They shied away, until she removed the magic al cloak long enough to show them who she was.
The worms looked vastly relieved. The leader reported their encounter with the barbarian. "H-he m-m-must b-be a d-demon! He s-s-slew C-c-cook and T-t-tuma!"
She waved the two worms to silence. The loss of two guards was nothing; the important thing Was that the barbarian was nearby. No time to stop and rest, then.
She did not ask of further matters.
The witch climbed onto the tail of the larger guard. "When I change back into the winged creature, you are to use your muscles to hurl me inio the air, that way," she said, pointing. Without waiting for a reply, Chuntha donned the scaled garment and once again a.s.sumed the form of its former owner.
The startled guard, no less so for having been told this would happen, lashed his tail sharply, catapultingthe ensorceled witch into the air like a rock hurled from a sling. The leathery wings flut-tered and snapped out, and Chuntha sailed down the long corridor.
There were several ways the barbarian could have taken, but she knew at least one that he had not and others that were less than likely. She Was near, she felt it, and she would have him soon!
Katamay Rey had long since attained the sh.o.r.e, and now his cyclopian carriers bore him in a jolt ing run down the most direct corridor toward home. He had the distinct feeling of being late to the party, and tardiness in this case might well be his undoing. "Hurry, you useless lumps, hurry!"
If anything, the continuation of Wikkell and Deek"s plan went smoother than had the beginning. The pair of Cyclopes who guarded Rey"s chambers knew better than to impede Wikkell"s comings and goings; apparently the wizard had not bothered to enlighten them as to Wikkell"s current status, an oversight that the cyclops had counted upon. The wizard thought they were all morons, and seldom bothered to inform the Cyclops of anything that did not directly concern them. Wikkell knew that Rey also thought that little, if any, of his business concerned anyone save himself, so the fear that the guards would attempt to stop Wikkell had been a small worry at best.
With Deek slithering along behind him on the leash, the two of them entered the wizard"s chambers.
As they had done in the witch"s quarters, the rogue cyclops and renegade worm quickly selected a talisman and departed. Once away from the general vicinity of the guards, it was Wikkell"s turn to demonstrate to Deek the instrument they had just stolen.
It seemed to Deek that the small graystone jar was innocuous enough. From it Wikkell removed a pinch of pale powder and cast it in a glittery shower upon the floor before the worm.
"Wh-what d-d-does i-it d-d-do?"
"Crawl over it and see."
Had he shoulders, Deek would have shrugged; lacking them, he twisted his body slightly and started to slither over the fine power. Quickly the worm found that he could not gain any purchase on the floor. He could move his own body by contracting his muscles, but there was no friction between his body and the underlying rock. It was as if the solid stone had turned to air for all the resistance it offered.
Wikkell grinned down at his friend. "A special lubricant," he said. "You cannot move upon a surface coated with it, nor can anybody do anything but slip and slide upon it. Here."
With that, Wikkell leaned toward Deek and gave him a gentle shove. Deek slid across the rock more easily than had their web boat over the surface of the water. He hit a patch of normal rock half a body length behind, and hastened to inch himself back onto it.
"Im-im-impressive," Deek said. "I-is i-it p-p-permanent?"
"No. It lasts but an hour or so, then vanishes. Still, with these two items to show our brethren, perhaps we can generate more support." "Un-un-d-doubtedly."
"Then let us waste no more time. My folk or yours?"
"M-m-mine a-a-are cl-closer."
"Then lead on, friend."
Conan"s sharp hearing caught the high-pitched sound of the cluttering bats before his companions noted their approach. The Cimmerian wheeled about, drawing his sword and frightening the others with the suddenness of his movement.
"Conan-what-?" Elashi began.
"Bats, behind us!" Conan said.
The bats, more than a dozen strong, boiled through the green light toward them. They were in a fairly wide cave, though it had begun to narrow where Conan and the others stood. A few more paces and they could attain a short tunnel that would force the oncoming bats to fly in tandem to enter it.
Tull pulled his knife and Elashi her sword, while Lalo bent for a fist-sized rock.
"Into the tunnel," Conan ordered. "I shall hold them until you are inside."
"Conan-" Elashi began.
"Do as I say, quickly!"
The three obeyed, and Conan could hear the fear in their thoughts, along with their reluctance to leave him alone to face the bats. They had no intention of deserting him, and he smiled grimly at the power of knowing their minds. He raised his sword for the first cut.
