Songs of the Dying Earth

Mike Resnick INESCAPABLE

His name was Pelmundo, and he was the son of Riloh, Chief Curator of the Great Archive in the distant city of Zhule. Like all fathers, Riloh wanted a son who followed in his footsteps, but like many sons, Pelmundo was determined to make his own way in the world.

He had been a soldier, and then a mercenary, and finally he became a Watchman of the city of Maloth, which nestled alongside the River Scaum. He wore a shining silver medallion, his pride and joy, full five inches across, as a token of his office, and a plain sword that had tasted blood more than once rested in a well-worn scabbard at his side. His leather garments bore the mark of not only his station, but the horned bat that showed him to be favored by the city’s true protector, Umbassario of the Glowing Eyes. It was Pelmundo’s job to keep the streets safe from drunks and rowdies, and the homes safe from thieves. The greater dangers, the otherworldly and netherworldly, were the province of Umbassario.

It was a symbiotic relationship, reflected Pelmundo; Umbassario protected the town against all other magicks, and in turn the town turned a blind eye toward his own.

But it was not Umbassario and his creatures that dominated Pelmundo’s thoughts. No, it was a golden creature that played havoc with his mind and his dreams. Her name was Lith, perfect in form and movement, golden of skin and hair, a youthful witch, still in her teens, but already with a woman’s body and a woman’s power to enchant even without magic.

Pelmundo was totally captivated by the young golden witch. She had left her village and never spoke of her parents, dividing her time between her home in a hollow tree in the Old Forest, and, when she had business in the city, Laja’s House of Golden Flowers, and of all the golden flowers who plied their ancient trade there, her blossoms were the sweetest.

Time and again, Pelmundo would approach her, awed and tongue-tied by her sensuous beauty, but determined to plead his cause. Time and again, she would laugh in amusement.

“You are but a Watchman,” she would say. “What can you possibly offer in exchange for my love?”

He would speak of honor, and she would speak of trinkets. He would promise love, and she would snicker and point out that the poorest jewel lasted longer than the greatest love. He would beg just to be with her, and the golden witch would vanish, only the echo of her amused laughter lingering in the empty air.

Pelmundo sought out Umbassario, who lived in a snake-filled cave high in the rocky outcroppings beyond Maloth. It was lit by black candles, and the light flickered off a thousand bats that slept their days away hanging upside down between the stalagmites before being sent off on their unholy errands.

“I have come to—” he began.

“I know why you have come, Watchman,” replied the mage. “Am I not Umbassario of the Glowing Eyes?”

“Will you help me, then?” asked Pelmundo. “Will you enchant her so that she can see only me?”

“And be blind to the rest of the world?” asked Umbassario with an amused smile. “That would almost be fitting.”

“No, I don’t mean that,” protested the Watchman. “But I burn for her. Can you not instill the same fire within her?”

“It is there.”

“But she teases and ignores me!”

“The fire is there, but it does not burn for you, son of Riloh,” continued the mage. “It burns only for Lith. She is a physically perfect woman, so she seeks only physical perfection — in jewels, in clothes, in men.”

“But you can change that!” urged Pelmindo. “You are the greatest of all the magicians who ply their trade up and down the River Scaum. You can make her love me!”

“I could,” acknowledged Umbassario. “But I will not. There once was a woman, almost as young and almost as perfect as the golden witch of your heart’s desire. I made her fall in love with me when I was younger and more foolish. Every night on the silken mat, she was the most responsive female that has ever lived, I truly believe that. But each time I would look into her eyes, even as her body jerked and spasmed in ecstasy, I would see the repugnance that my magic had banished to some secret inner part of her, and the taste of our erotic bliss turned to dust in my mouth. Finally, I removed the spell, and she was gone within an hour. Is that what you would want with Lith?”

“I truly do not know,” answered Pelmundo. “If I just had the chance, I know I could make her love me.”

The old mage sighed. “I don’t believe you have heard a word I have said. The golden witch loves only herself.”

