Flesh

  Stagg shook with rage. He said, “We haven’t reached Caseyland yet!”

  Noon came. Stagg ate much more than his normal allowance. Mary said nothing about it, but she kept eyeing him. Every time he came near, she flinched. They repacked the bag and resumed walking. Stagg obviously was beginning to feel the benefit of food. The fleshy upper part of the antler began to swell and to stand stiff. His eyes sparkled, and he gave little leaps into the air, grunting with suppressed joy.

  Mary began to lag behind. He was so affected by the approaching rush of desire that he did not notice. When she was about twenty yards behind him, she ran off into the bushes. He walked another twenty yards before he turned around and saw that she was gone. Then he roared and darted after her into the woods, losing all sense of caution and shouting her name.

  He found her trail in a bed of crushed weeds, followed it to a small, almost dry creek bed, crossed the creek, and entered a grove of oaks. There he lost the trail. Emerging on the other side, he faced a broad meadow.

  He also faced a dozen or more swords, behind every uplifted point of which was the grim face of a Caseylander.

  Beyond them he saw a girl of about twenty.

  This girl wore a costume such as Mary had worn when he first saw her in the cage. She was a mascot. The men were dressed in the red-soxed uniform of a Caseylander champion baseball team. There was one incongruous item among their clothes. Instead of long-billed caps, they wore feather-plumed hats, like an admiral’s headgear.

  Beyond them stood deer, nineteen for the first team and substitutes, one for the mascot, four to carry food and equipment.

  The leader of the Caseys, titled “Mighty” as all the Casey captains were, was a tall rangy man with a long lean face, one cheek of which was swelled with a quid of tobacco. He grinned savagely at Stagg. “So, Old Horney! You expected to find soft curved young flesh? And instead you find the hard biting edge of a sword. Disappointed, monster? Don’t be. We’ll give you the embrace of a woman—only her arms are thin and bony and her breasts are flabby and wrinkled, and her breath stinks of the open grave.”

  “Don’t be so damned melodramatic, Mighty,” growled one of the men. “Let’s hang him and get it over with. We’ve a game to play in Poughkeepsie.”

  Stagg understood then what they were doing there. It was no war party but a ball club that had been invited to compete in Deecee. As such, they would have a safe-conduct pass guaranteeing them against being ambushed.

  Furthermore, the guarantee involved the promise not to hurt any Deecee they might encounter in the wasteland.

  “Let’s not talk of hanging,” he said to Mighty. “According to the rules, you’re not to harm a Deecee unless he attacks you.”

  “That’s true,” Mighty said. “But it just so happens that we’ve heard of you through our spies. You’re not a native of Deecee; therefore our promise doesn’t hold for you.”

  “Then why hang me?” Stagg said. “If I’m not a Deecee, I’m also not your enemy. Tell me, didn’t you see a woman running ahead of me? Her name’s Mary Casey. She’ll tell you I should be treated as a friend!”

  “A likely story,” said the man who had urged hanging Stagg. “You’re one of those devil-possessed horned men! That’s enough for us.”

  “Shut up, Lonzo!” Mighty said. “I’m captain here.”

  He spoke to Stagg. “I wish now I’d had you cut down before you could open your mouth. Then you’d be no problem. But I would like to hear about this Mary Casey.” Suddenly he said, “What’s her middle name?”

  “I-Am-Bound-For-Paradise.”

  “Yes, that’s my cousin’s name. But I guess your knowing it doesn’t prove anything. She was hauled along with you on the Great Route. We have a good spy system, and we know you and she disappeared after the fairy-boys made a raid on Vassar. But the witches substituted another Horned King and then sent secret war parties out looking for you.”

  “Mary is somewhere nearby in these woods,” Stagg said. “Find her, and she’ll verify that I was helping her escape to your country.”

  “And what were you doing separated?” Mighty said, suspiciously. “Why were you running?”

  Stagg was silent. Mighty said, “I thought so. One look at you would tell anybody why you were chasing her. I’ll tell you what, Horned King. I’m going to give you a break. Ordinarily, I’d roast you over a low fire first, then rip out your eyes and stuff them down your throat. But we’ve the game to make and no time to waste, so I’m going to give you a quick death. Tie his hands, boys, and string him up!”

