“That old demon wanderlust got to you, huh?”
“Something like that. These people kept stumbling into the place, dirty, exhausted, grinning all over their faces. I finally had to find out what it was like.” Griffin was quoting the real Gary Tegner almost word for word. He knew Gavagan’s well enough, and he’d found the time to talk to the Gavagan’s Bar manager for nearly half an hour.
He’d been very busy these last few hours. Someone else had packed the backpack he had found waiting with the beer. Presently he’d have to search through it, to see if anything had been forgotten . . .
Tony regarded Griffin’s shoulders and arms casually, noting the way small muscles bunched and writhed in the man’s forearms as he turned his fork. “You know, I would have thought a man like you would want to be a Warrior.”
“Don’t like blood. I like skulking about in dark corridors, and outwitting the forces of justice. You?”
“Thief is what my Wessler-Grahm came out to. As a fighter, I wouldn’t have lasted more than a minute against the oversized turkeys yesterday.”
Acacia laughed and touched Tony’s arm lightly. Oliver chimed in. Griffin scooted over a couple of inches and patted the ground next to him. Oliver sat down, followed by Gwen. Griffin asked, “How did you do?”
“Against the big birds? Not bad. I didn’t kill one by myself, but I crippled two of them, and somebody else finished them off. Not a whole lot for my individual points, but the group points will be good, so I’m not worried about it. I’m worried about my little darlin’ here.” Gwen snuggled her back against his; she was facing the other way, pretending not to listen to the conversation. “She hasn’t really had a chance to strut her stuff yet.”
Now Gwen turned around. “Don’t worry about me. What about Tony and Dark Star? There hasn’t been any call for Thieves at all.” “Aha.” Griffin chewed for a bit, then explained. “I’ve been wondering why she came on so strong. Really attacked me.”
Acacia agreed readily. “Yes, you’re probably right. This expedition has been a field day so far for Warriors and Wizards. Not too shabby for Engineers either. I think Dark Star is worried about her points.” She tsked condescendingly,
“May I assume that you and the lady in question aren’t on the best of terms?”
“We aren’t on any terms at all. I just don’t warm to her, that’s all. Don’t know exactly why, except that I seem to remember something about her cheating in a Game.” Acacia seemed suddenly alarmed. “Don’t tell her I said that, though, okay?”
“Scout’s honor.”
“I could be wrong anyway.”
There was a cry from a group of Gamers a few feet away. Gina Perkins was dragging something that looked like an old-fashioned set of sleepers. It rustled like snakeskin.
Gwen tugged Oliver to his feet and they ran over to inspect the thing. Tony followed a second later. “Oliver and Gwen,” Griffin said to Acacia, “those two are pretty well inseparable, aren’t they?”
“Absolutely. Why do you ask?” She licked the last bit of gravy from her stew can.
Griffin stood up and stretched lazily. “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe I think she’s kind of cute.” He extended a hand to her and pulled her up.
“She’s adorable,” the dark girl granted. “But is she really your type?”
“And who might be more my type, hmm?” If Griffin had been standing four inches closer, they would have been kissing.
Acacia turned and pointed to the woman who had found the curious artifact. “Oh, I don’t know. How about Gina?” She smiled at him over her shoulder. “She’s with Chester, but she’s been known to forget that. I hear.” She started toward the group of Gamers, and Griffin followed close behind.
Business first, Alex. He shut his grin down to a bare smirk.
At first he couldn’t believe his eyes. Unmistakably, Henderson was holding up a complete human skin: hollow, dry, dark brown, flapping in the air like long underwear hung up to dry.
“What the hell is that?” Griffin asked.
“Either random magic, or . . .” Henderson was thoughtful. “I seem to remember something about a legend of men who shed their skins . . .”
S. J. looked at it closely. “Oh-oh.” His head snapped from side to side. “Where are our bearers?”
Kogoiano stepped forward promptly. So did Kibugonai, a short stout man with flat features.
Chester bellowed, “Nigorai! Nigoraiiii!”
Maibang shook his head with regret. I’m afraid that you are holding Nigorai in your hands.”
