Obooloo: capital of the Izdimir Empire. Lies amidst mountains in the province of Ang in the heartland of the continent of Yestron.
In the end, Guest Gulkan could not be dissuaded from his madcap plan to venture to Obooloo to liberate the Great God Jocasta. Furthermore, he sought to implicate and involve his father in this plan; and the Witchlord Onosh, who was consumed with guilt because he felt himself partly to blame for Guest's mauling in the arena of Chi'ash-lan, felt constrained to agree to commit his own strength to the raid on Obooloo.
So Guest said goodbye to Penelope, telling her that he was going to fly away on Sken-Pitilkin's stickbird, the airborne contraption which had so lately terrorized the skies above Dalar ken Halvar.
This was a blatant lie, since Guest was actually going to travel to Obooloo by way of the Doors of the Circle of the Partnership Banks; but the Weaponmaster had told his wife nothing of that Circle or those Doors, and did not intend to.
"When will you be back?" said Penelope.
"As soon as I can be," said Guest, speaking in perfect honesty.
For, though her womb had proved barren, Guest was generally satisfied with his wife, and had no thought to abandon her on a permanent basis. Rather, he wished her to do what the wives of heroes have always done: to wait.
"You'll be back?" said Penelope, seeking confirmation of the Weaponmaster's pledge.
It would not be true to say that the purple-skinned Penelope was passionately in love with Guest Gulkan. Nevertheless, he had been tolerably civil and attentive to her during four long years which she had spent as a refugee in the tunnels of Cap Foz Para Lash, sheltering from the wrath of her home city, which had given itself to the madness of the religion known as Nu-chala-nuth.
Indeed, Penelope would surely have fallen in love with Guest entirely, had she not already pledged her heart to another. That other was a valorous Ebrell Islander, Lupus Lon Oliver by name. To tell the truth, Penelope had once been married to the valorous Lupus, and had never gone through the formality of getting a divorce. The red-skinned Lupus Lon Oliver was currently in insurrection against the city of Dalar ken Halvar and the religion of Nu-chala-nuth. He was leading a wild life in Parengarenga's deserts, fighting with a band of doomed but undaunted revolutionaries led by a female of the Pang, a woman warrior named Shona.
In the absence of Lupus Lon Oliver, her true love, Penelope had developed a strong affection for Guest Gulkan, hence sought his return.
"I'll be back," confirmed Guest.
"Then," said Penelope, "take this."
And, with that, she took from her neck the bright-metal chain which she customarily wore, and passed the chain and its pendant to the Weaponmaster.
"Thank you," said Guest, taking the chain and the amulet which served as its pendant.
This object he had seen often enough, for Penelope wore it always, whether she was clothed or naked. He knew already that the pendant burnt with its own light, and was not surprised by this.
But – the weight!
The amulet was small enough for Guest to conceal in his fist, yet it was so uncommonly heavy that he wondered at its weight.
Over the last four years, it had been so much a part of his everyday existence that he had ceased to notice it. But now he looked at it closely. The webbing and weaving of half a thousand filigree threads created the oval of the amulet. The wire of which this work had been fashioned appeared at first glance to be silver, but it was not, for it glistened with a shimmering light like the moon itself made liquid and mixed with mercury.
"What is it?" said Guest.
"It is luck," said Penelope.
Then she kissed him.
So Guest Gulkan departed from the minor mountain of Cap Foz Para Lash, taking with him a mazadath, an amulet of Nexus make.
This mazadath – the pendant which Penelope had given to her Weaponmaster – had once been part of a dorgi. And the dorgi was a formidable brute of animated metal which had once guarded the tunnels inside Cap Foz Para Lash.
(At any rate, this is what Paraban Senk told Hostaja Sken-Pitilkin, for that disembodied demon, on realizing that Penelope had given her amulet to the Weaponmaster, and that the amulet was about the depart from Cap Foz Para Lash, was loathe to see the thing go; and, speaking privily to Sken-Pitilkin, Senk requested that the wizard relieve the Weaponmaster of his burden. Something Sken-Pitilkin declined to do, for life was difficult enough already without gratuitously enhancing its difficulties by trying to steal a love-charm from a Yarglat barbarian).
