Here, Conan.
Behind the beautiful plants just ahead of
you.
Come to me and I shall fulfill your every desire. Pleasure beyond
any you have ever known.
Conan blinked. So brazen! He had never known even a trull who so blatantly
offered herself to him.
The big Cimmerian glanced at Elashi. No doubt she would not find this
woman’s call so appealing, and Conan expected to hear of her displeasure
quickly and in full measure. But no, Elashi seemed to be caught up in her own
thoughts, staring off at the plants as if she could not hear the woman calling
to them. Even as he watched, Elashi took a step toward the Webspinners.
Then, next to him, Tull also started forward.
Abruptly, Conan felt a sense of wrongness about that voice.
Fear not, mighty warrior
,
came
the soft
tones.
Do not concern yourself with these two. They will not come between
us. It is you I want, and you whom I shall serve in any manner you desire.
Elashi and Tull walked toward the pale carpet, ignoring each other.
“Hold a moment,” Conan called to his friends.
Neither slowed, and Conan knew that the shadow of danger lay upon them. That
voice—he had not heard it with his ears, but within his head! It was a trap of
some kind.
Conan drew his blued-iron sword and leaped forward.
“Tull!
Elashi!
Stop!”
The Harskeel and its men and bats moved through the narrow corridor. They
were of necessity strung out some distance since the bats could not fly were
they bunched too close together. If Red’s information held true, they would
shortly come upon Conan and his friends.
It was all the Harskeel could do to keep from laughing. It urged its men to
greater speed.
“There,” Wikkell said, pointing to the shore.
The dead fish bobbed slightly as it slowly spun along the edge of the
waterway. Now that he looked closer, Wikkell could see the indentations that
must have been carved by something other than the teeth of a predator.
The cyclops rowed the boat ashore. He and Deek exited the craft. “There
is almost no current in the water. They must be around here somewhere.”
“B-b-back
th-
the w-w-way w-we c-c-came?”
Deek suggested.
“That makes sense. We did not pass them beyond. Let us return to the
water. We can move much faster that way.”
“A-a-agreed.”
Conan’s protective reaction was somewhat shortsighted. He leaped past his
friends and turned to face them. “Hold!” he ordered, his voice
echoing in the quiet cave. But… what if they did not? What was he to do, cut
them down?
Fortunately, both Elashi and Tull seemed stunned by the force of Conan’s
shout. They stopped moving just as they reached the floor covering and shook
their heads, as if awakening from a dream.
Conan, pay these two no mind! I am waiting for you.
The heretofore velvet-toned voice seemed somewhat terse and irritated in
Conan’s mind.
“Move back,” Conan said. He looked down and noted that he now
stood on the strange overlay upon the stone floor.
Elashi screamed. “Conan!
Behind you!”
The big Cimmerian spun, sword raised, in time to see a pale and thick
green-tinted rope hurtling toward him. The cable flew true, but as it would
have draped itself over Conan’s shoulder, he swung the sharp iron and hit the
thing solidly. The hawser seemed as solid as wood, but the force of Conan’s
shoulders and arms drove the razor-edged sword; the rope sheared cleanly on
impact. The severed section brushed past, touching Conan’s wrist and tearing
away a patch of skin as it fell. He felt something sticky on his hand where the
rope had touched.
Elashi had drawn her own sword, and Tull his dagger, and all three strove to
move away from the danger. Another rope was launched—from a hole in the trunk
of the nearest plant, Conan saw—and then a third and a fourth.
“Quick, it’s some kind of web!” Conan said, scrambling to attain
the bare rock, as did Elashi, but Tull slipped on the smooth coating over the
floor and fell. As he did, one of the cast lines landed on him. The rope adhered
to Tull’s tunic as if a part of
it,
and the slack in
the cable vanished. Tull began to slide toward the plants.
Conan sprang toward the captured man and hewed downward with his blade,
catching the rope. It took two cuts to sever it.
