Ellen Under The Stairs

by John Stockmyer

  Platinia did not know what the Mage meant. But that did not bother her. Often, she did not know what John-Lyon of the green, green eyes, talked about. She was not ashamed because others did not understand him, either.

  Still speaking to Platinia, the Mage said, "Let's see if we can get some answers."

  Turning back, the Mage spoke to the spider men, still stuck to the walls and floor and ceiling. "I am the Mage of Stil-de-grain. I have great power."

  Noise. A light noise. A fast noise. The spider men ... talking.

  "Stop," the Mage said in a loud voice.

  They stopped.

  "You," the Mage said, pointing to the nearest tunnel-man who was half-way up the wall; near to the Mage because he could not get farther away since he was blocked by others on the wall and on the ceiling over head. "You be the one to answer my questions."

  The spider man seemed to understand.

  "Do you have a leader?"

  "It is to answer yes," squeaked the man in a tiny, tiny voice.

  Platnia had heard mice squeak louder as they ran from cats.

  "Lead me to him. I want to speak to him."

  And that is what they did. All of the tunnel-men turning to walk away, some dropping to the floor, others walking along the walls, some still on the ceiling. All going away, the Mage following, but in a ... funny ... way. Bouncing. From the floor to the ceiling and back down again, to bounce up, then down. Up and down. Up and down.

  Remembering to follow, Platinia also bounced. To the ceiling, then back down. It was the light pull of this Band. Also the webs, that were soft and ... springy.

  "Stop." The tall, thin men stopped, looking back. "There's got to be a better way. How do you stick to the floor and walls?"

  "Stick we do, by this," said the same spider man, waving his long arms. At least Platinia thought it was the same one, the tall men all looking the same.

  "Show me."

  Though very much afraid, the man-of-the-tunnel -- for that was what this long hole in the ground was called, a tunnel -- came up to John-Lyon, bending down to show his hands to the Mage.

  "Secretion," said John-Lyon, another mystery word. "Since we cannot do that," he continued, "there must be some other way for us to walk. To stay on the floor."

  Platinia could tell that the tall, white man understood. Trying hard, she could also hear with her mind that he was calling to the tiny spiders, the little ones coming as fast as their many legs would work.

  Not able to follow the fast speech of the spider men, Platinia was still able to understand that they wanted the Mage and Platinia to lift up their feet from the floor.

  "We are to lift up our feet from the floor," she said to the Mage.

  "How do you know that?"

  "I know."

  Believing her, John-Lyon pulled up his foot, Platinia also. And quick, quick, the tiny spiders wrapped webs around the Mage's shoes and around Platinia's shoes.

  Putting the wrapped feet down, lifting their other feet, the spiders did the same, John-Lyon and Platinia now having ... sticky ... webs that ... fastened them to the web floor. But only until they wished to walk. Pull up, and their shoes came loose, to stick again with another step.

  "Good," John-Lyon said, the spider men pleased they had made him happy. Platinia could see that in their many-one minds.

  And they were off, all walking on the floor of the tunnel, the spider men leading.

  Past big rooms. Rooms where tiny spiders wove webs. Great sheets of webs.

  Then, Platinia understood. The spiders were making the silk cloth that came from The Cinnabar. The fine Mage-cloth was made of Spider silk.

  Rooms. Rooms. Rooms. Rooms.

  Finally into another room with a spider man sitting on a soft, silk chair at the other end.

  The Mage, now alone, walked to the man, Platinia following. "I am John-Lyon, Mage of Stil-de-grain," he said.

  "I am Mage Cryo," said the man in his tiny, tiny voice, the man speaking so ... weak ... it was hard for Platinia to hear him.

  "I would speak to your King," John-Lyon said.

  "King?"

  "Your leader."

  "Leader are we all."

  "I don't understand."

  "All together, leader are we," he said, trying to explain.

  "You have no King?"

  "All King."

  John turned to Platinia, a question in his eyes.

  "They think together."

  "And what does that mean?"

