Obooloo: capital of the Izdimir Empire. Lies amidst mountains
in the province of Ang in the heartland of the continent of
Yestron.

                                                 * * *

        In the end, Guest Gulkan could not be dissuaded from his
madcap plan to venture to Obooloo to liberate the Great God
Jocasta. Furthermore, he sought to implicate and involve his
father in this plan; and the Witchlord Onosh, who was consumed
with guilt because he felt himself partly to blame for Guest's
mauling in the arena of Chi'ash-lan, felt constrained to agree to
commit his own strength to the raid on Obooloo.
        So Guest said goodbye to Penelope, telling her that he was
going to fly away on Sken-Pitilkin's stickbird, the airborne
contraption which had so lately terrorized the skies above Dalar
ken Halvar.
        This was a blatant lie, since Guest was actually going to
travel to Obooloo by way of the Doors of the Circle of the
Partnership Banks; but the Weaponmaster had told his wife nothing
of that Circle or those Doors, and did not intend to.
        "When will you be back?" said Penelope.
        "As soon as I can be," said Guest, speaking in perfect
honesty.
        For, though her womb had proved barren, Guest was generally
satisfied with his wife, and had no thought to abandon her on a
permanent basis. Rather, he wished her to do what the wives of
heroes have always done: to wait.
        "You'll be back?" said Penelope, seeking confirmation of the
Weaponmaster's pledge.
        It would not be true to say that the purple-skinned Penelope
was passionately in love with Guest Gulkan. Nevertheless, he had
been tolerably civil and attentive to her during four long years
which she had spent as a refugee in the tunnels of Cap Foz Para
Lash, sheltering from the wrath of her home city, which had given
itself to the madness of the religion known as Nu-chala-nuth.
        Indeed, Penelope would surely have fallen in love with Guest
entirely, had she not already pledged her heart to another. That
other was a valorous Ebrell Islander, Lupus Lon Oliver by name. To
tell the truth, Penelope had once been married to the valorous
Lupus, and had never gone through the formality of getting a
divorce. The red-skinned Lupus Lon Oliver was currently in
insurrection against the city of Dalar ken Halvar and the religion
of Nu-chala-nuth. He was leading a wild life in Parengarenga's
deserts, fighting with a band of doomed but undaunted
revolutionaries led by a female of the Pang, a woman warrior named
Shona.
        In the absence of Lupus Lon Oliver, her true love, Penelope
had developed a strong affection for Guest Gulkan, hence sought
his return.
        "I'll be back," confirmed Guest.
        "Then," said Penelope, "take this."
        And, with that, she took from her neck the bright-metal chain
which she customarily wore, and passed the chain and its pendant
to the Weaponmaster.
        "Thank you," said Guest, taking the chain and the amulet
which served as its pendant.
        This object he had seen often enough, for Penelope wore it
always, whether she was clothed or naked. He knew already that the
pendant burnt with its own light, and was not surprised by this.
        But - the weight!
        The amulet was small enough for Guest to conceal in his fist,
yet it was so uncommonly heavy that he wondered at its weight.
Over the last four years, it had been so much a part of his
everyday existence that he had ceased to notice it. But now he
looked at it closely. The webbing and weaving of half a thousand
filigree threads created the oval of the amulet. The wire of which
this work had been fashioned appeared at first glance to be
silver, but it was not, for it glistened with a shimmering light
like the moon itself made liquid and mixed with mercury.
        "What is it?" said Guest.
        "It is luck," said Penelope.
        Then she kissed him.
        So Guest Gulkan departed from the minor mountain of Cap Foz
Para Lash, taking with him a mazadath, an amulet of Nexus make.
This mazadath - the pendant which Penelope had given to her
Weaponmaster - had once been part of a dorgi. And the dorgi was a
formidable brute of animated metal which had once guarded the
tunnels inside Cap Foz Para Lash.
        (At any rate, this is what Paraban Senk told Hostaja Sken-
Pitilkin, for that disembodied demon, on realizing that Penelope
had given her amulet to the Weaponmaster, and that the amulet was
about the depart from Cap Foz Para Lash, was loathe to see the
thing go; and, speaking privily to Sken-Pitilkin, Senk requested
that the wizard relieve the Weaponmaster of his burden. Something
Sken-Pitilkin declined to do, for life was difficult enough
already without gratuitously enhancing its difficulties by trying
to steal a love-charm from a Yarglat barbarian).
