Khruuz waved a hand and said, “You see here the results of my datacollecting. The points are gate nodes, and the lines connecting them show the avenues traveled between and among gates. Those lines are drawn there just for the sake of the viewer. They separate the gates so that the viewer may more easily distinguish among them. Actually, the transit time between one gate and the next is zero.”
Kickaha said, “I saw a gate map once when I was with Jadawin in his palace. But it was nowhere nearly as complicated as this. Isn’t it something!”
Khruuz’s dark eyes regarded Kickaha. “Yes, it is something, as you say. But what is displayed is a map of all nodes known to me. Mostly, they’re Khringdiz gates, and the majority were opened into Thoan universes when my people were still battling the enemy. Thus, many of them connect with various Thoan gates, though the connection was done by accident.”
Khruuz admitted that he did not know where many of the nodes and routes were. If someone took these from Khruuz’s world, that person would have to go in ignorance to where the routes took him. And there were many nodes that intersected with closed-circuit routes.
“Is there a chance that a Khringdiz route might end at a gate leading into the Caverned World?” Kickaha said. “From what I’ve heard, there’s only one gate, or there was one gate, giving entrance to Zazel’s World. But what if there’s an ancient gate to it made by the Khringdiz?”
“There is a chance. But I don’t know what gate, if any, would take you there. It might take you a hundred years to travel every gate and route, and you still would not find the right one. Moreover, your chances of survival during this search would be very small.”
“But Red Orc must think that there is one. Otherwise, why would he have sent me out to find it?”
Eric Clifton said, “You should know by now that he seldom tells you the true reason for what he does.”
“I guess so. But he didn’t have to lie about that.”
During their time with Khruuz, Kickaha insisted that Clifton finish his often-interrupted narrative of how he had gotten into the Thoan universes. “Where was I? Oh, yes! First, a recapitulation of the events leading up to the point at which the flash flood stopped my telling of the tale.”
Kickaha sighed and sat back. There was no hurry just now, but he wished Clifton were not so long-winded.
“The madman Blake described to his friend the vision he had had of the flea’s ghost, which you and I now know was of the Khringdiz. I was so fascinated by this that I drew a sketch of the scaly man as described by Mr. Blake. I showed it to my closest friend, a boy named Pew. He worked for a jeweler, a Mr. Scarborough. He showed my sketch to his employer, and Mr. Scarborough showed the drawing to a wealthy Scots nobleman, a Lord Riven, who then ordered that a ring be made based on the sketch. But poor stupid Pew stole the ring. Knowing that there would be a hue and cry and that he would be the most suspected, he gave the ring to me to hold for him. That shows you how brainless he was. At that time, I had not repented of my sins and sworn to God that I would no more lead a dishonest life.”
Kickaha, his patience gone despite the abundance of time he had, said, “Get on with it.”
“Very well. The constables searched for Pew, who had taken refuge with the gang of homeless street boys he had joined before working for Mr. Scarborough. But the constables found him, and he was killed while fleeing from them. A shot in the back of the head, I believe, sent the poor devil’s soul downward to Hell.
“That meant, as far as I was concerned, that I owned the ring. But I knew that much time would have to pass before I could chance selling it. And it would be better if I went to a far-off city before I attempted that transaction. But I could not quit my employer, Mr. Dally, the bookseller and printer, immediately. I would be suspected, and the constables might discover my association with George Pew. If I was convicted, I would hang.”
Baron Riven was determined to find the ring and the person who had stolen it. One of his agents questioned Clifton about the theft. The agent had unearthed the fact that Clifton was one of Pew’s closest friends, perhaps his only friend. Clifton was terrified, but he denied everything except knowing Pew. That was a lie Clifton knew would be eventually exposed. One night, shortly after the interview, he fled, his destination the city of Bristol. He planned to board any ship that would carry him out of England. He had no money, so he would have to find work aboard as a cabin boy. Or any job he could get.
