Was he as powerful as he thought? Did this multiple spell hold traps of which he was unaware? Had he committed too much of his power too soon? Gut-wrenching terror chewed at his self-confidence, but he dared not admit it. Not in front of Kiska.

“Let’s not tarry. Our destiny lies in wait beyond.”

With more confidence than he felt, he walked forward. Lan’s eyes blinked as he passed under the stone archway. A slight electric tingle of spell had not been driven off, but it was a minor annoyance. He flicked it away as if it were nothing more than a buzzing insect.

He entered the chamber containing Claybore’s legs.

“There they are!” cried Kiska. “Claybore’s lost limbs.”

Lan restrained her. She tried to bolt forward and seize the beaten copper coffins holding those legs.

“The exterior protective spells are gone. Others remain. How else could those legs stay preserved?”

“Claybore is immortal. His parts are, too.”

Lan reeled at the notion. For whatever reason, this had never occurred to him. He studied the twin coffins and saw the spells woven through the fabric of the metal and flesh within and knew that Kiska was right. The spells the mage Lirory had placed on the legs bound them to this time and place; preservation was accomplished on a more fundamental level, one fraught with magics that even Lan did not pretend to understand.

“They can be destroyed,” he said, more to maintain the fiction of his superiority than anything else. Showing ignorance in front of Kiska bothered him more than he cared to admit.

“Of course they can be destroyed,” came a voice all too familiar from previous encounters. The words did not sound against air as others’ words might, but echoed from within the head. Claybore spoke directly from mind to mind. “You ought to know that my parts are not invincible. After all, you left my skin in a puddle of protoplasm from your spells.”