        So it was that Guest Gulkan took his leave from his wife
Penelope, exited from Cap Foz Para Lash, and made his way through
the city of Dalar ken Halvar to the Bralsh - the building which
housed the Door of Dalar ken Halvar's Door.
        According to their plans, Weaponmaster would unite with
Witchlord on Alozay, then together they would venture to Obooloo
to liberate the Great God Jocasta. By now, Guest was fired up with
a great enthusiasm for his mission, and for the quest for the x-x-
zix which would follow it.
        Witchlord and Weaponmaster would not be venturing alone, for
the wizards Pelagius Zozimus and Hostaja Sken-Pitilkin would be
daring the dangers with them, together with the knifeman Thayer
Levant. The last-named, Levant, was undoubtedly sent by Plandruk
Qinplaqus to spy on the others, but they did not resent such
scrutiny, since a cheating of the Silver Emperor formed no part of
their plans.
        Plandruk Qinplaqus came in person to the Bralsh to see them
off.
        "One last thing," said Qinplaqus, once all their arrangements
had been confirmed and reconfirmed for one last time.
        "What?" said Guest
        "Good luck," said Qinplaqus.
        That benediction meant a lot to Guest, and it warmed him
mightily as he ventured through the Circle of the Partnership
Banks, passing from Dalar ken Halvar to Tang, from Tang to Quilth,
and then to Stokos, to Chi'ash-lan, and then to Alozay.
        On Alozay, the ruling island of the Safrak Islands, Guest
Gulkan was greeted by his brother Morsh Bataar, who brought him
dire tidings of disease.
        "Our father is ill," said Morsh.
        "Ill?" said Guest, in startlement.
        This was the last thing which Guest had expected!
        "You speak as if you doubt my word," said Morsh. "But it is
true. As a horse has hair, so our father has an ailment. He cannot
quest with you, not yet, for his doctors have pronounced him too
sick to stir from his bed."
        "What's wrong with him, then?" said Guest.
        "He has a cold," said Morsh.
        "A cold!" said Guest, scandalized.
        They were heroes, were they not? Questing heroes! Truly
heroic heroes, their deeds and avowals proportioned like the
greatest of those of legend. How then could they be held up by a
trifling matter like a cold?
        Guest demanded to be shown into the presence of his father,
and found Lord Onosh laid up in bed with a bad headcold, which he
was endeavoring to treat with a medicinal concoction compounded
of lemons, hot water and something strongly alcoholic. As a
consequence of the side-effects of the alcoholic component of this
medicine, Lord Onosh had reached a stage of pronounced
incoherence.
        This did not please the Weaponmaster at all, who in his anger
was threatening to scalp the Witchlord when the Witch herself
appeared. Bao Gahai hustled Guest out of the sickroom,
interrogated him at length about all of his doings, then at last
consented to leave him in peace.
        In the moody solitude of his disappointed brooding, Guest
Gulkan took himself off to the Hall of Time. This was guarded by
men with spears, and by solid doors which a blacksmith had closed
with chains. Both the men and the doors resisted the
Weaponmaster's will, but Guest at length succeeded in subduing the
men and having the doors broken down.
        Then Guest Gulkan stalked into the Hall of Time, expecting to
find it a place of dust and cobwebs. It was and it wasn't. True,
there were cobwebs in plenty sprawled across the time prison pods.
But there was precious little dust, for the open slit windows of
the Hall of Time ventilated the place as a draughty cave is
ventilated.
        Guest Gulkan came to a halt in front of the jade-green
monolith known to him as Icaria Scaria Iva-Italis, demon of Safrak
and Guardian Prime. At first, the demon did not consent to
acknowledge his presence. But at last it spoke.
        "Greetings," said the demon.
        "And to you, greetings," said Guest.
        "You have come by a mazadath," said the demon. "Where did you
win such a prize?"
        "A mazadath?" said Guest. "What's that?"
        "The thing which you have about your neck," said the demon.
        "This?" said Guest, lifting his heavyweight amulet from its
concealment.
        "That," confirmed Italis. "Where did you get it?"
        "It was a present," said Guest. "A present from my wife."
        "So," said Iva-Italis. "So you are married. Have you
children?"
