by E. C. Tubb
"Well?" Marita was looking at him. She radiated the impatience of an expert to one who had interloped into her field. "Is there anything else?"
"Did the volunteers take any precautions? Make any preparations?"
"What would be the point? Clothing and weapons would be useless."
"I was thinking of less tangible things. Appeals to the gods, perhaps. Prayers. Mental adjustments of some kind. Deep breathing, even." His voice hardened. "I'm serious, woman!"
"Some, yes," she admitted. "They would vocalize their mental attitudes. Others seemed to meditate before taking the final step. You know what that is, of course?"
"I know what it has to be."
"Then-"
"That will be all. Thank you for your courtesy." He looked at Gustav. "Did Iduna often play with the things she found in your study?"
"Yes."
"There was no rule against it? No prohibition she could be conscious of breaking?"
"No, of course not. Why do you ask? What are you getting at?"
Questions Dumarest ignored as he stood thinking, remembering, assessing the information he had gained. It was little enough but it would have to do.
"The time," he said. "When you found Iduna in your study what time was it?"
"Late afternoon." Gustav sounded baffled. "Earl, I don't understand what you are getting at. What does the time matter?"
"You have only one window and the sun sets to one side. Am I correct?"
"Yes. The window faces to the north and the sun sets in the west." Sudden understanding warmed the man's voice.
"The light? You think the intensity of light had something to do with it?"
"Perhaps. Marita, lower the brilliance of the lights." Dumarest frowned as they died. "Don't kill them, woman! Just dim them."
"How? We have no rheostat in the circuit."
"Then fit one!" Kathryn was sharp. "And be quick about it!" As the technician hurried to obey she said to Dumarest, "You have discovered something? You have a plan?"
"An idea. It may be nothing." He knew she wanted more. "A question of attitude," he explained. "I feel it could be important."
"Is that all?" She frowned her disappointment, the frown clearing as Marita called that all was ready. The woman had worked fast. "Have you seen enough?"
Dumarest nodded. The gamble had to be taken, there was no point in extending delay.
"Then commence!"
Guards stepped from where they had been lurking in the shadows, armed, armored, strong women dedicated to the Matriarch. Invisible until now but always Dumarest had been conscious of their presence. Watching, waiting for him to move, to make the journey which others had taken and which, for them, had ended in mindless dead. One he had no choice but to take in turn.
"Dim the lights," he ordered. "More. More-keep dimming until you emulate a shadowed room."
The harsh glare faded as he began to walk toward the Tau, dulling even more as the complimentary lights died so as to leave the enigmatic object apparently unsupported and shining with a soft effulgence as if oil had been spread on glowing water.
Dumarest stared at it, concentrating, adjusting his attitude, blanking out the threat of guards and possible horror. Forgetting those who had gone before aside from one. Iduna who now lay quietly sleeping in a room of sterile whiteness.
And, walking, he stepped through time and space to a point years in the past when a happy, carefree child came skipping into a deserted study to discover something new and wonderful which held an immediate fascination. A bright and glowing object illuminated by the dusty light of the setting sun. Enigmatic, mysterious, magical.
And he became that child, running now, entranced, eager to discover what a doting parent had bought. To reach out with open arms. To fold them around the Tau. To hug it close and to press his face against the bright enchantment. To feel the faintest of tingles and to see the luminosity suddenly expand to engulf him. To take him elsewhere.
Chapter Four
He was in a room designed for the use of giants with walls which soared like the face of cliffs and a ceiling which looked like a shadowed sky. The floor was covered with a carpet with a pile so thick it reached to his ankles and all about loomed the bulk of oddly familiar furniture. Turning he studied grotesquely distorted tables, chairs, something which could have been a desk, something else which held stuffed and sagging dolls.
"Hello, there! Will you play with me?"
Dumarest spun to see a waddling shape come hopping toward him. A parody of what a human should be; the face round as were the eyes, the mouth a grinning slit, the chin merging into the neck, the whole dressed in a clown's attire.
