“Just get on with it and wake up Jardin,” said Jill. “The longer we go without hearing from the Scapula the more nervous I get. We haven’t gotten anything back from the brother, either, and it must be almost an hour since I sent off the messenger.”
This time Gashanatantra led the way out into the hall, letting the pedestal reassemble itself behind him. “The Scapula is probably preparing himself for the Knitting. It is conceivable his preparations include the recapture or more lasting extermination of his brother. The Knitting is the central concern.”
“That’s exactly what’s been on my mind. I’ve been thinking about your friend Iskendarian too. Don’t you think you should go bring him in before the Scapula gets hold of him?”
“The Scapula already has hold of him,” Gashanatantra stated. “From what Monoch tells me he is frozen in a chair no differently from any of the others we have already heard about. As far as that goes, he’s likely to be less of a danger in that condition than anywhere else. Even if he somehow manages to escape there is still no need to worry. He may know Monoch is a soul-drinker, but I don’t believe he’s realized all the implications: Monoch is keyed to him, and Monoch has his orders. On the other side, I suspect the Scapula will wait until he has some leisure time to review his catches one by one, and I doubt he’ll discover what he has until then. Even when and if that happens, he may find himself in a situation... not to his liking.”
“Tell me about it,” Jill growled. “Iskendarian or whoever he is is a walking disaster. You’re looking for booby-traps? - he’s the -”
“Now, now, dear, don’t foam at the mouth.” He could feel Jill glaring at him behind his back, then thought he knew when the grudging hint of a grin flickered through the murderous intent. Just the memory of old times, or perhaps the glint of something fresh and closer to hand?
Back in the workroom, Gashanatantra eyed Jardin carefully, alert to the possibility he had risen from his coma to prowl around the place in their absence with malign intent. No evidence of this presented itself. The restorative drips were proceeding, the shock radiator remained where he had left it, the chain restraints he had insisted on applying were undisturbed. Gashanatantra clicked open his box and began sorting through its contents.
“Where do you think the Scapula is, physically?” asked Jill. “In Jardin’s sanctum?”
“Possibly,” Gashanatantra said. “He may be on the way to the Knitting, or he may be planning to execute whatever his plan is by remote action. Or he may be using Protector of Nature’s lair as a base, or Vladimir’s, or his own original Scapular facilities.”
“I - that’s not a thumbscrew, is it?”
“Only incidentally. But I prefer to try this first.” He held a vial up to the light and tapped it to clear air bubbles.
“Is that your amphetamine?”
“No,” said Gashanatantra. “This is much more powerful, but you would have been unlikely to have any yourself; that’s why I asked for the other instead. This is old, very old. I doubt anyone is still making it. Now.”
“You’re injecting it into his chest?”
It was a long needle. “Directly into the heart. The action is not only pharmaceutical, the formulation contains a cross-linked spell-skein as well. If he - ah.”
Jardin’s chest had twitched. A low creaking rattle came from somewhere deep within it. His right arm jerked; then, his eyes flew open and his lips drew back and his teeth rattled, his back arched up from the table, a whiplash wave ran down his body to his feet, which drummed a brief rat-a-tat, he gave voice to a guttural wail that brought with it a thin spray of greenish bile, he began to draw in paroxysmal rasping breaths.
“Jardin!” called Jill. “It’s me! Can you hear me?”
Jardin’s staring eyes were rolling and red. “That scum bastard,” he was whispering between wheezes.
“Which one?” Gash murmured urbanely. “Now listen closely. It is important that we talk.”
CHAPTER 16
Zalzyn Shaa had never been fond of conventions. Even a family reunion was edging over the line, but then with his family any rational observer would feel that that part of his attitude, at least, was perfectly understandable. So when he considered the fact that he was at least partially responsible for the present congregation of disreputable characters spread out along the street - could even be defined, in fact, as co-host - it was enough to make a new identity and a turn to the open road seem of more than merely passing appeal. But lurking around on the other hand was the matter of responsibility. Who knew what this gaggle of loons would do left to their own devices if he headed off into the sunset?
Still, matters had clearly passed smoothly through the absurd and were charging unwaveringly into the preposterous. Where would it all end? An old phrase Max had picked up from one of his researches came to mind, “the heat-death of the universe.” Max had spent a few years tossing out this remark as his contribution whenever a situation became completely unintelligible, as an illustration of incomprehensibility that might only be resolved by one with unknowable knowledge or an unachievable vantage-station from which to exercise their point of view. It was clear the ancients had meant something by this mysterious “heat-death”, but for all Max’s exertions it had remained only a string of cryptic words.
So as Shaa stood there, surveying his rabble of compatriots and wondering where and whether all this would end, reflecting that by now it might take an apocalypse of legendary proportions to achieve resolution by the sheer expedient of sweeping all of them and perhaps even the rest of Peridol with them into the sea, he felt his thoughts turning philosophically to -
Someone gave him a hard slap on the back. Someone? No, that was a smack he recognized. “I am also pleased to see you, my sister,” Shaa said, raising an eyebrow.
“Not a very good time to sink into reverie, wouldn’t you say?” said Eden pointedly.
“Yes, I suppose you’re right.” Shaa considered the problem. “It would be better to find a small coffee shop and sit on its veranda swapping reminiscences and recapitulating hardy moments from the recent pitched battle. Or, considering how many invitations would need to go out to ensure the attendance of everyone appropriate, perhaps a ballroom would be better instead, even if a tea-lounge would be more atmospheric. Shall I call the caterer?”
“You’ve been on the road too long,” Eden told him. “You’ve finally up and lost your mind.”
“Certainly I’ve been doing something too long,” agreed Shaa, putting his hands in his pockets. “Probably slithering in and out of plots. But I suppose that’s still the leading matter on the table now, to sit down and brew up our next wily scheme, leaving the rest cure in the country for a later date.”
“I’ve been on a rest cure in the country for the last - well, you know how long - and trust me, it doesn’t solve a thing.”
“That is not,” Shaa said reflectively, “the sort of thing I would choose to take on trust; one must experience it for oneself. Although I will accept that it can probably wait until morning.”