        "Not yet," said Guest.
        "Your brother Morsh has children," said Iva-Italis.
        "Has he?" said Guest, most surprised at this intelligence; for
nobody had even suggested to him that his brother Morsh had so
much as a woman, far less a child.
        "He has," said Iva-Italis. "He has two sons, Yurt and
Iragana."
        "So you say," said Guest. "But you have been locked in here
for years, far beyond any breath of rumor. So how could you
rightly claim to know such a thing?"
        "I am in communication with demons elsewhere," said Iva-
Italis. "Have you not been told of this? I communicated, to name
but one, with Koblathakatoria, he who is commonly known as Ko. You
know him? Koblathakatoria is the demon of Chi'ash-lan. There is no
scrap of gossip about Safrak which does not reach Chi'ash-lan, and
usually sooner rather than later."
        "So," said Guest. "They spy on us."
        "The mere collection of gossip is scarcely a matter of
espionage," said Iva-Italis. "Are your matings and breedings a
matter of state secrecy? If they are, then all I can say is that
you do not act in accordance with any such doctrine. It is a
matter of public record that your brother Morsh Bataar maintains a
wife on the island of Ema-Urk, and that she has given him two
sons. Yurt is aged two, and Iragana is but one year of age."
        "This is news to me!" said Guest.
        "So," said Iva-Italis. "But I doubt that you have any news
for me."
        "You didn't know about the - the maza," said Guest.
        "The mazadath," said Iva-Italis. "Maz-a-dath. No, I didn't
know about that. But I take it to be a recent acquisition. The
rest of your past I know. I have followed the saga of your
recovery in the city of Dalar ken Halvar. I know, too, that you
are now determined to venture to Obooloo."
        "They speak of this in Chi'ash-lan?" said Guest.
        "Of course they do," said Iva-Italis. "For Sod is held
hostage in this very mainrock in which we now stand. Sod's brother
rules in Chi'ash-lan, and fears that Sod will be murdered when
your father's minions hear of your father's death."
        "My father is not dead!" said Guest. "He's got a cold, that's
all!"
        "Yes," said Iva-Italis, "but soon you and your father will
both be venturing to Obooloo. In Chi'ash-lan, they think both
Witchlord and Weaponmaster will die in that venture, and that Sod
will be murdered once the pair of you are dead."
        "And will we die?" said Guest.
        "That is for you to say, not me," said Iva-Italis. "Tell me
how you are going to rescue the Great God Jocasta, and I will tell
you whether you are likely to live."
        Then Guest told the demon of the plan which he had hatched
with Sken-Pitilkin, drawing on Sken-Pitilkin's by-now-detailed
knowledge of the various Doors of the Partnership Banks.
        The questing heroes would venture through the Circle of the
Partnership Banks to the city of Obooloo. The Door in that city
was housed in the Sanctuary of the Bondsman's Guild, a structure
which stood atop a tall triangular rock known locally as
Achaptipop, from which it was possible to overlook the Temple of
Blood.
        By studious reconnaissance, Sken-Pitilkin had already
determined the layout of the Temple of Blood. It was built around
a central courtyard in which stood a Burning Pit into which human
sacrifices were periodically cast.
        "From the Sanctuary of the Bondsman's Guild," said Guest, "we
will overlook that Burning Pit. Sken-Pitilkin plans to improvise a
flying ship. He will not build a full-scale stickbird. Rather, he
will make a small device good enough for the descent from
Achaptipop to the Burning Pit."
        "So," said Iva-Italis, "you will float downwards through the
air, landing by the Burning Pit."
        "Precisely," said Guest. "But we're not sure how to find the
Great God Jocasta."
        "That's easy," said Iva-Italis. "The great rock Achaptipop
stands directly to the north of the Temple of Blood. The central
courtyard in which you find the Burning Pit has four sides."
        "Most courtyards do," said Guest.
        "The sides are orientated to the north, south, east and
west," said Iva-Italis, ignoring Guest entirely. "It is easy to
orientate yourself. Once you land in the central courtyard, look
for the great rock Achaptipop. It lies to your north."
        "And?" said Guest.
        "Where does Achaptipop lie?" said Iva-Italis.
        "To the north!" said Guest impatiently. "As I face that rock,
the east will be to my right, and - "
        "Go east," said Iva-Italis.
