The utensils were also confusing rather than enlightening. A little light reached the chamber from the cave opening, but his sonar was still searching the surroundings as though it were pitch dark. His heart beat almost as rapidly. Finish dis, he told himself frantically. Finish it, and get out.
Several additional chambers branched from the back of the one he was studying. He would begin with the one immediately on his right and work his way through them. Then Clothahump couldn’t say he’d made only a superficial inspection and order him to return.
It turned out to be a pantry-kitchen arrangement. It was discouraging to find that whoever had lived in the cave was omnivorous. In addition to instruments for preparing meat and fruit there was also a surprising garbage pile of small insect carcasses and empty nuts.
It was an eclectic and indiscriminate diet. Perhaps it also included bats. He shuddered, drew his wings tighter around his small body. One more room, he told himself. One more, and den if da boss wants more info he can damn well climb up and look for himself.
He entered the next chamber, found more furniture and little else. He was ready to leave when something tickled his sonar. He turned.
A pair of huge, glowing yellow eyes stared down at him. Their owner was at least seven feet tall and each of those luminous orbs was as big around as a human face. Pog stuttered but couldn’t squeeze out word or shout.
“Hooooooo,” said the voice beneath those fathomless eyes in a long, querulous, and slightly irritated tone, “the hell are yoooooo?”
Pog was backing toward the chamber exit. Something sharp and unyielding pricked his back.
“Tolafay asked you a question, interloper! Better answer him.” The new voice was completely different from the first, high and almost human.
Pog glanced over his shoulder, saw eyes not as large as the first pair he’d encountered but larger still in proportion to the body of their owner. Four yellow eyes, four malevolent little angry suns, swam in a dizzying circle around his head. He started to slump.
The sharp thing moved, poked him firmly in the side. “And don’t faint on us, interloper, or I’ll see your body leaves your gizzard behind… .”
“What the devil’s keeping him?” Jon-Tom stared with concern up at the cave where Pog had vanished.
“Maybe they go very deep into the mountainside,” Talea suggested hopefully. “It may take him a while to get all the way in and all the way out again.”
“Perhaps.” Bribbens stared longingly at a small creek that flowed from the base of an icefall across the barren little plateau. “How I long for a boat again.” He lifted one of his enormous, snowshoed feet.
“Walking’s beginning to get to me. No fit occupation for a riverman.”
“If it’s any consolation I’d rather be on a boat myself just now,” said Jon-Tom.
Then Mudge was gesturing excitedly upward. “Ease off it, mates! ’Ere ’e comes!”
“And damned if he hasn’t got company.” Talea unsheathed her sword, stood ready and waiting for whatever might drop out of the sky.
Pog drifted down toward them, a black crepe-paper cutout against the bright sky. He was paced by a similar silhouette several times more massive, with a distinctly animate lump attached to its back.
Dozens of other fliers poured from the perforated cloud-cliff like water from a sieve. They did not descend but instead blended together to create a massive, threatening spiral above the plateau.
Talea reluctantly placed her sword back in its holder. “Doesn’t look like they’ve hurt Pog. We might as well assume they’re friendly, considering how badly we’re outnumbered.”
“Characteristic understatement, flame-fur.” Caz’s monocle waltzed with the sun as he craned his neck to inspect the soaring whirlpool overhead. “I make out at least two hundred of them. Size varies, but the shape is roughly the same. I think they’re all owls. I’ve never heard of such a concentrated community of them as this, not even in Polastrindu, which has a respectable population of noctural arboreals.”
“It is odd,” Clothahump agreed. “They are antisocial and zealously guard their privacy, which fits with what the Weavers told us about the psychology of Ironcloud’s inhabitants. Yet they appear to have established a community here.”
Pog touched down on the high boulder he’d so recently tried to hide behind. The flier shadowing him braked ten-foot wings. The force of the backed air nearly knocked Flor off her feet.
The creature took a couple of dainty steps, ruffled its feathers, and stood staring at them. The high tufts atop the head identified this particular individual as a Great Horned Owl. Jon-Tom found himself more impressed with those great eyes, like pools of speculative sulfur, than by the creature’s size.
