Web of Defeat

by Lionel Fenn

  "We enter the forest tomorrow," he said as he watched the others going about their business, which was primarily telling Botham how they wanted their steaks, then standing there and telling him he was getting it all wrong.

  Grahne sighed at his perceptiveness and folded her arms over her breasts.

  "If my sister is right, we should be at the spot where we crossed the Khaleque by this time tomorrow night."

  "Oh, yes," she said breathily.

  "I hope that sometime between dawn and sunset, the Wamchus will try to stop us."

  "Wonderful," she said softly, and her arms dropped slowly to her lap.

  Be careful, he cautioned himself when he felt his ego beginning to inflate from her sensuous enthusiasm; remember that she doesn't want to sully your reputation.

  "That's when I'll need your help, Grahne."

  "Wow."

  On the other hand, a sullied reputation was easier to maintain with a lot less strain.

  "I'm counting on you, you know. The others mean well, but from what I've seen, you're the real fighter around here. At least, you seem to know what you're doing."

  "Oh," she sighed.

  Reputations, he decided, are highly overrated.

  A toss of her head flung her hair back over her shoulders, and she touched his arm reverently. "Do you have a plan?"

  He nodded.

  "Would... would you tell me about it?"

  He had the feeling that if he did, there was a good chance she would explode with ecstasy, which was not his usual way of making a woman happy—that moment generally came when he took her home, pursed his lips, and found himself shaking her hand.

  "No," she said then. "Don't."

  "Why not?"

  "Because it's probably brilliant and I won't understand it."

  Then, before he could respond, she closed her eyes and inhaled slowly and deeply, forcing him to look away to his sister, who was squatting in front of Botham and mournfully watching him palming his steak into his mouth.

  Brilliant, he thought then, was hardly the word for it. The plan as he'd conceived it was so simple he had already found fifteen or sixteen things that could go wrong before the expected confrontation, but he knew he hadn't the time to come up with anything more elaborate.

  What he wanted to do was present the sisters when they showed themselves with a united and determined front while, at the same time, somehow playing the exquisite Chou-Li's suppressed affection for him against the smoldering Thong's obvious disdain—that part was admittedly a little hazy, but he figured he could probably play it by ear. Once, however, the desired friction had been created and animosities fanned to the boiling point, he would then use each sister's evil plan of killing the other as a lever to convince one to join his team to fight the other; then, in a swiftly clever double-cross about which he had had only a few seconds' guilt that hadn't been very strong to begin with, he would turn on the remaining sister and incapacitate her, threaten her with return to her husband, and offer her her freedom in return for the lifting of the spell that had rendered Chey's fields infertile as well as nonproductive.

  All this, of course, was based on the hopeful assumptions that the sisters would indeed appear in the flesh and not send one of their monsters instead, that he could keep his people from running away if the sisters did appear, that he could get close enough to the sisters, singly and together, to talk to them, that he wasn't mistaken about Chou-Li, that he wasn't mistaken about their plans for each other, that he would be able to cold-bloodedly dispatch one while saving the other, that the other would agree to his offer, that—

  "Jesus," he muttered. "How stupid can I get?"

  "Well," Grahne said as she placed a sword on the ground and picked up a mace, "you could jump into the volcano. That would be pretty stupid."

  The Peak rumbled as if in answer, and twilight was tinted with a dull and blood-like red.

  The blacksmith and the duck went for a walk.

  Horrn and Abber sat by the fire and played a complicated game with several round pebbles, four yellow sticks, the preserved body of a footh, and some of the ugly black things from the masseur's tangled beard.

  "Hey, are you nervous?" Grahne asked when Gideon yelped as a nightbird perched on the tent's top and sang to itself one of Tuesday's duck songs.

  "Yeah," he said, grinning. "A little."

  "I guess you don't want to die again."

  "Not really, no."

  "Was it nice?"

  "Not really, no."

  "Oh." She seemed disappointed. "I thought it might be fun."

