Across a wide dusty plain, Gene rode for his life.
His mount was a voort (which Gene privately called a “thoat”), a six-legged cross between a camel and a knock-kneed llama. The sun was high and hot, but hotter still were Gene’s pursuers, mounted ape-men bestride huge beasts that resembled Brahma bulls. They were riding hell-bent for leather and closing fast.
Gene called them ape-men, but didn’t really know what animal stock they had been created from. They were likely some hybrid breed. Humanoid, exorbitantly muscular, their skin color a cadaverous blue, the hrunt were real mean sorts. The Umoi had created them for heavy labor, reserving the yalim for domestic and other semiskilled tasks.
The ape-men’s mounts were generally faster than voort though not as surefooted in hilly country. But these were the lowlands, hruntan lands.
Gene skirted a shallow depression, then came upon another one, this one wider, which he thought better to cut across than ride around. The hrunt disagreed, and, as it turned out, made the wiser decision. Slowed by rough ground, Gene’s mount scrambled out of the depression a bare six lengths ahead of the pursuit, its six spindly legs working in a complicated cadence, producing a rocking, seasickly gait.
A lance whistled by Gene’s ear. Legs tightening around the saddle’s girth, Gene took an arrow from his quiver, cocked his bow, pivoted his torso, took aim, and let fly. The arrow went wide of its mark, but the lead hrunt cautiously reined up and eased off the pace.
Gene followed up with another arrow to keep him honest, then turned forward and concentrated on whipping more speed out of the voort. But the beast was simply not built for speed.
Ahead were rocky foothills, leading to stark mountains beyond. Up there a voort would have the advantage, being a surefooted expert on the trails that wound over boulder-strewn slopes. Gene simply had to make it out of flat country and into the hills.
But that was the problem. He wouldn’t make it in time.
Having certainly done a bang-up job of locating the enemy, it could be said that in a certain sense his reconnaissance mission was a success. But he was fairly new to the scouting business and apparently had much to learn about keeping a low profile. Well, live and learn.
If he could live. He hoped there would be future opportunities for learning and growth and all the rest of that good stuff, but prospects weren’t exactly rosy at the moment.
Maybe he did have a chance. Hills rose up at either hand and the way narrowed between them. Just another quarter mile or so and he’d be among rocks, and his pursuers’ mounts tended to be gall-footed over anything but the packed sand of the plains.
Maybe —
The voort bleated and collapsed under him, sending him flying over its head and into the dirt. Shaken, he was slow getting to his feet, but managed it, sword already drawn. He saw the lance sticking out of the voort’s backside. Merely flesh-wounded, the animal struggled to its feet and limped off, bleating piteously.
The hrunt leader, its huge scimitarlike weapon raised, bore down on him. Gene stood his ground until the last second, then leaped away. Another rider followed close behind, and Gene dodged one lance, then a second. He dashed up the rise, making for a stand of boulders halfway up.
The riders dismounted and followed him.
Hrunt were fleet-footed, and Gene, still feeling the effects of the spill, had to turn and make a stand. The leader reached him first.
Up close, the hrunt was ugly as advertised, pinhole eyes, no neck, bulging upper body, and short fat legs. Its long greasy hair was blue black, its lolling tongue a liver brown. The thing snarled at him, wide thin lips curling into some thing resembling a victorious sneer. Then it spat.
Gene dodged the gob of green phlegm.
“Completely lacking in all the social graces, aren’t we?” Gene said. “Well, my good man —”
The thing charged. Gene took a swipe at it, backed off, feinted, then lunged. The hrunt fended off the attack, countering with a vicious slash.
Which Gene ducked under, coming up to drive the point of his sword into the hrunt’s throat.
The huge blue monster gurgled, thick blue ichor flowing from the gash in its neck. Then it fell over backward and rolled down the steep trail.
Fortunately hrunt were decidedly second-class swordsmen. Not so fortunately there were eight of them coming up the trail. Sometimes quantity counts.
Gene was therefore puzzled to see an arrow materialize in the forehead of the next hrunt. More arrows found their marks, beginning trajectories from the rocks above.
