This Crooked Way (44 page)

Morlock said nothing but reached into his boot and drew out a little piece of metal. He reached through the bars of his cage and tossed it to Rhabia. She caught it with her unwounded hand and looked at it. It was an odd little thing, like a long blunt needle with many flexible joints. She'd never seen anything like it, but she was very much mistaken if it wasn't a lockpick.

Rhabia looked at Morlock. There must be some reason he wasn't saying anything—maybe Nurgnatz was (or could be) listening just outside the door. She gestured toward the door of her cage, as if to say,
Shall we go now?

Morlock held up his hand
(Wait!)
and then gestured with his hand toward himself and then waved in the direction Nurgnatz had gone. She guessed he was telling her to stay where she was until Nurgnatz came back and took him away.

She gestured at him and herself and then more urgently toward the cage door.
Let's go now!

He gestured at his shoulders. She didn't get it at first, then she realized he was saying,
What about my backpack?

She gestured at him, then herself, then at her own shoulders, meaning,
Is a backpack worth your life or mine?

Rather unimaginatively, he gestured at his shoulders again, which Rhabia interpreted as,
I'm getting my damn backpack.

She shrugged and stood pat. After all, it was barely possible he knew what he was doing. If Nurgnatz wanted what was in Morlock's backpack so bad, maybe he shouldn't get it.

Morlock was pointing solemnly at his head, then at Rhabia.
You're pretty smart
, she read this.

“And cute, too,” she replied aloud, in a Nurgnatzian burst of self-esteem, and turned away to staunch her wounds.

Time passed. Crouching in a corner of her cage, Rhabia actually fell asleep for a while, in spite of her pain, and the cold, and her fear. But when Nurgnatz returned with his headless bear in attendance, her head snapped up and she leaped to her feet. The bear was walking upright, Rhabia saw dimly through sleep-bleared eyes, and its red forepaws were actually hands of a sort—with seven or eight fingers each, and at least three thumbs per hand.

Nurgnatz opened Morlock's cage and stood back. The headless bear rushed in before Morlock could dodge out, and it grabbed him with four arms—an extra pair extruded from the headless bear's belly to help it keep the crooked man captive. Then it lumbered out of the cage and went to stand by Nurgnatz.

“See you soon, my dear!” carolled the gnome, his warty chin still stained with her blood, and he dodged out of the many-mirrored chamber again. The headless bear, carrying Morlock, lumbered swiftly after.

She waited until their sounds had vanished, following them up the tunnel, and then she got to work with the lockpick. Her wounded hand hurt more than ever, and every time she had to use it the stumps started bleeding again…but fortunately she was right-handed. And, anyway, this was life or death; she couldn't worry about minor discomforts, or even major ones.

She had picked a few locks before, for lockbox owners who had lost their keys. (She wasn't a thief.) This lock was trickier than any she had tackled; Nurgnatz was evidently almost as gifted as he thought himself. But the lockpick was handier than any she'd used before; several times it seemed to move on its own to turn the tumblers back. Eventually she was free and gratefully pocketed the little device.

Now the program was a little hazier. But there was one obvious way out: the way she had come in. Unfortunately, that was also the way Nurgnatz and his headless bear had dragged Morlock. Still…

She crept carefully up the long tunnel leading away from the many-mirrored room. There were mirrors on the wall of the tunnel, too, and more love poetry from Nurgnatz to himself. Unfortunately there were no branches to the tunnel, only little lightless alcoves along the way, full of bones and bad smells.

When she was investigating one of these to see if it was the entrance to another tunnel a dry dead voice said, “Make stop.”

Rhabia leapt back. She wished she had a weapon—but, on balance, the voice hadn't sounded dangerous.

“Make who stop what?” she asked the unseen speaker.

“Make me stop. Make him stop. Make him make me stop. Stop. Please stop.” The dead voice droned on in the dark.

There was another sound along with the voice—an often repeated, soft squishing sort of noise. She couldn't place it. She stepped over to one of the dim flameless globes buried in the wall and pulled it loose and returned to the alcove where the dry hopeless voice was begging for something to stop.

After she saw what was happening she wished she had passed on without looking. A pudgy white-skinned man was sitting there on the floor of the alcove. Over half his body the skin and fat had been torn away so that the raw red muscle glared at her in the dim light of the globe. As she watched in horror his fingers reached out and tore away a strip of his own skin. Then he tossed it in a metal dish that sat nearby him on the floor. This was the constant squishy sound she had been unable to identify.

