They stepped back into the prior reality, but it didn't help. This was something that crossed realities. Seqiro had been able to do that, when contacting Colene the first time; she had found him physically by orienting on him mentally. There were many telepathic animals, in their various realities. This must be a telepathic slug or mindworm, feeding off the thoughts of other creatures, or perhaps driving them to it so it could feed on them physically.
"We've got to get out of its range," Colene said. She would not have understood what was wrong with Provos if she had not been able to read the mind horror directly. Since Colene's ability was as yet vestigial, it was surely much worse for Provos herself. The woman wasn't used to mental ugliness. Colene had had some experience, because of her own suicidal depression. Maybe that was why she was more resistant to this attack; the monster preferred healthy minds.
They ran on, and the realities changed, becoming crystalline and mountainous, with sharp little crystals underfoot. Colene was glad now for the knee-length boots. But they could not escape the mind predator, whose strength kept growing. Provos was almost unfunctional, responding only to Colene's direct hauling on her arm. Maybe the thing didn't need to bring its victims to it physically; maybe it could just suck out the mind across the realities. This was a new kind of threat, but as bad as any.
The hills became mountains, and the mountains mesas, with flat tops high up. Colene and Provos were in a valley channel, crunching blue, red, green, and yellow crystals with each step. In the sky were pastel-colored clouds. Suddenly Colene recognized this type of scene, from what Darius had told her: this was his home reality! They were approaching his anchor.
"We've got to get out of the Virtual Mode!" Colene gasped. "There's an anchor close by! Come on!" She dragged the woman along, still orienting on the faint tightness that was the route to an anchor. Had the mind-thing been attacking Colene herself, she wouldn't have been able to do it, for the horror would have blotted out the awareness. That had happened to Provos; Colene could feel it.
They ran on. Provos stumbled, and fell, and Colene fell with her, dragged down by her own hold on the woman. Pain lanced through them both: the sharply pointed crystals had
Stabbed through their clothing and punctured their skins.
Colene scrambled up, cutting her hand in the process, and lifted on Provos, who seemed not to feel the physical pain. Blood was flowing, soaking their clothing, but they couldn't worry about that. "On! On!" Colene cried. And in the back of her mind she realized that this was the first time in a long time that her blood had flowed when she hadn't cut herself. When she wasn't being suicidal.
The rightness became so strong that Colene realized that they must be at the verge of the anchor. But they weren't physically on it; they were to one side. Where was it?
With horror of another kind she realized that it had to be up on one of the mesas. They had to climb to the top. But how could they? The sides were so steeply angled that they were cliff-like.
"Come on!" Colene cried, hauling Provos after her as she circled the most promising mountain. It wasn't big around the base, but they did cross several reality boundaries in the process.
Then Colene found what she had hardly dared hope for: ladder steps. There were people here, and they did come down off their platforms sometimes, so they had made notches in the stone. In fact there were parallel series, so that one person could climb while another descended.
"Up!" Colene cried, shoving the woman at the right-side ladder and taking the left herself. Colene climbed a few rungs. "Up! Up! It's the only escape!"
Provos stared at her vaguely, preoccupied by the torment within. Colene tried again. She put all her strength into trying to project her thought mentally. Up! Escape the monster! Up!
It got through. Provos grasped a rung and hauled. Once started, she moved rapidly; she was used to vertical houses and in good condition for climbing. Colene had to scramble to keep up.
Gasping, they reached the top. The mesa was only a few feet across, roughly circular, and it was empty. Had they come up here for nothing? No, the anchor had to be here.
Colene took Provos1 arm. She stepped to the center of the circle.
Reality changed. Not on this mesa, but on the adjacent one, whose top was about sixty feet away across the chasm between them. It now had a house. Or perhaps a castle, girt by a small forest.
Colene stepped toward it, still holding Provos, passing through the anchor. Suddenly the horror in Provos' mind abated. They had escaped the monster!
But that monster would surely catch Provos again if she stepped back into the Virtual Mode. They had to hide here for a while, until the thing lost interest.
Where could they go? They could not reach the larger mesa, unless they climbed down the cliff and walked back through the crystalline valley. They were already bleeding from their prior tangle with those crystals.
But this was Darius' reality. Magic worked here. There would be people who could help. All she had to do was get their attention. She hoped.
Colene waved at the other mesa. "Help!" she cried.
To her gratified surprise, it worked. A man appeared at the brink of the other mesa, looking across at her. He seemed surprised. She could pick it up in his mind as well as his expression.
"I'm Colene!" she cried. Then she had a better idea. "Darius!"
"Darius!" the man echoed. And disappeared.
But in a moment he was back, with a woman. The woman studied them, and Cotene felt an odd but not alien touch on her mind.
The woman consulted with the man. Then both of them jumped across the gulf to land on the small mesa with Colene and Provos. Magic, indeed!
"I'm Colene, Darius' friend," Colene said. "This is Provos, also his friend. We are trying to help him, but need help ourselves." Could they understand her? She feared they could not, because that wasn't their kind of magic. But they should know Darius, and know about the Virtual Mode.
