Opening the portal had taken more than two thousand Energy, which was probably a significant amount. Still, Olivia could have done it almost three times in a row with her Energy stores. Squeezing tightly to Bronwyn’s hand, she stepped into the portal and felt her friend coming in after her. Though darkness enveloped her, and there was no feeling of air or movement, she felt like she was being thrust through inter-dimensional space with incredible power. She couldn't say whether it was an effect of Morgan’s tower amplifying her Energy or the keystone that Bronwyn had obtained, but the teleportation through the portal was swift. One minute they were in the tower; the next, she was stepping onto hard-packed, sandy dirt under a moonless, star-filled sky.

“Who’s there?” A panicked voice hissed. Olivia looked toward the speaker, seeing a huddled group of Ardeni limned in the red light of the portal.

“We’re friends. Where’s Morgan?” Bronwyn said, stepping up next to Olivia.

“Morgan? The big fellow who rescued us? He’s insane; he went to sneak into the invader’s base.” A taller, smooth-headed man said, standing up and moving a bit closer.

“I’ve got his tracks,” Bronwyn said, moving around the portal and pointing up the side of a nearby hill.

“Wow! That makes things easier,” Olivia said. She turned to the huddled Ardeni. “Are there more people in need of help? Why did Morgan go to sneak into their base?”

“Yes! He said he saw lots of captives in pens. He wanted to sneak in to try to figure out a way to get us out of here,” a woman replied, moving up next to the taller, bald man.

“Alright, well, we’ve got a way out, but we’re on a time crunch. I need one of you to step up and come with us; if we find people that need rescuing, I’ll want someone to lead them back to the portal.” The huddled Ardeni looked at each other, eyes wide as they glanced at the portal. The first man who had spoken to them shrugged and stepped closer to Bronwyn.

“My name’s Sento. I’ll come.”

“Great,” Olivia said, pointing at the portal. “The rest of you through there. You’ll be safely back on Fanwath. Lead the way, Bron.” She gestured up the slope, and Bronwyn didn’t wait for any second-guessing; she just trotted right up the side of the hill, and Olivia had to hustle after her. She was thankful for her new boots; no matter how the gravel and sandy dirt tried to slip out from under her, she never lost her footing. She could hear Sento panting behind her as he scrabbled up.

Bronwyn didn’t slow, loping easily up and down the sandy hills, avoiding the strange cacti that looked like triangular shadows in the darkness. After a short while, Bronwyn scrambled up a steep ridgeline, and Olivia had to strain to keep up. She took her eyes off Bronwyn to look for handholds, and when she finally scrabbled to the top, with Sento grunting quite a ways behind her, she was surprised to find Bronwyn laying on her belly looking out over a settlement of some sort.

“Get down,” Bronwyn hissed. Olivia dropped to her hands and knees, scooting up to lay next to Bronwyn.

“What do we have here?” Olivia whispered, looking out over the strange scene. A small lake, illuminated by scattered light posts and reflecting the stars above, sat at the base of the ridgeline. All around it were dark, rounded walls made into the shapes of pens, and Olivia could see huddled people lying, pacing, or sitting within them. A squat pyramid rose above the desert floor at the far end of the lake, dark openings on several of its tiers yawning into dimly lit tunnels.

“Look,” Bronwyn said, pointing to an oversized shape that seemed to be patrolling up and down one of the lanes between pens. From there, it looked like a giant, hunched man, bathed in shadow, but when it stepped into the light of one of the posts, Olivia saw that it was unclothed and dark gray. Now that she’d seen one, she spotted dozens more of the creatures pacing around the pens.

“Guards?” she asked as Sento finally gained the top of the ridge and fell down onto all fours, panting. “Sento, are those big gray guys walking around the ones that kidnapped you all?”

“Yes,” he said, finally gathering his breath. “Your friend called them garboils or something.”

“Gargoyles?” Bronwyn asked.

“That’s it.” He nodded, grunting as he tried to scoot forward on his belly.

“Well, should we try to get these captives moving back to the portal? We’ll have to fight those guards at least, but if we can get everyone running, we might be able to hold them off.” Bronwyn fidgeted, then added, “We only have around half an hour ‘til that portal closes.”