“Don't do that!” she yelped.

“Don't! Don't! Don't!” he begged. “But he makes me. He makes me make myself. Make me stop. Make him make me stop.”

Nurgnatz had placed a compulsion on the man; that was clear. It was also, unfortunately, clear why. The imprints of Nurgnatz's clever little hands were painted in blood around the rim of the metal dish. Nurgnatz liked skin and fat, and he was making the man strip his own flesh off. Occasionally Nurgnatz would stop by and have a snack….

Rhabia turned away, causing the man to panic. The tone of his voice didn't change, perhaps could not change, but he said faster than before, “Stop. Stop. Make it stop. Make me stop. Stop.” All the while his hand continued stripping away little bits of his own flesh.

Maybe Morlock could do something for him, Rhabia thought desperately. But Morlock was likely to have enough to do in helping himself. She couldn't help this man, but she couldn't leave him behind, begging the empty dark to make it stop. That maternal instinct again; what a nuisance it was!

“Listen,” she said, turning back to the man. “There's only one way I can make you stop. Do you understand?” She put the light-globe down on the ground.

“Make it stop,” he said, the eyes in his mutilated face meeting hers eagerly as she took hold of his half-raw throat. “Make me stop. Make me stop. Make—” Then he couldn't talk anymore. His hand stopped tearing at his flesh, but she held on until she was sure he was dead.

“A little of this, little of that,” she whispered, staring at her hands. She had never strangled anyone before. The exertion had been agony to her wounded hand, but that's not why she was weeping silently as she turned away.

She came at last to the end of the tunnel, which was its beginning in the upper chamber of Nurgnatz's cave.

There was a big pit in the center of the cave now. The pit was full of blazing coals. Over the pit stood a large metal grill, and on the grill lay Morlock Ambrosius, trussed hand and foot with chains. The chains were bound with leather strips to stakes thrust into the ground at the head and foot of the grill. It was apparently pretty hot; she could see the air wiggling over the grill, and Morlock's clothes were smoldering.

Nearby stood Nurgnatz, poking at Morlock uncertainly with a long fork. “Ready to talk now?” the gnome rasped. He patted Morlock's backpack, on the floor of the cave next to him. “If I have to, I'll burn this stupid thing. What good will anything that's in it do anyone then, eh? You made the stuff; don't you want it used?”

“Not by you,” said the smoldering maker through clenched teeth.

Nurgnatz continued to proffer reasonable arguments why Morlock should do everything that Nurgnatz wanted, and Morlock continued to reply with terse refusals.

Rhabia stopped listening. Her attention was transfixed by the backpack—specifically by the sword grip emerging from the sheath hidden in the framework. If she could get hold of that somehow, maybe something could be done. But the trick would be to get past Nurgnatz, who was stronger than he looked. Fortunately, she thought as she edged forward, the headless bear or whatever it was didn't seem to be present.

Unfortunately, it
was
present; Rhabia just didn't see it because it was behind her. She discovered this when it grabbed her by her upper arms and lifted her off the ground.

“Oh—” she began, then shut up. Mere profanity could not begin to express her frustration and despair.

Nurgnatz turned to look at her with his gorgeous dark eyes. It was hard to read expression on his wart-infested face, but he seemed pleased to see her. “Ah, my dear. Mustn't be anxious. All in due time; we will become as close as you desire. But may I say that I found your fingers quite delicious. In fact, perhaps,” he said, moving closer, “perhaps just a snack—”

Rhabia waited until he was close to her, and then kicked him as hard as she could in his face. She had the satisfaction of feeling his snout crunch against her toe-caps.

He reeled back, squealing a raspy scream. “Why is it always this way?” he wailed, wiping blood away from his nose and licking it off his fingers. “Nobody loves me.” Lick. “I live here all alone in splendid isolation—” Lick. “—with no one to enjoy my beauty—” Lick. “—and whenever—”

“Look, Nurgnatz,” she cut in. “Eat me if you can, but don't ask me to feel sorry for you. Tell it to your sister.”

“She hated me. Everyone hates me, and all I want is to be loved!”

She suggested he perform an act which was sometimes a gesture of love, but not in this case. “With that toasting fork of yours,” she added.