"Colene," the woman echoed. She was perhaps forty, but in good condition. She wore a tunic, and under it showed the bulge of her huge diapers. Grown women wore diapers here, Colene remembered, to conceal their sexual attributes. "Provos." She did understand that much. Then she pointed to the man: "Cyng Pwer." And to herself. "Prima."
"Prima!" Colene echoed. The one whom Darius had rescued from the captivity of the dragons, and whom he would marry, so that Colene could be his mistress. Odd as it seemed, this was no rival, but an important and vital friend, for marriage to Darius would kill Colene.
Prima brought out a little figurine that was made up to look like herself. The Cyng did the same, with his looking like him. Then each brought out another doU, a blank one, and quickly doctored them to resemble Colene and Provos. Colene obligingly provided a hair, some spit, and a breath, and Provos did the same. This was a type of magic they understood.
Prima took Colene's hand, and the Cyng of Pwer took Provos1 hand. Provos, freed of the attack by the mind-monster, was now remembering her coming experience in this reality, and understood. Perhaps better than Colene did. Prima and the Cyng moved the figures.
There was a wrenching, and Colene found herself standing on the larger mesa. This was Darius' way, all right!
They walked into the Cyng's castle/house. There pretty young women came to attend to the visitors. Colene and Provos were taken into a separate chamber, stripped, washed, touched with unguent, and magically healed of their cuts. Then, dressed in local tunics, slippers, and diapers—Colene knew better than to balk at this, apart from Provos' acceptance of it—they emerged to join their hosts.
Or rather, to separate. The King of Power was seated in a comfortable chair, and Provos went to join him. Prima led Colene outside. Colene glanced once at Provos, saw that she was satisfied, and knew that it was all right. They would rejoin and resume their travel in due course. They were simply being offered separate accommodations.
Prima took Colene's hand and icon, and conjured the two of them to another mesa and castle. "Cyng Hlahtar," she expla
ined.
The residence of the King of Laughter! This was where Darius lived—and where Colene would also, once she and Darius both got here. This was fascinating.
The current King of Laughter was a huge red-bearded man. He was actually the former king, who had returned to take Darius' place while Darius was on the Virtual Mode. His name was Kublai.
Then Colene learned that Prima was Kublai's wife, but not his love. His love was his former wife, Koren, who was a beautiful young woman not a lot older than Colene, and whose barely concealed bitterness immediately endeared her to Colene. Koren had had to give up her husband, whom she loved, so that he could return to being the King of Laughter and marry Prima. This was because it was necessary for the king to deplete the joy of his wife, eventually discarding her when she had no more joy to give. Prima could handle it; Koren could not. Koren thought that Colene was luckier, and she resented it.
That was one thing Colene could deal with. She understood Keren's situation a whole lot better than the other woman thought she did.
Colene approached Kublai. "Please, Colene, Koren, put us together," she said. "Mind to mind." She knew it wasn't the same as what Seqiro did, but there were aspects of similarity. "Show her my joy."
Kublai looked at Prima. Prima said something in their language. She evidently had a notion what Colene was asking.
Kublai nodded. He came to embrace Colene. Colene focused on her internal state, making no effort to suppress the several facets of her feeling: her depressive state, her love for Darius, and her somewhat bitter compromise with her dream: she could love but not marry Darius, for he would marry Prima.
Then Kublai drew from her. It was a terrible, sinking feeling, and Colene thought she would die, literally. In an instant he restored what he had taken, almost. She felt like living again. This was what he did: he took what feeling was in a woman, multiplied it, and sent it out to everyone, including that woman, so that all shared her joy. Except that Colene had not joy but depression to give.
Kublai stepped away from her. That was all. He had done it. Koren understood exactly how Colene felt, because she had received it.
Koren stared at Colene. Now she knew: their situations were exactly similar. Only their men differed—and those men were to have the same wife, Prima, whom neither loved. The two young women were not rivals or enemies, they were victims of the situation. They were sisters in misery and love.
The tears started so suddenly that it was as if someone had dashed a tiny cup of water in Keren's face. Colene held open her arms, and Koren stepped into them, hugging her.
After that, it was easy. They had no common language, but hardly needed it. Colene was able to pick up what she needed from their minds to get along. She made clear by signals and nods, sometimes twenty-questions type, what she was doing: going home to her reality, to get information she needed to rescue Darius from being stranded in yet another reality.
With, she added sourly, a lovely woman and Colene's beloved horse.
Koren became positively friendly. She had not before had any acquaintance who understood her situation so perfectly, and it was a great relief to her. She hoped Colene would succeed in bringing Darius safely back, not just because that would allow Kublai to retire and marry Koren again, but because she wanted to be Colene's friend and companion. Colene liked that notion; it would certainly make her life here easier. But she doubted that anything so nice and simple could come to pass. The Virtual Mode was a sterner taskmaster than that.
