"You mean that Misquamacus is using it like a messenger — to call on other demons?"
Singing Rock said: "Something like that. I'll tell you later. Right now, I think we'd be well advised to get out of here."
"The virus — what about the virus? Singing Rock — we have to take a chance and use it!"
Singing Rock moved away from the door. "Forget the virus. It was a clever idea, but it isn't going to work. Not now, anyway. Come on, let's go."
I stayed where I was. I was terrified, but if there was any chance of destroying Misquamacus, I wanted to do it.
"Singing Rock — we can threaten him with it! Tell him that if he doesn't close that gateway, we'll kill him! For Christ's sake — it's worth a try!"
Singing Rock came back to the door and tried to pull me away. "It's too late," he whispered. "Don't you realize what those demons are? They're a form of virus in themselves. The Star Beast will laugh at your influenza, and give you the worst death you can think of."
"But Misquamacus —"
"Misquamacus may be threatened, Harry, but once he's summoned these demons, it's too late. It's more dangerous to kill him now than ever. If one of these beasts comes through, and Misquamacus dies, then there is absolutely no way of sending it back. Look at it, Harry. You want to risk that being loose in Manhattan?"
The Star Beast rippled and shimmered in its own ghastly fluorescence. Sometimes it seemed to be fat and glutinous, and at other times it seemed to be composed of nothing but sinuous clouds. It gave off an indescribable atmosphere of freezing terror, like a mad and vicious dog.
"It's no good, Singing Rock," I told him. "I have to try."
Singing Rock said: "Harry — I can't warn you enough. It's no use."
But I had made up my mind. I put my hand on the ice-cold handle of the door, and prepared to open it.
"Give me a spell or something to cover me," I said.
"Harry — a spell isn't a six-gun! Just don't go, that's all!"
For the space of two seconds, I wondered just what the hell I was doing. I am not the stuff from which heroes are usually made. But I had the means to destroy Misquamacus, and the opportunity, and somehow it seemed easier and more logical to try and kill him than it did to let him go. If there was anything worse than the Star Beast, I didn't want to see it, and the only way to stop any more manifestations was to get rid of the medicine man. I counted to three and flung open the door.
I was not at all prepared for what it was like in there. It was so cold that it was like being in a dark refrigerator. And somehow, as I tried to rush forward, my legs could only move in slow motion, and whole minutes seemed to pass as I waded through the gluey air, my arm upraised with the glass vial of virus, and my eyes wide.
It was the sound that was the worst, though. It was like a terrible chill depressing wind, a note that was constantly falling and yet which never sank below a dull rushing monotone. There was no wind at all in the room, but that intangible hurricane screamed and roared and blotted out all sense of time and space.
Misquamacus turned toward me, slowly, like a man in a nightmare. He made no attempt to ward me off or to protect himself. The Star Beast, only yards away in the center of the frosty gateway, shifted and pulsated like coils of toadspawn, or twists of smoke.
"Misquamacus!" I shrieked. The words came out of my mouth like slow drips of melting wax, and seemed to freeze in mid-air. "Misquamacus!"
I stopped only two or three feet away from him. I had to hold one hand against my ear to try and blot out the deafening moan of the wind that wasn't there. But in my other hand, I gripped the infected vial of influenza, and held it up above me like a holy crucifix.
"Misquamacus — this is the invisible spirit which struck down your people! I have it here — in this bottle! Close the gateway — send back the Star Beast — or I will release it!"
Somewhere in the back of my brain I heard Singing Rock shouting "Harry — come back!" But the hurricane was too loud, and my adrenalin was pumping too fast, and I knew that if I didn't push Misquamacus to the brink, we might never rid ourselves of the wonder-worker, or his demons, or any of the fearful legacy from a magical past.
But I'm a clairvoyant, not a medicine man, and what happened next was something I just couldn't cope with. I felt something cold and wriggly in the palm of my hand. When I looked up at the vial, it had turned into a black squirming leech. I almost dropped it in disgust — but then a small warning in my mind said it's an illusion, another of Misquamacus's tricks — and I held it tight instead. As I gripped it, though, the wonder-worker outmaneuvered me. The vial appeared to burst into flames, and my brain wasn't fast enough to override my nervous responses and reassure me that this was an illusion, too. I dropped the vial, and it sank slowly toward the floor — unnaturally slowly, like a stone sinking in transparent oil.
Terrified, I tried to turn away and run for the door. But the air was heavy and limpid, and every step was congealed into a massive effort. I saw Singing Rock in the doorway, his hands stretched out toward me, but he seemed to be miles and miles distant, a lifesaver on a shore I couldn't reach.
The writhing, colorless shape of the Star Beast had an irresistible attraction all of its own. I felt myself being physically drawn away from the door and back toward the center of the magic gateway, even though I was using all my strength to try and escape. I saw the vial of influenza virus literally change course in mid-fall, and move through the air toward the Star Beast tumbling and turning like a satellite falling through space.
Intense cold drowned itself over me, and in the dirgelike din of that windless wind, I saw my breath forming clouds of vapor, and stars of frost collecting on my coat. The vial of virus froze into crystals of glass and ice, which rendered it as harmless to Misquamacus as an empty gun.
I turned — I couldn't help turning — to look at the Star Beast behind me. Even though I was struggling across the room away from the gateway, my steps took me no further in the direction of the door. My feet were now only inches away from the chalked circle, and within the center of the circle, the horrifying tangle of disturbed air that constituted the Star Beast was drawing me nearer. Misquamacus, his head lowered and his left arm raised, was intoning a long and deafening chant that appeared to excite the Star Beast even more. The monster was like the shadowy X-ray of a stomach, churning and twitching in digestive peristalsis.
I had been fighting to escape, but the cold was so bitter that it was difficult to think about anything else except how good it would be to get warm. My muscles ached with the frosty clutch of zero degrees and below, and the effort of running through the moaning gale and the oil-thick air was almost beyond me. I knew that I would probably have to surrender, and that whatever Misquamacus had in store for me, I would have to accept I remember I dropped to my knees.
Singing Rock was screaming at me from the doorway. "Harry! " he yelled. "Harry! Don't give up!"
I tried to lift my head to look at him. My neck muscles seemed to be frozen, and the hoar frost on my eyebrows and hair was so thick that I could hardly see anything at all. My hair was laden with frost, and there was a beard of icicles around my nose and mouth, where my breath had frozen. I felt nothing but a distant Arctic numbness, and all I could hear was the terrifying rush of that wind.
"Harry!" screamed Singing Rock. "Harry — move, Harry! Move!"