The wizard’s eyes went blank. His limbs stiffened, hardened, became cold. On the table, the wooden figure of a mummified corpse rose and began marching, lurching a bit, toward the besieged snake. Caranga heard that advance; the tread of thousands of marching feet, outside the tent. He hated his gooseflesh and was glad he could not see beyond the walls of Pyre’s tent. He stared down at a puppet corpse that walked without strings, an unnerving sight. Seeing a vast army of the dead marching into combat might be more than his sanity would bear.
The horrid outré forces were converging on the snake. Did this mean his beloved daughter would be saved or given the doubtful blessing of a clean death? If she lived, might not rescue by such weird and truly ghastly powers blast her reason? I myself am without fear, but Tiana — Tiana is only a girl, still, no matter how she … ah, if only I’d burned that accursed map unopened! She’d never have been drawn into this nighted intrigue.
More than half the snake’s body had been pulled underground. Such success had been accomplished at the expense of abandoning the assaults on temple and altar. The cloud had split the tail wide open, and it oozed. Mighty ice worms were crushing the snake’s foreportion between them, while the wooden corpse held the head down and pounded upon it. Having moved in close, the frost giant froze the split tail solid. All Pyre’s forces except the third ice worm were close to the enemy, and defeating him.
The watching Caranga frowned. This seemed a tactical error to the pirate with long experience at assault. It were wiser, surely, to hold some forces in reserve. He could not see what happened next on the table of sand, for the ground beneath him twisted and lunged. The earth shook like a bucking horse and he was thrown from his feet. That restless earth opened beneath him and he fell backward.
For an instant Caranga thought he was falling into the open mouth of hell; then he landed on his backside. Quickly he scrambled out of a shallow crack in the ground. Bardon, too, was rising to his feet.
Both pirates stared at the greatly altered table.
Of the cloud, the frost giant’s head, and the first and second ice worms there remained no trace. The third worm was rapidly melting. Wounded and bleeding, the snake reared triumphant beside a red glowing pool of molten sand. In that awful lake floundered the last traces of the corpse-figure that represented so many resurrected warriors — animated by the soul and brain of Pyre. The puppet’s hand was valiantly raised above the surface like that of a drowning swimmer.
It burned as it sank.
“Lost,” Caranga whispered.
“But how?” Bardon demanded. “How could such an array of might be whelmed this way?”
They stepped out of the tent and into stinking, smoking horror. Scant hours before the earth had been undisturbed. Now three broad tracks rent it, marking the passage of three mighty rivers of ice. While other signs indicated that the table of sand had showed a true presentment, the pirates’ attention was fixed on what sprawled out before them. Where once a grassland had stretched in fertile beauty, now a proud mountain rose to towering height. Smoke and fire belched from the mountaintop and molten rock poured in rivers down its flanks.
The two men of Vixen stood stunned. At last Caranga swallowed and spoke.
“Lava. We knew Sarsis could make the world hot. Now we see the means.”
They reentered the tent. Pyre’s empty body still sat stiffly before the table of sand. The eyes were merely chips of agate, utterly void. There was no hint that his lost soul might ever return. He had imbued an army of corpses with the seemingly indomitable force of that soul, and the army had been returned to corpses. All Caranga saw here was evidence that Pyre’s soul was trapped on the far side of mortality. How long would the wizard’s empty husk of body last?
Caranga was spurred to curse the Gods and Fates for laying such burdens on him, but that would not help. A terrible defeat had been suffered, and perhaps it was final, terminal for humankind. Yet some small measure of life and power remained. There remained yet one blow to be struck. A man ought not to lie down and die until the last measure of his strength was spent. He turned to his aide.
“Come, Bardon,” he said, quietly. “Let us to our tasks.”
Bardon did not move and Caranga stared at him, expecting the younger man to say something. After an awkward silence, the second mate shook his head and that strange pentacular earring swung and flashed beneath his lobe.
