The Pandahem Cycle II

“Green Shadows”-2

We spent some time waiting to recover from that ordeal and I learned some of the familiar reasons why these people had ventured down here. The Humped Land, the wide area of Monsters and Moders, attracted many diverse folk; all sought something special to them. Jadelgren’s merchanting had sunk into a decline, so that financially he was at rock bottom. San Ferald had heard strongly substantiated rumors that a highly powerful Book, a Hyr-Lif of enormous thaumaturgical knowledge, had in the long ago been secreted in this particular Moder. Both men hoped to gain what they most desired.

The Lady Shamsi merely laughed so that the mili-milu jumped. “I seek my pleasure down here, and if fortune comes my way among the gallant adventuring, why, then I am doubly rewarded.”

My own story was simple; I was a paktun hired as a guard.

When we’d recovered sufficiently to push open the double doors we stepped through into a vast and ebon chamber. Robed in black the walls, black the throne, black the candles and black the obscene statue of a forgotten god. The massed candles threw an oddly mellow light, out of place and unsettling, upon that somber scene and upon the two balass doors beyond the throne. The eyes of the statue glittered and seemed to watch our movements.

“Why was I persuaded to venture into this awful place?” Jadelgren’s voice quivered. “By Havil! I regret it now!”

“You came, as did we all, to gain magic and treasure and plunder the tombs,” said the Lady Shamsi. “As we all admitted.” She smiled graciously upon the Fristle sorcerer. “You did well to remember your spell, San Ferald. No doubt you will recall more for us?”

“I do not think so, my lady. All that is in my head is a childish exercise—”

“No matter.” She interrupted brusquely. Her gloved hand stroked the mili-milu who crouched down, his chain chiming. “We must go on. Which door, do you think?”

It was all one to me. Yet I could clearly see the excitement seething in this sharp and haughty lady. She’d come down here primarily for the thrill of it and one felt a certain admiration for her poise amongst all these terrors. As for Jadelgren, his face now shone as green as before, with the veins pulsing blue. He said very uneasily to me: “I don’t like the look of that statue’s eyes.”

“If we do not touch anything and go carefully,” I told him, “we should regain the safety of your main party.”

“That Havil-forsaken trap! It snatched away my crossbow as well as my purse. Look!” He showed me the ring on the little finger of his right hand. A cut sapphire, it was engraved with the representation of an archer. “This ring gives me the accuracy to hit nine times out of ten.”

“Very useful—if you had a bow.”

Now, from my previous experiences down a Moder I had gained an inkling of the way the Moder Lord liked to toy with those bold fellows and ladies who had the effrontery to go delving down among the treasures. Every now and then as the delvers proceeded they would come across a chamber handsomely furnished with broad tables and comfortable chairs. Those fine tables would be covered with dishes containing — food! There would be silver goblets with fine wines. Needless to say, by this time my inward parts were groaning with the stark necessity of finding and devouring vittels. I surely needed a wet, by Vox!

Of course, the Moder Lord, guardian of the treasures, only sets out these tables of gourmand food and fine wines so that he may continue to keep the delvers going in order that he may torture them further.

“Aye, jikai,” he said on a gusty sigh. “Well, Lady Shamsi, I do not know which door.” He hunched up his shoulders in the incongruous black leathers. “Nor, by Hanitcha the Harrower, do I care to choose!”

The contrast between the demeanor of the two men and the woman struck me forcibly. They’d all fallen through the same trap, they’d encountered the same dangers, yet the men had gone to pieces. Truly, if this Lady Shamsi was not a Jikai Vuvushi, a Battle Maiden, then she would be welcomed with open arms into any regiment of Warrior Women.

She continued to babble her prayers in a low and barely audible voice, yet this did not detract from the impression of fortitude; rather, it perhaps revealed the inner source of her strength. She stroked the mili-milu. Most folk like to stroke these friendly creatures, to rub their noses in the sweet-smelling hair, to caress them. She had her face turned away, staring at the statue.

“If,” quoth Ferald the Sorcerer in a quavery tone, “that thing comes to life, I can do nothing.”

“But you told me you remembered another spell!” She swung about, alarmed and angry. Her green eyes slanted upon the Fristle.

“Yes, my lady, a trifle of foolishness learned when very young — a baby spell—”

The ebon statue, ten foot tall, seized a double-bitted axe and jumped for us. His eyes blazed. All the horror of this unholy place concentrated in those glaring eyes.

I leaped forward. “Leave him to me!”

Do not think I was vainglorious or wishing to prove my right to be called jikai before these people. Oh, no, by Zair! I was in deathly terror lest the Star Lords banished me back to Earth. And, also, I suppose in those days, I was stupid.

We fought. Axe against sword we battled around and around that ebon chamber with the tall unflickering candle flames and drapes black as the hour of dim on a night of Notor Zan.

Far above us the Suns of Scorpio, Zim and Genodras, sent down their streaming mingled radiance, shining ruby and jade, and down here we faced the horrors from the tomb. In the end I cut the statue to pieces and sundered him in black fragments upon the marble floor. Green smoke puffed from the splintered detritus, a stifling odor of rot stank in our nostrils. The Lady Shamsi clapped her hands together, white flesh and solid glove, calling again: “Jikai!”

The other two delvers jabbered in frenzied relief, the little mili-milu remained silent, crouched upon the lady’s shoulder. I just felt a testy embarrassment that the great word jikai was being bandied about like a clipped copper ob piece.