Henderson started, then examined the skin more closely. When he came to a tiny white scar over the left eyehole, he nodded. “I suppose the revolvers he was carrying are gone too.”
A quick search confirmed it. “Then he was a spy, a . . . a member of the enemy impersonating a Daribi.” He wiped a thin hand across his forehead, and Alex could see that the Lore Master’s hand was trembling.
“Faked out again,” Acacia whispered at his shoulder. “We’ve lost points, and now the enemy knows we’re coming. He was a spy.” He started to throw the skin to the side, then stopped. “No. I’m not going to be stupid again. When lunch break is over I’m going to scan both of our bearers. I’m also keeping this skin. It may come in useful.” He folded it carefully and put it in his pack.
As the crowd drifted back to their lunches, Griffin found himself wondering about the only man in the group larger than himself. Eames had sandy red hair and freckles; he looked boyish, and his massive musculature provided an interesting contrast. He seemed to be alone. A single man in the group could have slipped away last night.
Griffin stood with his back to Eames, trying to pick up bits of his conversation with the slender man with the receding hairline and brown braided hair. Leigh, that was his name, Griffin remembered it from the dossier he had studied before joining the Game.
Alan Leigh trailed his hand appreciatively over Eames’ shoulders. “You look a little tight there. Muscles need massaging, maybe?” There was a minimum of leer on Alan’s face; perhaps his chipmunk cheeks were a bit more in evidence than usual. Out of the corner of his eye, Griffin saw Eames was flinching.
“Look, Alan. I told you last night. It’s not that I don’t like you as a person, I just don’t get into it like that. Really. “
Leigh sighed. “What a waste. I could be a big help to you in the Game—”
Wrong thing to say. Eames became palpably hostile. “Under what circumstances?”
He was about to say more, but Alan picked up on the feeling and wagged his head. “No, I don’t mean that. Really.” He smiled sheepishly. “Anyway, we still have three nights left, and you know where to find me.”
That was as much as Griffin felt like eavesdropping on, and he turned away. Most of the gamers had finished eating and were preparing to leave. Griffin had tagged eight gamers as couples: Chester and Gina, Dark Star and that “Bowan the Black” character, Oliver and Gwen, Acacia and Tony. Acacia seemed to be looking around. All of the other players were singles, and were therefore to be considered first.
Except that the comment about Felicia “Dark Star” Maddox was very interesting. Something to keep an eye out for, while most of the wackos kept their eyes open for dragons and such . . .
Chapter Fourteen
THE WATER PEOPLE
The ground was mushy. Water lapped over the laces of Griffin’s boots. Twice he had to stop to shake the water out. The realism was hard to fault. He half-expected to find leeches on his ankles. “Goddam Gamers,” he muttered “Why couldn’t this have been a desert game? Or a nice mountain?”
“What was that, Griffy?” a gravelly voice sang in his ear, He shuddered. “You can call me Griffin, or Griff.”
“If it makes you happy, but I like Griffy better.”
This was insane. He was being nursemaided by a fifty-year-old battleax of a midget who carried a nasty halberd, on her back, and continuously sang snatches of dirty songs. If a man had called him “Griffy”, tee
th would have flown like popcorn. In Mary-em’s case, he wasn’t sure whether it was amusement or caution that kept his dander down. The woman was as solid as the warrior she pretended to be.
Henderson called the column to a halt. They had reached the edge of a waterway that stretched in three directions as far as he could see. It was choked with plants and floating debris, and subtle disturbances of the surface suggested living things within. Griffin shuddered. Realism. Henderson conferred with Maibang out of his hearing, and Alex went back to Mary-em.
“I take it you’re a long-time Gamer.”
“Oh, yeah.”
“How many of the Gamers do you know?” he asked nonchalantly.
“Y’mean before this Game started?” She scratched her head thoughtfully. “Well, Chester an’ me are old buddies. Hell, I wetnursed him through his first stretch as a Lore Master.”
“How long ago?”
“Seven years. A jaunt into the Hyborean Age to steal the Serpent Ring of Set from the finger of Thoth-Amon.” She gave a harsh bark of amusement. “Now there was a pretty bit of thievery for you.”
“Difficult, was it?”