“No, sir. I said before that the time for last farewells had not come. I still believe it.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Caranga stood with his back to the Mound of the Great Snake. About his feet lay those he had slain. After carrying out Pyre’s instructions, the black pirate had wandered about looking for some way to hinder the plans of the Eyes of Sarsis. Thus he had come upon the large work gang. They were shoveling dirt, repairing the damage inflicted on the Mound by the third glacier. When he charged, bellowing his war cry, the slaves had scattered like sheep before a lion. Only then did he see their beastmen guards. At first glance those armed and armored creatures appeared formidable foes, but as he expected, they fought only as highly trained animals. Caranga’s broad blade slew them by ones and twos as they attempted maneuvers that failed because they were performed by rote without understanding.
At last they broke their training. Throwing aside their weapons, they had attacked like a wolf pack. The slaughter had been rapid and brief.
The victor leaned back against the mound and began to bind his wounds as best he could. Soon the moon would rise. That might mean his daughter’s death; indeed the death of all he knew and valued. Yet Pyre had promised some faint hope, a last chance to snatch the world out of the jaws of the Snake. Caranga had carried out his part without understanding it. It felt very good to have wielded weapon without sorcery.
As instructed, he had carried the wizard’s cold empty body to the Temple of Cignas, arriving well ahead of the Eyes of Sarsis. The model had not done justice to the temple’s beauty.
Its walls were a complex lacy tapestry, as if someone had woven the pink-white marble rather than carved it.
The tiny flowers that nearly covered the building had not grown there. They were glass, perfect replicas of natural flowers. Inside stood hundreds of statues of men and women. Each figure was nude and posed with great dignity and beauty. Here three strong men were moving a great rock, there a dozen maidens spun in a gay dance of spring. Lovers ranged in pose from the first tender kiss of young love to intense passionate embrace.
Caranga had no time for more than brief inspection but it was clear that whoever had arranged these statues believed the human form was a thing of grace and elegance and had built this temple to celebrate that beauty. Yet Pyre had said that these statues had been made from living men and women by eating their souls. It seemed impossible to reconcile this accusation of hideous evil with what he saw.
Still, Duke Holonbad did have a lovely collection of stuffed wild birds, and the duke loved to eat fowl.
Caranga’s instructions were to conceal Pyre’s body among the statues, but it seemed unlikely the wizard wished to be stripped naked. Therefore Caranga left the body in a dark corner, and departed unseen.
That was all the wizard had bidden him to do. It seemed a useless task, like placing a legless, armless cripple to wait in ambush for a mounted warrior in helm and mail. Even if Pyre’s lost and shattered soul could somehow reassemble and find its way out of the cosmic night into his body, was the wizard not powerless, his last resource spent?
Neither did Caranga expect that his preventing the repair of the mound would do more than inconvenience the Eyes of Sarsis.
He had finished binding his wounds when, over to his right, he heard digging sounds. That makes no sense; that sweet glacier caused no damage there!
He moved toward the sound, to discover another slave work-gang rapidly digging a hole through the Mound. They were adding to the damage caused by the glacier. Had the slaves rebelled? No; the beastmen guards were still among them. But
this was clearly sabotage. Caranga was more deeply sunk in despair than he realized. For a moment his brain refused to function, for hope can be most painful.
Then it became clear. The slaves were ruining the Mound because they had been given false orders. There was a traitor among the minions of Sarsis! A host of confused questions raced through his mind. There was only one certainty: this dark game was not yet over. With mixed fear and hope, Caranga waited for moonrise.
*
For long and long Jiltha had rested in the soft womb of darkness. Only slowly did the nightmares come, tiny pinpricks of terror. Steadily they grew worse. Formless horrors attacked her. She tried to grasp the darkness, to bury herself in unconsciousness. The assault of fear only grew more intense and deafening screams filled her ears. Only when her breath ran out did Jiltha realize that it was she who was screaming.
No kindly nurse came murmuring in response to this royal nightmare.
Awake and frightened, Jiltha tried to take stock of the situation. She was outside but could see little by the dim starlight. She lay on her back on cold hard stone. A chilly wind puffed across her naked body. How dare anyone treat a princess thus? For a moment anger and embarrassed modesty displaced her fears, then the royal adolescent found she could not move her arms and legs. She was bound in all four limbs; secured upon an altar of sacrifice.
