by Lionel Fenn
"Wimp?" the Wamchu shouted.
Gideon hurried to Red's side, reached up, and tapped his sister on what passed for a shoulder. She glared at him, hissed at the Wamchu, who was taking a third step toward her, and looked back to her brother.
"Well, what do you want?"
"To stay alive," he suggested.
"Better red than dead, is that it?"
The lorra snorted in disgust, bucked, and Tuesday agilely landed on her feet, which she instantly used to scurry over to her brother.
"No," he said. "Caution. We are, as the man says, rather outnumbered."
"Well, I'd rather be dead than be a duck any longer."
"But you'd be dead," he pointed out.
"Yes, well, there is that," she conceded. "But Jesus!"
"Enough," ordered the Wamchu imperiously. "You will follow me, now, and make no attempt to escape."
Gideon checked the hundreds of giant dwarves surrounding them and wondered if Lu thought he was alone.
"Where are we going?" he asked with no great enthusiasm.
"Just follow me, and watch yourselves at all times," was the answer. At which point, the Wamchu turned smartly, smoothed his shirt down over his chest, and began walking. Away. In a straight line toward the horizon.
Gideon looked at each of his companions in turn, saw no desire there to attempt either an escape or a clever ruse that would fool the Moglar into believing they were involved in a lost cause, and gestured them forward.
Minutes passed.
The sky deepened to a hue close to crimson.
Hours passed, full night descended upon the plain, and the Wamchu ordered them to sit down, sleep as best they could, and keep their weapons about them because one never knew about a restless Moglar who was faced with the temptation of a good fight.
"You think one of us is going to challenge all of them?" Gideon said incredulously.
"I know heroes," the man said pointedly. "You are a foolish lot, and a bunch of damned fools. You'd try anything to prove yourselves."
"I wouldn't attack an army," Gideon said, and concentrated on letting his feet and legs understand that all was not lost, that they were not, as far as he knew, destined to be worn down to the kneecaps, though he felt oddly guilty when, at the same time, he crossed his fingers.
Incredibly, they did sleep.
Incredibly, when they awakened to the Wamchu's booted prodding, they felt as though they hadn't slept at all.
Fifteen minutes later, they were moving again, under a sullen sky that had turned the color of sluggish blood, over a plain that reflected that color without much spirit but with a fair amount of grimness, and through the day and into the next night, which boasted no stars, no moon, no wind.
Walk. Rest. Walk.
An interminable march of hellish proportions.
Walk. Stumble. Rest. Walk.
Tuesday was so disheartened she didn't even try to sing.
One foot in front of the other, mindlessly, soullessly, numbing the brain to all but the most primitive of thoughts.
Tag's face was taut with the effort not to cry, to prove that he too was a man and could take all the punishment the Wamchu could hand out.
The Wamchu seemed indefatigable, and the Moglar who dropped from exhaustion were ignored by their brothers after they had been relieved of their boots, their armor, their weapons, and what little food they carried in tiny pouches slung under their chins.
Tag and the duck slept on the lorra's back; Lain managed an hour's dozing when Tag fell off and was dragged along by Gideon, who refused to give in to his body's demands for renewal and rehabilitation, because he did not want Lu to think less of him than he already did.
Dumb, he thought when he stumbled over his shadow.
Dumb, dumb, he thought when he bumped into Red's tail, and the tail lashed at him wearily.
This is stupid, he thought, and pulled Tag off the lorra, climbed on with Red's sleepy permission, and buried his head in the animal's hair.
He had no idea how long he slept.
But when he woke up, they were still tramping across the Shashhag, Wamchu striding briskly as though he were heading down to the corner store for a box of ammunition, and the Moglar strung out on all sides, not terribly alert but still on their feet.
Groggy from sleep, Gideon slid to the ground and did a few walking exercises to loosen his tightened leg muscles, his aching back muscles, and the rest of the muscles that ached just to blend in so unnecessary demands wouldn't be made upon them. Then he saw how weakly Tuesday clung to Red's hair, how wobbly were Tag and Lain on their feet, and he began to lose his temper.
