Dus - Lure Of The Basilisk Part 5

He tumbled awkwardly down a few steps, then caught himself. He was on a narrow stair which descended further than he could see by the dim torchlight, with walls of solid stone on either side. The walls, in fact, appeared to be natural uncut stone; he could see no seams or mortar. The tunnel and stair were hewn from the living bedrock of the valley.

A breath of cool air wafted up to him from the invisible depths below.

He had found the crypts of Mormoreth, he was quite certain.

Caution was called for from here on; at any moment he might encounter the basilisk. His only means of ensuring that he would not be petrified in such an encounter was the shaving mirrors he had brought, taken from the dead bandits. He found one of the two mirrors in his pack and stood it on his shoulder, holding it in place with his free hand. Then he turned his head and angled the mirror so that he could see the reflection of the descending steps in it, and twisted his helmet around on his head so that its earpiece blocked his view. As long as he looked toward the mirror be would be unable to see in front of him, except by reflection. It was an awkward and uncomfortable arrangement, but he thought it would probably do.

Thus equipped, he returned to the head of the staircase, retrieved his torch, and pushed the door to, being careful not to let it lock. He returned his broken dirk to its sheath, then turned and descended, holding the torch high and finding his way entirely by the image in the mirror.

CHAPTER SEVEN.

The stairs curved somewhat back and forth, with a sinuous grace; they continued downward for perhaps a hundred steps, perhaps more, and ended in a small chamber with a corridor opening from each side. The air was cool and dry, free of any movement or breeze. Garth had lost his sense of direction on the long, curving staircase, but that mattered little so far underground.

The corridor walls were astonis.h.i.+ngly clean; there was no dust, and not a cobweb to be seen. Likewise, the antechamber was completely empty, nothing but a stark cube of stone with three corridors and the staircase opening from its four sides. There were no stalact.i.tes, nor niter deposits, nor any other sign of age, of growth, or of decay. It was as if the tunnels were newly bored. Still, there was an indefinable something, perhaps a scent in the air, which made the overman suspect that the catacombs were very ancient indeed, ancient and somehow evil. Certainly they were totally silent; there was no dripping water, no rustle of mice, no scratching insects, and the silence seemed somehow oppressive and ominous.

Moving slowly and carefully, guiding himself by the dim reflections in his shoulder-mirror, Garth advanced up the left-hand corridor and started his search for a living thing. He had hoped that despite Shang's warning he might somehow find some minor vermin, perhaps a fly or a rat, before coming across the basilisk; but having seen the utterly dead and sterile corridors, he all but gave up on that idea. His footsteps echoed from the blank walls like the booming of a drum, and he was quite sure that the buzzing of a gnat or the swish of a lizard would be magnified to audible proportions if such a thing dwelt anywhere nearby. He began to wonder how it was that he could not hear anything of the basilisk.

As he proceeded, moving through the complex web of corridors, Garth began to realize that he should have brought a thread to find his way out by; the crypts were a labyrinth of branching tunnels, echoing chambers, subtly sloping floors and identical pa.s.sages which might well have been designed to confuse an intruder. He wondered what their original purpose had been, but could think of nothing plausible.

As time pa.s.sed he began to feel strangely tired, and perhaps a trifle nauseous. He shook his head to clear it, and paused in his patrol. In so doing, he noticed that the echoes of his footsteps could still be heard, resounding and reechoing, for long seconds after he stopped.

Why was he tired and ill? True, he had not slept in a day or two, but that was not unusual, and he had always been able in the past to go without sleep for as much as a week without difficulty. Perhaps it was hunger? He found a strip of dried meat in his pack and devoured it; it made no difference. In doing so, however, he noticed a peculiar smell, and realized that it had been present for some time and growing steadily stronger. It was a dry, reptilian smell, rather horrible; it could only be the odor of the basilisk, and the monster's poisonous breath was undoubtedly what was weakening him. It meant he was drawing near his goal.

Gathering himself together again, he adjusted his shoulder-mirror and moved on. His progress was necessarily quite slow, navigating by reflection.

Still, it was with surprising suddenness that he found himself looking at a low, humped shape that lay resting against the wall of a good-sized chamber.

There could be no doubt that this was his quarry.

He took a step further, so that the sleeping shape was lit by his flickering torch; it was a dark, rich green, some seven feet long, counting the thin, pointed tail, and somehow forbidding in appearance. As he studied its reflected image, it awoke, raised its head and peered at him.

It had golden eyes, slanting, slit-pupiled eyes, eyes that caught Garth's; he froze, and tried to tear his gaze from the mirror. He could not.

