DG5 - Horrors of the Dancing Gods

by Chalker, Jack L

  Certainly, from more of a distance, she could see and even feel what was too omnipresent to pick out closer in: the massive cloud of bizarre evil that seemed to be centered there, to be oozing from that point out to the whole of the world.

  Right from the center of that stadium, almost like one of those steam vents on the volcano over there.

  So the stadium wasn't just a stadium. Or perhaps it was more than a stadium. At night they goofed off, but by day they built, and a fissure in space-time opened there in the middle of the field and stayed open, spewing forth its evil ectoplasmic ichor.

  It wasn't all that clear whether there was any other development anywhere in the valley, though, and all those creatures, as loathsome and horrible as they were, were recognizable as having once been far more normal-looking and probably native to here. If there was an entity—something new, special, and not of this universe—it had yet to show itself. If it was still in the valley, though, it was hard to figure how it could hide from faerie sight, if only by a sudden cessation of it.

  She tried to remember the map of the valley they'd gotten from Macore. Over there, on a line from the stadium and then just a wee bit farther up. Up inside the rocks, that very different grove of trees—that was it! She looked back toward where Poquah had made camp and scowled. So cautious and so limited!

  She flew just above treetop level in hopes of attracting no attention and went over toward the spot where she was certain the McGuffin lay. It would take a mortal to get it—she understood that—but if she could spot it and scout a decent route, they might be able to do this in nearly record time. It was beginning to look like a real piece of cake in spite of it all.

  She recognized the tree almost immediately. It was set off from the rest, and it had its own sort of meadow completely surrounding its vast, thick trunk. The local trees even seemed to bend in just slightly toward it as if deferring to its age and rank, and it was certainly old.

  It was unlike any other tree in this forest or in fact most other trees anywhere, but she had seen its kin. Not exactly the same, but you could tell the relationship. This tree, even in darkness, exuded multiple metallic bands of color on the faerie level, glimmering beautifully as it displayed the entire spectrum. Closer in, the trunk seemed almost golden, the leaves like copper or bronze, and the fruit, the perfect fruit, like .. .

  Little green apples.

  Once she'd seen the Tree of Life. Now she was in the presence of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.

  One bite, she thought bitterly. One lousy crunch and it screwed everything up for everybody. She couldn't help but wonder what would happen to anybody who had a second bite of the fruit. It wouldn't matter. It had stained the souls of all creation and brought death and judgment to humankind. The knowledge of good and evil ...

  It had cursed the faerie, too. Some in the Garden had failed to prevent the disobedience or even had egged it on. So the faerie had been cast out of Heaven as well and condemned to lose to mortal humankind on Earth and be driven here to await the final judgment.

  Somewhere within sight of that tree was the Great McGuffin. She looked around, seeing at last a lava extrusion in back of the tree at the edge of the grove, going up and blending into a rise. It looked a bit like a stage and a bit like an altar as well, but it didn't look like the hiding place for anything important.

  Still, it had to be there, and they were, oh, at worst, under five miles from their final destination.

  She suddenly felt a strong pang of real danger, not from above but from below, from the grove! What? Who? she wasn't sure, but it was very strong and very menacing; it was alive, and it was down there.

  And something about it was hauntingly familiar.

  She was being probed! Something horribly evil down there was checking her out! She decided to get the hell out of there immediately and sped off as quickly as possible back toward the camp.

  Her new confidence shaken, she regained most of her composure before she got back to the others after she determined that whoever or whatever had discovered her was not following.

  Of course not, she thought nervously. It knows we either have to come to it or give up, and either way it wins. Poquah wasn't going to like this at all, either.

  He didn't, but he seemed more relieved at her return and her report than concerned about it.

  "As you say, it suggests an easy task," he agreed. "Why should they trouble themselves with a heavy defense, manhunts, and the rest when they know we must come to them? How much of a force do you think they have around there?"

  "Impossible to say, but I didn't sense anybody. That one was more than enough. I don't remember ever feeling that kind of power or that strange and alien a sensation from it, either, but the funny thing is, I did find something familial there. I just can't put my finger on it!" She suddenly stopped, frowned, and looked around. "Where is Joel Thebes?"

  "What!" Poquah shot around and surveyed the scene, looking for auras, and he found two where there should have been three. "I thought it smelled better here, but I couldn't be certain!"

  "He said he was going to take a leak," Irving noted. "That was quite a while ago now, but I guess I just didn't think about it."

  Marge surveyed the whole area. "Well, he's gone now. You want me to try and find him? I might be able to put the come-hither on him if he still has anything between his legs."

  "No," the Imir replied. "However, it does mean that we can no longer stay here under any circumstances, and that means you must lead. Whether he is a traitor or simply blunders into one of them, he will betray us all. Get us closer to this grotto, and we will see what we might be up against"

  "You're not going to try it tonight!" She was appalled at the idea. "You haven't experienced that—thing—out there."