He snapped the bat into his hand and lengthened his stride until he was only a few feet behind the Wamchu, who heard him coming and looked disdainfully over his shoulder until he saw the expression on Gideon's face, then quickly slipped a hand into his shirt and brought out a gleaming, nine-pointed silver throwing star whose edges were so sharp that not even he was able to handle it without the cost of a few drops of blood.
Gideon had seen the weapon before; he was not afraid.
"Enough," and he set the bat on his shoulder in an attitude of casual but hair-trigger menace. "We have to rest, or we'll all be dead before we get to wherever it is you're taking us."
"Out of the question," said Lu, tossing the star up, catching it, wincing, and tossing it up again.
"I'm no good to you dead," he said.
"You shall be dead anyway, hero. I will not grieve at your passing, whether it be here or there."
Gideon glanced around, and realized that the nearest Moglar was only a few inches shy of a hundred yards away. "Where is there?"
"Shashhag, of course."
One eye closed. "But this is Shashhag."
"And so is there Shashhag. It is," the Wamchu said with a wave of the starless hand, "all Shashhag. And it is all mine."
Gideon felt reckless, and was glad that Tuesday couldn't hear him. "Really? Does Agnes know that?"
The effect was precisely what he had predicted in that last moment before he called himself a shithead—Lu stopped, turned, and gripped the star in its close-quarters throwing position. His eyes were hooded, his lips bloodless, his chest rising and falling in graphic demonstration of his extreme agitation.
The main body of the Moglar army, receiving no orders to the contrary, marched on.
Red and Lain took the opportunity to fall down.
"You will die for that," Wamchu said, as close to hissing as he could get in a sentence without sibilants. "This all would have been over if it wasn't for her. And you are the reason it isn't over, hero."
"You just said it was Agnes," he said, flexing his fingers around the bat's handle.
"Agnes. You. One and the same."
Gideon turned sideways toward him. "It isn't my fault your wives aren't happy at home. It isn't my fault you can't provide them with enough diversion to keep them out of trouble."
"You are a murderer," Lu said heatedly. "You have killed two of the only things I have ever loved!"
Then Wamchu drew back his hand; Gideon tightened his grip on the bat.
A tense moment.
"If we weren't so close," Wamchu said, "I would kill you here and now."
"Close? Close to what?"
Ask a stupid question, he thought then, as the Wamchu whirled and threw the star.
It whirred, hummed, soared, spiraled, arced, and Gideon was just about to wonder aloud what the purpose of that demonstration was when, suddenly, the star seemed to explode, and the air shattered like glass before it.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
"In my dressing room," Tuesday said, "I had a mirror that had six panes, so you could see yourself from the back when you had to. Do you have any idea what it's like sneaking up on yourself when you're sitting down?"
Gideon grunted.
"I mean, it's really spooky. Especially if you're wearing makeup and you don't recognize yourself. I was dressed like a guy for one part and almost
proposed to myself. God, was I fresh. What a mouth."
He grunted again.
"Nice pecs, though."
"Tuesday, be quiet," he said gently.
Chatting with an hysterical duck was not at the top of his list of priorities just at the moment, though he had to admit that she had a point, since it seemed as if all this time they had been walking toward the biggest mirror he had ever seen in his life. And an odd mirror at that, since it had reflected only the plain and not those traversing it.
Wamchu was silent as well, except for an occasional spate of curses the general drift of which damned himself for knocking down a perfectly good illusion instead of opening the damned door.
And a door there must have been, for beyond the large opening the nine-star had created was another plain. This one, however, was green, and treed, and the sky was blue, the breeze refreshing, the flowers brilliant, and the noise Gideon had been subliminally hearing since Lu had confronted him more distinct.
It was the sound of fighting.
Lots of it.
Luckily, not within easy walking distance.
"Well?" the Wamchu said, and stepped through.
The others, too stunned to argue, too pleased by the change in venue, followed; and as soon as they did, and looked behind them, Shashhag was gone.
