Robert Asprin - Tales From The Vulgar Unicorn

They paddled even faster, though it had not seemed possible until then. And then the prow of the boat bumped into the wall. 'Swim for it!' Smhee bellowed, his voice rebounding from the far walls and high ceilings of the cave.

Masha feared entering the water; she expected to be seized by those huge claws. But she went over, the boat tipping, and dived.

Something did touch her leg as she went under the stone down-cropping. Then her head was above the surface of the pool and Smhee's was beside her.

They scrambled out onto the hard stone. Behind them came the clacking, but none of the crabs tried to leave the pool.

The sky was black; thunder bellowed in the north; lightning traced white veins. A wind blew, chilling them in their wet clothes.

They ran towards the dugout but not in a straight line since they had to avoid the bushes with the poisonous thorns. Before they reached it, rain fell. They dragged the craft into the river and got aboard. Above them lightning cracked across the sky. Another bolt struck shortly thereafter, revealing two bears and a number of men behind them.

'They can't catch us now!' Smhee yelled. 'But they'll be going back to put their horses on rafts. They'll go all the way into Sanctuary itself to get us!'

Save your breath, Masha thought. I know all that.

The wind-struck river was rough now, but they got through the waves to the opposite shore. They climbed panting up the ridge and found their horses, whinnying from fear of the lightning. When they got to the bottom of the ridge, they sped away, their passage fitfully lit by the dreadful whiteness that seemed to smash all around them. They kept their horses at a gallop for a mile, then eased them up.

'There's no way they can catch us!' Smhee shouted through the thunder. 'We've got too much of a head-start!'

Dawn came. The rain stopped. The clouds cleared away; the hot winter sun of the desert rose. They stopped at the hut where they had slept, and the horses rested, and they ate bread and cheese.

'Three more hours will bring us within sight of Sanctuary,' the fat man said. 'We'll get your family aboard the Sailfish, and the Raggah can search for us in vain.'

He paused, then said, 'What do you intend to do about Eevroen?'

'Nothing,' she said. 'If he gets in my way I'll brain him again.'

He laughed so much he choked on his bread. When he'd cleared his throat, he said, 'You are some woman! Brave as the goddess makes them! And supple in mind, too! If I were not vowed to chastity, I would woo you! I may be forty-five and fat, but...'

He stopped to stare down at his hand. His face froze into an expression of horror.

Masha became equally paralysed.

A small purple spider was on Smhee's hand.

'Move slowly,' he said softly through rigid lips. 'I dare not move. Slap it when you've got your hand within a few inches of it.'

She got up and took a step towards him. Where had the creature come from? There were no webs in the hut. Had it come from outside and crawled upon him?

She took another step, leaned over, and brought her hand slowly down at an angle towards the thing. Its eyes were black and motionless, seemingly unaware of her presence.

Maybe it's not poisonous, she thought.

Suddenly, Smhee screamed, and he crushed the spider with his other hand. He leaped up then, brushing off the tiny body.

'It bit me! It bit me!'

The dark swelling had started.

'It's not one of the mage's creatures,' she said. 'Its venom may not be deadly.'

'It's the mage's,' he said. His face was white under the heavy pigment.

'It must have crawled into my bag. It couldn't have done it when we were on the way to the mage's rooms. It must have got in when I opened the bag to skin off the tattoo.'

He howled. 'The mage has got his revenge!'

'You don't know that,' she said, but she was certain that it was as Smhee had said. She removed her small belt-bag and carefully poured out the jewels. But that was all it contained.

'It's beginning to hurt,' Smhee said. 'I can make it back to the city. Benna did, and he was bitten many times. But I know these spiders. I will die as surely as he did, though I will take longer.

There is no antidote.'

He sat down, and for a while he rocked back and forth, eyes closed, moaning. Then he said, 'Masha, there is no sense in my going on with you. But, since I have made it possible for you to be as wealthy as a queen, I beg you to do one favour for me. If it is not too much to ask.'

'What is that?' she said.

'Take the jar containing the tattooed skin to Sharranpip. And there tell our story to the highest priest of Weda Krizhtawn. He will pray for me to her, and a great tombstone will be erected for me in the courtyard of the peacocks, and pilgrims will come from all over Sharranpip and the islands around and will pray for me. But if you don't want...'

Masha knelt and kissed him on the mouth. He felt cold.

She stood up and said, 'I promise you that I will do that. That, as you said, is the least I can do.'

He smiled, though it cost him to do it.

'Good. Then I can die in peace. Go. May Weda Krizhtawn bless you.'

'But the Raggah ... they will torture you!'

'No. This bag contains a small vial of poison. They will find only a corpse. If they find me at all.'

Masha burst into tears, but she took the jar, and after kissing Smhee again, she rode off, his horse trotting behind hers. At the top of the hill she stopped to look behind at the hut. Far off, coming swiftly, was a dark mass. The Raggah. She turned away and urged her horse into a gallop.

'By Savankala and the Son!' Regli swore, 'why can't she bear and be done with it? And why does she demand to see her brother but won't see me?' The young lord's sweat-stained tunic looked as if it had been slept in. Indeed, Regli would have slept in it if he had slept any during the two days he had paced outside the bedroom, now couching room, of his wife. Regli's hands repeatedly flexed the shank of his riding crop. There were those - and not all of them women - who would have said that agitation heightened - Regli's already notably good looks, but he had no mind for such nonsense now. Not with his heir at risk!

'Now, now,' said Doctor Mernorad, patting the silver-worked lapels of his robe. The older man prided himself as much on his ability to see both sides of a question as he did on his skill at physic - though neither ability seemed much valued today in Regli's townhouse. 'One can't hurry the gods, you know. The child will be born when Sabellia says it should be. Any attempt to hasten matters would be sacrilege as well as foolishness. Why, you know there are some... I don't know what word to use, practitioners, who use forceps in a delivery? Forceps of metal! It's disgusting. I tell you. Prince Kadakithis makes a great noise about smugglers and thieves; but if he wanted to clean up a real evil in Sanctuary, he'd start with the so-called doctors who don't have proper connections with established temples.'

'Well, damn it,' Regli snapped, 'you've got a "proper connection" to the Temple of Sabellia in Ranke itself, and you can't tell me why my wife's been two days in labour. And if any of those bitch-midwives who've stood shift in there know' - he gestured towards the closed door - 'they sure aren't telling anybody.' Regli knuckled the fringe of blond whiskers sprouting on his jawbone. His wealth and breeding had made him a person of some importance even in Ranke. Here in Sanctuary, where he served as Master of the Scrolls for the royal governor, he was even less accustomed to being balked. The fact that Fate, in the form of his wife's abnormally-prolonged labour, was balking him infuriated Regli to the point that he needed to lash out at something. 'I can't imagine why Samlane insists on seeing no one but midwives from the Temple of Heqt,' he continued, snapping his riding crop at specks on the mosaic walls. 'That place has no very good reputation, I'm told. Not at all.'