The lump attached to its back, which even Caz had not been able to identify, now detached itself from the light, high-backed saddle it had been straddling. It slid decorative earmuffs down to its neck, unsnapped its poncho, and leaned against its companion’s left wing.
Now the spiral high above started to break up. Most of the fliers returned to their respective caves in the hematite. A few assumed watchful positions.
Jon-Tom eyed the lemur standing close to the owl. It was no longer a mystery who made use of the thin, knotted vines fringing the cave mouths. With their diminutive bodies and powerful prehensile fingers and toes, the lemurs could travel up and down the cables as easily as Jon-Tom could circle an oval track.
Pog glided down from the crest of his boulder and sauntered over to rejoin his friends. “Dis guy’s called Tolafay.” He gestured with a wingtip at the glowering owl. “His skymate’s named Malu.”
The lemur stepped forward. He was barely three feet tall. “Your friend explained much to us.”
“Yes. Quite a story it was, tooooo.” The owl smoothed the folds of its white, green, and black kilt. “I’m not sure how much of it I believe,” he added gruffly.
“We have managed to convince half a world,” replied Clothahump impatiently. “Time grows short. Civilization teeters on the edge of the abyss. Surely I need not repeat our whole tale again?”
“I don’t think you have to,” said Malu. He indicated the watchful Ananthos. “The mere fact that a Weaver, citizen of a notoriously xenophobic state, is traveling as ally with you is proof enough that something truly extraordinary is going on.”
“look who is calling another ‘xenophobic,’” whispered Ananthos surlily.
“It had better be extraordinary,” the owl grumbled. He used a flexible wing tip to wipe one saucer-sized eye. “You’ve awakened all of Ironcloud from its daily rest. The populace will require a reasonable explanation.” He blinked, shielding his face as the sun emerged from behind a stray cloud.
“How you can live with that horrid light burning your eyes is something I’ll never understand.”
“Oh very well,” said Clothahump with a sigh. “You will convey details of our situation to your leader or mayor or—”
“We have no single leader,” said the owl, mildly outraged. “We have neither council nor congress. We coexist in peace, without the burdens imposed by noisome government.”
“Then how do you make communal decisions?” Jon-Tom asked curiously.
The owl eyed him as though he represented a lower species. “We respect one another.”
“There will be a feasting tonight,” said Malu, trying to lighten the atmosphere. “We can discuss your request then.”
“That’s not necessary,” said Flor.
“But it is,” the lemur argued. “You see, we can welcome you either as enemies or as guests. There will be a feasting either way.”
“I believe I follow your meaning.” Caz spoke drily, eyeing Tolafay’s razor-sharp beak, which was quite capable of snapping him in half. “I sincerely hope, then, that we can look forward to being greeted as guests… .”
They gathered that evening in a chamber far larger than any of the others. Jon-Tom wondered at the force, technological or natural, which could have hol
lowed such a space in the almost solid iron.
It was dimly lit by lamp but more brightly than usual in deference to the Ironclouders’ vision-poor visitors. Trophy feathers and lizard skins decorated the curving walls. Nearly a hundred of the great owls of all species and sizes reveled in music and dance along with their lemur companions.
Their guests observed the spectacle of feathers and fur with pleasure. It was comfortably warm in the cave, the first time since departing Gossameringue any of them had been really warm.
The music was strange, though not as strange as its sources. Nearby a great white barn owl stood in pink-green kilt playing a cross between a tuba and a flute. It held the instrument firmly with flexible wing tips and one clawed foot, balancing neatly on the other while pecking out the melody with a precision no mere pair of lips could match.
Owls and lemurs spilled out on the great circular iron floor, dancing and spinning while their companions at the huge curved tables ate and drank their fill. It was wonderful to watch those great wings spinning and flaying at the air as the owls executed jigs and reels with their comparatively tiny but incredibly agile primate companions. Claws and tiny padded feet slipped and hopped in and around each other without missing a beat.
