Jack Chalker - Horrors of the Dancing Gods

Irving was still trying to figure out what to do. He couldn't bring himself to kill his father no matter what, but he didn't want his father, under some weird enchantment, to kill him, either.

Marge had no solutions for him, but she couldn't figure out the scene as she saw it. "Little Miss Alvi over there was half-human and mortal. She should have been able to get the McGuinn. Why stop her?"

"Maybe they act first and think later," Irving suggested. "Some do, but not here. L -look! It's Larae! Up there!"

Irving frowned, then saw the girl's figure slowly emerge and make its way carefully over on very slender finger-thin ledges and handholds toward the back of the McGuffin's shrine.

As she emerged, Poquah stepped out of the forest and into plain view about halfway between the Tree and the altar area and out of reach of either guardian by at least a small amount, or so he hoped.

Up until then neither of the two planted ones had moved so much as a muscle, imitating the trees around them, but now, suddenly, the eyes opened and they began to seem very animated.

Marge reached out to restrain Irving, but it was too late. The boy drew his sword and stepped out of the other side, just opposite Poquah and perhaps just out of range of Joe.

"Dad!" he shouted. "It's me, Irving! If there's any of you left in there, don't try and harm me!"

The nymph's face contorted as if in agony, and finally she managed, "Irving? No! Back! I — can — not — stop my — self. Go! Get — way!"

Irving felt tears of pity come to his eyes and also tears of conviction. "I cannot, will not believe that you can harm me!"

"Believe it!" Poquah called to him. "Do you think he can control it? Someone else programmed the body! Someone who doesn't give one damn about you!"

Larae had reached a small, crooked bush growing out of the side of the rock and had locked her legs around it. Irving tried not to watch what was going on but knew full well that the bush and its branches wouldn't have supported his weight as they did hers, nor was he in the kind of shape to hang and dangle like that.

Had it been directly over the enclosure with the idol, there would have been little trouble at that point, but it was slightly off, forcing her to swing on her legs like a gymnast. She had the base of the sling in her right hand and, using it, was trying to encircle the neck of die birdlike statue on every pass.

"Go!" Joe shouted insistently. "Run! No hope! No hope! Bo — Bo—"

Larae latched onto McGuffin just as Joe began to speak, and, twisting the handle deftly with her wrist, she pulled up and away and it came loose!

Joe and Alvi could not help but hear it when it happened, hitting against the side of the rock a couple of times, and both immediately turned and began slashing.

"Make the wish!" Poquah shouted to her. "In the name of all that's holy, make the wish now!"

But Larae didn't speak, not immediately, gathering up the unexpectedly heavy statue in her hands, swinging one more time, then doing a nearly classical dismount off to one side. A sword from Alvi's top hand came so close, there was a tiny scratch and some blood beaded up on her leg, but she had it, and, grinning broadly and knowing she was out of range, she got to her feet and held it up, totally forgetting that now was more dangerous a time than before.

"Larae! Make the wish!" Irving screamed at the top of his lungs, and she suddenly realized her error and started to speak—

A figure leapt out of the trees nearby and brought her crashing to the ground, the statue falling from her grasp and rolling slightly onto the forest floor. The newcomer rushed for it, picked it up, then stood back against a tree, a look of beatific insanity on its face.

"I wish I was the god of this whole world and all living things within it!" Joel Thebes shouted. "Bow down and prostrate yourself before me —now!"

For a moment the entire world seemed to pause, then Marge stepped out behind Irving. "I don't feel like bowing down to him," she noted, as much puzzled as relieved. "Do you?"

"Not a bit."

Thebes gaped, his face changing from a look of godlike power to the sort of horror no one should ever have glimpsed. He looked at the statue in his arms, turned it around, studied it as if it were some new species of creature, and finally read off something stamped on the roughhewn base.

"USA. 1941!" he read in total disbelief. "No! It can't be! USA! 1941! It can't be! It's not only a fake, it's the fake!" And with that he screamed with such terror that it echoed throughout the valley and caused even those who could not remember such things to pause and shudder for just a moment.

Irving ran to Thebes, barely paying him any attention, and helped a shaking Larae to her feet. "I am all right," she assured him. "I just feel very stupid."

Thebes sank down, staring vacantly at the black bird idol and the inscription and otherwise not moving at all.

"Don't worry about it," Irving sighed. "We've lost. I don't see how it's possible with everybody assuring us that the McGuffin wasn't gotten, but it was. It's a phony. A fake. Your wish wouldn't have done a damned thing."

A strange, eerie, yet commanding voice, an inhuman voice, said, "I assure you that it is as much a surprise to me as it is to everyone else here. And in this case, at least, as much of a relief. I certainly didn't go through all that I have endured to bow down ultimately to that!"

The troll-like soldiers appeared from all points of the forest, swords and bows at the ready. They were not particularly menacing, but they made it very clear that there was no escape. It was also clear that the one thing they feared and no other was the entity who spoke to them all now and who was in every sense their master.

It was a large creature, perhaps three meters high and in perfect proportion for its size. It had a hideous demonic face, blazing red eyes, and dark sickly purple skin that seemed somewhat reptilian. The mouth was permanently twisted into an insane smile that barely disguised the rows of sharp teeth within, and from its head grew two huge, grotesquely curled, and oversized ram's horns. From the waist it was covered with dense purple hair that made it almost seem as if it were wearing bizarre pants, down to thick legs that ended in granite hooves. It was a satyrlike creature but one from a nymph's nightmares. The arms and hands were huge and powerful and ended in razor-sharp claws a good seventy-five millimeters long. But what struck Marge was the genitalia, which were overly large even in proportion to the gigantic body.

"Where did you come from?" Marge asked him.

"You would not believe," the creature responded. "However, in the immediate term I have been not very far from right here. You have no idea of my power, but you will. Not even I ever dreamed of such power, and it is only the beginning. You may try your wiles on me all you like, Succubus, but you should be aware that I am not like other creatures in this world and I will drain any energy I deem irritating. Don't worry, though. I have plans for you — for all of you. That's what all this has been about. I left the McGuffin right there, where it was, and ordered that none be allowed to approach it, since I knew that if anyone did take it, you wouldn't come. And you had to come. It isn't perfect justice without you all."

"Justice? What in hell are you?" Marge screamed at him. "Who are you to speak of justice?"

The entity shrugged. "Revenge, then. Justice for one is always revenge for another, in any event, is it not?" The sinister eyes went over them all.

"Ah! Poquah! I had so hoped you would be along. It would not be complete without you," the creature said. "And you, little Irving, all grown up! And Marge — shorn of all that diabetic-inducing happy fairy nonsense and more gorgeous than ever. And a bonus!" He looked at Larae. "My heavens! That is a creative job there! I didn't know there was that much creativity left in all of Hell! There certainly wasn't when I was dealing with them. Why, such a combination might well be quite amusing. Makes cross-dressing seem rather passé, doesn't it? Perhaps we'll make you a true matched set. Give Irving here a groin more like the one Marge has. Like father, like son, eh?"