So it was that Guest Gulkan took his leave from his wife
Penelope, exited from Cap Foz Para Lash, and made his way through the city of Dalar ken Halvar to the Bralsh – the building which housed the Door of Dalar ken Halvar's Door.
According to their plans, Weaponmaster would unite with Witchlord on Alozay, then together they would venture to Obooloo to liberate the Great God Jocasta. By now, Guest was fired up with a great enthusiasm for his mission, and for the quest for the x-x- zix which would follow it.
Witchlord and Weaponmaster would not be venturing alone, for the wizards Pelagius Zozimus and Hostaja Sken-Pitilkin would be daring the dangers with them, together with the knifeman Thayer Levant. The last-named, Levant, was undoubtedly sent by Plandruk
Qinplaqus to spy on the others, but they did not resent such scrutiny, since a cheating of the Silver Emperor formed no part of their plans.
Plandruk Qinplaqus came in person to the Bralsh to see them off.
"One last thing," said Qinplaqus, once all their arrangements had been confirmed and reconfirmed for one last time.
"What?" said Guest "Good luck," said Qinplaqus.
That benediction meant a lot to Guest, and it warmed him mightily as he ventured through the Circle of the Partnership Banks, passing from Dalar ken Halvar to Tang, from Tang to Quilth, and then to Stokos, to Chi'ash-lan, and then to Alozay.
On Alozay, the ruling island of the Safrak Islands, Guest Gulkan was greeted by his brother Morsh Bataar, who brought him dire tidings of disease.
"Our father is ill," said Morsh.
"Ill?" said Guest, in startlement.
This was the last thing which Guest had expected!
"You speak as if you doubt my word," said Morsh. "But it is true. As a horse has hair, so our father has an ailment. He cannot quest with you, not yet, for his doctors have pronounced him too sick to stir from his bed."
"What's wrong with him, then?" said Guest.
"He has a cold," said Morsh.
"A cold!" said Guest, scandalized.
They were heroes, were they not? Questing heroes! Truly heroic heroes, their deeds and avowals proportioned like the greatest of those of legend. How then could they be held up by a trifling matter like a cold? Guest demanded to be shown into the presence of his father, and found Lord Onosh laid up in bed with a bad headcold, which he was endeavoring to treat with a medicinal concoction compounded of lemons, hot water and something strongly alcoholic. As a consequence of the side-effects of the alcoholic component of this medicine, Lord Onosh had reached a stage of pronounced incoherence.
This did not please the Weaponmaster at all, who in his anger was threatening to scalp the Witchlord when the Witch herself appeared. Bao Gahai hustled Guest out of the sickroom, interrogated him at length about all of his doings, then at last consented to leave him in peace.
In the moody solitude of his disappointed brooding, Guest
Gulkan took himself off to the Hall of Time. This was guarded by men with spears, and by solid doors which a blacksmith had closed with chains. Both the men and the doors resisted the Weaponmaster's will, but Guest at length succeeded in subduing the men and having the doors broken down.
Then Guest Gulkan stalked into the Hall of Time, expecting to find it a place of dust and cobwebs. It was and it wasn't. True, there were cobwebs in plenty sprawled across the time prison pods.
But there was precious little dust, for the open slit windows of the Hall of Time ventilated the place as a draughty cave is ventilated. Guest Gulkan came to a halt in front of the jade-green monolith known to him as Icaria Scaria Iva-Italis, demon of Safrak and Guardian Prime. At first, the demon did not consent to acknowledge his presence. But at last it spoke.
"Greetings," said the demon.
"And to you, greetings," said Guest.
"You have come by a mazadath," said the demon. "Where did you win such a prize?"
"A mazadath?" said Guest. "What's that?"
"The thing which you have about your neck," said the demon.
"This?" said Guest, lifting his heavyweight amulet from its concealment.
"That," confirmed Italis. "Where did you get it?"
"It was a present," said Guest. "A present from my wife."
"So," said Iva-Italis. "So you are married. Have you children?"
