A Fortune for Kregen (26 page)

Carefully, I said, “We survived.”

“Let me set one of my fellows to climb the wall!” burst out Kov Loriman.

“By all means,” said Tyr Ungovich.

We remembered what had chanced the last time he had said that. Loriman hunched himself up, his face bloating with anger.

“Well, Tyr Ungovich. What do you suggest?”

“Do we have all the parts of the key?”

They were produced as though they were precious relics, and Nedfar laid them out on a table which his son quickly turned up the right way. There were eight curiously-shaped pieces of bronze. We all stared at them solemnly.

Well, and by Zair! Weren’t they the most precious objects in all this Moder?

And, without the ninth part, they were valueless.

Much of the rampaging about and the ecstatic sorting through treasures to uncover the finest abated. The explosive release of tensions neared its own exhaustion. Men still capered about, fantastically arrayed in cloth of gold and festooned with gems, they still played stupid silly magical tricks one against another, with spurts of blue fire and whiffs of occult stinks, causing Yagno to twitch. But gradually they quieted and looked toward the group where the decisions of their fates rested.

The hood of ruby and emerald checks drew forward, shadowing all within, as I spoke to Ungovich.

“You sold Kov Loriman the Hunter magics to ward off the magics here. And the others bought trinkets of some power.” As the Hunting Kov started forward, clearly about to blaspheme by Sasco over the uselessness of the tiklo, I went on in a louder voice, “Perhaps in view of your knowledge of conditions here, you have knowledge of what it is we need to open these gates.”

“It is in my heart to have been with you and witnessed what went on when you were separated from us.

Did any of your party find a key?”

“What we have is there on the table.” Tyfar pointed.

Kov Loriman subsided, caught up in the importance we all sensed in the words of that rusty-hinge voice, consigning the matter of his tiklo to a Herrelldrin Hell.

“Nothing else?” Tyr Ungovich sounded as though he was becoming annoyed. His rusty voice grated unpleasantly.

These men had talked over and over before I had joined the group, and had settled nothing. We were going to be trapped here if one of us did not come up with the right answer.

“We found a golden key,” said Ungovich. “But an oaf lost it for us.”

Prince Nedfar drew in his breath. He spoke and all the quiet dignity of the man showed splendidly in that place. “Amak Rubbra, who was a just and honorable man, lost his life with that golden key.”

“An oaf, I said,” the rusty voice said spitefully. “And an oaf I mean.”

“Without a key—” San Yagno started to amplify.

“Here,” snarled Kov Loriman. He hauled out the box of a size to take a portion of cham and, opening it, proffered the contents. “A silver key we found. Is this what you want?”

“Ah!” grated Ungovich.

We all craned to look.

Ungovich reached for the silver key. It was left to Yagno to say, startled, “Tyr! Careful! It may be—”

“Quite.”

“A silver key for a silver gate, notors?” said Tyfar.

We all moved across to stand before the silver gate in the insubstantial iron wall. The shaft of pure white light lifted blindingly over our heads. Shadows fled away in long fingers of darkness. A smell of ancient decay hung in the air here.

“I do not think the key will harm me,” said Ungovich. He lifted it out. Nothing happened. We all watched him as, carefully, he inserted the key in the keyhole and turned, pressing sideways as he did so.

The silver gate moved inward a hand’s-breadth. He paused.

A man shrieked in terror and as we whirled to look back into the Chamber of the Flame other men took up that scream of horror.

This Mausoleum of the Moder was guarded.

From the transparent tank opposite the silver gate the colossal tentacled monster rose, twining those slimy arms and clawing at the sides, lifting itself up. As its gross body climbed to the lip of the tank its eyes, red as fire, large as shields, blazed upon us, and its serrated yellow beak clashed with a champing grating sound that chilled the blood.

I reached forward, seized the handle, and slammed the gate shut.

Instantly, the octopoid monster shrank back into its tank.

“By Havil!”

“May the gods preserve us!”

“To open the gate is to release —
that
!”

Prince Nedfar said over the hubbub: “It seems a perfectly logical arrangement.”

Tyr Ungovich’s unpleasant voice scratched out. “Well, notors. And what do you suggest now?”

“We cannot stay down here forever!” shouted Loriman.