“She will love me, with or without your spells,” said Pelmundo with iron determination.

“Without, I should think,” replied Umbassario as the Watchman left his cave.

Pelmundo walked back to Maloth in a foul mood that was apparent to one and all. People stayed out of his sight, and even the curs that scoured the street for scraps remained hidden until he passed by. Finally he entered the Place of the Seven Nectars, glared at the innkeeper and ordered the nonexistent Eighth Nectar, and, a moment later, was given a flagon filled to the brim. It tasted, he thought, exactly like the Seventh Nectar, but as it eased its way down his throat and warmed his insides, his temper began to improve and he decided not to protest.

He left the tavern and headed across the street to Laja’s House of Golden Flowers, where he found Taj the Malingerer standing in the street, staring at the front door.

“Greetings,” said Taj. “You can tell she is here today. She attracts men as honey attracts bees.”

“Who do you mean?” asked Pelmundo, feigning ignorance.

“Why, the golden witch,” replied Taj. “It is as if men read a secret signal on the winds, for I am drawn here only when she comes to Maloth from the Old Forest.” He winked at the Watchman. “Confess, friend Pelmundo: that is why you are here too.”

The Watchman glared at him and said nothing.

“My only question,” continued Taj, “is why she is here at all. Probably she is not yet skilled enough to pay her way as a witch.” Another wink. “Or perhaps this is the kind of witchcraft and enchantment at which she excels, for I love and honor my wife except on days Lith has come to town, and I have never seen you so much as look at any other woman.”

“You talk too much,” said Pelmundo irritably, because he disliked hearing the uncomfortable truths that rolled so easily off Taj’s tongue.

“I am almost through talking,” answered Taj. “For when the next man is escorted out of the house by Leja, it is my turn to pay my respects — and my tribute — to Lith.”

As the words left his mouth, Leja, old wrinkled crone who had once been almost as beautiful as the golden witch — some said two hundred years ago — led Metoxos the silk merchant to the door and bade him farewell. Suddenly, both men became aware that Lith herself was standing next to Leja — slender, with an animal grace, full ripe breasts, golden skin, hair that seemed to be made of spin gold, full red lips, and laughing eyes that seemed like sparkling embers.

“Prepare yourself, golden one,” said Taj, “for you are about to meet a real man, not a used-up walking wrinkle like that pathetic Metoxos.”

Leja reached out with her walking stick and cracked Taj across the shin.

He yelped in surprise. “What was that for?” he demanded.

“Be careful what you say about us walking wrinkles,” she answered.

“Come,” said Taj, taking Lith roughly by her bare arm. “Let us leave this crazy old woman behind and let me feast my eyes upon you in private.”

“You eyes have become bloated by the feast,” said Lith. “I do not like bloated eyes.” She turned to Pelmundo. “You are the Watchman. This person is annoying me.”

“He is a braggart and a boor, but he has every right to be here,” said Pelmundo unhappily. “This is, after all, the House of Golden Flowers.”

“Get rid of him and I will give you a kiss,” said Lith.

“He is my friend,” said Taj. “He laughs at your offer.”

“Look at him,” said Lith, obviously amused. “Is he laughing?”

Taj turned to face Pelmundo, who was clearly not laughing.

“Move on,” said the Watchman.

“No!” shouted Taj. “I have the tribute. I have waited my turn!”

“You have waited in the wrong line for the wrong flower,” said Pelmundo. “Move on.”

He lay his hand on the hilt of his sword. Taj looked at the sword. It was not new, did not shine, bore no jewels, no mystic inscriptions; it was the workmanlike tool of a man who used it with bad intentions.

“We are no longer friends, son of Riloh!” snapped Taj, starting to walk away.

“We never were,” replied Pelmundo.

He waited until Taj had gone one hundred paces, and then turned back to the doorway. Leja had returned to the dimly-lit interior of the structure, but Lith remained.

“And now your reward,” she said softly.

He stepped forward. “You have never let me touch you before,” he noted.

“And you shall not touch me now,” she said. “I shall touch you.”

