“Nay, let me carry the wench! I shall be gentle.”
With an oath Raynor whipped around, his sword bared. Eblik’s war-ax was suddenly in his hand, quivering like a falcon straining to be released. There, filling the passage by which they had entered, were a dozen men, fierce-eyed, grinning with hate and triumph—the outlaws of Mirak Forest.
At their head stood Baron Malric. His youthful face wore a gay, reckless smile, despite the fact that he was in the heart of the wizard’s stronghold.
“Hold!” he whispered. “Do not move! For if you do, I shall slay you.” And one slim hand slipped toward the loose velvet sleeve and the sharp knife Malric wore strapped to his forearm.
“How the devil did you get here?” Raynor snarled.
“I followed the path you opened for me. I swam the lake and crossed the field of the Black Flowers. I tracked you here through the citadel. It was not an easily won victory—no! Of all my men, these few are all that remain. Some sleep amid the Black Flowers. Others died elsewhere. But it does not matter. Ghiar was too reckless when he hired you to steal the girl from my castle. Warlock he may be, but I rule Mirak!”
“Hired me?” Raynor said slowly. “You mistake. Ghiar is my enemy, as he is yours.”
MALRIC laughed softly. “Well, it does not matter whether you lie or tell truth. For you and this black shall both die here, and after I have found and slain Ghiar, I shall go back to my castle with the wench.”
“After you have slain Ghiar!”
The words whispered out; the samite curtains parted, and a man stepped through. It was the warlock. The dim green light touched the great billow of white beard, the shaggy eyebrows, of the giant. The dark, somber eyes held no emotion.
“You seek me, Malric? I am here. Slay me if you can.”
The baron, after a single start, stood motionless. His gaze locked in a silent, deadly duel with the cold stare of the wizard.
Abruptly, without warning, Malric moved. Too fast for eye to follow his hand dipped, came up flashing brought death. Steel flickered through the air. The keen knife drove at Ghiar’s throat—and fell blunted, ringing on the stones.
“Mortal fool,” the warlock whispered. “You seek to battle the stars in their courses. Malric, I am Lord of the Zodiac. I have power over the Signs that rule men’s lives.”
The baron moistened his lips. His smile was crooked.
“Is this so? I know something of the Zodiac, Ghiar, and I know you do not rule all the Signs. You yourself, once spoke to me of being born under the Sign of the Fish of Ea. As was I. How can you rule your ruler—or any other Sign? Nor are you Lord of the Stars. There is a certain Sign”—Malric glanced at the great black jewel in the mosaic’s center—“Aye, there is Tammuz. He is Lord of the Master Sign.”
“Who can call on Tammuz?” Ghiar said coldly. “Once in a thousand years is a man born under his Sign. And only such a man may work the ultimate magic. Aye, I said to you I was born under the Sign of the Fish of Ea, but who are you that I should tell you full truth—as I do now?” The warlock frowned at Raynor. “As for you and your servant, you shall die with the others. Had you been wise, you would not have sought me here. This girl is mine; I need her life to give me renewed youth.”
“D’you think I fear a wizard?” Raynor snapped, and sprang. His sword sheared down, screaming through cleft air.
And rebounded, clashing. The weapon dropped from Raynor’s nerveless hand, which was paralyzed as though by a strong electric shock. Snarling an oath, the prince tensed to leap, ready to close with the warlock with bare hands.
Ghiar’s peremptory gesture halted him.
“Rash fools!” the wizard whispered, a chill and dreadful menace in the sibilant words. “You shall die as no man has died for a thousand years.” His arms lifted in a strange, archaic gesture. A gesture that reached up toward the stars far above, a gesture that summoned!
Bleak and ominous came the warlock’s voice.
“Your doom comes. For now I call on the Sign of the Fish of Ea!”
CHAPTER VI
The Sign of Tammuz
THE green light thickened and grew fainter. An eerie, cloudy emerald glow dropped down upon the roofless room. The figure of Ghiar was a dark shadow towering in the dimness. And the deep voice thundered out:
“Ea! Lord of Eridu and E-apsu! Dweller in the house of the watery deep! Shar-apsi! By the power of thy Sign I call on the Lord of that which is below, watcher of Aralu, home of the restless dead. Ea, troubler of the great waters, consort of Damkina, Damgal-nunna, rise now from the eternal abyss!”