"Not yet," said Guest.
"Your brother Morsh has children," said Iva-Italis.
"Has he?" said Guest, most surprised at this intelligence; for nobody had even suggested to him that his brother Morsh had so much as a woman, far less a child.
"He has," said Iva-Italis. "He has two sons, Yurt and Iragana."
"So you say," said Guest. "But you have been locked in here for years, far beyond any breath of rumor. So how could you rightly claim to know such a thing?"
"I am in communication with demons elsewhere," said Iva-Italis. "Have you not been told of this? I communicated, to name but one, with Koblathakatoria, he who is commonly known as Ko. You know him? Koblathakatoria is the demon of Chi'ash-lan. There is no scrap of gossip about Safrak which does not reach Chi'ash-lan, and usually sooner rather than later."
"So," said Guest. "They spy on us."
"The mere collection of gossip is scarcely a matter of espionage," said Iva-Italis. "Are your matings and breedings a matter of state secrecy? If they are, then all I can say is that you do not act in accordance with any such doctrine. It is a matter of public record that your brother Morsh Bataar maintains a wife on the island of Ema-Urk, and that she has given him two sons. Yurt is aged two, and Iragana is but one year of age."
"This is news to me!" said Guest.
"So," said Iva-Italis. "But I doubt that you have any news for me."
"You didn't know about the – the maza," said Guest.
"The mazadath," said Iva-Italis. "Maz-a-dath. No, I didn't know about that. But I take it to be a recent acquisition. The rest of your past I know. I have followed the saga of your recovery in the city of Dalar ken Halvar. I know, too, that you are now determined to venture to Obooloo."
"They speak of this in Chi'ash-lan?" said Guest.
"Of course they do," said Iva-Italis. "For Sod is held hostage in this very mainrock in which we now stand. Sod's brother rules in Chi'ash-lan, and fears that Sod will be murdered when your father's minions hear of your father's death."
"My father is not dead!" said Guest. "He's got a cold, that's all!"
"Yes," said Iva-Italis, "but soon you and your father will both be venturing to Obooloo. In Chi'ash-lan, they think both Witchlord and Weaponmaster will die in that venture, and that Sod will be murdered once the pair of you are dead."
"And will we die?" said Guest.
"That is for you to say, not me," said Iva-Italis. "Tell me how you are going to rescue the Great God Jocasta, and I will tell you whether you are likely to live."
Then Guest told the demon of the plan which he had hatched with Sken-Pitilkin, drawing on Sken-Pitilkin's by-now-detailed knowledge of the various Doors of the Partnership Banks.
The questing heroes would venture through the Circle of the Partnership Banks to the city of Obooloo. The Door in that city was housed in the Sanctuary of the Bondsman's Guild, a structure which stood atop a tall triangular rock known locally as Achaptipop, from which it was possible to overlook the Temple of Blood.
By studious reconnaissance, Sken-Pitilkin had already determined the layout of the Temple of Blood. It was built around a central courtyard in which stood a Burning Pit into which human sacrifices were periodically cast.
"From the Sanctuary of the Bondsman's Guild," said Guest, "we will overlook that Burning Pit. Sken-Pitilkin plans to improvise a flying ship. He will not build a full-scale stickbird. Rather, he will make a small device good enough for the descent from Achaptipop to the Burning Pit."
"So," said Iva-Italis, "you will float downwards through the air, landing by the Burning Pit."
"Precisely," said Guest. "But we're not sure how to find the Great God Jocasta."
"That's easy," said Iva-Italis. "The great rock Achaptipop stands directly to the north of the Temple of Blood. The central courtyard in which you find the Burning Pit has four sides."
"Most courtyards do," said Guest.
"The sides are orientated to the north, south, east and west," said Iva-Italis, ignoring Guest entirely. "It is easy to orientate yourself. Once you land in the central courtyard, look for the great rock Achaptipop. It lies to your north."
"And?" said Guest.
"Where does Achaptipop lie?" said Iva-Italis.
"To the north!" said Guest impatiently. "As I face that rock, the east will be to my right, and – "
"Go east," said Iva-Italis.