But Prima, too, was friendly. She remained most grateful to Darius for rescuing her, and she liked her role as wife to the man she had loved in her youth. That was part of Keren's problem: she suspected that Kublai's marriage was not quite as loveless as it was supposed to be. The whole business of Darius' departure and Prima's return messed up her formerly idyllic life, and she wanted only to get it put back together the way it once had been. But Prima was reconciled to her situation, and knew how much worse it would have been had Darius not ventured on the Virtual Mode. She had wanted to be the King of Laughter herself, having the special ability for it, but had been denied it because she was a woman. Now she had a portion of it, and would retain that portion if Colene came here. Colene, being depressive, represented less of a threat to her than anyone else.
Koren took Colene out to see the sights: the many mesas, with their separate domiciles of all types, and their elaborate gardens, and the colored clouds which came to nourish those plants. The myriad crystals of the lowlands, reflecting and refracting multicolored splays of light up. The forms of sympathetic magic, which enabled the folk to conjure things or themselves to familiar places. The animals and birds peculiar to this region.
"I love it!" Colene said.
But all this was in her future. First she had to return to Earth, and then to Oria. She had to enable Nona to bring the anima. Only then could they all come here to this marvelous magical land and live happily ever after. Who could say that the authorities would not suffer some change of heart, and allow Prima to assume the role for which she was qualified, freeing Darius to marry Colene just as Darius' return would free Kublai to marry Koren? It was worth dreaming about. If she could just accomplish her present mission.
She slept in a pleasant bedchamber by herself, declining the offer of a handsome young man to be her companion for the night. Even this aspect of this society was clarifying for her: love, sex, and marriage were three different things, and not necessarily found together. Colene was Darius' love; neither of the other two changed that. She had met Ella, Darius' bedmate on off nights; she was pretty, pleasant, bouncy, enthusiastic, and not phenomenally smart. So if Darius married Prima and took off Ella's diaper, Colene would still be his love. That was what counted.
In the morning, she bid farewell to Koren. "I hope we meet again," she said. She looked around. "The same for everything and everyone here. It's a better world than mine."
Then Prima conjured her back to the residence of the Cyng of Pwer, where Provos was waiting. Provos was in her normal outfit, but Colene had elected to stay with the local clothing, even the diaper. It made her feel closer to Darius.
They went to the anchor and ventured cautiously through, ready to retreat if the mind-monster still lurked. It was clear. The monster must have given up and sought other prey. It might return, but with luck they would be well clear by then. They were on their way again, this time to Earth.
CHAPTER 10
RABBLE
DARIUS blinked, acclimatizing to the gloom. They were in a cave or tunnel that seemed to be the continuation of the hole of the giant mandolin, leading straight on into the rock. Perhaps they had simply passed through the petrified back of the mandolin, which had blocked the passage.
It was dark, but the darkness was not total. As they walked, the light brightened somewhat, until they had no trouble seeing their way.
"But where is your contact mind?" Darius asked the horse.
It retreated in alarm as we arrived. But there is another approaching, f can not read it, I only sense its presence. It is female.
"Did you read anything in the original mind?"
No. It was stupid. I reached only as far as its eyes, to help you conjure us.
"Keep working on the new mind. First test for hostility, and warn us. We want only to hide safely until Colene and Provos return."
"You must be ready to use your magic here, Nona," Stave said. "The rabble may be dangerous."
"You call them rabble?" Darius asked, not amused.
"That is what we call them," Nona explained. "All the people and creatures who have been banned from the surface
because they lack even illusion magic. There are stories that they have an awful society in the center of the world, and live only to break out and slay all those on the surface. Both the despots and theows watch constantly to be sure that there is no escape for them."
"They may not be friendly, then," Darius remarked with irony.
"Yes," Stave agreed. "But there
may also be too many for us to oppose physically. Since they do not have magic, Nona should be able to protect us against them."
"I will try," she agreed. "But I depend on Seqiro to alert me to danger."
She is here.
They paused and let the woman approach them. She was young and comely in a belted brown tunic. She smiled and spread her hands, showing by gesture that she intended no harm. Her hair and eyes were the same shade as her tunic, a nice match.
"This is a banished inhuman monster?" Darius inquired.
I can not yet read her mind, but she is alone and seems friendly.
"I had gathered as much," Darius said wryly.
The woman came to him. She said something.
"I can almost make it out," Nona said. "I think she said she loves you."
Darius snapped a glance at Nona. "This is humor?"
"Maybe I misunderstood," Nona said.
The woman put her arms slowly around Darius, embraced him, and tried to draw his head down for a kiss.
"But I don't think so," Nona added.
He resisted. "But I don't know her!" he protested. "And Colene would be upset."
"I will try to explain to her," Nona said. She spoke to the woman, and because Seqiro continued to translate her thoughts, he heard it as his own language, "Woman, this man is taken."
The woman clung to Darius, speaking emphatically.
I can get only a glimmer. The thoughts are not coming through, but the fringe of the emotion is.
"There is no other," Nona said, translating.
"Yes, there is," Darius said firmly. "Her name is Colene, and she is my love."
Seqiro's thought came again, while Nona tried to get through to the woman.
That emotion is not love as you feel it. It is not quite lust. She desires to breed with you, but for some reason other than your physical appeal. She wants to foal your offspring. I can not fathom why.
The horse was not conscious of irony. Seqiro was not insulting Darius, merely admitting that the woman's motive for choosing this stranger was unclear.