“I snatched a purse and with the money got lodgings in a cheap dockside tavern,” he said. “I also applied at a dozen ships for work to pay for my passage. Finally, I got one as a cook’s helper aboard a merchantman.”
The night before he was to ship out, while he was walking the streets near the waterfront, he felt a hand on his shoulder and then a pinprick in his neck. He tried to run away, but his legs failed him, and he fell unconscions onto the cobblestones. When he awoke, he was in a room with Lord Riven and two men. He was naked and was strapped to a bed. The baron himself injected a fluid into one of Clifton’s arteries. Contary to Clifton’s expectation, he stayed conscious. When Lord Riven questioned him about the ring, Clifton, despite his mental struggles, told him the truth.
“A truth drug,” Kickaha said.
“Yes, I know. My sack, containing my few worldly possessions, had been examined. The baron now wore the ring. I expected to be turned over to the constables and, eventually, hanged. But it turned out that the baron did not want the authorities to know about me or the ring. He ordered his men, very rough and brutal-looking scoundrels, to cut my throat. He tossed them some guineas and started to walk to the door with a splendidly decorated and large leather bag in his hand. But he stopped after a few steps, turned, and said, “I have a more severe punishment in mind for him. You two leave now!”
They did so quickly. Then he took out from his bag two large semicircular flat pieces of some silvery metal.
“Portable gates!” Kickaha said.
“Ah, then you know what I am talking about?”
“They’re the means I used to get into the universe of the World of Tiers,” Kickaha said.
“Ah! But I did not have the slightest idea then what their purpose or origin was. I thought that they were tools of torture. In a way, they were just that. He placed their ends close together on the floor so that they formed a slightly broken circle. Then he untied me. I was too terrified to resist, and I wet my pants again, though I believe that I had emptied my bladder when I awoke tied to the bed.”
Lord Riven untied the Englishman, leaving his hands bound behind his back but his feet free. Then he picked up Clifton by the back of his neck with one hand. He carried him as if he were a small rabbit and stood him inside the two crescents. He told Clifton not to move unless he wanted to be cut in half.
“My teeth were chattering, and I was shaking violently. Though he had warned me not to speak, I asked him what he intended doing to me. He replied only that he was sending me directly to Hell instead of killing me first.”
Clifton believed that he was in the power of a devil, perhaps Satan himself. He begged for mercy, though he expected none. But Lord Riven bent down swiftly, shoved the ends of the semicircles together with his fingertips, stood up, and moved back several feet. For several seconds, nothing happened.
“Then the room and the baron disappeared. Actually, I was the one to disappear, as you well know. The next second, I was aware that I was in another world. It did not look like Hell. There were no capering devils or flames issuing from the rocks. But I was indeed in Inferno. It was a dying planet in one of the worlds of the Lords.”
He paused, then said, “Remembering that calls up the absolute panic and horror possessing me then. But I managed to get my hands unbound, and I managed to live, though I experienced the torments of the damned.”
“What year was it that you gated through?” Kickaha said.
“The year of Our Lord eighteen hundred and seventeen.”
“Then you’ve been about one hundr
ed and seventy-five years in the Thoan worlds.”
“Good God! That long! I’ve been so busy most of the time.”
The Englishman sketched his life since then. He had been many places, had passed safely through many gates, had been a slave many times to both Thoan and humans, had been a chief of a small tribe, and had finally settled down into a comparatively happy life.
“But then I got an itch for adventure. I took a gate that led me eventually through many worlds until I fell into the trap, the pit, set up by Red Orc. I did not know whose it was until I saw the man who appeared in Khruuz’s cell and was blown to bits.”
He paused briefly, “That man looked exactly like Lord Riven.”
“I had guessed that,” Kickaha said. “The baron was Red Orc, living at that time on Earth One and disguised as a Scotch nobleman.”
13
THOUGH KICKAHA KEPT BUSY SO THAT HE WOULD NOT THINK about Anana, he could not keep her out of his mind. With the images of her came anguish and fury. By now, the Thoan should have finished his memory-erasing on Anana, and she would think that she was only eighteen years old.
