I think somebody, possibly in drug dreams, must have seen that place before me. That would explain all those tales of eldritch horrors and unnameable names and unspeakable spooks—though I expect a lot is exaggeration for the sake of extra impact.
I wouldn't want to live in that place either, though.
A glimmering, pale, drowned man's sort of hand reached up from the darkness and grabbed the edge of the balcony. A corpse with pools of shadow for eyes pulled itself up until its empty mouth was level with the platform. It took me a moment to recognize the face, it was so filled with despair. Imar. The All-Father. The Harvester of Souls. Lord of the Hanged Men. Ass-Kicker Supreme.
He extended his other quaking hand toward Magodor, the Destroyer, the Driver of the Spoil, and all that stuff, his Executive Officer and First Assistant Supreme Kicker of Butts.
Magodor stomped his fingers. She put a foot in his face and shoved. So much for company loyalty. Without a sound, Imar twisted and fell into the gulf below.
I started walking back up the tunnel. Magodor stayed beside me a while, smiling up like we were headed home after a perfect date. She was excited. She could not stop shifting shape—although she never drifted far from human. Maybe we had grown on them over the millennia, too.
Might be worth some speculation. Might have something to do with why they weren't as all-powerful as they wanted us to believe.
I faded out of the tunnel into normal sleep. Normal sleep did not last nearly as long as I would have liked.
Surprise, surprise.
57
When first I awakened I was confused. My head hurt. But I hadn't been drinking. There was noise outside in the street. But it was way too early for any reasonable being to be up and about.
Didn't I do this already? Had I been dreaming, and been dreaming dreams within dreams?
It was the same damned racket out there. The same damned bigoted morons trying to start the same damned brickbat party.
I groaned as I tried to get up. My imagination was so good I had bruises and sore muscles.
I just had to try to destroy my eyeballs. I pulled a corner of a curtain back... Whoops! They had thrown extra logs onto the fires of the sun this morning, then done away with any clouds that might temper its brilliance. I backed off until my eyes stopped watering and aching. Then I eased into it.
Yep! Same old bunches of fools with too much time on their hands. Same old mischief looking for a place to happen.
Across the street there... rooted in exactly the same spot. Exactly the same redhead. Looking right at me, just like before. But this time I knew what she was. Trouble. This time I knew better. This time I wouldn't chase her and let her make a fool of me. I can manage that fine all by myself, thank you.
I felt a slight tingle way back in my mind. The Dead Man was there. I realized he must have been there all night. Meaning maybe he had had a thread connected during my nocturnal adventure. Which suggested that he was very concerned indeed. I tried to give him a good look at the redhead.
As though she realized she was under special scrutiny she sort of stepped sideways and backward and evaporated into a mob surrounding two women glaring at one another nose to nose. One was a very short, fat, ugly human woman. The other was a tall, skinny, beautiful dwarf. They looked like sisters.
Somebody had noticed and made mention of that fact. Somebody had been stirring with a big, big spoon.
A woman left the knot. There was a ghost of a hint of furtiveness about her. "That her?"
Indeed. I am able to follow her by sensing her as a sort of absence of presence in motion.
I didn't ask him to explain. I didn't care. I was watching the wonder of the latter half of our century. Mrs. Cardonlos and her broom were breaking up the all-female confrontation. She found the assistance of a public-spirited giantess invaluable.
"Damn me, the old harridan ain't all bad after all. What'll I do for somebody to hate?"
The Goddamn Parrot squawked on cue.
"Of course. Thanks, Morley."
Mr. Dotes himself was coming up Macunado, his sartorial elegance causing a stir all the way. Or maybe that stir was caused by the grolls accompanying him, a pair of ugly green guys fifteen feet tall. They had snaggly fangs in their mouths and knobbly clubs in their hands and raggedy sacks on their shoulders. They were smiling, but a smiling groll looks twice as fierce as a frowning groll.
Grolls are the result of careless dalliances between giants and trolls. These two came from a single lapse in judgment. They were brothers. Doris and Marsha by name.
Nobody alive in TunFaire would rag those two about their names. They are slow of wit and slower to anger, but once they get started you really don't want to be in the same county.
They were related to Morley in some obscure fashion.
Why was he leading them to my house?
"You still tracking Adeth, Old Bones?" Looking at Doris and Marsha left me wondering how The Call could take itself seriously. Boys like these could be more trouble than any fool wanted.
I am. Her movements seem haphazard. Perhaps even aimless.
"Think she knows you're onto her?"
Improbable.
I considered reminding him that he was highly improbable, but now Morley was just fifty feet from my stoop. The grolls were not his only companions. Several of his old crew, including Sarge, Puddle, and Dojango Roze, pint-size brother of the grolls, were with him. All were armed as heavily as the law allowed. All in all, that crowd had barely enough candlepower to light up the inside of a one-hole outhouse, but they had muscle enough to toss the toilet half a mile.
The Dead Man warned Dean. As Morley reached the foot of my steps the Goddamn Parrot went flapping into the morning, turning to follow Adeth. The shiny little buzzard was entirely under the Dead Man's control. He let fall a gift that would have spoiled Morley's splendor in a grand way, but Dotes was far too alert and quick. He eased out of the way.
Chuckling, I dropped the curtain, got myself dressed in something presentable, stumbled downstairs. I had aches and pains everywhere. And my head hurt, too. For nothing. Damn! You get up feeling awful, you ought to at least have had some drinks and fun.
58
At the foot of the stair I turned right into the kitchen. Dean wasn't back yet. I snagged a couple of fresh biscuits, broke them open and pasted them with butter, then smeared on great gobs of honey. Then I poured me a mug of tea and put some honey into that. Then I dug out an old teapot and put some water on to heat so I could follow the regular tea with an infusion of willow bark.
Dean returned to the kitchen shaking his head. "I hope he knows what he's doing."
"That pot is for willow bark tea."
"Don't talk with your mouth full. You didn't drink anything last night."
"Just one long one. This pain is from the job."
He frowned suspiciously. "What is this job? Nothing honest would pay so much."
He always worries about us getting paid at all. I've never heard him carp about us getting overpaid. "Huh?"
"Mr. Dotes just brought in what looks like a pirates' treasure."
"Argh! And she be a huge un, aye, matey?"
"Too huge."
"Great. I won't have to work for a while."
"Wrong. Mr. Weider requires your help as soon as you clean up this mess."
I sighed, buttered another biscuit. "It's a conspiracy. Everybody thinks I should work. You ever see a cat do anything more than he has to to get by? The world would be a better place if we all took a lesson from the cat."
"Cats don't leave anything for their children."