Isle Of The Dead   ::   Zelazny Roger

A consciousness touched my own, then Belion's--for I could feel the reflex that shrugged off the latter. Then the green one cried out and drew the dwarf away.

My enemy took his first step and the ground shuddered beneath it, slipped in places, collapsed upon itself.

The winds beat at him as he took his second step, and he fell to the ground, causing fissures to open about him. I fell with my second step as the ground gave way beneath me.

As we lay there, the isle gave a shaking, shrugging twist to our shoulder of rock, and it slid and settled and smoke came up from the cracks within it.

When we rose and took our third step, we stood in a nearly level place. I shattered the rocks about him as I took my fourth step; and with his, he toppled rocks toward me from above. Five was the wind and six was the rain, and his were the fire and the earth.

The volcanos lit up the lower sky and fought with my lightnings for the upper. The winds lashed the waters below us, and we continued to sink toward them with each jogging of the isle. I heard their splashing, within the wind, the thunder, the explosions, the constant _plit-plit_ of the rain. At my enemy's back, the partly crumbled chalet still burned.

With my twelfth step, the cyclones arose; and with his the entire isle began to sway and creak, the fumes coming heavier and more noxious now.

Then something touched me in a way that I should not be touched, and I looked for the cause.

The green man stood on a crag of rock, holding a weapon in his hands. A moment earlier, it had hung at my side, not to be used for the gaining of cycles such as this.

He pointed it first at me. Then his hand wavered and, before I could strike him, jerked to his right.

A line of light leaped forward and my enemy fell.

But the movement of the isle saved him. For the green man fell as it shuddered, and the weapon fell away. Then my enemy rose again, leaving his right hand on the ground beside him. He held the wrist in his left and stepped toward me.

Chasms began to open about us, and it was then that I saw the girl.

She had emerged from the burning building and edged around to the right of us, in the direction of the trail I had descended. Then she had been frozen for a time, watching our slow advance, one upon the other. Now she caught my attention as the chasm opened before her; and something cried out within my breast, for I knew that I could not reach her to save her.

... Then it broke, and I shuddered and ran toward her, for Shimbo was gone.

"Kathy!" I screamed, once, as she swayed and fell forward.

...