The Black Tattoo (23 page)

"Second," the Emperor went on, "there
is
something in it for the combatants, if they win.
 
Which reminds me — Gukumat?
 
What is the Ogdru Sisters' favor?"

Charlie turned to face the arena again, and his eyes went wide.
 
The fight was over.
 
Jocasta lay on her side, a great pool of liquid spreading from the terrible wounds that the raptors had inflicted on her.
 
Her eyes were open and apparently lifeless.
 
The three remaining raptors were standing side by side, facing up toward the royal box, their front claws clasped in a gesture of what appeared to Charlie, astonishingly, to be supplication.

Nothing of great import or interest, my lord
, said the tall demon.
 
I was going to grant their request without troubling you with it.

"Please, Overminister, for the benefit of our guests:
 
do tell us."

Well, Sire
, said Gukumat.
 
It is rather amusing, I suppose.
 
They wish to start a small... business.

"Business?
 
What sort of business?

There is a settlement, near the borders of the Plains of Flame.
 
"Gehenna," they call it.
 
There's not much there, no facilities to speak of, but the Ogdru Sisters believe that the place has some potential as... well, a tourist destination.

"Really?" asked the Emperor, wrinkling his nose.
 
"But all that brimstone and so on!
 
A bit sulphurous, I'd've thought.
 
Wouldn't you?"

Indubitably, Sire.
 
But as my lord knows, with the High Reaches demons one can never predict what fads and foibles may catch on next.
 
The Ogdrus propose to start what they call, I believe, a "health spa."

"A health spa?" echoed the Emperor, with distaste.
 
"Gukumat, you amaze me."

Shall I grant their request?

"Fine," said the Emperor, suddenly losing interest.
 
He turned back to Charlie.
 
"You see?
 
The winner is granted a boon from me."
 
He leaned forward on his mountain of cushions.

"This is how things work here in Hell," he said.
 
"If you want something, you have to fight for it.
 
Kill or be killed."
 
He yawned again.
 
"You follow?"

Charlie nodded numbly, though he didn't — not in the least.

"You may clear the arean, Gukumat."

At your command, Sire
.

Gukumat bowed.

The arena floor seemed to ripple—

—and the remaining raptors, plus the body of their opponent, suddenly vanished.
 
In another moment, the stains of the battle were gone too.
 
It was as if none of it had happened.

"Now," said the Emperor, settling back once more.
 
"I've got something rather special lined up next, I believe.
 
Gukumat?"

Sire?

"Is it time?"

Time for what, Sire?

"The boy," said the Emperor, annoyed.
 
"Is he in position?"

Yes, my lord.

"Splendid."
 
The Emperor looked down at Charlie, smiling again.
 
"Here's something that might interest you."
 
He gestured lazily at the next gladiator as he stumbled uncertainly out into the center of the arena.
 
"This little chap arrived just after you did.
 
Said he was a friend of yours.
 
Now, what was his name?"
 
He looked up at the ceiling as if trying to remember.

"Oh, God," whispered Charlie.
 
"Jack."

"Oh yes," said the Emperor.
 
"That was it.
 
Jack.
 
Gukumat?" he barked.
 
"Open the gates.
 
Let's see what the little fellow is made of."

His grin widened.

"Quite literally, I should imagine," he added.

"GLADIATOR JACK"

Jack had been waiting in his cell when the jelly stuff came for him again.
 
It had appeared from nowhere, swallowed him as before — and deposited him, this time in some sort of short passageway.

He was standing in front of a blank wall of cool, slate-gray stone.
 
The passageway was empty and, apart from his breathing, entirely silent.
 
Also, he had a knife in his hand.

The knife's blade was very short, an elongated half oval of glinting blue-gray metal.
 
The black stuff the handle was made of was smooth and vaguely rubbery:
 
against its dark surface Jack's knuckles looked whiter than he was expecting, until he noticed how tightly he was holding it.

His having a knife wasn't, he realized, particularly good news.
 
He had not missed the Emperor's earlier words about gladiator pits.
 
The knife meant, in all probability, that Jack was going to be expected to fight with it — and knife-fighting was not, as it happened, something that he had ever done before.
 
Forcing his hands to relax, Jack tried a couple of jabbing and stabbing movements in the air and only succeeded in making himself feel very silly indeed.
 
No, he decided:
 
this whole situation was really getting worse and worse all the time.

That was when, with a low rumbling sound, the wall lifted to reveal what was beyond.

Gladiator Jack, step forward into the arena, please
, said a voice in his head.
 
The voice sounded bored and unfriendly, but suddenly, Jack wasn't really listening to it.

Step forward, gladiator.
 
In accordance with the rules of the pit, if you do not step forward, you will be disemboweled, slowly and carefully.
 
You have four seconds to comply.

Three.

Two.

One.

Jack blinked and stepped out.

Thank you.
 
Please proceed toward the center of the arena and await the start of the bout.

Numbly, on legs that felt distant and rubbery, like they belonged to someone else, Jack did as he was told.

The arena was the size of a football pitch — bigger, probably — and surrounded all the way round by huge black slabs of rock, identical to the one that was rumbling down behind him, cutting off the only exit.

And above the slabs was the audience.
 
Each and every row was filled to bursting by thousands — hundreds of thousands — of monsters.
 
They were all looking at him.
 