The first bat to arrive felt the shock of cold iron slicing through him but realized his mistake too late.
Entrails spilled as the dying creature careened into a stalagt.i.te and expired.
The second and third attackers fared no better as a backstroke with the sharped blue iron took one"s head from its furry shoulders and the return stroke sheared the hindquarters from the other.
There were too many of them, though. Before Conan could ready the sword for another cut, four of the bats barreled into him. They were much smaller and lighter than he, but the weight and momentum of their number were enough to knock him from his feet. He stabbed upward as he fell, skewering one of the bats.
One of the other attackers dragged its claws over Conan"s shoulder, drawing blood to fill the gouges.
Conan grabbed the thing"s neck with his free hand and squeezed. Small bones and cartilage cracked wetly as the Cimmerian tossed the strangled bat away from him.
Behind the frantic fluttering of the bats, Conan saw the form of the Harskeel. He might have suspectedthat one was still around.
The Harskeel darted toward Conan, a thin blade drawn for action, but it could not get close enough to bring its blade into play-the flurry of bats darting hither and yon impeded.it.
Behind him, Conan heard Tull, Elashi, and Lalo yell.
"We are coming, Conan!"
As Conan punched one of the bats square in the face with his knotted fist, shattering that poor creature"s teeth and jaw, he thought that the odds now seemed more in their favor. A few more bats, one man; they could deal with those- Something screamed.
It was an unearthly sound, like nothing the Cimmerian had ever heard; a grating, screeching roar that made the skin of his neck chill and b.u.mp. It came from above, that horrible shriek. He risked a glance upward and noticed that the bats and the Harskeel did the same.
A flying monster swooped down toward him. It had a long, thin head and a mouth filled with teeth the size of a man"s fingers, and its wings seemed to stretch halfway across the breadth of the cave.
Conan jerked his sword back to strike at the thing-Crom, it was huge!-but one of the bats, trying to get away from the descending horror, flitted behind him just as the Cimmerian c.o.c.ked the blade and started to shift his grip on the handle. The edge of the blued iron bit into the bat"s skull, effectively stopping further voluntary activity by the bat; unfortunately, the blade stuck in the wet bone, and the weight of the bat was enough to pull the sword from a startled Conan"s too-loose grip Time to leave, Conan thought. He turned to sprint toward his friends, but it was too late. The talons of the flying monster closed upon him, one claw gripping his arm like an iron band, the other snagging in the leather of his belt. Conan felt himself lifted into the air as easily as a newborn child picked up by its mother. The flapping of the great wings fanned the air, stirring up a stinging spray of rocky grit and mold from the cavern floor.
"Run!" Conan yelled to his friends.
In answer, Lalo took aim and hurled his rock. Unfortunately, his aim was less than perfect and the rock struck Conan on the thigh.
"Go!" Conan yelled.
Conan was already too high for his friends to reach. They needed no further urging. The three of them ran for the small exit tunnel as Conan was lifted yet higher into the. air by the demonic flying beast.
Beneath him, the Harskeel screamed in a voice that started deep but quickly rose to a woman"s shrillness. "Noooooo!"
The monster bearing Conan banked to the left and flapped away. Conan did not struggle. To be dropped from this alt.i.tude upon the rocky floor could hardly help his cause. Better to see where this thing would end its flight than to be dashed to jelly upon the surface below.
The Harskeel"s rage evaporated in an instant as it realized that which had dropped upon it from the monster above was none other than Conan"s blood. Only a few drops, to be sure, but certainly that would be enough? And the sword lay embedded in one of the dead bats on the ground, not three paces away!
The Harskeel had started for the fallen sword when Red alighted upon the floor in its path.
"Stand aside," the Harskeel ordered.
"We are done trucking with you," Red said, fluttering his wings in apparent anger. "Give us our spell, now!"
. "Certainly, certainly, in a moment. I only need fetch that-"
"Now!"
It was too much. To be thwarted by a fool of a bat when its goal lay within reach was too much. The Harskeel whipped its blade around in a flat arc, all the strength of its shoulder and upper arm in the blow.
Red"s head spewed blood as it looped through the air and fell, to bounce twice upon the cavern floor.
There were perhaps five or six bats still unin jured. They glanced at one another, then at the Harskeel.
"Anyone else in a hurry?"
No one, it seemed, was in a hurry.
