Horrors of the Dancing Gods

within him; it had bothered her only culturally before, and somehow it troubled her not a bit now. Still, if this mad expedition somehow succeeded, she knew that one way or another she'd get her hands on that thing they were seeking long enough for just one wish. One wish she'd thought of that would solve it all.

They had a midday siesta, then a substantial dinner with the sun perhaps ten degrees above the horizon. Finally it was time to move.

Irving looked around. 'I don't see much in the way of camels or horses,' he noted. 'What are we supposed to do? Walk?'

Ali ben Hazzard looked at him with those almond eyes and grinned. 'Of course not, effendi! How would we ever get anywhere with mere camels in conditions like this?' He removed what seemed to be a panpipe from a pocket in the folds of his robe and blew a series of notes on it

Three broad Persian-style rugs approached and braked to a stop.

'Ohmigod!' Irving exclaimed.

'Very good models, effendi, among the best!' Ali assured them. 'Now, I want each of you to get a bit of practice before we go. I would not want to lose you out there in the middle of nowhere!'

'Flying carpets?' Marge yawned. 'Fascinating. No handholds, though, I note. Doesn't bother me, but I'm not too sure about the rest of you.'

'Oh, you will need them as well, madam!' ben Hazzard assured her. 'I do not think that anyone flies this fast. Your destination is more than a thousand kilometers that way!' he noted, pointing to the south and slightly west. 'If all goes well, we will make it, with one brief stop, in about eleven hours. Now, come! It does take a bit of practice, you know, and if you fall off and survive, we will lose time. We do not want to be aloft in daylight!'

It appeared that flying carpets weren't quite as easy to handle as in the old tales, that was for sure. For one thing, the speed was quite good, but balance was the key, and that meant lying pretty well flat and making certain that anything you did was balanced by what someone else did.

The first carpet was to have the 'mechanics,' along with some freight. After some balance tests, a couple of the vacuous fairies were shifted to ben Hazzard's carpet.

Irving, Larae, Poquah, and Marge were on the second, or middle, carpet, arranged pretty much to balance out the weight. Again, some small boxes and such were placed in the center, along with a supply kit. The general rule was, no matter what you did, you held on to the carpet, and you never stood up.

Ben Hazzard himself, along with Thebes and the leftover 'mechanics,' made up the third and final carpet, along with probably the most freight.

The first carpet seemed to have kegs rather than boxes, and a hopeful Thebes asked what the kegs contained.

'A yellowish dye, effendi! I have an order for it, and it is quite rare! Very difficult to get! You need to go into the dark jungles and find a particular giant insect, a member of the tick family but one which feeds on certain very large plants rather than animals. It is very lazy, and it simply lies on the plant and drains its juices slowly over time. Inside its stomach, the interaction of plant and tick juices can, if the tick is removed and cut open, result in a very good dye! Different plants produce different colors, but those are yellow, one of the rarest colors!'

It was still not quite dark, but Marge, hearing this outrageous explanation, shook her head and wondered just how little inhibition of any sort she had left. It was so very, very tempting…

'How do we go to the bathroom?' Irving asked ben Hazzard.

'If you cannot hold it until the break, use the container in the back. Yes! That squared wooden one there! Just remember how fast you are going and always be the last one to the rear of the carpet, eh?'

Irving looked at it and sighed. 'Yeah, okay. So I guess it's time now, huh?'

They got on their carpets, lay down, got one more set of cautions from ben Hazzard, and then it was time. The caravan master played a series of notes on his pipes, and slowly, ever so slowly, the carpets rose up into the air until they were lined up in the light of the setting sun about thirty feet above the desert in the order ben Hazzard had determined.

'Ready?' the man with the panpipes called. 'All right, then! We go! Hold on!'

He played a few notes, and slowly the first carpet, then the second, and finally the third moved out in a direct line toward the south-southwest, accelerating as they did so, the wind picking up and blowing against them as they went faster and faster.

Marge couldn't stand it anymore. Not at all worried and stuck like glue to the front of the carpet, she sat up and pointed.

'Okay, everybody. Follow the mellow tick woad!'

If any of them got it, they didn't give her the satisfaction of a reaction.

CASTLE ROCK

Always be respectful to the King of Horror or you will be eaten alive by lawyer birds.

— Rules, Vol. RIR, xiv, advice in Preface

IT WASN^'T DIFFICULT TO SEE CASTLE ROCK, THE HEART, soul, and center of Yuggoth. It rose up out of the vast, basically flat desert floor like a gigantic black monolith, dominating all it surveyed.

Everyone was impressed, and Irving's eyes narrowed. 'Hey! Those look like lights up there! Earth-type lights!'

Poquah nodded. 'I believe you are correct. I never expected to see such a thing here. It is against the Rules.'

'Not right there,' Irving shouted over to them. 'I remember that from the Rules volume before creepy pants dropped it! The reigning monarch of Yuggoth has a dispensation: almost anything he or she wants, as long as it's limited to this area and only this area. This is real power, the kind even Ruddygore can't do!'

'He doesn't have to,' Poquah noted. 'He can go to Earth any time he chooses, and he still chooses to live here.'

'What happens when we get there?' Lame asked them. 'I mean, I thought you already knew where you were going.'

'True, but nobody else knows that,' Irving explained. 'Besides, it'll be easier with the passes and blessings from this character.'

'Be respectful to the King if you should get into his presence and remember to remain respectful about him while in his immediate area. Remember, everybody up there works for him and is totally dependent on him for their present and their future. Anyone who can reach this status has enormous power, at least the equal of the continental powers of all the other great Council members, and in addition, just like them, undoubtedly has a somewhat well-deserved ego. You don't get and keep such a position without it. Just let me do most of the talking and keep a low profile otherwise! We have come very far in a very short period of time. It wouldn't do to screw it up now, and I have the very strong impression that this fellow almost doesn't care if Hell or the invaders win. He's apparently so powerful, he can work with either one! He's doing this strictly as a favor.'

Marge had the most brilliant night vision, and she stared at the great rock in wonder. It did look like a gigantic castle on top, a function not only of buildings there but also of the rocky spires and prominences, but the rock itself was very odd, too, and amazingly regular. In fact, if she didn't know better, she thought, she'd swear that it was a gigantic Earth beer can. It was almost as if she could see the label on it. S-T-R — nope. Couldn't make out any more.

Had to be her imagination, she told herself. That was absurd. Good lord! Was that a lighthouse on top? In the middle of the desert they needed a lighthouse?

The top did in fact resemble a rocky coastline, except that the drop was sheer and there were buildings all