Journey Beyond Tomorrow by Robert Sheckley

Author:Robert Sheckley [Sheckley, Robert]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

of ingredients and bound it to the skull with a shroud string, turning the string three times as the sun turns.

Pollito said, "The message of the sacred golden deer was to give the skull a pinch of snuff; that he said would be enough."

"Spare me your moronic rhyming," the witch doctor said, "and give me the snuff."

"I don't have it, sir."

"Then where is it?"

"Earlier you said that you had put the snuff in a safe place."

"Naturally. But in which safe place did I put it?" the witch doctor asked, rummaging wildly through his ingredients.

"Perhaps it's at the Divining Place," Pollito said.

"No, none of those places seem right," the witch doctor said. "Let me think. . . ."

The Beast, however, gave him no further time for thought. It trotted out of Joenes's cabin and sprang at the line of hunters. A dozen arrows and spears darted forward to meet it, humming in the air like angry hornets. But these missiles had no effect. Unharmed, the Beast burst through the hunters' line. Already the witch doctor and his assistants had gathered up their ingredients and sprinted into the forest. The hunters also ran, but Lunu and two others were killed.

Joenes followed the hunters, and fear lent speed to his feet. At last he came to a clearing in the forest with a weathered stone altar in its center. Here he found the witch doctor and his assistants, and behind them shuddered the hunters. In the forest, the howls of the Beast were growing louder.

The witch doctor was fumbling on the ground near the altar, saying, "I'm almost positive I put the snuff around here somewhere. I came here to ask the Sun's special blessing on it this afternoon. Pollito, do you remember what I did then?"

"I wasn't here," Pollito said. "You told us you were going to perform a secret rite, and that our presence was forbidden."

"Of course it was forbidden," the witch doctor said, digging vigorously around the altar with a stick. "But didn't you spy on me?"

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.