  "It was fun waking up again, that's about it."

  She brightened. "Isn't that always the way, though? You go to sleep, you wake up, and you have a whole new day ahead of you to do whatever you want and be happy."

  He looked at her in astonishment, and was struck by the heretical notion that perhaps she wasn't as empty-headed as he'd first thought. She was... happy. Simply, unreservedly happy. It was frightening.

  Her gaze met his for a fleeting second that stretched into a full minute. "I think," she said softly, "you're not as dumb as you look."

  He blinked.

  "What I mean is," she went on, blushing her dusky skin darker, "you know what you're doing even if your friends think you don't know what you're doing because that's the way it sometimes looks, if you know what I mean."

  He blinked again.

  She blushed again. "And you don't look dumb, either. What I meant was, you have this look that makes you look dumb but I guess you're just thinking or something. Is that right? Do you think a lot?"

  I think, he thought, I'm thinking too much.

  He yawned, stretched, and said, "Early day tomorrow." He raised his voice. "I think—"

  "See what I mean "

  "—we all ought to get some sleep."

  Red lifted his head from the pile of grass he'd been chomping and snorted, folded his legs, and promptly dozed off.

  Horrn nodded eagerly and grabbed up the sticks, footh, and pebbles, while the ugly black things returned to Abber's beard; Abber grumbled because he was winning, but did not insist the game continue when the second earth tremor sent all the ugly black things from his beard to his hair.

  The tent swayed but did not fall.

  Gideon looked for his sister and Botham, decided that what they were doing was none of his business, and ducked inside. Furs had been placed around the perimeter of the hard-packed dirt floor, and he chose the one nearest the entrance. Horrn tripped over him, Abber kicked his shins, and Grahne lay on the opposite side of the entrance, chin in her hands. Staring.

  The volcano bellowed.

  The red light reached into the tent and gave them all the look of slightly boiled lobsters.

  Gideon lay on his side and stared out at the Grassplain, ignoring the looks Grahne sent his way, trying to ignore her heavy sighs and the breeze that rustled his hair from her batting eyelids. He had no doubt that were they alone she would make a pass at him; he also had no doubt that with Harghe no longer glaring out a window, he would succumb to her charms and hate himself in the morning.

  He supposed such problems were commonplace with heroes, and they were unfortunately ones he would have to continue to learn to live with until that time when he could find a Bridge and go home. A rough life, he decided; the psychological and physical pressures for this job were as constant and demanding as being back in the real world, though who was to say, when he thought about it, which was the real world and which was the fantasy?

  Grahne blew in his ear from across the floor.

  He shuddered, turned slightly, and watched the stars.

  Horrn snored.

  Abber and all his friends snored.

  Grahne reached across the entrance and tickled his ear with a blade of grass.

  Red purred in his sleep and thumped the ground with his tail.

  There was no sign of Tuesday.

  The red glow deepened.

  I'd better get up and go look f
or her, he thought, and fell asleep before he could open his eyes which he hadn't realized were closed until they opened and he saw the sun's first light giving form to the Grassplain.

  He sat up quickly, looked around, and jumped to his feet. "Up up up!" he shouted, booting the thief and the masseur in their sides and shaking Grahne's shoulders. "Damnit, get up! They're gone!"

  "No, they're not," the giant's niece said as she sat, stretched, rubbed her eyes, and stretched again when she saw Gideon looking. "They're right over there."

  "No, not them—Tuesday and Botham. They're gone."

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  There were several moments of confusion before he raced outside, sidestepped Horrn's following rush, and prayed that the pair had only risen early and were now gaily preparing breakfast before the trek into the forest.

  The campsite was empty.

  The Grassplain was deserted.

  The sky was grey with Hykrol's smoke.

  When he looked north frantically, he could see the rugged steep slopes deeply ridged with ancient lava beds, and between the ridges fresh glowing flows that crawled sluggishly down toward the trees.

