Gaal the Conqueror (28 page)

John never paused for a backward glance. He had heard the
matmon stumble and curse, and was grateful for the extra yard
or two it gave him. In readiness he had also extracted the chain
and the stone before reaching the corner, and as he swung into
the side street he flipped the chain over his head and slid into
invisibility. He was delighted to see the street was crowded and
stood with his back against the wall of a building, letting the
crowd pass by.

He was just in time. The matmon, his lips pressed together
in fury, leaped round the corner into the narrow street and,
seeing no sign of John, recklessly pushed his way among the
shuffling inhabitants of Bamah looking this way and that.

John drew a deep breath of relief. For a few moments he
remained where he was, and stared at the silent crowds that
drifted past him. He knew what he ought to do. The proper
thing would be to remove the Mashal Stone and make his way
to the baker's shop. But now it was round his neck his feelings had changed. Fear and dread had gone. For days he had
longed to experience the sense of joyful courage it always
seemed to impart to him. Sometimes he had daydreamed of
wearing it forever, not because it made him invisible but because it filled him with such an extraordinary sense of power.
But he remembered Gaal's warning, and for a few minutes he
struggled with his conscience.

John knew he should have taken the stone off then and
there, but he was tempted. Word had reached the followers of
Gaal of the return of Lord Lunacy to Bamah and of a special
meeting of the Circle of Light. Surely it would be helpful if
Gaal's followers knew what Lord Lunacy planned. He began to
picture himself surrounded by underground leaders as they
listened with earnest attention to his revelations. He could almost hear their expressions of awe and gratitude at his amazing
exploit.

He suppressed the warning bells that clamored for his attention. What prevented him from playing the invisible spy? Why
indeed shouldn't he? He had proved already that the Lord
Lunacy could not see him when we wore the Mashal Stone.
Nothing had happened to him last time he was in the temple.
Surely nothing serious could happen now. He would actually
be helping Gaal's cause. He continued to suppress his misgivings and in the end desire won out over conscience.

Hardly aware of pulling himself away from the wall John
began the ascent to the temple, hidden from his view for the
moment by the crowded terraced houses. But it was not long
before he saw the awesome structure which dominated Bamah.
Fifteen minutes later he had left the shuffling crowds behind
and had reached a strange circle of massive stones (`just like
Stonehenge," as he and Eleanor had commented to each other) that encircled it, and was crossing the grassy space and
heading for the temple opening.

There was no one in sight. In spite of the Mashal Stone and of the assurances he had given himself, a chill of fear entered
his heart. What would he encounter there this time? Nothing
had happened last time-but what if... ? Still he pursued his
way forward. Shadows and dimness slowly wrapped him round
as he tiptoed through the massive opening.

Twenty yards inside the temple John stopped. Sinister shadows shifted constantly. At times they passed right through him,
chilling him by their passage. It was as though a draft of cold
damp air had gone through his body. Sometimes he would
dodge one shadow only to get in the way of another. And each
time it happened he was left feeling a little colder than the time
before.

Anxiously he peered round, wondering where he might find
Lord Lunacy. There was no sign of the kind of beings who
might be members of the Circle of Light. Did they meet in a
hidden chamber somewhere? Cautiously he began to move forward, his eyes searching for the particular column which bore
the stone rose. The need to be able to escape quickly entered
his mind and the column with the rose would serve as his
escape route. It took him some minutes to find it. When he did,
some obscure instinct made him squat down, leaning his back
against it. He felt safer that way.

But by now he was in the grip of an icy chill, a cold of an
intensity he had not experienced even in Canada. It seemed to
wrap itself round his heart, slowly freezing what courage and
hope the Mashal Stone had given him. Still the flitting shadows
swept and swirled around and through him. Instinctively he
hunched himself into a ball, wrapping his invisible arms
around his invisible knees. He had the curious feeling that
there was no difference between the inside of him and the
outside.

