Vengeance of the Dancing Gods

by Jack L. Chalker

  "So you want us to go in tonight?"

  "Yes. This will be an exploratory foray at ground level, but it may give us the last few pieces of the puzzle. Late this afternoon, if the weather holds, I'd like to go into town and pick some likely prospects. I spotted the van, off the road a few miles ahead. But since it will be recognized now, we'll leave it and stick to this car. We can always pick it up later, if we need it."

  "The demonic force behind all this resides below," Poquah told them in a briefing before they were to go into town. "Gimlet and even Marge felt it and knew that it was there, although it does seem somewhat under control by the proper spells and restrictions. Do not underestimate it."

  "Still only one demon, though," Tiana remarked. "Can it be Hiccarph again?"

  "It is doubtful. The demotion seemed plain, and they wouldn't trust a known blunderer and insubordinate on an Earth project. It will be one of the majors, though— count on that. We will have to find some way to deal with it. I am still not clear why they need it this close to the Earthly plane of existence. Dacaro has more than enough power for this sort of operation." He thought a moment. "Unless Dacaro himself is being prepared merely as a conduit through which the demonic power can flow. Yes, that must be it, but what could the Baron have dreamed up that would require that much raw power?"

  "Great, so we got a demon in the cellar—" Joe began, but Poquah cut him off.

  "No, beneath the cellar and not quite in this plane of reality, but real enough."

  "So, all right, that gives us still more of a blank. Did Gimlet get down to the cellar at all?"

  "No, the tremendous force of evil made her quite naturally too afraid to do so. The first floor, however, has been redone so that there is a single long room along the left side, here, terminating in a standard altar and having a few hundred folding chairs. This is obviously the chapel where they conduct services for the locals. On the other side, there is a large and comfortably furnished reception room and in back of that is the kitchen. On the second floor is a suite of offices, still in the unfinished stages, used by Dacaro and the Baroness, and also headquarters and quarters for the chief Elders and the heads of the Ministering Angels. The third floor is only partially used, apparently as communal quarters for more of the enforcement personnel, and is partly sealed off. The fourth floor is boarded up and not used at all."

  "Hmmm..." Tiana studied the drawings made from Gimlet's observations. "So where are the Baron's offices?"

  "In the cellar, we must assume. The Baron and Baroness use the master bedroom on the second floor, while Dacaro is currently sleeping in a small area behind the altar downstairs until they finish up his own complex. The exterior is well patrolled by the Elders; the interior has a Ministering Angel or two in each of the rooms. Gimlet says that all of the Angels are totally enslaved by spells, and are specifically assigned to a task—a room, a person, and so on. The Elders have more freedom and individuality and less clearly defined tasks, but are no less bound. She also states that there is a lot of equipment of various sorts piled up all over the place, and that technicians seem to be working there day and night. Just what's up, though, is unclear, although I have some suspicions. Come. Let's go into town."

  "Aren't you afraid they'll recognize me?" Joe asked him.

  "It is unlikely that those Elders will be around, and I wouldn't worry about them in any event. The Baron, if he doesn't already know, will know soon enough."

  The day remained fairly clear and warm, giving Tiana some help, and the three drove the car from the old industry siding where the truck was parked and into the town.

  It was in fact a quite attractive little place, not very large but with all the requisites—a general store, a small cafe, a couple of tiny old churches, a sheriff's office— but no jail—a gas station, a tiny branch bank, a Wards catalog store, and nine places selling redwood burl. There were mostly pickups parked diagonally up and down the lone main street, but not a lot of people or traffic. The place looked unnaturally, antiseptically clean, though, and, while the people they did see were all dressed pretty normally for this place and the time of the year, almost all of them seemed to have something yellow on—a shirt, a skirt, or perhaps a kerchief. Even Joe, Tiana, and Poquah wore yellow shirts this time; in Stockman Mills, even those who weren't members of the True Path found it better to show solidarity.