The night was half dead when Jon-Tom leaned over to ask Flor, “Where’s Clothahump?”
“I don’t know.” She stopped sipping from the narrowmouthed drinking utensil she’d been given. “Isn’t he magnificent?” Her eyes were glowing almost as brightly as those of an acrobat performing incredible leaps before their table, his long middle fingers tracing patterns in the air. A beautiful female sifaka joined him, and the dance-gymnastics continued without a pause.
Jon-Tom put the question to the furry white host on his other side.
“I don’t know either, my friend,” said Malu. “I have not seen the hard-shelled oldster all evening.”
“Don’t worry yourself, Jon-Tom.” Caz looked at him from another seat down. “Our wizard is rich in knowledge, but not rich in the ability to enjoy himself. Leave him to his private meditations. Who knows when again we will have an opportunity for such rare entertainment as this?” He gestured grandly toward the dancers.
But the concern took hold of Jon-Tom’s thoughts and would not let go. As he surveyed the room, he saw no sign of Pog, either. That was still more unusual, familiar as he was with the bat’s preferences. He should have been out on the floor, teasing and flirting with some lithesome screech owl. Yet he was nowhere about.
Jon-Tom’s companions were having too good a time to notice his departure from the table. In response to his questions a potted tarsier with incredibly bloodshot eyes pointed toward a tunnel leading deeper into the mountainside. Jon-Tom hurried down it. Noise and music faded behind him.
He almost ran past the room when he heard a familiar moaning: the wizard’s voice. He threw aside the curtain barring the entryway.
Lying on a delicate bunk that sagged beneath his weight was the wizard’s bulky body. He’d withdrawn arms and legs into his shell so that only his head protruded. It bobbed and twisted in an unnerving parody of the head movements of the Weavers. Only the whites of his eyes showed. His glasses lay clean and folded on a nearby stool.
“Hush!” a voice warned him. Looking upward Jon-Tom saw Pog dangling from a lamp holder. The flickering wick behind him made his wings translucent.
“What is it?” Jon-Tom whispered, his attention on the lightly moaning wizard. “What’s the matter?” The echoes of revelry reached them faintly. He no longer found the music invigorating. Something important was happening in this little room.
Pog gestured with a finger. “Da master lies in a trance I’ve seen only a few times before. He can’t, musn’t be disturbed.”
So the two waited, watching the quivering, groaning shape in fascination. Pog occasionally fluttered down to wipe moisture from the wizard’s open eyes, while Jon-Tom guarded the doorway against interruptions.
It is a terrible thing to hear an old person, human or otherwise, moan like that. It was the helpless, weak sound a sick child might make. From time to time there were snatches and fragments of nearly recognizable words. Mostly, though, the high singsong that filled the room was unintelligible nonsense.
It faded gradually. Clothahump settled like a fallen cake. His quivering and head-bobbing eased away.
Pog flapped his wings a couple of times, stretched, and drifted down to examine the wizard. “Da master sleeps now,” he told the exhausted Jon-Tom. “He’s worn out.”
“But what was it all about?” the man asked. “What was the purpose of the trance?”
“Won’t know till he wakes up. Got ta do it naturally. Dere’s nothin’ ta do but wait.”
Jon-Tom eyed the comatose form uncertainly. “Are you sure he’ll come out of it?”
Pog shrugged. “Always has before. He better. He owes me… .”
XII
ONCE THERE WERE inquiring words at the curtain and Jon-Tom had to go outside to explain them away. Time passed, the distant music faded. He slept.
A great armored spider was treading ponderously after him, all weaving palps and dripping fangs. Run as he might he could not outdistance it. Gradually his legs gave out, his wind failed him. The monster was upon him, leering down at his helpless, pinioned body. The fangs descended but not into his chest. Instead, they were picking off his fingers, one at a time.
“Now you can’t play music anymore,” it rumbled at him. “Now you’ll have to go to law school… aha ha ha!”
A hand was shaking him. “Da master’s awake, Jon-Tom friend.”