"East?" said Guest.
"Yes," said Iva-Italis. "A single archway is set in the eastern side of the central chamber of the Temple of Blood. Go through that archway and you will find the Great God Jocasta."
"What does the Great God look like?" said Guest.
"The Great God," said Iva-Italis, "looks like a doughnut."
"A doughnut?" said Guest, baffled by this description.
"Take a single link from a chain," said Iva-Italis. "Beat that link into a circle, and there you have your doughnut. The wizard Pelagius Zozimus commonly bakes a kind of sweetened bread in just such a shape. Have you never eaten such?"
"Ah!" said Guest, "now I understand!"
"So," said Iva-Italis. "The Great God Jocasta is a doughnut, a doughnut about the size of your head. The Great God is trapped in a force field. Do you know what a force field is?"
"Tell me," said Guest.
"A force field," said Iva-Italis, "is a wall of light which is hard to penetrate."
"Then how is Guest to penetrate this particular wall of light?" said Sken-Pitilkin.
At which Guest almost jumped out of his skin, for the Weaponmaster had been so engrossed in his dialog with the demon that he had not heard the wizard of Skatzabratzumon enter the Hall of Time.
"The Weaponmaster Guest can cleave through this particular wall of light by the mere application of his sword," said Iva-Italis.
"Really?" said Sken-Pitilkin, sounding somewhat sceptical.
"Yes," said Iva-Italis, "for these force fields are but poor and trivial devices. Once Guest has hacked the force field apart with his sword, the Great God Jocasta will be free. The Great God will then confer upon Guest the powers of a wizard, and will secure your exit from the Temple of Blood."
"So you say," said Sken-Pitilkin, who still had reservations about this venture.
"Rest assured," said Iva-Italis. "It is as I say. Besides, you will have a demon to help you."
"You're coming with us?" said Sken-Pitilkin.
"No!" said Iva-Italis. "For I am scarcely portable! But a demon stands in the Temple of Blood already. The demon stands beside the imprisoned Great God."
"There's a demon which guards the Door of the Bondsmans Guild," said Sken-Pitilkin.
"The demon Lob, yes," said Iva-Italis. "But that's not the demon of whom I'm speaking. There are two of my siblings in Obooloo. One is Lob, of whom you have spoken. The other is Ungular Scarth, who stands beside the Great God Jocasta."
"Then why can't this Scarth claw away this force field?" said Sken-Pitilkin.
"Because," said Iva-Italis, "a force field of the kind of which we are talking about can only be destroyed by the application of metal. Iron will do, or steel. Bronze. Tin.
Whatever. But it must be metal!"
"Then I will remember to leave my wooden sword at home," said Guest.
"Do that," said Iva-Italis. "Go, now! Go! Do as you have vowed to do! Rescue the Great God! And you will be a wizard within the week!"
"The week!" said Guest. "You too know of this business of weeks!"
"It is true," said Iva-Italis, "for I am mighty in knowledge, and anything a wizard knows I know too. Go now! And do well!"
So Guest and Sken-Pitilkin departed from the Hall of Time, paying no heed to the cobwebbed time pods which were set about its walls, and occupied themselves with preparations for their journey. Guest found the time to seek out his brother Morsh Bataar, and to question him about his alleged wife; and Morsh inspired Guest's jealousy by confessing that he had indeed married one of the women of Ema-Urk, and that he had his own small sheep farm on that island, and had sired two sons.
"I will likewise have sons," said Guest, "for my wife Penelope will bear them for me. Once I have the powers of a wizard, I am sure I will be able to overcome her barrenness."
Comforted by this thought, the Weaponmaster occupied himself by choosing gear, and by climbing up and down the stairways of the mainrock Pinnacle to put a keen fighting edge on his fitness. And, once his father had recovered from his transitory illness, the questing heroes gathered together.
Need the heroes be named?
There was Witchlord and Weaponmaster; there was the servile Thayer Levant; and there were the wizards Pelagius Zozimus and Hostaja Sken-Pitilkin. Guest had wanted to bring with the wizard Ontario Nol, but Sken-Pitilkin had vetoed this.