        "East?" said Guest.
        "Yes," said Iva-Italis. "A single archway is set in the
eastern side of the central chamber of the Temple of Blood. Go
through that archway and you will find the Great God Jocasta."
        "What does the Great God look like?" said Guest.
        "The Great God," said Iva-Italis, "looks like a doughnut."
        "A doughnut?" said Guest, baffled by this description.
        "Take a single link from a chain," said Iva-Italis. "Beat
that link into a circle, and there you have your doughnut. The
wizard Pelagius Zozimus commonly bakes a kind of sweetened bread
in just such a shape. Have you never eaten such?"
        "Ah!" said Guest, "now I understand!"
        "So," said Iva-Italis. "The Great God Jocasta is a doughnut,
a doughnut about the size of your head. The Great God is trapped
in a force field. Do you know what a force field is?"
        "Tell me," said Guest.
        "A force field," said Iva-Italis, "is a wall of light which
is hard to penetrate."
        "Then how is Guest to penetrate this particular wall of
light?" said Sken-Pitilkin.
        At which Guest almost jumped out of his skin, for the
Weaponmaster had been so engrossed in his dialog with the demon
that he had not heard the wizard of Skatzabratzumon enter the Hall
of Time.
        "The Weaponmaster Guest can cleave through this particular
wall of light by the mere application of his sword," said Iva-
Italis.
        "Really?" said Sken-Pitilkin, sounding somewhat sceptical.
        "Yes," said Iva-Italis, "for these force fields are but poor
and trivial devices. Once Guest has hacked the force field apart
with his sword, the Great God Jocasta will be free. The Great God
will then confer upon Guest the powers of a wizard, and will
secure your exit from the Temple of Blood."
        "So you say," said Sken-Pitilkin, who still had reservations
about this venture.
        "Rest assured," said Iva-Italis. "It is as I say. Besides,
you will have a demon to help you."
        "You're coming with us?" said Sken-Pitilkin.
        "No!" said Iva-Italis. "For I am scarcely portable! But a
demon stands in the Temple of Blood already. The demon stands
beside the imprisoned Great God."
        "There's a demon which guards the Door of the Bondsmans
Guild," said Sken-Pitilkin.
        "The demon Lob, yes," said Iva-Italis. "But that's not the
demon of whom I'm speaking. There are two of my siblings in
Obooloo. One is Lob, of whom you have spoken. The other is Ungular
Scarth, who stands beside the Great God Jocasta."
        "Then why can't this Scarth claw away this force field?" said
Sken-Pitilkin.
        "Because," said Iva-Italis, "a force field of the kind of
which we are talking about can only be destroyed by the
application of metal. Iron will do, or steel. Bronze. Tin.
Whatever. But it must be metal!"
        "Then I will remember to leave my wooden sword at home," said
Guest.
        "Do that," said Iva-Italis. "Go, now! Go! Do as you have
vowed to do! Rescue the Great God! And you will be a wizard within
the week!"
        "The week!" said Guest. "You too know of this business of
weeks!"
        "It is true," said Iva-Italis, "for I am mighty in knowledge,
and anything a wizard knows I know too. Go now! And do well!"
        So Guest and Sken-Pitilkin departed from the Hall of Time,
paying no heed to the cobwebbed time pods which were set about its
walls, and occupied themselves with preparations for their
journey.
        Guest found the time to seek out his brother Morsh Bataar,
and to question him about his alleged wife; and Morsh inspired
Guest's jealousy by confessing that he had indeed married one of
the women of Ema-Urk, and that he had his own small sheep farm on
that island, and had sired two sons.
        "I will likewise have sons," said Guest, "for my wife
Penelope will bear them for me. Once I have the powers of a
wizard, I am sure I will be able to overcome her barrenness."
        Comforted by this thought, the Weaponmaster occupied himself
by choosing gear, and by climbing up and down the stairways of the
mainrock Pinnacle to put a keen fighting edge on his fitness. And,
once his father had recovered from his transitory illness, the
questing heroes gathered together.
        Need the heroes be named?
        There was Witchlord and Weaponmaster; there was the servile
Thayer Levant; and there were the wizards Pelagius Zozimus and
Hostaja Sken-Pitilkin.
