In the Moons of Borea Read Online Free

before him took shape. He lay in something of a shallow depression with his chin buried in coarse sand, the soil of the silent forest glade. Beyond his immediate horizon was a more distant one of shaded greens, the forest wall at the far side of the pool. De Marigny shuddered, and not at all because of the cramped chill steadily creeping into his bones.
    Turning his head carefully to the left, he saw a stretched leather thong that reached out from his neck to where it was tied to a peg driven deep into the soil. He was similarly tied down to the right. Since he could not move his legs at the- knees, they too must be tethered. He struggled briefly, uselessly, then slowly and methodically began cursing himself for a fool. To have been so utterly careless, so criminally stupid as to get himself into a mess like this. It was unthinkable!
    Disgusted with himself and with his predicament, he nevertheless attempted to analyse his desperate mistake. He believed he knew how it had come about.
    His adventures in Earth's dreamworld — the terrible threats and dangers he had faced and conquered there, until it had seemed he must be almost indestructible — had lulled him into a state of false security. How could he have come through so much only to fall prey in the end to the primitives of some nameless planet on the rim of reality?
    What angered the Earthman more than anything else was the fact that he was wearing the cloak brought back by Titus Crow from Elysia, an antigravity device which allowed the wearer to soar aloft as effortlessly as any bird. He was sure that in the dreamworld his reactions would have been instinctive: to reach for and activate the buttons in his harness that would have lifted him instantly to safety. But here in this strange new world . . . things had simply seemed to move too fast for him.
    If only he might free one hand and reach the controls of his he had no doubt that —
    Any further thoughts of escape were aborted, driven from his mind the instant that he caught sight of a pulsating, blue-veined leech-thing that suddenly came slithering over the rim of the hollow in which he lay. It saw him at once, tiny red eyes fixing upon him hungrily, jellyfish body throbbing as the creature slid and slithered down the slight declivity toward his face.
    Frozen in horror, de Marigny could only think: `My face — my eyes!' But even as the pulsating leech reared up in front of him, inches away, and even as a dozen or so more of the awful things appeared almost simultaneously over the lip of the hollow, still he could not avert his gaze. Hypnotized and immobilized by his unthinkable situation, by the fate about to descend upon him, de Marigny could only watch and wait for it to happen, and -
    - The earth shuddered beneath him as a leather-booted foot came down on top of the menacing leech-thing in the moment that it made to strike for his face. Its juices splashed him as it was ground into the moistureless soil.
    A second later and the silver blade of a wicked picklike
    weapon flashed down once, twice, and the thongs that tethered de Marigny's neck were severed. He felt cold metal touch his wrists and his hands were free, his legs too. Another second and - amazing sight! - a snarling, coughing mountain of white fur, a bear almost eleven feet tall, shambled swiftly into view, stomping the now retreating leech-things and shaking the ground with its massive weight.
    Then, before the astounded Earthman could even muster his thoughts to consider these miraculous developments, he was hauled gently but irresistibly to his feet. Left to stand on his own, weak and bloody as he was, de Marigny might well have fallen, but steely arms supported him and keenly intelligent eyes stared into his own first in concern, then in recognition.
    He stared back — stared even harder — then gasped and shook his head in dizzy disbelief. Finally he managed to mumble: 'Hank? Hank Silberhutte? I don't — '
    'Neither do I, Henri,' the Texan