one person places a great shock on a single psyche, leading to instant oblivion. When the shock’s shared among so many, nobody drops down unconscious.’
‘I didn’t feel any shock,’ objected Ingalawa.
‘Didn’t you?’ said Zozimus. ‘I did! The light! It was near-blinding! We were all shocked, weren’t we? But put it down to the burst of light.’
‘But,’ protested Chegory, ‘why should the demon make all our voices Odolo’s? Why not leave us with our own voices?’
‘Because,’ said Odolo himself, ‘this way the demon can contribute to our counsels. Am I not right? At any moment the demon might command one of our bodies, one of our voices. It could give advice — the rest of us thinking that advice to come from our friends.’
‘One thing’s for certain,’ said Zozimus, ‘while the demon’s doubtless weak from the exorcism, its strength will renew swiftly. We have to act! Now!’
‘Dear cousin,’ said Hostaja Sken-Pitilkin, ‘our options are limited. Theory allows for group possession — but scarcely for group exorcism.’
‘Yes,’ said Zozimus. ‘But Theory is a stranger to the Hermit Crab. There is a Power which may help us yet!’ His words brought a babbling outcry of fear, protest and terror. The Hermit Crab! Most of those who dwelt on Untunchilamon feared it more than anything else imaginable. It was known to be cruel, ruthless and unpredictable. It had turned people inside out. It had once — or so legend said — brought darkness to Injiltaprajura for ten days at a stretch.
But Zozimus was adamant..
‘The Hermit Crab,’ said Zozimus, ‘hoped for help from the demon Binchinminfin. The Hermit Crab wished for such help in order to become a human. We have the demon. Perhaps the Hermit Crab can extract the demon then imprison it in a cat. Or a dog. Or something. But one thing I do know for certain. When the demon gets back its strength it will take a most terrible revenge upon all those who helped with the exorcism here today. Which means all of you.’
‘But — but why?’ said Odolo.
‘If you’d been inside my head, my lad,’ said the Empress Justina severely, ‘you’d not ask any question so stupid. I don’t know what this exorcism looked like to you. But I can tell you what it felt like. It felt — no, you’re a man, you wouldn’t understand that. So — ah yes, I know. Imagine yourself being castrated while someone with a red-hot poker-’
The Empress Justina continued in this vein until Odolo, despite the natural olive coloration of his skin, had grown quite pale.
‘All right,’ said Zozimus, bringing Justina’s spirited description to a close. ‘I’m sure everyone here realises how serious this is. All of us are doomed if we give the demon chance enough to regather its strength. Let’s get ourselves to the Hermit Crab.’
So, with fear of demonic vengeance at last overmastering fear of the Crab, the group left the exorcism chamber to visit the Power which dwelt so close at hand, the Power which was a worker of wonders far greater than anything any mere sorcerer could have attempted.
Counting that morning’s dawnsun breakfast, the Hermit Crab had now enjoyed a full four meals prepared by Pelagius Zozimus, leading the master chef to hope that its mood would be tolerably mellow. Even as Zozimus exited from the Analytical Institute he was rehearsing the eloquence with which he would convert the Hermit Crab to his cause. But his chain of thought was disrupted abruptly when he found a hostile force drawn up outside the Institute.
‘Varazchavardan!’ cried Chegory Guy.
It was indeed Aquitaine Varazchavardan — his right arm in a sling to support the collar bone which Artemis Ingalawa had broken. The wonderworker had changed into fresh robes: those he had been wearing just a few days earlier when he interrupted a luncheon at the Institute. Serpentine dragons blazed upon the ceremonial silk, their colours alive in the sun.
[Here an impossibility, for surely we have seen these specific robes ruined twice already. Once when Varazchavardan was swept into the sea by the first flood from the wealth fountains. A second time when the Master of Law set his own clothes alight when using fire to defend himself against pirates Downstairs. Such an obvious lapse severely undermines the credibility of this text. Srin Gold, Commentator Extraordinary.]
