The Philosophical Strangler(101)

“Shut up, Ignace,” growled Greyboar.

Shelyid gave me a wounded look. “You helped steal the Rap Sheet for free, Ignace.”

A stab to the heart. But I rallied. “That was in another country. And besides, the Crud is dead.”

My protests, alas, were ignored. Greyboar plowed right over them.

“Why do you say it can’t be done?” he asked Eddie. “Doesn’t sound all that difficult to me. From what you’ve told me before, all those tunnels link up sooner or later. Sure, it might take awhile. But if we plug away at it, we ought to be able to find him eventually.”

The three dwarves shook their head in unison and began to speak, but the wizard cut them off.

“I fear not, sirrah Greyboar. Indeed, ’tis the very impossibility of the task which has led us to your door.”

Greyboar looked to Zulkeh. The mage spread his hands apologetically.

“ ’Twas my recommendation, that, when Gwendolyn approached me in the Mutt with her proposal. She had thought it would be a simple matter of continuing down the tunnels past the place where the dwarves broke off their search. But I was forced to open up to her understanding certain inauspicious realities of tunnelics and cave lore. Not the mundane aspects of the science”—here, a dismissive wave of the hand—“which any miserable engineer can handle, but the more arcane branches of the study. I speak, of course, of monstrology and beastics. Subterranean devilism, and the like.”

An apologetic cough. “Not to mention the more abstruse problems posed by the Joe relics we might possibly encounter. Which, of course, explains to a degree my own willingness to assist her in this otherwise ridiculous affair of the heart.”

Another apologetic cough. “So, naturally, I thought of you at once. I was quite impressed by the talents which you displayed in the course of our adventure with the Rap Sheet. In an adventure such as this, one really does require more than a modicum of brawn.”

“Why?” demanded Greyboar. “What’s in those tunnels?”

As one dwarf, Eddie and Lester and Frank shuddered.

“For a start,” explained the mage, “we may encounter tunnel snarls.”

“I’ll take care of that!” exclaimed Shelyid. Proudly: “I’m a snarl-friend.”

Greyboar eyed him skeptically. “How sure of that are you, Shelyid? Rock snarls, yes. I know you’ve dealt with such. I was there. But—”

“And forest snarls!” piped the dwarf. “I met them when we went through the Grimwold.”

His face scrunched, injured. “Any kind of snarls, Greyboar,” he said in a hurt little voice. “You shouldn’t doubt me. It’s not right, you shouldn’t.”

Greyboar smiled. “All right, Shelyid. I’ll take your word for it.”

He looked back to the wizard. “What else?”

The mage stroked his beard furiously. “What else? Say better: what else is there not? In terms of monstrology, we are certain to encounter any number of noxious specimens. Devils, too, of course. If I misdoubt me not, our expedition will most certainly require penetrating into divers of the divers regions of that diverse realm known to the ignorant as the Inferno, but more properly titled—”

Greyboar interrupted, frowning. “I’ve never tried to choke demons and devils.”

“Bah!” oathed the mage. “Your talents shall not be needed with that tripe. I shall deal with any such who might make so bold as to confront our puissant presence. Besides, I have a stratagem in mind which may enable us to circumvent the problem of the passage through the Inferno, and even many of the other horrors of the underworld. But stratagems—even my own—do go awry from time to time.”

If I hadn’t seen him in action, I would have laughed right there. Zulkeh’s not only the world’s greatest pedant, he looks the part. Picture a middle-aged scholar, then imagine a caricature of one. That’s Zulkeh. Oh, yeah—don’t forget the ridiculous robe covered with obscure signs and runes, the tall pointy wizard’s hat and the staff.

But—fact is, I had seen him in action. A truth: when it comes to real actual sorcery, there probably isn’t a better thaumaturge in the universe than Zulkeh of Goimr, physician. Except for maybe God’s Own Tooth, the dreaded master of the Godferrets.

“No, no,” continued the mage, “your physic skills will be required to deal with the less ethereal denizens of the underworld. I speak, of course, of the deadly Worm of the Deep—”

As one dwarf, Eddie and Lester and Frank wailed.

“—the dreaded Beast from Below—”

Another wail.