  A rope was thrown over the branch of an oak and a noose put around his neck. Two men seized his arms, while a third prepared to tie them. He did not resist, though he could easily have tossed the two aside.

  He said, “Wait! I challenge you to a game according to the rules of One against Five, and I call God to witness that I have challenged you!”

  “What?” Mighty said, incredulously. “Columbus’ sake, man, we’re late now! Besides, why should we accept the challenge? We don’t know if you’re our equal. We’re all diradah, you know, and a challenge from a shet hed is not acceptable. In fact, come to think of it, it’s unthinkable.”

  “I am not a shet hed,” Stagg said, also using the term for a peasant. “Have you ever heard of a Sunhero being chosen from any but the ranks of the aristocrats?”

  “That’s right,” Mighty said. He scratched his head. “Well, it can’t be helped. Let him loose, boys. Maybe the game won’t take long.”

  There was not even a flicker of thought in his mind to ignore Stagg’s challenge and hang him. He had a code of honor, and he would not think of breaking it. Especially since Stagg had called on the name of his deity.

  The Caseys who were to play on the first five removed their plumed admiral’s hats and put on long-billed caps. They took their equipment from the bags on the sides of their deer and began laying out a diamond on the nearby meadow. From a leather bag they poured out a heavy white powder to mark the lanes from plate to plate and from each plate to the pitcher’s box. They drew a narrow square around each plate, since in the rules of One against Five, Stagg might have to bat from any one of the bases during the course of the game. They drew a somewhat larger box for the pitcher.

  “Is it okay if our mascot is the ump?” Mighty asked. “She will swear before the Father, Mother, and the Son that she will not favor us over you. If she isn’t fair, lightning will strike her down. Worse, she’ll become sterile.”

  “There’s not much choice,” Stagg said, hefting the brass-bound bat they’d given him. “I’m ready when you are.”

  His desire for women was gone now, sublimated in an eagerness to spill the blood of these men.

  The mascot, wearing a barred iron mask and a heavily padded uniform, waddled up to her place behind the catcher.

  “Batter up!”

  Stagg waited for the Mighty’s pitch. The Mighty stood only thirty-nine meters away from him, holding the hard leather ball with the four sharp steel spikes. He eyed Stagg, then wound up and let fly.

  The ball sped like a cannon shot straight toward Stagg’s head. It came so fast and so true that it was doubtful if a man of normal reflexes could have avoided it. Stagg, however, bent his knees. The ball skimmed an inch over his head.

  “Ball one!” the mascot cried in a high, clear voice.

  The catcher made no effort to catch the ball. In this game his duty was to chase after the ball and return it to the pitcher. Of course, he also guarded home plate and would try to catch the ball in his immense padded glove if Stagg ever tried to slide into home.

  Mighty Casey wound up again and aimed this time for Stagg’s midriff.

  Stagg swung. The bat connected with a dull sound that contrasted strangely with the sharp crack he had automatically expected.

  The ball bounced off to Stagg’s left and rolled out of the diamond, crossing the foul line.

  “Strike one!”

  The catcher returned the ball. Mighty Cas
ey feinted winding up, then threw it suddenly in one smooth motion.

  Stagg was almost caught. He had no time to swing, just barely enough time to stick the bat out. The ball struck the side and clung for a second, one of its spikes embedded in the brass.

  Stagg ran for first, clinging to his bat as the rules said he could do if the ball stuck to it. Mighty Casey ran after him, hoping the ball would fall off on the way. Otherwise, if Stagg reached first and had possession of the ball, he became the pitcher and Mighty Casey became the batter.

  Halfway toward first, the ball fell off.

  Stagg ran like the deer he resembled, launched himself head foremost and slid on the grass into the plate. The bat, which he held out before him in his extended arm, hit the first baseman in the shinbone, knocking him off his feet.

