D’Averc sprang up. He began to run through the tall corridors, his boots echoing loudly. He ran until at last he came to the doors of the Throne Room where a score of guards saw him and turned their weapons upon him, but he used his own flame lance again and cut them down, being singed only slightly in his right shoulder. He pushed open the doors a crack and looked into the Throne Room. A mile away was the dais, but he could not see if Flana sat on it. Otherwise the hall was empty.

D’Averc began to run towards the distant throne.

And he shouted her name as he ran. “Flana! Flana!”

Flana had been day-dreaming on her throne and looked up to see the tiny figure advancing. She heard her name taken up by a thousand echoes in the huge hall. “Flana! Flana! Flana!”

And she recognised the voice but thought that she had probably not yet woken up.

The figure came closer and it had a helmet that shone like polished silver, like a mirror, But the bodywas the body not recognisable?

“Huillam?” she murmured uncertainly. “Huillam D’Averc.”

“Flana!” The figure wrenched off its mask and flung it from him so that it clattered across the great marble floor. “Flana!”

“Huillam!” She stood up and began to descend the steps towards him.

He opened his arms, smiling with joy.

But they never touched in life again, for a flame beam descended like a stroke of lightning from a gallery high above and burned off his face so that he screamed in agony and fell to his knees; burned into his back so that he slumped forward and died at her feet while she sobbed great, strangled sobs that shook her body.

And a voice of a guard from the gallery called in great self-approval. “You are safe now, madam.”

Chapter Sixteen

The Final Fight

THE DARK EMPIRE forces were still swarming from every rathole in their maze city and Hawkmoon noted with despair that the Legion of the Dawn was getting thinner. Now when a warrior was slain another did not always take his place. Around him the air was full of the bittersweet scent of the Runestaff and strange patterns in the air.

Then, as Hawkmoon saw Meliadus, a wave of pain gnawed again at his brain and he fell from his horse.

Meliadus dismounted from his black charger and walked slowly towards Hawkmoon. The Runestaff had fallen from his hand and the Sword of the Dawn was only loosely held.

Hawkmoon stirred, groaning. Around him the battle still raged, but it did not seem to be anything to do with him. He felt the energy leaving him, felt the pain increasing, opened his eyes and saw Meliadus approaching, the helm snarling as if in triumph. Hawkmoon’s throat was dry and he tried to move, tried to reach the Runestaff which lay on the cobbles of the street.