Ruyo used the cover of the shimmering magic wall to study the towers. They flickered again and she ruled out the nearest one right away. But how about the ones to her right? She dashed in that direction and glanced back over one shoulder. "Is there any way to disrupt that thing? Or the illusions?"

Nusina followed her, making the ice elementals spray a mist into the air. Somehow it was weakening the beams, turning them into rainbows. "Remember, the ward weakens all divine power here. Ordinary elemental power will work better. Um. I'm thinking."

Ruyo flung as much water as she could behind her. She wasn't sure how to make a continuous mist but maybe it'd help. She reached the nearest tower and ran through its door. Since the building was just a shell around the stone pillar it contained, she was in a narrow circular hall. She ran all the way around it to be sure nothing was hidden there.

"It's coming for you!" Arneson shouted. The moment Ruyo reached the door again she saw the wheel flying closer, and she dodged just in time to avoid more searing beams.

Ruyo said, "Nusina, can we bounce its own beams off the windows, like mirrors?"

"Maybe?"

The monks harried it with prayers and their knives. But most of its spinning, shining attacks were aimed at her, blasting the doorway. "Lift me up the outside, to a window?"

The spirit enveloped her with the water she carried, and splashed her way out of the tower. She flowed up the building's side. More beams shot out at her, striking the tower walls and making the wall cease to exist for an instant. Ruyo barely suppressed a yell of fright as she tried to hold her breath. Nusina caught her again and shot up to where the window was. "We're going to drop in a moment," she said.

A single white-hot eye opened on the wheel. Nusina plunged, saying, "Fall flat!" Just overhead the light struck the mirror and bounced... upward into the hazy sky. Wasn't it supposed to bounce right back?

Just then, Nusina hit the ground. Ruyo let herself flatten out to land on her chest. With the water-ball around her the impact was only jarring. Nusina flowed away to let her gasp and cough for breath.

Matthias said, "We need to get out of here!"

No! This damned evil god needed fighting, and she was right here, and it hadn't even tried to talk before shooting at her! "Nusina. Water affects the beams. Can we make a mirror and aim it?"

"Ice. As smooth as possible, like this."

Nusina split her hoard of water into blocks, flattening them into shining sheets and standing them upright. Ruyo tried to do likewise, holding one block before her like a shield. While the monks tried to get its attention, the monster flashed out at her again. This time, Ruyo held her ice out and the beam struck it dead on, bouncing back to sear the wheel itself. It ignited, becoming a smoking wheel of eyes and killing light. "I think that's an improvement?" she said, frantically trying to repair the hole burned into her shield. More beams shot out, striking Nusina's barriers and scattering in a light show that struck towers across the cave.

"I see it!" said Arneson, pointing to one of the distant pillars. Ruyo saw only the false walls but she was distracted. Badly enough that claws of light ripped along her legs, burning her instantly. She screamed and fell back, throwing water into the beams' path.

Nusina raised walls of ice, making parts of them mirror-smooth where she could. From behind these Ruyo tried to draw the monster's attention. The monks got aggressive with their shouts and spells but the wheel slashed out at them. Arneson took the worst of it this time, collapsing to his knees and patting at his chest where his robe had caught fire.

"Nusina, help them!"

The spirit flitted off to fling water at Arneson, soaking him. She did it to Matthias too for good measure. Ruyo stood behind one of the mirror shards and shouted, "Hey, wagon-face!"

In response a stray beam struck Ruyo's head. She staggered and fell back behind cover, using magic to soak her face. Her vision danced with spots and everything was dim.

Nusina joined in with the monks to harass and threaten the wheel. The icy elementals filled the space between them with mist, blunting another spray of light.

Ruyo stood up and grabbed another frosty mirror. Six eyes opened at once. Ruyo's vision was starting to clear, while the eyes glowed. She threw herself forward, willing her watery aura to flare up and catch her as she tumbled. She hit the ground gently and the spell rolled her like a wave, back up to her feet. Just in time; another eye had opened.

She held up her shield. An intense beam shot out, piercing the fog and steam around her, and bounced back in a tight letter "V". The ice was melting and cracking under the attack, but she held her ground and tilted it to sweep right across the wheel, catching the eye dead on. The spinning circle screeched and exploded into fragments flying off in all directions. Flaming wreckage sailed past Ruyo. Now there was a crater where the biggest piece had crashed, twitching feebly and burning away slowly to blackened shards.

Ruyo limped over to the monks, blinking rapidly to get the dazzling spots out of her vision. "Are you all right?"

Both men were singed, their clothes scorched, and were out of breath. Matthias was leaning on the younger Arneson, but they both nodded.