"If your demon is telling the truth," said Sken-Pitilkin,
"then we have strength sufficient for our mission. And if your demon is lying, then the mere addition of another wizard will not help us if we have to fight the city of Obooloo as a whole."
"Of course the demon's telling the truth!" said Guest. "It wants to have Jocasta liberated!"
"Doubtless," said Sken-Pitilkin grimly. "But if the task were so simple, then one suspects it would have been performed long ago. Anyway, let us be going!"
So the questing heroes passed through the Circle of the Partnership Banks to the city of Obooloo, where they enjoyed the hospitality of the Sanctuary of the Bondsmans Guild on the heights of the great rock Achaptipop.
There Sken-Pitilkin improvised a kind of air-raft, a primitive flying device sufficient to sustain the weight of the heroes and moderate their descent from Achaptipop to the central courtyard of the Temple of Doom.
When all was ready, the heroes gathered by the edge of Achaptipop, and, aided by Sken-Pitilkin's air-raft, they floated gently down to the central courtyard of the Temple of Blood. In the gloom of night, they located the archway on the courtyard's eastern flank. The arch opened onto a tunnel of uncommon darkness, a tunnel which could have doubled as part of the gut of a whale.
The heroes drew their swords and ventured into that darkness.
It was an uncommonly moist darkness, which smelt alternately of the sewer and the brothel. As he shuffled forward through that absolute blackness, the Weaponmaster Guest started to find it difficult to keep his balance. A momentary dizziness beset him, and found himself breathing swiftly, too swiftly.
"We should have brought a lamp," said Thayer Levant.
"Hush!" said Guest, who thought that Levant's rightful mission on this quest was to hew firewood, draw water and peel potatoes, not to pass comment on the plans and performance of his social superiors. Thayer Levant did hush, though in all truth the knifeman felt himself well-qualified to pass comment. Levant had traveled the Circle of the Partnership Banks for a great many years as the servant of Plandruk Qinplaqus, hence thought himself an expert on that Circle and its cities; and, to him, his companions on this present quest were but rank amateurs in the art of traveling the world.
Once Levant had hushed, the silence became oppressive. Each of the questing heroes could hear the steady scrapage of boots against stone, the clinkage of metal, and the tiny sounds made by their tongues and their teeth, by the creaking of their kneecaps and the hush-wash of their breathing.
In the black and oppressive hush, wash after wash of smells assailed them. From somewhere came the smell of dung; then that of camphor; then a sweet, sickly perfume of the kind favored by women of ill repute, or by young women who have yet to learn the art of sophisticated restraint in matters of self-enhancement. In that darkness -
"Stop," said the Witchlord Onosh.
All stopped.
"What is it?" said Guest.
"Something," said Lord Onosh.
"What?" said Guest.
"Hush! Not so loud!" said his father.
"What is it?" said Sken-Pitilkin.
"A light," said the Witchlord.
It was a dull, red light which lay ahead of them. It was so dull it was almost impossible to see. Sken-Pitilkin stared at it for a long moment, then abruptly strode forward. The light moved.
"The light's moving!" cried the Witchlord.
"Because," said Sken-Pitilkin, with scathing scorn, "it is in my hand. That's why it's moving."
Then Sken-Pitilkin returned to his companions, bearing in his fist a stick of incense, which he waved rigorously before letting it fall. Like a dying star, the incense lay on the stones.
"Light," muttered Lord Onosh. "I wish we had light."
Then the Witchlord bethought himself of the ring of ever-ice which he had taken from Banker Sod long, long ago on his first conquest of the island of Alozay. Lord Onosh now customarily wore that ring on a chain slung around his neck. Bethinking himself of that light, he produced it: but its feebleness could scarcely do more than illuminate his own face.
Not to be outdone, Guest Gulkan produced his mazadath. That amulet was a light more powerful than the Witchlord's ring of ever-ice, but it was insufficient to light the path.
"Hush down your lights," said Pelagius Zozimus. "They can but betray us. They cannot serve us."
