by David Drake
Chester obediently offered the shopping bag. He'd been carrying it beneath his carapace, but the robot's body was too small to provide much protection.
Wincing in anticipation, Dennis reached in for a loaf of bread. It squished.
He thrust his hand down fiercely, hoping that at least some of the bread would still be dry.
It was all soaked through, a mass of soggy paste.
"All the sausages are gone!" he shouted. "Did you have to throw all the sausages?"
"I did not have to throw any of the sausages, Dennis," the robot said mildly.
Dennis hurled the embroidered bag into the jungle. It caught in the vegetation less than a yard from where it left his hand.
For a moment Dennis breathed hard. Chester remained silent, and the rain spattered them both. Then a bucketful of water from the tree's disturbed heights cascaded down on the companions.
"Patience is the gods' greatest gift," Chester said.
"We may as well keep going," said Dennis, lifting the sheathed sword again with his left hand. The rain would clean the bread mush off his right hand soon enough.
The sword would probably be rusting. And—
"Chester, will you rust?"
"In this rain alone, I do not think that I will rust, Dennis," the robot replied, leading the way as they walked because the trail was too narrow for them to go side by side.
"That's good," Dennis said.
"And I'm sorry," he added, but he couldn't be sure that he spoke those words aloud. He was plodding forward, step after step, and the monotony of even the pain was a defense against the misery he felt.
Things had to get better soon. Things had to get better soon. Things had to get...
CHAPTER 14
Dennis wasn't sure how long they'd been walking when he saw the light. It was a soft gleam, yellowish orange, not far off the trail.
"There, what's that light?" he said excitedly.
When Chester replied, his voice held as much puzzlement as the robot was capable of feeling: "There is no light that I see, Dennis."
"Right over here," the youth insisted.
He plunged into the undergrowth, waddling as he forced his way through the brush that grew most thickly at the fringes of the trail. The light flickered, but it was too saturated to be merely a will-o'-the-wisp—rotting wood or gas glowing as it drifted from fallen vegetation. It looked like firelight; and when it was raining like this, a fire meant there was shelter as well.
He'd half feared that the light would somehow slip away; but as Dennis fought his way onward, the orange warmth grew clear enough to have shape through the angles of tree-boles and writhing vine stems.
There was a cabin hidden here in the jungle, and a wedge of light from its fireplace glowed through its half-open door.
"Oh, thank goodness!" Dennis cried as he freed his swordhilt from the loop of vine that caught it. "I knew something would turn up!"
The cabin appeared perfectly normal, built of logs like those of the trees all around; but there was no path to the door, just tangled jungle like that through which Dennis had thrust his way. Dennis paused. "Is this...?" he began. "Ah, Chester? Who lives here?"
"I do not see that anyone lives here, Dennis," the robot replied coolly from behind him.
Dennis stepped to the door. The threshold was an axe-smoothed log. "Hello?" he called. "Hello? Is anyone here?"
The rain continued to dribble down.
Inside the cabin was a table holding a jug of cider, a pot of aromatic stew, and a single place-setting. The fire was burning brightly in a stone fireplace with a stack of additional logs ready to be added at need. In one corner stood a tall cabinet, and a bed heaped with feathered pelts waited along the wall opposite the fire.
No one answered.
"Hello?" Dennis repeated. His scabbard clacked against the door jamb as he stepped inside. He snatched at the hilt to keep the weapon from swinging—and realized just too late that anyone who saw him would take the movement as a threat.
But there was no one in the cabin to see.
The fire's warmth was as close to bliss as anything this side of Paradise could be. Dennis fluffed his shirt out, shaking droplets of water onto the half-logs of the puncheon floor. He looked around.
Chester still stood outside.
"Come on in," the youth directed.
Chester neither moved nor replied.
Dennis shook his head angrily. "All right," he said. "Suit yourself. Maybe you will rust!"
He banged the door closed—after checking that the leather latch-string was out so that his companion could get inside at will.
The stew smelled wonderful.