"Will you play?" The voice had a high-pitched squeakiness. "I know lots of fine games. We could hunt the slipper or find the parcel or we could roll marbles or climb. Don't you want to play?"
"Who are you?"
"I'm Clownie. I'm the one who makes you smile when you are sad and unless I am very, very good, very good, you give me no tea but that isn't often because always I am good."
"Tea?"
"Tisane. See? Tee for tisane. Tea. Isn't it fun to make up words?"
"Where are we?"
"In Magic Land. Where you always go when you're alone. Now hurry and meet Bear."
Bear was as tall, covered in short brown fur, nose and lips of black, eyes round and gleaming. A wide ribbon adorned his neck and his voice was deep and a little gruff as befitted a serious person.
Solemnly he held out a paw. "You are welcome to join me in a game. What shall it be? Soldiers?"
"For that we need armies."
"We have armies. They are in the boxes but if you call them they will come on parade." The bear glanced at the clown. "He doesn't seem to know what to do."
"He needs to eat," said the clown. "I'll get the cakes and you call the others. Hurry, now."
They came from nowhere, oddly shaped creatures of garish colors and peculiar appearance. Eyes and heads and faces seemed alien and yet totally familiar. They moved and talked and aped the style of humans but they were not and could never have been fashioned in human form. They were more like caricatures of familiar types; the fat one with the round, shining face, the fox-like one, the pigs, the toad, the nodding, weaving monkey, the solemn policeman with his truncheon, the giggling girl, the staid matron-the playmates of a lonely child.
Dolls!
Companions of the mind created from the toys of childhood when imagination took things of rag and wood and stuffing and gave them life and form and voices. And the vastness of the room and the furniture.
Dumarest knew the answer.
Leaning back, ignoring the babble around him, he looked at the nursery. The bed would be elsewhere but here, surrounded by comfort, he would play with the toys provided and with the magic of childhood endow them with individual personalities. But he was not a child but a grown man so why should he be in the nursery?
"A cake!" The bear was insistent. "You must have one of these cakes. Mistress Gold baked them and she will be very angry if you do not take one. She may even order you to be shut up in a cupboard for a whole hour. You wouldn't like that, would you?"
"No," said Dumarest.
"Then take a cake." The bear nodded as he did so. "And one for you, Clownie. And for you, Foxie. And for you, Toadie." His voice was a drone above the clatter of cups and the ritual of pouring tisane or tea as they called it. A party. A tea party. A pastime beloved by the young, especially young girls who aped their mothers in playing the hostess.
Had Iduna played such games?
Iduna!
Dumarest looked at his cake and set it aside. This was her world, not his. The soft and comfortable world of a loved and cherished child who would find the living toys perfectly natural. A delightful realization of an often-pretended charade in which they would have been placed around the table and fed tisane and cakes and moved and placed and given words in the entrancing world of make-believe which every child could call his own.
"You dirty thing!" The matron seethed with anger as she glared at one of the pigs. "You spilled tea on my gown! You did it on purpose!"
"It was an accident."
"Don't talk such lies! You should be beaten for having been so bad. Look at my nice new gown! You've spoiled it!"
"Be calm," rumbled the bear. "Ladies, be calm."
"Hit them," suggested the clown to the policeman. "Hit them both."
"Now, now there!" The policeman lurched to his feet. "We don't want trouble, do we?"
"Why not?" The toad gaped and seemed to blur. "Why not?"
The giggling girl half-turned and froze as she lifted her cup to hurl its contents in the face of the red-cheeked drummer who smiled as he toppled to one side to lie with his head in a quivering mass of jelly, his hands still jerking to produce a death-like rattle from his drum.
Anger, the petulance of childish rage had ruined the party but in a moment all could be as before with those involved going through their paces like well-trained puppets manipulated by mental intent. As always during a party when spats and outbursts provided variety. When things were done deserving of punishment which could then be administered with solemn ceremonies.
