Vale of the Vole (40 page)

Then he snapped the fingers of his free hand. "What a fool I am!" he exclaimed.

"For waiting so long," the Bria close to him agreed.

"No," he said, invoking his magic.

"She fuzzed in outline, then reverted to Metria's form. "Curses, foiled again!" she exclaimed, disgusted, and vaporized.

Esk looked at Bria. "You never spoke!" he exclaimed.

"I knew you could distinguish between us if you wanted to," she said.

"I wanted to, but—" He shrugged. "Not the way you suggested."

"I know I shouldn't tease you like that! It could make trouble."

"Not anymore," he said. "Now that I've finally figured out the obvious."

"Your fleshly brains do seem rather inefficient at times."

"I'm insulted."

"Then I must apologize." She came to him and put her arms around him.

"No," he said.

She halted in place. "I wish you'd let me."

"Just making sure," he said. "You didn't dissolve into vapor, so you are the right one."

She nodded agreement, but still could not kiss him, because of his magic. So he kissed her instead.

The battle died down. The monsters were either tiring or running out of targets. "Do you think the demons have flown?" Bria asked.

"I don't trust them to give up so readily," he replied. "There must be some trick." But he couldn't think what it might be, because the demons certainly seemed gone.

The skeleton returned. "The action has died out everywhere," he reported. "The monsters have run out of demons."

"Give me your hand."

The skeleton extended his hand. "No," Esk said.

"I realize you don't trust this report, but that's the way it is," Marrow said uncomfortably.

"I know it is," Esk said. "I had a false skeleton come before, so I am verifying each."

"Oh, yes, of course. I had forgotten."

Chex and Latia were approaching. Esk touched each, using his magic, and each was genuine. There seemed to be no demon tricks.

"Maybe we had better verify this ourselves," Esk said.

"How can we do that?" Chex asked.

"Well, I can touch things to make sure they aren't demons, and I thought Latia might throw a curse. That could stir them up."

"I think it could," Latia agreed. "But I could verify only a limited region that way, and I have only two curses before I reach a blessing."

"That's my problem too," Esk said. "I can expose one demon at a time, but it would take forever to expose them all, and that wouldn't get rid of them anyway. So let's hope they're really gone."

They walked into the valley, to the nearest square governed by an ogre. The ogre stood and made a monstrous ham fist, ready to pulverize them.

"Oops, I hadn't thought of that," Esk said. "Of course it thinks we're demons pretending to be us."

"You stop the ogre, so I can get close enough to curse his territory," Latia suggested.

"Good enough."

When they reached the edge of the square, the ogre charged. "NoP* Esk said sharply.

The ogre, dully surprised, backed off. Latia stepped in and hurled her curse.

A rock, a bush, and a pile of dirt wavered and vaporized. In a moment three demons manifested, rubbing the regions of their posteriors. This was evidently where the curse had scored.

"Go to it, ogre!" Esk cried, as he and Latia scrambled back.

With a horrendous roar, the ogre grabbed at two demons and bashed their heads together, while stomping on the third. The demons, of course, dematerialized. But their cover had been blown.

"If any new objects appear in your territory, bash them!" Esk called to the ogre.

"Me see, hee hee!" the ogre agreed, stomping gleefully. Meaning had returned briefly to its life.

Chex sighed. "Obviously the demons haven't vacated. They are getting plenty of solid-time by concealing themselves as inert objects. They can't hurt us that way, but neither can we drive them out. I fear we are losing this campaign."

Esk nodded glumly. "Fortunately, we do have another resource. I had hoped we wouldn't have to use the wiggle swarm, but it seems we'll have to."

"I vuppove we alwayv knew it would come to thiv," Volney said. "Otherwive we would not have vet up for it."

"But it means that the voles remaining in the Vale will have to evacuate," Chex said. "They won't like that."

"We will do what is nevewary," Volney said grimly. "I will give the word now." He moved off to find his liaison.

"It seems ironic," Chex remarked, "that in order to save the Vale, we have to come close to destroying it."

"We seem pretty much like monsters ourselves," Bria said.

They proceeded dejectedly back toward their camp.

Chapter 16. Swarm

Wake, Esk!" Bria whispered urgently.

"Huh?" he asked dully, finding it dark. "What time is it?"

"Midnight, or thereabouts," she said. "Esk, I hear something."

He grabbed her hand. "No," he said.

"Oh, don't doubt me now!" she cried. "I'm the real brassie! Just listen."

She was solid, and did not vaporize at his challenge. He had been afraid that Metria was trying to fool him at night, when he couldn't see her. He listened.

There was a kind of distant roaring noise. "Maybe the ogres, on their way home," he said. For they had dismissed the ogres and winged monsters, knowing that their efforts could not after all dislodge the demons.

"Ogres make crashes, not sustained roars. That's something else."

"Maybe Marrow will know. He's been scouting around. He doesn't sleep any more than I do."

"Where is he?"

"Out there somewhere. Should we call him?"

The roaring seemed louder. "Yes." Esk put his hands to his mouth and called: "Marrow! Marrow!"

In a moment they heard the skeleton approaching. "You heard it?" Marrow asked.

Esk took his bone hand and verified his identity. "Yes. Do you know what it is?"

"It is water, and it is coursing this way. Is that significant?"

"Water? From where?"

"From the Kill-Mee River, obviously, or the Kill-Mee lake. That is the only significant source in this vicinity."

"But we are uphill from the Vale! How can the water be coming here?"

Chex stepped up; there was no mistaking her footfalls in the dark. "The demons must be doing it. They are good at channelizing; they may

have made a new channel that leads here, and boosted the water with a spell."

