Part 14 (1/2)

s.e.m.e.n. And what did this hideous creature want with it anyway?

Light footsteps on the stairs behind him, the little guy running through the doorway, broom apparently discarded. Across the table the beast-thing - the succubus - was shuffling to and fro, uncertain which way to chase Thom, who was also weaving about, trying to confuse his pursuer.

'Don'tlet.i.tgit.i.t!'

Thom paused for just a second. What?'

The agitated pint-size was jumping on the spot - did he seem taller now? About eighteen inches high?

A pint-and-a-half size? - pointing in turn at the beaker and the beast. He suddenly stood perfectly still and his almond-shaped eyes focused directly on Thom's. He seemed to be concentrating hard.

'Don't let the succubus git it,' he said, his voice slowing and dropping several octaves.

Thom shook his head uncomprehendingly. He knew he wasn't dreaming, but surely it wasn't the real world he was living in at this precise moment. Couldn't be. Creatures like these didn't exist in the proper world. Not the one he was used to. But it was happening and he was scared witless. Okay, maybe there was one thing he could do to bring some reality to the situation.

While keeping a wary eye on the bobbing head on the other side of the scarred kitchen table, he reached behind and swiped his hand down against the two light-switches by the front door. The moonlight immediately relinquished its right to the room and the kitchen and small landing next door were flooded with bright clarifying artificial light. Both oddities clapped hands or paws over their eyes as if blinded, the beast grunting and snarling, the little man giving out a sharp shriek of surprise.

If Thom hoped the abundant illumination would improve the situation he was wrong. He remained in a nightmare that wasn't a dream, still in his kitchen confronted by two of

the most peculiar creatures he had ever laid eyes on, one a beast, the other a dwarf. The latter was morelike ... more like a pixie or elf, not quite the same as those you saw in kids' storybooks but, he guessed, the closest thing to one. It was then that it occurred to Thom that his stroke, the impediment of blood to his brain, really had either killed off certain key cells - those dealing with reason maybe - or at least damaged them, made chemical and electrical charges, or whatever, act in a different way. In other words, caused hallucinations. Oh b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l!

Even so, something told him he could only go with it, ride the flow. If he didn't, then his abused mind might tell him this beast could actually harm him and, in believing it, it would be so. Thom fled to the other side of the table as the succubus, still blinking those awful black eyes against the new light, decided which way to give chase.

Stalemate once again. The beast halted before the open front door, while Thom staggered back against the tall bookshelf on the other side of the room. He felt a weight dragging on his leg and, looking down, found the little man clinging to him, his body trembling all over. To see such terror gave Thom no comfort at all.

Breathing heavily, its great shoulders heaving, the brute-beast turned its great head towards the open doorway through which a cooling night breeze blew. For one optimistic moment, Thom thought his pursuer might be making ready to bolt out into the darkness of the forest, its work here frustrated.

He couldn't have been more wrong.

Instead, the creature reached out a great paw and slammed the door shut.

Now Thom truly was trapped and he bitterly regretted not having escaped from the cottage when he had had the chance. So what if he had been hampered in the woods, tripped by a fallen branch, entangled in shrubbery, knocked out by a tree he had not seen coming - at least he would

have stood some kind of chance. Now this. Shut inside his own kitchen with a gibbering sub-midget hugging his leg like a dog in heat At the thought, he glanced down. Was he mistaken, or had his hopeless champion grown shorter again? He - it, whatever - was less than a foot high. Thom almost accepted the previous notion: he was going mad. That didn't mean he wasn't just as terrified though.

He had to get out. But the monster was guarding the door. Get up to the roof, try and hold the door shut when he was outside? No chance. The beast, as small and hunched as it was, was far too powerful to hold off - all muscle, sinew and mammoth shoulders - and the roof door opened inwards anyway.

Besides, the door to the staircase was next to the front door, so the beast had them both covered. The windows? Closed. By the time he'd managed to get one open -z/they still opened after all these years of disuse - he'd be caught. And to limit his options further, his attacker was lumbering towards the kitchen table, paws, or b.l.o.o.d.y claws, reaching out to push it across the room and trap him in a corner.

Thom looked around wildly. Oh s.h.i.+t.

Okay. Keep calm. A window was his only choice and he was going through one, open or not. He only hoped the old wooden frames were weak.

Its legs made a sc.r.a.ping-grinding noise against the stone floor as the heavy table came closer and Thom made ready to climb on to it, use its surface as a launching pad for his leap through the nearest window.

But the little man was tugging at his leg. 'Thebookthebookthebook!'

It sounded like a squealing of,'dabukdabukdabuk !' but this time he understood what his terrified companion was shouting. Unfortunately, he had no idea what he actually meant.

'What book?' Thom yelled back.

The midget - had he grown taller once more? - was

pointing at the top shelf of the bookcase behind them. Again he forced himself to speak more slowly so that Thom understood his words more easily. 'Get the book!'

Meanwhile, the big table was less then two feet away, its weight alone preventing it sliding across the floor to smash into Thom's legs. He barely had time to look at the row of books on the highest shelf, then back down at the little man's anxious face.

'Pickmeup! Pick-me-up!' Only a little slower, now, but coherent.

Still grasping the beaker in one hand, Thom scooped him up by the back of his coat and with his free hand held him against the top shelf. The little man weighed less than a one-year-old child, so holding him there required hardly any effort.

Thom gasped with pain as the edge of the table slammed into his lower right thigh and he fell across its top. The bowl of fruit, condiments, a table mat, a couple of magazines he had brought up from London with him, an empty coffee cup with spoon still inside - all the things he had not bothered to clear away earlier - came sliding towards him, some of them falling to the floor, the mug smas.h.i.+ng. Hurt, eyes momentarily closed, he heard the beast's low-growling snarl. He looked up to see that it had jumped up on to the table, only the bowl, which had lost its top fruit, between them. Almost eyeball to eyeball, they stared at one another.

He could easily have been mistaken, so lackl.u.s.tre were the black eyes of the beast, but Thom thought he saw a look of gloating triumph on the other's brutish face. The gaping mouth with its scores of jagged teeth seemed to be grinning at him.

Thom wanted nothing more than to close his eyes against the leering vision, perhaps even offer up the beaker with what was left of its contents, let the monster have his s.e.m.e.n, even say, 'cheers', as it drank - if that's what it wanted to do.

He had no strength left, he wanted to rest, sleep, escape the nightmare. But no, f.u.c.k it, that wasn't what he was going to do.

Thom drew the beaker into himself, holding it beneath his chest as if it were the elixir of life itself, the plastic container a holy chalice. Which got the succubus really mad.

Squatting on the table, it lifted its great arms like a baboon and screeched and screeched and screeched. So loud was the screeching that Thom felt the thump of the book rather than hearing its sound as it landed on the table next to his shoulder. He turned his head to look at it.

The little man was standing over it. 'Open-the-book,' he said slowly and evenly.

'Uh?' '

'Open-the-book.' Even slower, but it still managed to sound like 'Uppendabuk'.

Fortunately, as exhausted and as terrorized as he felt, Thom was becoming familiar with the strange talk. He reached out and flipped open the book just as the succubus started forward.

It fell open about half-way through and the rus.h.i.+ng beast halted in its tracks. The big black deadpan eyes again took on a faint expression. Thom, who was cowering under the antic.i.p.ated onslaught, could have sworn that the look was one of trepidation.