by Hugh Cook
Sod's plan was extremely dangerous, but Sken-Pitilkin, though he thought Sod over-audacious, nevertheless accepted that plan as one possible option.
Then Sken-Pitilkin tossed the coins that the coins might decide which plan they would opt for.
The coins directed them to Guest Gulkan's choice:
Gendormargensis.
This occasioned uneasiness amongst all of them, even Guest Gulkan himself, for Gendormargensis was ruled by the Red Emperor Khmar, who had won his name by slaughtering so many of his enemies that the rivers ran red with their blood.
"I have another plan," said Nol. "It lacks the virtue of being randomly chosen. But, even so, I do not think that Shabble will divine this plan."
Then the wizard of Itch pointed at Sken-Pitilkin's map. He pointed at the south-west of Tameran. He pointed at a tongue of land which sprinted out into the sea, terminating in a bulb of rock. He pointed at the bulb itself "There," said Ontario Nol, softly. "The bubble will not seek us there."
"There!?" said Sken-Pitilkin, in patent alarm.
While thoughts of venturing to Gendormargensis had made Sken-Pitilkin uneasy, this new suggestion made him positively alarmed.
"What place is that?" said Guest Gulkan.Sken-Pitilkin looked around, then said, albeit with some reluctance:
"We will not speak its name. Not here. But Nol is right. It is a good destination."
So Sken-Pitilkin flew his stickbird to Lex Chalis, a place of caverns where the rock is fluid and warm beneath the touch. It is a place of ghosts, a place of hallucinatory dreams and waking delusions. Do you wish to hear more? Then you must seek elsewhere for the telling. For Lex Chalis awakens things which the mind has deliberately put to sleep. It stirs the old things to life, cracks the inner coffers of the psyche, incarnates the dead.
Worse, in the caverns of Lex Chalis, the thoughts of one person's mind create half-perceived shadows in the minds of that person's companions. Assume, then, that you are in Lex Chalis in the company of Guest Gulkan, he who was once mauled by the Great Mink in an arena in Chi'ash-lan. Assume that Guest is asleep, and dreaming, and that you are dreaming too. Can you imagine what your condition will be when you finally wake, heart pounding, eyes bulging, skin drenched with sweat?
In the great days of the Empire of Wizards, when all of Argan was ruled by the eight orders of the Confederation, then many wizards ventured north to Tameran, and dared their way to the caverns of Lex Chalis. But it is not recorded that any of them had any profit from such venture. For the place is beyond the understanding of wizardry; and, as far as history can tell, there has never been anything made of flesh or blood or stone or steel which has been able to grapple with its mysteries.
During the season in which the travelers sojourned in Lex Chalis, Ontario Nol was once moved to theorize on the nature of the caverns of Lex Chalis. He claimed those caverns to be the work of a theoretical breed of Experimenters.
"It is said by those who claim to know," said Ontario Nol,
"that Probability is a single sheet of fabric pockmarked here and there by those patches of embroidery which mortal creatures know as the Realms of Time.
"It is further said that Probability is the great Enablement which permits the existence of the gods. Enabled by Probability, a god such as the Horn may master a small patch of this great fabric to its own purposes, just as a woman may master a small patch of a great bedsheet for her own embroidery."
Listening to this theorizing, Guest Gulkan thought it disgraceful that a Yarglat male as mighty as Ontario Nol should use reference to a woman's work to describe things so weighty.
Nevertheless, he followed the metaphor.
"If the gods, then, are those who embroider worlds on the raw fabric of Probability," said Ontario Nol, "then the Experimenters are those who move from patch to patch to rearrange each piece of embroidery to something closer to their own liking."
At which, Guest Gulkan began to lose track of Nol's explanation, finding the metaphor to be growing obscure. So Nol switched metaphors.
"Supposing we talk of the soil as a great Enablement which permits life," said Nol. "Suppose we then think of a god as an entity which can create a seed - an entity which can create life.
