Cenotaph Road

CHAPTER FIVE

A bug burrowed its way into his nose, making him snort and sneeze in protest. This was the rude awakening Lan Martak had the next " morning." As soon as he pulled the offending insect from his nostril, he looked up to the leaden rain clouds swirling above the trees. There seemed no difference at all in the light intensity, yet Lan felt this should be morning. He had slept long enough to take the edge off his nervous exhaustion from fighting the wolf pack and meeting his strange companion in arms, Krek- if a spider might be considered a companion in arms.

Lan looked to the dark shape, still crouched in the middle of the tiny clearing. Krek hadn' t moved a hair since their encounter. The man tried to figure out the spider, then shook his head. It would take much work to do something as complex as picking apart the inner workings of that intelligent arachnid' s brain.

“ Ready to do some hiking, Krek?” he called out, unsure of the spider’ s reaction. When the spider only let out a very human groan, Lan feared some injury had gone unnoticed in the excitement of the “ night” before. He went to the hulking beast and laid his hand lightly on the ridge above Krek’ s eyes.

The spider was crying.

" Krek, are you hurt? Did the wolves nip one of your legs?" He looked in confusion at the tangled array of furry legs curled around the spider. If one had been injured, he wasn' t sure how he would attempt fixing it. A bite, even a deep one, required only a bit of bandaging and a simple healing spell, but an outright break posed grave problems. He didn' t know how to splint a spider' s leg, and his mind reeled at the thought of Krek using a crutch.

" Oh," sobbed Krek, " it is all so useless! I shall never see the lovely Klawn- rik' wiktorn- kyt, light of my life, again. She is gone, gone forever!"

" Krek? Have you had a vision? Can you foresee the future?" Lan shook the spider hard now, trying to get information. Precognition was rare on his world; few claimed it and fewer actually possessed the talent. Once, he had gone to a spring fair years before meeting Zarella and watched the acrobats and jugglers perform. Tiring of them, he found his attention drawn to a tiny booth. The crone propped in the chair inside had spoken to him, telling of things in his future. At the time, he had laughed them off as ravings of an old woman wanting to impress him into giving her a few coins. He had, but when the very things she foretold came to pass, he experienced dйjа vu feelings for months. When the Resident of the Pit had foreseen his future, it had felt different. The Resident was not human by any definition and had lived for eons, the study of time but a hobby. It seemed fitting that such a being could peer into the clouded depths of the future for a few pertinent facts.

If Krek could foresee the future, what a boon!

" A vision? Whatever are you talking about, you silly human? I bemoan my fate, my pitiable fate, being marooned on this wet world, so far from my Klawn."

" You' re not hurt? Nothing' s happened to your mate? Then why in all the seventeen hells of the Lower Places are you weeping like a spinster at a wedding?"

" My fate seems so cruel at times," the spider explained. As the tears stained the fur under his eyes, he reached out and brushed the moisture away with a quick front claw. " Are you ready to travel?" he asked abruptly.

" Yes."

" Then why didn' t you say so? You humans waste so much time with your petty intrigues, it' s a wonder you accomplish anything at all."

The spider rose and began loping off in what appeared to be a totally random direction. Lan watched, open- mouthed, then trotted after Krek, hard- pressed to maintain the speed of the multi- legged creature through the boggy lands.

Lan used the time travelling to think, to sort out all he had learned in the past several hours. This storm- wracked watery world seemed a hollow shell, devoid of surface life. Yet something vicious occasionally sprang out to devour the unwary. The pack of wolves had to live off food more substantial than the damned, all- pervading fingers of fog drifting through the interminable swamps. Lan wondered if the cenotaph providing a gateway between worlds had to be one of a human to open the Cenotaph Road. While Krek was decidedly unhuman, he had mentioned accidentally killing a human in his travels on this world.

" Krek?" Lan panted, speeding up enough to pull alongside the spider. " Was that human caught up in your hunting web from this world?"

" I had not thought on the matter. The unfortunate occurrence happened not fifty days' travel from here, but I doubt he was of this world, now that you bring the question to light. I was so wrapped up in my own concerns at the time, you understand, I never thought on it."

