Morlock said, "Death and Sleep are brothers. I am not afraid of dying, as long as-" He broke off abruptly.
"As long as what?" Nurgnatz prompted him. "What is it that frightens you more than Death or Sleep?"
Rhabia heard all this dimly through a red haze of pain and anger and shame. She was sick at the thought of being mutilated, and the torn flesh of her finger-stumps felt as if there were little fires, growing more intense all the time, and she was furious at Nurgnatz for biting her and at herself for letting it happen. She was even angry at Morlock, who just stood there in his cage and gaped uselessly at her. The burning pain in her wounded hand reminded her somehow of the message set on fire by the wound in Morlock's hand, and she suddenly thought of a way to get revenge on the gnome who had mutilated her.
She laughed harshly. "I know what he's afraid of," she said to the gnome. "I'll tell you."
Morlock looked at her as if he'd been slapped, and the gnome turned with relief to his more cooperative witness. "Well?" Nurgnatz said.
"I'll tell you if you promise me something," Rhabia said slowly.
"Don't!" shouted Morlock.
"What is it?" Nurgnatz asked.
"I want you to kill me before you eat the rest of me," Rhabia said dully. "I don't want to be eaten piece by piece."
"Hm," Nurgnatz said slowly. "It's rather a great concession, as I like my meat fresh and fresh. Still. Very well."
"Don't do it!" Morlock urged. "He's lying to you!"
"It's fire," Rhabia said swiftly, before she could change her mind. "Morlock's terrified of it. I had to make the campfire and cook the food all through the trip-"
"Eh," Morlock said weakly, "it's woman's work."
"We'll see about that," Nurgnatz said thoughtfully. "I've a grill upstairs I haven't used for ages. Shall we try it out, Morlock?"
"You wouldn't dare," replied Morlock glumly.
"You forget I am All-Wise, All-Strong, All-Brave-the compendium of all the virtues! We'll test yours in a little while," he leered, and scampered back the way he had brought them.
Morlock said nothing but reached into his boot and drew out a little piece of metal. He reached through the bars of his cage and tossed it to Rhabia. She caught it with her unwounded hand and looked at it. It was an odd little thing, like a long blunt needle with many flexible joints. She'd never seen anything like it, but she was very much mistaken if it wasn't a lockpick.
Rhabia looked at Morlock. There must be some reason he wasn't saying anything-maybe Nurgnatz was (or could be) listening just outside the door. She gestured toward the door of her cage, as if to say, Shall we go now?
Morlock held up his hand (Wait!) and then gestured with his hand toward himself and then waved in the direction Nurgnatz had gone. She guessed he was telling her to stay where she was until Nurgnatz came back and took him away.
She gestured at him and herself and then more urgently toward the cage door. Let'r go now!
He gestured at his shoulders. She didn't get it at first, then she realized he was saying, What about my backpack?
She gestured at him, then herself, then at her own shoulders, meaning, Is a backpack worth your life or mine?
Rather unimaginatively, he gestured at his shoulders again, which Rhabia interpreted as, I'm getting my damn backpack.
She shrugged and stood pat. After all, it was barely possible he knew what he was doing. If Nurgnatz wanted what was in Morlock's backpack so bad, maybe he shouldn't get it.
Morlock was pointing solemnly at his head, then at Rhabia. You're pretty smart, she read this.
"And cute, too," she replied aloud, in a Nurgnatzian burst of self-esteem, and turned away to staunch her wounds.
Time passed. Crouching in a corner of her cage, Rhabia actually fell asleep for a while, in spite of her pain, and the cold, and her fear. But when Nurgnatz returned with his headless bear in attendance, her head snapped up and she leaped to her feet. The bear was walking upright, Rhabia saw dimly through sleep-bleared eyes, and its red forepaws were actually hands of a sort-with seven or eight fingers each, and at least three thumbs per hand.
Nurgnatz opened Morlock's cage and stood back. The headless bear rushed in before Morlock could dodge out, and it grabbed him with four arms-an extra pair extruded from the headless bear's belly to help it keep the crooked man captive. Then it lumbered out of the cage and went to stand by Nurgnatz.
"See you soon, my dear!" carolled the gnome, his warty chin still stained with her blood, and he dodged out of the many-mirrored chamber again. The headless bear, carrying Morlock, lumbered swiftly after.
She waited until their sounds had vanished, following them up the tunnel, and then she got to work with the lockpick. Her wounded hand hurt more than ever, and every time she had to use it the stumps started bleeding again …but fortunately she was right-handed. And, anyway, this was life or death; she couldn't worry about minor discomforts, or even major ones.
She had picked a few locks before, for lockbox owners who had lost their keys. (She wasn't a thief.) This lock was trickier than any she had tackled; Nurgnatz was evidently almost as gifted as he thought himself. But the lockpick was handier than any she'd used before; several times it seemed to move on its own to turn the tumblers back. Eventually she was free and gratefully pocketed the little device.
Now the program was a little hazier. But there was one obvious way out: the way she had come in. Unfortunately, that was also the way Nurgnatz and his headless bear had dragged Morlock. Still …
She crept carefully up the long tunnel leading away from the manymirrored room. There were mirrors on the wall of the tunnel, too, and more love poetry from Nurgnatz to himself. Unfortunately there were no branches to the tunnel, only little lightless alcoves along the way, full of bones and bad smells.
When she was investigating one of these to see if it was the entrance to another tunnel a dry dead voice said, "Make stop."
Rhabia leapt back. She wished she had a weapon-but, on balance, the voice hadn't sounded dangerous.
"Make who stop what?" she asked the unseen speaker.
"Make me stop. Make him stop. Make him make me stop. Stop. Please stop." The dead voice droned on in the dark.
There was another sound along with the voice-an often repeated, soft squishing sort of noise. She couldn't place it. She stepped over to one of the dim flameless globes buried in the wall and pulled it loose and returned to the alcove where the dry hopeless voice was begging for something to stop.
After she saw what was happening she wished she had passed on without looking. A pudgy white-skinned man was sitting there on the floor of the alcove. Over half his body the skin and fat had been torn away so that the raw red muscle glared at her in the dim light of the globe. As she watched in horror his fingers reached out and tore away a strip of his own skin. Then he tossed it in a metal dish that sat nearby him on the floor. This was the constant squishy sound she had been unable to identify.
"Don't do that!" she yelped.
"Don't! Don't! Don't!" he begged. "But he makes me. He makes me make myself. Make me stop. Make him make me stop."
Nurgnatz had placed a compulsion on the man; that was clear. It was also, unfortunately, clear why. The imprints of Nurgnatz's clever little hands were painted in blood around the rim of the metal dish. Nurgnatz liked skin and fat, and he was making the man strip his own flesh off. Occasionally Nurgnatz would stop by and have a snack….
Rhabia turned away, causing the man to panic. The tone of his voice didn't change, perhaps could not change, but he said faster than before, "Stop. Stop. Make it stop. Make me stop. Stop." All the while his hand continued stripping away little bits of his own flesh.
Maybe Morlock could do something for him, Rhabia thought desperately. But Morlock was likely to have enough to do in helping himself. She couldn't help this man, but she couldn't leave him behind, begging the empty dark to make it stop. That maternal instinct again; what a nuisance it was!