Gene ducked behind a boulder as ambushing yalim archers made quick work of the remaining hrunt. Then the rest of the cohort swarmed down for the mopping up, letting out whooping war cries.
It was short work. Turning his back on the grisly business of head-taking, Gene peered up the hill and saw Yerga, the Captain of the Royal Guard, come out from behind a ridge of sandstone.
Yerga was grinning at him, and Gene didn’t like it. The grin was half sneer, half triumphant gloat. There was bad blood between Gene and Yerga, had been from the start. Yerga was the Queen’s favorite — had been, that is, until Gene’s arrival.
Gene could now see Yerga’s stratagem in all its ingenuity. Yerga would have come up a winner on every throw of the dice. Send inexperienced Gene out on patrol. Gene could hardly refuse such a mission. If he gets killed, fine. If he’s spotted and followed, again, he’ll probably lose his life, and he’ll have served his function in flushing out the hruntan raiding party that had been giving the tribe trouble recently. If, as it happened, he turns up in dire need of rescue, that very same raiding party hot on his tail, he’ll look silly and lose face, if he doesn’t buy the farm that way, too. Check and mate.
Gene could only admire such a well-thought-out screw job. It was hard, though, because now he had to listen to Yerga regaling the cohort with endless jokes at his expense.
Yes, hadn’t the Strange New One looked the fool hightailing across the wastes like a frightened yethna (small ground-dwelling mammal).
Hoots.
No, it was not usually a good idea to wave greetings to the hrunt and let them know you’ve come to observe them.
Guffaws.
Yes, it had been very hospitable of Gene to invite the hrunt to midday meal.
Howls!
And so on and so forth. Gene didn’t mind it so much, but he didn’t like the fast slide down the pecking order that this ragging would doubtless cause. That was the way of this tribe. Lose face once and you might as well pitch your tent in the slit latrine, for all the respect you’d get.
There was a possibility of retrieving the situation, although Gene didn’t care for the method. It was harsh medicine. But when he considered the alternative — a loss of face perhaps catastrophic enough to leave only suicide or self-exile (same difference) as the only honorable recourse — he realized he had no choice. He would have to challenge Yerga.
Gene suffered in silence all the way back to Winter Camp, a collection of tents and leantos pitched at the foot of a twin-peaked crag. Nearby lay the mouth of a cave, wherein the Queen usually dwelt. The tribe usually summered in sparsely forested mountains off to the east.
The yalim tribes had been nomads for centuries. The plains were dotted with ruins, attesting to many attempts at something better, but no yalim civilization to date had withstood hruntan depredations. Which was a shame, because the yalim were truly capable of civilization.
The yalim wouldn’t remain nomads forever, if Gene had anything to say about it. He was determined somehow to precipitate a move into one of the Umoi cities, preferably Zond. What the Umoi had abandoned, their underpeople, the yalim, would inherit. Would, that is, it the yalim could overcome strong taboos about the abodes of the Old Gods. Legend had it that a body could die simply from looking at an Umoi city. Gene had his work cut out for him.
But for now, he faced a harder and much more unpleasant task: dealing with Yerga.
Gene looked up toward the mouth of the Roya
l Caves — the Queen and her ladies-in-waiting were the only tribe members who lived indoors. No one showed. The High Mistress usually greeted the troops when they returned from battle.
Gene dismounted, tethered his voort, and checked the beast’s wounded rump. The thick leathery hide was almost like armor. The lance had barely penetrated muscle underneath. Barring infection, the animal would live.
Had Gene been wearing gauntlets, he would have thrown one or two down, but in this neck of the woods the accepted way of calling a guy out was to rip down his tent. Gene went directly to Yerga’s campsite and did this thing.
The whole tribe held its breath. Yerga looked slowly about, then faced Gene and drew his sword, smiling a crooked, evil little smile.
Gene got the distinct feeling that he had walked the rest of the way into Yerga’s trap. He wondered now why he had ever thought he could best Yerga in a swordfight. This was not the castle, and the spell that gave Gene his talent was not operative here. But, as was the case with the translation spell, there was some carryover. Even without the spell, Gene had felt evenly matched with Yerga.