" Surely, Krek, but if he wasn' t of this world, did he come through the cenotaph you took to get here?"

" Doubtful. The one in the Egrii Mountains is at such an altitude that you humans begin to wheeze and faint from lack of air. It does not bother me, of course."

" Of course," Lan agreed, to keep the spider talking. " So there are many paths leading to this world?"

" Certainly, and many off it. Why, I can see no fewer than four of them. The ones shielded by the bulk of the planet are beyond my sight, so many others might exist elsewhere. I am not perfect, friend Lan Martak."

Lan bit back a retort.

" How many of those four cenotaphs lead directly to your world? Only the one you came through?"

Krek' s head wobbled about until Lan thought it might fall off. Then he decided this was the spider' s equivalent of an assenting nod. One cenotaph, one world linked through it. This assumed that only one death had occurred to create the universe- strain required to traverse the myriad worlds. But he had heard of others with many worlds attached, and he had fallen some distance through thin air before hitting the surface of the lake when he' d walked the Road.

He asked and Krek answered, " That can mean only one thing. The empty grave on your world' s side was improperly consecrated. A oneway gate formed instead of a door leading in both directions. Not uncommon, especially in lesser- developed human cultures."

Lan bristled at the implied insult, then held his barbed reply in check. The spider was larger than he, and it did possess knowledge he needed if he wanted to walk the Road successfully after parting company. At this moment, Lan wished the appropriate cenotaph gaped in front of them. He didn' t trust his temper much longer with this selfimportant creature.

" Let' s stop for a few minutes' rest, Krek. My leg was injured yesterday."

" Last night," the spider corrected.

" I don' t care when it was, it still hurts." Lan stumbled to a halt, then fell to the ground. He rubbed his leg until the stiffness faded, then chanted his healing spell. He wished he' d learned more of the healing magics, but life had always seemed so filled with other, more important items. Looking up, he saw Krek passively standing, waiting for him to finish his odd human rituals.

" I want to rest awhile, Krek. My leg will give out under me if I don' t."

" Very well. I tire of running like this in the middle of the night."

" There' s no difference," Lan flared, irritated in spite of himself.

" If you say so."

Lan massaged his muscles and changed the bandage on the alligatorbitten leg. The terrain where he rested differed not one iota from where he had so ignominiously splashed down on this world. He wondered if Krek actually knew where he was going or if the giant spider simply wanted to play him for the fool. He was tired of sloughing around in knee- deep scum.

" How do you keep oriented on this world?" he finally asked. " My compass needle felt neglected with no magnetic field. And the sky and all those damned clouds prevent a sighting on stars."

" I know nothing of such things," the spider said. " I simply sight in on the cenotaph I desire, then go directly toward it. I am surprised you humans lack this talent. You boast of all manner of other, less useful talents."

" Such as?"

" The oddest one you call taste. It has something to do with the interaction of food on your eating orifice. I never understood that, though many lower animals apparently have it. They choose certain foods over others, simply due to this strange trait. Take the carrioneaters, for example. They prefer their food dead several days, just as you do. What difference does it make? Dead a day, dead a month? Is it not all the same?"

" You don' t taste your food? How dreadful. I don' t know what I' d do without being able to savor a juicy steak, cooked only until it' s red encased in a light brown skin. The salty tang of it as it works against my tongue is indescribable."

" That is what I said." The spider continued, unperturbed. " No, this sighting talent of mine is akin to vision, but differing."

" That makes as much sense as my description of taste," admitted Lan.

" The empty graves yawn wide and glow a variety of colors. They are so necessary to keep sanity on this dreary world. All seems bland here. Very depressing." For a long moment, the spider said nothing. Then: " It forces me to remember my plight, how I am adrift in a world of woe." Krek sank to the ground and pulled his eight legs under him. A gusty sigh vented like a fumarole before he said, " All this saps my strength. How can I go on?"

Lan stood, twisting to make sure his own legs were up to the task of pacing the spider' s loping gait. Sure that he was ready for a few more hours, he softly said, " Remember Klawn. Remember your mating web. And I' ll help you back to it."