Ruyo took a breath. "Well. That takes care of your evil god problem."

Matthias said, "That? That was just a servant."

Ruyo swore loudly. "Let's get out of here and regroup."

Nusina said, "These fragments might be useful."

Ruyo gently kicked one. It looked like a fragment of curved bone with a blister where an eyeball had been. She shuddered. "Are these safe to take with us?" she asked the monks.

They examined a few of the more intact pieces. Matthias said, "These pieces carry the taint of the Unspoken One, but they're not literally pieces of it. If they'd be useful to your studies I don't see any danger in taking them."

Reluctantly, Ruyo picked up a few fragments and stuffed them in her pockets. The monks took a few too. Then they headed for where Arneson had said he saw the stairs for a moment.

Ruyo said to Nusina, "I had suggested wrecking the room where this god is confined, but it'd be a tall order."

"This is some sort of folded space, not simply the basement."

"That doesn't tell me much," Ruyo said, looking around for trouble. Her elementals scuttled slowly after her.

"I'll explain what little I know when we're out of here."

Arneson said, "I'd love to hear your theories. We've been speculating for generations."

The next flicker of the illusory world showed clearly that there was a rough-hewn spiral staircase hidden in a tower. There were no handholds, making it a frightening trip. "Careful, everyone," Matthias said.

Nusina floated nearby with a ball of water, sticking to the stonework. "I can catch you."

Ruyo said, "Can you levitate while carrying someone?"

"No. There's this property called adhesion... which again is a lesson for later."

Now and again the tower walls around them vanished, putting the staircase in open air. During those alarming moments the Pale City surrounded them: a cave with no life, no noise but their footsteps on stone.

Ruyo said, "What can we expect up above? Emerging back in the temple?"

Matthias, out of breath, said, "I doubt it. Our records say it can't keep people here who're determined to leave, so our actions right now will take us out. But I doubt the master of this foul geometry will let us go without even seeing you."

A stone room seemed to hang in the air above them, and the staircase led up into it. She hadn't seen it until just now. She and Matthias climbed farther. Matthias reached the top first. He said, "Headbands! It's here!"

Ruyo checked her suppressive headband and walked up second into a room of broken white marble. Someone was pinned beneath rubble! Ruyo started toward the prone, helpless figure, then realized the scale of the room. It was far larger than she'd assumed, and the beautiful man with rune-carved stonework crushing his spine was at least three times her size.

He, it, wore a white robe over skin like grey marble and hair that pooled around him in shiny black puddles. His open, pleading eyes blazed white, too bright to look at. Only his right hand was free to move, and it held an oversized scroll, small in his palm, as though offering it to Ruyo. His lips moved. The room slowly pulsed with a heartbeat she could feel in her bones.

Nusina shed her supply of water and clung to Ruyo's left shoulder. "I... I understand a little of what this monster is saying. Should I repeat it? Oh, please don't do anything it says!"

Ruyo patted Nusina, mostly to reassure herself. "I won't. But what is it saying?"

The God of Light spoke again, looking only at Ruyo, and let out a pained smile. According to Nusina, it said, "Sorry for trouble. Kin. Help. Use this gift."

Matthias stepped back from the pinned god, and pointed toward another upward staircase, this one seeming just like the one leading back to reality and the temple. "You've seen it. We can go now."

Ruyo held up one hand. "A moment. Can this... being understand me?"

Its lips moved. Nusina said, "I want to lie to you, milady, but I won't. It claims that it can understand you. It offers to teach you the old tongue, if you'll remove the headband. Don't do it!"

Chunks of the ceiling had caved in long ago. What was this place originally? A temple or magical wellspring like her own, or a trap laid for the god? There was so much to learn about the Lost World, so much more she could accomplish if she could just ask someone whose memory hadn't been lost. Who was she to judge the morality of this unknown, suffering creature, based only on stories from a band of monks who'd recently tried to kill her? Why, it was righteous to hear the poor prisoner out at the very least!

Ruyo wasn't entirely sure these thoughts were her own, and that was what stopped her.

She stepped backward as though leaving the presence of a king, or someone who might stab her. The God of Light opened his lips in a silent plea, his hand outstretched, offering so much for so little. Ruyo made herself turn away and run up the stairs with Brother Matthias, with Nusina hurrying after her. Whatever hidden price there might be, she didn't want to pay.

The monk led Ruyo up to the temple, in the comfort and light of the normal world where the laws of physics made sense. He and Ruyo pushed the altar back into place to block the entrance. "And good riddance to it!" said Ruyo, letting out a sigh. She was glad they'd all gotten out safely.