        Guest had wanted to bring with the wizard Ontario Nol, but
Sken-Pitilkin had vetoed this.
        "If your demon is telling the truth," said Sken-Pitilkin,
"then we have strength sufficient for our mission. And if your
demon is lying, then the mere addition of another wizard will not
help us if we have to fight the city of Obooloo as a whole."
        "Of course the demon's telling the truth!" said Guest. "It
wants to have Jocasta liberated!"
        "Doubtless," said Sken-Pitilkin grimly. "But if the task were
so simple, then one suspects it would have been performed long
ago. Anyway, let us be going!"
        So the questing heroes passed through the Circle of the
Partnership Banks to the city of Obooloo, where they enjoyed the
hospitality of the Sanctuary of the Bondsmans Guild on the heights
of the great rock Achaptipop.
        There Sken-Pitilkin improvised a kind of air-raft, a
primitive flying device sufficient to sustain the weight of the
heroes and moderate their descent from Achaptipop to the central
courtyard of the Temple of Doom.
        When all was ready, the heroes gathered by the edge of
Achaptipop, and, aided by Sken-Pitilkin's air-raft, they floated
gently down to the central courtyard of the Temple of Blood. In
the gloom of night, they located the archway on the courtyard's
eastern flank. The arch opened onto a tunnel of uncommon darkness,
a tunnel which could have doubled as part of the gut of a whale.
The heroes drew their swords and ventured into that darkness.
        It was an uncommonly moist darkness, which smelt alternately
of the sewer and the brothel. As he shuffled forward through that
absolute blackness, the Weaponmaster Guest started to find it
difficult to keep his balance. A momentary dizziness beset him,
and found himself breathing swiftly, too swiftly.
        "We should have brought a lamp," said Thayer Levant.
        "Hush!" said Guest, who thought that Levant's rightful
mission on this quest was to hew firewood, draw water and peel
potatoes, not to pass comment on the plans and performance of his
social superiors.
        Thayer Levant did hush, though in all truth the knifeman felt
himself well-qualified to pass comment. Levant had traveled the
Circle of the Partnership Banks for a great many years as the
servant of Plandruk Qinplaqus, hence thought himself an expert on
that Circle and its cities; and, to him, his companions on this
present quest were but rank amateurs in the art of traveling the
world.
        Once Levant had hushed, the silence became oppressive. Each
of the questing heroes could hear the steady scrapage of boots
against stone, the clinkage of metal, and the tiny sounds made by
their tongues and their teeth, by the creaking of their kneecaps
and the hush-wash of their breathing.
        In the black and oppressive hush, wash after wash of smells
assailed them. From somewhere came the smell of dung; then that of
camphor; then a sweet, sickly perfume of the kind favored by
women of ill repute, or by young women who have yet to learn the
art of sophisticated restraint in matters of self-enhancement. In
that darkness -
        "Stop," said the Witchlord Onosh.
        All stopped.
        "What is it?" said Guest.
        "Something," said Lord Onosh.
        "What?" said Guest.
        "Hush! Not so loud!" said his father.
        "What is it?" said Sken-Pitilkin.
        "A light," said the Witchlord.
        It was a dull, red light which lay ahead of them. It was so
dull it was almost impossible to see. Sken-Pitilkin stared at it
for a long moment, then abruptly strode forward. The light moved.
        "The light's moving!" cried the Witchlord.
        "Because," said Sken-Pitilkin, with scathing scorn, "it is in
my hand. That's why it's moving."
        Then Sken-Pitilkin returned to his companions, bearing in his
fist a stick of incense, which he waved rigorously before letting
it fall. Like a dying star, the incense lay on the stones.
        "Light," muttered Lord Onosh. "I wish we had light."
        Then the Witchlord bethought himself of the ring of ever-ice
which he had taken from Banker Sod long, long ago on his first
conquest of the island of Alozay. Lord Onosh now customarily wore
that ring on a chain slung around his neck. Bethinking himself of
that light, he produced it: but its feebleness could scarcely do
more than illuminate his own face.
        Not to be outdone, Guest Gulkan produced his mazadath. That
amulet was a light more powerful than the Witchlord's ring of
ever-ice, but it was insufficient to light the path.
        "Hush down your lights," said Pelagius Zozimus. "They can but
betray us. They cannot serve us."