Jon-Tom straightened himself. He’d been asleep on the floor, leaning back against the chamber wall. Clothahump was sitting up on the creaking wicker bed, rubbing his lower jaw. He donned his spectacles, then noticed Jon-Tom. His gaze went from the man to his assistant and back again.
“I now know the source,” he told them brightly, “of the new evil obtained by the Plated Folk. I know now from whence comes the threat!”
Jon-Tom got to his feet, dusted at himself, and looked anxiously at the wizard. “Well, what is it?”
“I do not know.”
“But you just said… ?”
“Yes, yes, but I do know and yet I don’t.” The wizard sounded very tired. “It is a mind. A wonderfully wise mind. An intelligence of a reach and depth I have never before encountered, filled with knowledge I cannot fathom. It contains mysteries I do not pretend to understand, but that it is dangerous and powerful is self-evident.”
“That seems clear enough,” said Jon-Tom. “What kind of creature is it? Whose head is it inside?”
“Ah, that is the part I do not know.” There was worry and amazement in Clothahump’s voice. “I’ve never run across a mind like it. One thing I was able to tell, I think.” He glanced up at the tall human. “It’s dead.”
Pog hesitated, then said, “But if it’s dead, how can it help da Plated Folk?”
“I know, I know,” Clothahump grumbled sullenly, “it makes no sense. Am I expected to be instantly conversant with all the mysteries of the Universe!”
“Sorry,” said Jon-Tom. “Pog and I only hoped that—”
“Forget it, my boy.” The wizard leaned back against the black wall and waved a weary hand at him. “I learned no more than I’d hoped to, and hope remains where knowledge is scarce.” He shook his head sadly.
“A mind of such power and ability, yet nonetheless as dead as the rock of this chamber. Of that I am certain. And yet Eejakrat of the Plated Folk has found a means by which he can make use of that power.”
“A zombie,” muttered Jon-Tom.
“I do not know the term,” said Clothahump, “but I accept it. I will accept anything that explains this awful contradiction. Sometimes, my boy, knowledge can be more confusing than mere ignorance. Surely the universe holds still greater though no more dangerous contradictions than this inventive, cold mind.” He reached a decision.
“Now that I am sensitized
to this mind, I am confident we can locate it. We must find out whose it is and destroy him or her, for I had no sense of whether the possessor is male or female.”
“But we can’t do dat, Master,” Pog argued, “because as you say dis brain is under da control of da great sorcerer Eejakrat, and Eejakrat stays in Cugluch.”
“Capital city of the Plated Folk,” Clothahump reminded Jon-Tom.
“Dat’s right enough. So it’s obvious dat we can’t… we can’t…” The words came to a halt as Pog’s eyes grew wide as a lemur’s. “No, Master!” he muttered, his voice filled with dread. “We can’t. We can’t possibly!”
“On the contrary, famulus, it is quite possible that we can. Of course, I shall first discuss it with the rest of our companions.”
“Discuss what?” Jon-Tom was afraid he already knew the answer.
“Why, traveling into Cugluch to find this evil and obliterate it, my boy. What else could a civilized being do?”
“What else indeed.” Jon-Tom had resigned himself to going. Could this Cugluch be worse than the Earth’s Throat? Pog seemed to think so, but then Pog was terrified of his own shadow.
Clothahump’s strength had returned. He slid off the bed, started for the doorway. “We must consult the rest of our party.”
“They may not all be in a condition to understand,” Jon-Tom warned him. “We have generous hosts, you know.”
“A night of harmless pleasure is good for the soul now and then, my boy. Though it should never descend to unconsciousness. I am pleased to see that you have retained control of yourself.”
“So far,” said Jon-Tom fervently, “but after what you’ve just proposed, I may change my mind.”
“It will not be so bad,” said the wizard, clapping him on the waist as they swung aside the concealing curtain and moved out into the tunnel. “There will be some danger, but we have survived that several times over.”
The Spellsinger Adventures Volume One: Spellsinger, the Hour of the Gate, and the Day of the Dissonance Page 50
