Tales of the Dying Earth (44 page)

“Only in a broad sense,” replied the old man. “You may not tally this man to your account; if justice were absolute you and he would fulfill my score; did not my parchments bring you to the cave?”

“But not within!” declared Fabeln. “Here lies the careful distinction which must be made! The rat-folk concur, and hence you have not been released.”

“In this case,” said Cugel, “I hereby claim you as an item upon my score, since I sent you into the cave to test the circumstances to be encountered.”

Fabeln shrugged. “This is a matter you must take up with the rat-folk.” He frowned and blinked his small eyes. “Why should I not claim myself as a credit to my own account? It is a point worth asserting.”

“Not so, not so,” came a shrill voice from behind a grate. “We tally only those items provided after impoundment. Fabeln is tallied to no one's account. He however is adjudged one item: namely, the person of Cugel. Zaraides has a score of null.”

Cugel felt the collar at bis neck. “What if we fail to provide two items?”

“A month is your tune; no more. If you fail in this month, you are devoured.”

Fabeln spoke in a voice of sober calculation. “I believe that I am as good as free. At no great distance my daughter waits. She is suddenly impatient with wild leeks and hence redundant to my household. It is fitting that by her agency I am released.” And Fabehi nodded with ponderous satisfaction.

“It will be interesting to watch your methods,” Cugel remarked. “Precisely where is she to be found and how will she be summoned?”

Fabeln's expression became both cunning and rancorous. “I tell you nothing! If you wish to tally items, devise the means yourself!”

Zaraides gestured to a board where lay strips of parchment. “I tie persuasive messages to winged seeds, which are then liberated into the forest. The method is of questionable utility, luring passersby to the mouth of the cave, but enticing them no further. I fear that I have only five days to live. If only I had my Hbrams, my folios, my work-books! What spells, what spells! I would rive this warren end to end; I would convert each of these man-rodents into a blaze of green fire. I would punish Fabeln for cheating me.... Hmmm. The Gyrator? Lug-wiler's Dismal Itch?”

“The Spell of Forlorn Encystment has its advocates,” Cugel suggested.

Zaraides nodded. “The idea has much to recommend it.... But this is an idle dream: my spells were snatched away and conveyed to some secret place.”

Fabeln snorted and turned aside. From behind the grate came a shrill admonition: “Regrets and excuses are poor substitutes for items upon your score. Emulate Fabeln! Already he boasts one item and plans a second on the morrow! This is the sort we capture by choice!”

“I captured him!” asserted Cugel. “Have you no probity? I sent him into the cave; he should be credited to my account!”

Zaraides cried out in vehement protest. “By ho means! Cugel distorts the case! If pure justice were done, both Cugel and Fabeln should be tallied to my score!”

“All is as before!” called out the shrill voice.

Zaraides threw up his hands and went to writing parchments with furious zeal, Fabeln hunched himself on a stool and sat in placid reflection. Cugel, in crawling past, kicked a leg from the stool and Fabeln fell to the floor. He rose and sprang at Cugel, who threw the stool at him.

“Order!” called the shrill voice. “Order or penalties will be inflicted!”

“Cugel dislodged the stool, to send me sprawling,” complained Fabeln. “Why is he not punished?”

“The sheerest mischance.” stated Cueel. “In my opinion the irascible Fabeln should be placed incommunicado, for at least two, or more properly, three weeks.”

Fabeln began to sputter, but the shrill voice behind the grate enjoined an impartial silence upon all.

Food was presently brought, a coarse porridge of offensive odor. After the meal all were forced to crawl to a constricted burrow on a somewhat lower level, where they were chained to the wall. Cugel fell into a troubled sleep, to be awakened by a call through the door to Fabeln: “The message has been delivered — it was read with great attention.”

“Good news!” came Fabeln's voice. “Tomorrow I shall walk the forest a free man!”

“Silence,” croaked Zaraides from'the dark. “Must I daily write parchments for everyone's benefit but my own, only to lie awake by night to your vile gloating?”

“Ha ha!” chortled Fabeln. “Hear the voice of the ineffectual wizard!”

“Alas for my lost librams!” groaned Zaraides. “You would sing a vastly different tune!”

“In what quarter are they to be found?” inquired Cugel cautiously.

“As to that, you must ask these foul murids; they seized me unawares.”

