“There are paths here,” Hailey said. He pointed to a pattern of flat stones snaking across the landscape.
“These were probably paved roads at one time,” Eva explained. They were sitting next to Caruncle in the driver’s seat.
“Yes,” said Caruncle. “We are arrive-coming upon ruins from your people. I have explored them on prior excursions, which is how I discovered the path-pass through the mountains.”
“I had no idea the ruins stretched across both sides of the mountains,” said Eva.
“Oh, yes. Down here these overgrown ruins spread-run in all directions for quite a distance. Also, do you see how lush-green the land is?”
Eva nodded.
“That is because we are on the windward side of these mountains. The air is heavy with water-rain as it blows south from Lake Concors.”
“But it’s like a desert on the other side,” said Eva.
“Because the water-rain gets trapped here on this side. It is too heavy to blow over those peaks.” Caruncle pointed toward the jagged mountains looming closer.
“And you know a way through there?” Hailey asked.
“The only way. Yes. One of these pass-paths will take us. Only I, Caruncle, am the one who knows where it is. You-human will see when we cross these mountains. We will come to the ancient desert ruins and we shall locate-find Zin. I will lead us straight through the night, so that we arrive by sunrise tomorrow.”
Caruncle’s team trotted down the ancient highway. Tufts of lush grass and weeds broke up the sun-bleached pavement. Hunks of rock and boulders were strewn on either side of the road. As they passed close by, Eva realized the rocks were actually bricks and the remnants of walls. Where a building once stood, now there was only a fractured foundation—a large ghostly footprint of a world that was no more.
On the peak of a low-lying mountain, Eva saw a giant statue amidst the ruins. Though the morning sun was bright behind it, the statue’s elongated silhouette brought to mind the pillar guards from the Royal Museum of Solas. Eva masked the sun’s glare with her hand to get a better view, but the statue had . . . disappeared? She searched for a nearby turnfin to ask for an explanation, but none of the birds were present. She considered asking Hailey but decided he would just tease her about seeing things that weren’t really there.
“Once we get to the cover of these overgrown ruins up ahead, we should stop-rest and let Bix and Bax eat before we set off through the mountains,” said Caruncle. He snapped the reins, and the munt-runners loped ahead.
“Are there any dangers here?” Eva stood in a crumbling courtyard of stone. Towering above her the remnants of once majestic edifices revealed the scars that time had etched upon their surfaces. Thick roots snaked through these remains, like veins running through the entire overgrown city. In her drab poncho Eva would have disappeared among the lichen-covered rubble if it weren’t for her snow-white hair.
“I have found-seen nothing beyond the usual.” Caruncle filled a woven feedbag with grain. The munt-runner’s hides quivered and they watched him with dilated eyes. He laid the feedbag on the ground in front of his team, and the munt-runners bent low to peck at the food with their short blunt beaks. “But don’t go climbing on anything,” Caruncle said. “None of these structures are stable.”
“You can say that again.” Hailey gazed up at a fractured relief set above a large gaping doorway. He walked through the stone doorway and into the overgrown ruins beyond. “Wow! Look at this place!” His voice echoed.
“Don’t go too far. We shall leave shortly.” Caruncle found his pipe and his bag of spices. “However, if you discover something interesting, come find-get me.”
Eva followed a particularly large mass of roots that crept down from the roof of a deteriorating building. The roots grew out from a squat tree. Hanging from the twisted trunk were tangled vines covered in jade-green leaves. “Caruncle, what is this?”
“Ah! Mimic ivy,” Caruncle answered from his sloop. “Feel-touch it.”
Eva looked back at him, suspicious.
“Don’t worry. It will not harm-hurt you.” Caruncle wore a toothy grin.
Eva placed her fingertips on the thick serpentine roots of the ivy. Immediately the leafy vines rustled and moved. They came together in such a way as to form a shape—the animated shape of a large Dorcean. Unsure of what she was witnessing, Eva backed up. The ivy-formed Dorcean rushed at Eva. She cried out and stumbled backward over fallen debris.
