by Джеффри Лорд
In the fading light, even Blade's keen eyes could not see that the crack around one section of four paving stones was wider than usual. His foot came down squarely on the one farthest to the left. With a squeal and a crash, all four stones vanished under Blade, as an iron plate supporting them swung down on its hinges. Suddenly there was nothing but empty air and a black shaft under Richard Blade, and he plunged out of sight.
His drawn sword crashed against the edge of the shaft and the shock broke his grip on it. Before he had time to regret the loss, he landed with a thud on some thickly carpeted surface.
The fall rammed the crossbow into Blade's back, knocking all the wind out of him. He lay, unable to move for a moment, while around him in the darkness iron and wood squealed and creaked and groaned like a chorus of madmen.
Suddenly the surface under Blade shuddered violently, then tilted. He fell, this time landing on his side. He wriggled around until he could reach the crossbow and unsling it. As he pulled back the cocking lever, more squealing and groaning sounded overhead.
As Blade watched, a trapdoor swung down, leaving a gaping hole fifteen feet on a side. High above, Blade could see the evening sky, the branches of a tree, and a tower of the Wizard's citadel. Then something else went click, the surface under him vibrated-and with a terrific whang it snapped upward.
Blade soared up out of the hole in the ground like a rocket. At the top of his climb he found he'd parted company with his crossbow. Twisting in midair, he saw he was flying toward a row of thorny-looking bushes, with a broad expanse of something black and shiny beyond them. He twisted again, desperately trying to bring himself down into the bushes. They'd probably tear off half his skin, but the alternative was landing beyond them on the black surface. It looked like polished stone, and hitting it from this height would break half his bones.
Blade plunged down, knew a sickening moment of realizing he was going to hit the black surface, then struck it. It wasn't stone, but inky water, deep and icy cold. He plunged far under, then came to the surface sputtering and gasping.
As he sucked in a deep breath, he realized there was a strong current in the water, carrying him across the pond. He tried to swim, realized the current was too strong, and found himself being swept over the lip of a small dam. It sloped steeply down and vanished in shadow far below. He could not see the bottom, but he could see a wooden footbridge running across the face of the dam. From under the footbridge iron spikes jutted downward, the water foaming about their points. Anyone coming down the face of the dam would be impaled on the spikes, unless they flattened themselves enough to pass under.
Blade had only a few seconds to realize his situation, then a few more to act as the water swept him along. He squeezed himself as flat as possible, until his head was under the water. Pain seared across the top of his head as one spike gouged his scalp. Then he was past the barrier, sliding down into the shadows. He raised his head, took a deep breath, and in the next moment plunged out into thin air again.
This was the longest fall of all and Blade had time to wonder if it was going to be the last one of his life. Then he plunged into another icy pool with a splash so loud that it was still echoing from the stone walls as his head broke the surface.
Before Blade could do anything more, a metallic clank sounded from high overhead, then suddenly light flared close at hand. The glare after so much darkness half-dazzled Blade. It was a moment before he could make out a ledge at the side of the pool, glistening gray walls rising all around him, and seven fully armed Wolves standing on the ledge.
Blade saw at once there was no way out of there except past the Wolves and through a doorway at the rear of the ledge. He swam to the ledge and heaved himself out of the water. He stood up, water dripping from him, keeping his hands carefully in view and well away from his knife. He took a step forward, the Wolf leader waved his arms, and the six men-at-arms ran at Blade.
Blade had no time to see that the Wolves were coming at him barehanded. All he could see was that, after all he'd gone through, the Wolves were going to slaughter him. He'd never see the Wizard of Rentoro. It had all been wasted.
So rage filled him and he let out a roar of sheer fury that made even the Wolf leader jump. As the echoes of that roar boomed around the cave, Blade leaped forward, his knife rasping out and gleaming in the torchlight. He slashed at one Wolf, wheeling as he did to aim a kick at the groin of a second.