His eyes were dry; he could not blink. He stared fixedly at the monster's reflected face until his crimson eyes ached. Finally, the creature moved, rising to its feet, and the spell was broken. Garth closed his eyes and held them tightly shut, afraid to meet that baleful gaze again.The image of the basilisk's eyes remained, even with his eyes shut; those hideous yellow orbs were like nothing Garth had ever seen, deep and hypnotic, tinged with an aura of knowing, timeless evil, an impression of a ghastly malign intelligence. Its stare had been the unrelenting, immobile and utterly emotionless gaze of a serpent or lizard-and of course, the basilisk was a lizard. Just a lizard, Garth told himself.

Its stench was strong now; it held all the rot and decay that the catacombs lacked. It was a dry, burning smell, the smell of something long dead, or of death itself. Garth steeled himself and opened his eyes again, trying to avoid meeting the thing's reflected glare.

He looked at it as it stood, unmoving, perhaps twenty feet away. A golden ridge ran the length of its graceful, sleekly powerful body, ending in a crest atop its narrow head in the shape of a seven-pointed coronet. It had a long, narrow jaw, lined with hundreds, perhaps thousands, of small, needle-sharp teeth; a long black tongue flicked silently. Two slit nostrils breathed out a cloud of venom, a pale-silver ghost of vapor in the torchlight.

It had four short, st.u.r.dy legs with long, clawed toes and, save for its huge size, much the shape of any lesser lizard. Its abominable eyes were unavoidable, though; Garth found his attention being drawn back to them, sucked in by that glittering golden smirk. He tore his gaze away once more, and felt his helmet s.h.i.+ft. Fearful lest he should meet its eyes directly, he closed his own and this time kept them shut.

He wondered how old the thing was, and how long it had dwelt beneath Mormoreth; its, eyes seemed ageless, as if they had watched the dawn of time with that same unchanging evil. He wondered also what it fed on, here in the empty, lightless, and lifeless crypts, and decided he would rather not know.

He heard a swish; the basilisk was moving. Having more respect for his life than his dignity, he turned and ran helter-skelter down the nearest corridor, only remembering at the last instant that he must not fling aside his stub of a torch; instead, he clutched it tightly as he fled.

When at length he paused, Garth carefully drew forth and lit a fresh torch from the glowing stump he held, licking at his hand where it had been slightly scorched by the flame. That done, he tried to relax, to stop the trembling induced by the sudden burst of adrenaline he had triggered; he breathed deeply and raggedly. If there were G.o.ds, he told himself, that creature did indeed serve the G.o.d of death, the one whose name was never spoken aloud. He was frightened of the basilisk as he had never before been frightened; its mere gaze induced more fear, more abject terror, than anything else he had ever seen.

He began to think that Shang was right, that the basilisk could not be captured. Further, he admired Shang's courage in entering the crypts to gather its venom, knowing what the basilisk was.

Suddenly he stopped his trembling and admonished himself fiercely that he was panicking, letting fear run away with him as if he were some mere animal, like a rabbit or a human, rather than a thinking, reasoning, and therefore supreme overman. There was nothing that could not be dealt with, he told himself sternly. He had to approach the problem objectively. He needed to capture the monster and bring it back alive; that was the basic requirement.

He had to entrap it somehow, yet not touch it-as he had been entrapped in the Annamar Pa.s.s. Then his only problem would be getting it out past Shang without looking at it.

Clearly, the carved wooden rod he had taken from Dansin was perfect.

He had lost his mirror in his mad dash from the basilisk; it lay somewhere on the stone floor behind him. Fortunately, he had another. He delved into his pack and drew forth both the magic rod and the remaining mirror. He reminded himself to be more careful with these. They were almost all he had left; he had lost his sword, lost the Jewel of Blindness, broken his dagger, and now lost and most likely broken one of his mirrors. Such carelessness was inexcusable.

He had fully regained his nerve. Cautiously, with the mirror held inplace with one hand while the other gripped the rod, he advanced back up the corridor, leaving his torch on the floor behind him, so that his shadow lengthened before him as he walked.

The basilisk had moved, apparently in casual pursuit of the fleeing overman. As he approached, it slid out into the corridor, its rich green armor faintly iridescent in the dim torchlight. Garth glimpsed it from the corner of his eye and turned away hurriedly before it looked at him; not caring to risk even the reflected image if he could avoid it, he closed his eyes and began fumbling with the talisman, working by feel.