“What’s wrong?” Hailey poked his head out from a stone doorway.
Caruncle bellowed with laughter. “It is nothing to fret-worry about.” He waddled over and helped Eva up to her feet. “You have never seen mimic ivy before?”
The ivy-formed Dorcean blocked Eva from the trunk of the plant. She focused her mind on its thick sinuous trunk.
I see. You. Go. Away, the ivy said.
“Look-see here.” Caruncle pointed at tiny black berries growing from the ends of the ivy’s shoots. “These are its eyes. It view-sees an animal, something that would eat its leaves, and then—”
“It creates a shape, a silhouette, to frighten it off.”
Caruncle cackled and slapped Eva on the back. “And it scare-frightened you good, Eva Nine!”
“Why a Dorcean?” Eva went to touch the leaves of the ivy. The ivy-formed Dorcean backed up just beyond reach. “Does it know what I fear?”
“No. It just picks an animal larger than you.” Caruncle lit his pipe. “Probably something that it has seen before.”
Eva pointed to the Dorcean shape and whispered to the mimic ivy. “You’ve seen this form before?”
Yes.
“Recently?”
No. Many suns ago.
“Have you seen my shape before?” She walked under the fragment of a stone archway covered in a tangle of roots.
No.
The ivy’s vines twined to create the silhouette of Eva. As she walked, it mirrored her every move. Eva skipped. The ivy-Eva skipped. Eva stopped, but the ivy-Eva continued down a corridor. Eva now followed the ivy. She exited and found herself in a wide expanse of the ruins.
“Do not walk-go too far,” said Caruncle. “We leave soon.”
“I am not the sort who would eat your beautiful leaves. So maybe you can show me what others you have seen?” Eva asked the plant.
Others. Yes.
The ivy began to take on a new shape. It reminded Eva of the holograms she had seen of topiaries used to decorate the fanciful gardens of the past. She watched an ivy-formed munt-runner gallop over the rubble. Eva gave chase, traveling farther and farther into the labyrinth. The munt-runner shape led Eva to the large façade of an ornate cathedral, now overtaken by the choking twining roots of the mimic ivy. Here the ivy took the form of a giant water bear, like Otto, and bound up and over the front of the cathedral.
“Eva, where are you?” Hailey called from somewhere.
“More!” Eva ignored Hailey. “Show me more.” She ran through the arched doorway into the roofless cathedral. Inside, Eva stopped abruptly. The ivy had now taken on an all-too-familiar shape: Zin.
“Eva?” Caruncle’s voice rang out through the ruins. “I can hear you. Tell me-Caruncle where you are.”
“This one,” Eva said to the ivy. “Where did it go?”
The ivy mimicked Zin’s arm movements as it pointed to the other end of the cathedral, opposite the direction Eva had come. There she spied a small opening through a collapsed doorway.
Eva paused and looked back toward the direction of Caruncle and Hailey. “They can wait. I’ve got to find him. Let’s go!”
The ivy-formed Zin zoomed down the length of the enormous cathedral and out beyond. Eva dashed after it. She wriggled through the collapsed opening, leaving Caruncle and Hailey far behind. I’ve found Zin at last! I knew he’d be in the ruins. She followed the ivy down abandoned alleys and across the cracked stones of a square, and arrived at the entrance of a disintegrating domed amphitheater. Eva stepped into the shadowy entran
ce and came out into the open-air space.
Inside the circular amphitheater the ivy-formed Zin flew up to join with another ivy-shape, a shape Eva had seen before. The statue. Standing among the empty rows that had once held seats, an ivy-formed giant loomed above Eva. Three columnar legs tapered up to a T-shaped head while long, flattened arms hung down on either side of its towering body.
“A pillar guard?” Eva asked the mimic ivy.
The vines of the ivy dispersed and returned to their natural shape, revealing an actual pillar guard that had been shrouded underneath the foliage. Its three eyes lit up, and it emitted a long, loud blat.
