by Mick Farren
"What happened to them?"
"You don't want to know."
Gibson shook his head. "I do want to know and I'm asking."
The demon from Xodd supplied the answer. "Can you imagine a thousand years of relentless pain or being buried alive in the heart of a mountain?"
"I don't think I can."
Slide smiled nastily. "That's why you don't want to know."
"So what happened next?"
This time the munchkin answered. "He slept and we survived."
"And now he's waking, you're worried that he's going to come after you."
Slide nodded. "His wrath is something else you don't want to screw around with."
"And where does this prophecy fit in?"
"We hope to appease Him through making sure the Prophecy is fulfilled."
Gibson frowned. "That doesn't make any sense. If he wakes up mad, how is one sorry human going to tip the balance in your favor?"
"When the Prophecy of Anu Enlil was told to us, we took it as an order that had been left behind. It has always been interpreted as a chance to redeem ourselves for the previous deception."
"Why not just go on hiding out?"
Slide sadly shook his head. "There'll be no hiding from Him when He wakes. He'll be strong, and He'll sense us wherever we are. We're His creatures, He'll be able to draw us to Him. We'll go to Him whether we want to or not, because that's what His power is all about."
Gibson took a long deep drink from the jug. He was beginning to sense what was coming, but he was determined to stave it off for as long as possible. "I still don't see how my going through the portal is going to save you all from the wrath of Necrom."
A shudder ran through the parlor of the Rearing Eagte, and Slide actually winced. "How many times do I have to tell you not to do that?"
Gibson was only now becoming aware of just how terrified the idmmmi were of what might happen to them when Necrom woke. Slide had to be the most frightened of all. "I guess he's going to take a special interest in you, seeing how you were the leader of the mutiny and all,"
Slide nodded. "He'll be looking for me."
"So what happens to me after I pass through the Portal?"
"I don't know. We only have the Prophecy.",
"But I'll be a part of the waking process?"
"That's our guess. When a massive mind like that comes back on line, it has to be a complex process. Maybe He'll draw something from you, some energy, or maybe He'll use the memories in your brain to somehow orientate a part of Himself. I truly don't know for sure."
"And will I come out the other side intact. Do you know that for a fact or is that just more guesswork? "
Slide spread his hands, and Gibson had the feeling that the demon was telling the truth, trying his hardest to overcome his previous reputation as a pragmatic liar. "It's written in the Prophecy, the very last verse, 'and he shall return and become the Master of Men.' "
"That's a lot to hang my life on. I mean, you're asking me to drop in on this being, and you're all too scared to even say his name."
Tom Enni-Ya pushed his way to the front of the crowd. "That's exactly what we are asking you."
Gibson nodded. "And you want an answer."
He knew that there was no way out. There hadn't been a way out since Slide had shot Rayx. Slide had saved him from being summarily dragged off by the man-beast, but it had been more of a case of saving his face rather than saving his skin. Slide had really only bought him the time to agree to go voluntarily.
"Okay, I'll do it. What else can I say."
A pandemonium of applause and relief filled the Rearing Eagle. The munchkin was pumping his hand and some other demon was slapping him on the back. Tom Enni-Ya was clapping his hands for the serving women and announcing drinks on the house. A load had obviously been taken off the minds of the idimmu and placed squarely on Gibson. For the moment, though, working on the principle that you might as well enjoy yourself while you can, he allowed himself to be carried along by the general euphoria. While an all but naked demon woman was kissing him, and, in the process, smearing Day-Glo green body paint all over his clothes, a full jug of corn was set in front of him along with a jar of ale with which to wash it down. It was almost like being a.rock star all over again. He did, however, wonder how long all this was going to last, how long he would be the hero of the hour before they'd expect him to go and face the waking Necrom.
He glanced round to Slide. "So when am I…"
He found that Slide had gone and that he was talking to an empty seat. He looked at the munchkin. "What happened to Yancey Slide?"
"He left. He didn't look too happy."