  It looked peaceful, orderly, and friendly enough, but there was something intangible in the air that they could nonetheless all feel.

  "You can almost smell the fear," Tiana remarked.

  Poquah nodded. "It is a strong stench, like being in one of the towns after the Baron's soldiers had taken it."

  "But—can't all those legitimate religious figures smell it, too?" Joe asked him. "I mean, here was Dacaro guest-preaching on some guy's TV show a few days ago, and you tell me he's gotten support."

  "People see what they wish to see," the Imir responded. "In just recent Earth history, we find Hitler the social reformer, Pol Pot the democratic liberator of Cambodia, and Khomeni the democratic liberal. In this very state, they hailed the Reverend Jones as a liberal reformer and even appointed him to government office. Humans are very much oriented to the surface, rather than what is within, both here and back home."

  "But he can't fool all of the people all of the time," Joe noted. "Eventually he has to come out into the open."

  "Perhaps. Probably. They all did, didn't they? But how much innocent blood was spilled to stop the cancers that should have been obvious? How many dead, maimed, and ruined in Husaquahr to block the Baron's visions of social reform? That is why we must stop him here and now, while the toll is still relatively small."

  The plans and the passwords were set. Tonight, a few more people would attend the services.

  Shortly after dark, Marge joined them. She had no need for transformations and disguises, being well able to manufacture her own. In fact, she just wanted to test things out a bit while it was easier to escape, and went into the general store on the pretext of buying a small can of orange juice. She used pretty much the same appearance she'd worn back in Texas, but without makeup and wearing plain-looking clothes. It was an easy, natural illusion to maintain, although she decided to forgo glasses as a follower of a faith healer.

  "Peace be unto you, sister," said the young, clean-cut-looking man behind the counter who was dressed all in yellow.

  "And to you, brother," she responded, having been briefed on the conventions they used. There weren't many; the Baron wanted loyalty and he really didn't want to work at a wholesale transformation of individual personalities—yet. She got the juice, gave him some coins, and, smiling, left the store. It was both easy—and disturbing. There had been a small TV camera of the kind usual in store security on them at all times, and, since no one had challenged her, they were going to have a real problem if and when they reviewed that tape, for she'd neither show up on it visually or vocally. Of course, the store would also be eighty cents short for the day. Her money was as illusory as her appearance.

  She would have to avoid close interaction with others where such cameras were likely to be, and alter her appearance and clothing each time. She walked down the street, smiling and nodding to those she met, and walked past the small church at one end of town. It was unusual for a town this small to have two churches, although they both were clearly closed, possibly from lack of interest. The one church, an old Protestant one, was being fixed up, possibly to handle overflow, but this one was left vacant, although it did look cared for. The old, weathered sign out front read: ST. DIONYSIUS ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH.

  Curious, she walked up the path and saw someone tending to what appeared to be a small garden on the side of the tiny church building. He was humming a tune and seemed to be in fairly good spirits, although it was rather odd to be tending a garden after dark, all things considered. He was dressed all in black; for a moment she wasn't certain he wasn't some kind of specter, a trap of the Baron's. This was, after all, enemy territo
ry in spades.

  The man heard her, or sensed something, turned, looked over at her, and an expression of total amazement was on his face. It was a kindly face, with rimless glasses, rosy cheeks, and blue eyes. He was perhaps fifty, graying, and looking far more weathered than his years. He was also, by his dress and collar, a priest, and by his manner and his odor, quite drunk.

  "Faith! What sort of fairy vision is this?" he managed, using a not very authentic-sounding Irish brogue.

  She was certain that her illusory powers were on and fully working, so she decided he was just being pleasant. "You are a priest? Here?"

  "Aye, that I am. And what, pray tell, might you be, all orange and with crimson wings?"

  That settled it! The man could see through her disguise! For some reason, her illusory projection, which could fool whole cities, had no effect on this man. "You can see me with wings?"