“But—”

“Be quiet, step forward, and receive your reward,” said Lith.

Muscles tensed with excitement, loins bursting with lust, Pelmundo stepped forward.

“And here is your prize,” said Lith, kissing him chastely on the forehead.

He stepped back and shook his head as if he could not believe it. Lith smiled slyly.

“That is it?” he said, dumbfounded.

“That’s all Taj was worth,” she replied, her eyes bright with amusement. “For a greater reward, you must perform a greater deed.”

“And for the greatest reward you have to offer?” he asked eagerly.

“Why, for that, you must perform the greatest deed,” said the golden witch with a roguish smile.

“Name it, and it shall be done!”

“When I am not here, I live in a hollow tree in the Old Forest,” began Lith.

“I know. I have looked for your tree, but I have never found it.”

She smiled. “It is protected by my magic. I think perhaps even Umbassario of the Glowing Eyes could not find it.”

“The deed!” he said passionately. “Get to the deed!”

“Whenever I come to Maloth, or return from here to my forest, I must pass through Modavna Moor,” continued Lith.

Suddenly Pelmundo felt the muscles in his stomach tighten, for he knew what she would say next.

“Something lives on that moor, something evil and malignant, something that frightens and threatens me whenever I walk through it, a creature from some domain that is not of this world. It is known only as Graebe the Inevitable. Rid the earth of Graebe and the ultimate reward is yours, Watchman.”

“Graebe the Inevitable,” he repeated dully.

She struck a pose, with the moonlight highlighting her bare breasts and naked hips. “Is not the prize worth it?” she asked, smiling at his discomfiture. “Send him back to the hell he comes from, and I shall let you ascend to a heaven that only I can provide.”

Pelmundo stared at her for a brief moment.

“He is as good as dead,” he vowed.

Pelmundo knew that he could not face the creature without enchantments and protections, so he headed to the high outcroppings beyond Maloth and sought out Umbassario in his candle-lit cave.

“Greetings, Mage of the Glowing Eyes,” he said when he was finally facing the old man.

“Greetings, son of Riloh.”

“I have come—” began Pelmundo.

“I know why you have come,” said Umbassario. “Am I not the greatest magician in the world?”

“Except for Iucounu,” hissed a long green snake in a sibilant tongue.

Umbassario pointed a bony forefinger at the snake. A crackling bolt of lightning shot out of it and turned the snake to ashes.

“Does anyone else care to voice an opinion?” he asked mildly, staring at his various pets. The snakes slithered into darkened corners, and the bats closed their eyes tightly. “Then, with your kind indulgence, let me speak to this foolish young Watchman.”

“Not foolish,” Pelmundo corrected him. “Impassioned.”

Umbassario sighed deeply. “Does no one listen to me even in the sanctity of my own cave?” His glowing eyes focused on Pelmundo. “Listen to me, son of Riloh. The golden witch has bewitched you, not with magic, but with what women have been bewitching men with since Time began.”

“Whatever the reason, I must have her,” said Pelmundo. “And I will need protections and spells against such a creature as Graebe the Inevitable.”

“Graebe is mine!” shouted the magician. “You will not touch him!”

“Yours?” repeated Pelmundo, surprised. “A creature like that?”

“You protect the city against thieves and ruffians. I protect it against greater evil, and Graebe is the weapon I use.”

“But he sucks out men’s souls with those great prehensile lips and feasts upon them!”

“He sucks out diseased souls that no one else would have,” said Umbassario.

“He dismembers his victims while they still live.”

“You seek a reward, do you not?” said the magician. “The dismemberment is his.”

“He threatens the golden witch.”

Umbassario smiled. “Then why is she still alive? After all, he is Graebe the Inevitable.”

Pelmundo frowned. It was not a question he was prepared for.