In his mind, Conan heard:
Sisters! Aid me! These are the ones worth
months’ of food
. There was no seduction in that voice, only menace.
Five, six, a dozen more sticky ropes jetted toward the trio. Tull scrabbled
to his hands and knees and ran doglike away from the plants. Two of the ropes
flew past, missing him and Conan, and the Cimmerian realized that the floor
covering was of the same material as the lines and, as well, a measure of the
extent of the lines’ reach. He darted past Tull, scooped him up with one arm,
and leaped for the closest patch of bare rock. One of the ropes tore a leather
scrap from his boot, but then they were out of range.
“Gods all!”
Elashi said.
The three stared at the plants.
Wait
, came that too-sweet voice to Conan again.
This is all a
mistake. Come to me and feel the depths of pleasure
.
Conan looked at Elashi. “Do you hear that?”
She nodded. “The powerful voice of a desert chief,” she said.
“Asking me to be his bride and firstwife.”
Conan glanced at Tull. “And what do you hear?”
“A wench who would render me unconscious with her lusts,” Tull
said.
Conan nodded. He understood it now. The plants emitted some kind of lure to
attract victims. Those so attracted would no doubt become sustenance for the
plants in short order.
No
,
came
the voice.
You are not to be
eaten. Believe us
.
“I think not,” Conan said. He turned back to his friends.
“Best we go back and find another route.”
But as the trio turned to go back the way they had come, a bat chittered and
swooped out of the tunnel toward them. After a moment more bats followed, and
there came the cries of men.
Conan shook his head and raised his sword. Was there no end to this madness?
It was Deek who spotted the exits from the cavern. Wikkell angled in toward
the shore, beached the craft, and he and Deek alighted.
“Th-they m-m-must h-have g-g-gone th-there.”
“What makes you so certain?”
“L-l-look.”
Wikkell quickly noted what the worm was indicating. The shore, such that it
was, virtually disappeared a short distance past the three holes in the rock
above them, leaving a sheer cliff face dropping straight into the water. They
would have to have the agility of flies to stick to that wall. If their prey
had truly come this way, the only method left to them would be to swim a
considerable distance, and Wikkell did not think that likely. They had not
gotten this far by being particularly stupid.
“Aye.
But which hole?”
“O-o-one i-is a-as g-g-good a-a-as a-another.”
Wikkell nodded.
“The one to the right, then?”
“W-w-why n-not?”
The climb was fairly easy for Wikkell, but it took a bit longer for Deek.
When they finally attained the orifice, Wikkell noted that it was rather dark
within.
“I shall go back down and scrape up some glow-fungus.”
“N-n-no n-need.
I c-c-can
s-s-see w-w-well e-enough.”
“I shall follow your lead, then.”
The two of them entered the passage.
Bad luck rode the wings of the first four bats to swoop at Conan. The first
attacker became two half bats as he was split lengthwise by the Cimmerian’s
blade. The second and third bats pulled out of their dives to avoid the deadly
sword, but in so doing, they flew within range of the plants and their sticky
lines; the plants wasted no time in snaring the hapless bats in their ropes.
The fourth bat managed a tight turn, grinning as he avoided a line cast by the
Webspinners. The grin disappeared as Conan slashed again, removing the bat’s
head from its shoulders. The hurtling body sailed into the first pikeman to
arrive, knocking him flat.
Elashi and Tull cut with their own weapons. Conan had time to see Tull open
the belly of a bat and Elashi’s steel take the wing and leg of another.
The racket smote Conan’s ears: screaming bats, yelling men, the hiss of
plant ropes thrown through the dank air. Even so, he grinned. This was
something he could deal with, a direct threat, and it was far better to meet an
enemy face-on than to continue skulking about in these blasted caves forever.
With that, Conan stepped forward and whipped his blade back and forth at the
next wave of bats.
