Swords Against the Shadowland (Fritz Leiber's Lankhmar) (43 page)

And he resented it.

"Plunge it in!" Sheelba rasped. Bony fingers closed around the Mouser's arm and sought weakly to force it downward. "Plunge it in, and save us all!"

The Mouser's jaw knotted, and he gnashed his teeth in anger. The blood on his hand—it stank in his nostrils! Not innocent blood, by any means. Malygris, the jealous and insane fool, had intended to kill, and kill he did. But was he, too, no more than a puppet, playing a part dictated to him, dancing on strings pulled by some greater power?

The Mouser did not doubt it, and the hand that held bloody Catsclaw trembled with rage.

Then Fafhrd doubled over in a fit of coughing. One hand clutching at the edge of the table drapery, he stumbled back. The liquid in the crucible splashed violently. The crucible itself threatened to tip and spill its life-saving contents. Sheelba made a grab for the vessel, but the Mouser brushed his hands aside, caught the rim and saved the potion himself.

Fafhrd's spasm passed, leaving him gasping for breath and pale of face. Wiping a hand over his lips, he looked with fearless eyes toward his partner.

The Mouser nodded to himself as much as to Fafhrd. Then unseen by the others, he rolled his dark and angry eyes toward the roof and beyond.
Well-played, you puppet-masters,
he thought.
Well-played. To save Fafhrd, I’ll dance your jig.

With that, he plunged Catsclaw into the liquid.

The rainbow energies, directionless before as they swam, surged around the blade, entwined around it like fiery serpents. The blood diffused into the liquid, and for a brief moment, the liquid turned scarlet, and the rainbows faded away as if some battle had been lost.

But the scarlet faded in turn, and from within the red water the rainbows rose again. They danced upon the dagger blade, climbed it, licked the blood from the Mouser's hand and sleeve, growing as they fed until bands of colored fire encircled the Gray Mouser.

A spark leaped from those bands, then another, each touching Sheelba and Fafhrd, and the arcanely heatless flames spiraled around and around them. Within those bands, Fafhrd straightened; he drew back his shoulders, and lifted his head, and when he looked across the room at the Mouser, all pain was gone from his bright green eyes.

Within his own body, the Gray Mouser felt a sharp-toothed worm die. For the life of him, though, and for the lives he had won, he could not rejoice. Even as vitality and renewed life flowed back into his frame, his thoughts turned to Ivrian. Ivrian, who was dead. He felt her absence and the distance between them like a horrible, heart-breaking gulf.

He opened his eyes again. Fafhrd stood at the hut’s doorway staring outward. "Come and see this," he said quietly to the Mouser.

"Go on," Sheelba urged. In one hand, he held the jug Fafhrd had fetched. With the other, he lifted the lid of the trunk where he kept his wine. "I have a much better vintage than this, and we have much to celebrate."

"We have nothing to celebrate," the Mouser said bitterly. "But bring your wine. I need a drink."

The Mouser went to the doorway and pushed aside the covering. Fafhrd was already climbing down the ladder, but he kept his gaze toward Lankhmar's distant walls as he descended.

The Mouser leaned in the doorway, beholding a sight like none he had ever seen. Nor would he ever, he knew, see another like it.

Arching across the walls, the spires, and minarets of Nehwon's most ancient and mysterious city, a shimmering aurora blazed against the star-speckled heaven, neatly dividing the black of night in the west from the creeping light of dawn. Brighter, far more spectacular than the northern lights of Fafhrd's cold homeland, more awesome than any common rainbow, it floated in the air like a burning promise that Malygris's curse was forever ended.

A tear rolled down the Gray Mouser's cheek. One tear for all the dead. For Jesane and Demptha Negatarth. For Sadaster and Laurian. For a little blond girl with a straw poppet. For his beloved Ivrian.

He brushed the tear away before Sheelba could see it as he felt the wizard come up behind him. "You used me," he said coldly. "Death used me."

"Nor is that the end of it," Sheelba answered, not without some sympathy in his voice. "Death is only Death after all, and is used in turn by greater powers. That's what truly frightens you. You think you have glimpsed those greater powers."

"Is nothing we do of our own choosing?" the Mouser demanded. "Are we just pawns advanced or sacrificed at Fate's whim?"

"Climb down," Sheelba suggested patiently. He sloshed the bottle of wine he held. "We can all use a drink."

The Mouser obeyed. Weary in body and spirit, he went to Fafhrd's side. It was where he belonged, where he was meant to be. Fafhrd, for whom he would do anything, risk anything.

But did he belong at Fafhrd's side because he chose to be there? Did he have any say at all in where he went, what he did, who he called comrade?

He looked at Fafhrd with blackly resentful eyes.

"I'm thinking of Vlana," Fafhrd whispered, not noticing the hate-filled look of his partner. "The night she first came to Cold Corner with a troupe of actors and dancers, an aurora hung like a curtain in the sky. We joked once that it was the curtain going up on the stage-play that our lives together would make." He paused, though his gaze continued fixed on the blazing vision over Lankhmar. "In my homeland, auroras are considered omens. I've sometimes wondered if the aurora that burned that night over my lovemaking with Vlana was for good or ill."