"Hello?" Dennis called again, half-heartedly; and, when the silence answered him, dipped the horn-handled spoon into the pot and tasted the stew. Carrots and onions; potatoes; and a flavorful meat that seemed to be lamb, all in a rich gravy and just at the right temperature to eat.
He'd apologize to the owner when he came home. Anyway, he'd leave half the potful for the owner.
And the owner couldn't possibly need the food more than Dennis did.
The youth unbelted his sword, leaned it against the stone fireplace, and helped himself to the stew without further ado. He remembered that he was going to leave half; but when the pot was half empty, Dennis felt as hungry as he had when he started... and after all, the food would just get cold if he left it...
The room warmed up nicely with the door closed; but as Dennis' belly filled, he began to feel the discomfort of his wet clothing. The cloth was stiffening where it faced the fire and still clammy over most of his body.
He looked at the bed. The coverlet was a single feathery skin, large enough to have clothed an ox. Dennis couldn't imagine that it came from a bird... but he couldn't imagine anything but a bird having feathers, either.
Dennis got up and stripped off his own uncomfortable clothes. He hung them over the chair which he slid nearer the fire. Then he wrapped himself in the coverlet, tossed another log on the fire, and lay down in front of it.
The feathers were soft and warm and wonderful. Enfolded in them, Dennis forgot the rain and the misery of the hours since he left Emath. Soon it would be dawn...
And soon he slept.
CHAPTER 15
Someone called him. He swam up from the sea depths, stroking through nightmare toward the sunlit surface...
Dennis flung off the coverlet. The fire was a sunken glow. A jet of gas hissed briefly from the dull orange coals, providing a blue flicker and the only movement within the silent cabin.
The rain continued as a dull patter on the roof shakes.
"Who's there?" Dennis called. He groped for the chair where his clothing dried. "Hello?"
Nothing answered him. The chair was where he remembered it, but his clothes weren't hanging there as they should have been. Maybe in the dim, red light he had the wrong chair.
His sword wasn't leaning against the fireplace, either.
"What will you give me for your lodging?" boomed a voice.
Dennis whirled around with a scream of startlement, the sort of yelp that a nearby thunderbolt would have jolted out of him. The feather coverlet tangled his feet.
No one was with him in the cabin.
Dennis ran to the door and threw it open. "Hello?" he called. "Here I am. Where are you?"
Rain spattered him. His naked body was already shivering, although the air in the cabin had been comfortably warm. The night was dark, and nothing visible stood in it.
"Chester?" Dennis shouted. "Chester! Chester!"
A stream of cold water shifted down the threshold log, over Dennis' feet. The voice behind him repeated, "What will you give me for your lodging?"
He slammed the door and stood with his back to it, surveying the room by fireglow. He could make out the table and chair; even the bed across the cabin. His clothes and sword were nowhere to be seen, and there was no one else in the—
The tall cabinet to Dennis' left creaked op
en. A tall figure stepped out, moving as stiffly as the warped door that had concealed him. "What will you give me for your lodging, boy?" demanded the figure, glaring into Dennis' eyes.
It was the Wizard Serdic.
The corpse of the Wizard Serdic.
Serdic's cheeks had sunk in and were blotched with mold. His hair had been black the day he died. It had continued to grow in coarse tangles, but they were as red-orange as the dim light from the fire.
Serdic's fingernails were claws as long as the digits themselves.
Dennis jumped backward and slammed into the cabin door. It knocked him toward Serdic with a crash of wood. He spun and jerked the door open.
"What will you—" the corpse repeated, tottering forward on stiff, shrunken legs.
Dennis bolted into the night.
There wasn't a trail, and Dennis couldn't see the trees until he slammed into them. His eyes were wide open, but he was so blinded by fear that, for the first few minutes, he wouldn't have been able to dodge obstructions even in broad daylight.
"Chester!" Dennis cried as he ran. "Dad! Chester!" Every time a vine tripped him or a tree knocked him sprawling, he got up and ran again—a little slower and with a little more of a drunken stagger.