Red Orc would explain to her that she had had amnesia and was now in his care. Or that she had been given as his ward to him by her father and then had suffered a memory loss. He would make sure that she did not learn how many millennia had passed since that supposed event.
Even now, he might be attempting to seduce her. Or he might be forcing her to his bed. Kickaha tried shutting out the visions of her making love to Red Orc. But it was not as easy as pulling down a window blind.
Two months passed. On the third day of the third week of the third month (a good omen, if you believe in omens), Khruuz told Kickaha and Clifton to come to the gates-display room. The vast chamber was unlit except for the light-points on the ceiling dome and the walls. They were much brighter than during the first visit. A single light illuminated Khruuz and the control panel before which he sat. When they entered, he rose with an expression that the two knew by now was intended for a smile.
He rubbed his hands together just as humans did to express their joy or high satisfaction. “Good news!” he said. “Very promising!”
He stabbed a finger at the ceiling. Bending his neck, Kickaha saw a huge point that had not been there when he was in the chamber. Many lives ran from it to many smaller points. He also saw that one bright point had changed from white to orange. Several lines leading to it were also orange. One of them ended at the big point.
“The orange point leads to Zazel’s World-if my calculations are correct.”
“Are you sure?” Kickaha said.
Khruuz sat down before the huge indicator-control panel. “I just said that I was not sure. If the computer is correct, I’m sure. But I don’t know if it is correct. The only way to know will be to gate someone to it.”
“How did you do it?” Kickaha said.
“I set the computer to tracing all the lines you see in this room. Since you were here last, many new points and lines have been added.”
“But you said that you had shut down all the gates leading to here because of Red Orc,” Clifton said.
“True. I had. But I took the chance that Red Orc would not detect the new gates I opened. These were opened for some microseconds before closing down. In that time, the computer did its tracing. The results of millions of tracings in the microsecond intervals are now displayed.”
Kickaha wondered what it was that made the Khringdiz believe that he had found the gate to the Caverned World. Before he could ask, Khruuz said, “Look at the point that is far larger than the others. Now, do you see the orange line leading from it to the smaller orange point? The large point is a cluster of points so close together they look to your eye as if they were one point.”
He looked up and smiled again. “The big point represents something I do not believe that the Thoan know about.”
“Is that the all-nodes gate you asked me about two months ago?” Kickaha said. “I wondered about that, but you didn’t say anything more when I said I’d never heard of it.”
“Your answer was enough, even though you are only an expert on gates by experience. But you are not a scientist. Also, if Red Orc knew of the revolving or all-nodes gate, he would have used it.”
He said something into the panel, and the screen before him showed a different display. In its center was a big light, the cluster of points that made up the all-nodes gate. Now Kickaha could see a small separation among the points.
Khruuz said one word in his harsh language. The screen zoomed in toward the point until the image almost filled it. By it appeared a word in small Khringdiz letters.
“That indicates the gate in the all-nodes cluster that leads to two places, what you call cracks, in the `wall’ of Zazel’s World. Note that the faults are much dimmer than the active gates. One fault is a once-active gate; the other, a weakness that was in the wall when that universe was made. The once-active gate was the gate that was closed, I believe, by the creature that rules the Caverned World. That being-you said his name is Dingstethnot only closed the gate, he moved the fault. That implies great knowledge and a vast power source. Even my machines are not capable of doing that. But my machines can detect that the fault has been moved. Look closely. I’ll turn the power up so that it may be better seen.”
He spoke another word. A very faint line appeared. One end was at the dim point, and the other end was at an even dimmer point.
“Traces of the operation,” the scaly man said. “There are thousands of light-points on the chart. But this is the only one showing the path of a gate or fault that has been moved. Of course, what Dingsteth did was to shut down the shearing trap in the one-way gate that Red Orc had used to get into his world. Then he made it into a two-way gate just long enough to disintegrate the hexagonal structure. He would not have to leave his own world to do that since the beamer rays he used on the inner side of the metal hexagon would disintegrate it in his world and in the other.
