But how? His friends and his brain told him one thing, but his eyes were filled with contradictions.
“Put it out o’ your mind, mate,” the otter instructed him as he dodged a spear thrust and put an arrow in still another assailant. “You’re too easy a target. We can’t ‘old ‘em off you forever.”
Even as he spoke the remaining Taleas had clustered around them and were trying to separate Jon-Tom from his stubborn bodyguards. Despite their valiant effort, Colin and Mudge were driven in opposite directions, away from Jon-Tom and from each other. Dormas and Sorbl were trying to protect Clothahump and had no time to spare for someone who wouldn’t raise a hand to defend himself.
Then one of the Taleas burst through, charging down on Jon-Tom, holding her sword over her head. He could only stare. Talea, it was Talea, from her flowing hair to the tips of her toes. Yet he’d just watched while a dozen identical Taleas had turned into something small and brightly colored before exploding. They had been cloned by some devilry, called up by a sinister magic. They were not his beloved. His heart’s desire was a phantom.
Then it was time for reflexes to take control from an unwilling mind. As the sword came down he brought up the front of the ramwood staff. The blade glanced off the nearly indestructible wood and slid harmlessly off to the side. He wasn’t even nicked. Continuing the defensive motion, he brought the club end of the staff around to strike his attacker just above the temple, staggering her. The pain that shot through him had nothing to do with the recoil his arm muscles absorbed. Recovering, she brought the sword around in a low arc, aiming for his legs and trying her best to cripple him. He had no choice but to thumb the concealed button on the side of the staff, releasing the six-inch-long blade hidden in the shaft.
Closing his eyes as he did so, he stabbed swiftly. The point went right through his assailant’s throat. She let out a violent gurgle and fell away from him, but there was no blood, not a drop, not even when he withdrew the blade. Contraction, change, explosion, and she—or rather it—was gone.
“See, mate!” Mudge called over to him. “None of ‘em is for real. They’ve been conjured up to confuse and bemuse us, and you most of all!”
Of course. When he’d defeated the impish spellsingers sent to stop them, he’d alerted the evil force within the fortress.
Recognizing the danger Jon-Tom posed, the perambulator’s captor had somehow conceived of and put into effect a defense specifically designed to take care of his most dangerous opponent. And it had nearly worked. Only his companion’s ceaseless defense on his behalf had preserved him from a death by deception.
They’d carried the load for him long enough. It was time to strike a few blows on his own behalf.
“You’re right, Mudge. I’m sorry.” Angrily he waded into the thick of the fight, swinging the club end of the staff in great sweeping arcs. Now that he’d been jolted out of his reverie, he fought with twice the resolve of his friends, furious beyond measure at anything that would employ such insidious intimacy against an opponent. The ranks of identical attackers grew thin as one after another blew up and vanished into the clear mountain air.
Showing unexpected speed, Colin ducked, twisted, and struck with one booted foot at an unprotected knee. The Talea on his left dropped her Weapon, let out a loud moan, and fell to the ground. She knelt there, holding her leg and rocking back and forth. The koala brought the long saber up and around for a killing blow. At the same time it struck Jon-Tom forcefully that this was the first time anything like a lingering cry of pain had been produced by any of their attackers. But having progressed from one mental and emotional extreme to the other, he was loath to make a fool of himself again. So he hesitated.
“Son of a bitch,” the injured Talea mumbled girlishly. Jon-Tom’s eyes went wide.
“Colin, no!” He managed to interpose himself between the fallen woman and the falling sword just in time to block the decapitating blow. Colin gaped at him for a moment but, with no time to argue, turned to deal with another attacker.
It wasn’t possible, of course. He held his staff out warily in front of him as he approached the figure that was rocking back and forth on the ground and clutching her injured knee. Lifting the spear end of the ramwood, he held it ready to thrust into the body beneath him. He was acutely conscious of the fact that the rapidly diminishing band of Taleas might be attempting to substitute craftiness for numbers. This might be a new ploy, designed to trap and bemuse him anew.
The figure seemed to see him for the first time, raised a hand in a feeble attempt to ward off the spear’s point. “Please, Jon-Tom, don’t you recognize me? It’s me, Talea!”
While the battle raged around him there was another, no less furious, boiling within him. It looked like Talea, it sounded like Talea, but so had all the others, and when pricked, they had gone up in puffs of orange-red gas. He had time to hesitate, to consider, because Mudge and Colin were temporarily in control of his flanks.
“I—I have to do this. Forgive me.” And he jabbed down with the point of the spear.
But only to puncture lightly, not to kill, tearing the slightest of cuts along one arm. The figure let out a little scream.
“You motherfucking bastard, you’ve ruined my blouse!” She started to sob.
Yes, it certainly sounded like Talea, but of more importance was the thin flow of blood that began to trickle down her arm. She grabbed at the wound and continued to curse him. It was difficult because she was crying so hard.
“She’s bleeding, she’s bleeding!” He whirled, shaking the ramwood staff joyfully over his head. “Did you hear me, Mudge, she’s bleeding!”
“Right, mate, I ‘eard you.”
Colin spared a glance for the tall man, then commented to the otter fighting at his shoulder. “Sounds like these two have a wonderful relationship.”
“Of course, I’m bleeding, you stupid imbecile! You stabbed me.”
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” He was so relieved and so happy, he could hardly speak. “I had to.”
“You had to stab me?” She looked down at her arm. Blood continued to filter through her fingers. “If you wanted to tell me mat you still love me, you could have given me flowers instead.”
“You don’t understand. Look. Look around you.”
She did so, and blinked, several times. Jon-Tom had to catch her to keep her from falling. She was warm and familiar against him. Her anger vanished, to be replaced by fear and confusion.
“Where am I, Jon-Tom? What is this place? And—and why do all those women look like meT’
“You really have no idea?” She shook her head, wide-eyed, and suddenly looking very small and vulnerable.
He eased her gently down to the ground, left her sitting there, holding on to her still bleeding arm. “I’ll explain it to you as best I can,” he assured her softly, “as soon as the rest of you are all dead.”
XIII
Thanks largely to the fighting skills of Mudge and Colin, the number of redheaded attackers was soon reduced to half a dozen. Acting under orders from an unseen master, these viragos retreated and prepared to roll heavy rocks down on the advancing intruders. They never had the chance to complete the planned ambush. Using his longbow, Mudge picked them off one by one. In so doing, he used the last of his arrows, but he was able to recover the majority of them from the surrounding rubble-strewn slope, where they had come to rest after passing completely through the spurious bodies of the Talea clones.
Jon-Tom and the others waited for the otter to conclude his collecting, a task in which he was greatly aided by Sorbl. Meanwhile the spellsinger held the hand of his heart’s desire and tried to comfort her. Talea, however, was her usual self again, which meant that she was in no mood to be coddled. She did acquiesce to Clothahump’s ministrations, allowing the wizard to bind the shallow cut in her arm. Actually Colin’s kick to the leg was giving her more trouble than Jon-Tom’s revealing spear stroke. With his help she rose and tried walking. She found she could move well enough but with a definite limp.