" Ah, yes, I had forgotten precious Klawn- rik'- wiktorn- kyt in the midst of my sorrow." The spider' s eyes came unfocused and it stared, dewy- eyed, at nothing Lan could discern. He began to worry about the creature. Its flights of fancy took longer and longer. This might be a form of sleep or relaxation for the beast, but Lan was leery of taking such a chance. His experience included a creaturealmost human- that could dissociate its spirit from its body and roam the world at will. Not quite a ghost, the therra usually managed to return to its body before it died of starvation. If it failed and the body perished, the therra had to be hunted down and exorcised by an experienced mage. But all that lay behind him on his home world.

This world was: different.

" Krek. Krek! I hear voices. Men. Wake up, dammit!"

" Hmmm? Oh, yes, of course. I heard the men and all those silly four- legged horses some time ago. I assumed you had, also. Shall we go meet them?"

Lan' s exasperation at the spider knew no bounds. Krek had actually heard them before he had and said nothing. He stamped his foot, then regretted it as tiny stabs of pain jabbed into his wound. Controlling his voice with great effort, he told Krek, " I don' t know if they are peaceful or not. If there are too many of them, we can' t fight them all if they' re after our necks."

" Once," mused Krek, " I could have fought them all. But that was ever so long ago. My powers fade. Oh, why did I ever choose to roam? Fool that I am, it still seems a dream."

" Too late for recriminations," muttered Lan. " Our well- armed friends have seen us. Let' s hope, at least, they are our friends."

It took several minutes for the horsemen to trot into full view. Lan felt his stomach tighten into a knot. He thought he' d left such men as these behind him. The leader of the grey- clad soldiers reined in and peered down at Lan. His tunic and trousers were slightly different in tailoring from those Lan was familiar with back on his own world, but the arrogance and demeanor were identical. These greyclads were of the same band as those led by Kyn- alLyk- Surepta.

Lan did a quick head count. Fifteen of them, all mounted, all armed with sabers, some of the soldiers wearing body armor. He failed to detect any longer- range weapons such as bow and arrow or even the bulky wheel lock pistols of his own world.

" Good evening, sir," he said, assuming Krek to be right about the time of day.

The officer in charge said nothing. He stood in his stirrups and stretched, as if he' d been long asaddle. Finally, he deigned to notice Lan.

" What manner of man are you?"

Lan wondered how to answer such an odd question.

" The same as you," he said cautiously.

" You dare say you are of my clan!" roared the soldier, glowering down at Lan from his superior height. His hand rested on the hilt of his saber. From the whiteness of his knuckles, he would draw and slash at any instant.

" No offense intended," Lan hastily said, but his own hand slipped his knife free, hiding it behind his forearm. If the grey- clad soldier intended drawing the sword, a tiny wrist motion would send cold steel into his throat.

The soldier relaxed a little.

" We are the Saviour Waldron of Ravensroost' s outpatrol. We guard the far borders for our lord and master. I ask again, what manner of man are you?"

" I am Dar- elLan- Martak, recently come to this world of yours. All we ask is simple passage."

" We?" repeated the soldier. " You have companions?"

Lan turned to find Krek tightly compressed into an amorphous lump near a cypress. In the dim light it was impossible to tell that a tall spider lurked so near. Lan decided this was part of the duty he had shouldered. Krek either feared these men or had retreated into his own personal spidery world for reasons of his own.

" A figure of speech."

" No," demanded the soldier. " You said ' we.' Where are your travelling companions? Tell me!"

" I' m no peasant to be badgered by your likes. I have every right to walk this world unmolested by you."

" Kill him," came the sharp command from the officer.

Lan whipped his knife forward, wondering if he could hamstring a couple of the horses and escape in the ensuing confusion. He doubted it. These men carried their sabers as if they knew how to use them. All the accursed soldiers seemed superbly trained and ready to die in battle. He' d find his head severed from his torso the instant he dived for the horses.

To his surprise, the horses all reared, one even throwing his rider. The others bolted and ran, no matter how their riders tried to slow them. Lan saw that most of the grey- clad soldiers weren' t trying very hard to control their steeds, either. Even the officer turned pasty white and spurred his horse away, screaming incoherently.

