Blade crept back to report to the others.
"They"re up there," he murmured.
"Maybe they don"t see us," Rena put in hopefully.
"They see us all right," said Blade. "Why else would they pick this one place among all others to park?"
"Why don"t they attack then?" Dr. Leyndt asked, frowning.
"They"re playing with us," Stramod answered grimly. His simian face, tilted upward, was an even darker blue than usual.
"Then let"s give them a good game," said Blade. "Come on." He led them, crouching, deeper into the sweltering maze of greenery.
Five minutes later Stramod said, "They"re following us."
Blade glanced upward. The Menel craft had moved with them, and still hung exactly overhead.
"I don"t understand . . ." Rena began.
"I understand," Blade said. "The aircraft can"t land in this thick foliage, so they are contenting themselves with marking our position for their ground party."
"Ground party?" Rena"s eyes grew rounder.
"That"s right," said Blade. "I think we can safely a.s.sume that someone is following us on the ground."
"Listen!" Stramod stood rigid, head c.o.c.ked at an angle.
A moment later Richard could hear it too, the crashing of falling trees, the crack of splitting wood, and finally the m.u.f.fled thump-thump-thump of footsteps.
"The ice dragons," Blade said.
Though they were still far away, he could tell there were several of them. They were huge beasts, like dinosaurs, as Blade knew only too well, and on the back of each would be riding an armored Dragon Master, a human slave of the Menel, while in the wake of each immense lizard would come a ragtag raiding party, more of the Menel"s human slaves.
Rena, near hysteria, cried, "We don"t stand a chance!"
"Not here, perhaps," Richard mused. "But up ahead there"s a steep hill, too steep for the dragons to climb though not too steep for us, and from the top we can roll rocks down on them." He leaped to his feet and led the way through the dense undergrowth, hacking a path with his sword. Their progress was slow, dangerously slow.
The crash and crack and heavy thumping footsteps grew louder and louder behind them. Ahead they could occasionally glimpse through the trees the tantalizing rocky hill. Above them the gleaming aircraft continued to hold position, following them.
They came to a stretch of open clearing and were able to run. As they ran the scene around him faded and Blade saw instead the wavering image of a high-ceilinged hallway. The end of the hallway was only a little way off.
Richard shouted, "This is another one of your illusions, Ngaa! I see through it! There are no ice dragons here, no jungle, no alien aircraft!"
Stramod grabbed his arm, saying, "Snap out of it, Blade! Don"t let the heat get you!"
Again the jungle closed in around them and they plunged onward, hacking and sweating and panting while clouds of insects swirled around them, humming and biting.
The dragons were gaining on them. Blade could hear their harsh hissing breathing.
Blade thought, It"s an illusion. An illusion.
Rena tripped and fell.
Blade turned to help her to her feet.
And saw, above the treetops, an immense reptilian head, fanged jaws gaping, forked tongue flicking in and out. At the same moment the hot stinking breath of the creature engulfed him like a wind off a burning pile of corpses, choking him, blinding him with tears.
Rena tried to crawl, as if she could hope to escape on hands and knees, but the head swung down and the jaws closed on her struggling body. Richard struck uselessly at the head with his sword.
Rena screamed as the jaws lifted her, then tossed her into the air as a child tosses a ball, then swallowed her in a single gulp.
The mouth opened again, swept downward.
Richard felt the fangs penetrate his back and chest.
He thought, I must wake up! Can I never wake up?
But there was only pain and pain and more pain as from far below Dr. Leyndt, Nilando, and Stramod stared up at him in helpless terror.
Chapter 16.
Richard Blade awoke with an agonizing headache.
An image began to form.
The blue rolling Crystal Seas, where lived the amphibious mermen of . . .
"No!" Blade shouted, and his shout echoed in the high-ceilinged pa.s.sageway.
Another image faded into view.
The green sun-drenched forests of Zunga, where . . .
"No!" Blade shouted again.
At last the pa.s.sageway appeared, grew solid and did not fade. It had an intensity, a presence that the best of the Ngaa"s illusions lacked. Reality had a richness of detail, of sensory impressions, that could not be duplicated. In reality a thing was what it was, nothing more, nothing less.
He realized that he had almost reached the end of the corridor. All the time his conscious mind had been lost in a cascade of nightmares, his subconscious had driven the body onward, as if running, like breathing, was a thing that went on whether you thought of it or not.
