A Fortune for Kregen (27 page)

That was sweet politeness from the Hunting Kov.

“I think,” I said, “I might try a shaft at it the next time it shoves its ugly snout out.”

“Let us all try, by the Blind Archer!”

When next the gate was opened all the archers left let fly at the flaming red orb of the tentacular monster.

If the shafts hit at all, it was difficult to say. They ricocheted and caromed away. When that happens to an arrow driven by a Lohvian bowstave, the archer knows he has loosed at something special.

“The thing is cased in some kind of damned armor!”

“Kov — would you care to try your sword against it?”

He took my meaning at once. The veins in his purple nose swelled. He looked meanly at me. “When the order to open the gate is given — I will...” He hesitated, and then said, “I will try.”

Kov Thrangulf drew his sword. “If you will, kov, I will stand at your side and smite blow for blow.”

“You are welcome, Kov. Let us stand together and smite!”

Although as usual I was amused by all these kovs this and kovs that, here was an intriguing example of etiquette functioning in ways that were universally recognized on Kregen.

The gate opened and the two kovs, positioned and ready, leaped to strike doughty blows at the writhing tentacles. Their swords rebounded. I would not have been surprised had they both been snatched up and ground to pulp in that ugly yellow beak. Kov Thrangulf went on slashing and hacking like a madman, quite uselessly. Kov Loriman dragged him back and a glistening tentacle swept past closer than any fighting man cared to see. A bright blue favor was wrenched from the shoulder plate of Thrangulf’s armor.

“By Krun, kov! That was—” Thrangulf swallowed down and looked about. “You pulled me back!”

“Aye! Otherwise you’d be beak-fodder by now — kov!”

Then it was time to bellow the gate closed. The monster was now quite clearly remaining much higher in the tank, and three tentacles hung down outside the rim. As we waited a thought crossed my mind. The Krozair longsword might only be an illusion; it could cut, had cut — would it cut this monster?

I went across. The two kovs were stiltedly polite, one to the other, and it was clear Loriman’s opinion of Thrangulf as a fighting man had plummeted. I lifted the Krozair brand.

Loriman said, “You are wasting your time.”

“Nevertheless, it is needful I try.” And I slashed.

The shock vibrated right up my arms, through my shoulders and exploded in my skull. I was swung around and staggered.

“I told you,” said Loriman.

Thoroughly bad-tempered I stomped across and bellowed for them to open the gate. On that occasion we did not get above half the next waiting group through. I began to calculate the odds.

That confounded red and green checkered hood came into view and the rusty hinge voice croaked,

“You cannot do it.”

“We will try.”

“That is the privilege of apims.”

So that meant nothing. He could be apim or diff and say that, say the same words with vastly different meanings.

I went down to the gate and gave Tyfar’s men a thorough talking to. Then I stalked along the waiting lines and threatened them. The threats were redundant with the looming menace writhing within the tanks.

Four limp tentacles hung down outside; those within the transparent walls coiled and squirmed.

And, the tanks farther around in the circle showed their awful denizens at precisely higher stages of movement, as though they were notes in a scale — a scale of horror.

I said to the people at the tail end, “If we all move faster, and do not stumble, we will all get through —

just.”

Hunch looked ill. Nodgen shook his spear.

Kov Thrangulf came up to me again, puffing his cheeks out.

“They all contume me,” he said. He was by way of being light-headed. “I do not have that famous ham in my name. My grandfather carved out the kovnate, and I have held it. Is not that a great thing?”

“Aye, kov.” I spoke true words — for I knew of the dangers and difficulties in retaining a hold on lands and titles.

“I am a plain man. I do my best. The Empress Thyllis has turned her face from me.” He sounded maudlin. I think at that moment he believed he was going to die, that he was facing certain death and not the possibilities of death that lurked in the Moder. “I am a plain man,” he said again. “Not fancy. I try.”

“I’m sure,” I said. “Kov.”

“My grandfather, the kov. He lived too long. My father never forgave him for that.” He choked up and wiped his mouth. “My father showed me his displeasure, knowing I would be kov.”