The thorns tore bright lines across Dennis' consciousness. When rough bark scraped away his skin, he throbbed with dull purple pain.
Dennis' clothes wouldn't have protected him from the punishment he was taking, but they'd have made him feel more like a man. Stumbling naked through the wet, clawing jungle he was only a hunted beast, a child screaming for his parents...
His parents didn't answer. Chester had disappeared. There was no one to hear Dennis as he cried for help with tears of pain and frustration dripping down his rain-wet cheeks.
At last he ran head-on into a tree whose trunk was spongy with rot and fungus. By now Dennis was only staggering, so the impact wasn't hard enough to throw him to the ground. He clung to the tree, wheezing and crying and expecting that at any moment Serdic's long fingernails would close on him from behind.
Nothing touched him but a dribble of water; and even the rain seemed to be stopping.
Dennis straightened and turned around, though he kept one hand in contact with the tree bole. He wasn't sure he could stand unsupported. He had a stitch in his side that hurt like a hot plowshare being driven up under his ribcage.
The sky had cleared. Enough moonlight filtered down through the canopy that Dennis could glimpse—as grim, gray giants—the trees surrounding him.
He must not have slept for very long after all. Without seeing the moons he couldn't be sure, but if both of them were as high in the sky as it seemed, the time couldn't be later than midnight.
Dennis began to shiver slightly, though the air was growing warm and steamy in the aftermath of the rain. Something bellowed in the distance, a hunting call similar to that of the dragons guarding Emath.
The tree that had finally stopped Dennis' wild career through the jungle was almost six feet thick at the base. Roots spread across the ground in wide convolutions beneath it, and the trunk was ridged by the serpent tracks of vines.
Dennis touched one of the vines. It was hairy with the filaments that allowed the main stem to cling to the bark, but it wasn't defended by thorns.
The beast called again, perhaps a little closer.
Dennis gripped the vine with both hands. It was slippery from the rain, but the stem's convolutions gave his bare feet some support also as he started to climb. His flesh winced every time he brushed against the tendrils. Their touch was unpleasant—animalike but too cold to be alive. Still, they couldn't hurt him the way so much of the jungle had already done.
He didn't know what he was hoping to find—perhaps a branch to which he could tie himself with vines, out of reach of clawed creatures until dawn. To Dennis' pleased surprise, the bole split into a triple fork fifteen feet in the air. The pocket from which the three branches spread was a cup broad enough for him to curl up safely.
Miniature frogs croaked in startled irritation as Dennis settled himself. The cup held about an inch of water, tepid and almost comforting as it soaked Dennis' battered skin. The gold-and-crimson striped frogs which had been mating in the raised pond hopped away disgruntled.
A day before, Dennis wouldn't have believed that anyone could sleep in conditions like these. Now he settled himself, appreciating the soft, half-decayed texture of the bark beneath his head.
A frog chirruped beside his ear. Dennis thought he felt the touch of webbed feet crawling cautiously onto him, but after the events of the night thus far, not even that was going to keep him awake.
CHAPTER 16
The noise of the frogs didn't awaken Dennis, but their sudden silence did. He snapped alert and heard the grumble of voices below him.
It was still night, but his eyes were fully adapted to the moon glimmer. He peered out cautiously.
Four figures were struggling through the undergrowth, carrying a long box. Cursing with the effort, they lowered the box to the ground directly under the tree where Dennis sheltered.
"Who's got the light?" demanded one in a breathy voice. Dennis realized with a shock that the speaker was a lizardman. It shouldn't have surprised him, out here in the jungle, but...
All four of them were hacking at the brush with long knives, glitters slipping in vicious arcs through the moonlight. "That's enough," said one.
"It's not enough," said another, and the third speaker at least was human. "He's too cold. We'll need more."
While three of them slashed down more fuel, the fourth figure knelt and took a stick of glowing punk from the gourd roped to his waist. He blew the punk to a bright yellow-orange, then touched it to a stem of gathered brush. Despite the rain of only hours before, the brush caught. The fire spread with oily, crackling intensity.
