Perenelle drew upon that memory now. Fixing the dump clearly in her imagination, she visualized a huge clump of stinking, corpse-smelling flowers in the very heart of the refuse and then she imagined a wind carrying the foul stink northward toward Alcatraz.

The stench of something long rotten wafted over the island and a rippling wave coursed through the massed flies.

Perenelle focused her will. She visualized the sprawling dump scattered with blooms: calla and carrion flowers poking through the rubbish, giant red and white spotted rafflesia thriving amid the junk, and the air filling with the noxious scents, mingling with the dump’s own fetid odor. Then she imagined a wind pushing the scent north.

The smell that washed over the island was eye-wateringly foul. A wave pulsed through the thick carpet of flies. Some rose buzzing into the air, circled aimlessly but then dropped back onto Areop-Enap.

Perenelle was tiring, and she knew that the effort was aging her. Drawing in a deep breath, she made one final effort. She had to move the flies before the second swarm joined them. She concentrated so hard on the foul stench that her normally odorless ice white aura shimmered and took on the hint of putrefaction.

The sickening stink that flowed over the island was a nauseating mixture of fresh dung mixed with long-spoiled meat and the rancid odor of sour milk.

The flies rose from Alcatraz in a solid black blanket. They hummed and buzzed like a power station and then, as one, set off heading south toward the source of the stench. The departing insects encountered the second huge swarm as it was just about to descend on the island and both groups mingled in an enormous solid black ball; then the entire mass turned and flowed south, following the rich soupy scent.

Within moments, there was not a living fly left on the island.

Areop-Enap shook itself free of tiny carcasses and then slowly and stiffly climbed the wall, sliced the web holding Perenelle in place and lowered her gently to the ground on a narrow spiral of thread. Perenelle allowed her aura to flare for a millisecond and the cocoon of spiderweb, now dotted and speckled with trapped flies, crisped to dust. She threw back her head, pushed her damp hair back off her forehead and neck and breathed deeply. It had been suffocatingly warm in the web.

“Are you all right?” she asked, reaching out to stroke one of the Elder’s huge legs.

Areop-Enap swayed to and fro. Only one of its eyes was open, and when it spoke, its normally lisping speech was slurred almost beyond comprehension. “Poison?” it asked.