He whistled oddly. The extra pair of arms extruded from the headless bear's stomach and gripped her legs firmly. “I will love you,” the gnome said quietly, “in my own way. And you will be one with me, and, for a while, I won't be lonely anymore.” He sidled toward her.

“Nurgnatz,” Morlock said, no longer through clenched teeth. “Turn me over. I'm done on this side.”

The gnome, annoyed at the interruption, wheeled around and stabbed Morlock viciously with the fork. The tines entered his shoulder and sank deep. Nurgnatz drew the fork out and was going to stab him again, but never got the chance. Blood from Morlock's wound fell on the hot coals and burst into a cloud of orange flame.

Nurgnatz screamed and jumped back from the fire. Meanwhile the fire was eating away at the leather thong binding Morlock's wrist-chains to the stake. He pulled the chains loose and sat up to quickly untie the thong binding his feet-chains. In seconds he had rolled off the grill, although his hands and feet were still chained.

“Hey!” Nurgnatz shouted, in apparent disapproval.

Morlock, holding out his hands, called,
“Tyrfing!”

Morlock's sword leapt out of its sheath, flew across the fire pit, and landed in his outstretched right hand. He gripped it with both hands and held the blade at guard.

“Not bad,” Nurgnatz said, with professional courtesy. “A talic impulse woven into the crystalline lattice of the blade, I suppose?”

For a wonder, Rhabia actually understood this. In her years of doing a little of this, a little of that, she had learned a very little about magic. And she knew what tal was: the quasi-material force by which living souls impelled mere matter into motion. Every living consciousness was haloed with tal. Morlock must have implanted some tal into the sword, so that it would come to his hand when he spoke its name.

“Impressive, in its rather primitive way,” the gnome said superciliously. “Still, have a look at this!”

Nurgnatz muttered a few words that Rhabia didn't quite catch. A golden sword dropped out of the ceiling and stood at guard opposite Morlock.

To Rhabia's dismay, Morlock was obviously dismayed. He stared at the blade hanging in midair and essayed a tentative cut at its grip. The golden blade executed exactly the same move, and the two magic blades clashed in midair. Morlock withdrew his sword to guard, and the golden blade mimicked the act.

“A talic construct?” Morlock speculated.

“Precisely. You really are almost my equal—at least professionally,” Nurgnatz added with a vain smirk. “It perceives the talic impulses of your intended action before you have time to execute it, and matches its action to yours.”

“You used the tal of your dead victims, I suppose?” Morlock asked.

“Some of them. I find that the extraction process spoils the flavor of the meat.”

Morlock nodded. “Interesting. Still, tal is produced only by a living consciousness. Every action your construct takes depletes its reserves of tal. Eventually it will run out and have to be recharged.”

Nurgnatz snickered. “Oh, it can outlast you, Morlock; don't worry about that.”

Morlock had hooked his foot around one of the legs of the grill, and he flipped it into the air at the golden sword. It executed the same move as before, severing the grill in midair. The two unequal chunks of iron fell to the floor of the cave with dull thumps, as heavy as Rhabia's heart.

“Oh, I forgot to mention,” Nurgnatz added smugly. “It learns. Any attack or defensive move you make, it can remember and use at any time.”

“Is this as bad as it looks?” Rhabia called out to Morlock.

“Nothing,” said Morlock, “is as bad as Nurgnatz looks.”

The gnome, evidently considering this a joke, threw back his head and laughed. Morlock quickly crouched down (the golden sword opposite him mimicking the position of Tyrfing). He shifted Tyrfing to his right hand alone and scooped up coals from the fire pit with his now-free left hand. He tossed the coals at Nurgnatz.

The gnome's laugh turned into a rippling screech. The fiery coals set alight the grease thickly layering his warts. “My warts!” he cried desperately. “My warts! My beautiful warts!” He ran around the cave frantically, patting at the flames, which only spread to his greasy bloodstained hands. At last he dodged out the dark cave entrance and rolled in the snow outside.

Morlock tried to follow him, but he was hampered by the chains on his feet and a sudden attack of the golden sword. He was forced to stop and defend himself and, apparently by reflex, slashed in counterattack, teaching his opponent a new move. It used the attack instantly, forcing Morlock to retreat past Nurgnatz. He gave the grovelling gnome a good stomp as he passed, but it wasn't enough to disable his enemy.