“You wouldn’t believe it. Chester lost three-fourths of our party, but the Game Master was penalized by the I.F.G.S. for running an excessively nasty game.”
“I wouldn’t have thought you would complain about anything, Mary.”
“Mary-em, Griffy.”
“That’s Griffin, Mary-em.”
There was something moving on the marshy water. Boats? Boats. Several rude canoes were floating toward shore. They shimmered and wavered like things of myth, their pace as slow as the setting of the sun. By now the entire party was standing at the edge of the water, and Griffin peered out, hands shadowing his eyes from the reflected glare of the Dream Park sun.
There were six of the canoes, all large enough for more than the two apiece who were paddling them.
“What’s this?”
“Looks suspiciously like transport, Griffin.”
“Where are we going?”
She gave him her kindest shut-up-and-see smile and then ignored his question.
Henderson waved greeting to the approaching boat-men. There was no response, and even from a distance. Griffin could feel Chester’s body go tense. The Lore Master raised his thin arms and performed an invocation. Green light enclosed his body, then streamed across the water to envelop the canoes. When they reflected only green, the Lore Master relaxed and dissolved his spell.
Now the oarsmen were closer. They seemed dead-eyed and unnaturally quiet. Even their paddles were silent as they dipped into the lake.
The lead canoe nosed into the gooey excuse for a shore. Its occupants exchanged greetings with Kasan.
“Do you know him? Our guide?”
Mary-em looked at him curiously. “Not before the Game. Why?”
Griffin cursed himself silently. These surroundings were affecting his professional judgment. He could not just line up suspects and quiz them. “I just had the feeling that I’d seen him somewhere before. Funny.”
“Why funny? He’s bound to be a professional actor. Now will you kindly shut up and let me enjoy the Game?”
She gave him an affectionate elbow-nudge in the gut. Griffin gasped for breath.
She was one of the three. Chester Henderson, Alan Leigh, Mary-Martha Corbett: the three who had explored Gaming Area A on previous Games. Drown it, he had to ask her questions. But he didn’t have to like it.
Henderson called them all around him. “These folk are the Agaiambo. They are our next link in the chain, and will take us to our rendezvous. Split into groups of three, and get ready to board the canoes.”
“You and me?” Griffin asked Mary-em playfully.
“Try getting rid of me, Handsome.”
They joined Rudy Dreager, the plump Engineer who had pulled Griffin from the quicksand. They piled in between two silent boatmen.
The paddlers crossed a stretch of clear water, then turned into a channel choked with green and yellow vegetation. It looked like a stagnant canal in the last throes of nutrient strangulation, the vines and roots growing so fast that they kill themselves and the entire eco-system of the waterway.
The going was painfully slow. The lead canoe halted at frequent intervals so that the front paddler could saw vines with a long-handled knife. At last Griffin began to relax. He leaned over to speak to Mary-em, who was humming tunelessly, her sharp little eyes never ceasing their side-to-side, sweep of the vegetation.
“How did you get into this, Mary-em?”
“Regular little psychiatrist, aren’t you? What do you do on the outside? I mean for work. Very few people can make a living out of prying into other people’s business.”
“I’m supervisor for Gavagan’s Bar in Dream Park.” The lie came surprisingly hard. Masochistically, he forced himself to elaborate: “Most of my job is keeping the food and the service up to par. R&D does the special effects. But letting a customer bend my ear is part of the job too. What about you?”
“Well, I retired myself at thirty-five.”
Griffin whistled. “Good going.” He trailed his hand in the water, until he remembered the vague stirrings he had seen at the bank of the main body, and pulled it out quickly. “How did you manage that? Lose a toe on the job?”
He felt her tense, and wondered what nerve he’d scraped. “Nothing so dramatic, sonny. Just a little principal called Modular Economics. That means that instead of getting a lot of money for doing one thing, you get little chunks for doing different things well, and you’re your own boss. It’s flexible, fun, and free. The three Fs.”
“Sounds good. What do you do well?”
“If your ears were a little dryer I might be convinced to show you. If, however, you mean what do I do for money, I’d have to give you an alphabetical listing.”
“A few highlights would do.”