When he had completed the sequence that was supposed to establish the magical barrier, he cautiously opened his eyes and studied the scene reflected in the mirror. The basilisk was still moving toward him, with a slow and regal pace as befitted the king of lizards. Abruptly it stopped, its advance halted in mid-stride. It hissed angrily, and Garth felt dizzy and ill from the monster's noxious breath. It explored to either side, and still encountered resistance; rearing up, its lightercolored belly scales flas.h.i.+ng in the torchlight, it seemed to climb in thin air, only to slide back awkwardly. It could not climb the barrier, lizard or no.

Apparently that barrier, which could not be budged from the inside, could adjust to outside pressures, since it had narrowed to fit inside the corridor's dimensions.

Garth was satisfied. He turned his back on the basilisk and went to recover his torch. He was extremely pleased with himself; he had captured the creature, fulfilling his quest and defying Shang with the wizard's own device.

All that remained was to transport the basilisk safely back to Skelleth. Of course, that might be a bit difficult. He still had to get the thing out of the crypts and beyond the city without encountering Shang. It was a great pity that he had lost the invisibility charm; even with its various disabilities, it could be useful.

He stooped and picked up the torch, then turned far enough to see the basilisk's reflection. He froze. It had come further down the corridor; it was scarcely as far away as it had been when he turned, though he had walked a dozen yards.

To his inexpressible relief, it stopped short, just as it had done before, and at the same distance. He had forgotten that the invisible wall would move as he moved, maintaining a constant distance from the generating talisman.

He caught a glimpse of the monster's eyes in the mirror, and an involuntary shudder ran through him. The calm evil in its gaze had been replaced with hatred, an emotion so intense that even Garth could not mistake it. Its regal air of detachment had vanished; its muscles were tensed with fury. The overman tore his gaze from the mirror and turned to face directly away from the monster again. Carefully, he removed the gla.s.s from its perch and wrapped it in a bit of cloth before putting it in his pack. He did not care to look at his catch again, either in reflection or directly; he reluctantly admitted to himself that he was afraid to.

The capture itself accomplished, he now had to get out. Again, he regretted that he had not thought to equip himself with a thread. Instead he would have to find his way out from memory, and without ever looking behind him; this latter necessity was stronger than any bargain or geas, it was a matter of personal survival. Yet as he began to walk he found himself possessed of a growing urge to turn and look, to make sure that his prize was still there, still secure-and no closer. Further, the thing's infernal gaze had a fascination all its own, and it took an effort of will not to seek it out.

It took him several hours to find the stairs leading up to the wine cellar; he repeatedly made wrong turns, only realizing that a corridor was unfamiliar when he had traversed half its length and having to retrace his own steps carefully backward, pressing the basilisk and its magical enclosure back-for the basilisk, though it willingly moved toward him, refused toretreat under its own power and had to be pushed along. This was done by moving the wooden rod that controlled the cage with force sufficient to move the monster, which must have weighed a good two hundred pounds. This dragging, when combined with the poisonous fumes the thing emitted and the corrosive trail its venom left on the stone floors, made any doubling back an ordeal, leaving Garth tired and weak. By the time he finally stumbled upon the steps he was exhausted and sick, his boots worn almost through by the venom-stained floors. He collapsed onto the staircase and rested for several minutes.

Rising at last, he started up the steps, and proceeded without difficulty up the first thirty or forty; then, abruptly, he lost his balance and fell back, as if an invisible hand had grabbed at him and yanked. Only by closing his eyes immediately did he avoid looking back at the basilisk. As he fell, he could hear the monster hissing angrily. Then something caught him, just as something had thrown him off balance, and he realized what it was; the talisman, which he carried in his belt, was responsible. The basilisk had followed willingly as far as the foot of the staircase, then balked. It was when the rear of the invisible cage collided with two hundred pounds of braced basilisk that he had been thrown off balance, and he had been caught again by the rod when the front of the cage encountered the basilisk, which had refused to retreat just as firmly as it had refused to climb the stairs.

It appeared that he would have to drag the creature up the winding staircase step by step. He wished Koros were here to do the hauling, though of course the huge warbeast would not have fit on the narrow stairs. Again he felt weak and sick. But telling himself it was necessary, he clambered to his feet, eyes still closed, and renewed his climb, this time moving slowly and carefully so as not to overbalance again.