The Harskeel walked to Conan"s fallen blade and wrenched it free of the dead bat. The words of the spell came to it, firmly set in its memory after all the years of searching. The few drops of Conan"s blood were carefully sc.r.a.ped onto the tip of the blue iron, and the point of the sword was just as carefully drawn down the Harskeel"s body by its trembling hands, making a thin furrow from the top of its head to its crotch.
The last words of the spell came from the Harskeel"s throat.
The air around it began to shimmer, and the Harskeel felt a surge of joy. It was going to work! Already it could feel itself-no,themselves -begin to separate into two beings. The male half focused on the right, the female half on the left, as the furrow-drawn by the blade and the blood of a truly brave man-combined with the magic of the spell to widen, forming two people where before there had been one.
The remaining bats watched in awe. The Harskeel laughed, the sound now coming from two throats and two mouths. Success! It had killed hundreds, slain indiscriminately, robbed, cheated, stolen, and finally, finally after all the years, it had achieved its-no, not its-theirgoal! The lovers would now become two, as they had been before.
Stretching apart as might a strand of elastic clay, what had been split finally into two. A mo merit later, a man stood facing a woman. Their smiles were radiant.
"What is this?" came a voice from behind them. The man and the woman turned. The man held Conan"s blade, the woman the thin sword that had been the Harskeel"s.
They found themselves facing none other than Katamay Rey.
"Who are you?" the wizard demanded to know.
"None of your affair," the woman said.
"Hold your tongue," the man standing next to her said.
"After all these years? I will not!"
"It was your hasty speech that got us into this mess originally," the man said.
"I beg your pardon! It wasyou who-"
"Silence!" the wizard yelled. "I have not the time for this bickering."
"If we are fast enough, we can take him," the woman said, dropping her voice to a whisper, "Do not be a fool," the man whispered back.
"Now!" she yelled. The woman leaped toward the wizard, the sword held ready to cut him down. Half a step behind her, the man who had recently been joined with her managed to shake his head as he jumped to follow her. One more killing would hardly cause them problems.
A pair of cyclopes stood behind Rey, but at some distance. They would not be able to intervene in time.
The wizard raised his hands and waggled his fingers, and he spoke four hard-edged and harsh words." "
Even as he gathered himself for the final leap to chop down the wizard, the man who had been half of the Harskeel felt himself slow, as if his feet had become liquid. He chanced a quick glance down, and in an almost detached manner noted that this was indeed so-his feethad become fluid. Even as he looked, his lower legs sank into the puddle that had been his feet. There was no pain, but a foul odor came from the ooze.
The man twisted his body to look at the woman with whom he had been perversely intimate for so long.
Her lower half now consisted of an identical ooze, and she sank rapidly into this bubbling pool of high stench, looking quite puzzled.
"Now look what you have done!" she said, her voice a wail.
"I?I have done?"
It was the man"s last speech, and in a moment the words were followed by his final thought: curse all the G.o.ds!
An instant later the two who had been the Harskeel of Loplain were nothing but bubbling puddles of stinking slime upon the floor of the cave. Twenty-one Deek"s appearance accompanied by a cyclops caused no small stir amongst his kind.
"-D-d-deek! Wh-wh-what i-is th-this-?"
"-h-h-how c-came y-you b-by on-one-eye-?"
"-a-are y-you c-crazy-?"
But a short demonstration that first ensnared some of their folk and then turned the floor to oiled ice beneath others of them stirred them even more.
"-b-by all the g-g-G.o.ds-!"
"-r-r-emove th-th-this st-stuff-!"
"Think they are ready to listen?" Wikkell asked.
"S-so it w-w-would s-s-seem."
So the worms listened as Deek and Wikkell out lined their scheme. While there was no generalized rush to mount a revolution against the witch, voices that had been still before now were heard. That there was dissatisfaction with Chuntha"s rule no one doubted; that there might be a chance to void that rule had never been thought likely. But if all of the giant worms joined with all of the cyclopes, perhaps such a thingwas possible. Deek and Wikkell"s possession of the two talismans they had purloined indicated that the witch and the wizard did indeed have vulnerable spots.
The discussion heated up and the talks were not short; in the end, though, the worms reached a consensus: if Deek and Wikkell could guarantee partic.i.p.ation by the one-eyes, well, then, certainly the worms would be willing to fight alongside of them.