When he withdrew it, a bloated, six-legged lizard squirmed fitfully in his fist. Without hesitation, Crawler closed his jaws over its head, bit if off, spit it out and began climbing again, sucking at the blood-spurting neck stump.
Ericson’s belly turned over with cold disgust. He tried to avert his gaze from the mutie and his snack. Crawler peered at him, a mocking up-from-under look, red-filmed teeth grinning around the feebly kicking body in his mouth.
Doing his utmost to maintain a stoic expression, Ericson continued to climb. Crawler slithered and lunged beside him, the lizard’s tail flopping back and forth, slapping his cheeks lightly. The doomie kept pace with him, as if it were a race to see who could reach the summit first. Ericson fleetingly considered stomping on Crawler’s head, attributing it to a misstep.
By the time they reached the wide ledge, Baron Sharpe stood before the recessed sec door. He cast a smirk over his shoulder, snickered and rapped on the portal with a feyly bent wrist. “Let me in or I’ll huff and puff and blow your house in.”
He tilted his head, pretending to hear a response from within, then piped in a falsetto, “Not by the hairs of our chinny-chin-chins.”
The three Mags gained the shelf and spread out in a semicircular formation in front of the door. Quietly Ericson said, “Please, my Lord Baron. I must insist you stand away from the door.”
Baron Sharpe regarded him with ingenuous blue eyes. “Danger?”
“Quite possibly.”
The baron hugged himself, fringes quivering in ex-citement. “Oh, I truly hope so. Crawler, what colors do you see?”
Crawler’s lips went slack, and the lizard dropped from his mouth. The Magistrates watched sourly as the doomie went through his performance, clutching at his brow, shivering and moaning. Ericson wished the crippled bastard would expand his repertoire.
In his whispering, aspirated voice, Crawler said, “White clouds, golden sunshine and serenity. All is happy. All is golden. Friends from afar await.”
Ericson couldn’t help himself. His voice was a loud, harsh blare as he demanded, ” What ?”
The baron’s smooth features displayed his disappointment. “No danger?”
Crawler husked out, “No danger. Only friends who wish to invite you to join their games.”
Ericson glared at the mutie in furious suspicion, then wheeled on the baron. “My Lord, your high counselor is mistaken. He must be.”
Irritation flickered in the big blue eyes. “Why must he be?”
The Magistrate administrator groped for a response. Knowing he trod on exceedingly treacherous ground, he said matter-of-factly, “The first squad did not return from this place. There are indications that they are dead. For your own safety, I demand we operate on the assumption that we are in dark territory, regardless of your high counselor’s assessment.”
Baron Sharpe’s lips pursed. He flicked his eyes down to Crawler’s upturned face. Ericson watched the brief eye exchange between them. Crawler inclined his head in a curt nod.
The baron’s shoulders slumped. In a weary, resigned tone, he said, “Oh, very well, then. Ericson, be so kind as to lend me a blaster.”
Ericson handed him his Copperhead, first making sure the firing-rate selector was switched to single shot. He wasn’t foolish enough to give a subgun set on full or even semiauto to a novice.
Baron Sharpe hefted the weapon in his hands, as if trying to guess its weight. Then, with smooth, deft motions, he planted the bore of the Copperhead under Ericson’s exposed chin and squeezed the trigger.
The report, muffled as it was by flesh and bone, had a flat, lackluster quality to it. There was nothing lackluster about the effect of the 4.85 mm steel-jacketed round. It punched a path through tissue and jaw, driving up through the roof of the mouth and deep into the brain. Only Ericson’s helmet kept his cranium casing from coming apart in fragments.
He toppled backward without a sound. All of the Magistrates saw the crimson-edged, ragged stellate wound where his chin had been. A sooty halo ringed the lower portion of his face. The sweetish odor of cordite mixed with the stink of seared human flesh.
Baron Sharpe cast a swift glance toward Crawler, his eyes shining like a pair of newly minted coins. Crawler smiled in approval. “Well played, my Lord.”