  "They have ... one thought. All together."

  "A group mind?"

  Platinia did not know what a group mind might be, but she thought maybe the Mage had understood.

  "All right," said John-Lyon, turning to the spider man again. "I seek the evil Mage of Malachite, Pfnaravin."

  Fear! Platinia felt fear at that name!

  "Him, the Mage, I know. Kill many."

  "At the trading floor?"

  "That is where he did," said the man's tiny voice, the man waving his long arms very much.

  "You tried to stop him like you did me?"

  Head bow, a little. "Others not to come here."

  "And he used his Crystal against you."

  Head bob. Agreeing. Very much fear!

  "Where is he now?"

  "Down the land."

  "Down land?"

  Hand wave to agree.

  "Can you take me to him?"

  "down-light soon."

  "After up-light?"

  "You go. We stay."

  "You won't be able to help? Is that what you're saying?"

  "Down the land. So no go. Unsafe."

  Platinia has heard others talk of down land. It was the edge of the world. You could fall off.

  "You have quarters where we can sleep until up-light?"

  "Yes."

  "And food?"

  "Yes."

  "But you can't help with Pfnaravin?"

  "Tried. Very power much. Hope ...."

  "That I'll get him for you."

  Was the Mage reading the spider-Mage's mind? Platinia did not know. Knew only that, soon, John-Lyon would be alone to fight Pfnaravin. So alone even Platinia could not help.

  Now, Platinia was afraid!

  * * * * *

  Chapter 23

  Though Pfnaravin had much to do to control the situation, he was supremely confident he would seize absolute power. With enough supplies to complete his mission, the only possible worry was the drain on his own Crystal's force, Pfnaravin still having to spend additional amounts of Crystal-power to probe the mind of the girl companion of the pretend Mage. And to maintain the ward-restraint necessary to keep the woman under control.

  Upon crossing the border into Cinnabar, he'd had to use more Crystal-force than he'd intended. First, to blast through the tough, silk lines thrown up to prevent his penetration of the red band. After that, aware of movement under ground, he'd needed to exert even more power to blast whatever entities lurked below. And finally, it had taken extra energy to smash off hunks of rock from the flat trading table, a continued drain of Crystal-force needed to "attract" sizable rock-shards to the bottom of his boots so he had weight enough to walk in that lightly pulling band.

  At last, he'd entered down-land -- the conclusion of his plan. For here, the rust colored light was too feeble for the pretend Mage, John-Lyon, to charge his Crystal, light in this dismal place as lifeless as the bare stones under foot.

  His thorny eyes searching the terrain, his hawk nose failing to pick up a hint of odor, he was confident that even the daemon animals of down-light could not survive in this dry dead place.

  Spending an additional fraction of his remaining Crystal-force, he probed the golden Gem of Stil-de-grain. Was pleased, as before, to feel ... nothing. With the pretend Mage's Crystal drained -- no chance in down land to recharge it -- what remained of Pfnaravin's power would be overwhelming!

  Fortunately, the men following John-Lyon had stayed behind. For Pfnaravin did not know if he had the Disk-en
ergy left to wither them all. All that mattered now was that he had sufficient force to kill the girl and the young Mage, after that, move forward to pick up the dead Mage's Crystal, the golden Gem of Stil-de-grain making Pfnaravin a double-Crystal Mage of fearsome power!

  The Ellen woman disposed of, upon his return to Realgar (that Band's orange light strong enough to re-charge both Disks,) he would overwhelm Realgar's fat Mage, taking from his dead body the orange Crystal.

  As triple Crystal-Mage, Pfnaravin would be invincible!

  Careful to reserve as much force as possible, but needing to keep track of John-Lyon, he rubbed the Disk's green surface to send out a ward-tendril to his enemy.

  Yes. John-Lyon was near. And nearer still. Traveling underground.

  Pfnaravin was ready!

  * * * * *

  John and Platinia had been hurtling after the tunnel-men, the trick to going fast, pushing forward to half run, half float.