Any urge Dennis felt to join the newcomers evaporated when he got a good look at them. If they weren't robbers, they were worse. The sole human had a patch over one eye. Dangling from his left ear was a jewel too big to have been acquired honestly by anyone of his appearance.
The lizardmen were worse. What Dennis had thought was a gourd to carry the punk was in fact a human skull. One of the lizardmen wore a collar of spikes around his neck, and the backs of all three bore the scars of brutal floggings.
Two of them set up a crude spit, using forked saplings and a long pole chopped to a sharp point on one end. The other pair tipped over the box they'd all been carrying. The top fell off.
The corpse of the Wizard Serdic spilled out.
"He's too cold," said one of the lizardmen. "It's going to take a long time."
"Shut up and help me," said the one-eyed human as he began to impale the corpse on the pole.
"Too cold..." the lizardman repeated, his forked tongue adding to the words a sibilance that couldn't have come from a human mouth.
Working together despite their grumbling, the four scarred outcasts lifted the pole and the cold, stiff corpse of the wizard onto forked sticks set at either end of the fire. The brush burned with a hard flame that threw shadows like teeth across the forest. It sizzled and popped angrily.
"Don't let him burn," muttered a lizardman, giving a twist to one end of the spit where a knot gave some leverage. The pole creaked against both its forked supports as it turned, rotating Serdic's body from face-down to face-up. The dead eyes stared toward the crotch and the horrified Dennis.
One of the lizardmen tossed some more brush onto the fire. "We're going to have to leave," he said morosely.
"We can't," said the human. "Who'll mind Serdic?"
"Dennis will mind me," said the corpse of the Wizard Serdic.
Dennis jerked his head back out of sight. His bare flesh shuddered in streaks, up his thighs and down his shoulders.
The corpse hadn't really spoken. The bright-colored frogs were poisonous. They'd croaked and splashed and padded across Dennis' skin as he slept—rubbing him with venemous slime and bringing on wild h
allucinations.
"Dennis," called the one-eyed human in a rasping voice. "Come down and mind the fire."
"Dennis, come down," agreed the lizardmen together.
"Dennis, come down," said the Wizard Serdic. "Or I will have to fetch you down."
Dennis had heard that hard, disdainful voice almost every day of his life. He couldn't mistake it now.
But neither could he possibly be hearing it.
Dennis stretched his head over the edge of the branch, looking down and expecting to see nothing but tangled brush and darkness. The fire glittered at him, and the five upturned faces shocked the youth as bitterly as a slap in the mouth.
"Come down, Dennis," said the corpse.
The lizardman holding the knotted end of the spit gave it a turn, rotating Serdic's face downward again. The dead voice trailed off in the sputter of the flames.
Dennis climbed down from what he'd thought was his hiding place. His chest was so cold and stiff with fear that he felt his pulse only in his ears. The vines were slick with rainwater. The fire threw shadows upward, concealing rather than illuminating hand-holds.
Halfway down, Dennis slipped. He fell the remainder of the distance, banging and scraping the inside of his right knee on a gnarled hump of vines. The pain was sharp and so fierce that it turned his stomach for the moment.
Whatever this was, it wasn't something that he was dreaming.
The lizardmen hissed in muted amusement; the one-eyed human giggled.
The corpse of the Wizard Serdic wore a smile that broadened. The spit creaked another quarter turn so that he faced the naked, shivering youth again.
"Here, boy," said a lizardman wearing nothing but a belt through which were stuck at least a dozen knives—rusty, notch-bladed weapons whose wooden handles were cracking and wired clumsily onto the tangs. "Take the spit."
Dennis stepped forward. His fear pulled him, because if he ran he would have to turn his back on these... men.
One of the lizardfolk was tall, taller than Dennis even if the youth stood straight instead of hunching over against his fear and pain and nakedness. That one rolled a human skull in his left hand, while his right palm rested on the brass hilt of a cutlass. His tongue forked between pointed teeth as he grinned.