Hiero Desteen (Omnibus) (42 page)

Coldly, never relaxing his struggle to be free, yet to the outward eye simply standing still and peering forward, he watched the eyeless bulk glide toward him. The creature was far larger than he had realized when seen at a distance. The soft, plush mound towered far above his head, and the long rods which sprang from it, each tipped with that poisonous orange glow, were at least four times the length of his own body. It paused and then came on again, though more slowly. All the long rods were aquiver, their lengths rigid and yet soft, as soft as the purple pile surface of the unearthly shape. Now it was just in front of him, blotting out the view of all beyond. He breathed a prayer and also continued the struggle without a second's hesitation, wrenching his mind about its strange, invisible prison as an eel hurls itself against its woven willow trap, without success perhaps, yet never giving up.

Unflinching thus, he faced his doom and so he saw the horror struck down, even as it reared over him.

The blazing crossbow bolt had barely sunk to the feathers, deep into the pulpy flesh, when another followed, burying itself not a foot away from the first. Slimmer, longer arrows came in a sheet after that, each one with flaming tow tied tightly to the shaft. One of the most ancient devices of man, the fire arrow, was being used against a hell creature spawned out of science-wrought cataclysm and devastation.

Over his head, the rain of burning arrows continued, and he realized that Luchare and Brother Aldo must have brought the tree women to their aid, conquering somehow their fear of the blight.

The slime mold reared up and shook in its agony, and for an instant Hiero thought it would fall upon and slay him in its death throes. Fire ran in coruscating runnels down its rounded, shifting sides and leaped into blazing light on the phosphorescent pseudo-pod ends, the clean light of honest fire burning out the poisonous phosphorescence by which the thing slew its prey.

At this moment, the mind control vanished. The House, unnerved by this sudden and unexpected onslaught, released its prisoners. No less alert than Hiero, Gorm instantly turned on his own stout length and scuttled for his life, the warrior-priest racing hard on his furry heels. In a few seconds they had reached and passed the clean wood's edge. In an instant more, Hiero again was squeezing the life out of his dark love, while to her right and left, Aldo and Vilah-ree directed the dryad archers as they still launched their blazing shafts out into the territory claimed by the House, Gorm promptly sat down and began to lick himself.

Satisfied that Luchare was unharmed (and that so was he), Hiero turned to look back, still keeping one arm firmly about the D'alwah girl's shoulders. It was a wonderful and awful sight.

The ravening molds and fungi of the blight all shared one terrible weakness. How the House had guarded its territory from chance lightning, Hiero could not imagine, but it must have had some method, for now the whole border of the foul infection was ablaze. Fire wrapped the scorched body of the giant, predatory slime mold, now writhing feebly in its death agony. But yellow flames raced over the ground, smeared and barren as well and bloomed on the mushroom forest, causing the great, stalked umbrellas to explode as the heat scorched them. The colossal puffball in the middle foreground exploded as the fire struck it, and each tiny spore became an instant coal, a second later a cinder mote. The great, murdered trees became living candles of flame as they too burned, from the caught fire of the shrouding growths which had slain them. Black, greasy smoke, foul and reeking with all the unpleasant scents of the burning fungi, wreathed the scene and began to drift into the forest beyond, where it met and drowned the perfumes of the wood.

Hiero looked at Vilah-ree anxiously.
Is your wood dry? Will the fire spread?

Better to burn than be killed by that,
was her answer.
But the forest is moist. Only two nights ago it rained. And we know how to keep water moving through the ground, my people and I.
She did not elaborate and turned away to watch the holocaust of the blight. He could sense the exaltation in her almost inhuman mind and spirit as the enemy of her beloved trees and her strange people suffered the flames.

As dusk grew, though occasionally choking and coughing, they still watched the destruction of the foul growth from their vantage point at the forest's edge. When night came, the smoke and filthy vapors hid most of the stars; but at length, when the moon rose, there came a breeze out of the north, which drove much of the shroud away before it out into the waste. To their surprise, no fire was now visible in the distance.

"Do you think it raced through the whole area that quickly?" Hiero was frankly puzzled. Aldo looked thoughtful.