Gibson was immediately alarmed. Why had Slide suddenly vanished when he'd just got what he wanted? Was there something more that he wasn't telling? Gibson disengaged himself from the woman in the Day-Glo body paint and moved quickly to the door. A few of the demons, thinking that he was running out on the party, called after him, but he hurried on. Outside on the street, it continued to be dark. Slide stood by himself, head thrown back, staring up at the pseudo night sky.
Gibson halted, suddenly unwilling to approach him. "Yancey, are you all right?"
Slide didn't appear to either see or hear him. His mouth suddenly opened and a stream of words came out. "Eli ameri-ia amru-usanaku! Imdkula salalu musha urra!" It was like the cry of a wounded animal, plaintive and desperate.
Gibson moved quickly toward him, but, before he reached where Slide was standing, Yop Boy stepped out of the shadows. "Leave him be, Gibson."
"What's wrong with him?"
"He's just contemplating his fate, his mortality."
"But I thought that everything was settled. I agreed to go through the Portal."
"That may not be enough to save him. Remember that he was the leader of the escape. He may not be forgiven for that, whatever you do."
The terrible cry came again. "Eli ameri-ia amru-usanaku! Imdkula salalu musha urra!"
"Is there anything we can do for him?"
Yop Boy shook his head. "Just leave him alone. Go back inside and leave him alone,"
"But…"
"Just go back inside."
Gibson took a last look at Yancey Slide and then did as he was told.
Back inside the Rearing Eagle, the party was still in full swing, and no one else seemed to be suffering the same soul torture as Slide. The booth where Gibson had been sitting had been taken over by other revelers, so he made his way to the bar, where he was greeted like a long-lost friend even though he had only been gone for a couple of minutes. Once again he was congratulated for his courage in deciding to brave the Portal, more drinks were pressed on him, and women smiled into his face. Borne along by a company who, at least for that night, seemed to be determined to adore him, he found that it was all too easy to turn his back on Yancey Slide's angst and bask in his own moment of glory. Over in the corner, the woman with the guitarlike instrument had struck up a lively dance tune and was singing in a husky voice.
"Ssalmani-ia ana pagri tapqida duppira
Ssalmani-ia ana pagri taxira duppira
Ssalmani-ia iti pagri tushni-illa duppira
Ssalmani ini ishdi pagri tushni-illa duppira.
Slide was speared by a pang of guilt. The words of the song sounded very close to the same language in which Slide had been screaming, the same hissing sibilants and guttural vowel sounds.
"Ssalmani qimax pagri taqbira duppira
Ssalmani ana qulqullati tapqida duppira
Ssalmani ina igari tapxa-a duppira
Ssalmani ina askuppati Tushni-illa duppira."
He couldn't, however, make Slide his problem. Slide had Yop Boy to look after him, and Gibson was essentially on his own.
As it turned out, though, he wasn't alone for very long. A woman moved along the bar and stood next to him. She was dressed tough, in stained leather jeans and a loose white, Greek-cut shirt with embroidery on the collar and cuffs. A belt of silver chain was slung around he
r hips, and a dagger hung from it in an ornamental scabbard. A brooch in the shape of a small green lizard, decorated with rubies, was pinned to the shoulder of her shirt, or that's what Gibson thought until the brooch turned its head and looked at him, at which point he realized that it was an extraordinarily tame ornamental pet. The woman's skin was deathly pale, and her tawny Nordic hair hung dead straight, clear to her waist. Even though there were some demon beauties in the tavern, this one was something special, a cool blond warrior maiden who probably gave no quarter.
"I'm Thief Lanier."
"I'm Joe Gibson."
"I know that."
Gibson, well aware that the idimmu tended to take a superior attitude around humans, ignored her somewhat snotty tone and continued to play it pleasant. "Thief is a strange name."
"It's what I do."
"Oh, yeah? And what do you steal?"
She suddenly laughed. "Practically anything that isn't nailed down. Do you know I saw you perform once?"
"I hope you liked it."
" You were okay." Her tone seemed to indicate that she considered she was doing him a favor by even attending one of his shows.