The green darkness thickened. Raynor, straining his eyes, could see nothing. He made an effort to move, but found he could not. A weird paralysis held him helpless.
He heard a sound, faint and far away. The sound of waters. The tinkling of brooks, the rushing of mighty cataracts, the thunder of tides crashing on basalt cliffs. The noises of the great deep heralded the coming of Ea, Lord of the waters under the earth.
Nothing existed but the glowing emerald fogs. A deeper light began to grow above. The mists poured up toward it.
Thicker they grew, and thicker. They swirled into an inverted whirlpool, rushing up toward the bright green shining in the air, flooding into it, vanishing. Vanishing as though plunging into an abyss that had no bottom!
A figure swam slowly into view, stiff and rigid. One of Baron Malric’s wolves. Raynor had a glimpse of a strained, agonized face, and then the man was caught up into the torrent and vanished into the emerald glow. A thin, high scream drifted faintly from afar.
There were others after that. One by one the outlaws were caught up by the tide of alien magic, drawn into the weird whirlpool, swirled into nothingness. All were gone at last save for Malric.
Now the baron came into view. His youthful face was expressionless, but in the wide eyes was a horror beyond life. The bright hair tossed as though the man floated through water.
No sound came from Malric. He drifted up—and vanished!
The tide gripped Raynor. He felt himself lifted weightless, felt himself circling, rising. The shining abyss loomed above him. Desperately he fought to escape from the necromantic spell.
Quite suddenly the green mists were blotted out. Raynor seemed to hang in a black, starless immensity. He was alone in the void of eternal night.
In the distance a white, chill light began to grow. It approached, meteorlike, and Raynor saw a round, oddly familiar object speeding toward him. Soon it hung in the void not far away, and the prince remembered the deformed monster that had sat on the throne above the abyss—the captive of the snake that he had slain. Here was the same misshapen, hideous head, with its glazed eyes and elongated muzzle, all covered with glittering scales.
The Thing spoke.
“My promise, Prince Raynor. You gave me release. And I promised aid when you should need it most. I bring that aid now.”
“The amulet,” said the monstrous disembodied head.
Abruptly Raynor remembered the talisman Ghiar had given him in Mirak forest, the disc that bore the Signs of the Zodiac on its surface. He did not seem to move, yet the amulet was in his hand, and lifted high. It had changed. The Signs were erased, all but the black jewel in its center. Within the gem the star-point pulsed and waned with supernal brilliance.
“Tammuz is Lord of the Zodiac,” the hideous muzzle croaked. “His magic is above magic. He is master of truth. Through him you may cast away the fetters of glamour and sorcery. Once in a thousand years is a man born under this Sign, and only such a man may call on Tammuz. I am that man! I was born under the Master Sign! Ghiar lies—he boasts of that which he is not! And now, to keep my promise and to aid you, I summon the Lord of the Zodiac. I summon—Tammuz!”
Forthwith the black jewel blazed with an icy, incredible light, starkly pitiless and blindingly bright; and the fantastic vision snapped out and vanished. The talisman was snatched from Raynor’s hand. He felt firm stone beneath his feet; a cold wind blew on his sweating f
ace.
Once more he was in Ghiar’s citadel. He stood in the roofless room of the Zodiac. But no longer was it filled with the green mists.
DELPHIA and Eblik stood motionless; near them towered the warlock. Of Malric and his wolves there was no trace.
Ghiar’s beard fluttered in the frigid blast. His deep eyes were hate-filled. And, with a queer, strange certainty, Raynor knew that by the Sign and the power of the real Tammuz, all magic had been stripped from the wizard.
No longer master of dark sorcery, Ghiar was human, vulnerable!
Raynor’s shout was madly exultant as he sprang. The armor of invulnerability had been torn from Ghiar. But inhuman strength still surged in the giant frame. Huge muscles rolled under the coarse robe.
Ghiar swept out his arm in a bonecrushing blow. The shock of it made Raynor reel. Shaking his head blindly, he reeled in and closed with the warlock.