  "Where the hell is Red?" he demanded as he buckled on his bat holster. He called for the lorra and received no answer, called again and added Tuesday's name as well, and still there was nothing but the volcano in its sullen eruption and a slight sighing wind that drifted over the plain.

  "Oh, boy," Horrn said when he joined him. "That doesn't look very good, does it?"

  "No," he answered shortly. "Jesus, I'm an idiot. What the hell kind of—"

  Horrn grabbed his arm. "It's all right," he said, his young eyes trying to look as confident as he tried to sound. "Give me a couple of minutes and I'll see what I can do."

  "What are you going to do?" he said bitterly. "Sneak up on their shadows or something?"

  "Gee, I never tried that. Or maybe I did once. Over by—" He stopped, grinned, patted Gideon's arm. "Never mind. Just give me a chance, hold your lorras."

  On hands and knees, then, Horrn examined the ground, sniffing on occasion and shaking his head, moving on, straightening, bending down again, taking another sniff.

  Abber walked up, watched, and asked Gideon if the boy had caught something during the night.

  "He's tracking."

  The grey man stared. "Is that what that is?"

  Five minutes, and ten, until, at last, Jimm rose and pointed toward Hykrol. "They went that way."

  "How do you know that?" Gideon asked as he joined him. "I didn't know you were a tracker."

  The thief brushed himself off. "I'm not, really. I don't think so, anyway. But I sneak around, and I can tell when others sneak around, too."

  Gideon almost smiled. "What you're saying is, then, someone sneaked in here last night. They sneaked in while we were all sleeping."

  "That's right. In and out," Horrn said with a sharp nod, and pointed triumphantly to clear deep tracks in the earth that, as he said, led in and out of the camp.

  "But who?" he asked as he studied the marks. "That doesn't look like people. It doesn't even look like the Wamchus."

  "Right again. Not people—dragons."

  "You're kidding."

  Abber rubbed his chin thoughtfully until Horrn slapped his hand away. "No, he's not kidding," the grey man said. "I would say, from all the signs presented here, that the blacksmith and his duck were sitting out here minding their own business and watching the moon when the foul slope-dragons came in low under the trees and took them by stealth and surprise. They probably carried them off to their lairs on Hykrol. If we're lucky, we may be in time to save their bones."

  Horrn applauded his concurrence.

  Grahne, still buckling on her weapons, applauded as well, pleased that the crisis had its happy side.

  Gideon turned around. "How do you know they were watching the moon?" he asked in a low steady voice.

  "I saw them."

  The voice rose a few notes. "You saw them? And you didn't tell them to get inside?"

  Abber scuffed the ground with a toe. "Well, they were doing really disgusting things and I—"

  Gideon waved him silent brusquely and felt the first sting of tears. "Damn. Damn! I knew I should have posted a guard. God, how stupid can you get? Why the hell didn't I think? Why the hell didn't I post a stupid guard?"

  "Against dragons?" Horrn said.

  "Against whatever!" he yelled. "Christ, against the Loch Ness monster, for all I know. Jesus!"

  "Nessie?" Abber said in astonishment.

  Grahne put a restraining arm around Gideon's shoulders before the rock he picked up could be hurled at the masseur's head. "Don't worry about a thing," she said with a smile and a hug. "They'll be all right."

  "Oh, sure," he said bitterly. "But I already met one dragon, remember? They're not going to be all right, they're going to be dead."

  The tall woman turned him around, lifted his chin and smiled into his eyes. "Now, you just calm down, Gideon, you hear me? They are not going to be dead, and you have to stop thinking like that, even if you do think all the time."

  "But the dragons—"

  She flicked a playful finger against his cheek and shook her head. "Now, what did I just say? You do not worry about those nasty things back there. The dragons around here aren't really bad, not really. They don't eat meat anyway."

  "They don't?" Horrn said, blinking at the wide road that led into the forest, at the volcano, at the woman who shook her head slowly.