"Fascinating," Lain said, and pointed to the west. "My word, Gideon, those are the Scarred Mountains, eastern slope, if I'm not mistaken."
"Very clever, woodsman," Lu said with a harsh cackle. "Very clever, for all the good it will do you."
The Scarred Mountains rose immediately to their left in a forested wall toward towering clouds scudding across the sky. Streaks of red gave the range its name, and though they were not terribly high as mountains go, they were still daunting. And it was from there that the wind carried the symphony of battle.
Gideon stood with his hands on his hips. "Do you mean to tell me," he said to no one in particular, though he wished mightily that Glorian were here, "that all we had to do was walk around the goddamned things instead of—" He sputtered.
"Right," said Tag.
Gideon noted with some astonishment that most of the Moglar army had disappeared. Nine Moglar lined up behind the Wamchu, looking as if they'd be hard pressed to lift a leg, much less their weapons, but they were fierce enough to settle the tiny band into an uneasy silence while Lu scanned the plain for several minutes before nodding to himself.
"Still four days to go," he muttered.
"Aha!" Gideon said, feeling a sudden surge of hope. "You, too, huh?"
Wamchu turned, slowly. "If you have the nerve to suggest that I am concerned about the upcoming Event..."
Gideon grinned, and leaned casually against Red, who was so busy grazing on fresh, moist, tender grass that he didn't object because permission hadn't been asked. "Damn right I am."
The wind shifted; the battle sounds faded.
Wamchu hooked his thumbs into his belt and studied the former quarterback sullenly. "She could do us all great harm," he said.
"Slice us," Tuesday explained.
"She could," the Wamchu continued, "insure our subjugation to her will."
"A little seasoning, maybe some mushrooms."
The Wamchu looked thoughtful. "She could make sure, if she wanted, that we would never walk the earth again."
"Well done," Tuesday said, and fell off Red in a swoon.
Tag hurried to her side, fanned her with his vest, and held her close.
"Don't worry about it," her brother told him. "She's thinking about steaks again." He looked to his archenemy. "And I suppose you're wondering how to stop her, before the Day makes her too powerful? No. Don't answer. I can see it in your eyes. Lu, you are as afraid of her as we are. Which makes me wonder why you're bothering with us instead of her."
The Moglar sat down, sensing a long bout of exposition scarcely a word of which they would understand since it didn't have anything directly to do with killing things.
The Wamchu toyed with his ringlets, his strands, his curls, his locks, and shook his head. "Bait," he said at last.
"Ah," said Lain. "A ploy."
Gideon nodded.
The Moglar, confused, stood up.
"A trade," Lu continued. "You for my life. If I don't succeed in taking care of her first."
Gideon looked at Lain, looked at Tag and his sister, looked across the rolling, idyllic plain, and sighed. It was, he thought, ever thus. A pawn in the great chess game of power.
The Moglar, seeing his expression, sat down.
Wamchu, he went on in silence, will hold me until he strikes a bargain with his wife. Then he will release me, and I will die. Or Agnes won't bother, but simply will wait until the Day and just take me because no one will be able to stop her. Or Wamchu, knowing that he doesn't really have anything to bargain with unless she is set on a lot of torture before the Event, will pretend to use me as a hostage while, all the time, attempting to find out the disposition of Glorian's armies.
Unfortunately, the wind shifted, and they all knew the disposition of Glorian's armies. The fighting was fierce, by the sound of it, and he hoped, suddenly, that the Vondels weren't getting scalped.
Lu cleared his throat, and the Moglar stood up.
Gideon shrugged. "You're not that stupid," he said. "You know it won't work. There's an ulterior motive."
"Ivy," Tuesday said from her position in Tag's arms.
Gideon gaped.
Wamchu might or might not have blushed.