But this world was not one he had known. His childhood had contained no similar comforts. It had been a time of harsh deprivation unrelieved by moments of joy.
Dumarest shivered, remembering, then shivered again to the chilling wind.
It came from the north where ice still coated the ponds and snow filled the gulleys; the residue of winter stubbornly defying the sun. He glanced at it, narrowing his eyes against the glare, wishing the watery brightness held more strength. Soon it would be dark and all hope of game lost and, again, he would hug an empty belly and nurse bruises from savage blows.
Crouched against the gritty soil he stared at the area ahead. The wind touched his near-naked body, driving knives of ice through the rents, numbing the flesh and blood and causing his teeth to chatter. He clamped them shut, feeling the jerk of muscles in his jaw, the taste of blood as his teeth caught at the tender membranes of his cheeks. Weakness blurred his vision so that the scrub barely masking the stoney ground danced and spun in wild sarabands of bewildering complexity. Impatiently he squeezed shut his eyes, opening them to see the landscape steady again, seeing too the twitch of leaves at the base of a matted bunch of vegetation.
The lizard was cautious. It thrust its snout from the leaves and stared with unwinking eyes before making a small dart forward to freeze again as it checked its surroundings for possible enemies. Watching it, Dumarest forced himself to freeze.
To rise now would be to lose the prey; it would dive into cover at the first sign of movement. Only later, after it had come into the open to warm itself by the weak sunlight and search for grubs, would he have a chance and then only one. For now he must wait as the wind chilled his body, gnawing at him with spiteful teeth, sending more pain to join the throb of old bruises, the sores from festering wounds, the ache of hunger and fatigue.
He narrowed his eyes as the wind lifted dust and threw it into his face, stirring the lank mane of his hair and fluttering the ragged neck of his single garment. A movement which would have scared the quarry had it not been out of its sight and the wind carried his scent from the reptile who, moving with greater assurance now, had come well into the open.
Dumarest flexed his fingers and touched the crude sling at his side. A leather pouch and thongs made from the hides of small rodents. Stones carefully selected and of the size of small eggs. He would have time for one cast only-if he missed the chance would be lost. All depended on choosing the exact moment, of hand and arm and eye working in harmony, of speed which would enable him to strike before the lizard could run to safety.
Now?
The creature was alerted, head lifted, eyes like jewels as they caught and reflected the sunlight, scaled body blending with the soil on which it stood. It would be best to wait.
To wait as the wind chilled his blood and stiffened his muscles, as dirt stung his eyes and the sickening fear that he might miss added itself to the destructive emotions of his being. Then, guided by subconscious dictates, to act. To rise, the loaded sling lifting, to swing in a sharp circle, the thong released at the exact moment to send the missile hurtling through the air.
To land in the dirt at the side of the lizard's skull.
Dumarest was running even as it left the pouch, lips drawn back, legs pounding, breathing in short, shallow gasps to oxygenate his lungs. To gain energy and speed so that, even as the half-stunned lizard headed toward cover he was on it, snatching up the prize, holding it fast as his teeth dug into the scaled throat and released the blood of its life.
Blood he gulped until it ceased to flow and then to fight the temptation to rip into the flesh and fill his stomach with its raw sweetness.
A boy forcing himself to think like a man.
A child of ten fighting to survive.
The place which was home rested ten miles distant over torn and hostile ground, the surface cut and scarred with crevasses edged with fused blades of obsidian, craters of starred silicates, mounds of bristling fragments blasted from the rubble of mountains. A journey which had to be taken with care for a slip could mean a broken leg and that would lead to inevitable death.
It was dark by the time he arrived and the fire was a warm beacon in the gloom. The only welcome he would get but, with luck, he would be given a portion of his kill. A hope which died as the man came to the mouth of the cave to snatch it and send him reeling with a vicious, back-handed blow.