The hate and anger faded from the Mouser's face. "I know you're not a superstitious man ..." he said.

"I'm not!" Fafhrd interrupted defensively.

"Then forget omens," the Mouser said. "Just cling to Vlana's memory. Hold tight to it, Fafhrd. Keep it like a treasure, or the gods will steal it away from you." He cast his gaze upward.

No sky had ever been more beautiful, or seemed to him more alien. Through that shimmering curtain that hung high above the world like the drapery of some cosmic proscenium he glimpsed subtle shadows and a hint of puppeteers' strings.

"Drink," Sheelba said, wiping the back of his hand over the lower part of his unseen face as he passed the bottle of wine to Fafhrd. "The gods never give thanks to mortals. Such is not the nature of the world. But if it means anything, I thank you."

Fafhrd took a long pull from the bottle and swallowed noisily. "Only three words mean more," he said, passing the bottle to the Mouser.

Sheelba folded his hands inside his sleeves. "And they are?"

"I love you," the Mouser answered somberly. Closing his eyes, he conjured the face of his one true love and drank a deep, final toast to her. "At least I had the chance to apologize and ask Ivrian's forgiveness for not being at her side when she died."

Fafhrd nodded gravely. "And I had the same chance with Vlana. Perhaps I can at last let go of that guilt and pain."

Sheelba took the bottle back from the Mouser and stoppered it. "There is another price you'll have to pay for that pain-ease," the wizard said sadly. "Another day will come when you will face Death of Nehwon, and it must be as if for the first time. You'll see your women again and make your apologies."

Fafhrd scoffed. "No need to apologize twice to Vlana. We've made our peace." He put a hand on the Mouser's shoulder and gazed yet again at the dazzling aurora. In the distance, bells were pealing out from all the temples in Lankhmar. "We saved a city, Mouser," Fafhrd said. "Perhaps a world. Who knows how far Malygris's curse might eventually have reached. We've done good work."

The Mouser moved closer to Sheelba and rubbed a hand wearily over his eyes. "Fafhrd has a good heart," he whispered. "But he doesn't see. Malygris's curse was never out of control. It would have reached only as far as Death of Nehwon allowed it, or only as far as Death's master, Fate, would have allowed." He hugged himself against a cold that clung like a mist to his spirit and knew that he would never feel warm again. "But I see," he said. "I see."

"You see too much," Sheelba murmured softly, his voice hypnotic. "And though Fafhrd hides it, he sees as well and shares your resentment."

The Mouser rubbed his eyes again. His lids felt so heavy, and a growing numbness was spreading through his limbs. He turned to look at his partner. Fafhrd slowly slumped to the ground as he watched.

"I didn't see you drink," the Mouser said thickly. He groped for his sword, but couldn't seem to grasp Scalpel's oddly elusive hilt. "You bastard. What was in the bottle?"

"A draught of forgetfulness," Sheelba answered. His voice seemed to roll from some distant valley. It echoed and reverberated in the Mouser's ears as he felt himself sink to the ground. The grass felt so soft beneath him, so warm, so comfortable.

"Sleep," Sheelba intoned, "and wake again in the Elder Mountains, with Lord Hristo at your heels and saddlebags of treasure by your campfire."

"Don't," Fafhrd protested sleepily. "Don't make me forget Vlana."

"It's not fair," the Mouser said. "To have an adventure, and then forget it. What will we have learned from all this?"

"You've ended a plague, my heroes," Sheelba said. "No one but you two could have done that. If Fate has chosen you for her champions, it's because your skills and passions have made you worthy of her attention."

The Mouser's eyes closed. Still he heard Sheelbas voice in his ears, or perhaps in his mind. He tried to shut it out, but failed. He filled his thoughts with Ivrian's face, the memory of her touch. And more—he thought of Malygris, of Koh-Vombi, of a small gray cat on the rooftops of Lankhmar. All precious to him, every memory and detail. He clung to them ferociously, though they melted away one by one.

And through it all came Sheelbas voice, Sheelba, who he knew somehow he would meet again.

"Your adventure now is at a close;

Sleep, heroes, in well-deserved repose.

When you waken this bedevilment will seem

But a vague, disturbing, half-remembered dream.

With hearts unburdened by thoughts of Death and Fate,

Find new trails to blaze, new seas to navigate.

Rescue maidens!. Sing! Drink! Enjoy!

Life's a gift, and Nehwon is your toy!

Solve her riddles, all her mystery,

And burn your names in Lankhmar's history.

Sleep now, Night's Black Agents, sleep,

Our Knight and Knave of Swords—sleep.

Your work is done, the tale is told,

And lives are saved a hundred-fold.

If only all man’s plagues could be

Such a neatly ended fantasy."

THE END