The Talisman

of the male had swollen to the size of pillows and sagged onto the ground. What had made such monstrosities? Nuclear damage, Jack supposed, since scarcely anything else had such power to deform nature. The creatures, themselves poisoned from birth, snuffled up the equally poisoned water and snarled at the little train as it passed.
    Our world could look like this someday, Jack thought. What a treat.
    8
    Then there were the things he thought he saw. His skin began to feel hot and itchy – he had already dumped the serape-like overgarment which had replaced Myles P. Kiger’s coat onto the floor of the cab. Before noon he stripped off his homespun shirt, too. There was a terrible taste in his mouth, an acidic combination of rusty metal and rotten fruit. Sweat ran from his hairline into his eyes. He was so tired he began to dream standing up, eyes open and stinging with sweat. He saw great packs of the obscene dogs scuttling over the hills; he saw the reddish clouds overhead open up and reach down for Richard and himself with long flaming arms, devil’s arms. When at last his eyes finally did close, he saw Morgan of Orris, twelve feet tall and dressed in black, shooting thunderbolts all around him, tearing the earth into great dusty spouts and craters.
    Richard groaned and muttered, ‘No, no, no.’
    Morgan of Orris blew apart like a wisp of fog, and Jack’s painful eyes flew open.
    ‘Jack?’ Richard said.
    The red land ahead of the train was empty but for the blackened trails of the fireballs. Jack wiped his eyes and looked at Richard, feebly stretching. ‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘How are you?’
    Richard lay back against the stiff seat, blinking out of his drawn gray face.
    ‘Sorry I asked,’ Jack said.
    ‘No,’ Richard said, ‘I’m better, really,’ and Jack felt at least a portion of his tension leave him. ‘I still have a headache, but I’m better.’
    ‘You were making a lot of noise in your . . . um . . .’ Jack said, unsure of how much reality his friend could stand.
    ‘In my sleep. Yeah, I guess I probably did.’ Richard’s face worked, but for once Jack did not brace himself against a scream. ‘I know I’m not dreaming now, Jack. And I know I don’t have a brain tumor.’
    ‘Do you know where you are?’
    ‘On that train. That old man’s train. In what he called the Blasted Lands.’
    ‘Well, I’ll be double-damned,’ Jack said, smiling.
    Richard blushed beneath his gray pallor.
    ‘What brought this on?’ Jack asked, still not quite sure that he could trust Richard’s transformation.
    ‘Well, I knew I wasn’t dreaming,’ Richard said, and his cheeks grew even redder. ‘I guess I . . . I guess it was just time to stop fighting it. If we’re in the Territories, then we’re in the Territories, no matter how impossible it is.’ His eyes found Jack’s, and the trace of humor in them startled his friend. ‘You remember that gigantic hourglass back in The Depot?’ When Jack nodded, Richard said, ‘Well, that was it, really . . . when I saw that thing, I knew I wasn’t just making everything up. Because I knew I couldn’t have made up that thing. Couldn’t. Just . . . couldn’t. If I were going to invent a primitive clock, it’d have all sorts of wheels, and big pulleys . . . it wouldn’t be so simple. So I didn’t make it up. Therefore it was real. Therefore everything else was real, too.’
    ‘Well, how do you feel now?’ Jack asked. ‘You’ve been asleep for a long time.’
    ‘I’m still so tired I can hardly hold my head up. I don’t feel very good in general, I’m afraid.’
    ‘Richard, I have to ask you this. Is there some reason why you’d be afraid to go to California?’
    Richard looked down and shook his head.
    ‘Have you ever heard of a place called the black hotel?’
    Richard continued to shake his head. He was not telling the truth, but as Jack recognized, he was facing as much of it as he could. Anything more – for Jack was suddenly sure that there was more, quite a lot of it – would have to wait. Until they actually reached the black hotel, maybe. Rushton’s Twinner, Jason’s Twinner: yes, together they would reach the Talisman’s home and prison.
    ‘Well, all right,’ he said. ‘Can you walk okay?’
    ‘I guess so.’
    ‘Good, because there’s something I want to do now – since you’re not dying of a brain tumor anymore, I mean. And I need your help.’
    ‘What’s that?’ Richard asked. He wiped his face with a trembling