Fabeln raised his head to complain. “Do you intend to exchange reminiscences the whole night through? I wish to sleep.”

Zaraides, infuriated, began to upbraid Fabeln in so violent a manner that the rat-folk ran into the burrow and dragged him away, leaving Cugel and Fabeln alone.

In the morning Fabeln ate his porridge with great rapidity. “Now then,” he called to the grating, “detach this collar, that I may go forth to summon the second of my tallies, Cugel being the first.”

“Bah,” muttered Cugel. “Infamous!”

The rat-folk, paying no heed to Fabeln's protests, adjusted the collar even more tightly around his neck, affixed the chain and pulled him forth on hands and knees, and Cugel was left alone.

He tried to sit erect, but the damp dirt pressed on his neck, and he slumped back down on his elbows. “Cursed rat-creatures! Somehow I must evade them! Unlike Fabeln, I have no household to draw from, and the efficacy of Zaraides' parchments is questionable.... Conceivably, however, others may wander close, in the fashion, of Fabeln and myself.” He turned to the gate, behind which sat the sharp-eyed monitor. “In order to recruit the required two items, I wish to wait outside the cave.”

“This is permitted,” announced the monitor. “Supervision must of course be rigid.”

“Supervision is understandable,” agreed Cugel. “I request however that the chain and collar be removed from my neck. With a constraint so evident, even the most credulous will turn away.”

“There is something in what you say,” admitted the monitor. “But what is there to prevent you from taking to your heels?”

Cugel gave a somewhat labored laugh. “Do I seem one to betray a trust? Further, why should I do so, when I can easily procure tally after tally for my score?”

“We shall make certain adjustments.” A moment later a number of the rat-folk swarmed into the burrow. The collar was loosened from Cugel's neck, his right leg was seized and a silver pin driven through his ankle, to which, while Cugel called out in anguish, a chain was secured.

“The chain is now inconspicuous,” stated one of his captors. “You may now stand before the cave and attract passers-by as best you may.”

Still groaning in pain, Cugel crawled up through the burrow and into the cave-mouth, where Fabeln sat, a chain about his neck, awaiting the arrival of his daughter. “Where do you go?” he asked suspiciously.

“I go to pace before the cave, to attract passers-by and direct them within!”

Fabeln gave a sour grunt, and peered off through the trees.

Cugel went to stand before the cave-mouth. He looked in all directions, then gave a melodious call. “Does anyone walk near?”

He received no reply, and began to pace back and forth, the chain jingling along the ground.

Movement through the trees: the flutter of yellow and green cloth, and here came Fabeln's daughter, carrying a basket and an axe. At the sight of Cugel she paused, then hesitantly approached. “I seek Fabeln, who has requested certain articles.”

“I will take them,” said Cugel, reaching for the axe, but the rat-folk were alert and hauled him quickly back into the cave. “She must place the axe on that far rock,” they hissed into Cugel's ear. “Go forth and so inform her.”

Cugel limped forth once more. The girl looked at him in puzzlement. “Why did you leap back in that fashion?”

“I will tell you,” said Cugel, “and it is an odd matter, but first you must place your basket and axe on that rock yonder, where the true Fabeln will presently arrive.”

From within the cave came a mutter of angry protest, quickly stifled.

“What was that sound?” inquired the girl.

“Do with the axe as I require, and I will make all known.”

The girl, puzzled, took axe and basket to the designated spot, then returned. “Now, where Js Fabeln?”

“Fabeln is dead,” said Cugel. “His body is currently possessed by a malicious spirit; do not on any grounds heed it: this is my warning.”

At this Fabeln gave a great groan, and called from the cave. “He lies, he lies. Come hither, into the cavel”

Cugel held up a hand in restraint. “By no means. Be cautious!”

The girl peered in wonder and fear toward the cave, where now Fabeln appeared, making the most earnest gesticulations. The girl drew back. “Come, come!” cried Fabeln. “Enter the cave!”

The girl shook her head, and Fabeln in a fury attempted to tear loose his chain. The rat-folk dragged him hastily back into the shadows, where Fabeln fought so vigorously the rat-folk were obliged to kill him and drag his body back into the burrow.

Cugel listened attentively, then turned to the girl and nodded. “All is now well. Fabeln left certain valuables in my care; if you will step within the cave, I will relinquish them to you.”