They were all screaming, howling, and jeering at him.
 
The noise alone was incredible enough; the overall effect of the scene, Jack found, was really very alarming indeed.

As Gladiator Jack's opponent in this next bout
, intoned the voice in his head (the crowd quieted a little, so Jack knew that they voice wasn't just talking to just him anymore),
we present to you an undisputed master of the pit — the most feared fighter of our time.
 
No quarter has he asked or given in a career that has now spanned some fifteen years.

Terrific
, thought Jack limply.
 
Oh, terrific.

His speed is unmatched,
the voice went on
.
 
His cruelty is unparalleled.
 
His name alone strikes ice-cold terror deep in the hearts of all who hear it.
 
Fight fans, we present to you the Black Prince himself:
 
LEO THE UNSPEAKABLE!

Well, thought Jack, the name wasn't exactly the scariest he'd ever heard.

But now, on the opposite side of the ring from where Jack had come in, another of the black slabs was lifting.

It came slowly at first.
 
Extending two long black — what?
 
legs?
 
feelers? — out into the blazing light, the thing seemed to test the ground, flexing.
 
Then it took a whole step and moved into view.

It was a giant spider, and quite the most vile creature that Jack had ever seen in his life.
 
Its body, slung at the center of its arched, oddly delicate-looking legs, was a good twenty feet long by itself, massively bloated and covered all over with spines like large screwdrivers.
 
Its fangs glistened with slime, and its rows of eyes regarded Jack greedily.

BEGIN!
 
Barked the voice, and as Jack watched, the spider bounced twice in a preparatory way, then began to scuttle toward him, its long legs striking eagerly at the sandy ground.
 
Jack was still staring at the spider, rigid with horror, when it
leaped
, knocking Jack flat on his back.

And now it was standing over him!
 
It was bending down at him, blotting out the sky, and the distant roaring of the crowd was reaching a fever pitch.
 
Jack's nostrils were filled with the spider's damp, musty smell.
 
Layers of wet fangs split open like terrible flowers in front of him.
 
There was nothing else in the world, nothing else to see but the dark maw and dripping fangs reaching toward him.
 
And then—

"Stab me," said a voice.

There was a pause.

Jack had been screaming a bit.
 
He screamed once more, but without quite so much conviction this time.

"Stab me," the voice repeated.

Jack stared.
 
The dreadful mouth was still there, but it hadn't moved.

"Can you hear me?" asked the voice.
 
The words were appearing in Jack's head, much as the others had done before, but the effect was strangely soothing, as if soft, cool fingers were stroking his mind.

"Can you
hear
me?" the voice asked again.

"Y-yes?" said Jack's aloud.

"Good," said the voice.
 
"We don't have much time.
 
Listen carefully."

As far as Jack was concerned, this instruction wasn't going to pose any problems.
 
He had never listened more carefully to anything in his entire life, ever.

"The tip of your knife," said the voice, "is only a short distance from my abdomen.
 
If you drive your hand upward, right now, then you will stab me."

Jack did nothing, just gaped.

"Is there a problem?" asked the voice.
 
"Can you move?"

"Er, yes," said Jack.
 
"It's just — you
want
me to stab you?"

"Of course not.
 
But it will be better for you if you are seen to put up a struggle, yes?
 
So do it.
 
Do it now."

Drawing on all his strength, Jack gripped the knife and jerked it upward.
 
The spider had him pinned down; he couldn't see what effect the blow had had, but he felt something warm and slimy drip down and over his hand.

"Like — like that?" he asked.

"That's the best you can manage?" asked the voice.

"Yes," said Jack.

"Then it'll have to do.
 
YEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"

With a noise like hideously amplified chalk on a blackboard, the spider reared up over him, screeching.
 
Jack watched the spider's massive black underside in awe as its legs twitched and shook, giving every impression of terrible agony.
 
He could hear the crowd roaring and baying and clamoring, and for a moment he felt a strange kind of exhilaration.

Then the jaws came down.
 
They closed around his neck.

And the spider bit him.

Jack could feel the spider's fangs in his neck, and a weird, wet, itchy dripping sensation as his blood began to well out around the punctures.
 
But almost as soon as he had identified it, the feeling was gone.
 
Jack wanted to scream some more — and why not?
 
The situation certainly merited it — but he found he couldn't open his mouth.
 
The blood seemed to be clogging in his veins, the breath was sticking in his chest, and Jack's vision was fading, filling with purple splashes that swam and spread, turning everything dark.

"There," said the spider.
 
"Before you lose consciousness, I want you to know that — well, this isn't personal.
 
I don't know you, I've never seen you before, and in any other circumstances it's quite possible that we might have become friends.
 
I just want you to know," the spider repeated, "that I find that thought very distressing."

Oh, great
, thought Jack weakly.
 
Thanks a bunch.

"Goodbye, Jack," said the spider's voice.
 
"Go with my blessing."

Then the purple patches spread to cover everything.

Well
, Jack thought,
that's the last time I try and rescue anybody.

Typical
, he just had time to add.
 
This whole thing.
 
It's absolutely bloody TYP—

Then everything went black.

*
       
*
       
*
       
*
       
*

"Well," said the Emperor, looking down at Charlie.
 
"That wasn't too exciting, was it?
 
Really," he added, "was that the best you people can do?"

Charlie said nothing.