Both Witchlord and Weaponmaster accepted this admonishment from the slug-chef Zozimus, and, concealing their futile lights, they pushed on down the tunnel until they saw a familiar green glow ahead.
That steady-burning jadeness was sure sign of the presence of a demon. Or so thought these questing heroes! As it happens, they were right, though some experts hold that the eyes of a basilisk burn with just such a cold and steady green; and certain mariners aver that a kraken encountered at night will be seen to emanate a similar baleful light; and one of the brands of the moonpaint which comes from the city of Injiltaprajura is most definitely a thus-shaded green.
Still, in the confidence of encountering a demon, Guest Gulkan and his companions advanced, and found themselves in a vaulted octagonal chamber. Ranked around the walls of that chamber were niches in which stood timeprison pods identical to those of Alozay's Hall of Time – some occupied, others not.
"Time pods," said Thayer Levant.
"And a demon," said Sken-Pitilkin.
Indeed, in the center of that chamber stood a jade-green monolith identical in outward form to Icaria Scaria Iva-Italis, demon of Safrak. Thanks to a briefing from Iva-Italis, Guest Gulkan knew this to be the demon Ungular Scarth, a servant of the Great God Jocasta.
Illuminated by the green frostlight of the demon Ungular Scarth was the Great God Jocasta. As advertised, the Great God was a doughnut the size of a man's head. It was floating in the air within two shells of light. The inner shell of light was a dull red, the red of iron which has lately been removed from a furnace, and is cooling. The outer shell was blue – a sharp-burning blue which hurt the eyes and made Guest Gulkan think of the sun, and of teeth. (Why teeth? He could not tell, but that outer shell of blue-burning light made him think most decisively of saliva and teeth).
"It is a demon," said the Witchlord Onosh, whose attention was given not to the Great God but to Ungular Scarth. "But it is short for its kind."
"Because," said Guest, heavily, "it is standing in water."
So it was, as Lord Onosh saw a moment later. The demon Ungular Scarth was half-buried in oily sewer waters. For the octagonal chamber in which the demon and the Great God were imprisoned was awash with sewer-water.
Fortunately, a metal grille reached from wall to wall, and looked as if it would allow the intruders to dare the approach to demon and god without getting their feet wet. Guest tested the grille, found that it bore his weight, and advanced to the base of the demon. The grille appeared to have been custom-made, and to have been installed long after the demon took up residence in this octagonal chamber, for the demon rose up from a neatly-edged square hole in that grille. Guest Gulkan glanced down into the oil sewer waters, where hunks of unidentifiable material floated on the surface. The water was still, unmoving, fetid. In the chamber's sullen silence, Guest heard his father's breathing, which was uncommonly labored. He guessed that Lord Onosh was distressed by this place, and found its silence hard to bear.
To break that silence, Guest Gulkan addressed the demon Ungular Scarth.
"I am the Weaponmaster, Guest Gulkan by name," said he. "I am here to rescue the Great God Jocasta in fulfillment of my oath."
"Greetings, Guest Gulkan," says the demon, speaking to him in his native Eparget.
"And to you, greetings," said Guest politely. "Okay, what do we do now?"
"You cut through the fields of force which have trapped my master," said Ungular Scarth.
"Okay then," said Guest.
Then Guest drew his sword, and, striking with all the confidence of a hairy-arsed barbarian who has hacked off more heads than the world has fingers to count, he struck. He hacked with his sword, striking a mighty blow, a blow sufficient for the decapitation of dragons, the rupture of chains, or the lopping off of the limbs of a giant. But that blow availed the Weaponmaster not, for his sword bounced off the bubbles of force as if off the celestial armor of the greater war-gods.
"Gods!" said Guest.
"Come," said Ungular Scarth. "You did but tickle it. You can do better than that."
"Better!" said Guest. "I have struck with force sufficient for the murder of ten men simultaneously."
"Then strike again," said the demon.
So Guest struck. But his metal bounced from the blue-burning force field which imprisoned the Great God Jocasta.
"What are you?" said Ungular Scarth. "Are you a child? I thought you a man!"
