unburning pit – for it was full of squelched ashes. Amidst those ashes, Guest saw a ribcage, a cracked skull and a thighbone. Turning his face from these grim tokens of piety, he looked up – and realized that the southern face of the great rock Achaptipop was covered with crawling figures. Like so many spiders, dozens of penitents were scaling the face of the cliff, as they always do when the city of Obooloo has suffered some great misfortune.
Those human spiders were climbing without ropes, and, even as Guest watched, one slipped and fell. In utter silence. Guest listened, but heard no scream, no sound of impact – nothing but the unending wail of ten thousand mourners and the hoarse gutturals of a distant shout which might have been entirely unrelated to the fallen climber.
'Come,' said the Witchlord, leading the way into the tunnel which exited from the courtyard's eastern side. Guest followed, splashing through rank puddles of his own urine, which further soaked the ruinous wads of his straw sandals.
In such manner, Guest ventured the fumbling darkness till he saw ahead the green glow of the demon Ungular Scarth.
Witchlord and Weaponmaster found that the octagonal chamber which housed the demon was still graced with a metal grille which allowed one to walk across the pool of liquid filth which dominated that room.
When that pool had been temporarily drained so a ring of ever-ice could be recovered from the floor of the chamber, a small portion of the metal grille had been removed to admit a man, but this portion had been replaced, and the once-drained pool had been flooded again. It occurred to Guest that maybe Anaconda Stogirov, the notorious High Priestess of the Temple of Blood, had arranged for the chamber to be flooded with liquid filth as a way of demeaning the untouchable demon which dominated the room with its green icelight.
'Greetings,' said Guest Gulkan.
'And to you, greetings,' said Ungular Scarth. 'I see you have the knife. Is it Anaconda's knife, or did you take it from the Mutilator?'
'I took it from the Mutilator,' said Guest.
'And you have the cornucopia,' said Scarth, speaking to the Witchlord. 'So! That explains the misfortune which has beset Obooloo!'
'One would have thought you would have guessed that much already,' said Lord Onosh.
'I should have,' admitted Scarth. 'But I am as other people are. When legend speaks of the cornucopia, it speaks of the generation of silver, of gold, of wealth beyond imagining. It says nothing of pissing.'
'That is the difference between legend and life,' said Guest.
'Yes,' said the demon. 'And there is a further difference.
The people of legend have more sense than the people of life. Why are you wearing those gutter-tread sandals when your father has boots?'
'Am I to kill my father for his boots?' said Guest.
'It may well be that you will end by killing your father,' said Scarth, 'but I was not talking of murder. The cornucopia, man! If the boots are folded, they will fit!'
Then Guest felt properly foolish, for he knew his father's feet to be a match for his own.
'Never mind that,' said Guest, unbuckling the sheath which held the Mutilator's hooked knife. 'We'll see about boots later.'
With that, Guest Gulkan withdrew the Mutilator's blade from its sheath.
And wondered.
How had the demon Ungular Scarth detected the presence of that weapon when it had been hidden from sight inside the buckle-down sheath? Maybe… maybe by logic alone. For, after all, Guest would not have ventured idly into the Temple of Blood. His presence in that Temple implied that he had secured resource sufficient for the liberation of the Great God.
With knife in hand, Guest Gulkan advanced upon the Great God Jocasta, who hung silent and unchanging in the air. While Guest advanced, his father hung well back, taking care to keep well out of reach of the demon Ungular Scarth. For Lord Onosh did not trust the demon further than he could throw it.
While Lord Onosh had profound reservations about the demon and the Great God it served, Guest Gulkan had none such. He smiled upon the Great God, which presented the same aspect to the world as it had done when Guest had seen it first. It was a doughnut the size of a man's head, floating in the air within two shells of light – a dull red inner shell of its own production, and a sharp- burning outer shell of blue which constituted its imprisonment.
'Hail, Jocasta,' said Guest, with due formality.
The Great God made no reply, and the demon Ungular Scarth did not speak on its behalf.
Then Guest applied the blue-green bead at the end of the Mutilator's hooked knife to the surface of the blue- burning shell which imprisoned the Great God.
As the knife touched the force field, it began to vibrate, setting Guest's teeth on edge. He had expected the knife to slice apart the transparent shell, but instead it twisted wickedly and skidded across the surface.
'More strength!' said Scarth.
'More!' said Guest. 'I am using strength enough to open a coconut!'
'More,' affirmed Scarth. 'Use your muscle!'
Then Guest gritted his teeth and applied his full strength to the task. His hands, his arms, his entire body shook with vibratory energy. A thin line of white fire appeared, and widened to a slit.
'I've done it!' said Guest.
And withdrew the knife.
The slit promptly healed itself.
'The force field is self-sustaining,' said Ungular Scarth.
'Self-sustaining, self-healing.'
'Now you tell me!' said Guest.
'Try again,' said the demon.
'Again!' said Guest, who was sweating heavily, and who could feel his forearms shaking with the effort of his exertions.
'Are you a weakling?' sneered the demon.
'Am I weak?' said Guest, with an ill temper. 'Well, yes, I am, because I have suffered in the dungeons of the Mutilator, and suffered in the Stench Caves, and suffered from bedless wandering since, and I am in no mood to be trifled with!'
'I do not call the liberation of gods a matter of trifling,' said Scarth, softly. 'Look! The Great God is ready!'
At which Guest saw that the red glow of the Great God's selfprotective force field was dying away. Where there had been two spheres of light, now only one remained: the outer sphere of imprisoning blue. Guest realized that the Great God was preparing to exit, was preparing to escape.
'Your strength, now,' said Ungular Scarth. 'Use your strength, and liberate a god!'
Thus encouraged, Guest scraped the ruinous mess of his straw sandals from his feet, and braced his bare feet against the rigidity of the metal grille. Then, with all the brutality at his command, Guest hacked a great slice through the blue-burning skin of the force field. Before the slit could heal, the Great God pushed its way to liberty, birthing itself with a sound like a breaking harpstring.
'Ha!' said Guest, his face alight with a grin of triumph.
'So! You are free! Well, here I am!'
There he was, indeed, and the Great God Jocasta was duly conscious of the fact. Liquid fire ran through Guest Gulkan's veins. Images swirled through his head in a dementing turmoil. He felt dizzy, and almost dropped the knife he was holding. A hand which was not his own forced that knife to the challenge, but the hand was his own, his own hand but not his own to control, and his head was turning, his body was turning, he was turning on his father, the knife was poised to kill -
Then Guest found tongue enough to cry and yelled:
'Run!'
Lord Onosh took the hint, and fled.
Then Guest Gulkan, hopelessly possessed by the Great God Jocasta, was puppeted into the pursuit of his father.
With his son in hot pursuit, Lord Onosh raced into the central courtyard, slipped in a puddle of urine and went