  Something struck Stagg in the shoulder. He groaned with pain as he felt the spike sticking in the flesh. But he leaped up, reached behind him, and pulled the spike out, heedless of the warm gush down his shoulder.

  Now, according to the rules, if he survived the impact of the ball and had strength enough, he could throw it at either the pitcher or the first baseman.

  The first baseman had tried to run away, but he had been so badly hurt by Stagg’s bat that he could not even walk. He had removed his own bat from the sheath hanging over his back and stood ready to knock down the ball if Stagg would throw it at him.

  Stagg threw, and the first, his face contorted with the pain of his leg, swatted at the ball.

  There was a thump. The first swayed back and forth, then slumped, the spike buried in his throat.

  Stagg had the choice of staying safe on first or trying to steal second. He chose to run, and again had to slide in face first. The second baseman, unlike the first, stood to one side. So great was Stagg’s momentum that he slid past the plate. At once he twisted around and rolled back to touch second base.

  There was a smack as the ball caught in the second’s enormous thickly padded glove.

  Stagg was—theoretically—safe on second. But he did not relax because of the look of fury on the second’s face. He jumped up, his bat ready to hit the fellow over the head if he forgot the rules long enough to try to hit Stagg with the ball.

  The second, seeing the bat poised, let the ball drop to the ground. Blood dripped from his fingers where he had cut himself on the spikes in his eagerness to get the ball loose from the glove.

  Time out was called, while the first baseman had some brief rites said over him as he was being covered with a blanket.

  Stagg asked for more food and water because he was beginning to feel faint from hunger. He had a right to demand such if the other side called time out.

  He ate. Just as he finished, the mascot called, “Play ball!”

  Now Stagg, standing within the narrow box marked around second base, was at bat again. Mighty wound up and let loose. Stagg knocked the ball to his left just inside the foul line. He began running, but this time the fellow who had replaced the dead first baseman was on the ball as soon as it landed and stuck in the ground. Stagg broke his run for a split second, not knowing whether to run on for third or return to second.

  The first tossed the ball in an underhand motion to Mighty, who, by now, was crouched close to the lane between second and third, almost in Stagg’s path. Stagg’s back would be unprotected if he continued. He spun around; his bare feet slipped on the grass, and he fell on his back.

  For one terrible second, he thought he was done for. Mighty was very close and had drawn back to throw at his prostrate target.

  But Stagg had clung to his bat. Desperately, he raised it before him. The ball hit it glancingly, knocking the bat out of his hand and itself rebounding to a spot a few feet away.

  Stagg roared with triumph, leaped to his feet, picked up the bat, and stood there, swinging the bat warningly. Unless he was actually hit by the ball while between bases, he could not pick it up and hurl it back at his opponents. Nor could he leave the white-marked lane to threaten anyone who tried to pick it up. However, if the ball was lying on the ground close enough for him to bat anybody who tried to pick it up, he could do so.

  The ump’s feminine voice shrilled over the field as she began counting to ten. Stagg’s opposition had ten seconds in which to decide whether to try for the ball or allow him to stroll safe to third.

  “Ten!” called the mascot, and Mighty turned away from the swinging bat.

  Mighty threw again. Stagg swung and missed. Mighty smiled and threw at Stagg’s head. Stagg swung and missed the ball, but the ball also missed him.

  Mighty grinned wolfishly because, if Stagg struck out, Stagg would have to throw aside his bat and stand unmoving while Mighty tried to hit him between the eyes with the ball.

  However, if Stagg managed to get to home plate, then he became the pitcher. He would still be at a disadvantage because he had no teammates to help; on the other hand, his greater speed and strength made him a one-man team.

  There was a hush with only the murmurs of the prayers from the Caseys to be heard. Then Mighty hurled.

  Straight for Stagg’s belly the ball flew, giving him the choice of trying to bunt it down or else lean to one side and still keep his feet in the narrow box. If he stepped or fell outside, he had a strike against him.

  Stagg chose to lean.

  The ball shot by his shrinking flesh. So close was it that a whirling spike point ripped out a tiny gobbet. Blood trickled down his stomach.

  “Ball one!”