At which Guest was enraged, and hacked again at the force field. Again his metal bounced harmlessly from the sphere of force.
"Let me," said Lord Onosh.
Upon which Guest stepped aside, with hot sweat dripping down his forehead – sweat which was consequent upon the combination of exertion and embarrassment.
Lord Onosh hacked at the force field. But, just like his son, the Witchlord made no impression on that blue-burning armor.
"It is too much for us," said Lord Onosh.
Upon which the demon laughed.
"Ah," said Ungular Scarth, "but what did you expect?"
"We expected to be able to cut it," said Guest, starting to lose his temper. "Iva-Italis told us that steel would be ample for the purpose."
"And you believed my dear friend Italis?" said Ungular Scarth. "Of course you did. For you are but a naive barbarian.
Italis has told me of you. Often. And in detail."
"Naive!" said Guest. "Why am I naive? Am I not your ally? I came to save the Great God!"
"Then save the Great God," said Ungular Scarth.
"How?" said Guest. "We have tried to cut the force field, but we cannot."
"Of course you can't," said Scarth. "For your swords are not metal but wood."
"Wood!" said Guest, in renewed fury. "I'll show you what kind of wood this is!"
Then Guest chopped at the demon Ungular Scarth. But his blade bounced harmlessly from the demon's jade-green flanks.
"Cool yourself," said Scrath. "Cool and calm. Enough of jokes. If you would liberate the Great God Jocasta, then you must first secure a tool which is ample to your purpose. There is a kind of knife. Two specimens are known to me. One is carried by Anaconda Stogirov, the High Priestess of this temple. The other is in the possession of Aldarch the Third, the Mutilator of Yestron.
You will know these knives – "
"Knives!" said Guest. "I was told that a sword – "
"Italis lied," said Sken-Pitilkin. "I suspected as much. I told you so."
"True," said Ungular Scarth. "A sword is useless for the liberation of the Great God. To cut through the force field, you must first procure this special knife of which I have spoken."
"There are two spheres of force," said Guest. "The outer blue and the inner red. Will one knife cut through both?"
"You need only cut through the outer," said Ungular Scarth.
"The shell of blue-burning light was put there by Anaconda Stogirov. It keeps the Great God a prisoner. The inner shell of red light is a field of force which is generated by the Great God itself. That inner shell has preserved the Great God from all attack by the evil Stogirov."
"So the inner shell is armor," said Guest, "and the outer shell a cage."
"Precisely," said Ungular Scarth. "Now if you will but listen, then I will describe to you the knife which you must win to cut through the outer shell. The knife is small. It is curved.
It ends not with a point but with a bead. Stogirov has one, and the Mutilator has the other."
"There are only two?" said Guest.
"There was once a third, a fourth and a fifth," said Ungular Scarth. "But three are lost, and only two remain."
"Very well," said Guest, with some bitterness, realizing he was so deeply embroiled in this adventure that there was no easy way out. "Then tell me. Which of these knives is closest?"
"That which is closest is that which is carried by Anaconda Stogirov," said the demon. "For she dwells nearby."
Then the demon directed Guest Gulkan to her chambers, and so to her chambers the adventurers went. They quit the octagonal chamber which was home to the Great God Jocasta, exiting from that chamber by means of an arch set in its northern wall. The arch admitted them to another black tunnel, a tunnel which terminated in a stairway. Up the stairway they went, expecting to find Stogirov's bedroom at the top.
But they were far from the top when Guest – who was in the lead – unexpectedly stepped on a man who was sleeping on the stairs. Guest tripped, and went down. The man awoke with a bellow, and his bellow woke a dozen of his fellows.
Were these sleeping men guards, petitioners or exhausted lovers of the evil Stogirov? Guest had no time to ask, for the men did not stand still for questioning. Rather, they drew weapons and attacked the adventurers.
Such was the disorder of the dark that the men who guarded the stairs were soon hacking at each other in their blindness, while the adventurers tumbled back down the stairs.
"I am wounded," gasped the Witchlord Onosh.
And Guest Gulkan saw it was true. His father had been sorely wounded in the gut. Pain was clearly writ on his face, and Guest doubted him able to run.