Lan turned to find Krek towering behind him. The spider asked in a mild voice, " Why did they run like that? Did they remember an appointment? It was one like them who died in my hunting web. I feared they would inquire about that misfortune, as the others have done in the past. Perhaps they are willing to live and let live."

" Something like that, Krek. Let' s get moving to that cemetery. I think this world is getting too hot for us."

" Too hot? It seems the right temperature to me. A bit moist, perhaps. I hate water, you understand. But:"

Lan shut out the rest of Krek' s likes and dislikes. As long as the spider continued frightening patrol officers, all was fine.

" I feel stronger, friend Lan Martak, much stronger now that we head for the sorry mountains this world offers. Having you along to fend off some of the minor annoyances has done much to restore my courage and good humor, too."

Lan snorted. Minor annoyances, indeed. He didn' t consider the grey- clad soldiers to be minor. The fact that they were on both this world and his own caused him to wonder. The time to ponder this was granted him by the utter sameness of the cloudy countryside as they wearily trudged onward. Each step seemed a hundred and each hundred multiplied into millions. The single day' s journey had lengthened to the point that Lan worried about Krek' s cosmic sense of time.

Still, minor variances in the terrain became apparent after another long day' s walk, and by the end of the third tiring day, small, rocky hills sprang up in front of them, hardly mountains but promising relief from the slop caking Lan' s boots and making each foot weigh half again what it should.

" Krek? How well do you know these hills? I feel the need of a spot to stop."

" In midafternoon?" Krek' s ungainly bulk swayed from side to side as he lumbered alongside Lan. " I know little of this area. It seems no different from any other span of lumpy hills. Do you feel danger?"

" Nothing positive, but I' m uneasy. We haven' t seen any of those grey- clads for some time now, and they didn' t appear the type to forget even a passing insult, much less a rout like we staged. And there' s still the matter of the soldier who was hanged in your web. Does that crevice yonder appeal to you for a resting spot?" He had come to find that Krek had odd instincts concerning his resting places. If any hint of running water was nearby, Krek became nervous and snappish. The last thing Lan wanted was for that powerful set of mandibles to inadvertently close on him while he slumbered.

The spider accomplished the reconnaissance in a few minutes of jumping about. Lan took this to mean approval.

" Let me explore the depths of the cave. Best to stand back," he cautioned. Lan had also learned that fire wasn' t merely something the spider disliked- his fear was a mighty phobia. For a self- proclaimed fearless warrior, Krek exhibited strange weaknesses.

Lan soon found a small opening outlined by the flare of his torch. The valley opening on the other side, of the hill stretched deep, peaceful and deserted. Satisfied he wouldn' t be boxed in, he returned to his spider companion with the good news.

" Looks secure," he said. " Now all we need is some food. Maybe a nice squarrat, basted in its own juices and- Krek! What' s wrong?"

The giant spider hadn' t moved a hair since Lan' s return. All eight legs stretched wide, claws digging into solid rock in a manner Lan had never before witnessed.

" Lan Martak! They come! I can feel the vibrations of many men. They come to kill me for that accident with the commander' s hatchling!"

" What do you mean?"

" The one caught in my hunting web was the hatchling of the greyclad' s commander. Oh, woe! I am to die this day!"

Lan' s mind raced. To be trapped in this small chamber was out of the question. No doubt existed in his mind that these were from the company of grey- clad soldiers Krek had so ably frightened off earlier. If a more bold officer rode with them this time, a second such scare tactic would fail. They had evinced such a proprietary interest in this dismal country that Lan feared they would kill any traveller, not merely him and Krek. If Krek were right about the youth he' d accidentally killed, no escape at all was possible. The commander would track them to the ends of this world.

" Pull in your legs and get that hairy carcass of yours moving. We can be through this passage and down the valley on the other side before they discover us. Hurry, curse you, hurry!"

" It is no use, friend Lan Martak. I am too weak. Once I could have fought them all and laughed while doing it. Now I am nothing. Riven from my web, an outcast, unable to mate, what is left for me? Go. Save yourself from my sorry fate."

Lan surprised himself by going to the prostrate spider and kicking him hard in the spot where a human' s ribs would be.