This is a mighty act, and it takes a god to do it. But what then do we call the farmer who takes the seed and breeds it down through the generations to a plant reshaped to his own requirements. Is the farmer a god? No. He is but a technician, albeit great in his field. And those who claim to know of such things construe their theoretical Experimenters as just such a breed of technicians."Guest Gulkan had difficulty following this metaphor, too, since it was an agricultural metaphor, and the Yarglat have precious little understanding of farming. So Ontario Nol was put to the labor of explaining that farmers can selectively breed plants to reshape them to their own requirements - a datum which was new to Guest, and one which he was inclined to regard with great scepticism.
Yet that was the best metaphor which Ontario Nol could provide, so, whether Guest could understand it or not, he had to put up with it.
"We have, then," said Ontario Nol, "three levels of Power.
There is the original Enablement, which some call Probability.
Then there are the gods, the creators-of-life, those who shape spheres of existence from raw Probability. Then there are the technicians, those who do but remold that which the gods have created."
"What of demons?" said Guest. "And ghosts?"
"They are the creatures of the sub-categories," said Nol, using one of those airy generalizations which a teacher employs when he is in no mood to plunge into complexities. "Let us not bother with sub-categories. Let us stick to our main division, which is the Enablement, the gods and the technicians. The Experimenters, then, are a theoretical race of technicians much given to wholesale remolding."
"And," said Guest, "you claim these caverns of Lex Chalis to be a part of their work?"
"I claim nothing," said Ontario Nol. "I merely retail the theories of others. Those others claim the very configuration of our world to be the result of a wholesale remolding undertaken by the Experimenters. It is said by these theorists that Lex Chalis is a communicator of sorts - an artefact which the Experimenters once used to communicate from world to world."
So said Ontario Nol.
But it must be clearly stated that there are well over a thousand different theories which purport to explain Lex Chalis, and that all of these theories are in conflict. The only thing which all theories are agreed upon is that Lex Chalis is a singularly unpleasant place in which to take up residence.
In that singularly unpleasant place, Sken-Pitilkin and his companions passed the winter season, grubbing a living from the seashore and studying the irregular verbs. Yes! Let it be stated as a fact! Before that season had run its course, Guest Gulkan had grown so desperately bored by the tedium of his refugee existence that he had permitted Sken-Pitilkin to tutor him in one or two of the milder of the foreign irregular verbs.
So passed a season of hardship, in which the refugees often Shabble searching the continents for their shadows, interrogating the buttercups of X-zox Kalada and the humming birds in the southern jungles, bathing in the red dust of Dalar ken Halvar or rolling in the snows of Chi'ash-lan Then, in the spring, Sken-Pitilkin at last declared that he was ready to fly them to Drum.
"Will that be any improvement?" said Guest, who knew of Sken-Pitilkin's island only that it was rocky and infested by sea dragons.
"A great improvement," said Sken-Pitilkin. "For we will be able to sleep in peace, without alien intrusions vexing our nights."
"You mean, then," said Guest, "that your island has no ghosts."
"That is not all I meant, but it is part of it," said Sken-Pitilkin. "Yes, take it from me, there are no ghosts on Drum."
That was a lie, for Drum was haunted by a number of ghosts, and Sken-Pitilkin knew at least seven of them by name. But, since their visitations were infrequent, Sken-Pitilkin thought he could get away
with this lie.
Then Sod declared that, ghosts or no ghosts, he was in no mood to fly to Drum, and thought it would be far better for them to make for Chi'ash-lan.
"Impossible," said Sken-Pitilkin flatly. "For once you have been in Chi'ash-lan for a day or less, the demon Ko will know of it. And once Ko knows of it, then so too will every other such demon, and Shabble may well be in alliance with these demons by now even if Shabble was not in alliance with them before."
At last, Sod was persuaded - coerced is perhaps a better word for it - into Sken-Pitilkin stickbird. Then Sken-Pitilkin sent this airship whirling skywards, and headed south.Guest Gulkan, who had grim memories of a traumatic journey across the wastewaters of Moana, predicted of a certainty that Sken-Pitilkin would lose them somewhere over the sea. But in this the Weaponmaster was entirely mistaken, for Sken-Pitilkin knew Drum and its surrounding geography to a nicety. Thanks to his intimate knowledge of the area's geography, the wizard had already worked out a failsafe method of finding his way to Drum by air.
