Tales From the Vulgar Unicorn Part 5

After they'd recovered their wind, he said, 'You tread water while I go back. I want to see how far back this s.p.a.ce goes.'

She didn't have to wait long. She heard his swimming - she hoped it was his and not something else - and she called out softly when he was near.

He stopped and said, 'There's plenty of air until just before the tunnel or cave reaches the pool. Then you have to dive under a downthrust ledge of rock. I didn't go back out, of course, not with that creature out there. But I'm sure my estimate of distance is right.'

She followed him in the darkness until he said, 'Here's another downthrust.'

She felt where he indicated. The stone did not go more than six inches before ceasing.

'Does the rope or your boots bother you any?' he said. 'If they're too heavy, get rid of them.'

'I'm all right.'

'Good. I'll be back soon - if things are as I think they are.' She started to call to him to wait for her, but it was too late. She clung to the rough stone with her fingertips, moving her legs now and then. The silence was oppressive; it rang in her ears. And once she gasped when something touched her thigh.

The rope and boots did drag her down, and she was thinking of at least getting rid of the rope when something struck her belly. She grabbed it with one hand to keep it from biting her and with the other reached for her dagger. She went under water of course, and then she realized that she wasn't being attacked.

Smhee, diving back, had run into her.

Their heads cleared the surface. Smhee laughed.

'Were you as frightened as I? I thought sure a bengil had me!'

Gasping, she said, 'Never mind. What's over there?'

'More of the same. Another air-s.p.a.ce for perhaps a hundred feet. Then another downcropping.'

He clung to the stone for a moment. Then he said, 'Have you noticed how fresh the air is? There's a very slight movement of it, too.'

She had noticed but hadn't thought about it. Her experience with watery caves was nil until now.

'I'm sure that each of these caves is connected to a hole which brings in fresh air from above,' he said. 'Would the mage have gone to all this trouble unless he meant to use this for escape?'

He did something. She heard him breathing heavily, and then there was a splash, 'I pulled myself up the rock and felt around,' he said. 'There is a hole up there to let air from the next cave into this one. And I'll wager that there is a hole in the ceiling. But it must curve so that light doesn't come in. Or maybe it doesn't curve. If it were day above, we might see the hole.'

He dived; Masha followed him. They swam ahead then, putting their right hands out from side to side to feel the wall. When they came to the next downcropping, they went through beneath it at once.

At the end of this cave they felt a rock ledge that sloped gently upward. They crawled out onto it. She heard him fumbling around and then he said, 'Don't cry out. I'm lighting a torch.'

The light nevertheless startled her. It came from the tip of a slender stick of wood in his hand. By its illumination she saw him apply it to the end of a small pine torch. This caught fire, giving them more area of vision. The fire on the stick went out. He put the stick back into the opened belt-bag.

'We don't want to leave any evidence we've been here,' he said softly. 'I didn't mention that this bag contains many things, including another waterproof bag.

But we must hurry. The torch won't last long, and I've got just one more.'

They stood up and moved ahead. A few feet beyond the original area first illuminated by the torch were some dark bulks. Boats. Twelve of them, with light wood frameworks and skin-coverings. Each could hold three people. By them were paddles.

Smhee took out a dagger and began ripping the skins. Masha helped him until only one boat was left undamaged.

He said, 'There must be entrances cut into the stone sections dividing the caves we just came through. I'll wager they're on the left-hand side as you come in.

Anyone swimming in would naturally keep to the right wall and so wouldn't see the archways. The ledges where the crabs nest must also be on the left. Remember that when we come back. But I'd better find out for sure. We want , to know exactly how to get out when the time comes.'

He set his torch in a socket in the front of the boat and pushed the boat down the slope and into the water. While Masha held the narrow craft steady, he got into it. She stood on the sh.o.r.e, feeling lonely with all that darkness behind her while she watched him by the light of the brand. Within a few minutes he came back, grinning.

'I was right! There's an opening cut into the stone division. It's just high enough for a boat to pa.s.s through if you duck down.'