As he started upward, he realized that he had lost his current torch; he opened his eyes on complete blackness. He shrugged. It mattered little, since he could scarcely go wrong from this point on. All it meant was that he was safe from the basilisk's gaze. Without thinking, he started to turn for a glance behind him. It was only the superhuman speed of an overman's reactions that stopped him in time when, as his head came around, he caught a sickly greenish glimmer; the basilisk had some luminescence of its own. Unable to resist, he rummaged in his pack and drew forth his remaining mirror; in it he saw that the creature's scales had a dim, silky blue-green phosph.o.r.escence, while its golden eyes glowed with an unnatural light that seemed as bright in the stygian gloom as the full moon at midnight. The glow enhanced the hypnotic spell of the monster's gaze. Garth had no idea what happened nor how much time pa.s.sed from his first glimpse of the eerie illumination to the breaking of the mesmeric spell when the basilisk, unable to pa.s.s the protective barrier, gave up and blinked.

Instantly, when that blink came, Garth shut his own eyes and turned again. Then, after a moment for rest and recuperation, he proceeded, managing to drag the monster up onto the first step only by exerting every ounce of his remaining strength. Fortunately, the basilisk itself was unable to move the barrier, no matter how little resistance Garth provided; this was one distinct advantage the magical device had over any more usual net or cage.

Weakened as he was by the poisoned air, Garth found he had to rest several minutes after each step was surmounted. He began to l.u.s.t after the scent of fresh air as he had never before l.u.s.ted for anything, save in the s.e.xual fit induced by an overwoman in heat.

To his immense relief, just as he thought he might be unable to reach the wine-cellar before losing consciousness completely and probably permanently, the basilisk gave up its resistance and began to crawl reluctantly upward under its own power. Apparently, now that it was out of sight of the crypts proper, it had decided it preferred cooperation to the tiring and probably painful struggle against the unseen and impenetrable wall that had pushed it so far. It still lingered at the lower end of the cage, but now moved upward at the first touch of the advancing barrier. Garth knew that this was the turning point, that he could make it the rest of the way now.It was not very much later that he felt in front of himself only to scratch his outstretched hand rather painfully on one of the iron spikes set in the door that divided the crypts from the wine-cellar. Upon close investigation, he noticed that there was a faint trace of light seeping in around the edges of the portal. He paused, but decided against waiting for it to vanish; it was most likely another torch accidentally left burning.

Furthermore, even if Shang were just beyond, he doubted he had the stamina to wait for very long in the poisonous air of the crypts. The element of surprise would undoubtedly be on his side if he emerged immediately, and any delay could only weaken him further.

The decision made, he drew his broken dirk and worked it into the crack he had left between the door and its frame. With a slight tug, the portal swung inward. As soon as the opening was wide enough, he sprang through into the wine-cellar, barely able to keep from falling headlong in his debilitated condition.

He was blinded temporarily by the sudden blaze of light after his long sojourn in complete darkness; when his sight returned, he found himself facing a wine-rack as if to impale it upon his blunted dagger. He crouched in a fighting stance and looked about.

The cellar was brightly lit, not merely by comparison with the crypts but in fact; torches flared cheerily in every bracket, though he knew he had left several of them empty. Also, it seemed that there were more empty wine-racks; less than half of those in sight held so much as a single bottle.

Something had happened.

Befuddled as he was by exhaustion, the bright light, and enough basilisk venom to kill a dozen men, it was several minutes before he thought to look toward the stairs that led to the palace kitchen. When he did, he saw Shang standing at their head, leaning casually on the iron rail and watching the confused overman with sardonic amus.e.m.e.nt.

When the wizard saw Garth's gaze turn toward him, he laughed, a long and loud laugh. "Well, overman, you would appear to have survived," he said.

Garth made no answer.

"Are you ready now to concede your task impossible and to depart in peace?"

"Perhaps." Garth's voice was hoa.r.s.e and unpleasant. He tried to clear his throat, with little success.

"It was rather careless of you to leave your sword cluttering up my kitchen floor, you know."

"Ah." His voice was little more than a croak. "Is that where it was?" It took an effort to make any reply at all, but his own self-respect demanded that he not let this upstart human verbally dominate him.

"I take it that your stay in my little catacomb was less than pleasant.

You look quite bedraggled."

Garth did not answer; instead he began to wonder what Shang meant to do.

"It was careless to lose the Jewel of Blindness, too; at least, I a.s.sume you lost it. By now, even your slow mind would have remembered it, if you still had it, yet I can still see you."

"You speak, but make no sense."

"Do not pretend ignorance. When I see a broadsword appear from thin air before my eyes, I know that magic is in use. You brought none with you, I'm sure; the Forgotten King would not make free with his own, and everyone knows that overmen use no sorcery. So you must have taken it from that fool bandit I entrusted it to. Undoubtedly he told you how to work it, fearing your sword more than he feared my vengeance."

"Undoubtedly, save that dead men do not often trouble to explain such matters to their slayers."

