculate me. Well," he leaned forward, his face red with fury, "none of those things will touch me! I am incapable of being touched by love or joy or forgiveness. They ceased many aeons ago to have any meaning forme!"
"And yet Caelum managed to —"
"Caelum infuriated me because he would not struggle against me. I found that... irritating. His love left me cold."
Ice spread over the table, covering wood and platter and glassware alike, and DragonStar had to jerk his hand away from his glass to save it from being similarly encased.
"Sheol may have been frightened by it," Qeteb continued, his voice now a vicious whip, "but your redemption will never, never, never touch me!"
"So why bring me here?" DragonStar said. "Why?"
"To explain the rules of this confrontation. The Star Dance and I have been jousting since the beginning of time. Now it has made you its final weapon. Your problem, DragonStar, is that you've only been around some forty years, and you have some catching up to do. Now," Qeteb leaned forward,
"listen up.
"You think that you and I must meet in a final confrontation. Correct?"
DragonStar nodded slowly, his eyes not leaving Qeteb's face.
"Well, in that you're right. You also believe that before you and I meet, there must be individual confrontations between your five and my five companions. Right?"
DragonStar nodded again, but even more cautiously.
Qeteb beamed, and sat back. "My dear chap, again you are perfectly correct! Well done!
"But," Qeteb's entire demeanour darkened, and became triumphantly malevolent, "although you instinctively know the broad outlines of the rules of the game, some of the subtle, legalistic niceties have entirely escaped your attention.
"Did you know, you starry-eyed piece of shit, did you have any realisation, that the confrontation between yours and mine will decide the outcome between you and me?"
DragonStar went cold. He desperately did not want to believe what Qeteb had said, but...
"You can feel the truth of the matter can't you?" Qeteb said. "Oh! You naive simpleton! You were so damned sure that because you think to represent the forces of righteousness and love and gods know what else, you think you will win!
"Wrong. Five of yours will meet five of mine. There can be no even score. If one of yours fails, you will be weakened, as I would be if one of mine failed. If two of yours fail, you would be seriously weakened, as I would. If three of yours fail, you will fail because the balance will have fallen in my favour. Do you understand?"
DragonStar stared, unable to speak.
Qeteb smiled slowly, and folded his arms across his chest. "You poor boy. You are upset. Well, I am prepared to be magnanimous. After all, me and mine have had far longer to think about it all, to prepare, than your sweet witches ... and isn't one of them pregnant? The poor girl! She must be quaking in her dainty boots! Therefore I will allow your witches the choice of weapons and place —
although you and I are more bound by the rules, of course."
There was a sweeping darkness, and a wind, and the faint cries of the Hunt through theMaze.
"You have lost Rox," said DragonStar. "Leagh doesn't have to —"
Qeteb snarled. "Know that Leagh will have to attend!" The Demon leaned forward again, swarming over the tabletop like a deformed spider. "I've had enough of this pretence, DragonStar! I brought you here to make sure you know, beyond any doubt, that you will die, DragonStar. To make sure you know beyond any doubt that you will fail. To make sure that you know beyond any doubt that everything you love and treasure will be swallowed up to live eternity in the dark, writhing masses of my belly. There is no way that your five can triumph over my five. I will hunt you through the Maze, StarSon.
And when I do the outcome will be inevitable!"
The four cats leapt screaming into the air, and DragonStar lifted his arms reflexively. As he did so, he felt Qeteb reach dark, clawed fingers into his mind.
DragonStar's body jerked and sat up.
"DragonStar?" Faraday said.
"No, you bitch," Qeteb whispered with DragonStar's voice. "Not your lover at all, but one who will nevertheless eventually love you anyway."
Faraday, as did everyone else in the room, jerked back in horror.
"DragonStar can do nothing against me," Qeteb continued, and he twisted DragonStar's features into a parody of a grin. "He will die, you will all die, and everything you love shall be utterly destroyed."
Axis' hand fiddled with his sword, and Qeteb saw, and laughed. "If you kill this body now, then you will still not touch me," he said. "Nothing can touch me."
DragonStar's hand jerked up and touched Faraday's face.
She scrambled back in horror.
"I can penetrate his mind at will," Qeteb said. "Take over his body at will. I can do it. Whose voice will issue forth at what time of the day? Whose orders will it mouth? Whose hands, Faraday, will caress your body?"
The Demon laughed, and DragonStar's body jerked in a violent fit. "I give you back DragonStar," the Demon said, "for he has some important information for you."
DragonStar's body gave one final jerk as Qeteb howled in laughter, and then it slumped back in its chair.
Chapter 22
The Sacred Groves