        Both Witchlord and Weaponmaster accepted this admonishment
from the slug-chef Zozimus, and, concealing their futile lights,
they pushed on down the tunnel until they saw a familiar green
glow ahead.
        That steady-burning jadeness was sure sign of the presence of
a demon. Or so thought these questing heroes! As it happens, they
were right, though some experts hold that the eyes of a basilisk
burn with just such a cold and steady green; and certain mariners
aver that a kraken encountered at night will be seen to emanate a
similar baleful light; and one of the brands of the moonpaint
which comes from the city of Injiltaprajura is most definitely a
thus-shaded green.
        Still, in the confidence of encountering a demon, Guest
Gulkan and his companions advanced, and found themselves in a
vaulted octagonal chamber. Ranked around the walls of that chamber
were niches in which stood timeprison pods identical to those of
Alozay's Hall of Time - some occupied, others not.
        "Time pods," said Thayer Levant.
        "And a demon," said Sken-Pitilkin.
    Indeed, in the center of that chamber stood a jade-green
monolith identical in outward form to Icaria Scaria Iva-Italis,
demon of Safrak. Thanks to a briefing from Iva-Italis, Guest
Gulkan knew this to be the demon Ungular Scarth, a servant of the
Great God Jocasta.
        Illuminated by the green frostlight of the demon Ungular
Scarth was the Great God Jocasta. As advertised, the Great God was
a doughnut the size of a man's head. It was floating in the air
within two shells of light. The inner shell of light was a dull
red, the red of iron which has lately been removed from a furnace,
and is cooling. The outer shell was blue - a sharp-burning
blue which hurt the eyes and made Guest Gulkan think of the sun,
and of teeth. (Why teeth? He could not tell, but that outer shell
of blue-burning light made him think most decisively of saliva and
teeth).
        "It is a demon," said the Witchlord Onosh, whose attention
was given not to the Great God but to Ungular Scarth. "But it is
short for its kind."
        "Because," said Guest, heavily, "it is standing in water."
        So it was, as Lord Onosh saw a moment later. The demon
Ungular Scarth was half-buried in oily sewer waters. For the
octagonal chamber in which the demon and the Great God were
imprisoned was awash with sewer-water.
        Fortunately, a metal grille reached from wall to wall, and
looked as if it would allow the intruders to dare the approach to
demon and god without getting their feet wet. Guest tested the
grille, found that it bore his weight, and advanced to the base of
the demon. The grille appeared to have been custom-made, and to
have been installed long after the demon took up residence in this
octagonal chamber, for the demon rose up from a neatly-edged
square hole in that grille.
        Guest Gulkan glanced down into the oil sewer waters, where
hunks of unidentifiable material floated on the surface. The water
was still, unmoving, fetid. In the chamber's sullen silence, Guest
heard his father's breathing, which was uncommonly labored. He
guessed that Lord Onosh was distressed by this place, and found
its silence hard to bear.
        To break that silence, Guest Gulkan addressed the demon
Ungular Scarth.
        "I am the Weaponmaster, Guest Gulkan by name," said he. "I am
here to rescue the Great God Jocasta in fulfillment of my oath."
        "Greetings, Guest Gulkan," says the demon, speaking to him in
his native Eparget.
        "And to you, greetings," said Guest politely. "Okay, what do
we do now?"
        "You cut through the fields of force which have trapped my
master," said Ungular Scarth.
        "Okay then," said Guest.
        Then Guest drew his sword, and, striking with all the
confidence of a hairy-arsed barbarian who has hacked off more
heads than the world has fingers to count, he struck. He hacked
with his sword, striking a mighty blow, a blow sufficient for the
decapitation of dragons, the rupture of chains, or the lopping off
of the limbs of a giant. But that blow availed the Weaponmaster
not, for his sword bounced off the bubbles of force as if off the
celestial armor of the greater war-gods.
        "Gods!" said Guest.
        "Come," said Ungular Scarth. "You did but tickle it. You
can do better than that."
        "Better!" said Guest. "I have struck with force sufficient
for the murder of ten men simultaneously."
        "Then strike again," said the demon.
        So Guest struck. But his metal bounced from the blue-burning
force field which imprisoned the Great God Jocasta.
        "What are you?" said Ungular Scarth. "Are you a child? I
thought you a man!"