  Mighty hurled for the belly again. To Stagg the ball seemed to swell enormously, pregnant with doom, a planet toward which he was falling.

  He swung hard, the bat coming around in a swift arc, parallel to the ground. Its tip connected with the ball, and a shock ran down the bat. It broke in two, and the ball soared back to Mighty.

  The pitcher was caught off guard. He could not believe that the heavy ball could fly so far. Then, as Stagg raced for home, Mighty ran forward and caught the ball in his glove. At the same time, the other players, breaking out of their paralytic astonishment, closed in for the kill.

  Two men stood between Stagg and home, one on each side of the white lines of the path. Both begged for Mighty to throw them the ball. But he chose the honor of tackling Stagg himself.

  Desperately, Stagg struck the ball down with the stub end of his bat, the wooden part which had separated from the brassbound half. The ball did not rebound but stuck in the ground at his feet.

  A Casey dived for it.

  Stagg caved in the hat and the skull beneath it.

  The others stopped running.

  The mascot had thrown her hands over her mask, shielding the sight of the dead man from her eyes. But in a moment she put her hands down and looked beseechingly at Mighty. Mighty hesitated for a moment, as if he were going to give the signal to rush at Stagg and dispose of him, to hell with the rules.

  Then he took a deep breath and called out, “Okay, Katie, start the count. We are diradah. We do not cheat.”

  “One!” quavered the mascot.

  The other players looked at Mighty. He grinned and said, “Okay. Everybody line up behind me. I’ll try first. I wouldn’t ask you boys to do anything that’s my duty.”

  One of the men said, “We could let him walk home.”

  “What?” cried Mighty. “And have every henpecked, skirt-wearing, idol-worshiping man in Deecee laughing at us? No! If we must die—and we have to die some time—we’ll die like men!”

  “Five!” the mascot called, sounding as if her heart were breaking.

  “We haven’t a chance!” a Casey groaned. “He’s twice as fast as any of us. It’ll be a lamb to the slaughter.”

  “I’m no lamb!” Mighty roared. “I’m a Casey! I’m not afraid to die! I’ll go to heaven, while this fellow’ll roast in hell!”

  “Seven!”

  “Come on!” Stagg bellowed, swinging the broken half of the bat. “Step up, gentlemen, and try your luck!”

  “Eight!”
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  Mighty crouched for the leap, his lips working in a silent prayer.

  “Nine!”

  “STOP IT!”

  16

  Mary Casey ran from the woods, her hands held out in protest. She threw her arms around Mighty and began kissing him, weeping all the while.

  “Oh, cousin, cousin, I thought I’d never see you again!”

  “Thank the Mother you’re safe,” he said. “So what this horned man said was true, heh?” He held her away from him and looked carefully at her. “Or did he harm you?”

  “No, no! He didn’t touch me. He was a true diradah all the time,” she said. “And he’s not a worshiper of Columbia. He swears by God and the Son. I’ve heard him many times! And you know no Deecee would do that.”

  “I wish I’d known that,” Mighty said. “We’d not have two good men dead for nothing.”

  He turned to Stagg. “If what she says is true, friend, there’s no reason to continue the game. Of course, if you insist, we will.”

  Stagg threw the stump of the bat to the ground and said, “My original purpose was to go to Caseyland and live there the rest of my life.”

  “We’ve no time to talk!” Mary said. “We have to get out of here! Fast! I climbed a tree to get a better look around, and I saw a pack of hellhounds and a group of men and women on deer following them. And the death-hogs!”

  The Caseys turned pale.

  “Death-hogs!” Mighty said. “Alba is riding! But what’s she doing here?”

  Mary pointed at Stagg. “They must know he’s in this area, and they must have picked up his scent. They were coming too fast just to be casting around.”

  “We’re in a hell of a dilemma,” Mighty said. “She won’t bother us, I think, because we’ve a safe-conduct pass. But you never know about Alba. She’s above such things as treaties.”

  “Yes,” Mary said, “but even if they don’t harm you, what about Peter—and me? I’m not included in the safe-conduct.”