  "Aye, sure I can! Are ya some demon from the heathens yonder come to close me down at last?"

  "I'm no demon. Father. They are my enemies as much as yours."

  He stood up and waved the trowel. "Then let's have at the beggars!"

  She tried to quiet him and finally managed it. "It won't work—that way. This evil is the kind you preach about, and that your liberal theologians claim doesn't even exist."

  He sank back down and sat on the grass. "Used to preach about, you mean. Hasn't been anybody come to these services in months." He sighed, and tears welled up in his eyes. "It never was much of a congregation, understand—just twenty or thirty people—but adequate for an old man who couldn't get along in the big city churches after bein' an army chaplain for twenty-five years." He reached into his coat for a flask, opened it, took a good slug, then carefully recapped it and put it back. "Now there's none that come, even for baptism. He took the whole of the Church of the Woods on the other side of town, too, including Bob Moody, the pastor."

  "I'm surprised he didn't come directly for you. A Catholic priest on his side would have been something interesting."

  "No. He wants no deaths, not even accidents, around here. It might attract attention. He hoped that, without a church, my superiors would simply declare this and me a loss and send me away, but I've no place to go and no place to stay except here, and I have my army pension, so I'm officially retired anyway. He can't have me, for I know him for what he is and who he represents, and he wants me nowhere near his little compound." He hiccupped and then looked sheepish, but continued. "You see, his master knows I've performed exorcisms." He sighed, and took another slug from the flask. "I don't know why I stay, but that's just the way it's been. Too old or too stubborn, I guess."

  She was certainly interested now, even though the man was becoming increasingly drunk. She doubted if he could stand up right now, yet, oddly, the more he drank the less accent he had and his conversation remained lucid.

  Exorcisms! Few even in his own church, let alone others, still believed in it at all. If he had not only a belief in demons but knowledge of how to control or send them back, that was in itself magic of a very high art. It was too bad he was so pickled now that he was starting to lean to one side. Clearly it wouldn't be more than a few minutes before he passed out completely. She thought he was out cold now, but suddenly he perked up.

  "It's my fate to be ground into the ground here and now," he wailed, stifling a sob. "Do you know what my name is? Francis Xavier O'Grady. I had it legally changed because I was in awe of Barry Fitzgerald." He raised the flask unsteadily. "Here's to old Barry, the greatest priest of all times!"

  "Then you're not really Irish?"

  "No, actually I was born Casimir Wyczalek. In those days, in Boston, you didn't have priests named Casimir Wyczalek, and nobody would confess to a priest whose name they could neither spell nor pronounce. So I had it legally changed—and they went and elected a Polish Pope!" He broke down in deep sobs.

  "Uh—Father, about those exorcisms. Were they real?"

  He stopped for a moment and nodded. "Indeed. Otherwise I would never have tried, in spite of all those Georgetown psychiatrists saying as how it was because their mothers talked mean to them when they were still in the womb. But devils can be controlled. Their power is limited, lass, to those who fear or worship them. With the right words and the right symbols and with God's power, they can be stopped." He tried to get up, but couldn't quite manage it. She went over and offered him a hand, although she was far shorter and much slighter than he.

  He took it, but did not rise. "Such a strange hand," he said, marveling. "There is an unnatural warmth and power in you. I can feel it, but I do not feel the evil such power usually accompanies. Are you an angel, then?"

  "I'm no angel, but I am of the fairy folk. The Baron is a man of great evil who came from our world to this when he failed there. We—what is that little pin in your lapel?" It was a strange, abstract design of some gold or gold-plated material.

  "Why, 'tis the fish, the ancient symbol of Christianity. Surely you should know that."

  She felt an eerie shock, the same sort of shock she felt when she'd discovered the injured Gimlet on the Midland rooftop.

  While the demons are stopped by a pickled fish....

  "I must go now," she told him. "Will you be all right?"