There, not more than a hundred yards away, was the closed circular entrance to the Ngaa"s Chamber of the Innermost Self. Beside it was the altar of polished bone on which Zoe lay in her white nurse"s uniform, staring upward with unseeing eyes.
Blade slowed to a walk.
The voice that was a mult.i.tude of voices spoke in his mind. "Richard! I congratulate you. You are the first human who has been able to cast off my well-crafted visions."
"Thank you," Blade answered with irony.
"Such an effort! Too bad it"s all for nothing. You are no closer to victory than you were when you first arrived."
"I"m closer to you, Ngaa, and to Zoe."
"One step more and she will die."
Blade halted.
Was that relief he detected in the Ngaa"s telepathic voice? "You see, Richard? It was all for nothing." Blade thought, You were worried, Ngaa. You were unsure of yourself.
"Unsure? Never!" The fear was there. The Ngaa was at last afraid.
Richard looked at Zoe. Was she more beautiful than other women? No, in the X dimensions he had seen beauty that made her look plain and commonplace. Had she been closer to him? No, in the X dimensions there had been women whom he loved deeply, women who had borne his children. What was she to him then? Why did he value her more than all the others?
He could answer his own question.
Zoe was all he had left of the normal world, of the sometimes harsh, often unjust, but somehow understandable world he had known before the day when Dimension X had opened and swallowed him. J and Lord Leighton had never been in Dimension X, yet they were a part of it. They lived in it, through him. Of all the people who mattered deeply to him, only Zoe had remained outside, in the small, comforting microcosm of England. No matter how far Blade roamed into the unknown, he knew she was there, his anchor in the world of things as they used to be.
Yet if the Ngaa won, the world of things as they used to be would be lost. Dimension X would invade and conquer Home Dimension. In all the infinite dimensions, with all they had to offer, there would be no good green England to return to!
"She"s a soldier, Ngaa," Blade whispered, and stepped forward.
Zoe cried out, like a child awakening from a nightmare. She turned and saw Blade.
"Richard?" She sat up, held out her arms.
He came forward and embraced her, kneeling at her side, and her body was strangely cold. "I"m here, Zoe," he said.
"I"ve had such dreams, d.i.c.k love. Beautiful dreams."
"So have I."
"You were in them."
"You were in my dreams, too, Zoe. You were always in my dreams."
Why was she so pale? he thought. Why was her voice so weak?
She glanced around. "Where are we, d.i.c.k? I don"t like this place."
"I don"t like it either, but. . ."
"Where"s Reginald?"
Blade felt a pang of jealousy. It was jealousy that made his voice needlessly harsh as he said, "Reginald is dead."
"My husband? Dead? No. No."
"It"s true."
"I remember. The fire. It was because of me, wasn"t it?"
"No!"
"I brought it on him. The Ngaa killed him because of . . . because of what I felt for you."
"No, if anything it was because of what I felt for you, Zoe. The Ngaa needed you for bait, and needed you single."
"And the children, d.i.c.k?"
"They"re dead, too." It was too late to be kind.
She closed her eyes and moaned, "No, no that can"t be. I won"t let it be." She went limp in his arms, like a rag doll.
"Zoe, you must get up. You must walk."
Her eyes opened. "Did you hear that?"
"Hear what?"
"The children are crying! They"re not dead! I can hear them!"
"It"s an illusion. The Ngaa is making you hear them!"
"No, I really do hear them!" Her voice was filled with an anguished gladness. She struggled to a sitting position, shook off his arms. "I must go to them. Yes, it"s been good talking to you, but I have things to do. You know how it is. I never have a moment to myself." Her eyes had taken on a peculiar glazed look. "The children. They need me." She stood up, swaying. "Ta, darling," she said brightly, in the south country style.
When she fell, Richard caught her and lowered her gently to the bone floor.
"d.i.c.kie," she whispered.
He kissed her.
She relaxed with a sigh, and her head fell back.
He tried to take her pulse, but there was none to take. He let her go and stood up.
"Murderer!" he shouted. "Now you"ve given me a hate for you stronger than anything you could throw at me! I"m going to kill you! I"m going to kill you now!"
The Ngaa was frightened. The voice that was many voices shook with fear. "We did not kill her. She killed herself."
"Lies!"
"We found in her a wish for death, and we . . . we only showed her how to die."
"Lies!" Yet Blade knew, as he shouted, that the Ngaa was for once telling the truth. "I"m coming for you, Ngaa. Can you stop me?"