        At which Guest was enraged, and hacked again at the force
field. Again his metal bounced harmlessly from the sphere of
force.
        "Let me," said Lord Onosh.
        Upon which Guest stepped aside, with hot sweat dripping down
his forehead - sweat which was consequent upon the combination of
exertion and embarrassment.
        Lord Onosh hacked at the force field. But, just like his son,
the Witchlord made no impression on that blue-burning armor.
        "It is too much for us," said Lord Onosh.
        Upon which the demon laughed.
        "Ah," said Ungular Scarth, "but what did you expect?"
        "We expected to be able to cut it," said Guest, starting to
lose his temper. "Iva-Italis told us that steel would be ample for
the purpose."
        "And you believed my dear friend Italis?" said Ungular
Scarth. "Of course you did. For you are but a naive barbarian.
Italis has told me of you. Often. And in detail."
        "Naive!" said Guest. "Why am I naive? Am I not your ally? I
came to save the Great God!"
        "Then save the Great God," said Ungular Scarth.
        "How?" said Guest. "We have tried to cut the force field, but
we cannot."
        "Of course you can't," said Scarth. "For your swords are not
metal but wood."
        "Wood!" said Guest, in renewed fury. "I'll show you what kind
of wood this is!"
        Then Guest chopped at the demon Ungular Scarth. But his blade
bounced harmlessly from the demon's jade-green flanks.
        "Cool yourself," said Scrath. "Cool and calm. Enough of
jokes. If you would liberate the Great God Jocasta, then you must
first secure a tool which is ample to your purpose. There is a
kind of knife. Two specimens are known to me. One is carried by
Anaconda Stogirov, the High Priestess of this temple. The other is
in the possession of Aldarch the Third, the Mutilator of Yestron.
You will know these knives - "
        "Knives!" said Guest. "I was told that a sword - "
        "Italis lied," said Sken-Pitilkin. "I suspected as much. I
told you so."
        "True," said Ungular Scarth. "A sword is useless for the
liberation of the Great God. To cut through the force field, you
must first procure this special knife of which I have spoken."
        "There are two spheres of force," said Guest. "The outer blue
and the inner red. Will one knife cut through both?"
        "You need only cut through the outer," said Ungular Scarth.
"The shell of blue-burning light was put there by Anaconda
Stogirov. It keeps the Great God a prisoner. The inner shell of
red light is a field of force which is generated by the Great God
itself. That inner shell has preserved the Great God from all
attack by the evil Stogirov."
        "So the inner shell is armor," said Guest, "and the outer
shell a cage."
        "Precisely," said Ungular Scarth. "Now if you will but
listen, then I will describe to you the knife which you must win
to cut through the outer shell. The knife is small. It is curved.
It ends not with a point but with a bead. Stogirov has one, and
the Mutilator has the other."
        "There are only two?" said Guest.
        "There was once a third, a fourth and a fifth," said Ungular
Scarth. "But three are lost, and only two remain."
        "Very well," said Guest, with some bitterness, realizing he
was so deeply embroiled in this adventure that there was no easy
way out. "Then tell me. Which of these knives is closest?"
        "That which is closest is that which is carried by Anaconda
Stogirov," said the demon. "For she dwells nearby."
        Then the demon directed Guest Gulkan to her chambers, and so
to her chambers the adventurers went. They quit the octagonal
chamber which was home to the Great God Jocasta, exiting from that
chamber by means of an arch set in its northern wall. The arch
admitted them to another black tunnel, a tunnel which terminated
in a stairway. Up the stairway they went, expecting to find
Stogirov's bedroom at the top.
        But they were far from the top when Guest - who was in the
lead - unexpectedly stepped on a man who was sleeping on the
stairs. Guest tripped, and went down. The man awoke with a bellow,
and his bellow woke a dozen of his fellows.
        Were these sleeping men guards, petitioners or exhausted
lovers of the evil Stogirov? Guest had no time to ask, for the men
did not stand still for questioning. Rather, they drew weapons and
attacked the adventurers.
        Such was the disorder of the dark that the men who guarded
the stairs were soon hacking at each other in their blindness,
while the adventurers tumbled back down the stairs.
        "I am wounded," gasped the Witchlord Onosh.
        And Guest Gulkan saw it was true. His father had been sorely
wounded in the gut. Pain was clearly writ on his face, and Guest
doubted him able to run.