The two men crashed down on the stones. Ghiar fell uppermost; his fingers stabbed down at Raynor’s eyes. The prince rolled his head aside, and the warlock bellowed with pain as his hand smashed against rock. Abruptly Ghiar thrust himself away, and his mighty body dropped upon Raynor with an impact that drove the breath from the smaller man’s lungs.
Weakly the prince drove a blow at the wizard’s face. Blood spurted, staining the white beard. Roaring, Ghiar’s hands fastened on Raynor’s throat. They tightened remorselessly.
The prince rolled aside; he caught Ghiar’s body between his legs, locking his feet together. Breath spewed from the warlock’s lips in a foul gust. Ghiar bared his teeth in a murderous grin. And his fingers tightened—tightened.
A hot, throbbing agony was in Raynor’s skull. He could not breathe. Knifelike pain thrust into his spine. A little more pressure, and his backbone would crack.
Sheer blind madness swept down on the prince then. Like a flood of red waters it poured through him, sweeping away all else but an insane lust to kill—and swiftly.
Raynor’s thigh muscles bulged, holding Ghiar’s body in a vise between them. The grinding strain of that frightful effort made sweat burst out on the prince’s face; yet he knew that this was the crucial time. It was kill or be slain.
Bones cracked and gave sickeningly. There was a sudden softness in the wizard’s body. Ghiar gave a frightful, howling shriek that seemed to burst up from the depths of his lungs. Blood spewed from the gaping mouth, frothed over the white beard, fell on Raynor.
The mighty hands released their grip on the prince’s throat. Ghiar sprang up in one last convulsive effort. Dying, he thrust up his arms to the cold stars and screamed like a beast.
And he fell, as a tree falls, smashing down on the stones. He lay inert. From him blood crept darkly across the mosaic, touching and then covering the Sign of the Fish of Ea, the Sign under which Ghiar had been born and had ruled.
The warlock was dead.
Consciousness left Raynor then. Merciful darkness blanketed him. Nor did he recover until he felt water poured between his lips, felt a cool, soft hand on his brow. He opened his eyes.
ABOVE him sunlight slanted between the branches of an oak. The green, warm daylight of Mirak Forest was all about him. And Delphia knelt at his side, her eyes no longer blinded with sorcery, her face clouded with anxiety.
“Raynor,” she said gratefully. “You’re alive, thank the gods!”
“Alive?” growled Eblik, coming from behind an oak. “I’d not have carried him here if he hadn’t been. How do you feel, Prince?”
“Well enough,” Raynor said. “My legs ache like fire, but I’m unharmed, I think. You carried me out of the citadel, Eblik?”
“That he did,” Delphia nodded. “And swam the lake with you. The Black Flowers were dead, Raynor, blasted as though by lightning.”
“If you can walk, we’d best be moving,” Eblik said impatiently.
Raynor stood up, wincing slightly. “True. We’ll find horses and leave this accursed forest behind us.” Together he and Delphia set out along the winding path that led through Mirak. Eblik hesitated a moment before he followed. He looked up at the blue, cloudless sky.
“May the gods grant we get out of this wilderness before nightfall,” he grunted. “Out of this black forest, and in another land—a land where the stars are less evil.”
Gripping his war-ax, he hurried after Delphia and Raynor. And, presently, the three of them were swallowed by the cool, dim aisles of the vast forest.
THE MISGUIDED HALO
The Youngest Angel didn’t quite understand—and K. Young found a saint’s life not a happy one!
THE youngest angel could scarcely be blamed for the error. They had given him a brand-new, shining halo and pointed down to the particular planet they meant. He had followed directions implicitly, feeling quite proud of the responsibility. This was the first time the youngest angel had ever been commissioned to bestow sainthood on a human.
So he swooped down to the earth, located Asia, and came to rest at the mouth of a cavern that gaped halfway up a Himalayan peak. He entered the cave, his heart beating wildly with excitement, preparing to materialize and give the holy lama his richly earned reward. For ten years the ascetic Tibetan Kai Yung had sat motionless, thinking holy thoughts. For ten more years he had dwelt on top of a pillar, acquiring additional merit. And for the last decade he had lived in this cave, a hermit, forsaking fleshly things.