Gibson didn't have much to say after that shutdown so he went for the obvious. "Would you like a drink?"
Thief Lanier nodded. "Yes, but none of that god-awful corn that you're swilling," She gestured to Tom Enni-Ya. "Hey, Tom. Get out one of my private bottles, will you?"
The private bottle carried no label and was thick with dust. Thief Lanier blew the worst of the dust from it and removed the cork herself. When she poured her first drink, Gibson saw that it was a pale-golden liquid that actually seemed to shimmer and move in the glass.
"What is that stuff?"
Thief Lanier swallowed the first glass in one gulp and closed her eyes for a moment as though in ecstasy. "Very rare."
"Could I try some?"
Thief Lanier shook her head. "Not now. Maybe later, though. You wouldn't feel it after all that rotgut corn you've been pouring down your throat."
"What happens later?"
Thief Lanier smiled. "I figured that I'd take you off somewhere. There's something about a man who knows he's only got a few hours."
Gibson blinked. "What?"
"I said that there's something about a man who's only got a few hours."
Gibson was alarmed. "Who said I only had a few hours?"
"You're going to the Portal as soon as the celebrating stops. Even if you come back this way, you're going to be changed by the experience. It's your last hours as you are now."
"I'm not sure I like the idea of changing."
"You're so perfect as you are?"
"No, but I've grown accustomed to myself."
"Well, there ain't a damned thing you can do about it, but why worry? You humans change all the time, so you ought to be used to it. It's because you're so short-lived. You have a lot to get in."
Gibson was more concerned with the idea of his last few hours. "I also didn't realize that I was going to the Portal so soon."
"Nobody here wants to wait around."
"I wouldn't mind."
"Having second thoughts?"
"Of course."
"It's too late now."
"I'm well aware of that."
"So, are you coming with me?"
Gibson, aware of his new celebrity status, decided to play it a little hard to get. "Coming where?"
"To where I live."
Gibson looked around the Rearing Eagle. The party had reached that stage where it had taken on a life of its own, and it could get on very well without him. Gibson smiled nicely at Thief Lanier. "I'd be very happy to come to where you live."
As it turned out, Thief Lanier lived in the phallic pink glass tower with the circular Lucite balconies that stood right beside the Rearing Eagle. To be precise, she lived, or at least entertained, on the third level of the phallic pink glass tower. They entered the building by a circular door that faced the street and operated like the iris diaphragm of a camera, and then climbed a transparent spiral staircase. The third level was one large round room with a diffused rose-colored light coming from the walls. A huge circular bed with a red satin cover was positioned in the exact center of the room, and the ceiling overhead was one huge mirror. Thief Lanier obviously took her entertaining very seriously.
The space was surprisingly bare. Gibson had half expected that an idimmu's home, if indeed the idimmu had homes as he knew them, would be filled with the booty of countless lifetimes. Not so in the case of Thief Lanier. A suit of armor in black-and-red lacquer that must have come from sixteenth-century Japan stood against the wall like a mute guardian, and a small white bird of prey, maybe an albino falcon, sat quietly on its perch secured by a thin silver chain and with a leather hood over its eyes. A silver pitcher and two matching chalices stood on a small Moorish table that was inlaid with mother-of-pearl. Thief Lanier placed a hand on the pitcher.
"I think you're ready to try my private stock?"
Gibson nodded. "Why not?"
She poured golden liquid into each of the chalices and handed one to Gibson. He looked into the glass. The liquid actually seemed to be shimmering, squirming almost.
"What is this and why does it move like that?"
"It's the wine of a very weird dimension."
Gibson took a first sip. The wine was aggressively cold and vibrated and bubbled on his tongue like a very dry champagne that had somehow acquired a life of its own, and, to his surprise, it actually seemed to clear his head. He had heard of people drinking themselves sober but he had never really believed in it. The wine had to be some kind of stimulant that he had never encountered before. As he took a second sip he noticed that a straightedge razor lay on the Moorish table beside the chalice.
"What's that?"