  "Not tonight, no," Poquah agreed. "However, close to dawn is a different story."

  "What have you got in mind?" she asked him.

  `Think about the situation. This entity obviously knows that we must make a try for the McGuffin. It must also be assumed that it has at least a reasonable idea of who and what we are by this point. The most important thing is that the McGuffin is still there. It hasn't been used, nor is it currently in anyone's hands. That means the entity can't get at it, either. Possibly all those on his side, even the mortals, get so corrupted with this alien plasma that it prevents them from picking it up as well. I do not think they will stop us. I am not even certain they will try to capture us, although I could be wrong in that. They want one of us, probably Irving, to pick up the McGuffm. Then they will move without giving him time to use it."

  "And you're still going for it? Now?"

  "Yes. The entity must be cursing itself right now. It made a mistake in probing, in betraying its location and its power to you. Now we know it is there. What is the commonsense approach?"

  "Lay off. Try and figure a way in. Sneak in, if possible."

  "Exactly. It will not, I hope, be quite so prepared for us rushing straight in as quickly as possible. We will gain nothing by putting it off. We need to act. Now, tell me about what you saw at the structure and the entities you heard as exactly as you can while we gather up what we have here and make ready to shift position."

  "You aren't gonna believe this."

  "Perhaps. What were the names?"

  "Forgive my pronunciation problems. One sounded like Cath-oo-loo."

  "Cthulhu. Ancient master of all the waters. Yes."

  "Yog something or other."

  "Yog Sothoth. Master of the Air, the Lurker at the Threshold. He will be first through, for he and his followers alone have the key and power to punch through. Any more?"

  "Shub somebody."

  "Shub Niggurah. The Goat with a Thousand Young. Yes, very consistent. The seed of this one, that pantheon's symbol of fertility, bears careful watching. You won't be just a pleasure nymph under her. You will be used to help breed what they require. Remember that!"

  "If she's a goat who has all those kids, why does she
need me?"

  "Regardless of form or attitude, you were never stupid before, so please do not start now. The goat is often associated with fertility, as are the rabbit and the egg, the symbols of Ishtar upon which your own cult originated. Likewise the satyr, the male nymph, Pan, half-human and half-goat and all the time on the make. It is difficult to say what kind of creations she would make of such as you, but you would not be pleased."

  "I get the idea. So, as usual, we're all the way here with no hope and everything against us, huh?"

  "That about sums it up," he agreed.

  "Figure the entity needs the McGuffin to complete his opening, right? That's why it picked here. Something has blocked him, probably something in the Rules, which it's still stuck with until the takeover, right?"

  "Yes."

  "So somewhere there's a way for us to win. The Rules demand it."

  "That is certainly true," the Imir agreed. "However, finding it simply can't work every time ..."

  THE ENTITY STRIKES BACK

  Old enemies are more likely than new enemies to be at the root of plots.

  —Rules, Vol. VI, p. 297(a)

  THERE WAS MORE ACTIVITY IN THE WOODS THAN THERE appeared to be from the air or from their initial base not far inside.

  Proceeding through the dense thicket, they found a honeycomb of well-developed trails, some obviously quite recent. 'Now and again there were users of those trails as well, causing the four companions to scramble for cover and hold their breaths—and occasionally their noses—until the creatures were long gone by. They included a small corps of the fish-eyed monsters Marge thought of as cousins of the Creature from the Black Lagoon, looking very much out of place there, as well as furry man-sized things with drooling mouths and hideous laughs and cries and others too indescribable and unimaginable to handle.

  Clearly many, if not most, had once been human or faerie and had paid a price for crossing over to this third side, a price they were now too insane even to realize they had paid. Perhaps they had seen what no mind could conceive; perhaps it was a rite of initiation. The fact remained, they saw a great many creatures as they went those few miles in, and at no point did they see anything remotely familiar.

  Because of their nature and their insanity, however, those creatures did not keep order and discipline well, as predicted. Only one group, in fact, seemed to maintain any semblance of military bearing as it marched past, and those looked like a cross between trolls and minor demons. They did, however, have a good snappy march and could be heard singing as they passed nearby.

  "Now Sauron had no friend

  To help him in the end;

  Not even an orc or a slave.

  It was dirty Fordo Baggins

  What kicked his little wagon

  And laid poor Sauron in his grave!"

  "Haven't they got the wrong mythology?" Marge whispered to Poquah.

  He shrugged. "Perhaps. Perhaps they changed sides. Perhaps all such denizens of the Sea of Dreams think they're going to emerge victorious."

  "Not much farther now," she told them. "Just up here. I don't see or hear much in front of us, so maybe they'll only have a token guard on the place."

