He looked around quickly. There were stretches of bare wall which could conceal a gate. But wouldn't Urthona place the gate where he could step out hidden from the sight of anyone in the room? Such as, for instance, the space behind the control console. It wasn't against the wall.
He ran to it and stepped behind it. Seconds, a minute, passed. Was Urthona delaying because he wanted to get a weapon first? If so, he would have to go to a hidden cache, since Ore had jettisoned every weapon he could locate.
Or was the staying in the control room, where he was safe? From there he could order all the robots in the palace and there were several score or more, to converge on this room.
Or had he gated to a room nearby and now was creeping up on his enemy? If so, he would make sure he had a beamer in his hand.
There was a thump as the robot blindly blundered into the wall. At least, Kickaha supposed that was the noise. He didn't want to stick his head out to see.
His only warning was a shimmering, a circle of wavy light taller than a tall man, on the wall to his right. Abruptly, it became a round hole in the wall. Urthona stepped through it, but Kickaha was upon him, hurling him back, desperate to get both of them in the control room before the gate closed.
They fell out onto the floor, Kickaha on top of the Lord, fingers locked on the wrist of the hand that held a beamer. The other laid the edge of the knife against the jugular vein. Urthona's eyes were glazed, the back of his head having thumped against the floor.
Kickaha twisted the wrist; the beamer clattered on the tile floor. He rolled away, grabbed the weapon, and was up on his feet.
Snarling, shaking, Urthona started to get up. He sank down as Kickaha ordered him to stay put.
The robot, Number Six, started towards them. Kickaha quickly ordered Urthona to command Six to take no action. The Lord did so, and the robot retreated to a wall.
Grinning, Kickaha said, "I never thought the day'd come when I'd be glad to see you. But I am. You're the cat's paw that pulled the chestnuts out of the fire for me. Me and Anana."
Urthona looked as if he just couldn't believe that this was happening to him. No wonder. After all he'd endured and the good luck he'd had to find a boulder with a gate in it. For all he knew, his enemies were stranded on his world or more probably dead. He was king of the palace again.
It must have been a shock when he found the door to the control room welded shut. Somebody had gotten in after all. Possibly a Lord of another world who'd managed to gate in, though that wasn't likely. He must have figured that somehow Ore or Anana and Kickaha had gotten in. But they couldn't get into the control room, where the center of power was. The first thing he had probably done though, was to cancel the decaying orbit of his palace. After setting it in a safe path, he would have started checking the sensory system. The regular one, first. No doubt one of the flashing red lights on the central console indicated that someone was in a trap. He'd checked that and discovered that Ore was in the cube.
But he must also have seen Anana. Had he ordered the robot Two to kill her?
He asked Urthona. The Lord shook his head as if he was trying to throw his troubles out.
"No," he said slowly. "I saw her there, but she wasn't doing anything to endanger me for the moment. I started then to check out the auxiliary sensories just to make sure no one else was aboard. I hadn't gotten to the room in which you were yet. You connected with the control room... and ... damn you! If only I'd gotten here a few minutes earlier."
"It's all in the timing," Kickaha said, smiling. "Now let us get on with it. You're probably thinking I'm going to kill you or perhaps stick you in that wheeled cage and let you starve to death. It's not a bad idea, but I prefer contemplating the theory to putting it into practice.
"I promised Ore I'd let him go if he cooperated. He hasn't done a thing to help, but I can't hold that against him. He hasn't had a chance.
"Now, if you cooperate, too, Urthona, I'll let you live and I won't torture you. I need to get Ore, your beloved brother, out of that trap so I can get my hands on the Horn. But first, let's check that your story is true. God help you if it isn't."
He stood behind the Lord just far enough away so that if he tried to turn and snatch at the beamer he'd be out of reach. The weapon was set on low-stun. Urthona worked the controls, and the concealed TV of the auxiliary system looked into the room with the cube. Ore was still in his prison; Anana and Two were standing by the hole in the wall.
Kickaha called her name. She looked up with a soft cry. He told her not to be frightened, and he outlined what had happened.
"So things are looking good again," he said. "Ore, your brother is going to gate you into the control room. First, though, put the beamer down on the table. Don't try anything. We'll be watching you. Keep hold of the Horn. That's it. Now go to the corner where you appeared in the cube when you were gated through. Okay. Stand still. Don't move or you'll lose a foot or something."
Urthona reached for a button. Kickaha said, "Hold it. I'm not through. Anana, you know where I went. Go up there and stand by the wall behind the control console there. Then step through the gate when it appears. Oh, you'll meet a blind robot, poor old One. I'll order it to stand still so it won't bother you."
Urthona walked stiffly to a console at one end of the enormous room. His hands were tightly clenched; his jaw was clamped; he was quivering.
"You should be jumping with joy," Kickaha said. "You're going to live. You'll get another chance at the three of us some day."
"You don't expect me to believe that?"
"Why not? Did I ever do anything you anticipated?"
