torg 02 - The Dark Realm by Douglas Kaufman Page A

said, kicking a stone across the field.
    "But it has only just begun, stormer," the Gaunt Man laughed. "And I must say, you are doing extremely well."
    "Doing?" Decker asked. "What am I doing?"
    Before the Gaunt Man could answer, a burst of flame erupted from Decker's chest — from the metal staves, actually — flashing brightly before it dissipated into the air.
    "I see someone tried to remove the rune staves," the Gaunt Man said. Decker turned to him, concern etched deeply in his face. "Oh, don't worry," the Gaunt Man said with a dismissing wave of his thin-fingered hand. "They would need to rip them out of you before any harm would befall your body. The person who attempted the action, however, may not be so lucky."
    "What are you after?" Decker demanded. "What do you want with me?"
    The Gaunt Man gestured and more doorways appeared in the barren field. "I need your choices," he explained. "I need you to distinguish one possible event from another. Take this field for example. In mere minutes the ground will start to shake, fissures will appear, and you will more than likely be swallowed into a deep, rumbling pit. Unless, of course, you choose which door does not have this outcome behind it."
    Decker couldn't believe it. He was stuck in a dream obeying the dictates of a madman! No, he decided, I will not let my subconscious mind turn me into someone's slave!
    "Make your own decision," Decker shouted above the rising wind. Somewhere in the distance a deep rumbling began to build. It rolled like a wave beneath the ground, shaking the landscape as it passed by.
    "Very well, Mr. Decker, this is your dream," the Gaunt Man said, straightening his long coat and adjusting his wide-brimmed hat. "If you have no regard for your own life, who am I to tell you differently?"
    The Gaunt Man started to walk away as the ground shook and cracked wide. Long crevices split open, releasing foul, long-trapped vapors into the air. Decker lost his footing and hit the shaking ground hard. He remained that way for long seconds, trying to regain his breath. When he did move, a fissure opened in the place he departed.
    On his feet again, Decker watched as the Gaunt Man walked across the field as though the ground was not shaking violently. Decker, meanwhile, was doing everything he could to stay upright and avoid the ever- widening cracks. He turned back to the doors. Already a number of them had been knocked down or swallowed into the dirt. If he didn't move soon, he wouldn't have any choices left to make. He turned again to the Gaunt Man.
    "It is your choice to make, Decker," the Gaunt Man called above the roar of the earth. "It is your decision. Choose a door and life, or choose to stand where you are and die."
    Decker stepped back as the earth shifted in front of him, throwing up a mound of rock. Then, without another moment of hesitation, he dashed through one of the remaining doors.
     
    30
     
    The banshee floated closer, and Father Christopher Bryce tried to control the fear that raged through his body. He was shaking badly, acutely aware that he had no weapon with which to battle the specter. His cross, which handily dispatched the other banshee, was lost somewhere on the floor of the cockpit. Even if it were close by, he doubted he could reach it before the grave- cold hand touched him and drained away his life force.
    The ethereal arm reached toward him, spreading ethereal fingers wide. Bryce desperately forced his mind to think through the problem facing him. What was the cross that it was able to destroy spawns of hell? What power did it possess? Perhaps, he reasoned, it only possessed what he gave it, focusing his faith into a tangible field of good that no evil entity could withstand. Did he need the cross to duplicate the feat? Rationale told him no, but faith was a leap beyond the rational.
    The hand was closer still.
    Bryce began to pray aloud fervently, imagining the power of the words cloaking him with holy armor. "Though I walk