The youngest angel crossed the threshold and stopped with a gasp of amazement. Obviously he was in the wrong place. An overpowering odor of fragrant saki assailed his nostrils, and he stared aghast at the wizened, drunken little man who squatted happily beside a fire, roasting a bit of goat flesh. A den of iniquity!
Naturally, the youngest angel, knowing little of the ways of the world, could not understand what had led to the lama’s fall from grace. The great-pot of saki that some misguidedly pious one had left at the cave mouth was an offering, and the lama had tasted, and tasted again. And by this time he was clearly not a suitable candidate for sainthood.
The youngest angel hesitated. The directions had been explicit. But surely this tippling reprobate could not be intended to wear a halo. The lama hiccuped loudly and reached for another cup of saki; and thereby decided the angel, who unfurled his wings and departed with an air of outraged dignity.
Now, in a Midwestern State of North America there is a town called Tibbett. Who can blame the angel if he alighted there, and, after a brief search, discovered a man apparently ripe for sainthood, whose name, as stated on the door of his small suburban home, was K. Young?
“I may have got it wrong,” the youngest angel thought. “They said it was Kai Yung. But this is Tibbett, all right. He must be the man. Looks holy enough, anyway.
“Well,” said the youngest angel, “here goes. Now, where’s that halo?”
MR. YOUNG sat on the edge of his bed, with head lowered, brooding. A depressing spectacle. At length he arose and donned various garments. This done, and shaved and washed and combed, he descended the stairway to breakfast.
Jill Young, his wife, sat examining the paper and sipping orange juice.
She was a small, scarcely middle-aged, and quite pretty woman who had long ago given up trying to understand life. It was, she decided, much too complicated. Strange things were continually happening. Much better to remain a bystander and simply let them happen. As a result of this attitude, she kept her charming face unwrinkled and added numerous gray hairs to her husband’s head.
More will be said presently of Mr. Young’s head. It had, of course, been transfigured during the night. But as yet he was unaware of this, and Jill drank orange juice and placidly approved a silly-looking hat in an advertisement.
“Hello, Filthy,” said Young. “Morning.”
He was not addressing his wife. A small and raffish Scotty had made its appearance, capering hysterically about its master’s feet, and going into a fit of sheer madness when the man pulled its hairy ears. The raffish Scotty flung its head sidewise upon the carpet and skated ab
out the room on its muzzle, uttering strangled squeaks of delight. Growing tired of this at last, the Scotty, whose name was Filthy McNasty, began thumping its head on the floor with the apparent intention of dashing out its brains, if any.
Young ignored the familiar sight. He sat down, unfolded his napkin, and examined his food. With a slight grunt of appreciation he began to eat.
He became aware that his wife was eying him with an odd and distrait expression. Hastily he dabbed at his lips with the napkin. But Jill still stared.
Young scrutinized his shirt front. It was, if not immaculate, at least free from stray shreds of bacon or egg. He looked at his wife, and realized that she was staring at a point slightly above his head. He looked up.
Jill started slightly. She whispered, “Kenneth, what is that?”
Young smoothed his hair. “Er . . . what, dear?”
“That thing on your head.”
The man ran exploring fingers across his scalp. “My head? How do you mean?”
“It’s shining,” Jill explained. “What on earth have you been doing to yourself?”
Mr. Young felt slightly irritated. “I have been doing nothing to myself. A man grows bald eventually.”
Jill frowned and drank orange juice. Her fascinated gaze crept up again. Finally she said, “Kenneth, I wish you’d—”
“What?”
She pointed to a mirror on the wall.
With a disgusted grunt Young arose and faced the image in the glass. At first he saw nothing unusual. It was the same face he had been seeing in mirrors for years. Not an extraordinary face—not one at which a man could point with pride and say: “Look. My face! But, on the other hand, certainly not a countenance which would cause consternation. All in all, an ordinary, clean, well-shaved, and rosy face. Long association with it had given Mr. Young a feeling of tolerance, if not of actual admiration.
But topped by a halo it acquired a certain eerieness.
The halo hung unsuspended about five inches from the scalp. It measured perhaps seven inches in diameter, and seemed like a glowing, luminous ring of white light. It was impalpable, and Young passed his hand through it several times in a dazed manner.
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