“I don’t know; what if there’re thousands of those things in that pyramid?” Olivia asked, frowning. “I hate to say this, but maybe I should go back through the portal, so I can keep it open while you try to figure out where Morgan is.”

“Yeah, that might be the best move…” Bronwyn was cut off as a loud, reverberating klaxon blared forth from the pyramid. It sounded like a dozen discordant horns being blown at once, and it instantly changed the scene below: captives jumped to their feet, jostling to see what was going on, and the gargoyles on patrol all started running toward the pyramid. “What the fuck?” Bronwyn stood up, squatting down, ready for action.

“I feel like this might be the time to move; this feels like Morgan is up to something,” Olivia said, also climbing to her feet.

“If the number of gargoyles charging into that big tunnel is any indication, he’s going to have his hands full. We better move!” Bronwyn yelled, already starting down the slope.

“Come on, Sento! You’ve got to let these prisoners out and get them back to the portal! Bronwyn and I are going to find our friend.” Olivia charged down the slope after Bronwyn, trusting her boots to keep her from slipping. Soon they were racing around the edge of the little lake, running full tilt toward the pyramid; there weren’t any of the “gargoyles” in sight, having all run into the big tunnel on the first tier of the structure. “Can you still see Morgan’s tracks?” she called to Bronwyn. Damn, but she was fast!

“Yes! I can see where he climbed the wall!” She ran around the pen where, presumably, Morgan had climbed in, but she didn’t turn back to the gate when she circled the corner, charging ahead toward the steps leading up to the tunnel. “I saw his tracks coming out of that pen,” she called back. “He’s gone up the steps!” Bronwyn was pulling ahead of Olivia, and she didn’t show any sign of slowing. Olivia dug deep, running as hard as she could, wishing she’d learned some spells that would allow her to move faster. She couldn’t stop her mind from theorizing ways to utilize wind spells with her air Elemental Form to make her run faster, but she shook her head, focusing on the moment.

When they gained the top of the steps and Bronwyn charged into the tunnel, Olivia paused to look back. She could already see people streaming out of some of the pens; Sento had done as she asked. Hopefully, they’d all work together to release as many as possible. She didn’t know who all was held in those pens, but anyone kidnapped and living in captivity deserved to be freed as far as she was concerned. She turned and charged after Bronwyn. The dark tunnel gave her pause, for the first time fearing she might lose Bronwyn. She yelled ahead, “Bronwyn, wait! I can’t track!”

The tunnel was lit with weird chunks of red-range crystal that shone periodically out of the mud-caked ceiling or high on the walls. In the dim, creepy light, she was relieved to see Bronwyn slow down and turn to look at her, waving her forward impatiently. “I’m running as fast as I can,” she softly called as she got closer.

“Yeah, I’m sorry, look, I can see Morgan’s tracks cause they’re tons brighter than the gargoyle tracks, which, by the way, the System calls ‘Rakeyda’ tracks, but there are fucking shit loads of those things. I mean, I can’t count them all cause they’re all piled on top of each other, but it’s in the hundreds.”

‘Well, we need to hurry, not just for Morgan, but for the portal! I’ll try to keep up.” Olivia started jogging, and Bronwyn hurried past her, leading the way. She took a sloping tunnel to the right, and Olivia could see that the dried-mud ground had seen a lot of traffic, even without Bronwyn’s tracking skill.

“His tracks go this way, but so do all the Rakeyda tracks. Some look really old and faint, but hundreds are bright and fresh.” They continued, jogging up the tunnel, ever climbing as the tunnel wound upward through the gargoyle, or “Rakeyda” lair. Their spiral climb had grown tighter, and Olivia felt like they must be nearing the top when some figures charged around the corner, racing toward them.

A tall Ardeni man, followed by a dozen or so other types of people from a burly Urghat, to several bird-like people, to a diminutive little lady with the features of a rodent, came charging toward them, eyes wide with panic. They were covered with mud and gore, and they slid to a halt when they saw Bronwyn and Olivia. “Run! The invaders are busy fighting a madman!” the Ardeni hollered as he got close.

“We’re going to help him! How many invaders?”

“Hundreds! You won’t get to him; he’s fighting a retreating battle up another tunnel; the invaders are between you and him! Run!” He didn’t listen to their protestations or to Olivia when she shouted about the portal. The crowd of escaped prisoners rushed past them, taking little care not to jostle or shove the two women.