Now that there was no turning back, though, he had his doubts.
These things were best done quickly. Gene drew his sword, approached his opponent, and got even more worried. Now Yerga’s satisfied smile confirmed Gene’s suspicions that it had all been planned this way. But there was no hope of rescue, and no remedy except to turn tail and run. The rover was out in the desert somewhere, pinned under hundred-ton boulders. Zond was powerless to help. He was trapped in a backwater universe, bound by its peculiar laws. He would have to make the best of things, or die trying. Of course, the latter was the more likely possibility.
Yerga sprang at him, and Gene sidestepped a wicked lunge that nicked his rib cage. The crowd ohhed at the sight of first blood.
Not the greatest of beginnings, Gene thought. I’ve already half-defeated myself.
Gene countered with a series of feints and lunges, but Yerga’s masterly parrying left no opportunity. Then Yerga went back to the offensive, and Gene had to dance over an open campfire to get away.
Kicking out a hot coal that had wedged in his sandal, Gene got angry, mostly with himself. He had dug a fine psychological hole for himself, one of his gravest faults, on Earth as well as here. If he was to lose this fight, he was determined not to be defeated by his own self-doubt.
Gene attacked savagely, if not expertly, and sheer momentum drove Yerga back. Soon, though, the captain countered effectively, and broke the brunt of Gene’s offensive.
Thereafter it was give-and-take, neither combatant able to gain the upper hand.
Gene wished mightily for magic. It was hard to get used to the notion that there was none here. At least he didn’t think there was any. Maybe Sheila could tap whatever unseen forces were available. But this was probably a hard-science universe; and besides, Sheila was worlds away.
He missed her, and Linda, too. Two powerful magicians, those girls.
Again, Gene felt an unfocused resentment that his powers were relatively feeble, and only came on him inside the castle. But why? What was different about his case? It wasn’t fair.
He rejected that note of defeatism as well. Fair, hell. The universe — the universes weren’t fair. If he could only summon the will, the power. He knew what he felt like when the gift was upon him. If he could re-create that feeling in himself, perhaps the power of suggestion …
Yerga’s renewed attacks brought him back to the task at hand. Gene fought back strongly, gaining confidence and power with every stroke. Maybe Yerga was showing his age, or maybe it was just the fortunes of war, but the tide of battle seemed to be shifting. Yerga’s smile was gone, replaced by a look of grim concern.
The mortal combat went on and on, its deadly choreography carrying them across the length and breadth of the camp. Gene’s swordsmanship continued to improve, and Yerga’s confidence eroded precipitously.
At length, Yerga knew he was bested, and seemed to give up except for desperate parrying and backstepping. Gene maneuvered him toward a latrine. Yerga looked behind at the last second, tried to leap backward over it. His foot slipped into the hole and he fell, slamming his head against the side of the ditch.
Gene waded into the filth of the latrine and stood over him. Yerga was out cold.
The fight was over. Now all that remained was delivering the coup de grace. Gene raised his sword.
Then lowered it. He couldn’t do it, but not out of any feeling for Yerga. It was just not Gene’s style.
Of course, a refusal to slit Yerga’s throat might itself cause another loss of face. But he’d have to risk that.
He looked toward the mouth of the cave. Queen Vaya, the High Mistress, had been watching with regal detachment, and now she regarded Gene with questioning eyes that seemed to ask.Why do you wait?
Gene’s command of the language was still shaky, even with Zond’s help. But he summoned all he knew and spoke.
“In the land of my birth, it is wrong for a man to take the life of another. I cannot do this thing. High Mistress, I beg your permission to spare my comrade-in-arms.”
And he thought, Jesus, I sound like a B movie character. But, hell, I’m in a B movie! I can smell the frigging popcorn!
The High Mistress gave it some thought, then nodded, shrugging. Okay, don’t kill the worthless jerk. Use him for hrunt bait, what do I give a shit.
She turned abruptly and went back into her palace.
Gene exhaled and slipped his copper sword into his belt. He fetched a waterskin and doused Yerga with its contents. Yerga’s eyes fluttered, and he came to.