“Yet if we open the gate—” said Yagno.

“Cannot you spell the beast, San Yagno?”

Ungovich said, “I do not think a mortal spell will affect that beauty.”

I looked at Quienyin. He had been keeping silent lately. He caught my look and, in the pause after Ungovich’s conversation-stopping statement, said, “This is not a case for spells. This needs the military mind, organization, determination and decision.”

Prince Nedfar, Prince Tyfar, I was pleased to see, understood at once what Quienyin meant.

Ungovich said, “I do not see—”

Loriman had grasped it, now.

“Then stand aside, Tyr, and let those who do see — do!”

“Before you begin,” I said, “notors, two things.” I shouted to Hunch who was standing nearby with his aptitude of overhearing likely conversations. “Did more than one monster climb up its tank?”

“Aye, notor!” shouted back Hunch, quaking.

“And, two,” I drew an arrow and nocked it. “Will a shaft perhaps dissuade a monster from climbing—?”

“You delude yourself!” said Ungovich.

“I think not, Notor Jak.”

“But more than one monster moves. So we must be quick.”

All the same, I held the Lohvian longbow half-bent, the arrow gripped in the old archer’s knack in my left fist, as we went about organizing what had to be done.

We allowed half a bur for final preparations. The Deldars — those who were left — bellowed and roared in fine Deldar style and the men formed ranks. The slaves, piled with loot, were positioned and threatened with unmentionables if they stirred too soon and did not run when told to grak. The notables arranged themselves with each party. Nedfar would lead. I offered to be the last, and Tyfar and Lobur said they would stay also, seeing that my party consisted of myself and two men only. Hunch and Nodgen, shuffling up under enormous bundles, looked at me reproachfully.

“Remember,” Nedfar called, his voice ringing out for us all to hear. “There is no need for panic. Long before there is any danger we will prevent it. Do not jostle or push. Any man who disobeys me will be cut down.”

There spoke your true Prince of Hamal, by Krun!

What we were about to attempt was obvious in the context of the situation. I just hoped the situation would not change. The bastard up there, the Wizard of the Moder, the Moder-lord, could so easily change the rules.

Quienyin stood beside me. “I think I will—”

“You, San, will go out with an early party — as you value my friendship!”

“But, Jak—”

“It will be a pretty skip and jump at the end, I think.”

He looked at me with a worried expression. And he was a Wizard of Loh! “The Moder-lord will run us hard.”

“Aye.”

He nodded. “You are right. I feel strength in the — in the air. Mayhap I can do most good as you suggest.”

“I am confident of it.”

Prince Tyfar walked to the head of the line to bid his father luck, as I judged, and then he turned to Ariane. She nodded, once, white-faced under that rosy-red, and swung away to speak to her numim bodyguard. The Pachak twins guarded her close. Tyfar, scowling, came back to me.

“Notor Jak — my fellows will swing the gate. Agreed?”

“Agreed.” Then I added, “Prince.”

“You are a strange fellow — and I see you still wear the red.”

“I overlooked that, prince. Still, it is the color of blood.”

“Oh, no, Jak! Why, that loincloth is brilliant scarlet!”

“So it is. Well, let us swing the gate and hope it is not stained a darker red.”

Ungovich came over. “Get as many through at one time as you can.” As he spoke I felt an irrational desire to haul off that concealing hood and have a look at this mysterious man.

He stalked off to take his position in the line, and Quienyin rubbed his thumb under his jaw, scratching.

“I think,” he said, and he looked meaningfully at Tyfar and me. “I really do think you should not allow the creature to climb out of the tank.”

“Once out—?” said Tyfar.

“Indubitably, my dear prince.”

I turned away. Deb-Lu-Quienyin was most certainly feeling some tremor of the future, some inkling of the resurrection of his powers. I wondered what kind of a man he really was. The old buffer I knew was certainly far removed from a puissant and feared Wizard of Loh, that was for sure.

All the relaxed air had gone out of the situation. The hullabaloo as the treasures were spilled out wantonly had vanished. Now the men looked anxiously at the silver gate, and cast uneasy glances over their shoulders at the ominous writhing shapes in the tanks. That close confining breathless sensation clamped down on us.