" On your feet. All eight of them. I' ve nursemaided you this far, and I' ll be dragged naked through all the Lower Places if I' m going to give up on you now. No fatalistic spider is going to keep me from my reward."

" Go to my web," said Krek, " and tell them I grant you your prize. Now, leave me be. My death is imminent. I feel it."

A shuddering sigh wracked the spider' s body. Lan was torn by indecision. He could run and save himself. That was the only sensible thing to do. His life had to be worth more than any stack of gold coins, no matter how high. But something rooted him to the spot. He couldn' t leave Krek to the fate decreed by the soldiers.

More than simple oath backed his resolve. The arrogance of the soldiers and what others of their kind had done back on his home world goaded him.

Grabbing a convenient hairy leg, he began tugging. The spider' s bulkiness surprised him. He' d thought it mostly illusion caused by the eight long legs. For the first time, he realized how massive the creature was.

" Move, you lovelorn pile of legs. Come along or I' ll have to try to hold them off here. That' s a damned messy way of dying, too, since I' ll be outnumbered dozens to one."

" You would do such a thing for me? Oh, well, maybe I should prolong my dreary life a while longer if it means so much to you."

They stumbled along the dark passageway until they burst into the secluded valley, the harsh glare of the overcast causing Lan to squint. Krek hesitated, spreading his legs wide and digging into the soft dirt. Though he lacked a sense of taste or smell, his tactile senses were vastly more refined than those of a human. They had to be, in order to feel the lightest of twitches in a monstrous web.

" They come," was all Krek said.

" So be it. Let' s move before they can close in on us. The only chance I see is that they' ll have to leave their mounts outside the cave. On foot, an armored soldier will be slower than we are."

The words cheered Lan more than Krek. The spider plunged into a fit of depression, and nothing Lan said brought back the bright sunlight of cheerfulness. They hurried along in stoic silence, legs straining to cover as much land as possible with each stride.

When they came to the cul- de- sac, Lan felt his own cheeriness drain. The sheer walls of the canyon rose to a height that would require a half- day' s climb. The only escape was back down the valley in the direction of the pursuing soldiers.

Lan looked at Krek. The spider collapsed into a heap of hairy legs.

" I knew such a thing would happen," he lamented. " My life is fated. Never will I know the loving caresses of my Klawn- rik' wiktorn- kyt. Her mating web will fall to sticky strands and never will our joys be as one. Never!"

Lan had to admit things looked as bleak as his friend predicted. His hand strayed to the dagger at his side. A pitiful weapon against a trained soldier. If only they were in a forest, that dagger would be more effective than a dozen great swords. What he lacked in armament, he made up for in stealth and cunning.

Whether that cunning would aid him now, so far away from a forest, was a question begging for a quick answer.

" Stay well clear, Krek. I' ll try to divert them away from you. If I succeed, we' ll both be on our way soon." He hoped he sounded confident. The way his stomach churned and knotted as hard as a hangman' s noose put the lie to any real feeling of impending success.

" As you say, Lan Martak. It is all hopeless. If only I could move my limbs. The weakness assaults me in waves. I drown in it." A shudder shook his body and made the hair on his long legs bristle. " Such a worthless death mine will be."

" All deaths, when they come too soon, are worthless," Lan told Krek. Then he slithered, snakelike, atop a massive boulder overlooking the path they' d just traversed. Glinting in the distance were soldiers swinging swords. They had shed their heavy armor, but this was only a slight additional factor in Lan' s favor. Their swords had the reach his dagger lacked.

Lan' s nervousness evaporated when the soldiers neared. The hunt always affected him this way. Adrenaline pumped fiercely into his arteries. He came alive, flowing with the invisible force that guided him in the kill.

He was not invincible; he still bled if cut. But he became something more than before. Now he called on all his wit and ability and abandoned himself to the inevitable.

As the first soldier drew abreast of his perch, Lan leaped. His hurtling weight smashed the man to the ground. A quick slash sent a fountain of crimson life spurting from the neck. Lan stood, the fallen soldier' s sword pressing heavily into his hand.

" There! Attack! Fifty crowns to the man slaying him!" echoed the voice of a hidden commander.