He directed the Lord to show him the unmarked controls which would bring Ore back. Urthona stepped back to allow Kickaha to operate. The redhead, however, said, "You do it."
It was possible that the controls, moved in the manner shown, would send a high voltage through him.
Urthona shrugged. He flipped a toggle switch, pressed a button, and stepped away from the console. To the left, the bare wall shimmered for a few seconds. A hemisphere of swirling colors bulged out from it, and then it collapsed. Red Ore stood with his back almost touching the wall.
Kickaha said, "Put the Horn down and push it with your foot toward me."
The Lord obeyed. Kickaha, keeping an eye on both of them, bent down and picked up the Horn.
"Ha! Mine again!"
Five minutes later, Anana stepped out of the same gate through which Kickaha and Urthona had fallen.
Her uncles looked as if this was the end of the last act. They fully expected to be slain on the spot. At one time, Kickaha would have been angered because neither had the least notion that he deserved to be executed. There was no use getting upset, however. He had learned long ago not to be disturbed by the self-righteous and the psychopath, if there was any difference between the two.
"Before we part," he said. "I'd like to clear up a few things, if possible. Urthona, do you know anything about an Englishman, supposedly born in the eighteenth century? Red Ore found him living in this place when he entered."
Urthona looked surprised. "Someone else got into here?"
"That tells me how much you know. Well, maybe I'll run across him some other time. Urthona, your niece has explained something about the energy converter that powers this floating fairy castle. She told me that any converter can be set to overload, but an automatic regulator will cut it back to override that. Unless you remove the regulator. I want you to fix the overload to reach its peak in fifteen minutes. You'll cut the regulator out of the line."
Urthona paled. "Why? You ... you mean to blow me up?"
"No. You'll be long gone from here when it blows. I intend to destroy your palace. You'll never be able to use it again."
Urthona didn't ask what would happen if he refused. Under the keen eye of Anana, he set the controls. A large red light began flashing on a console. A display flashed, in Lord letters, OVERLOAD. A whistle shrilled.
Even Anana looked uneasy. Kick
aha smiled, though he was as nervous as anybody.
"Okay. Now open the gates to Earth and to Jadawin's world."
He had carefully noted the control which could put the overload regulator back into the line if Urthona tried any tricks.
"I know you can't help being treacherous and sneaky, Urthona," Kickaha said. "But repress your natural viciousness. Refrain from pulling a fast one. My beamer's set on cutting. I'll slice you at the first false move."
Urthona did not reply.
On the towering blank wall two circular shimmerings appeared. They cleared away. One showed the inside to a cave, the same one through which Kickaha and Anana had entered southern California. The other revealed the slope of a wooded valley, a broad green river at the foot. And, far away, smoke rising from the chimneys of a tiny village and a stone castle on a rocky bluff above it. The sky was a bright green.
Kickaha looked pleased.
"That looks like Dracheland. The third level, Abharhploonta. Either of you ever been there?"
"I've made some forays into Jadawin's world," Urthona said. I planned someday to ... to ..."
"Take over from Jadawin? Forget it. Now, Urthona, activate agate that'll take you to the surface of your planet."
Urthona gasped and said, "But you said ... ! Surely ... ? You're not going to abandon me here?"
"Why not? You made this world. You can live in it the rest of your life. Which will probably be short and undoubtedly will be miserable. As the Terrestrials say, let the punishment fit the crime."
"That isn't right!" Urthona said. "You are letting Ore go back to Earth. It isn't what I'd call a first-rate world, but compared to this, it's a paradise."
"Look who's talking about right. You're not going to beg, are you? You, a lord among the Lords?"
Urthona straightened his shoulders. "No. But if you think you've seen the last of me ..."
"I know. I've got another think coming. I wouldn't be surprised. I'll bet you have a gate to some other world concealed in a boulder. But you aren't letting on. Think you'll catch me by surprise some day, heh? After you find the boulder-if you do. Good luck. I may be bored and need some stiff competition. Get going."
Urthona walked up to the wall. Anana spoke sharply. "Kickaha! Stop him!" He yelled at the Lord, "Hold it, or I'll shoot!" Urthona stopped but did not turn. "What is it, Anana?"
She glanced at a huge chronometer on a wall. "Don't you know there's still danger? How do you know what he's up to? What might happen when he gives the codeword? It'll be better to wait until the last minute. Then Ore can go through, and you can shut the gate behind him. After that, we'll go through ours. And then Urthona can gate. But he can do it with no one else around."
"Yeah, you're right," Kickaha said. "I was so eager to get back I rushed things."
He shouted, "Urthona! Turn around and walk back here!"
Kickaha didn't hear Urthona say anything. His voice must have been very soft. But the words were loud enough for whatever sensor was in the wall to detect them.
A loud hissing sounded from the floor and the ceilings and the walls. From thousands of tiny perforations in the inner wall, clouds of greenish gas shot through the room.