"I like to have a weapon to hand."
Gibson felt a little uneasy. "I hope you don't intend to use it on me."
Thief Lanier flashed him a fast smile. "You're perfectly safe as long as you behave yourself."
She took hold of his hand and and gave it a slight, brief squeeze. "I'm going to leave you for a moment. Don't go away."
She ran up the next flight of stairs to the level above, and Gibson was alone in the round room. He looked at the hooded bird and then walked over to the suit of armor and inspected it more closely. It seemed as though it might have been made for Thief herself, certainly for a woman, which was damned unique. What was the story, had she actually ridden with samurai?
Gibson was a little nervous. His only previous sexual encounter with a female demon had been the one with Nephredana, and that had left him close to shell-shocked. He guessed the only thing he could count on was that she wouldn't do him any permanent damage. They must want him intact to go to the Portal.
The sound of heels on the transparent stairs heralded Thief Lanier's return. As Gibson had imagined, she had slipped into something a little more comfortable, although when he saw her, he had to admit that comfortable was closer to magnificent. Her hair was piled up on her head and fastened with a gold chaplet, and the jeans and shirt had been replaced by by a flame-colored negligee that, when coupled with the rose glow of the walls and the scarlet of the bed, made the space look like a whorehouse in some high-tech hell. The garment was fastened at her shoulder with a gold pin so one breast was exposed and a revealing vent ran the length of her body, from ankle to armpit. The material was so sheer that she might as well have been naked anyway, and it also appeared to ripple and dance in a similar manner to the wine, as though it really was woven from living flame. Gibson could only imagine that the fabric also came from a very weird dimension.
"You look beautiful."
She moved past him, going to the bed and standing beside h, idly stroking the satin with her fingertips. "Come here."
Gibson put down his drink and went to her. For a second time, he was entering the strange landscape of demon lovemaking. After he had woken in Ba!g's lair to find Nephredana gone, it had
seemed to him she had been able to cast a spell that rendered him incapable of remembering individual moments or specific details. All that remained was a series of peaks that had taken him to a frantic, spine-snapping, mind-wrenching euphoria. It seemed that Thief Larder had a similar ability to cloud his mind. It was as if she didn't have to touch his skin, but was able to reach right inside him and stroke his actual nerve endings. Pain and pleasure blended and blurred into a single cresting frenzy that had him pleading that he couldn't stand it and yet, at the same time, begging for more. There was really only one coherent image that stood clear of the screaming erotic background noise, and, in many respects, Gibson wished that it, too, had been lost in the roiling erotic mists. At the peak of what seemed like the hundredth climax, Thief Lanier had left him, standing over him for a moment as he shuddered and spasmed on the bed, and then disappearing from his sight. In seconds, she had returned with the falcon on her wrist. In her other hand was the straightedge razor, and she spun it between her fingers. He saw the razor with the alarming clarity of sudden unthinking fear. It had a pearl handle and along the gleaming blade was the maker's logo-Charleston Bluesteel. The blade flashed blood-red as she sliced at and through the neck of the bird. The falcon, still being hooded, didn't see the blade coming and didn't so much as flinch. Thief Lanier stood over Gibson, straddling his prone body and holding the twitching headless body of the falcon by the wings that had stretched out in death. The blood dripped onto his chest, burning like acid and sending waves of shock coursing through him while his back arched so only his head and heels were touching the bed. Above him, every action, every contortion of his white body against the red satin was repeated in the ceiling-size mirror, and then red flame took over his vision and his whole body seemed to be sucked into a rent in the tissue of reality and then slowly ejected into a gradually cooling limbo,
Gibson lay for a long time, relearning how to breathe and feel. After what seemed like an eternity of recovering, he reached out to touch her but she was nowhere on the bed. His mouth was now so dry that he was quite unable to speak, and he rolled over, reaching for his wine. The first thing that he saw was the falcon, standing on its perch, intact and seemingly unharmed. Thief Lanier was bending over it, stroking its feathers and whispering small cooing noises to the creature.