Eva scurried away from the giant. A long arm, ending in a collection of serrated claws, extended at lightning speed. The claws sank deep into the earth just in front of Eva, blocking her escape. The pillar guard sounded off again, and Eva turned to face it. The guard yanked its claws from the ground, removing clods of turf with it, and retracted its segmented arm.
When Eva tried to leave again, the pillar guard blocked her path. Somewhere, far in the ruins, Eva could hear Hailey and Caruncle calling for her. She dashed off in one direction, then quickly changed course in hopes of tricking the guard, but again she was cut off from escape.
“Let me pass,” Eva cried.
The guard let out another loud blat, followed by several short trills.
“I don’t understand you,” Eva said, catching her breath. She gazed up.
The guard watched her with all three glowing eyes.
“Are you trying to tell me something?”
Her question was answered by a quick series of staccato notes.
“Ugh! I don’t know what are you saying.” Eva searched the ground for a stick to draw in the dirt with, but none could be found. Still hunting, she walked toward the roots of ivy. She glanced up to see the ivy-form of Zin flying around the amphitheater. She pointed to the ivy. “Is it Zin? Is he nearby?”
The pillar guard looked at the ivy and blurted out a melody of brassy sound. It laid its hand flat on the ground at Eva’s feet; its talons were as big as her body. In an instant the guard retracted its claws.
“You know where Zin is, don’t you?” Eva asked.
Once more it replied in musical notes.
“Can you take me?”
More music.
“Let me get my friends. You can lead us.” Eva pointed back from where she’d come. “Hailey! I’m over here,” she shouted.
Another loud blat echoed from the ancient walls. The pillar guard turned and took three steps away from Eva.
“Wait!” She ran to catch up with the guard, waving her arms wildly to stop it. “Don’t go.”
The guard made no more noise and lowered its hand to the ground once more.
“I guess it’s just you and me then, huh?” Eva took a deep breath and climbed up the pillar guard’s segmented arm. The guard lifted Eva to its shoulders, where she stood and found a handhold in the ridges of its neck. The giant turned and bounded away from the ruins toward the mountains.
CHAPTER 12: SIGNS
In the fading light Eva turned back to see the sun sink in the sky. Past the scree-covered slope, she watched the overgrown ruins far beyond slip into darkness. Somewhere out there Caruncle and Hailey were probably looking for her. I hope I can find them after I locate Zin, she thought.
The pillar guard trekked down a path that wound through a gap in the mountain ridges. As twilight blanketed the landscape, a brisk chill settled in the pass. Eva pulled her hood over her head to stave off the cool night air.
“Hey.” She tapped the guard’s neck. “We need to stop so I can take a break.” She pointed to the ground. The guard responded in more musical notes and lowered its arm so that Eva could climb down.
“I don’t know why the vocal transcoder doesn’t work with you.” She slid down the long arm. Once on the ground Eva stretched and flexed the stiffness and aches in her hands from gripping the guard’s neck for so long. After squatting down behind a large rock to relieve herself, Eva realized it had been some time since she had eaten. She pulled a Sustibar from the pocket of her poncho and nibbled off part of it. The bar must have been old as it tasted stale. She spit it out and wiped her mouth. Unsure of what to do with it, she decided to crumble up the bar and conspicuously place it on the ground along with the wrapper. I bet Bix and Bax will find this, and then Hailey will know I came this way.
Eva returned to the pillar guard. In the deepening night she could now see the pinpoint patterns of shimmering light that pulsated underneath the guard’s semitranslucent skin. It brought to mind the biomechanical nervous system of the Mother from the Heart of the Wandering Forest. Eva placed a palm on the guard’s wide columnar leg and felt the warmth emanate from within.
“I wonder, are you a machine or an organic being? Maybe you are both, like Muthr was?”
The guard laid its hand down on the rocky ground for Eva to climb onto.