“Can’t blame them; they look like they’ve been through hell,” Bronwyn said, starting up her jog again. Olivia followed her wordlessly. After a short while, they came to a large chamber littered with Rakeyda corpses. Olivia saw a handful of other dead people, but the gray gargoyle-like corpses made up the vast majority. Bronwyn stopped in her tracks, pulling her collar up over her nose, and Olivia held a sleeve over her own mouth when the scent hit her—the air was warm and damp, and the overpowering stench of spilled guts and bile made it very difficult to breathe.

“Good grief!” she hissed, scanning the room for any sign of Morgan.

“Did he do all this?” Bronwyn walked into the room, careful not to step in the puddles of blood and gore. Empty, bubbling, green-crystal vats occupied the center of the big room. Some of them were cracked with their contents dripping down into large, pungent puddles. They were working their way through the room, scanning for signs of Morgan, when a terrible screaming roar cut through the distant sound of the alarm klaxon. Bronwyn turned toward the sound; it had emanated from the mouth of a narrower tunnel that led away from the room, up into further heights.

“We should…” Olivia cut herself off as Bronwyn started sprinting toward the tunnel. “Here’s hoping one of us can get back to the portal in time,” she sighed, running after her. She figured they still had twenty minutes or so before the portal collapsed, and she was pretty sure Morgan or Bronwyn could make it back in less than ten. Hopefully, one of them would be able to get it open again if Olivia couldn’t make it.

When she entered the tunnel, she saw that it had a door that had been slammed into the wall so hard that the hinges had broken, and the mud-caked wall had cracked and crumbled into a pile around it. She charged up the narrower tunnel after Bronwyn, hopping over bloody, broken, gray corpses with every few steps. This new tunnel was very steep, and, once again, Olivia thanked her new boots; she made several missteps into puddles of gore and was sure she’d of slipped onto her face had it not been for the magical footwear.

She had to scrabble over a small pile of corpses to catch up to Bronwyn, but when she did, the other woman held her back. “Get ready; they’re just ahead, around this corner; are you sure you can fight?”

“Oh, I can do better than fight,” Olivia said. “Just don’t stand in front of me when things go sideways.” With that, the two women stepped around the final corner to look into a high-ceilinged, square room about forty feet across. A small horde of gray, roiling, thrashing beings, some tall and hulking, others thin with wings, and still others, standing near the back, wearing robes and wielding beams of scarlet Energy, had cornered a familiar figure. Morgan stood with his back to the room’s corner, his long, black sword sweeping left to right, keeping the creatures at bay.

His eyes were wild, and his tall, black-clad body was surging with stolen red Energy. When the gargoyles in the front were pushed into a charge, they seemed to overwhelm him for a second, and then a rip in reality made Olivia doubt her senses for a moment; was she losing consciousness? Then the sound came to her—a rending of light and space and time, a sound so strange and so against nature that her hackles rose and her mouth filled with saliva as though her body was preparing to purge a poison. A black globe of nothing spread out from Morgan, decimating the front row of Rakeyda, causing them to turn and try to flee in panic. When the bubble faded, Morgan was standing among a pile of broken corpses, brandishing his sword, waiting for the next wave.

“Look!” Bronwyn said, pointing to the other side of the room. Another Rakeyda variant was standing on a platform, hurriedly flipping levers and moving crystals around on a control panel of some sort. Tubes ran from the control panel to several large vats lining the wall, where Olivia could see humanoid shapes floating in green bubbling liquid. The Rakeyda on the platform was enormously tall with massive wings and wearing a shimmering silver robe.

“I’ll help Morgan! You go try to deal with that guy!” Olivia shouted. Bronwyn nodded and charged forward, and that’s when the entire pyramid shuddered, vibrating like it was on top of a giant snare drum. The klaxon, still droning away outside, cut off, and a different sound commenced; something like a giant jet engine or train. Olivia kept her feet, thanks to her boots, but nearly everyone else in the room stumbled when the rapid vibrations rolled through the chamber.

“Stop him!” Morgan roared, and Olivia turned to see him pointing his sword at the tall, silver-robed Rakeyda.