"Guest," said Zozimus, speaking with harsh directness. "We must run. If your father cannot run with us, then you must make a choice."
"You could choose to put him in a time pod," said Thayer Levant.
"In a time pod?" said Guest, in amazement.
"Why not?" said Levant. "He'll be perfectly safe there."
"Your servant Levant speaks with good reason," said the demon Ungular Scarth. "Nobody in Obooloo has a ring apt for the opening and closing of these pods, not to my knowledge. Look! To your left! The pod nearest the exiting archway is empty!"
"It is best," said Lord Onosh, scarcely able to speak because of the pain of his wound. "I can hardly stand, far less walk."
So Guest took the ring of ever-ice which hung from a chain round his father's neck, and with that ring he opened an empty time pod. Zozimus and Sken-Pitilkin helped the Witchlord into the pod, then Guest used the same ring to seal it.
Upon which the men who had surprised them on the stairs started to pour into the octagonal chamber.
"Scarth!" bellowed Guest. "Kill them!"
So saying, Guest gestured dramatically at the men who were pouring into the chamber. Such was the drama of the Weaponmaster's gesture that the ring of ever-ice escaped his hand. Still strung on its metal chain, it flew through the air, clittered to the steel grille, slipped through, slished into the oily depths of pungent sewerage, and was gone.
"Pox!" swore Guest.
As if commanded by this Word, the demon Ungular Scarth lashed the air with tentacles of quick-slicing green. But the chamber was too large for the demon's tentacles to command the whole of it, and Guest and his companions were soon sorely oppressed by their attackers.
"Go!" yelled Ungular Scarth.
Taking the hint, the adventurers began to retreat down the tunnel by which they had first penetrated to the Great God's chamber. They retreated through the darkness to the central courtyard which contained the Burning Pit.
"Your airship!" said Guest to Sken-Pitilkin.
"It was not made for ascent," said Sken-Pitilkin. "It was but a crude device made to let us float downwards. We cannot escape."
"Not by that means," said Pelagius Zozimus. "So let us try our strength in combat!"
"Which way to the Temple's outer gate?" said Guest.
"How would I know?" said Zozimus.
"The gate to the Temple of Blood is on the southern side," said Thayer Levant.
Since a few lights shone atop the great rock Achaptipop, and since Guest Gulkan knew that great rock to lie to the north of the Temple of Blood, it was the work of a moment to determine which way was south.
An archway on the southern side of the Temple's central courtyard gave the adventurers access to yet another tunnel, and by dint of the speed of their feet and the bloody commitment of their swords, they shortly found themselves out on the streets of Obooloo.
"Which way now?" said Guest Gulkan.
"How would I know?" said Pelagius Zozimus in extreme irritation, somehow presuming that this generalized question had been addressed specifically to him.
"Now," said Thayer Levant, "we must make for Achaptipop. This way!"
Levant knew Obooloo intimately, since he had been there so often in the past with Plandruk Qinplaqus. And Guest Gulkan, who had initially thought Levant to be the most useless member of their party, was swiftly changing his opinion, and was now more inclined to think Levant likely the most useful of their number.
But the adventurers found the way to Achaptipop was barred against them. For alarm-trumpets blown on the heights of the Temple of Blood had already roused a great number of soldiers into the streets, and roadblocks had been thrown up, dividing Obooloo into a number of small areas between which communication was impossible.
Finding themselves trapped in a small area of the city, and surely doomed to be discovered by search parties, Guest Gulkan and his companions turned again to Thayer Levant, and asked for direction.
"I think," said Levant, "that only one recourse remains to us, and that is to make our way to the House of Conceded Sacrifice, which lies nearby."
"The House of Conceded Sacrifice?" said Guest. "That sounds ominous."
"It is," said Levant. "For it is a place where people go to die, and death is the only way to leave it."
This scarcely sounded inviting, but the inhospitality of the city was such that, in the end, Guest Gulkan and his companions had no alternative but to accept Levant's advice, and to consign themselves to the House of Conceded Sacrifice.