The girl shook her head in bewilderment “Fabeln owned nothing of value!”

“Be good enough to inspect the objects.” Cugel courteously motioned her to the cave. She stepped forward, peered within, and instantly the rat-folk seized her and dragged her down into the burrow.

“This is item one on my score,” called Cugel within. “Do not neglect to record it!”

“The tally is duly noted,” came a voice from within. “One more such and you go free.”

The remainder of the day Cugei paced back and forth before the cave, looking this way and that through the trees, but saw no one. At nightfall he was drawn back into the cave and pent in the low-level burrow where he had passed the previous night. Now it was occupied by Fabeln's daughter. Naked, bruised, vacant-eyed, she stared at him fixedly. Cugel attempted an exchange of conversation, but she seemed bereft of speech.

The evening porridge was served. While Cugel ate, he watched the girl surreptitiously. She was by no means uncomely, though now bedraggled and soiled. Cugel crawled closer, but the odor of the rat-folk was so strong that his lust diminished, and he drew back.

During the night there was furtive sound in the burrow: a scraping, scratching, grating sound. Cugel, blinking sleepily, raised on an elbow, to see a section of the floor tilt stealthily ajar, allowing a seep of smoky yellow light to play on the girl. Cugel cried out; into the burrow rushed rat-folk carrying tridents, but it was too late: the girl had been stolen.

The rat-folk were intensely angry. They raised the stone, screamed curses and abuse into the gap. Others poured into the hole, with further vituperation. One aggrievedly explained the situation to Cugel. “Other beings live below; they cheat us at every turn. Someday we will exact revenge; our patience is not inexhaustible! This night you must sleep elsewhere lest they make another sortie.” He loosened Cugel's chain, but now was called by those who cemented the hole in the floor.

Cugel moved quietly to the entrance, and when the attention of all were distracted he slipped out into the passage. Gathering up the chain, he crawled in that direction which he thought led to the surface, but encountering a side-passage became confused. The tunnel turned downward and, becoming narrow, constricted his shoulders; then it diminished in height, pressing down on him from above, so that he was forced to writhe forward, jerking himself by his elbows.

His absence was discovered; from behind caine squeals of rage, as the rat-folk rushed this way and that.

The passage made a sharp twist, at an angle into which Cugel found it impossible to twist his body. Writhing and jerking, he squeezed himself into a new posture, and now could no. longer move. He exhaled and with eyes starting from his head, lunged about and up, and drew himself into a passage more open. In a niche he came upon a fire-ball, which he carried with him.

The rat-folk were approaching, screaming injunctions. Cugel thrust himself into a side-passage which opened into a store-room. The first objects to meet his eye were his sword and pouch.

The rat-folk rushed into the room with tridents. Cugel hacked and slashed and drove them squealing back into the corridor. Here they gathered, darting back and forth, calling shrill threats in at Cugel. Occasionally one would rush forward to gnash its teeth and flourish its trident, but when Cugel killed two of these, they drew back to confer in low tones.

Cugel took occasion to thrust certain heavy cases against the entrance, thus affording himself a moment's respite.

The rat-folk pressed forward, kicking and shoving. Cugel thrust his blade through a chink, eliciting a wail of intense distress.

One spoke: “Cugel, come forth! We are a kindly folk and bear no malice. You have one item upon your score, and shortly no doubt will secure another, and thus go free. Why discommode us all? There is no reason why, in an essentially inconvenient relationship, we should not adopt an attitude of camaraderie. Come forth, then, and we will provide meat for your morning porridge.”

Cugel spoke politely. “At the moment I am too distraught to think clearly. Did I hear you say that you planned to set me free without further charge or difficulty?”

There was a whispered conversation in the corridor, then came the response. “There was indeed a statement to that effect. You are hereby declared free, to come and go as you wish. Unblock the entrance, cast down your sword, and come forth!”

“What guarantee can you offer me?” asked Cugel, listening intently at the blocked entrance.

There were shrill chattering whispers, then the reply: “No guarantee is necessary. We now retire. Come forth, walk along the corridor to your freedom.”

Cugel made no response. Holding aloft the fire-ball, he turned to inspect the store-room, which contained a great store of articles of clothing, weapons and tools. In that bin which he had pushed against the entrance he noticed a group of leather-bound librams. On the face of the first was printed: