The warlock insane (3 page)

"No, Papa!"

"Papa, come back!"

"Husband, thou hast not readied thyself for being long out of doors!"

"Sacred Blue!" Rod muttered to himself. "As though I hadn't slogged through sixteen-hour winter days before I ever met her!"

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"On the planet Pohyola, as I remember, Rod," Fess said at his shoulder, "when you were helping the rebels to organize."

"Are you there, then?" Rod scowled up at the great black horse. "Go away. I'm of questionable mental equilibrium, remember?"

"No one but yourself has said so, Rod."

"No one but myself has had to live in my mind." Rod stopped stock-still, staring off into the night. "That's it!"

"What is what, Rod?"

"Why I could see a troll, and none of the rest of you could. Because it wasn't there." You could almost hear the relief in Fess's voice. "That is, certainly, a logical conclusion, Rod."

"Yeah, but then isn't it equally logical that I'm hallucinating?"

"That is simply a matter of definition."

"No, it's a matter of scrambled brains. Face it, Fess—I'm insane." Rod stopped in the snow, a beatific smile spreading across his face. "Yeah, insane. Well! If that's all it is, then I can relax again."

"Would you… explain the basis for that attitude, Rod?"

"What's to explain? As long as I know what it is, I know what to do about it.''

"Which is?" Fess asked, with foreboding.

"Stay far away from Gwen and the kids, for openers, so I can't hurt them. Stay away from everybody, for that matter, until I manage to get myself straightened out." Rod started walking again. "That forest looks inviting. I'm overdue for a vacation, anyway."

"Now, Rod." Fess hurried to catch up with him. "Surely you are exaggerating."

"No, I'm hallucinating. And if I'm hallucinating, I'm either starving, drugged, suffering from heatstroke, or insane."

"That is not a warranted inference…"

"Oh, yeah? Do you know any other causes of hallucination?" Fess was silent a moment, then said, "An excess of religious zeal, perhaps, usually coinciding with deep meditation."

"Yeah, well, I sure haven't been praying this afternoon— and after that banquet Their Majesties fed us, I'm certainly not starving! If any of that food had been drugged, there'd be a hundred other people hallucinating, too!"

"Have we any proof that they are not?"

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"Judging by the ruckus I've been making, we'd have heard them by now—or at least heard about them; Their Royalties always summon us when something unexplain-able happens to somebody."

"That does seem valid," Fess said with reluctance.

"You bet it does! As to heatstroke, it's the middle of winter—and that leaves insanity!"

' 'The term is perhaps a bit extreme…"

"Sure—I'm just seeing things that aren't really there. Seeing them attack me, too—and will you really try to tell me that I haven't always been a little bit paranoid?"

"Your grandfather did perhaps exert too strong an influence on you, with his medieval fantasies…"

"Yes—my darling, beloved, but dotty grandfather. Is that an adjective you'd accept, Fess? Or how about 'mad as a hatter'?"

"I think I might prefer the last," Fess said slowly, "considering its association with the works of Lewis Carroll."

"Then it's heigh-ho! Off to Wonderland! Are you coming along, Fess?" But Rod didn't wait for an answer.

The trees closed behind him. Rod glanced back, and saw only a maze of bare branches, outlined by the snow clinging to them. At once, he slowed his pace with a sigh of relief. "They did it. They stayed."

"They do recognize your need for occasional solitude, Rod."

"Still there, Steel Steed?" Rod looked up at his old companion, and was surprised to see that the great black horse was facing front, not watching him. For some reason, this made the pressure roll off. "Well. So I'm on sick leave."

"It would seem advisable," the robot agreed.

"Great!" Rod stretched, then relaxed with a happy sigh. "No more emergency calls from Tuan and Catharine! At least, not for a while."

"Yet Gwen will have to manage the children alone," Fess murmured.

"She does, anyway, Fess, you know that. I'm just a security symbol for them all, a sort of animated teddy bear."

"Oh, no, Rod! You do them an injustice. You are far more, to all of them…" He stopped, seeing that his owner wasn't listening.

"Fess—what's that great big brown blob over there?"

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"Where, Rod?" Fess followed Rod's gaze, but saw nothing. Rod, however, saw a large, fat animal stand up on its hind legs and wave, a cheerful smile on its face.

"It's a bear, Fess—six feet tall, if it's an inch. Very friendly-looking, too," he said, puzzled. "I thought bears were supposed to be hibernating."

"They are, Rod." There was a cautious note to the robot's voice. "Are its legs much thicker than is normal for its kind?"

"Yeah, and it has pink pads instead of paws… Hey!" Rod whirled, staring up at Fess. "You don't mean it's a teddy!"

"Yes, Rod—an animated teddy bear, such as you were just discussing."

"Odd coincidence." Rod waved back to the teddy, then watched it stroll away into the wood. It looked rather familiar. "You don't mean it showed up because I talked about it?"

"That is a distinct possibility, Rod. If you are hallucinating, anything that comes to your mind might appear."

"And anything that's there, waiting to surface, but hasn't come to the fore yet?" Rod frowned. "Don't know if I like the sound of that last part.''

"It may turn out to be fallacious—but perhaps the visual images stored in your subconscious will not arise unless some random association triggers them."

"Like that thought about my role in the family." Rod glanced about him, suddenly apprehensive. "Right now, Fess, it looks to me as though I'm walking through a moonlit deciduous forest, with snow outlining the limbs of the trees."

"You are, Rod."

"So the forest is real, anyway." Rod rubbed a glove across his chin. A long, mournful cry echoed through the forest, and a shadow with eyes of fire detached itself from a nearby branch. "Fess! It's a vampire!"

"No, Rod—it is only an owl."

The huge bat dove at them, its jaws lolling open to show glistening fangs. Rod ducked, grabbed up a branch with a sharpened tip, and stabbed at the monster's breast. With a howl of dread, it sheered off and hurtled away into the forest. "Owl or not," Rod muttered, "I had to deal with it in terms of the fantasy it came from." Then a sudden thought struck him. "What am I holding, Fess?"

"A broken twig, Rod. "

"It grew amazingly." Rod threw the sharpened stake away. "This is going to take some getting used to. Well, at least I have light." He looked up at the planetoid overhead. "Hey! It stayed a moon!"

"It would seem that the spell has passed," Fess murmured.
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"Only temporarily." Rod shook his head. "Be nice if it would stay gone—but I think I'd better wait a while, to make sure."

The moon reddened.

"Uh—strike that."

"What is happening, Rod?"

"The moon has turned crimson. A big, fat drop is collecting on its bottom… it's dripping…" Rod squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head. "No, I don't think I'm ready to go home."

"It is surely a chemical imbalance," the robot protested. "A blood analysis…" Rod looked up, horrified. Fess had grown batwings; two long, sharp fangs protruded from his mouth.

"Get away from me!"

"But, Rod… I only meant…"

"Meant to stop by for a quick sip! What the hell is this, a vampire horse?"

"Exactly," chuckled a rich baritone voice.

Rod whirled, and saw a tall, debonair devil lounging against a tree trunk, twirling its tail. "Go to blazes!"

"Oh, all right," the devil grumped. "But I'll find you later." He exploded into flame and was gone, leaving Rod trembling.

"Rod, surely the correct antidote…"

"There is no antidote!" Rod leaped back. "Because there's no poison! You're in this with them! You're all out to get me—even you, my old tutor and guardian! Get away! Get out of here! Go!" The vampire horse stood, glaring at him with eyes of fire.

Rod whipped out his dagger. "Turn into a sword!" The blade sprouted, grew three feet. "Silver!" Rod cried, and the sheen of steel turned to a mirror finish.

"I will go," the vampire said slowly. "But I am grieved to find that your imbalance is so severe as to make you doubt me, Rod."

"Doubt? I'm sure of it! Now get out of here, before I run you through."

"I will go." The horse turned away—and as it went, the glow in its eyes died, the fangs shrank and were gone, the wings dwindled and flowed back into the form of a saddle—and only familiar old Fess plodded away through the snow, head hanging.

Rod felt a stab of remorse. "No! I mean…"

Fess paused and lifted his head, turning to face Rod. "Yes?"
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"It's ebbing again," Rod explained. "It seems to come and go—and it makes me paranoid when it happens."

"I have heard of such phenomena," Fess answered.

Rod frowned. "Just reinforcing my natural tendencies, you mean?" Then before Fess could answer,

"Never mind—it doesn't really matter. Whatever it is, I'll have to figure it out and learn to cope with it. You'll have to leave me alone to work it out, Fess. I know that's hard for you, but you'll have to."

"I have always endeavored not to be overly protective, Rod, in spite of my programming."

"Yeah—and I know how hard that is." Rod grimaced, remembering how he had to school himself to leave Gregory and Cordelia to fend for themselves—not always successfully. And Magnus and Geoffrey, when they were little. "No need to override that tendency completely, though. Don't be too far away, okay?"

The great black horse stared at him for a moment, while its eyes seemed to quicken again. Then it said,

"I will come at your call, Rod."

"Thanks, old friend." Rod grinned with relief. "But you'd better not stay too close."

"I understand. I will be here, but not here." And the horse turned away, fading into the night. Rod frowned, wondering if Fess had donned a cloak of invisibility. The thought alarmed him—he looked about in near panic, wondering how many invisible enemies might be looming over him.

"Magic spectacles." The devil was there again, a set of lenses dangling from its hand. "Guaranteed to let you see anyone wearing a cloak of invisibility, or even a Tarnhelm, anywhere nearby—and available only to you."

"Through this special offer, eh?" Rod glowered. "What's the price?"

"Only your signature, in blood." Rod shook his head. "I couldn't read the fine print right now—it might keep changing on me. Retro me, Satanus !"

"Wrong devil," the demon scoffed, "but I take your point. Just remember, the offer remains open." It faded, and was gone.

"The offer is also empty," Rod snorted. Then he remembered that the biggest step in invention was realizing that something could be done—after that, research and engineering went faster. "Well, if I'm hallucinating, I ought to get some good out of it. Magic glasses! Appear!" He snapped his fingers, then held his hands out, cupped to catch.

Nothing happened.

"Might have known it wouldn't work when I wanted it to," he muttered, and turned away, plodding off into the night.

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Rod hadn't gone far when he began to hear the piteous wail.

He broke into a trot—the fastest pace possible in the thick snow. The sound was that of someone in trouble and, his own natural inclination to help aside, he had to confront the hallucinations sprung from his secret fears, not flee from them.

Around a bend in the path, past a curving wall of trees, he saw a huge old oak tree, its trunk riven by some long-forgotten lightning bolt. The cleft in the trunk had closed fast around the arm of an old peasant woman who was moaning and shivering in the cold. She saw Rod. "A rescue, kind sir! Free me from the grip of this evil tree!"

And, so help him, the tree gave a menacing grumble.

Rod squeezed his eyes shut and gave his head a quick shake, then looked again. The oak and the crone were still there—of course. Still, what he saw might not be what she was seeing—or was she part of the hallucination, too?

One way to find out. He stepped up cautiously. "How did you come to catch your arm in that oak tree's trunk, grandmother?"

"I sought to grasp that sprig of mistletoe, sir, for the holiday!" A sprig dangled just beyond the woman's reach, for all the world like bait. "I reached, and the tree rocked toward me and caught my arm! Wilt free me, good sir? Oh, I beg of thee!"

A limb reached down twiggy fingers. Rod drew his sword in a slashing arc, and the twigs drew back with a shriek of stressed wood. The trunk rumbled angrily.

Rod looked up, eyes alight. "Doesn't like the steel, does it? Well, then, ma'am, all I have to do is…" He stretched out the blade, probing into the crack in the trunk. The tree moaned in horror, and the edges of the cleft shrank back. The old lady snatched her arm free with a shout of joy, and the tree rocked forward, rumbling in rage.

"Run!" Rod shouted, as a branch struck at him like a club. He dodged, but other branches began to wave and lash the air, reaching toward him, while the tree's groans rose to thunder—and nearby trees began to stir restlessly.

Well, if it hadn't liked the steel of the sword, what would it really fear? Rod remembered a six-foot-long, two-handed lumberjack's saw he'd seen in a museum once— and his sword fluxed and stretched, growing until he found himself holding just such a toothy blade in his hands. The tree shrank back with a moan of fear.