        "Guest," said Zozimus, speaking with harsh directness. "We
must run. If your father cannot run with us, then you must make a
choice."
        "You could choose to put him in a time pod," said Thayer
Levant.
        "In a time pod?" said Guest, in amazement.
        "Why not?" said Levant. "He'll be perfectly safe there."
        "Your servant Levant speaks with good reason," said the demon
Ungular Scarth. "Nobody in Obooloo has a ring apt for the opening
and closing of these pods, not to my knowledge. Look! To your
left! The pod nearest the exiting archway is empty!"
        "It is best," said Lord Onosh, scarcely able to speak because
of the pain of his wound. "I can hardly stand, far less walk."
        So Guest took the ring of ever-ice which hung from a chain
round his father's neck, and with that ring he opened an empty
time pod. Zozimus and Sken-Pitilkin helped the Witchlord into the
pod, then Guest used the same ring to seal it.
        Upon which the men who had surprised them on the stairs
started to pour into the octagonal chamber.
        "Scarth!" bellowed Guest. "Kill them!"
        So saying, Guest gestured dramatically at the men who were
pouring into the chamber. Such was the drama of the Weaponmaster's
gesture that the ring of ever-ice escaped his hand. Still strung
on its metal chain, it flew through the air, clittered to the
steel grille, slipped through, slished into the oily depths of
pungent sewerage, and was gone.
        "Pox!" swore Guest.
        As if commanded by this Word, the demon Ungular Scarth lashed
the air with tentacles of quick-slicing green. But the chamber was
too large for the demon's tentacles to command the whole of it,
and Guest and his companions were soon sorely oppressed by their
attackers.
        "Go!" yelled Ungular Scarth.
        Taking the hint, the adventurers began to retreat down the
tunnel by which they had first penetrated to the Great God's
chamber. They retreated through the darkness to the central
courtyard which contained the Burning Pit.
        "Your airship!" said Guest to Sken-Pitilkin.
        "It was not made for ascent," said Sken-Pitilkin. "It was but
a crude device made to let us float downwards. We cannot escape."
        "Not by that means," said Pelagius Zozimus. "So let us try
our strength in combat!"
        "Which way to the Temple's outer gate?" said Guest.
        "How would I know?" said Zozimus.
        "The gate to the Temple of Blood is on the southern side,"
said Thayer Levant.
        Since a few lights shone atop the great rock Achaptipop, and
since Guest Gulkan knew that great rock to lie to the north of the
Temple of Blood, it was the work of a moment to determine which
way was south.
        An archway on the southern side of the Temple's central
courtyard gave the adventurers access to yet another tunnel, and
by dint of the speed of their feet and the bloody commitment of
their swords, they shortly found themselves out on the streets of
Obooloo.
        "Which way now?" said Guest Gulkan.
        "How would I know?" said Pelagius Zozimus in extreme
irritation, somehow presuming that this generalized question had
been addressed specifically to him.
        "Now," said Thayer Levant, "we must make for Achaptipop. This
way!"
        Levant knew Obooloo intimately, since he had been there so
often in the past with Plandruk Qinplaqus. And Guest Gulkan, who
had initially thought Levant to be the most useless member of
their party, was swiftly changing his opinion, and was now more
inclined to think Levant likely the most useful of their number.
        But the adventurers found the way to Achaptipop was barred
against them. For alarm-trumpets blown on the heights of the
Temple of Blood had already roused a great number of soldiers into
the streets, and roadblocks had been thrown up, dividing Obooloo
into a number of small areas between which communication was
impossible.
        Finding themselves trapped in a small area of the city, and
surely doomed to be discovered by search parties, Guest Gulkan and
his companions turned again to Thayer Levant, and asked for
direction.
        "I think," said Levant, "that only one recourse remains to
us, and that is to make our way to the House of Conceded
Sacrifice, which lies nearby."
        "The House of Conceded Sacrifice?" said Guest. "That sounds
ominous."
        "It is," said Levant. "For it is a place where people go to
die, and death is the only way to leave it."
        This scarcely sounded inviting, but the inhospitality of the
city was such that, in the end, Guest Gulkan and his companions
had no alternative but to accept Levant's advice, and to consign
themselves to the House of Conceded Sacrifice.