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.The elf archers reached the coach and took up positions with a view of the hillside.The great troll lumbered after them, but hadn't reached the coach.Iahn couldn't see the panther-headed creature—a problem, but one that would have to wait.Iahn's bolt sailed down the slope and buried itself in the chest of an archer.The elf cried out, then yelled, "I can hear you! I can." The elf crumpled onto the brown grass beneath the coach.The other archer loosed a shaft in return, but it cracked ineffectually on the dolmen pillar to Iahn's left.The archer, seeing her arrow fall, ducked behind the coach.She yelled out in Common, "Beware, poison bolts! Mohmafel is dead!"The troll reached the shelter of the coach and hunkered down before Iahn could fire a second venomous bolt.The vengeance taker scanned for Deamiel.Was the creature already sheltering behind the coach? No matter.Iahn yelled down the hill in Common."Stand still, or prepare to hear your doom.If the Voice is the last word to enter your ears before death, your soul is consigned to wander forever." He doubted the creatures understood his implication, but Iahn believed the threat might give them pause.The vengeance taker watched the coach.He saw no movement, heard no sounds.Like his adversaries, he didn't want to risk leaving the sanctuary of his dolmen.The blurring enchantment the taker had employed had dissipated.Iahn's quickslide to the coach had exhausted his small reservoir of arcane ability.Until he could renew it, the vengeance taker could rely only on his guile and skill.A hundred breaths passed without any movement.The sun reached its zenith in the empty sky.Heat blistered the bare scrublands.Iahn was like the rock he sheltered behind; how patient were his adversaries? In the vengeance taker's experience, his tolerance for boredom was rarely bested.Half-heard mutters from below preceded a sudden river of fog that streamed around, over, and past the coach, completely obscuring it.With the mist came cries and dreamy exhortations.Slender tendrils of mist extended from the mass, as if patting and feeling for sustenance.The diameter of the fog bank swelled.The vengeance taker envenomed another bolt from his damos.Deamiel, presumably, had manufactured a cloak of concealing vapor, a perfect blind from which to launch an attack.Iahn's eyes narrowed—from which portion of the mist would it come? Did the.The troll emerged from the mist, running up the slope with the speed of a bounding boulder.Iahn took a bead on the fast-approaching troll, but an arrow scorched his left arm, ruining his aim.The elf archer had gotten off a shot from just inside the fog's boundary!Iahn snatched a third bolt, taking the time to envenom it.The damos, too, was nearly spent this day.But the troll had to be dealt with, first and foremost.The charging troll reached the crown of Iahn's hill.A great gray hand grasped the dolmen pillar Iahn sheltered behind.The hand was followed by an enormous head that blotted out the sun.Iahn shot the bolt straight into the creature's left eye.It gasped out a word in a language the taker didn't know, then collapsed back down the slope.Iahn knew that the venom was more potent than the troll's ability to renew itself.He dropped the crossbow and snatched up his dragonfly blade.Not a moment too soon—black-furred Deamiel had run up the slope in the troll's wake.The creature, roaring, sprang on the vengeance taker from the other side of the dolmen.The crystal amulet on its breast suddenly blazed with a wavering, violet light.Moving with a speed Iahn could scarcely fathom, Deamiel struck him.The violent blow hurled the vengeance taker back ten paces.The world spun around Iahn as he tried to regain his feet.He kept his grip on the hilt of his dragonfly blade and used it to lever himself upright.Blood streamed from his cheek, and his left arm and shoulder were partly numb.The vengeance taker had assumed the troll was the greatest threat, but.Deamiel was on him, hiccupping horrid laughter.It picked him up in both hands, so swiftly that Iahn failed to resist, and as easily as if the vengeance taker were but a child.Deamiel screamed."Pandorym's blessing sings in my blood! Its will is mine, but.It.I.Pandorym! I am not."Deamiel's arms shook with some sort of inner struggle.Despite the creature's difficulty speaking, its grip was slowly tightening on Iahn's suspended body.More importantly, Iahn saw the crystal on Deamiel's breast pulse in tempo with its speech, word for word.One arm still free, Iahn brought the steel hilt of his dragonfly blade down on Deamiel's amulet.The crystal exploded.The midnight blaze that blossomed from the amulet transfixed Deamiel, but Iahn was blown clear.The vengeance taker fell painfully for the second time in about as many heartbeats.* * * * *Iahn did not stir when his senses returned.Instead, he studied the scene with slitted eyes.Deamiel lay near, still burning, its chest cavity an exploded, gory ruin.Not a pleasant sight, but he'd seen worse.Farther down the slope lay the crumpled form of the gray troll.Farther still, the mist-shrouded coach.Apparently, only an instant had elapsed since the amulet's destruction.As Iahn watched, the fog bank swirled, thinned, and blew away in ragged, evaporating streamers.The remaining elf archer was revealed, showing little concern.She moved cautiously, studied her elf comrade, then hiked up the slope to the troll.The crystal on her breast did not glow or flare.When she was close enough to Iahn, he sprang to his feet, catching one of her arms and twisting it painfully behind her back.Not all his skills brought death to his foes—some just delivered debilitating agony.Sometimes, final justice was not for a taker to dispense.Sometimes."Submit," Iahn demanded.The elf said nothing, but stopped struggling in his grip.The vengeance taker jerked the elf closer.With his teeth, he grabbed the leather strand holding her amulet.He jerked his head back and stripped the amulet from the archer's neck
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