Around the Lady Shamsi’s neck a triple-gold chain hung down, its ends vanishing under her tunic between her breasts. She pulled up the chain and I caught a single glimpse of a round white object which she instantly clasped in her bare hand. She no longer stroked the mili-milu.

The merchant adventurer in his ridiculous black leathers glared at the two doors past the throne. “The wiles of Spag the Junc foil us at every turn. At his evil pleasure we are lost.” He swung up a shaking finger. “If we are to choose, then let us take the left hand door.”

“The right, surely?” said the sorcerer.

Once again the Lady Shamsi began her low-voiced muttering, apparently intoning private prayers for our safe deliverance. I was just thinking that her display of spirit shamed us when a stunning crash smashed into the chamber and destroyed any problems of which door we should choose.

The entire throne crashed to the floor. From the black and cavernous opening so dramatically revealed a shrieking horde of skeletons burst upon us.

There are many forms of Kaotim, the Undead, upon Kregen and these were not apim skeletons, the bones of Homo sapiens. I recognized them by the lean viciousness and the snarling reptilian jaws, the vindictive speed of their onslaught, their very blasphemous possession of vigorous life in forms that should be dead and buried. They were Schrepims, incredibly fast and deadly, inordinately difficult to kill. And I must slay them all a second time!

My sword blurred into action. Commonplace words, perhaps, but only with the aid of Zair and Opaz and the utmost exertion were we to come out whole from this fraught encounter. So — my sword swept into action, slashing and hacking, for to thrust was useless. Swords and axes swirled about me. I fought. Oh, yes, Dray Prescot, rogue and emperor, can at least fight.

In a situation as desperate as this, could there be any shame in fighting?

Now, I have been called an onker, stupid, a get onker, an onker of onkers, more times than I have mentioned. And I own to trying to see the best in people until I am proved wrong. I began to see the pattern, and to add up what I should have added up long since.

This was why the Everoinye had dispatched me here. The trap through which these delvers had fallen had sundered all their chains—purse, Book, sword—but what of the Lady Shamsi’s chains? And who stroked a friendly little mili-milu wearing a heavy gauntlet? She’d not even bothered to talk to him properly, to call his name. And lizard-skin around the tops of boots—were they then lined in reptile scales? I’d not seen the Fliktitors until after she called in alarm. Perhaps the most damning piece of evidence was the relief with which she’d given me the red scarf... Her decisiveness and sharpness had earlier given me the idea that had she not been a lady she might well have acquired a sobriquet. She’d be called Shamsi the Otlora. Otlora means no nonsense. In this stark adventure down the Moder, she’d earned that name, by Krun!

As I fought and ducked and slashed, I yelled: “San Ferald! Use your spell! Now and quickly. Before it is too late.”

“But it is only a silly—”

“Cast it!”

The reptilian skeletons pressed on and I chopped them. I took a nick or two, which displeased me mightily. San Ferald took a bright red ring from his pocket and began to chant.

The Lady Shamsi laughed, a shrill, triumphant scream. Her white face now quite clearly showed green traces where the artificial whiteness of cosmetics was wearing away. And I battled. By the Blade of Kurin, I fought!

Pallid with fear, Jadelgren stood close to the sorcerer as Ferald chanted. The Fristle held the red ring aloft. He pointed it at the skeletons of the Schrepims. I shrieked.

“No! No! At the woman! At Shamsi!”

He was well into his chant now. I simply roared at Jadelgren, putting all the old devilish cutting command into my bellow.

“Jadelgren! Swing him around. Pivot him at the lady!”

As a farmer swings a scarecrow, so Jadelgren swung the sorcerer. The pointing ruby ring aimed at Shamsi — the spell climaxed in babbled confusion — and all the skeleton reptile-men disappeared.

My sword slashed at thin air.

“It will last only a moment!” screamed Ferald. “It is weak and she is strong, strong!”

The Lady Shamsi stood with her left thumb in her mouth. She made sounds like: “Coo. Glug.”

“It is for soothing babies to sleep.”

Before any of us could move, a hairy motion on her left shoulder drew our rapt attention. The little mili-milu simply took the turquoise-headed stick-pin from her tunic and drove it deeply into her eye.

Long before she fell to the floor, her clothes, her flesh, her scales, sloughed away. A skeleton reptile-woman, she sprawled, a mere scattering of yellowed bones.

“She was sent by the Moder Master to betray us,” said Jadelgren afterwards as we fought our way back. “You shout mighty loud, Jak ti Tamlin.”

We struggled higher into the next zone — which is another story — and then, thankfully, we could hear the voices of the main party and lights bloomed a welcoming rose and gold along the rocky walls.

“Sink me!” I said. I stroked the little mili-milu. His collar and chains had been taken off and thrown down upon the pathetic green-dyed wig and pile of yellowed bones. His thralldom to the reptile sorceress had ended. Perched on my shoulder he chittered happily away, a warm hairy bundle of lovableness.

“I wouldn’t have had to shout so loudly if I’d had my wits about me from the first. By the Black Chunkrah! All the clues were there.”

But, I think, and to my shame I confess, it was the sight of my face as I fought and commanded, that old demonic Dray Prescot Devil Look, that so galvanized Nath Jadelgren into instant action.

Of one thing I was very sure. I’d have to be excruciatingly careful how I explained my foolishness, and how the little mili-milu had joined us, when I got home to Esser Rarioch and told it all to my own bewitching Delia.

Talons of Scorpio