  He'd noticed another thing. That the tall, white men ahead stopped frequently to communicate up and down the tunnels, doing this by twitching long, silk threads running the length of the padded corridor, vibrations over the lines communicating information as surely as electric pulses sent over telegraph wires. There also seemed to be "thin spots" in the tunnel's roof through which the under ground men could glimpse the surface.

  Though the talk of the tunnel men was too fast for John to decode, Platinia seemed to know what they were saying, Platinia assuring him the spider men were taking them straight for Pfnaravin, Pfnaravin waiting just beyond the Cinnabar border. Waiting in down-land, down-land the last stop before ... nothing.

  Running, gliding, they'd been traveling longer than John could calculate.

  Thinking back to up-light, he remembered how strange it had seemed to be offered the same food here you found in every band. Not that surprising since the produce of other bands was traded for Cinnabar silk. Spider silk. No wonder people who knew fashion -- people like Ellen -- were amazed by the feel of this world's cloth.

  Thoughts to distract him from the coming war. For war it would be, if only between two combatants.

  There was increased chittering up ahead, that high pitched twitter the language of the denizens of this blighted band. Also the panicky running up the walls and across the ceiling, John first seeing that upon his entrance to this silk shrouded world. To be interpreted as fear.

  "What's happening, Platinia?" They had slowed, finally to stop, the others halted a ways ahead.

  "They are at the end of the ... tunnel."

  "So, what happens next?"

  "They ... do not know."

  "What?!"

  John saw one of the men turn back to approach slowly.

  "What's the trouble?" John asked, the man stooping to be at the Mage's height.

  "We at the end are."

  "And what does that mean? The end of where?"

  "Above is down land." He pointed a slender, elongated arm. First, down the corridor, then up.

  "Do you have a port here?"

  The man turned to look at Platinia, these tunnel peoples' eyes, like their bodies, a milky white.

  "A hole. To above." She pointed.

  The man -- all of the men resembling the nearly transparent spiders John had seen in an "insect zoo" on earth -- seemed confused.

  "Yes or no?" John said impatiently. Were there no Bands where people did the obvious without being told?

  "At a time. Long. One went ... to surface. Come ... never back. Fell. Edge ... of world." There were other words, said so fast John couldn't register them, the man speaking in the rapid chirp of this band. Not that there was a need to pick up every word, the man's meaning clear. One of their kind had ventured to the surface and not come back, perhaps falling off the edge of the world. Or so this man believed.

  "Shut tight. Never again go."

  "But there has to be a way up, used by the man who was lost," John said, trying reason as a way to make sense of the situation.

  The nod. What John had learned meant yes.

  "No need for any of you to go to the surface. Just show me how to get out and I'm on my way."

  "The ... Mage ... without."

  "Pfnaravin is just outside?"

  "Talking thread say so."

  That would be the spider strands used for communication along the tunnels.

  "You remember where the exit is?"

  Nod.

  "Then take me to it."

  Turning, the tall, thin man walked slowly, John following, Platinia trailing, the man leading John through the waiting man-spiders, the others cringing away as John came through their cluster.

  Stopped at the end of the silk-padded corridor, the tunnel slanting up, the man pointed ahead, John seeing nothing at first. Then, an outline behind the silk; a round pattern in the earth. Clearly, one of the exit points.

  Behind them, the thin men were racing up the walls and over the ceiling to "spider" their way down the opposite wall, going round and round in a dizzying array of flailing limbs.

  "Stop!" John commanded.

  They stopped.

  "You have done well," John said, softening his voice. "There is no need for any of you to go outside."

  A chattering among them, John beginning to tell when their fast-talk pattern sounded happy and when it sounded sad, this time seeming as joyous as he'd heard it.

  "My advice is to draw back." A suggestion that didn't seem to have translated. "Go back down the tunnel so that nothing bad can happen to you."

  That, they got, the men turning quickly, running away, using the corridor floor, walls, and ceiling. Chittering happily, their chirping noises disappearing to ... silence.

