He hung frozen to the rock face, watching as the fissure grew. The opening in the giant mound gaped wider like the jaws of some immense beast, and the buzzing that came from within it grew even more shrill, as if the sound itself might force open the portals still further.
It was the sound that shook him free. He struggled forward now with a new urgency, ignoring the pain of his burned feet, clawing his way feverishly up the rocks that shook and heaved as if to throw him off, pulling himself at last to the ledge by his hands, one hand still gripping his weapon. Before him lay the spread form of Carol and the long white body arching over her, the face turned away, the torso like an immense white artery throbbing in time with the throbbing of the earth.
Even in the darkness he could see that it looked barely human. And what had happened to the head? Once, as a boy, he had chanced to drop a jar of peanut butter onto a stone floor; the container had shattered, but the shards of glass had remained clinging loosely in place, held by the substance inside. So it was, he thought suddenly, crazily, of this creature's hairless skulclass="underline" shattered like crockery, yet all the pieces still intact.
The other took no notice as Freirs dragged himself onto the rock shelf beside them. Suddenly the white arc of the body tautened, the face, once hidden, turned toward Freirs, the tube filling the mouth, and in the moonlight Freirs recognized the farmer, his host and friend Sarr Poroth.
The face stared past him with no more recognition than a scarecrow, the eyes unseeing. There was nothing behind them. Carol's body quaked, her legs sprawled open in the moonlight, and it dawned on Freirs what the concentric rings on them were for: a signpost for something unfamiliar with the human female body. A target.
Slowly, as if it had read the revulsion in Freirs' mind, the farmer's eyes turned toward him, and the corners of the mouth stretched in a smile.
In terror Freirs lashed out with the sickle, the metal flashing in the firelight. The thing before him barely quivered at the blows, as unyielding as a slab of dead meat. Idly it raised a ravaged hand and groped toward Freirs' face. With the next blow Freirs struck home, the sharpened blade sweeping cleanly through the appendage that snaked from the farmer's open mouth.
Severed, the thing twisted and shriveled like a sliced-open worm, streaming obscene milky fluid. The farmer's body jerked twice, then fell limp upon Carol's. Above them the buzzing grew higher in pitch, became a scream as the thing within the mound thrust once more toward the stars, rising coil upon coil, then subsided. The seam began to close. Freirs saw the line of fire grow thinner as the massive blocks of earth slid together again, the great portals shutting. Miles to the south, the singing ceased as roses turned black and withered on their stems.
The mound sank inward on itself, settling back to its original shape, the cracks closing completely and blocking the fire inside, the tremors subsiding. The white appendage hung limply from the corpse's mouth like a severed umbilical cord. Freirs looked down in time to see a tiny charcoal-black creature slip from the hollow tube and scurry down the rocks, a rodent fleeing the collapse of its home. Poroth's tale came back to him, the mouse within the dead man's gaping mouth. Before he could cry out, the creature had leaped nimbly down the wall of rocks and the dark earth had swallowed it up.
The roaring was stilled, the vibrations had stopped. Around him now he could hear the innocent crackling of the flames and the voices of men pushing their way through to the hillside. Once again the sound of crickets filled the night.
Carol lay dazed upon the altar, eyes shut, her mouth still hanging open. Freirs rolled the farmer's body off her; it was already stiffening, the appendage dry and withered. Gently he closed Carol's mouth as one would the mouth of a corpse, not daring to peer inside, and covered her nakedness with his torn and sweaty shirt, thinking how different the moaning, heaving woman he'd seen below the farmer had been from the Carol he'd known, and wondering, reluctantly, how much pain there'd really been in those sounds she'd made, and how much pleasure.
Embracing her, he promised himself not to think too hard about it.
The moon gazed silently upon his kiss, the stars stared coldly down; and if they heard his vow, they made no sign.
Epilogue: Christmas
Those same stars looked coldly down that winter upon the teeming city.
The stores were open late that night for last-minute shopping. Crowds hurried through the frozen streets, arms laden with packages. Salvation Army bands competed with the sounds of the traffic. Steam rose from holes in the pavement.
He walked with her, hand in hand, through the crowd. She was smiling at the shop windows, the Santas in the street, the excited, rosy faces of the children, but something in her gaze seemed far away, and always would be.
He, too, was distracted. He was musing upon the holy birth now being celebrated, and upon the unholy one so narrowly averted that very summer. He reminded himself for the thousandth time that nothing, that night, had been born.
And yet the monstrous thing itself, the thing the old man had given his life for, had not been destroyed. Might it not be living still, waiting in its egg of earth? Had he -interrupted the Ceremony in time?
The stars trembled unseen beyond the lights of the city. He felt his wife's hand in his. Surrounded by the throng, he paused, listened a moment, then walked on.
'What is it, Jeremy?' she asked. 'Is something wrong?'
'It's nothing, honey,' he said. He smiled at her and clutched her hand more tightly. She hadn't heard it.
But he had – he was almost sure of it. Above the sounds of the city, the taxi horns, the music, and the laughter, he had heard the roar of the dragon.