How long he remained like this he could never afterward say.
Something deep inside was telling him to leave. But he had lost,
or seemed to have lost, all power to make decisions. He sat huddled, cold and invisible at the foot of a column, almost
frozen by the power of evil. Darkness fell (which was strange,
for it was only the middle of the morning) and since the lamps
were not lit, he soon could see nothing.

A voice broke the silence, a voice he recognized clearly and
hated-the voice of Lord Lunacy. He could not tell whether it
sounded inside him or around him. He was even not sure,
when he heard it, that he had a body at all. "We are gathered,
I see." Clearly the remark was addressed to someone other than
John.

Murmurs of assent filled him with a sense of nausea, but
once again he had no idea whether the sound of the murmurs
was only in his mind, or whether it surrounded him.

"Your assigned tasks have not been changed. Perform them
lest I consume you before your time."

There was a long silence, so that John eventually began to
wonder whether the meeting was over. He could no longer feel
any part of his body and began to fear that he indeed might
no longer have one.

"My plans mature," Lord Lunacy said at length. "The miserable creature Gaal will be sacrificed tomorrow, so that I shall
then have no rivals in my control of this particular planet. Its
kingdoms will develop and serve me, and its peoples will die
and fatten me."

There were murmurs of approbation, and this time John had
the distinct impression that they came from different points of
a circle surrounding him.

"You will all protect a certain Regenskind for the next twentyfour hours. His name is Prodo Tehs. It is he who will bring Gaal
into our hands. He is one of the humans whom Gaal interfered
with, but he has returned his loyalty to me. We shall dispose of
him once he has served his purpose. Remember the nameProdo Tehs."

For some reason the sound of it began to echo in John's mind, "Prodo Tehs, Prodo Tehs, Prodo Tehs."

"I regret to inform you that our comrade here, the Lord
Shagah, has persisted in an independent course."

John sensed a wave of fear hit him as if it came from the side
of the circle opposite the voice.

"However, I sense that your own cleverness may undo you,
Shagah. The sorcery you have devised for your salvation may
trap him for centuries, and when it does, your doom will be
sealed. How can you ever expect to have success apart from me?
And now, my esteemed Hocoino?"

A voice on John's left answered, "Your majesty?" and as it did
so a vision flashed into John's mind, a startlingly clear vision
of an exceedingly tall, thin man, draped in gold-braided black
velvet that fell from a hood over his head and dropped down
to his feet. His face was the face of a corpse, smooth, gray and
dead, the nose aquiline and the lips a line of scarlet that
slashed the dead flesh beneath it. His eyes were two burning
black holes. For a second the vision was frighteningly real.
Then it was gone.

"I know your heart. It is in my hands. You must be especially
careful. If you meet Lord Shagah when he is released from his
picture," the disembodied voice of Lord Lunacy continued,
"and should you ally yourself with him at that time, you will
share his doom."

"Your majesty knows all things," Hocoino's voice replied.

"Quite so. Now let me come to the point of this meeting. You
are all to focus your powers on the legendary Sword Bearer. He
must be somewhere in the vicinity-"

There was a second pause, even longer than the first. When
Lord Lunacy's voice sounded again it awoke terror in John's
heart.

"Indeed he is closer than I had suspected. I can actually
smell him. Let me describe the smell to you so that you with
me can close in on him. There is that rather pleasant perfume we all exude, the smell of a lust for power. Nearly all humans
drift our way when they have a real taste of it. It is modified
by a light and refreshing touch of vanity and the scent of fear.
Spoiling all that is the odor of the fire of the Changer's hateful
sanctity. That should be enough for us all to smell our way to
him." He laughed long and riotously, peal after peal multiplying the terror in John's heart. "Who would have believed it?
Who could have credited it? The Sword Bearer-fulfiller of
prophecy and destroyer of my tower-oh, fool that he is!-has
flown like a fly into my web, a web that was never even planned
with him in mind!"