  "No, they don't. They eat the juicy green plants and the big sturdy trees and the silly little birds and the crawly nasty things that live in the ground and a few rocks and—"

  She stopped, and her smile strained just a bit.

  Gideon bolted for the road that led into the trees.

  "But, Gideon," she called as she raced for the tent to pick up the rest of her weapons, "they're only little birds."

  —|—

  The forest that lay between the River Khaleque and Hykrol Peak was like none other he had ever seen, which wasn't saying much since none of the others he had seen here were like anything he had ever seen before either. This one had taller trees, no underbrush at all, and the spaces between the trunks were sometimes a score of yards across. When, in his headlong rush, he slammed into one of the boles, he first cursed himself for being so damned reckless, then noted that the dark brown bark was as hard as iron; a defense, he imagined, against the lava flows that had scoured the rest of the ground and left piles, mounds, deadfalls, and smooth areas of hardened residue over and around which he ran as fast and as prudently as he could.

  There was no sign of his sister.

  There was no sign of Red.

  That there was no sign of the blacksmith bothered him only in that there being no sign of the blacksmith meant there was no sign of his sister either, an observation from which a moral could be drawn had he not heard so many stories about brothers-in-law and nonreturned lawn mowers and loans.

  He slowed as the air grew warm and heavy, and its unnatural red tinge brightened.

  He stopped for a breath to let the others catch up and admire him for his speed and endurance.

  He asked for a drink of water, and was dismayed to realize that no one had thought to grab the supplies, since there was no telling how long it would be before they reached the slope of the Peak and confronted what he sensed would be the sisters in deadly combination.

  It had to be them.

  He didn't think the dragons would have left the tent alone if they hadn't been directed by some other, even more evil intelligence than their own.

  "Oh, don't be such an old worrywart," Grahne said with a thrilling laugh.

  Maybe, he thought, I'll kill her.

  She kissed his cheek soundly.

  And maybe I'll just strangle her a little.

  Unaware of the danger she faced, Grahne chose a mace from her belt, swung at the nearest tree, and stood back when a few dozen large pink seedpods showered lightly to t
he ground. With her axe she sliced them open; with her sword she beheaded a bevy of multi-legged creatures that scurried out from the white pulp; with a dagger she scooped out the seeds, which, she explained as she tossed them away, gave you a really painful stomachache if you swallowed them accidentally; and with her long fingers she pried loose the pulp, tipped back her head, winked, and squeezed until a clear liquid spilled into her mouth.

  Abber tried it, and never saw his ugly black friends again.

  Horrn used his palms and his hair slicked back.

  Gideon eyed the pulp doubtfully, but accepted the woman's offer to do the squeezing herself, though he wondered why she thought she had to brace herself by placing her free hand quite firmly on his chest. Not that he was complaining, but there ought to be limits.

  The drink, when he finally focused on it, was cool, refreshing, and hinted of a champagne-like effervescence that made his lips tingle.

  When they were done, they moved on in a line with five yards between them, weapons at the ready and eyes peering into every shadow, every depression, every nook and branch where something lethal might be hiding.

  Nothing was found or even hinted at, and in a wash of anguished guilt Gideon swore that he would never leave Tuesday alone again, that he would try with all his might to be a better brother, and that he would even try if it killed him to learn to like Finlay Botham, though he crossed his fingers at the same time and knew that no one, especially the duck, expected him to perform miracles.

  "She'll be all right," Grahne comforted with a toss of her hair and a twitch of her furs.

  He nodded glumly.

  Abber thumped each tree they passed with the butt of his staff, wincing at the booming hollow chords the blows produced; and, having no luck getting someone to respond if anyone was hiding in the branches, which they evidently weren't—unless they were and didn't want to be known, in which case they were being marvellously quiet—stopped when he felt himself getting a headache.

  Jimm Horrn walked with his sword straight out and his hair coming unslicked.