“After doing this, he remade the gate into a one-way entrance. Having done that, he moved the fault to another location, a feat beyond the power of present-day Thoan technology. That’s why Red Orc could not find it on the Unwanted World. What you saw through Manathu Vorcyon’s device was, as you realized later, a false light.”
“That’s wonderful!” Kickaha said. “But what about the one-way gate through which Dingsteth let Red Orc out of the Caverned World?”
Khruuz held his opened hands palms up in another human gesture. “It’s been closed down, made into a no-way fault. I doubt that Red Orc has detectors sensitive enough to locate the fault. The lack of these also accounts for his failure to detect the entrance gate and the path it made when it was relocated. Even though the gate had been a two-way momentarily, the creature had means to cancel the trace of the two-way gate’s existence. But you’ll have to reopen the exit gate after you get in there.”
“I’ll handle it!” Kickaha said. “Let’s get going!”
“Not so fast. Here’s the machine that will open, or should open, the entrance point Dingsteth closed.”
Khruuz said something, and a drawer slid out from the wall below the control panel. From it, he took a black metallic cube, four inches across. An orange button was on its top; the bottom part was curved; a strap dangled from one side of it.
“The key to the gate to the Caverned World,” Khruuz said. “Your Horn of Shambarimen is the only other key.”
He held up the black box. “I inherited this from a friend, a great scientist, who was killed a few days after he gave it to me. As far as I know, it’s the only one in all the universes. Strap this gate-opener onto your wrist. Without it, you might as well stay here.”
The preparations for the trip took two days. Eric Clifton argued that he should go with Kickaha. Khruuz said that the chances were high that Kickaha would fail in his mission. If Clifton went with Kickaha, he might die, too. Khruuz needed Clifton’s knowledge of the universes of the Lords if he was
to be effective in the battle against them.
“Besides,” Khruuz confessed to Kickaha when Clifton was not present, “I would get very lonely, even if he is not a Khringdiz.”
Thus, though impatient, Kickaha had to wait until Khruuz told him when the correct time for entering the all-nodes gate arrived.
“The node does not really revolve,” the Khringdiz said. “But I use ‘revolve’ as a convenient term. Launching you requires exact timing. You have an interval of twenty seconds to get into the node and to take the gate that should lead you to the fault in Zazel’s World. If you are delayed by ten microseconds, you’ll enter another gate taking you to somewhere else.”
The Khringdiz had built a nine-angled metal structure to mark the place for Kickaha to enter. An hour before the time to go, Kickaha put on an oxygen mask, an oxygen bottle, a pair of dark goggles, weapons, a backpack filled with supplies, and, strapped to his left wrist, the cube containing the device for opening the fault. Kickaha called it “the can opener.”
Eric Clifton was there to see his fellow Earthman off. “God be with you,” he said, and he shook Kickaha’s hand. “This is a war against the Devil, so we are destined to win.”
“God may win against Satan,” Kickaha said. “But how about the casualties along the way?”
“We will not be among them.
A display in Khringdiz numbers on the wall indicated the time. Kickaha had learned what these meant. When he had two minutes to go, he checked a Khringdiz watch on his right wrist. It was synchronized with the wall instrument. He stood before the nonagonal structure, and when he had thirty seconds to go, made ready to enter the gate. Though Khruuz had told him that he would meet no one else, Kickaha had unstrapped the beamer in his holster.
Khruuz said, “Get ready to go. I’ll give the word twenty seconds from now.”
It seemed that he had just quit talking when he shouted in Thoan, “Jump!”
Kickaha leaped. He passed through the nonagon and was momentarily bewildered. He seemed to be stretched far out. His legs and feet looked as if they were very elongated. His feet were at least twenty feet from his torso. His hands, at the ends of beanpole arms, were ten feet from his shoulders.
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