“Then I shall tell you,” continued Umbassario. “If you were to enter the hollow tree in which she lives, you would find a golden loom, upon which your witch is weaving a tapestry of the Magic Valley of Ariventa.” He paused. “The tapestry is hers, but the loom is Graebe’s, made from the bones of a golden creature he killed in the netherworld. Your witch does not want you to perform a heroic deed to prove yourself worthy of her. She wants you to eliminate a creature that only seeks what belongs to him. And if she was as helpless as you seem to believe, he would long since have obtained it.”

“If he is Graebe the Inevitable, why has he not?” asked Pelmundo.

“Because he is drawn to souls like a moth to flame, and she has none.”

“You must not say such things about her,” admonished Pelmundo.

“Is your love of life so fleeting that you dare say such things to me in my own cave?” demanded Umbassario. “Did you not just see what happened to my favorite snake?”

“I meant no offense,” said Pelmundo quickly. Then his spirit stiffened. “But I will have the golden witch, and if that means I must slay your creature, then I will do so.”

“Despite what I have told you?” said the magician.

“I must,” replied Pelmundo. “She is everything I have ever wished for, everything I have ever dreamed of.”

“Be careful what you wish for,” said Umbassario with a secret smile, “and of what invades your dreams.”

“I am sorry it has come to this,” said Pelmundo. “I do not wish us to be enemies.”

“We shall never be enemies, son of Riloh,” the magician assured him. “We shall just not be friends.” A final smile. “Do what you must do, if you can — and remember, you have been warned.”

“Warned?” said Pelmundo, frowning. “But you have told me nothing about Graebe the Inevitable.”

“I was not talking about Graebe,” replied Umbassario.

Pelmundo turned and left the cave, and began climbing down over the rocky outcroppings. When he was finally on level ground, he considered going to a lesser mage, but he knew that if Graebe was truly Umbassario’s creature, only a magician of equal power could supply him with the charms and spells he needed.

“Then I shall have to defeat you as I have defeated all other foes,” muttered Pelmundo, staring off toward Modavna Moor, which separated Maloth from the Old Forest. “Be on your guard, monster, for Pelmundo, son of Riloh, is on your trail.”

And so saying, he began his march around the village and into the foreboding darkness of Modavna Moor. The mud seemed to grab his foot with each step, and to hold it tight, as if to say, “Foolish man, did you think to run from Graebe the Inevitable?”

Suddenly he saw a Twk-man mounted on a dragonfly. The dragonfly circled his head twice, then perched lightly on a leaf.

“You are far from your stomping grounds, Watchman,” said the Twk-man. “Are you lost?”

“No,” answered Pelmundo.

“Then beware lest you be found,” said the Twk-man, “for Graebe the Inevitable is abroad this day.”

“You have seen him?” said Pelmundo. “Is he near?”

“If he were near, I would be elsewhere,” said the Twk-man. “Endlessly he searches, both for his loom and the witch who took it.”

“Then you have nothing to fear,” said Pelmundo.

“I have a life and a soul, and I wish to keep them both,” said the Twk-man. “You would do well to preserve yours while you still can.”

“But you tell me he wants Lith.”

“He searches for her,” corrected the Twk-man. “But he sucks the souls of whatever crosses his path.”

“Fly ahead, Twk-man,” said Pelmundo, “and tell him that his fate is approaching him inexorably.”

“Approach Graebe the Inevitable?” gasped the Twk-man, clearly shocked.

“Then fly away — but know that after today there will be no more cause for fear or alarm.”

The Twk-man tapped his dragonfly, and circled Pelmundo twice more. “I have never seen such suicidal madness before,” he announced. “I must burn it in my memory, for surely no one will ever go searching for Graebe again.”

“Not after I slay him, they won’t,” promised Pelmundo.

“It is very odd,” said the Twk-man. “You do not look like a man who wishes to race into the gaping maw of his death.”

“Or his destiny,” said Pelmundo, visions of Lith’s undulating golden body dancing in his mind.

“She must have promised you much, Watchman,” said the Twk-man.

“She?” repeated Pelmundo.

“Did you really think that you were the first?” said the Twk-man with a laugh. Then he was gone, and Pelmundo was alone once more.