They dragged the boat back up onto the ledge. The cave ended about a hundred feet from the water. To the right was a U-shaped entrance. By its side were piles of torches and flint and steel and punk boxes. Smhee lit two, gave one to Masha, and then returned to the edge of the ledge to extinguish his little one.

'I think the mage has put all his magic spiders inside the caves,' he said.

'They'd require too much energy to maintain on the outside. The further away they are from him, the more energy he has to use to maintain them. The energy required increases according to the square of the distance.'

Masha didn't ask him what he meant by 'square'.

'Stick close to me. Not just for your sake. For mine also. As I said, the mage will not have considered women trying to get into his place, so his powers are directed against men only. At least, I hope they are. That way he doesn't have to use as much energy on his magic.'

'Do you want me to lead?' she said, hoping he wouldn't say yes.

'If you had as much experience as I, I wouldn't hesitate a moment. But you're still an apprentice. V we get out of here alive, you will be on your way to being a master.'

They went up the steps cut out of the stone. At the top was another archway.

Smhee stopped before it and held his torch high to look within it. But he kept his head outside it.

'Ha!'

11.

He motioned her to come to his side. She saw that the interior of the deep doorway was grooved. Above the grooves was the bottom of a slab of stone.

'If the mechanism is triggered, that slab will crash down and block off anyone chasing the mage,' he said. 'And it'd crush anyone in the portal. Maybe ...'

He looked at the wall surrounding the archway but could find nothing.

'The release mechanism must be in the other room. A time-delay device.'

He got as near to the entrance as he could without going into it, and he stuck his torch through the opening.

'I can't see it. It must be just around the corner. But I do see what looks like webs.'

Masha breathed deeply.

'If they're real spiders, they'll be intimidated by the torches,' he said.

'Unless the mage has conditioned them not to be or uses magic to overcome their natural fear. The magic spiders won't pay any attention to the flame.'

She thought that it was all very uncertain, but she did not comment.

He bent down and peered at the stone floor just beyond the doorway. He turned.

'Here. Your young eyes are better than my old ones. Can you see a thread or anything like it raised above the floor just beyond the door?'

She said, 'No, I can't.'

'Nevertheless.'

He threw his torch through the doorway. At his order, she got, down with her cheek against the stone and looked against the flame.

She rose, saying, 'I can see a very thin line about an inch above the floor. It could be a cord.'

'Just as I thought. An old Sharranpip trick.'

He stepped back after asking her to get out of the way. And he leaped through the doorway and came down past the cord. She followed. As they picked up their torches, he said pointing, 'There are the mechanisms. One is the time-delay. The other releases the door so it'll fall behind the first who enters and trap him.

Anyone following will be crushed by the slab.'

After telling her to keep an eye on the rest of the room, he examined the array of wheels, gears, and counterweights and the rope that ran from one device through a hole in the ceiling.

'The rope is probably attached to an alarm system above,' he said. 'Very well. I know how to actuate both of these. If you should by any foul chance come back alone, all you have to do is to jump through and then throw a torch or something on that cord. The door will come down and block off your pursuers. But get outside as fast as you can because...'

Masha said, 'I know why.'

'Good woman. Now, the spiders.'

The things came before the webs were clearly visible in the lights. She had expected to see the lights reflected redly in their eyes, but they weren't.

Their many eyes were huge and purplish and cold. They scuttled forwards, waving the foremost pair of legs, then backed away as Smhee waved his torch at them.

Masha walked half-turned away from him so that she could use the brand to scare away any attack from the rear or side.

Suddenly, something leaped from the edge of the darkness and soared towards her.

She thrust the brand at it. But the creature seemed to go through the torch.

It landed on her arm and seized the harfd that held the torch. She had clenched her teeth to keep from screaming if something like this happened. But she didn't even think of voicing her terror and disgust. She closed her hand on the body of the thing to crush it, and the fingers felt nothing.