It would be impossible to describe the depth of horror that
gripped John, a horror against which the Mashal Stone gave
him no protection. It was a horror of the blackest kind, a horror
of being lost and undone, a horror that paralyzed him, leaving
him totally unable to move. His fate was sealed. His end was
upon him, and the folly was entirely his. He had been warned,
and he had ignored the warning.

Did he imagine the sounds? Or could he actually hear the
sniffing and snuffling in a wide circle all round him? What kind
of a fool had he been? There had been no need for him to
keep the Mashal Stone around his neck once the Habesh matmon had lost him. Why had he let his foolish vanity and desire
to play with the stone get the better of him?

The snuffling grew steadily nearer. He knew he had a body
now, for he could feel the hair at the back of his head coming
erect. He could also smell his own sweat and feel it trickle coldly
down his back. He wanted to scream, but he tightened his
throat and pressed his lips together. He knew that he should
be groping for the stone rose, and pressing it so as to escape.
But he could not move a muscle.

They were almost upon him, the snuffling so strong that it
seemed to draw the breath out of his lungs. In desperation, he
released his knees and flung his head back, fighting for air. As he did so his head struck the rose and the door swung backward behind him so that he tumbled through it, rolling and
tumbling down the stairs.

Blue light was about him again, and it was as though he came
to his senses. He pulled himself to his feet and looked up
toward the door, screaming at what he saw. An obscene thing
was following him through the door-a browny-pink living
thing that was still sniffing and snuffling as it shuffled down the
steps toward him. It was an extension of something, the rest of
the something remaining in the temple-a proboscis of some
sort as far as he could tell. It was much bigger and thicker than
an elephant's trunk, and in any case there were slobbering lips
on its lower surface. And it was after him, inhaling and sucking,
pulling him into itself in the same way a vacuum whisks up dust.
He found himself being picked up by the air around him and
dragged toward the flaring nostrils and mucus-dripping lips.

In rage and terror he snatched the sword from its scabbard
and hacked wildly at it. There came a scream and immediately,
at the first stroke of the sword, it retracted with unbelievable
speed back into the temple. The door slammed behind it and
John was alone on the blue-lit stairway.

But he did not wait to luxuriate in relief. Instead he ran on
trembling legs down to where the steps broadened, and then
faced the outer wall. In a shaky, high-pitched voice he cried, "I
come to the hiding places in the name of Gaal!" Instantly the
staircase was gone, and he was inside a tunnel of rock, almost
in darkness, the light from widely spaced oil lamps seeming like
tiny stars in the distance. He pulled the chain from around his
neck, and sank to his haunches shivering with the incredible
cold that still gripped his body.

He knew where he was. Fifteen minutes walk along the tunnels would bring him to the widow Illith's chamber. But he
seemed to have no will to move. An unnatural exhaustion
sapped his strength and made him long to lie down and sleep. The burst of energy with which he had attacked the snuffling
proboscis had forsaken him. The same torpor that had plagued
him in the temple still seemed to suck the strength from his will
and from his limbs. For several minutes he struggled against it,
then rose unsteadily to his feet.

Shivering and filled with dread he stumbled along rock-lined
tunnels, forcing himself to take one step after another. The
fifteen minutes seemed like an eternity. From time to time he
would pass other followers of Gaal, for the tunnels were a city
within a city. Some would stare at him and say, "You are ill,
brother! Let us aid you."

But John would reply, "I'm O.K, thanks. I'm going to the
widow Illith's chamber." Had he turned he would have seen
them staring after him with concern on their faces.

At last one man refused to leave him, holding him gently by
the arm, and watching his faltering steps carefully. And when
they arrived, he opened the trap door that led down to the
widow's chamber, calling down to her, "Help him down the
steps, Widow. The darkness is upon him-the darkness of the
Circle. It seems that death itself is fingering his heart."

But it was Eleanor who leaped up the steps to guide him,
shocked by what she saw. "Widow-pull back the covers on the
bed in the wall. There's something terribly wrong with him."

Thereafter his recollections grew confused. He remembered
the widow Illith looking down at him and muttering, "It is the
darkness. It is all through him. Where has he been?"