He sat up, disoriented, then looked around. Titters rippled through the crowd of tribespeople. Then laughter came in waves.
Yerga looked up at the victor, his eyes radiating hatred. Gene suddenly realized that killing Yerga would have been the more charitable act.
You can’t fight city hall, Gene thought, and you can’t change the laws of a given universe, human or otherwise.
Live and learn.
Eighteen
Desert Island
“Isn’t there a tv game show where they ask you who you’d like to be marooned on a desert island with?”
Trent finished laying another layer of palm leaves on the roof and stepped back from his handiwork. It wasn’t a proper grass hut, more of a lean-to, but it would do in a pinch, or in a light rain shower. Major precipitation would be another matter. Sooner or later they’d have to move off the beach and seek shelter in the hills. Can’t live on raw shellfish and quasi-breadfruit forever.
“Maybe a parlor game,” he said. “Why?”
Sheila turned over on her stomach and bunched up a pile of leaves for use as a pillow. She was getting a terrific body tan. “Well, I can’t think of anyone I’d more like to be stranded with.”
“Than little ol’ me?”
“Than little ol’ you. Your Royal Highness, darling.”
“‘Nice of you to say.” He knelt and kissed the spot between her shoulder blades. “Goes double for me. Besides you, all I need is Mozart, Rachmaninoff, a little Mahler, and a couple of Stephen King books. And some good sour-mash whiskey.”
“You don’t need much. Are those your favorite things?”
“Well, romantic Rachmaninoff relieves classical Mozart, and Mahler makes you sober up after listening to Mozart and Rachmaninoff. You could also do a Beethoven-Chopin-Stravinsky thing. And Stephen King is always good for a yuck in the middle of the night.”
“Well, King is fun, but I don’t know much about classical music,” Sheila said. “Maybe we’re not so compatible. I’m more at home with, you know, Billy Joel.”
“He’s okay, too,” Trent said. “Besides, who needs compatibility when you have great sex.”
She laughed, then stretched dreamily. “You know, you were talking in your sleep last night. You woke me up.”
“I wasn’t sleeping.”
She giggled. “Then who were you talking to?
”
“Incarnadine.”
Sheila sat up quickly. “What?”
“I think.”
“You think? Well, were you? Can he —?”
“I didn’t want to get your hopes up I think it was Incarnadine trying to contact me. Something prevented it, I don’t know what. Some sort of interference. I told him our predicament. I have a feeling I didn’t get through.”
Sheila looked deflated. “We’ll never get out of here.”
“Don’t despair. Something’s obviously going on. When it’s over, he’ll get us out.”
“But we’re on the other side of a wild portal. How will he even know where to look?”
“There are ways. He could get a fix on us, then drive a tunnel through to this universe, pick us right up.”
“He can do that?”
Trent sat down in the sand, picked up a shell. “Anything’s possible in the castle. He could teleport us back to the castle. Summon us, conjure us.”
Sheila was amazed. “No kidding? I was always under the impression that there was no way to travel between universes except by using the castle’s portals.”
“Well, for the most part, that’s true. But with virtually unlimited energy, which the castle has, anything’s possible. Like conjuring. I know Incarnadine can reach out and snatch things from other universes. Fetch them. He has all kinds of junk that he’s filched. Strange artifacts, gizmos, art pieces, books, you name it. There’s no reason he couldn’t snatch a person — or two.” Trent considered it. “Unless there’s some technical barrier. Maybe the spell doesn’t work with live organisms.” He shook his head. “I don’t know. But as I said, anything’s possible.”
“That makes me feel better,” Sheila said.
“Incarnadine has any number of tricks up his sleeve. He’s very creative, magically speaking. So is … was my sister Ferne.”
“Did you like her?”
“Respected her, yes. Liked her?” Trent let a cascade of sand fall from the shell. “Hard to say. Beautiful she was. But infinitely crafty. And clever. The thing was, she was reckless. She’d try anything. I don’t know how many spells she tried that could have blown up in her face. Some of them did. Once she tried tapping interstitial etherium.”
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