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best she could, she tried to explain
    the position to him. It was possibly true that Joe could survive,
    even triumph, but not without dire cost to her. "For my sake,
    Joe, stay here. Promise me. Give me your solemn word."
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    Chalker, Jack L - Demons of the Dancing Gods
    He sensed her genuine concern and, although he put up
    something of a front, he knew from that point on that he'd lost
    the argument. He glanced around. "Okay. Two days from right
    now—then I'm coming in looking for you."
    "Two days! Joe, I don't know how long this is going to
    take! It could be going just right and then you'll come in and
    screw it all up!"
    "Thanks for the confidence," he grumbled, "but two days
    is it."
    She thought a moment. "How about this, then? If I'm delayed
    for any reason, I'll send a message somehow. One that
    could only come from me. Fair enough?"
    He considered it. "Maybe. But remember, we've got a hard
    way to go to that wizard's convention yet. We'll see. That's
    the best I'll do for now."
    And, in fact, it was the most she could get out of him, and
    she decided it would have to do. She realized that his attitude
    was entirely based on his concern for her safety, and that made
    it really impossible to go further. She got down from her horse
    and turned toward Mohr Jerahl.
    "You gonna walk?" he called out, surprised.
    She nodded. "I think it's best. I know it is, somehow."
    "No weapons or food or stuff?"
    "No, Joe. This one I walk into clean. You take care of
    yourself. You're going to be a sitting duck out here for a couple
    of days, and this kind of place holds who knows what kind of
    dangers."
    "I can take care of myself," he assured her. "Just make sure
    you can."
    She blew him a kiss. "I think I'll be pretty safe once I get
    across the creek." With that, she walked down to the riverbank
    and into the water. It wasn't very deep; even at the center, it
    did not come up beyond her waist, and the current was weak
    and lazy. She had no trouble making the other side. Emerging,
    she turned and saw him, still there atop his horse, staring after
    her. She waved at him, then turned and disappeared into the
    forest. •
    JACK L. CHALKER 27
    * * *
    That feeling that she'd had since they diverged from the
    road less than two days earlier was tremendous now. She'd
    felt its overpowering influence from the first time she'd looked
    at the place across the river, but now she was in it and the
    feeling was all around her. For the first time she sensed, at
    least, what the nature of that strange sensation was.
    It was raw power.
    Mohr Jerahl was in some ways an analog to the Glen Dinig;
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    Chalker, Jack L - Demons of the Dancing Gods
    it was a place of enormous magical power, power that could
    be seen, touched, felt. But while Huspeth's small realm was
    under tight and absolute control, Mohr Jerahl was not. The
    term "raw power" was literally correct—this was no tame and
    obedient magic, neatly tied into complex spells, but a force of
    supemature, an unbridled power that just was. It was incredibly
    strong, yet it had a single defined center, a locus, that she
    instinctively headed for. There, at that central radiation point,
    would be Kauri. There she would meet what she must become.
    It seemed to take forever to get anywhere in the forest, and
    the sun was passing out of sight and influence by the time she
    was sure of any real progress, yet she felt neither hunger nor
    thirst, nor did she feel the least bit tired. The tremendous
    magical radiation went through her, tickling and even slightly
    burning not only her skin but inside as well, yet she knew it
    could not harm her. How she knew this, she wasn't sure, but
    it was a certainty that she was feeding off the radiation, drawing
    strength and whatever else she needed from it.
    Darkness fell, in a land where the trees were so thick they
    would block the sun in daylight, yet she had no problem with
    that darkness. In fact, fed by the radiation she could now see
    as a