  "Don't bet on it," the Imir responded. "This is the one place they know we must come. Irving, you cannot hesitate. You know the words. The moment you have the McGuffin in your hands, you must say them no matter what happens, no matter who pops out, no matter who gets threatened or killed. It is our only hope."

  Irving nodded in the darkness, although he was feeling less and less sure of himself on this.

  They reached the edge of the meadow, well within sight of their goal, and Marge put a finger to her lips for absolute silence, then pointed.

  Even in the darkness it was easy to see the area. The Tree of Knowledge gave off its faerie glow, and all of them had faerie sight; beyond, they could see the outcrop, and Irving saw something more.

  "Right there," Irving whispered very quietly. "In the hillside in back of the flat rock, there's some kind of recess with something in it. I bet that's it."

  Both Marge and Poquah looked and saw absolutely nothing.

  "Suppose I just let it get a little light and then I sneak around and get it," Irving suggested in the same low whisper.

  "I see it, too," Larae told them. "Why don't I try it from the other side at the same time. One of us might get to it even if the other is caught."

  Irving nodded. "Poquah, you cover Larae. You might be able to get a shot in. Marge can cover me. She's sensitized to the place and can warn me."

  "We may have a little complication," Marge whispered, pointing first over to one side of the altar and then to the other. There, deep in the shadows, were two creatures, both armed, one a fair bit larger than the other but both indistinct in the limited real light and giving off only very faint auras.

  "Is either one—?" the Imir started, but Marge shook her head to tell him no.

  "If the entity is here, I can't sense it at the moment, but it won't take it long once they know we've arrived."

  "Well, we should be able to take both of them out pretty quietly," Poquah said confidently. "Still, watch carefully for others."

  "It's gonna start getting light any time now," Larae noted. "Let's get moving and get in position."

  Irving was nervous seeing the Imir and Larae go off and vanish in the woods, but he knew that it was now or never and that there was no other choice. He found Larae's bravery to be incredible, too, and he only wished he felt as confident or even as foolishly courageous. Instead, all he wanted to do was pee in his codpiece, and he made every effort not to as he moved forward with Marge.

  He frankly wouldn't have trusted Marge with Larae, particularly in this setting, but something deep down told him that Marge would never, never harm him. It was a feeling he had to go with.

  Marge was trying to get some sort of fix on the guards, who seemed well concealed. Neither was male; she got no sense of reaction from either of them.

  As they drew closer on their end, to within perhaps five meters of the nearest guard and nine or ten from the McGuffin's cubbyhole in the rock, she had a sinking feeling, one that was confirmed as the sky began to lighten and they could finally get something of a decent normal-light view of the scene in the light of false dawn.

  Irving saw what Marge saw and had the same thoughts she'd already considered.

  The figure was definitely a wood nymph, or, more accurately, it had begun as one. The face, arms, upper torso were all still clearly the same, but instead of being inside a tree, she was a tree, at least in a sense. Instead of two legs extending from the hips, there was a single green stalk the width of both thighs going down deep into the ground. The creature clearly had some serpentlike mobility, but only within about the three-meter range the roots would allow.

  She was also pregnant, obesely so, with an enormously distended abdomen.

  Irving felt he had to risk a whisper. "That can't possibly be my dad, can it? I mean, you can't get that pregnant in a few weeks, can you?"

  "Not normally you can't," she responded, "but we don't know what black magic and Rules apply here. At the moment I'm concerned with the fact that she's got a light but sharp-looking blade in each hand."

  "Yeah, well, I guess she's still easier to handle than the one on Larae's side," Irving noted, gesturing.

  It wasn't as easy to see the other creature from, this angle, but you could see enough to realize that while fundamentally the same as the wood nymph now, it had not begun as a wood nymph but rather as something else.

  Poquah, who had a much better view from the opposite side, was appalled. The figure, while "planted," had three sets of arms, each with a full-blown sword, and three sets of breasts, and she seemed to be almost three times as pregnant as the other. Both the Imir and Lame examined the guardians, and both determined that pregnant or not, if both extended themselves on their stalks to the fullest, they could cover the entire altar area. Short of killing them both, the only way throug
h, using the original plan, would be to somehow lop off all their limbs, and that didn't seem too likely a possibility.

  "This is what became of Irving's changed father and the girl he was with, isn't it?" Lame whispered. "The description is too close."

  Poquah nodded. "I am afraid so. And I think that Irving knows it, too. They are enchanted, of course, or cursed, or something similar. That means they won't recognize us in all likelihood and will kill us, even Irving, if they can. Not good."

  "I wonder if one of us could get up behind them," she said. "I can virtually see the bird-thing from here. If I can just come in from the rocks, I might be able to reach down and grab it and still be just out of their range."