Lan savagely slashed the legs out from under the next man presenting himself at the notch in the rock. But swarming over the still- struggling body came another and another and still another.

Lan faced three experienced swordsmen. No novice with the sword, he knew he could never match these grisled veterans if the fight wore on too long.

" Die, lover of animals," snarled the one closest to him.

Lan was almost duped into turning to face the man mouthing the curse. The soldier at the opposite end of the line lunged, barely missing his target in Lan' s gut. Lan' s dagger drew a red line of agony along the man' s ribs, not fatal but enough to remove him temporarily from the fracas. Lan barely leaped back in time as the two remaining swordsmen weaved a net of steel death around him. His mind settled to the deadly fighting. He couldn' t penetrate their singing blades, but he could still run and dodge.

Rolling to his right, Lan put one of the men between himself and the other. He lunged. His blade was deflected by a sharp parry but still found a meaty shoulder.

As he cursed in pain, the soldier continued fighting. Lan felt the sharp sting of his own skin being scored by a razor- sharp edge. Ducking, he barely kept a second thrust from lopping off an ear.

" Krek!" he called. " Help me. I need you!"

The expression on the soldier' s face told Lan that Krek had come. The spider need do nothing save loom large and menacing. The flush of abject fear turned to agony as Lan buried his sword into the man' s sternum.

Unable to pull the blade free as the corpse sank to the ground, Lan attacked the other man with his dagger. One swift toss and the steel spike found an exposed throat. The bubbling noise and the sight of pink froth gushing from the pierced windpipe were not pleasant. Still, better the soldier dying than Lan.

" You will die, scum! More men come. You will bow to the power of our Saviour, Waldron of Ravensroost!"

Lan saw the guard commander standing, legs widespread, atop a boulder, cape fluttering in the blood- warm wind. The black rage masking the man' s face would vanish only when he witnessed death- the death of Lan and Krek.

" We made it past the first wave," Lan panted. " But I can' t keep fighting them off forever. They' ll wear me down soon." He hoped Krek didn' t notice how his hands shook. His mouth had turned dry, and his breath came in ragged gusts. Fighting for the sake of fighting as sport invigorated him; killing sapped him of strength.

" I will never see my mating web or the lovely Klawn again. Never! And all because of those humans. A chance encounter and they hunt me like a rabbit! Me! Webmaster of the Egrii!"

Lan stood back, amazed, by the spider' s sudden vicious frontal attack on the soldiers. The charging arachnid killed a full score before the battered survivors fled in confusion. Dripping gore from his hairy legs, Krek ambled back to the stunned Lan.

" That taught them respect. Imagine their impudence!" The spider seemed unaware of the monumental transformation in his attitude. One moment, he cowered docile and willing to die. The next, he was a fighting terror even highly trained men with steel weapons couldn' t contain.

" What brought all that on?" Lan inclined his head toward the bloody carnage.

" I have no idea. It simply seemed the thing to do." Krek considered the problem for a moment, then said, " You humans come apart easily."

" I agree, I agree!" Lan babbled. " But we' ve still got to get out of this trap. He' s got more men than the two of us will ever be able to kill."

" Speak for yourself," declared Krek. " I, mere human, am a Webmaster!"

" Krek," pleaded Lan, worrying about the sudden surge of overconfidence. " Listen to me. They' ll bring in crossbows and shoot us at their leisure. They can call up hundreds of men. They: they might even set fire to us." He watched as the horror of flames assailed the spider. As much as he hated doing it, he had to play on each and every weakness to prevent the spider from pursuing a course that was as suicidal as simple surrender.

" We can' t attack. We' ve got to escape. Do you understand? Our lives will be forfeit if we continue fighting them on their terms."

The spider strutted about, flexing mighty sinews in his legs. He leaped from one side of their sandy arena to the other, almost faster than Lan could follow.

" I must bow to your superior knowledge of humans. After all, you are one."

" It' s going to be difficult, but we must creep by their sentries and get out of this valley."

" They will catch us. I am too large to creep."

" Until we can climb those canyon walls, that' s our only hope."

Krek looked up as if for the first time. " That is all we have to do, climb these puny stone walls? Every day in the depths of the Egrii Mountains, I swing from pinnacles higher than this."