The sagacious wizard of Skatzabratzumon flew south, navigating by the sun alone. Since Lex Chalis is barely a hundred leagues north of Argan, Sken-Pitilkin soon picked up the coast of that continent. Then it was a simple matter to continue down the coastline, keeping a lookout to the west.
As Drum lies barely thirty leagues west of Argan, and as it is a considerable island (for an ant must walk for twenty leagues to cross from its northern coast to its southern), the island is easily seen from the air on a clear day.
Had Sken-Pitilkin gone too far south, he would have realized his error as soon as he reached Larbster Bay, an unmistakable landmark which should serve to safeguard the aerial navigator against error. That at least was the theory - but there was no need to put theory to the test.
For, as Sken-Pitilkin flew south, he sighted Drum to the west, and headed in that direction.
On reaching the island, Sken-Pitilkin did not immediately land at his castle, but ventured on a circumnavigation of the shore. From the heights, Sken-Pitilkin and his companions checked the rocky shores for boats, ships, rafts, canoes and wreckage, but saw none such. All they saw was a number of sea dragons, variously sea bathing and sun bathing.
"It is safe," said Sken-Pitilkin with satisfaction, "at least as far as I can see."
Then the wizard sent his stickbird scudding downwards toward his castle. But, while the airship was still high in the air, it began to shake, as if seized in the grip of an enormously powerful invisible monster.
As the air adventurers clutched at the sticks of the airship in outright panic, it tore apart entirely - leaving them hanging in the air with nothing between them and the rocks below but the clear blue sky.
Chapter Forty-Five
Confederation of Wizards: the organization which represents the interests of the eight orders of wizards. The strongholds of the Confederation are the strongholds of Drangsturm, the flame trench which divides Argan North from Argan South. The Confederation dedicates itself to guarding that flame trench, which protects the lands of the north from the Swarms - monsters of the southern terror-lands which are controlled by an entity known as the Skull. The Confederation looks upon the maintenance of Drangsturm as a holy trust. And a very profitable holy trust it is, too, since the Drangsturm Road is an important trade route, and the wizards tax every scrap of merchandise which moves along it.
So Sken-Pitilkin's stickbird tore apart, leaving the sagacious wizard of Skatzabratzumon and his passengers hanging in midair - with nothing between them and the rocks below but the clear blue sky.
Much to Sken-Pitilkin's surprise, they did not fall.
"Are you keeping us up?" yelled Guest.
"No!" said Sken-Pitilkin, clutching the star-globe tight to his chest and keeping a firm grip on his country crook.Sken-Pitilkin's powers of levitation were by no means equal to the task of supporting so many in midair so far above the ground.
"If you're not keeping us up here," said Sod, kicking his legs in midair, "then how about getting us down?"
"I'll think about it," said Sken-Pitilkin.
But he had not the slightest idea of where to start. Usually, to descend after levitating, a wizard of Skatzabratzumon simply eased off the application of Power, and gravity (that force of universal suction exerted by the planet on which we live) then secured a certain descent.
"Get us down!" yelled Sod, kicking his legs in fury.
At which - without Sken-Pitilkin doing anything about it at all - they began to rotate. Swiftly they grew dizzy, and in their dizziness they were sucked downward through the air, which thickened to an impenetrable white fog, which hardened to something as cold as glass.
They ceased rotating, and found themselves sitting in a small teardrop-shaped chamber which glowed with its own cold white light. The light was that of sunstruck snow.
"Where are we?" demanded Sod.Sken-Pitilkin made no response to this demand, for he had not the slightest idea where they might be. He was disorientated - and more than a little frightened.
Then the opacity of the walls began to clear, easing away to a lucid transparency, and Sken-Pitilkin and his erstwhile passengers found themselves sitting inside a tiny teardrop in the center of a three-legged table. Abruptly, the teardrop was ceased, and hoisted skywards. Eljuk screamed in involuntary terror, and Sken-Pitilkin almost joined him in that scream.
