Universe Twister - Keith Laumer [132]
On the tiny balcony scabbed to the face of the immense cliff receding rapidly behind him, a tiny figure waved a scarf. O'Leary forced his eyes down, saw the rolling grassy landscape sliding swiftly behind him. He closed his eyes tightly.
"Mamma mia," he muttered. "And me without even a paper bag, in case I get airsick!"
The palace-fortress known as the Glass Tree rose out of the west like a star caught on the peak of a mountain. Dazzling in the rays of the setting sun, it scintillated red and green and yellow and violet, materializing gradually into a cluster of sparkling, crystalline shafts. A branching structure of tall towers, dazzling bright minarets, glittering spires, clustered on the tip of the highest peak of the range.
"O.K., cloak, do your stuff," O'Leary murmured, gathering the garment about him, arranging the wide skirts so as to encompass as much as possible of the carpet itself. Sprawnroyal had assured him that Prince Krupkin was in possession of no antiaircraft facilities, but Lafayette nonetheless scrunched down on the rug to provide the minimum possible target as he swooped toward the looming structure ahead.
At half a mile he ordered the rug to slow. If there was any change in the speed—too fast—and the direction—dead at the tallest tower—Lafayette was unable to detect it. With frightening speed, the slim, glittering minaret rushed closer . . .
At the last possible instant, the rug braked, banked—almost pitching a petrified O'Leary over the side—and circled the tower.
"Like a sack of Idaho number-ones," O'Leary whispered urgently to himself. "Please, up there, just let me get out of this one alive, and I promise to tithe regularly . . ."
The rug slewed to a halt, hung quivering in the air before a tall, Moorish-arched window.
"OK, all ahead, dead slow," Lafayette whispered. The rug drifted closer to the translucent, mirror-polished wall. When it nudged the crystal rail, he reached cautiously, grabbed, and held on. The rug bobbled and swayed under him as he climbed over; relieved of his weight, it began to drift away, rippling slightly in the breeze. Lafayette caught a corner, pulled the carpet to him, rolled it into a tight cylinder, and propped it in a corner.
"Just wait here until I get back," he whispered to it. He took a moment to tuck in the tail of the embroidered shirt Sprawnroyal had supplied, and tug his jeweled sword into line, then pressed the button set in the pommel of the latter.
"Flapjack to Butterfly," he whispered. "O.K., I'm down, in one piece."
"Very good," a shrill whisper rasped from the two-way comm rig installed in the weapon's hilt. "Proceed inside, and make your way to the royal apartments. They're on the twelfth floor of the main keep. Watch your step; don't give yourself away by knocking over a vase or stepping on somebody's foot."
"Glad you mentioned that," Lafayette snapped. "I intended to come on strumming a ukulele and singing 'Short'nin' Bread.'"
He tried the door, stepped into a dim-lit, softly carpeted chamber hung with rose-and silver drapes. A pink-and-silver four-poster stood opposite the balcony. Silver cupids disported themselves at the corners of the dusty-rose ceiling. A wide crystal chandelier sparkled in the center of the room, tinkling with the breeze from the open door. Lafayette started toward a wile silver-and-white door at the far side of the room, halted at the sound of voices beyond it.
" . . . just for a nightcap," a wheedling male voice said. "And besides," it went on with an audible leer, "you might need a little help with those buttons."
"You're impertinent, sir," a familiar feminine voice said in a playful tone. "But I suppose it will be all right—for a few minutes."
"Daphne?" Lafayette mumbled. As a key clattered in the lock, he dived for the shelter of the four-poster. He had no more than gained the darkness behind the brocaded skirt when the door opened. Lying with his face to the rug,