Prince Nedfar called, “In the name of Havil the Green! Open the gate!”

Tyfar nodded to his men, chief among whom were Barkindrar and Nath the Shaft. The silver gate swung open. Nedfar stepped resolutely through, his shield and sword positioned, vanished out of my sight. I swung about, narrowly watching that coiling slimy monstrosity within the tank lifting itself up. The tentacles seemed to be signaling to me, hypnotically waving and demanding my obedience. The tentacles slid over the rim. One red eye appeared, and another. The curved serrated beak showed. Over half the bloated body lifted above the rim of the tank.

“Close the gate!” I bellowed.

Tyfar’s men slammed the gate, and others held back the next in line. They halted, sullenly, looking back.

The monster slowly sank down into its tank.

I watched it narrowly. Down and down it dropped behind its transparent wall. I fancied, when it stopped moving, it had not dropped as far down as it had been.

“Gate!”

The gate opened and the line began to pass through, inevitably jostling and pushing. Now that the first party had gone on through and had not reported back disaster, the second party were more confident.

When the gate was shut at my shout and we waited for the coiled monster to subside I took stock of the man who came up to stand beside me, breathing deeply. Kov Thrangulf held himself stiffly erect, and his face flushed a dark and painful red. Over in the third group, where we had thought it wisest to include the women of the expedition, Lobur was laughing and talking to the Princess Thefi, who was responding beautifully. Thrangulf bent his lowering brows upon them. Ahead of the princess, the lady Ariane and her people waited patiently.

“By Havil,” said Thrangulf. “I am forced to put up with much!”

I watched the monster sinking down. When it came to rest I was convinced it was not as far down as previously.

And — one limp tentacle hung down over the rim of the tank and was not withdrawn. “Gate!”

The people pushed along. Following the women’s group a column of Chuliks waited. One of them was quite clearly incapacitated from the drink and as they moved forward he toppled flat on his face. Some of his comrades were for leaving him; in the end and moving with speed, they threw his sack of booty away and a comrade hoisted him up onto his shoulder, perched precariously along with the swollen bundle of swag. “If he wants his life, we will give him that. But as for his booty—”

“He will never make paktun now,” said another. They pressed on. The little check caused them to be tardy, opening up a gap into which they crowded forward smartly, leaving a gap to their rear. I eyed the monster. The tentacles writhed above the rim and a red, shield-sized eye peered balefully down. It seemed to me the damned thing was climbing up quicker each time. I would take no chances. As the serrated beak began to move forward above that gross body, surrounded in slimy coils, I bellowed,

“Shut the gate!” I whirled as shouts broke out by the silver gate. Tyfar and his men were pulling the gate but three burly Chuliks struggled within the opening, effectively blocking the closure. They insisted on pushing through. The gate hung open, jammed. And the monster began to hiss. “Out of it, you cramphs!”

shouted Tyfar. I ran. I sped up to the gate and gave the center Chulik such a buffet he took off headlong, his feet flying up. He vanished out of sight and his two comrades were caught, a fist around each pigtail of coiled hair, and thrust savagely on. Tyfar’s men hauled the gate shut.

I stood back. I felt intensely annoyed by such stupidity.

The monster hissed and began to descend — and the thing dropped down reluctantly...

“By Krun, Notor Jak! You deal severely.”

“Onkers,” I said. “Get onkers.”

“Next time—”

“Next time teach ’em with steel!”

And I stomped away.

Kov Thrangulf was staring at me as though I was a madman.

“That was Prince Tyfar to whom you had the honor of addressing yourself—”

“I know. And he’ll be a prince in that tentacular beast’s inward parts if he doesn’t look lively!”

Kov Loriman stumped over. He had elected to stay with the last party, which did not surprise me.

Despite all the horrors of this place I had the dark suspicion that he rather fancied getting his blade into one of those red eyes.

“The prince was given the task because he is a prince and the son of a prince. But if he cannot manage—”

“He will,” I said. “Kov. Do not fret.” Then I added ominously, “By the time it is our turn that beast is not going peaceably back to its tank.”

He looked at my bow — I should say that I had put the bow away once I had taken up my new task —

and he grunted. “I say shaft it, Notor Jak.”