  Time to try the port hole, the corridor rising, the tunnel itself ending in a solid wall.

  With no man-spiders to get in the way, John approached the portal, the spider webbing made to fit it. Feeling around the edge, John tried opening the door from several directions, finally locating a kind of hinge. Pushing the closure opposite to the hinge, John felt the circle ... give. Shoving harder, heard a groan -- indicating the hole cover's lack of use -- the trap door swinging up, the path to down-land open.

  John turned to Platinia, the girl sometimes seeming to be attached to him by an invisible cord. "If our spider man friend is right, Pfnaravin is just outside. I've got to put on the Crystal to have a chance against him." She nodded. "Doing that sometimes makes me ... insane. Remember the time I hurt you because I was wearing the Crystal?" Again, the nod. "Though you never seem to do what I ask, this time, you've got to go back. If something happens to me, I'm sure these underground men will see that you return to Realgar. Once there, Coluth and Golden will take you wherever you want to go." No nod. No expression on her little girl's face. Platinia being Platinia.

  Turning to the open passage again, John fumbled in the deep pocket of his robe; found the Crystal on its chain. Taking out the Gem, he looped the Disk's chain around his neck ......

  So far, so good. No surge of the God-like feeling he sometimes got. Of course, when he rubbed the disk's surface to build a static electric charge sufficient to unleash the Crystal's force ....

  No need to do that until the final confrontation with the Malachite Mage.

  As ready as he was going to get, not needing to bend over as the tall men did, John emerged through the hole, John in down-land, down-land because this place tilted "down" toward oblivion.

  Looking up, it seemed to him the sky-ceiling was no more than fifty feet over head, the reflected light a dull, red-brown. Hardly enough illumination to see the ground beneath his feet.

  Ground?

  Stone -- no dirt. No vegetation.

  Fortunately, the spider webbing under his shoes stuck to stone as well as to the silk corridors under ground. Doubly fortunate because there was so little gravity. (He reminded himself to be careful to have one foot stuck to the stony ground before lifting the other foot. Jump ... and there was little to pull him back to earth, John to float helplessly ...
for who knew how long.

  The air ... had no smell. Was so dry he could feel it sucking water from his skin. Dry and cold, only the tension of the moment keeping him warm.

  Squinting in the faded light, did he see something ahead? A tall column of stone?

  No way to tell from this distance.

  Time to go.

  Setting out slowly, grateful the stony ground produced no dust to cloud his vision, his immediate concern was to keep one foot in full contact with the rock surface, a walking pace his best chance of doing that.

  On and on, looking at his feet to be sure they stuck to the rocks.

  Reddish brown light. Step after hypnotic step. Until ....

  A cruel laugh stopped him cold.

  Head up, looking not that far away, John saw two figures, one as tall as the men underground. Had the spider men come to help him after all?

  No. The extra tall person was ... Pfnaravin.

  But ...?

  Then, John knew. Pfnaravin was standing on the corners of the trading floor that he'd broken off to give himself extra weight in these outer bands.

  Frantically, John rubbed the Crystal to build its deadly power. If he could direct electric fire at Pfnaravin before the old Mage could do the same to him, he might yet win the battle!

  Though feeling no static charge build up on his body, John could wait no longer. Raising his hands, pointing his fingers at Pfnaravin, hoping not to hit Ellen (who was the smaller person beside the Mage,) John willed the fire to leap from his fingertips ....

  Nothing.

  Except for another evil laugh.

  "It is as I thought," Pfnaravin barked. "There is no force in your Crystal. And too little light here to renew it. You are helpless, as I planned."

  And John's last hope ... collapsed. For himself, at least.

  "I'm the one you want," John said, trying to keep his voice firm.

  "Because, pretend Mage though you are, you possess the golden Disk. At your death, the first to pick up the Crystal of Stil-de-grain becomes the Crystal's master. As you, yourself, became lord of the yellow Disk upon the death of the Mage Melcor."

  "Since I'm who you want, I'll give myself over to you if you let the woman go."