One of the pikemen charged toward Tull and Elashi, pike extended to impale
them. Conan smiled as he saw his two friends leap aside, except that Tull stuck
his foot out and tripped the attacker. The unfortunate man stumbled and managed
to keep his footing but only after he had run a good dozen overbalanced paces
onto the silken floor covering. A pair of sticky ropes flew and connected with
the pikeman. Plant food he
was,
and nobody’s fault
save his own.
No time to think about that. Back to the business at hand!
The Harskeel was altogether enraged: two of its men were down; the other two
hopped around like dancers, failing to engage the barbarian and his friends;
and the bats were dropping like cut wheat. The Harskeel had drawn its own
blade, but it felt no confidence in its men or the bumbling bats. Time for
magic, it decided, and quickly!
In the Harskeel’s belt pouch were two glass vials: one was of shroud powder,
the other of sundust. Tossed against a hard surface, the former would explode
into pitch blackness, the latter into brilliant light. Were the Harskeel to use
the sundust here in the cave, that brightness would certainly blind any who
gazed upon it. Conan and the other two would be easier to deal with were they
sightless.
The Harskeel pulled the vial from its belt and raised it for the throw. They
must be looking in its direction for the magic to work, so attention must be
paid.
“Conan!” the Harskeel screamed.
Hearing his name, the barbarian glanced away from the bat he had just cut
down. The sound of its voice calling Conan also drew looks from the man and
woman next to him. Good!
The Harskeel threw the vial.
On the
Sunless
Sea
,
Katamay Rey felt a disturbance in the air. It was a distance ahead, but he was
certain that it concerned his quest. To his bearers he said, “Faster! Your
best speed!”
The two
cyclopes
who carried him complied. Because
the dock created never-ending extensions of
itself
at
whatever the speed of its occupants, the party began to move at a run, a pace
considerably faster than any man could manage.
Chuntha stopped her living raft at a turning in the waterway and stepped
ashore. She moved to the cover of a boulder half eaten away by water dripping
from the far ceiling, and peeped around the rock to see how far ahead Rey’s
party had moved. She expected to see him no more than a short distance away,
but she was surprised. The wizard had gained considerably; more, he and his
one-eyed trolls now moved at more than twice the speed he had been traveling at
earlier. Sensha curse him! What was he up to now?
The witch ran back to her raft and increased the turning of the screw that
powered her craft. Whatever he had in mind, she would not be left behind!
The raft of worms churned out into the waterway and moved rapidly around the
turning.
“M-m-may all
th-
the g-gods D-d-damn!”
“What is it?”
The giant worm halted his slither and spoke to Wikkell. “I-it’s a-a
d-d-dead e-end,” he said.
“Th-the p-p-passage
n-n-narrows j-just a-a-ahead.”
“Is there no alternate passage?”
“N-n-none.”
“Well, Misha curse it. We will have to go back and try the next
passage.”
“L-l-let u-us h-h-hurry.”
Indeed, Wikkell thought, let us do precisely that.
The vial that the Harskeel tossed flew through the air to smash against the
rock exactly where it had aimed. The Harskeel closed its eyes and further
covered them with an arm in anticipation of the blinding flash. One, two,
three, that should do it!
But when the Harskeel jerked its arm down and opened its eyes, what greeted
it was blackness as thick as cold tar.
Curse all the gods! It had thrown the wrong damned vial!
The cave suddenly went black, and Conan spun about in wonder. That creature,
the Harskeel, had tossed something at the floor that must be the cause of the
instant night.
But… why?
It was magic, right enough,
and potent, but how could darkness favor the Harskeel?
Conan did not want to wait around to find out. He whispered.
“Elashi!
Tull!”
“Here,” Elashi whispered back.
“And here,” Tull said.
“Move toward me. I think I can lead us past them.”
There was considerable thrashing about in the darkness as various beings
tried to move without hitting a wall or each other. The bats had a certain
expertise, but even they must have relied somewhat upon their eyes. Conan heard
thumps as bats hit things in the curtain of night that had enveloped them.
“Conan?”
“Here, Elashi.”
The woman was very near, and Conan reached out and found her. His hand
touched her breast.