The next moment, the spider disappeared.

She told Smhee what had happened.

'Thanks be to Klooshna!' he said. 'You are invulnerable to them. If you weren't, you'd be swelling up now!'

'But what ifit'd been a real spider?' she said as she kept waving her torch at the monsters that circled them. 'I didn't know until my hand closed on it that it was not real.'

'Then you'd be dying. But the fact that it ignored the brand showed you what it really was. You realized that even if you didn't think consciously about it.'

They came to another archway. While she threw her torch through it and got down to look for another thread, Smhee held off the spiders.

'There doesn't seem to be any,' she said.

'Seem isn't good enough,' he said. 'Hah, back, you creatures of evil! Look closely! Can you see any thin lines in the floor itself? Minute cracks?'

After a few seconds, she said, 'Yes. They form a square.'

'A trapdoor to drop us into a pit,' he said. 'You jump past it. And let's hope there isn't another trap just beyond it.'

She said that she'd need a little run to clear the line. He charged the spiders, waving his torch furiously, and they backed away. When she called to him that she was safe, he turned and ran and leaped. A hairy, many-legged thing dashed through the entrance after him. Masha stepped up to the line and thrust her brand at it. It stopped. Behind it were ma.s.ses that moved, shadows of solidity.

Smhee leaped towards the foremost one and jammed the burning red of his brand into the head. The stink of charred flesh a.s.sailed their nostrils. It ran backwards but was stopped by those behind it. Then they retreated, and the thing, its eyes burned out, began running around and around, finally disappearing into the darkness. The others were now just beyond the doorway in the other cave. Smhee threw his torch into it.

'That'll keep them from coming through!' he said, panting. 'I should have brought some extra torches, but even the greatest mind sometimes slips. Notice how the weight of those spiders didn't make the trapdoor drop? It must have a minimum limit. You only weigh eighty-five pounds. Maybe...?'

'Forget it,' she said.

' Right you are,', he said, grinning. 'But Masha, if you are to be a master thief, you must think of everything.'

She thought of reminding him about the extra torches he'd forgotten but decided not to. They went on ahead through an enormous cavern and came to a tunnel. From its dark mouth streamed a stink like a newly opened tomb. And they heard the cry that was half-grunt, half-squall.

Smhee halted. 'I hate to go into that tunnel. But we must. You look upward for holes in the ceiling, and I'll look everywhere else.'

The stone, however, looked solid. When they were halfway down the bore, they were blasted with a tremendous growling and roaring.

'Lions?' Masha said.

'No. Bears.'

12.

At the opposite end were two gigantic animals, their eyes gleaming redly in the light, their fangs a dull white.

The two intruders advanced after waiting for the bears to charge. But these stayed by the doorway, though they did not cease their thunderous roaring nor their slashes at the air with their paws.

'The bears were making the strange cry,' she said. 'I've seen dancing bears in the bazaars, but I never heard them make a noise like that. Nor were they near as large.'

He said, 'They've got chains around their necks. Come on.'

When they were within a few feet of the beasts, they stopped. The stench was almost overpowering now, and they were deafened by the uproar in the narrowness of the tunnel.

Smhee told her to hold her torch steady. He opened his belt-bag and pulled out two lengths of bamboo pipe and joined them. Then, from a small wooden case, he cautiously extracted a feathered dart. He inserted it in one and raised the blowpipe almost to his lips.

'There's enough poison on the tip of the dart to kill a dozen men,' he said.

'However, I doubt that it would do much harm, if any, if the dart sticks in their thick fat. So...'

He waited a long time, the pipe now at his lips. Then, his cheeks swelled, and the dart shot out. The bear to the right, roaring even louder, grabbed at the missile stuck in its left eye. Smhee fitted another dart into the pipe and took a step closer. The monster on the left lunged against the restraining collar and chain. Smhee shot the second dart into its tongue.

The first beast struck fell to one side, its paws waving, and its roars subsided. The other took longer to become quiet, but presently both were snoring away.