A giant - it was a giant, wasn't it? - was holding the teardrop on the palm of his hand. The giant brought the teardrop close to his face so he could peer inside. He grinned. Sken-Pitilkin stared at the vastness of the giant's slab of a face, at the stalks of his stubble poking through his skin, at the yellowness of his gravestone teeth and the white fur of unscrubbed detritus between the top of those teeth and the gums, and the whale-flank rubberiness of the giant's lips and the snarling crevices by his nose. In the wet overlay of reflections which slicked across the giant's nearest eye, Sken-Pitilkin saw the teardrop and its captives caught in reflection.
Then the giant began to move, jolting the teardrop severely.
Eljuk Zala was sick, spewing vomit all over Sod, who swore at him.
In response, Guest Gulkan braced himself in the swaying teardrop then bloodied Sod's nose with a blow from his fist. Nothing daunted, the Banker struck back, and the two of them began to fight in earnest. Thayer Levant and Ontario Nol fell on the fighters, struggling to separate them, while Sken-Pitilkin lashed out at knees and elbows with his country crook.
All the frustrations of a long season of confinement in Lex Chalis came out in that fight, which left all of them panting, besmirched by blood and vomit, stinking of bile and digestive juices. At which point the teardrop was set down on another table, this one being inside -
"Why," said Sken-Pitilkin in amazement, looking at the vastly enlarged geography outside the teardrop. "This is my living room!
My very own living room inside my very own castle!"
Thus did Sken-Pitilkin belatedly come to realize that he had not fallen to the possession of giants. Rather, he and his companions had been shrunk.
While Sken-Pitilkin was still savoring this discovery, another giant picked up the teardrop, then fiddled with a ring on his finger. Even as the giant twisted the ring, Sken-Pitilkin caught sight of a small yellow bottle on a nearby table, and guessed that the giant, the teardrop and the people trapped inside that teardrop would shortly be sucked inside that bottle.
And so it came to pass.
By now, both Sken-Pitilkin and Ontario Nol realized - more or less - what had happened. The stickbird had been destroyed by a subtle act of wizardry. And, caught by some new and unprecedented advanced in the wizardly arts, the stickbird's passengers had been sucked down from the sky and encapsulated in miniature in a small teardrop of some kind of imitation crystal. And now they were inside a bottle - and the nature of such bottles is well known to all wizards.
So Sken-Pitilkin and Ontario Nol, being orientated to their surroundings, tried to calm and reassure their bewild
ered companions. But they had barely begun this labor when the teardrop began to expand. Then, with dizzying velocity, Sken-Pitilkin and his companions expanded likewise - upon which the teardrop abruptly dissolved away to nothing.
So it was that Sken-Pitilkin and his companions were caught by a device of some description when their stickbird challenged the skies above the island of Drum; were sucked into a teardrop; were carried into the castle on Drum; were transported into the interior of a yellow bottle; and were then restored to their full size.
They found themselves the prisoners of a force of some five dozen of their enemies. There were a handful of the Confederation's wizards, who were in charge of the operation, and these were backed by a strong force of the mercenary soldiers of the Landguard which served the Confederation in the realms of Drangsturm.
Ever since Sken-Pitilkin had fled from Drum - which was a mighty long time ago - a force from the Confederation had been waiting for his return. Sken-Pitilkin was at first hard put to believe this, as he had been gone for 22 years; but it was explained to him that those who were keeping guard on Drum had been relieved every three years.
What had compelled the Confederation to make such strenuous and unprecedented exertions? Sken-Pitilkin did not know. His only recent crime against the confederation was the assistance he had given to the wizard Zozimus, the witch Zelafona and the dwarf Glambrax. Some 22 years ago, he had helped them escape the Confederation's wrath.
Obviously, that trio must have committed some truly appalling crime against the Confederation. But as Sken-Pitilkin's captors refused to say exactly what it was that Zozimus and company had done, Sken-Pitilkin was denied the satisfaction of knowing the true reasons for the state of arrest in which he found himself.Sken-Pitilkin and his companions were not the only ones to be imprisoned in the yellow bottle, for in that same bottle was Shabble, held captive inside a restraining net which was woven from a white-glittering substance which Sken-Pitilkin could not identify.