Lain rubbed his chin thoughtfully, and nodded. "But yes, that's it, and that's been it all along, hasn't it, you sneaky little devil? God, you're diabolical when you want to be. You want Ivy, and Agnes has her, and you think that trading Gideon for her will make Ivy so grateful to you that she will, perforce, ally her many warrior skills with yours, so that, on the Day, your losses will be kept to a minimum."
"Something like that," Wamchu said brusquely, and gestured to his men, who drew their weapons and sneered, growled, and trembled their heads in a threatening manner.
"No," Gideon said.
"You have no choice."
"I do so. I can say no, I won't be a part of it. I'd rather take my chances with Agnes, without putting myself in a position of vulnerability."
"Christ," Tuesday said, "you're sounding like him now."
Gideon didn't care. The Wamchu didn't have his army, didn't have him over a barrel, didn't have him anything except maybe furious for not having done something about it sooner. Though, he recalled, there were all those Moglar, which would have made doing something a bit on the dicey side. As it was, nine of them plus the Wamchu still was not in the best interests of his continuing health.
Lu drew himself up, and his hands disappeared into the folds of his cloak, reappeared with two highly polished daggers which he pointed at Gideon. "You will come with me to Thazbinn, now, hero, or you will die, now, hero."
"No," Gideon said.
"Then I will kill your friends, one by one, until you submit to my will."
"No."
Lu drew back his left arm. "I'm very good, you know."
Lain and Tag leapt to flank Red, sword and dagger at the ready; Tuesday fluttered to the lorra's back and bared her beak; and Red, looking up from his grazing and noting the situation, stopped chewing long enough to turn his eyes black.
"Honest," said the Wamchu. "I haven't missed in ages."
Gideon, getting tired of quandaries, predicaments, and no-win situations, realized in a blinding flash of belated insight that the main reason for the Wamchu's ascendancy to the throne of chief unmitigated bastard and general all-around pain in the ass was his three wives. They were the ones with the magical and psychic powers; they were the ones whose ambitions had loosed the canines of conflict; they were the ones who were two down and one to go, and the Wamchu was suffering a severe case of mortality.
The Moglar grumbled impatiently.
The Wamchu also wanted Ivy, and Gideon would be damned if h
e was going to give her up that easily.
"Take a long walk on a short pier," he said angrily, whipped out his bat, turned, and headed northward, with the abrupt slopes on his left. Tag, not wishing to be left behind to partake in the slaughter the giant dwarves were preparing, ran after him; Lain swatted the lorra's haunch and ran as well.
For his part, the Wamchu could only gape at the astounding and unprecedented bravado of the hero with the unsightly beard and really filthy jeans. "Hey!" he bellowed. "Hey, you can't do that!"
Gideon ignored him. Somewhere along the trail he had spotted at the base of the slopes was Thazbinn, and in Thazbinn, whatever that was, was Ivy. And Agnes. And he was going to have it out with all of them, once and for all, so he could get on with figuring out what the hell he was going to do with his life.
It occurred to him that getting rid of the Wamchus would effectively put him out of business.
It also occurred to him that he just might be able to get enough villages interested in football to start his own league, which wasn't all that bad a prospect unless the coaches he picked didn't want him on their teams.
A dagger slammed into the ground not five feet in front of him, and he whirled, colliding with Red, who was moving rather more quickly than the suddenly shrieking Moglar who were chasing him, and Tag, and Lain, who stopped every few feet, spun, fired a tipless arrow, and sent one of the warriors spinning to the ground.
The Wamchu did not run; he strode, spurs chinking loudly, and threw another knife.
Gideon sidestepped it, and tried to decide whether or not to wait. When the first Moglar caught up with him and narrowly missed taking off his left shoulder with a studded mace, he said, "Son of a bitch," and let his temper go.
The resulting melee was chaotic: Gideon was swinging at anything that moved. Lain was pinking anything that came within the thrust of his rapier, Tag was viciously bruising shins and slicing leather, Red was running back and forth between bites of a succulent blue shrub and butting Moglar from the back, and Tuesday was flying overhead, shouting the positions of the enemy, which eventually no one paid heed to since no one knew who she was talking to.