The knife sprayed sparks as it grated across the man's helmet, then drew a spurt of blood as it opened his cheek. Blade's kick missed the second man's groin, but slammed into his thigh hard enough to knock him off balance. He staggered into the path of a third Wolf, both men went down together, and Blade leaped on them.
He drove a booted foot down on a man's throat, felt bone and cartilage shatter, heard the man scream. He whirled as two men tried to grab his arms, his clubbed hands smashing both of them aside. He kicked one man in the knee and chopped him in the back of the neck as he screamed and tried to hop away on one leg. He fought like a mad robot, hammering and kicking and stabbing, until the floor ran with the blood of the Wolves and his own fists and arms were raw and bloody from pounding on steel armor.
He fought, until a Wolf got behind him for just long enough. Then pain and fire exploded in his head, he was briefly aware of staggering and falling, knew that he was lying on the floor helpless-and finally stopped knowing anything at all.
Chapter 12
Blade awoke in a canopied bed large enough for six people, under a pile of quilts thick enough to keep him warm at the North Pole. Every muscle in his body was complaining and he was bruised and scraped all over, as if he'd taken a quick trip through a cement mixer.
None of this was enough to keep him in bed. Blade rolled out of bed and did a few exercises. If it came to a fight, he would do well enough. Anything less than a strong force of Wolves in top shape was going to get badly mauled if they tried anything.
With an effort, he forced himself out of this bloodthirsty mood. Why assume he was going to have to fight again, when he didn't know what orders the Wizard had given? He now realized that the Wolves had taken him prisoner, when they could have easily chopped him to pieces and fed him to the castle's watchdogs. They'd taken him with their bare hands, and some of them had been killed doing this. He'd been allowed to reach the end of his long journey alive, well, and fit to meet the Wizard. Quite probably the Wizard of Rentoro didn't want him killed.
His mind settled on this point, Blade began to inspect his room. It was one of those rooms that made him wonder if he was a guest or a prisoner. The walls were hung with tapestries, the floor covered with fleeces and furs, the bed and the other furniture richly carved out of some pale hardwood. In one corner was a silver watertap and a wooden stand with two jeweled cups, in another corner a marble toilet.
There were also bars on the one high narrow window, iron rings hanging from the walls, and a door of solid iron, heavy enough to stop a tank. He was going to be quite comfortable in this room-but he was also going to be staying in it, whether he liked it or not, until someone outside let him leave.
After three days without food or clothing, Blade began to wonder just how comfortable he was supposed to be. He'd heard and seen nothing to suggest the castle was even inhabited. He knew it was, but he now knew as well that the Wizard and his men were ignoring his existence.
Maybe they hoped to weaken him by hunger, but they wouldn't find that easy. It would be another week before they could hope to find him seriously weakened. Until then, he would be both willing and able to put up a fight. His original bloodthirsty mood was beginning to return, stronger than before.
After another three days without food, Blade's stomach shrank down and its angry rumblings stopped. Blade's mood was more savage than ever. He was about ready to kill the first person who stepped through the door, then tear him apart, roast him over a fire of tapestries and furniture, and eat him!
Blade laughed at the vision this thought conjured
up. In a few more days, his situation would no longer be a laughing matter. He would start losing strength, until he would be an easy victim for even one Wolf, let alone half a dozen. Eventually he would start losing his willpower and self-control. Then what? He might not actually go mad, but he could become horribly vulnerable to whatever the Wizard might do to him. He was more vulnerable to hypnosis when his system was depressed by drugs, fatigue, illness, or hunger. Would he also be more vulnerable to the Wizard's mental powers? Would the Wizard be able to strip his mind of all defenses, extract its contents like the meat from a coconut, and turn him into a helpless puppet? Would the Wizard-
Whatever the Wizard might do, he, Richard Blade, would spend no more time worrying about it. The six days of hunger must already be working on him, if he could let his mind spin horrifying fantasies this way.