"But why?"

"My guess would be to get rid of us," she said. "We have caused them a lot of disturbance, and are planning more, so they may be launching a preemptive strike. I didn't think they had the organization for that, but it may be they do."

"You bet we do!" came Metria's voice. "We learned it from you. Too bad you woke up early."

"We'd better get out of here," Esk said.

"You'll break your legs, trying to run in the dark," the demoness said. "And if you don't run, you'll never escape it. We have a torrent coming! The whole of Lake Kill-Mee is pouring down here!"

"There is lowland all around," Marrow reported. "I believe she is correct; you cannot escape it in time. I am not threatened, of course, as I cannot drown, but the rest of you—"

"I cannot drown either," Bria said.

"Maybe we can throw up a barricade," Esk said, growing desperate.

"Fat chance, mortal," Metria said. "You've had it. My only regret is that you were too stupid to be seduced away from your stupid campaign."

Already the roaring was swelling to an alarming proportion. Water was surging along the lower channels to either side of the hillock they had camped on. "We've got to try!" Esk cried.

Then there was a new crashing. "Hoo, hee, where be?" Crunch's voice bellowed.

"Go away, you big ugly idiot!" Metria screamed.

"She nice too, demon shrew," the ogre bellowed back, pleased at the compliment. In a few more strides he arrived, his huge horny feet striking sparks from the groaning ground they hit. "It get wet, need help yet?"

'Take Volney to safety!" Esk cried, knowing that the vole, being lowest to the ground, was in the greatest immediate danger. Had there been more time, Volney might have tunneled down and made a closed-off chamber that would survive the torrent dry. But now he just had to be gotten away.

"Me roll, take vole," the ogre agreed. There was a sound as he found Volney in the dark and picked him up.

"Oh, phooey!" Metria exclaimed. "One's getting away!"

There was the sound of great wings, and a huge flying shape blotted out the few stars that dared to show their light on this awful night. "Squawk?"

"Sire!" Chex exclaimed. "Take Esk to safety!"

"No!" Esk cried. "Take Latia!" Because he knew that she was older and more frail than he.

Xap didn't argue. He found the curse fiend and got her mounted, then spread his wings and took off.

"Double phooey!" the demoness swore. "Two saved. But that's all, you fool; no other monsters are coming, so you're stuck!"

Indeed, the water was now attacking the hillock, gleefully gouging out chunks of it. By the sound, there was a great deal more coming. Marrow and Bria might survive the flood, being dead already, but Chex and Esk were in real trouble.

"Oh, how I wish I could fly!" the centaur cried over the almost deafening roar.

"I wish you could too!" Esk cried back. Then he had a notion. "Bria— could the accommodation spell make her able to fly?"

"It could make her able to mate with you, but that's all," Bria replied sadly. "Oh, Esk, I don't want to lose you!"

"Take my soul!" he screamed at her. "Take it before I lose it anyway!"

"No! That would only make me love you, and you'd be gone!"

"Then give it to me," Metria said. "No sense in wasting a serviceable soul."

Esk suggested that she do something with herself that perhaps only a demoness could manage; it would have turned a mortal inside out, or worse.

"Get on my back," Chex called. "I'll try to forge through the water."

"You'll never succeed, mule-mane!" the demoness screamed. "The water's too strong!"

Esk was sickly certain she was right, but he staggered through the shallow rushing water toward the centaur. "Where are you, Chex?"

"Here," she called back. Her swishing tail touched his right arm, which felt abruptly light.

He reached her and tried to mount, but the splashing water made her hide slippery. She had spread her wings for stability, and was flapping them, and the downdraft made it worse. He slid off with a splash.

"Try again," she urged. "Maybe Marrow or Bria can boost you." Her nervously switching tail caught him across the back.

Suddenly Esk felt impossibly light. He jumped—and leaped right over her back, landing with another splash on the other side.

"What's the matter?" she cried over the roar.

"I—I jumped over you!" he exclaimed, hardly believing it. "I feel so light!"

"That's true," Marrow said. "Her tail makes things light; I felt it when I rode her and it flicked me. I had forgotten."

"My tail makes things light?" Chex repeated, surprised.

"Chex!" Bria screamed, as Esk jumped again, more carefully, and made it to the centaur's back. "Flick yourself!"

"Why—" Chex said.

"That's right!" Esk said. "Your magic must be in your tail! It makes things light enough to fly! That must be why the biting bugs take off when you swish them."

Chex swatted herself with her tail. "Oh my goodness, I feel it! I feel it!" she screamed, delight overcoming her horror of the raging water. "I'm light—I think light enough to fly!"

"Take off!" Bria cried. "Marrow and I will be all right! Get into the sky!"

"Hang on!" Chex said, but Esk needed no warning; he was gripping her mane tightly.

She flapped her wings harder. Her body tilted, as if she were standing on her hind feet. Then it evened as her hind quarters lifted. They were airborne!

She continued to stroke strongly. Her body spun about in the air as it lifted, making Esk dizzy, but they were above the flood and therefore safe. "Just stay up!" he cried. "You don't need to go anywhere, just stay out of the water!"

"I wish I could see better!" she cried back. "I'm so afraid of crashing into something and falling!"

"Then fly straight up, toward the stars!" he replied. "You can see them!"

"Yes!" She pumped slowly on up. The roar of the water diminished slightly as they put distance between them and it. "But I am tiring!" she panted. "I've never flown before!"

"Call for help!" Esk recommended, not sure whether he was being facetious.

She took him literally. "Help!" she screamed.

There was an answering squawk in the distance.