"No, I think not, not from what you have told me. And there is the question of the lightning, which we discussed also. I'd judge this House creature had found a way of quenching the fires and has withdrawn, hurt perhaps, but not dead. We won't know until morning how far the fires actually went. So let's wait, or rather, rest while we can."

Soon all three humans were wrapped in cloaks and bedded down on the soft moss under a clump of fern. The bear was already-snoring a few yards away. As he drifted off into slumber, Hiero's last thought was of Vilah-ree, watching the stars as the smoke cleared. Once, through half-shut lids, he saw her watching him as well, her lovely face seemingly chiseled from alabaster under the moon's rays. Then he fell asleep.

His dreams were vague and formless for a long time; then— slowly they began to take a shape, to tell a story, half still a dream, half lovely reality, but all enchantment. He was awake in the dream, walking through the darkling woods under the pale stars, all alone. Nothing menaced him and he carried no weapons. Indeed, he wore no clothes and seemed to need none. Great fireflies lit his way, and patches of pale, luminous blossoms seemed to mark a path for him under the shadow of the vast trees. On and on through the titan forest he seemed to drift. He was going somewhere, but where he knew not, save only that journey's ending meant delight. Enticing scents both followed and led him on the breeze.

At length, in a moss-hung bower under the arching branches, he caught a glimpse of an ivory form. He sped toward it, calling out, only to have it flee. But from a few yards away rang out a rippling chorus of golden notes, questing, calling, mocking.

"Vilah-ree," he called, or seemed to, "Vilah-ree! Don't be afraid! Don't leave me." Again the golden-throated notes, the song or speech of some magicked paradise bird, rang out. Driven now by burning desire, Hiero followed down the aisles of the moonlit forest, his feet seeming to have wings, seeking nothing but the maker of the song, oblivious to all else.

Now he glimpsed her poised tiptoe on a low branch, next a marble arm beckoned from a fern thicket, but always when he pursued, she would be gone.

Yet he seemed in the dream to grow in strength, not weaken; and at length, in a tiny, open glade, where short-stemmed flowers made a soft carpet of the floor, the dancing white form seemed to falter and even stumbled as she fled from him. The next instant he had caught and held her. In the strange, green eyes now raised to his, he saw such a storm of passion that almost, for it was but a dream, he woke in fear. Then his own fires flared again and he covered her soft lips with his own, crushing the cold, slim body to him, forgetting everything except the miracle of desire.

And so the dream went and so the dream ended, for Hiero lost the thread, and all the lovely images and feelings went swirling and dissolving, down into oblivion.

It was mid-morning when he awoke. To his surprise, his first sight on opening his eyes was Captain Gimp, standing and bellowing at some of his men to "look alive there, you binnacle-butted slop-eaters."

Peering around, the priest saw that only a few of the tree women were in sight, standing together against the far side of the clearing. There was no sign of Vilah-ree, and he sighed, remembering his dream. But all of the seamen were mustering before him, looking well and hearty, as Blutho and Gimp shouted and bullydamned them into place. And Klootz was snorting nearby, tethered to a stump.
Hello, you big clown,
his master sent, eyeing the great, polished antlers and sleek hide appreciatively,
have a good rest?
A wave of affection came from the bull's mind in answer, affection and a wordless question which was still very clear to Hiero. When do we leave, when do we go, when do we fight, move, get on with the struggle? All these sentiments welled from the mind of the morse and he snorted loudly, pawing the soft earth into great clods.

"I see our big friend wants to leave. Have you had enough sleep, or at least some sweet dreams?" Brother Aldo stood smiling down at him, having quietly come out from the forest behind.

"Where's Luchare, and the bear too?" Hiero got up and stretched, still feeling curiously though not unpleasantly tired despite his long sleep.

"I believe she and Gorm were invited and went for a little visit to Vilah-ree. They should be back soon. As you can see, the seamen and Klootz are in fine fettle. The men think they got drunk and have just waked up, and I have not disillusioned them. I did, however, mention that the tree women were not to be touched, being under a protective spell which would kill anyone who did so. It seems to have proved effective. Curiously, the men appear satiated and uninterested in women. Odd for sailors, wouldn't you say?" Hiero looked suspiciously at the old man, but Aldo met his eyes frankly, his high cheekbones gleaming darkly over the spotless white beard.

