Piers Anthony - Neq the Sword

"Knock me out!" Neq cried again.

"I can't knock you out for the duration. I'd be substituting brain damage for hand damage. And I'll need your cooperation, because I'll be working without assistants. You have to be conscious. That means a local anesthetic-- and even so, it will hurt a fair amount. Like this."

Neq, sweating acceded. He had not known there could be so much pain remaining in his mutilated limbs. "We'll go to Helicon."

"One other thing," Dick said. "I don't want to exploit your weakness by bartering with you now, not on a matter like this, but I have my own welfare to look out for. Once you have your sword, you won't need me or want me along."

"That's true."

"I'm not strong. I spent weeks, months in that cage. I lost track. I was able to exercise some, and I knew which muscles to concentrate on, but I never was strong for the wilderness life. I'm in no condition to survive by myself. I'd only get captured again, or killed by savages."

"Yes."

"Deliver me to the crazies before you start your mission."

"But that would take months!"

"Steal one of Yod's trucks. You can kill some outlaws in the process. I can drive; I can teach you--even with metal instead of hands. That's worth knowing."

"Yes..." Neq said, realizing that the man had a point. Dick had repaid anything he owed for his freedom by tending to Neq after the amputation and finding food--probably stolen from Yod's tribe at great risk--for otherwise Neq would have died. The operation was a new obligation. So it was a fair bargain.

And Neq could do some damage while taking the truck. Then the tribe would be on guard--pointlessly--while the two made their journey to the crazies.

It was, on balance, worthwhile, Dick had a different entrance to Helicon. It was a stairway under a nomad burial marker, leading into a dank tunnel that in turn led to the main vault. Neq speculated privately that there must be numerous such ports--perhaps one for every underworld inmate of rank. That meant that many more could have escaped the flames and slaughter.

No wonder the defense of the mountain had collapsed so quickly!

They fetched the drugs and instruments. Under the film of ash much of Helicon was untouched. Had the under-worlders had any spunk they could have restored it to a considerable extent. Nomads would have.

Neq could not do much, but he could carry. Dick fixed a pack for him and he hauled everything they needed to the nearby hostel and set up for the operation.

* * *

Time passed.

When Neq emerged from the intermittent haze of drugs and pain, his right arm terminated in a fixed full-length sword. His left had dull pincers that he could open and close with some discomfort by flexing wrong-seeming muscles.

The first time he tried to practice with the sword, the pain was prohibitive. But as his flesh healed around the metal and callus and scar-tissue formed, that problem eased. Eventually he was able to strike quite hefty blows without wincing.

His swordsmanship was hardly clever. Deprived of a real wrist, he had to maneuver mainly from shoulder and elbow. But he had power, for there was nothing to break or loosen. Skill would come with practice, for his mind had all the talent it had ever possessed.

He had to work with the pincers, too, flexing them each day, gaining proficiency. They were actually quite mobile when under proper control, and would lock onto an object or a knob like pliers, enabling him to pick up and squeeze without destroying. They, too, had great power.

Neq and Dick returned to Yod's territory to stalk a truck. There was a guard: Neq cut him down with an axe-motion swing of his sword, almost severing the man's head from his body. One more down....

"Find a good one," he told the surgeon. "Load plenty of fuel. I'll watch for intruders."

"OK," Dick said, relieved. Neq knew the man did not like the killing, much as he hated the men who had tortured him. With Dick, hate was general, not subject to specific implementation; with Neq it was otherwise.

When he was alone, Neq hauled the body about with his clumsy pincers. He wanted to sever the penis that had violated Neqa, but he realized this would be meaningless. What he needed was a true token of his vengeance. That every man of the tribe would comprehend.

He struck down with his sword-arm, chopping at the gory neck. He struck again, and the head came loose.

He left it on the ground for a moment and walked to a sapling. He cut it down with one sweep, then caught the shaft in his pincers and held it for stripping. Finally he carved crude points on each end of the pole.

He returned to the loose head. He braced one foot on it and jammed with the pole. After several attempts he got the point wedged firmly inside the neck. He lifted the head, bracing the pole with both pincers and sword, and tried to set it upright in the ground.

It wouldn't go. Angry, and aware that he was wasting time dangerously, he jammed his sword down, making a cavity in the soil. He dropped the end of the pole in this and twisted it firm. It stood crookedly, but well enough.

Neq's monument was complete: the staring, dirt-smirched head of one of the men who had raped his wife. Mounted on a pole.

He had killed one of the men in the act, with the dagger, so this was the second. Of the forty-nine he had counted... Forty-seven to go.

If the tribe heard the truck take off, it was too late. No pursuit developed. If only they had been this lax before, Neq thought bitterly, he and Neqa would never have been caught....

Dick had done well. Not only was there spare gasoline, there were blankets and tools and food. Apparently Yod used the trucks for supply storage, and had kept them in running condition. That was good management, for few nomads had knowledge of trucks.

The journey back was routine. There were roadblocks, but none by a major tribe, and Neq had little trouble discouraging them. In fact it was excellent practice for his stiff arm and sword.

He learned to drive, passing his sword through the wheel and using it to steer. His left extremity and his feet did the rest of the handling.

He delivered Dick to Dr. Jones, and trusted the under-worlder to make the report Neqa had intended. Had his luck reversed all the way, this would have been the original truck, with her notes in the dash--but it was not. At least Dick himself had been there at Helicon for virtually all of it, so the report would be complete.

Then he turned back, driving the truck alone. His mission awaited him. Forty-seven lives....

Vengeance.

CHAPTER NINE

Yod's camp was on guard day and night. It had been alert the whole time Neq had been absent. Ever since that first spiked head.

Good. He wanted them to suffer, just as they had wanted him to suffer. They had succeeded in torturing him... and now he would repay them in equal measure. He wanted every man to remember what the tribe had done, that day Neqa died, and to know that the time of reckoning was at hand. To know that every man of Yod's tribe would be staring on a pike.

First he took the guards--one each night, until they began to march double, and after that two each night. When they marched in fours he desisted; that was too chancy. He didn't care about himself, but he didn't want to die or become further incapacitated before he had completed his vengeance.

He avoided the foursomes and moved instead into the camp, killing a warrior in his sleep and taking the head. After that there were men on guard everywhere--one sleeping, one busy with chores, the third watching. The tribe was down to forty, and it was terrified.

Neq made no killings for a week, letting them wear themselves out with the harsh vigil. Then, when they relaxed, he struck again, twice. That brought them alert again.

They had to take the offensive. They swept the forest for him, trying to rid themselves of this stalking horror. He killed two more and left their heads for their fellow-searchers to find.