“Father,” said Pelmundo softly, “I pledge the coming battle to you, for after I have slain the Umbassario’s nightmare creature my triumph shall be written up in song and story, and the day will come when as Chief Curator you file it in a place of honor in the Great Archive of Zhule.” Then, looking forward, he said in a steady voice: “Creature, beware, for your doom is approaching you!”

Deeper and deeper into the moor he went, the mud grabbing at his feet, his sweat cascading down his body. “Here I am, creature,” he said again and again. “You have but to show yourself.” But there was no sign of Graebe the Inevitable.

Pelmundo trod through the moor for an hour, then another, with no sign of any other living thing.

“The Twk-man was wrong,” he said aloud. “There is no monster abroad today. I must find the wherewithal to pay a mage for a spell to draw him to me, for without him there can be no ultimate reward from the golden witch.”

He plodded ahead, and finally reached the edge of the moor. The trees were less closely clustered now, and narrow rays of sunlight finally penetrated through the dense foliage. Birds chirped, crickets sang, even the frogs seemed at peace with their surroundings.

And then, suddenly, there was silence — an almost tangible silence. Pelmundo lay his hand on the hilt of his sword and peered ahead, but could see nothing — no shape, no movement, nothing at all.

He looked to the right and the left. Not a thing. His hand moved to his medallion, which he touched for luck and moved slightly to cover his heart. “Fear not, beasts of the moor,” he said at last. “My quarry has fled.”

“But your inevitable doom has found you,” growled an inhuman voice from behind him.

Pelmundo whirled around and found himself face to face with a creature out of his worst nightmares. The bullet-shaped head boasted coal-black eyes slit like a cat’s at high noon, nostrils that were uniquely shaped for sniffing out souls, gross misshapen lips whose only function was to suck the souls from its prey. It was shaggy, covered with coarse black hair. Its hands had but a single function: to grab souls and hold them up to its mouth. Its feet served but one purpose: to carry it to its prey, on dry land, on mud, even on water.

“I am Graebe the Inevitable,” it growled, stepping forward as Pelmundo retreated step by step, the mud feeling like more of Graebe’s hands, grasping at his ankles, holding tight to his feet.

“No,” said Pelmundo. “You are my tribute to Lith, the golden witch.”

“She has taken what does not belong to her,” said Graebe. “Now she tempts you with what does not belong to you.”

“I have nothing against you, monster,” said Pelmundo, “but you stand between my and my heart’s desire, and I must slay you.”

“Your heart has nothing to do with the desire you feel,” said Graebe contemptuously. Suddenly, the creature smiled. “This is a most fortuitous meeting. I have not dined all day.”

Pelmundo tried to step back as Graebe the Inevitable approached him, but his feet were mired in the mud, and he knew he would not be able to fight on a firm terrain of his own choosing. He withdrew his sword, grasping the hilt with both hands, holding it upright before him, prepared to slash in any direction—

— and at that instant a shaft of sunlight struck the Watchman’s medallion.

Graebe stared at the shining medallian, the smile frozen on his misshapen, soul-sucking lips. Suddenly he emitted a howl of anguish that echoed through the moor, and held his hands up to shield his eyes from the vision he saw.

Finally, he lowered his hands and stared once more at his image in the medallion.

“Can that be me?” he whispered in shock.

Pelmundo, puzzled, held the sword motionless.

“I was a man once,” continued Graebe, still barely whispering. “I made a bargain, but not to become…this! It is more than I can bear.”

“Have you never seen your reflection before?” asked Pelmundo.

“A very long time ago. When I was…as you.” Graebe stared hypnotically at his face in the medallion. “The rest of me,” he said, “is it the same?”

“Worse,” said Pelmundo.

“Then do what you must do,” said Graebe, lowering his hideous hands to his side. “I cannot go on. Do your worst, and claim your golden reward, little joy may it bring you.”

The creature lowered its head and closed its eyes, and Pelmundo raised his sword high and brought it down swiftly. A moment later, the head of Graebe the Inevitable rolled on the ground, but when Pelmundo looked at it, it was the head of a man, not handsome, not especially ugly, but a man, not a creature of darkness and horror.