"What shall we do now?" Aldo went on, changing the subject. "Would you like to see the waste where the fire killed the fungus plague? I have some ideas about the next move, but I'd like yours as well. Why not have a bit to eat first, though?"

The men greeted Hiero boisterously and obscenely as he picked up some cold rations and beckoned Gimp to follow him. They all felt they were living in some strange and incomprehensible world to which he was the only sure guide, and they felt fine as long as they could see him and his companions, meaning the girl, the Sage, the bear, and the bull morse, all well and ready for anything.

"What's going on here, Master Hiero?" Gimp asked as they picked their way to a burned-over mound where a forest giant had fallen in flames the previous night. From this eminence, whence tiny curls of acrid smoke still rose into the sunlight, they looked out over the late battlefield.

Far away, rolling and undulating, the land stretched, blackened now and scorched by the cleansing flames. But in the remote distance, yet well before the crags and lofty sand dunes of the desert proper, the fire had come to a halt. Even with unaided eyes, they could see that the strident ochers, repellent mauves, and sickly orange hues of the House's crop were still in existence. From a quick glance around, Hiero figured that the House somehow had saved about a third of its realm. He pulled out his far-looker and adjusted the lenses, The edge of the fired area was five miles off at least.

The House indeed had possessed a trick in reserve, he soon saw, and as he saw, described it to the others. Gimp had been brought up to date earlier by old Aldo, so that he needed only a limited amount of explanation.

As the fire had raged down upon its lair, the House had somehow forced its brood of fungi (perhaps a special breed) to exude a gummed foam of sticky bile, which hardened on contact with the air. Whatever the stuff was, it must have been completely fireproof. Now a ragged, brownish wall of it, something like congealed glue, glazed over and pitted with holes and bubbles, formed a rampart between the toadstool forest beyond and the burned lands. Here and there in the latter, smoke curled, mostly from vast, still-smoldering logs, but the main fire showed no sign of reviving. Barren though the aspect now was, Hiero felt it to be far more cheerful than the realm of the House when that was flourishing. His mind could detect no sensation of the monster, but he knew from experience that meant nothing.

Now he could see, looking to right and left, that small parties of the tree women, armed with blazing torches, were setting" fire to any small bits of the blight which the fire of yesterday had missed, chiefly on the edge of the true forest itself. No seed of that filth was to survive if they could help it!

The day was becoming overcast, with a hint of rain to come in storm clouds building towers far to the south. As they left the mound, they speculated on the chance of carrying fire further into the territory of the House and what that vileness might do in retaliation if further provoked.

"I don't think it's at the end of its resources, frankly," Hiero said.

"Indeed not, if what you tell of its strength is true, and also what I could feel of the mental barrier it was able to erect between us. How I hate to leave a wicked, unnatural thing like that alive. In a few years, perhaps even less, it will attack again, and we will not be here to save these women and their tree world the next time."

"Have you asked where the tree women's men are?" Hiero said, his mind off on a tangent.

"No, and if I had, I'm sure the answers would have satisfied no one. These strange, lovely creatures have a secret. Perhaps their males are very ugly, perhaps timid, or perhaps the women dominate them so, they are never allowed out in public. Why not simply accept it and not waste time on profitless speculation? They seem to be our friends at any rate."

"Yes." Hiero sighed. "But I had a strange dream, strange but beautiful. It was—" He ceased suddenly, for Gimp was looking at him oddly and had stopped walking.

"Did your dream have one of them white-skinned gals in it, now, Master Hiero? just you and her maybe? A
real
nice dream?"

"As a matter of fact, yes." Hiero was too old to blush, but he felt embarrassed. "How did you guess that, Gimp?"

"Because me and Blutho and all of the boys, mark you, even old Skelk, who's a bleeding grandfather, we all had the same dream. Each one of us had just one gal, see, and all to ourselves. Nicest dream we ever had, we all agrees. And do you know, none of them naked wenches will even talk to us this morning! How's that for a peculiar situation, eh?" His snub-nosed face looked both pleased and regretful.