Lan watched in amazement as a sticky strand of web material jetted from a nozzle just under Krek' s beak. In the span of a frenzied heartbeat, the spider had a long cable stretching into the hazy distance, fastened firmly for climbing.

" Why didn' t you tell me, Krek? We could have avoided the soldiers altogether!"

The spider gave his equivalent of a shrug. His entire body quaked as he said, " I never thought of it. I assumed you knew of this insignificant talent of mine. After all, spiders do possess the ability to spin webs." It was a matter closed.

" Hurry, then. I hear the commander goading his troops into action again." Lan watched the spider deftly scale the wall of stone, legs seldom touching the smooth rock for more than an instant. The man envied his friend' s agility, but as Krek had commented, he was a spider and to the web born.

" Kill! Kill them! They escape! A hundred crowns to the man who slays them."

Lan turned, his back pressed against the cold stone, and saw a full dozen armored men advancing. Bravely, he confronted them with his sword held en garde and his dagger ready for a quick, eviscerating stroke.

He knew, however, it would be he who died.

Closing with the foremost, he executed a deft stop thrust. The recoil of his sword off the man' s armor wrenched the blade from his grasp. He managed to drive the point of his dagger into the soldier' s armpit as the man foolishly watched Lan' s sword go spinning through the air. With blood seeping over his hand, Lan gathered his strength and heaved the dead soldier back at his comrades. Lan had to laugh at the incongruous sight. Men fell like skittle pins. In the confusion, he grabbed a fallen sword.

Even the best couldn' t have stood for long under the onslaught of armed and armored might. First Lan' s sword, then his dagger flew like a silver bird. He stood weaponless in the face of stark hatred.

As a dozen sharp sword points pricked his body, a cold voice commanded, " Stay! He is mine. The spider- thing has escaped, but this scum is mine!"

The commander strode into Lan' s field of vision. Clad in a grey cape held in front by a crimson frog, he presented an imposing figure, but it was the great sword, clutched as if it were a matchstick, that held Lan' s undivided attention. The man swung the massive blade with reckless ease. Each hypnotic pass through the air came a fraction closer to Lan' s head. Involuntarily, Lan ducked as he felt hot air and hotter steel rush by his ear.

" Coward!" roared the commander, his men supporting his case with angry curses.

Lan looked into the man' s eyes and saw only madness. Nothing but death would appease him. What manner of man was this soldier' s sworn liege lord that he allowed maniacs to represent him?

" I know nothing of your plans or your ruler or:" Lan flinched from the nearness of the swinging great sword. The arc blurred silver and edged toward his eyes with every stroke. Just as the huge blade rose for a last, killing stroke, Lan shrieked- and found himself dangling upside down far above the heads of the surprised soldiers.

Twisting, Lan saw the infuriated commander below him. The ponderous great sword smashed into the cliff face, sending electric blue sparks shooting high.

" Kill them! Kill, kill, KILL!" the man screamed in an inhumanly shrill voice.

Lan' s stomach turned over as he bounced repeatedly off the cliff face. But inexorably he jerked higher and higher. At the top of the precipice, he dared open his eyes again. Standing there as unconcerned as only a spider can be was Krek, a coil of web- stuff at his feet.

" Krek! But how?"

" I cast my snaring web. I have not lost a bit of my skill," the giant spider said smugly. " Again I prove my worthiness to be Webmaster."

" Why didn' t you get me out of there sooner? That madman damned near split my head with that demon sword of his."

" I thought you intended scaling the cliff on my climbing strand. After all, I could. When I realized you were incapable of a simple feat that any feebleminded hatchling could perform, I aided you with a bit of stick- web."

Lan wanted to argue and rail against the spider' s logic. He found himself too weak. His insides tumbled, and his morning meal threatened to choke him. Soon, his nerves calmed enough, he asked, " How far is it to the cenotaph off this thrice- damned world?"

" Another day' s travel. And I shall be reunited with my mate!" chortled Krek. " Ah, how we shall rejoice. Such a web she will spin for me, her betrothed."

Lan shut out the rest of the spider' s fulsome praise for his mate. He simply rejoiced in his own continued life.