Kickaha breathed in just enough of the metallic odor to make him want to choke. He held his breath then, but his eyes watered so that he could not see Urthona making his break. Red Ore was suddenly out of sight, too. Anana, a dim figure in the green mists, stood looking at him. One hand was pinching her nose and the other was over her mouth. She was signalling to him not to breathe.
She would have been too late, however. If he had not acted immediately to shut off his breath, he would, he was sure, be dead by now. Unconscious, anyway.
The gas was not going to harm his skin. He was sure of that. Otherwise, Urthona would have been caught in the deadly trap.
Anana turned and disappeared in the green. She was heading toward the gate to the world of tiers. He began running too, his eyes burning and streaming water. He caught a glimpse of Red Ore plunging through the gate to Earth.
And then he saw, dimly, Urthona's back as he sped through the gate to the world which Kickaha loved so much.
Kickaha felt as if he would have to cough. Nevertheless, he fought against the reflex, knowing that if he drew in one full breath, he would be done for.
Then he was through the entrance. He didn't know how high the gate was above the mountain slope, but he had no time for caution. He fell at once, landed on his buttocks, and slid painfully on a jumble of loose rocks. It went at a forty-five degree angle to the horizontal for about two hundred feet, then suddenly dropped off. He rolled over and clawed at the rocks. They cut and tore into the chest and his hands, but he dug in no matter how it hurt.
By then he was coughing. No matter. He was out of the green clouds which now poured out of the hole in the mountain face.
He stopped. Slowly, afraid that if he made a too vigorous movement he'd start the loose stones to sliding, he began crawling upward. A few rocks were dislodged. Then he saw Anana. She had gotten to the side of the gate and was clinging with one hand to a rocky ledge. The other held the Horn. Her eyes were huge, and her face was pale.
She shouted, "Get up here and away! As fast as you can! The converter is going to blow soon!" He knew that. He yelled at her to get out of the area. He'd be up there in a minute. She looked as if she were thinking of coming down to help him, then she began working her way along the steep slope. He crawled at an angle toward the ledge she had grabbed. Several times he started sliding back, but he managed to stop his descent.
Finally, he got off the apron of stones. He rose to a crouch and, grabbing handsful of grass, pulled himself up to the ledge. Holding onto this with one hand, he worked his way as swiftly as he dared away from the hole.
Just as he got to a point above a slight projection of the mountain, a stony half-pout, the mountain shook and bellowed. He was hurled outward to land flat on his face on the miniledge.
The loose rocks slid down and over the edge, leaving the stone beneath it as bare as if a giant broom had swept it.
Silence except for the screams of some distant birds and a faint rumble as the stones slid to a halt far below. Anana said, "It's over, Kickaha."
He turned slowly to see her looking around a spur of rock.
"The gate would have closed the moment its activator was destroyed. We got only a small part of the blast, thank God. Otherwise, the whole mountain would've been blown up."
He got up and looked alongside the slope. Something stuck out from the pile below. An arm?
"Did Urthona get away?"
She shook her head. "No, he went over the edge. He didn't have much of a drop, about twenty feet, before he hit the second slope. But the rocks caught him."
"We'll go down and make sure he's dead," he said. "That trick of his dissolves any promises we made to him."
All that was needed was to pile more rocks on Urthona to keep the birds and the beasts from him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
IT WAS A month later. They were still on the mountain, though on the other side and near its base. The valley was uninhabited by humans, though occasionally hunters ventured into it from the river-village they'd seen on coming from the gate. Kickaha and Anana avoided these.
They'd built a leanto at first. After they'd made bows and arrows from ash, tipped with worked flint, they shot deer, which were plentiful, and tanned the hides. Out of these they made a tepee, well-hidden in a grove of trees. A brook, two hundred yards down the slope, gave them clear cold water. It also provided fine fishing.
They dressed in buckskin hides and slept on bearskin blankets at night. They rested well but exercised often, hiking, berry-and nut-picking, hunting, and making love. They even became a little fat. After being half-starved so long, it was difficult not to stuff themselves. Part of their diet was bread and butter which they'd stolen one night from the village, two large bagsful.
Kickaha, eavesdropping on the villagers, had valid
ated his assumption that they were in Drachef land. And from a reference overheard, he had learned that the village was in the barony of Ulrich von Neifen.
"His lord, theoretically, anyway, is the duke, or Herzog, Willehalm von Hartmot. I know, generally, where we are. If we go down that river, we'll come to the Pfawe river. We'll travel about three hundred miles, and we'll be in the barony of Siegfried von Listbat. He's a good friend. He should be. I gave him my castle, and he married my divorced wife. It wasn't that Isote and I didn't get along well, you understand. She just wouldn't put up with my absences."
"Which were how long?"
"Oh, they varied from a few months to a few years."
Anana laughed.
"From now on, when you go on trips, I'll be along."
"Sure. You can keep up with me, but Isote couldn't, and she wouldn't have even if she could."
World of Tiers 05 - The Lavalite World Page 24