“Did you grow them muscles just so you could survive being nosy?” She tickled him, and he coughed to cover his broken giggle of surprise. “I do guide work for rock climbers in Yosemite, and I teach Kendo—”
“You what?”
“Let’s see. I do a little philately, sculpt bonsai trees half-well, and have been known to pick up a few bucks sewing costumes for Gamers. Want more?”
Griffin swallowed hard. “Jesus. How many of those things do you do well?”
“The Kendo and the rock climbing, mostly. The rest I just picked up.”
Alex nodded. He was wondering what such a superwoman was doing playing fantasy games, like a kid . . . but that was obvious enough. Didn’t R&D have something on the boards that would let someone like Mary-em play as a statuesque blond? Yeah, he’d heard something about distorted holograms: a process too expensive to use, so far, that would let a man play as a woman or vice versa, or as a dwarf or a giant . . . but he wasn’t about to mention it to Mary-em. She’d feed him her halberd.
After what seemed an interminable trip, the canoes drew into a less choked patch of water. Now instead of traveling single file, the five canoes spread out abreast of each other. Presently they pulled up to a rude dock with wooden moorings sunk in the muck.
It didn’t look like much, but it was indisputably a village.
The foundations were tree trunks that rose out of the swamp five or six feet, and the wooden platforms set atop them looked as stable as any paranoid schizophrenic.
Griffin tied their boat up next to one of the dwellings, and they waded soggily and carefully ashore. The boatmen followed unsteadily, as if walking on ice skates. When the men reached land, Alex could see why; their feet were hideously deformed, scarcely more than misshapen clubs.
Looking around, Alex found that all of the boatmen were similarly crippled. Most were using their paddles as crutches. He chose not to ask what was going on. A detective should spend some of his time detecting.
They were being led to a central platform. It was set on firmer ground than the dozen or so thatch-roofed houses grouped arou
nd it. Like the others, it too rose several feet above the ground, perhaps to discourage alligators from basking on the front porch. People were coming out of hiding, women and children and older men, and a small contingent of spear-carrying warriors. All were club-footed nearly to disability.
As they reached the central platform, Griffin watched the nightmarishly long shadows of their hobbling companions and suddenly realized that it couldn’t be later than two o’clock. But the sun was nearly set! He checked the watch on his cuff. It was quarter past two.
What were the Game Masters planning for tonight, to be bringing the night so early?
The Gamers were directed to a wooden ladder, and one at a time they mounted it. The two bearers waited below.
“Please,” Maibang was explaining softly. “The Agaiambo are a boat-people who spend most of their lives in and on the water. They venture onto land rarely. Over the years their feet have shriveled away to what you see. But they are a proud, fierce people, and great allies in our fight. Pay them the respect due to a warrior people who have resisted evil at tremendous cost.”
There was a muffled clumping sound, and the ladder shook as it was mounted. A face rose over the edge of the platform, a face incredibly aged and weathered. Only the eyes seemed truly alive: chips of diamond stuck in a withered black apple. The man was supported on one side by a walking stick, and on the other by a woman scarcely younger than he, her empty and wrinkled breasts swaying pendulously with each uncertain step. She helped him to a sitting position but remained standing herself. She held his hand with what Griffin interpreted as protective affection.
The old man mumbled, rubbery lips twitching with palsy, and as he did a thin streak of drool ran glistening to his chin. The woman spoke. After a minute of halting dialog, Maibang translated. “She says that her man is sorry not to greet us in strength, but he is very tired, the fight is not going well. The village of the Agaiambo is too close to the lands of the enemy, and the assaults come more frequently now. The end is near.”
The old man experienced a facial spasm, and his lips pulled back from brown stubby teeth. With an enormous effort of will he controlled himself, and mumbled again to his woman. She repeated his words aloud, and Maibang translated. “I am not the leader of the Agaiambo, he says, for the leader has been dead for a week. We placed him in his ku, his exposure coffin, so that the rain and the sun might return his flesh to the earth, and speed his spirit on its way to Dudi, the village of the dead. But our enemy, who had brought death to him in the form of the dreaded Bidi-Taurabo-Haza—”
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