The Wizards of Rentoro might once have been telepaths. In fact, Blade was prepared to believe they had been. But what about the present Wizard? Everything about the way he wielded his power over Rentoro could be explained without telepathy. Even the trances of the Wolf leaders could be nothing more than a ritual of meditation. With enough men loyal to him, the Wizard could give the appearance of having all the «magical» powers of his ancestors.
Still, telepathy or not, if the Wizard did not come within the next week, he would find Blade helpless, physically and perhaps mentally. What would happen then, Blade didn't care to guess, and firmly put any further wild fantasies out of his mind.
That night Blade enjoyed his best sleep since reaching the castle. He woke with a memory of strange dreams, to hear an almost equally strange sound. It was an iron key, turning in the lock of the door.
Blade sprang out of bed as the door opened. He crouched behind the bed as five Wolf leaders in full armor clanked into the room. Then he rose to face the man who followed the Wolves into the room.
His journey was really over. At last he was in the presence of the Wizard of Rentoro.
The man had to be the Wizard of Rentoro. It was hard to imagine anyone else being escorted about the castle by five Wolf leaders. Nonetheless, the man's appearance was something of a surprise.
Blade hadn't expected a Hollywood version of Merlin the Magician-long robe, high pointed cap, long flowing white beard, staff with mysterious carvings on it. Neither had he expected anything like the man who stood before him, arms crossed on his chest and dark face set in a tight, formal smile.
The Wizard seemed to be about Blade's own age-no longer young, but still in the prime of life. He stood just under six feet, barrel-chested, heavy-boned, with large powerful hands and legs like tree trunks. Large dark eyes stared at Blade over a hooked nose. The massive chin appeared even heavier due to a square-cut black beard, oiled and faintly perfumed. The Wizard wore a black velvet tunic with slashed and puffed sleeves, skin-tight hose with one leg green and the other white, red leather shoes with long points, and a sash of gilded metal links. A long dagger with a silver hilt in the shape of a wolf's head was thrust into the sash.
The man had an air about him that Blade found hard to define. There was no single word to describe it, there was only a list of the qualities that seemed to be in the man. Ruthlessness, alertness, determination, and sheer strength were all part of him. Blade suspected that right now the Wizard could be more than his match in unarmed combat. The more he looked at the Wizard, the more the man made him think of some great nobleman of the Italian Renaissance-perhaps a mercenary captain who'd fought his way up to rule a city, a man who could admire an exquisite statue one day and order a dozen men out for execution the next. Even without any telepathic powers, this man would not be easy to either fight or deceive.
Then the Wizard spoke. He spoke in the Rentoran language, with an accent that reminded Blade of something from Home Dimension. He was trying to remember what it reminded him of when he heard the Wizard's last words:
«-so I am pleased to bid you welcome, Richard Blade.»
The shock of hearing his name from the Wizard jerked Blade's attention back to the man standing in front of him. It was just in time. A moment later Blade sensed a message passing into his mind, filling it like an echoing shout in a cave.
«Open your thoughts to me,» was the message. «Open them, and let me know them. I am not your enemy.»
Fortunately Blade had been warned that he might be facing telepathy and other paranormal powers. So he was not caught unprepared or ignorant of what was happening, and that saved his mind if not his life.
The Wizard gave Blade no more than a few seconds to consider the request and reply to it. Then he struck with all the power of his mind, and Blade felt in that blow the anger of a proud man who takes the slightest resistance as not only a crime but a personal insult. The Wizard was as jealous of his supremacy over the inner world of the mind as he was of his supremacy over the outer world of Rentoro.
Blade knew that he had to resist. The Wizard was hardly likely to stop with merely reading Blade's thoughts. He would go on to plant his own, until there was nothing in Blade's mind the Wizard hadn't put there-or at least nothing to keep the Wizard from controlling all of Blade's actions.
Blade knew he had to keep his mind totally occupied with his own thoughts, so there would be no room for the Wizard to plant any of his deadly messages. He would also have to fight this battle entirely on the defensive. He hoped he could keep the Wizard's thoughts out of his mind, but he had no chance of pushing any of his own thoughts into the Wizard's mind.