Again she was not aware of screaming nor could she stop until her lungs ached.
Only exhaustion calmed her — or quieted her, at any rate. Her eyes focused on a shape standing a few feet from the altar. At first glance she thought it a tall man clad in robes of dark, dark green, but it stepped toward her moving with more than human suppleness. The cowl was the wrong shape to hide a human head. A soft sweet, voice emerged from the darkness within the cowl.
“Calm yourself, Princess. You need fear no evil. You are here to help in a great and noble work. I am Cignas. You need not fear that I shall harm you. I have come to celebrate your beauty, to enhance it and preserve it forever. Behold what a delicacy you are.”
The glass appeared before her eyes. She still lay in darkness but in the glass she saw a brightly illuminated image of herself. The altar beneath her supine form was a dull black stone that reflected no light but was flecked with bits of sparkling quartz. Thus she appeared to be floating on the vault of night, the stars beneath her. Jeweled gold bracelets and anklets decorated the wrists and ankles they also prisoned. A chaplet of silver and blazing blood-red rubies circled her golden head. Otherwise her beauty was unadorned and unconcealed. And what beauty!
She knew a brief conflict between shame and exhibitionism — and then Jiltha was proud to be so lovely, glad that any should look upon her, Never before had her skin been such a perfect creamy hue and texture, without blemish. Her hair was a shining spun gold. The last trace of baby fat was gone and even her tummy was tiny and taut. She was superbly shaped, her limbs exquisitely formed as a dancer’s. She had long fretted that her breasts were only buds that were never going to bloom. Now all such worries vanished. She gazed with pride and wonder at twinned round grandeur, and she smiled in delight. Her fear was replaced by wonder and gratitude.
“Cignas, you did all this for me?” Her voice remained high and most girlish. “Thank you, oh thank you. But how?”
“It is my art. One of the minions of Sarsis worked with you during your journey here, but mine was the final shaping. Nor am I finished enhancing you. Raise your leg a little.”
That did seem an order, and improprietous … but under the circumstances, Jiltha did so, and watched in the glass. The figure of Cignas did not appear. Roses did, white roses, to be pushed partly under her legs. She watched with fascination as Cignas bade her raise her arms, lift her golden head, roll slightly to the left, to the right. As she did so the unseen hands placed more fragrant white roses around her. Now she saw herself resting nude on an island of snowy roses, floating across the star-spent night sky. The sight pleased her vanity so greatly that she did not notice until the last blossom was placed:
“Cignas … I hate to complain, but … you forgot to remove the thorns.”
“No, Jiltha. You need a touch of color. Look, see how lovely the crimson of your blood looks against your creamy skin and the white roses.”
The pain was small and the voice of Cignas was soothing, lulling. She saw that the red on white contrast was indeed lovely. The urge to submit, to let this artist make of her what he would, was a sweet persuasion. Still, Jiltha was a spoiled aristocrat who had not learned to suffer without complaint.
“But it hurts,” she whined. “What do you think I am, a pheasant you’re preparing for a banquet?”
“That is an apt comparison.”
That statement was too unpleasant to be assimilated quickly, but Jiltha began to realize she was here to sacrifice more than her virginity. She wanted very badly to scream. That would be useless and she knew it. Bribery and threat, too, were out of the question. Perhaps a cunning lie would save her? Her only hope was to think calmly, but the base of her spine felt cold and interfered with thinking. Her fear grew stronger as she tried to devise a good lie and could not. The knowledge that yielding to fear would be fatal merely increased the terror that clouded her mind. Her mouth was dry. Her tiny stomach twisted in a tight knot and she was about to go into screaming convulsions — and she saw the approaching figure.
He was a tall gaunt man, armored and carrying a shining sword. A scarlet cloak flapped and fluttered about him.