Another batch of fugitives went through and I narrowly surveyed those remaining, measuring the length of the lines against the height up the tank of the nearest monster. And, as I thus watched the lines and the monsters, and listened to Kov Thrangulf, I was aware of another thought itching away, a trembling suspicion that we would not get away as easily as all that, even from here.

I felt sorry for Thrangulf. What he said added up; but the urgencies of the moment supervened, so I contented myself with saying, “All men have a purpose in life, kov. Find yours.”

He looked at me as though I had struck him. I stared back, and he took a step away from me as though blown by an invisible wind. I suppose my ugly old beakhead carried that demoniac look.

“Take your place in line, kov, and go through quickly...”

“I shall not forget you, Notor Jak — even if I die!”

He resumed his place in the line. The process of escape went on, a remorseless logic of attrition. Now there were a dozen tentacles hanging outside the tank. Limp when the gate was closed, they wriggled to squirming life when the gate opened, hauling up that gross body. The red eyes glared malevolently. The serrated beak clashed.

Hunch and Nodgen looked at me appealingly. I showed them a stony face. Someone had to bring up the rear. I could have wished it was someone other than them, though.

No prowling monster wandered through, gibbering. Had one done so I believe we would have roared with laughter at the inconsequentiality of such an apparition at this time.

Many of the nearer monsters hung close to the tops of their tanks, and bunches of tentacles hung down outside.

When but three groups of people remained I said to Loriman: “Let us leave the gate closed for a longer period, kov. Mayhap that beast will slip down.”

“We can try...”

So we waited, apprehensively, in that gruesome chamber among the overturned treasures. The tentacles of the monster hung limp. It did not, as far as I could see, drop down an inch. We waited.

Presently, Loriman swore. He said, “By Hito the Hunter! It is no use. Open the gate and send the next one through.”

We did so.

The monster balanced on the very rim of the tank, swaying and clacking its beak. That beak could grind stone to powder.

I believe the very remorselessness of the whole process, the gradual approach of the monster to escape and our destruction, the logic of it all, wore us down more than any screaming screeching monster-charge could ever do. And something of that feeling must have permeated the Moder-lord, watching us, no doubt, and giggling and mumbling soggy toothless jaws. A piece of discarded gold in the shape of a dancing Talu, beautiful and abandoned, stood up and began to dance toward a cabinet that righted itself and shuffled its legs into the position it had occupied before. The glass joined together over the Talu.

With a scraping whispering furtiveness the strewn treasures began to replace themselves within healed boxes and cupboards. Chests turned upright and refilled with spilled gems. The whole mausoleum filled with the glint of gold and the glitter of gems and the rustle of scuttering treasure. As for the magic items

— ghosts, wraiths, call them what you will, the cabinets filled and resumed their accustomed places.

“The cramph of a Moder-lord considers we are finished,” said Loriman. He spat and hitched up his shield and sword.

“There is still a chance,” I said. “There were two men in Jikaida City reputed to have returned from the Humped Land with treasure and with magic. Can they best us?”

“It is not they who will best us—”

“No. I think the monster will climb out of the tank the next time we open the gate—”

“Agreed!”

“So we must open wide and all press through, fast — fast! It must be done.”

Kov Loriman the Hunter, a rough, unpleasant slave-owning man, a player of Execution Jikaida, said, “I shall, of course, go last.”

I said, “Kov, tell me. What did you say to Master Scatulo when you lost at Execution Jikaida?”

He stared. “You were there?”

“I was there.”

“I told him that he had one more chance and then I would send him to take the place of the Pallan of the Blacks.”

“Very good. I shall go through last.”

“Do you wish to fight me for it?”

And then the incongruousness of the situation came to my rescue. I didn’t give an adulterated copper Havvey for him. Did I? Whatever path his honor made him tread, my path lay in the light of the Suns of Scorpio and of the well-being of Vallia.

“Of course, of course. With my compliments — you may go last,”

“As is right and proper.” And he fingered his sword and looked back with a black look at the octopoid monster.