  "Aye, I'll be fine, don't worry. As fine as you can be when you're alone in the seat of Hell on Earth."

  "You are not alone. Father," she told him. "In fact, some time tomorrow you can expect a visit from other friends."

  The True Path leaders didn't want the identifying marks too attractive or too distinctive; the believers should seem just average-looking people going up to the services. Ordinary nonbelievers who tried to walk in were caught by the spell; that had been what had frustrated the detectives. Still, none of the believers had spells themselves, or at least not spells of any similarity not otherwise accounted for, so the way through the spell had to be physical. If so, Joe and Tiana, as weres, were home free. Marge would not go in as a parishioner, but would instead join the throng after flying over the barrier.

  The true faithful donned yellow robes before going in, which was handy, since a were transformation didn't include clothing and might have been embarrassing. There was no way to time the change accurately, and no sure way that Joe and Marge would keep together without merely changing into each other, which wouldn't have been much help, so they just donned the robes Poquah had procured and then joined the throng near sunset. Although they had a password system, neither expected to be with or know the other until it was all over; inside, they would be strictly on their own.

  Joe tried to angle himself so he stood along the side of the path near where a couple of men roughly his size were talking, but he knew the folly of trying to get what he wanted at random on a curse like this from bitter experience. The men, it turned out, were waiting for their wives, and Joe found himself, not for the first time, turned into a woman by virtue of perhaps three seconds and five inches. He didn't mind that so much—he'd had it happen often enough he almost expected it—but the woman had been a good five inches shorter than he, and now the robe, which had been deliberately tailored a bit short on him, was baggy and dragged on the ground. She was also fat and not at all in good physical shape, which made the long trek into the compound and up to the mansion a real effort. He had no trouble in distancing himself from the real person whose body he now perfectly imitated.

  It grew damp and chilly in these parts at night, too, and most people had on their clothes and shoes under their robes. Because of the problems involved, he found himself barefoot and wearing only the robe, and that only increased his misery.

  Still, he made it, and found himself in a sea of yellow. The grounds in front of the house had been fully lighted by the perimeter lamps, and the big front porch was also all bright. Before the front door was a lectern, and on either side of the porch and on slim poles in the back were loudspeakers. It was clearly the only way these people could be accommodated.

  Whatever the physical ma
rk was that got you in, it was on the body, for he'd had no problems. Now he just took a position about halfway back and waited for it all to begin. For such a large throng, there was little or no talking and much meditation. He liked it that way, boring as it was. He didn't want to have to get friendly with anyone and make any slips here.

  Finally the front door opened and a darkly handsome man in a yellow suit walked out, flanked by four beautiful yellow-robed women: his Ministering Angels. Even here he wasn't taking any chances.

  Dacaro appeared very sleek and very Earth modern, but otherwise he hadn't changed a bit. He looked out at the crowd and seemed to smile cockily at the power represented there. Then, after a moment, he began to speak.

  "Peace be unto you, my brothers and sisters following the True Path." His voice was the same silky, mellow voice it had been so long before, but his English was flawless and about as devoid of accent as any could get. He might have been from Kansas or Nebraska.

  "And to you and all the Lord's works," responded the crowd reverently.

  "Brothers and sisters, we meet here tonight at a crucial turning point in our divine mission," he continued. "You are the leaders who will not only see the great revolution we will make, but will lead it and guide it in our Lord's name." His voice began rising now, and he took on a really good preacher's tone.

  "You have seen the hand of the Lord in how far we've come in so short a time. Less than three years ago we were unheard of. Then the Master came, with the power of the Lord in his hands and mind, and walked among many of you and healed you of what science could not. He cured your cancers, made sick hearts healthy, and even regrew and restored limbs that had been severed from you, or made useless. This was his sign to you, and those of you who understood came to him to serve! Together, we have built this place. Together, we are building the capital of a new tomorrow for ourselves and our children and our children's children!"

  There were many spontaneous "Amens" and other such comments from the crowd.