Cignas also sensed the approaching warrior and turned to meet him. The dark robed figure grew, changed, became a vast coiled serpent. Raising its head, the snake hissed at a sky gone bright blue. It slithered whippily through the sand, tightening coils thick as Jiltha’s arms. She looked with horror at that wriggling instrument of death, a hair-trigger spring with venomed fangs. The reptilian head shifted while the beady eyes watched something in the sky. Jiltha saw it. A tiny speck floating across the blue, coming closer to the bright sun …
Abruptly it was dropping. She had one clear glance at it: a hawk diving out of the sky to attack the snake! And then the hawk had vanished in the blinding sunlight. For several heartbeats there was only the bright sun, then a blur partly obscured it. An ear-splitting caw resounded and the sand was blown about by mighty wings. The snake struck at the blur and hit nothing. A frenzy of shining claws and beating wings was followed by quiet. The hawk dropped the snake’s dead body and the desert scene dissolved and night returned.
Cignas, in his somber robes, lay motionless on the ground. The warrior was pulling his strange sword out of the body. Jiltha saw no blood. For an instant she was curious. She wondered at the face of this master chef who prepared human beings. Her second thought was that she’d be happier not seeing it.
The warrior strode to the altar with a chiming jingle of good mail. His sword darted forth and Jiltha flinched. Only its point touched the bracelets and anklets which prisoned her; only touched them. They clicked open. She was free.
Jiltha gazed in awe upon this victor in enchanted combat — her savior. Her sigh heaved her new attributes.
“Who — who are you?” Her voice was high and tiny in the darkness.
“I am Bardon, Commander of the Star and Sword of Avan. I am come to your rescue, Princess.”
“Oh! You talk just the way a hero should talk, my hero!”
Aye, Bardon thought, who had said the words a hundred times in his wishful dreams. Heroes, he had long thought, should both behave and talk as heroes. He did, using his best voice: “Natheless we are in grave danger still, for even my powers cannot prevail against the Eyes of Sarsis. We must leave this evil place, and with great haste. Come.”
He had already removed his cloak, which he now wrapped around her. Jiltha only just had time to snatch the ruby-studded silver chaplet as her hero drew her away from the altar. He hastened her toward a dark hole in the ground. At its mouth she hung back; burrows in the earth hardly seemed fitting places for princesses and their he
roic saviors!
“Have no fear, lady Princess. They that dwell beneath the earth are my allies.” He lifted her and descended into the ground. “Since Your Highness has no shoes, I shall carry you.”
He certainly did, the thrilled Jiltha noted, and with seeming ease! What a man! Commander of the Star and Sword of Something! What a noble, perfect hero! The hole became a tunnel, and Bardon hastened down it, his way guided by the pearly light of his enchanted sword.
Jiltha was aware that shoes were not the only clothing she lacked. In addition to a crown she had a long narrow cloak that wouldn’t close in front. He was lean and spare of chest; she no longer was. Still, nestled in her hero’s saving arms she felt quite comfortable; more than comfortable!
“My lord Bardon, shall we be pursued?”
“Yes, Your Highness. The Eyes of Sarsis need you to complete an evil ceremony and will go to any length to recapture you. If we are fortunate this tunnel will lead to the field of battle where the immortal Phoenix was slain. It is not due to be reborn for a thousand years, but I hope my sword may revive it.”
Jiltha reflected in depth on that strange news. What romance and glamor but … if all went not well, her fate was one best not thought about. If all did go well, she would be flown gloriously back to the palace. Daddy would take one look at her new maturity and arrange her marriage to one of the princes of the neighboring realms. She visualized them: Fisheyes, Dragonbreath, and Whats-isname, the fat boy with all those pimples. More likely, Daddy would choose His Exalted Highness and Defender of the Realm, Prince Argarf — Froggy. Jiltha had found occasion to remind her father of Froggy’s unconscionable ugliness. King Hower had replied that if she married Prince Argarf, she would grow to love him, in which case he would be handsome to her. Jiltha didn’t believe it. Going to bed with Froggy would not make him into a handsome prince; more likely she’d get warts.
The Eyes of Sarsis Page 20