Other intrepid adventurers had come here and gone through the gates loaded with treasure. Mayhap this Moder was different from others, and those two successful men of Jikaida City had plundered an easier tomb. For, of course, we were all grave robbers — although the stakes were raised to a rarefied level.

But, still, other men had succeeded here, I felt sure. The tentacled monsters could be outwitted. That could only mean worse things awaited down the Shaft of Flame.

“Now?” said Loriman.

I couldn’t say I liked him. But he had been — useful — in his uncouth way. And I didn’t know from whence on Kregen he hailed. He had carefully not said.

I looked at the last men waiting. I shouted. “When the gate opens — run! If any man stumbles he must be pushed aside and tail on at the rear! So, doms — do not stumble!”

Loriman shouted, “I shall stand at the gate. If any man attempts to push out of place, him I will strike down!”

Prince Tyfar looked a trifle green about the gills. I walked across. “Prince — go out with your men first

— we will close the gate.”

“But—”

“
Do it
!”

He looked crestfallen, like a chastised child. I turned away and gave him no room to argue further.

“All set?”

“All set!”

The gate swung open. The men began to run through, quickly, plunging out of view, shooting like peas from a pod. Tyfar went. His men followed. The lines ran up, men panting, frightened, pushing on, keeping in line, shouting. Loriman stood at one side of the gate, his sword raised, his face hateful.

I prowled the other side, urging the men on, encouraging them.

With a monstrous hissing the tentacled octopoid, immense, writhing, slimy, toppled from the tank and scuttled for us.

“No brainless bunch of guts is going to beat us!” roared Loriman. “No matter that it is invulnerable to honest steel. Run, you hulus, run!”

Shrieking, a man stumbled and I seized his neck and hurled him on. Out of sight through the silver gate they crashed, two by two, hurling on. Hissing, writhing, the monster raced swiftly over the marble toward us. No treacherous pattern of that floor engulfed it. The tentacles swirled, slimy, reaching out...

Only a half dozen more... Nodgen and Hunch were through... Two more — then the last two... I swung to face Loriman.

In that moment he stood there, exalted, his face a single ruby flame, his eyes murderous. I thought he would stay and challenge the monster out of the sheer joy of hunting.

I grabbed his arm and pulled as a clansman pulls a vove up over a fire-filled trench. Together, we roared through the silver gateway and I slammed the portal shut. Its clang sounded like sweetest music.

The shaft of fire rose before us, lifting from a stone-walled pit. Men were running forward, following the one ahead and vanishing out of sight down between flame and wall.

“We’ve done it!” exulted Loriman. He swaggered toward the pit from which rose the Flame. “The cramph of a monster has been beaten!”

A gigantic hissing belched up behind us, like a volcano bursting. We swung about. We stared up, appalled.

Tentacles appeared over the top of the insubstantial iron wall.

A gross form rose into view. Red eyes like flame, the size of shields, stared wickedly down upon us. A yellow serrated beak clacked. Deliberately, the monster lifted over the wall, balanced, fell clutching down toward us.

Dread of that primeval horror exploded in my skull. Two thoughts clashed in my head. The monster was impervious to steel. And other men had escaped from this awful place.

Squirming with coiled animate energy the monster rushed swiftly across the stone toward us as we fled for the Shaft of Flame. Between that supernal white light and the lip of the stone pit a narrow opening offered the way of escape. Stone-cut steps spiraled downward within the confines of the pit. Another monster flopped over the wall and, hissing, propelled itself on those wriggling serpent-like tentacles toward us.

Men pushed on down the steps. The slot between wall and flame was perhaps just wide enough for my hulking shoulders. A man toppled. Screaming, he pitched from the steps. His body entered the flame.

Spread-eagled, his pitiful bundle of loot flogging free, he drifted down as though suspended against a blast of invisible force, and as he fell he dwindled and burned. We shuddered and hurried down the stone steps, treacherous with slippery moss and slimy with fungus.

Looking back past Loriman, who thumped down with a look of ferocious distaste on his florid features, I saw the monster’s red eye appear, festooned with coils of slimy writhings, saw it lash futilely down after us.

Loriman bellowed, jerking his head back. “The thing is balked! Ha! We have bested the monster!”