Pelmundo squatted down next to the severed head, frowning. He felt no regret about having killed the thing that had become Graebe the Inevitable. He felt no guilt about the fact that in death it had metamorphosed into a man. But he felt outrage that he could not prove to Lith that he had indeed slain the creature of the moor and should be given that most coveted reward.

“It is Umbassario’s doing,” he growled, and he made the decision to confront the mage, and either get him to change the human head back into the hideous Graebe, or at least testify to Lith that he had performed the task she set for him.

But when he stood up he felt somehow strange, not as if he had drunk too much at the Place of the Seven Nectars, but as if the world had somehow changed in indefinable ways. The colors seemed different, darker; the birds and insects louder; the mud weaker, as if it had finally decided to relinquish its hold on him; and he could sense the unseen presence of three Twk-men, two mounted on dragonflies, a third sitting on a branch high above the ground.

He began the trek to Umbassario’s cave, finding himself strangely unwinded as he climbed over the rocky outcroppings that led up to it. He reached up, gaining purchase on a rock, and his hand seemed to be a claw.

“A trick of the light,” he growled, blinking his eyes rapidly. But the hand did not change.

“Come in,” said Umbassario’s voice from within the cave, and he entered.

“I have come—” he began.

“I know why you think you have come,” said Umbassario of the Glowing Eyes. “But you have come because I called to you.”

“I heard nothing,” he said.

“Not with your ears,” agreed Umbassario. “You have killed my pet, my servant, he who did my bidding, and I demand reparation.”

“I have no money. You know that.”

“I said reparation, not tribute,” said the mage. “And you shall supply it. I warned you not to harm my creature, and you ignored me. I must have a servant. It shall be you.”

“I cannot,” he said. “I have my duties as the Watchman — and I have a reward to claim.”

“You shall never claim it,” said Umbassario. “The golden witch will shrink from your touch as she shrinks from no other. As for you, no-longer-Watchman, your servitude to me has already begun, and will last until the sun finally burns itself out. Study your hands well — and your feet. Place your fingers to your face, a face that would have frightened even Graebe. You are mine now.”

He felt his face. The contours were strange, inhuman. He screamed, but it came out as an inhuman howl.

“And because the golden witch is the reason you disobeyed my orders and killed my creature, she shall serve you as you must serve me. You will never touch her, but you will use her. Her beauty, her sensuality, will attract an endless stream of admirers. Men will come from as far away as Erze Damath and Cil and Sfere to gaze upon her, and I will allow you this one freedom, this one happiness: in your rage and jealousy, I will allow you to kill these men that she attracts. You will thread their unseeing dead eyes upon a cloak, and when the cloak is full, when it cannot accommodate one more eyeball, then perhaps we shall talk about restoring you.” A crooked smile. “But I suspect by then you will not want to return the weak, puny thing of flesh and blood that you once were.”

He tried to speak, but words felt strange in his mouth.

“I intuit that your name tastes of guilt and shame upon your tongue,” said Umbassario. “You shall need a new sobriquet.”

“I am…I am…” He tried to pronounce “Pelmundo,” and the word died on his tongue.

“I am…” He fought to force the words out. “I am…the…son of…” He stopped again.

“Once more,” said the mage.

“I am…” His tongue felt thick and alien. “I am chun of…”

“So be it,” replied Umbassario, who knew his creature’s name all along. “You are Chun.”

“Chun,” he repeated.

“You are Chun the Unavoidable. You have one day to put your affairs in order. Then you will do my bidding. Now begone!”

And Chun found himself standing in the darkened street between the Place of the Seven Nectars and Leja’s House of Golden Flowers.

At first, he was disoriented. Then he saw a figure lurching drunkenly down the street, and he knew that his cloak would soon begin.

An instant later, Taj the Malingerer felt a presence beside him in the night.

“I am Chun the Unavoidable,” said a deep, inhuman voice. “And you have something I need.”