All this ran through Blade's thoughts in seconds. Then he settled down to his mental duel with the Wizard.
His first thought was a defiant shout against the Wizard's call, «I am not your enemy.»
You are a liar! Blade mentally shouted.
You are a liar!
You are a liar!
Blade hurled that thought through his mind over and over again, more and more intensely as he felt the Wizard trying to interrupt him. If he'd been saying the words, he would have been shouting them at the top of his lungs.
You are a liar.
You must not fight me. I am not your enemy, the Wizard replied.
You are a liar.
You must not fight me. I am-the Wizard repeated.
And on and on, more intense, more savage with each exchange.
In time Blade sensed that his own thoughts were coming more slowly and knew he would have to find some new defense. So he shifted to problems in calculus. He'd always been competent rather than brilliant at mathematics. To do any problem in calculus in his head took total concentration. As the numbers began to dance across his mental vision. he felt the Wizard driven back-and also felt his growing anger.
In another moment, Blade could no longer read the thoughts the Wizard was using to try breaking through his own mental smokescreen of equations. Perhaps he was winning, or at least holding his own. He decided to test the idea. He thought of taking a step backward, then of raising both hands high over his head and lowering them. His muscles told him that his legs and his arms were obeying his mind. His mind and body were still his own, not the Wizard's.
The moment's break in Blade's mental defenses gave the Wizard his chance for a physical act. He took two swift steps forward, one arm shot out, and a heavy hand pressed itself against Blade's temple.
Blade jerked his mind back to the equations, but he felt the attack against him double its strength. He still read anger in that attack, but also curiosity. A mind as hard to penetrate and control as Blade's was clearly something new and mysterious for the Wizard.
That might be good news, if it kept the Wizard reluctant to kill him. It would also make the Wizard more determined than ever to break into his mind and find out what made it tick! This fight wasn't going to be over for a long time.
Suddenly the Wizard hurled his thoughts with total concentration and tremendous force at Blade. Blade's defenses started to collapse, slowly but inevitably, like a falling wall. He knew they were collapsing, knew that the Wizard was about to ente
r his mind. Images of London, of the computer room, of his apartment flashed across his mental vision instead of the equations.
This time it was Blade's chance to use his body. With all the willpower he had left, Blade forced his right arm into movement. His hand closed around the hilt of the Wizard's dagger and plucked it from the sash. He raised the sharp steel, holding it well out to one side so the Wizard could not grab it easily. Then he concentrated totally on an image of himself and the Wizard lying on the floor. The Wizard's throat gaped open, while Blade lay with the dagger buried up to the hilt in his chest. Both were as lifeless as the blood-drenched stone under them.
The Wizard jerked his hand away from Blade's temple as if it had suddenly turned red-hot and leaped backward. He made no effort to grab the dagger. Instead he dropped into a wrestler's crouch and raised one hand to send the Wolves into action.
The Wolves took two steps forward. Then Blade raised the dagger and held it with the point almost touching the bare skin of his chest. At the same time he formed in his mind another image-his dead body sprawled on the floor, with the Wizard and the Wolves standing around it, gaping helplessly.
The Wolves took another step forward. Blade gulped in air, realized that he'd bitten his lips hard enough to draw blood, and forced out words.
«No,» he said. «No, Wizard. Stop them where they are, or you'll never get anything from me. I can be dead long before they reach me.»
The Wizard stiffened for a moment, then nodded. The hand went up again and the Wolves stopped. The Wizard straightened, his eyes narrowed, and Blade knew he was gathering his thoughts for another mental attack.
«No,» said Blade again. «Stay out of my mind, too. I don't like that, any more than I like the Wolves. Leave me unharmed and free, both in mind and body, or see me dead in front of you.»
«You wouldn't dare,» was the thought that came clearly from the Wizard.