"Lazy young swine! What took you so long?" He didn't wait for an answer, standing tall and puffed, his scarred face twisted into a snarl. "You've been eating!"
"It's on your mouth! Blood!"
"From the lizard! I-"
"Liar!" Again the thudding impact of the hand, a blow which smashed against his nose and sent his own blood to join the dried smears already on his chin. "You useless bastard! I took you in, let my woman tend you, and all you do is lie! A day's hunting for this!" He shook the dead reptile. "Well, it's too bad for you. Stay out there and starve!"
"I'll freeze!"
"So freeze. What's that to me? Freeze and be dammed to you!"
Another blow and he was gone, snug within the confines of the cave, warmed by the fire and fed by the game Dumarest had won. From where he crouched he could hear the mutter of voices, the harsh, cackling laughter of the crone as she heard the news, a liquid gurgling as the man lifted a mug from his pot of fermenting liquids.
Later there were snortings and muffled poundings and the sounds of animals in rut. Later still came snores.
From where he had crouched Dumarest rose and rubbed cracked palms over his frozen limbs. The incident had not been new; often he had been treated like that before, but then it had been summer and the nights had been warm and he had been fortunate. Now the neighbor who had fed him was dead and the rest had no time for charity.
If he stayed in the open he would die.
He knew it as he knew that he had been robbed of his kill and would continue to be robbed while the man had the greater strength. As always he would be robbed unless he prevented it. A hard-won lesson and one which would be wasted unless he survived to put it into practice. And he intended to survive.
Softly he stepped toward the cave and pushed aside the curtain of skins which closed the opening. The fire burned low, little more than a bed of glowing ashes but they radiated a welcome heat and he squatted beside them warming his hands and rubbing them over his legs and biceps. From the pot standing beside the embers he found a bone and sucked it, cracking it between his teeth to extract the marrow before throwing the shards on the fire where they burned with little blue flickerings of brightness.
More followed until the pot was empty and, drugged by the nourishment, outraged muscles demanding rest, he fell asleep.
And woke to a scream of rage.
It was day and in the light seeping through the c
urtain the crone stood glaring at him, her raddled face convulsed with fury. A slut, her body sagging beneath the filthy clothes she wore, lice crawling in her matted hair, sores on lips and chin. A fit mate for the man who woke and lurched forward wiping the crust from his eyes.
"He's eaten it!" A cracked and dirty nail pointed at the pot. "The stew's gone! The thieving young bastard!"
"I'll teach him." The man pushed her aside. "I'll have the skin off his bones." He was naked aside from an apron around his loins. Stripping off the belt, he let it fall to reveal pallid, scabrous flesh. The leather whined as he swung it through the air. "Now you greedy young swine! Stand still and be taught a lesson!"
Stand and have the flesh scarred on back and thighs, bruised, cut with the edge of the belt, the heavy buckle weighting the end. Stand and be crippled, maimed, blinded. Stand and be killed!
Dumarest moved as the belt lashed toward him, feeling the stir of wind on his back through his torn garment. Unimpeded, the heavy buckle swung on to crack against the woman's arm. Her scream was echoed by the man's savage curse.
"Stand! Damn you, do as I say!"
He lunged forward, eyes blazing, face like that of an animal. The belt lifted, swung, again cut air as again Dumarest dodged. The third attempt was more successful and fire seared his shoulders. Trying to dodge the next blow he trod into the fire and the smouldering ashes seared his naked foot. Stumbling he fell to twist as leather lashed at his legs, his groin, one hand reaching out, feeling heat, fire which seared as he gripped a handful of embers and flung them into the snarling face.
"God!" The man screamed as he clawed at his face. "My eyes! My eyes!"
The woman was fast. Water showered from a pot and washed away the ashes to reveal eyes filled with streaming tears, bloodshot but otherwise unharmed. A face which was now a killer's mask.
"I'll get you," he panted. "I'll make you pay for that. By God I'll have you screaming before I've done with you."