"Indeed. Well, nonetheless, here you are, and you would appear to be without the Jewel. You also lack your sword, and your dagger appears damaged, which makes it rather useless. This leaves only the axe slung on your back.

Would you care to match it against my magic, or will you go peacefully, givingme your word that you will not serve him whom you call the Forgotten King?"

"This axe is not my only weapon."

"No?"

"No. Permit me to show you" He stepped forward, trying to look natural as he struggled to pull the basilisk from the tunnel. To his consternation, the monster hissed in annoyance.

Shang froze. Garth grinned and gave up all pretense, struggling to drag the basilisk out into the cellar.

The wizard closed his eyes and spoke. "I trust, overman, that you have that beast under control:"

"I do, wizard."

"I a.s.sume that you turned yet another of my devices to your own ends."

"Perhaps."

"You waylaid Dansin, no doubt. I have been overconfident. When next I meet a representative of that yellow-clad demon, I will be more cautious."

"I think it unlikely you will ever meet another."

"It will not concern you in any case. You will recall that I told you I would kill you if you captured the basilisk."

"We all make foolish remarks on occasion." Garth thought that the scrabbling, scratching sounds of the basilisk's progress had changed, indicating that it was past the doorway. He did not care to look to verify the fact. He moved another foot or two, then stopped.

"Before I dispose of you, I must compliment you on your success. I was not sure that the Sealing Rod would hold such a creature."

"It works quite well, thank you."

"Have you any final words, a message for your family, perhaps?"

"I think not; I have no intention of dying." Garth wondered what Shang planned to do; he was rather limited in his actions by the need to keep from meeting the basilisk's gaze. As the overman watched, Shang reached up for the torch beside his head.

"It is a shame that your intentions will not alter the fact."

Some instinct of caution told Garth that even with his eyes shut, Shang could be deadly. He suddenly decided that a retreat would be in order.

Shang held the torch now, having found it by touch. He turned back toward the cellar and spoke three words that Garth could not understand. The words echoed unnaturally, ringing from wall to wall-magic of some kind.

Closing his eyes, Garth dove for the door to the crypts, flinging the basilisk, hissing in protest, back down the stairs. He turned and looked again just in time to see Shang fling the torch amidst the wine-racks, where it exploded with a blinding flash and a wave of heat in a burst of supernatural flame that ignited the racks on all sides. They blazed up brightly, and the flames spread rapidly. Struggling with the reluctant lizard, Garth forced his way hurriedly back into the tunnel. Even there the heat was like a blast furnace. From the corner of his eye, Garth could see Shang leaving the cellar, his sleeve s.h.i.+elding his eyes from the painfully bright firelight. It was quite possible that he had not seen Garth flee and believed him to be trapped in the inferno that now filled the cellar. Had the torch struck nearer, or between himself and the door, he would most likely be trapped.

He found it necessary to retreat further down the stairs. This time the basilisk did not resist. It was feeling the heat as well. For his own part, Garth noticed that his breastplate bore a new mark where its finish had scorched and blackened, and that his hair was singed and crumbling. Only his leathery hide had saved him from incineration. A human would probably have died almost instantly. Shang's ignorance of the strengths of overmen might well be his undoing.

Seeing no reason to bake himself any more than necessary, Garth retreated further, stopping only when he reached the point where the basilisk was almost in sight of the bottom. Even here, he felt the heat of the flames; despite the curves in the staircase, the tunnel was lit a vivid orange around him. The flame was not magic merely in its origin, but in its nature, burningfar hotter than any natural flame could, given such fuel and such a location.

Garth was impressed. He wondered if those three incomprehensible words were the entire spell, or whether Shang had prepared things in advance and the words were merely a trigger. The latter would speak more highly for Shang's foresight, but the former for his magical prowess.

When the fire still burned unabated after perhaps half an hour, Garth relaxed and settled down for a long wait. It occurred to him that he might in fact be trapped permanently, but he thought it highly unlikely. Curiously, he found himself thinking more clearly and breathing more easily than he had before; the fire was apparently absorbing or consuming the basilisk's vapors somehow, while it drew cool, clear air up from the depths.

After due consideration, he decided there was nothing to be done until either the fire burned itself out or it became clear that it wasn't going to.

Therefore he ate a little of his dwindling store of provisions, took a sip of water from his half-empty canteen, and went to sleep. His last waking thoughts were worried, though; the basilisk had no food or water. He had no idea whether it needed such things or not; he had seen no trace of them in the crypts. And somewhere above ground, Koros would be getting very hungry. It had been at least a day, probably much longer, since he had left the warbeast.

CHAPTER EIGHT.