[My colleague Srin Gold is forgetting that Varazchavardan was a sorcerer and therefore surely capable of repairing his clothing by magic. Sot Dawbler, School of Commentary.]
[Dawbler should know better than that. No sorcerer ever possessed control of his Powers sufficient to enable him to undertake an operation as delicate as tailoring. The Originator of the Text must have been mistaken. Jan Borgentasko Ronkowski, Fact Checker Superior.]
[No. The Originator appears to have relied heavily on Shabble’s recall, which we have reason to believe to be perfect. Therefore we should not suspect error in an account of a scene so well witnessed. The logical inference is that Varazchavardan, who is elsewhere stated to be very rich, had a number of robes made up to the same pattern and identically adorned. Oris Baumgage, Fact Checker Minor.] [This is very plausible. Nevertheless, it is entirely inappropriate for a fact checker minor such as Baumgage to be making ‘logical inferences’. He demonstrates pretensions totally unfitting to his lowly station in life. Worse, he has shamelessly contradicted his superior, the eminent Ronkowski. Five lashes! Jonquiri 0, Disciplinarian Superior.] Despite the lightness of his silken robes, Varazchavardan was sweating heavily, outpouring salted water to join the sungrease which glistened on his albinoid skin, protecting it from the burning rays of the sky’s major luminary. Perhaps it was partly fear which made him sweat so much, even though the weight of numbers was on his side.
Yes, Varazchavardan had not come alone. In consort with the Master of Law there were a full two dozen wonderworkers. Chegory recognised some of them as survivors from the drunken party which had earlier raged in the Cabal House. There, for instance, was Nixorjapretzel Rat, once Varazchavardan’s apprentice but now a fully fledged sorcerer in his own right.
The two groups confronted each other.
Varazchavardan and his allies were not quite prepared to make the first move. After all, they could see the Empress Justina was on her feet. Was she still possessed by the demon Binchinminfin? If so, then she might have power enough to destroy anyone who sought her death.
In the opposing camp, Pelagius Zozimus and Hostaja Sken-Pitilkin looked at each other. Both knew their powers to be at low ebb. Sken-Pitilkin had been able to accumulate only a little strength since exhausting his resources in trials Downstairs. Zozimus, who had far superior abilities as a wizard, had built up much more strength in the same time — but had expended all of it in the recent exorcism.
The pair of them could not outfight two dozen wonderworkers.
‘Bluff,’ said Sken-Pitilkin in the High Speech of wizards.
Til do my best,’ said Zozimus. Then switched to Janjuladoola to say, in Odolo’s voice: ‘Varazchavardan! Hear me! I am the demon Binchinminfin! Withdraw! Or your doom will befall you!’
At this point Shabble, who had fled to the heavens above, floated down to join Chegory. Shabble was truly fearful, yet the childlike one could not bear not to know what was going on.
‘What’s happening, Chegory dearest?’ said the free-floating luminous orb.
‘We’re about to be killed,’ said Chegory in a soft but urgent voice. ‘Burn them, Shabble! Burn them, burn them up! The wonderworkers! Fry them alive!’
‘Oh, I can’t do that!’ said Shabble.
‘Then — then get the Hermit Crab! Now! Now! As you love me, go. Go, or I’m dead — and Olivia with me.’
Shabble went.
Zozimus was still speaking, threatening Varazchavardan with doom unspeakable unless the Master of Law withdrew in peace from the island of Jod. The young and inexperienced Rat grew notably nervous as Zozimus enlarged on this theme. But the albino stood his ground.
‘Threats great oft bespeak performance minor,’ said Varazchavardan when Zozimus was finished. ‘I think you’re bluffing. I don’t think you’re the demon at all. I’d be dead already if you were.’
‘You hear my voice,’ said Zozimus in Odolo’s tones.
‘So you can imitate a conjuror’s voice,’ said Varazchavardan coldly. ‘What else? Do you juggle oranges as