“My abilities certainly don’t work on you. How are we supposed to talk?”
A short melody chimed from the guard.
“They used remotes to control you back in Solas. Who is controlling you now? Is it Zin?”
The guard remained silent. Its hand still lay on the ground, waiting for Eva to join him.
“Do you understand anything that I am saying?” Frustration grew in Eva’s voice. Once more she looked for a stick to draw in the sand as Caruncle had done, but there was nothing but large rocks and thatch surrounding her. If only I had something to draw with . . . The liquid light pen!
Eva plucked the pen from her pocket and shook it as Hailey had done. She knelt down in front of a large boulder and scrawled out a picture of Zin holding a pillar guard remote. The light of the ink shone brightly in the night. She pointed to the drawing. “Is that who controls you?”
The guard’s eyes gazed down upon her drawing as if they were headlights on a hovercraft. It replied in a singsong of blats and trills.
“Good.” Eva added an arrow and the words “THIS WAY” to her drawing. She climbed up the guard’s segmented arm and took her perch at its shoulder. They continued their journey through the night toward the east. From time to time Eva dropped food and wrappers for Bix and Bax to find. It reminded her of an old story—a fairy tale—that Muthr had told her long ago. In that story two lost children had defeated an evil witch who’d tried to eat them. They found their way back home using a trail they’d made of pebbles. This brought to mind Eva’s conversation with Caruncle regarding fairy tales.
We’ll find out if this story has a happy ending soon enough, she thought.
The glow of a rising sun cut a golden slice across the dusky clouds above. Eva’s arms were cramped and her fingers sore from clutching on to the pillar guard throughout their journey. Somehow she had managed to stay put, even when she’d dozed off.
The guard stood at the edge of a ridge—the end of the mountain pass—that looked down into an arid valley littered with broken buildings and the skeletons of fallen skyscrapers. Eva had arrived at the westernmost edge of the ancient city. A corroded sign, half-buried in the sand, said WELCOME TO MANHATTAN.
So many horrible things have happened here, Eva thought. It’s the last place I want to be, but if he’s here . . . She tucked a braid behind her ear and scanned the vast ruins, hoping to see Zin zooming up to greet them, but he did not come.
The pillar guard plodded down the steep slope of the ridge toward the ruins below. He carried Eva past sand-worn statues and eroding monuments. At last the guard stopped at the edge of a wide cavern. Eva shimmied down the arm of the guard to the sandy ground.
The cave was much larger than the tunnel Otto had dug to the ancient library. It dropped straight down vertically for many meters into darkness. From its shadowed center rose a gigantic lichen tree, the largest Eva had ever seen. The tree’s umbrella shape blocked the bright sunlight from the cave that held its roots. Turnfins swooped and glided around the top of the tree, which housed their rookery. Down be
low the distinct sound of running water echoed up the cave walls.
“Is this where Zin is?”
A reply came as a loud blast, and the guard pointed into the cavern.
“Okay. I’ll go down.”
The guard looked up to the sky as if sensing something. It emitted another brassy melody, then bounded away into the rubble-strewn landscape.
“Where are you going?” Eva called after it. The guard did not reply.
Jagged slabs of concrete and cinder block that formed the cave walls made the climb down easy for Eva. Once she descended below the brightness of the daylight, her eyes adjusted to the dim world that she now entered. It was not a cave after all but an underground site of excavated ruins. It was as if some giant beast had torn the roof off a subterranean dwelling, revealing the many rooms and passages within. Eva continued her descent down through several stories and arrived at the original ground level.
Arched doorways ringed the edges of what appeared to have been a vaulted foyer. The giant lichen tree rose from the center of the foyer’s fractured floor.
“Hello?” Eva’s voice echoed throughout the ruin. Among the few remaining tiles still clinging to the walls was a cracked ceramic sign that read, CITY HALL STATION. The sound of dripping water echoed from one of the passages. Eva walked toward the sound through the dark passage.
She arrived in a wide curved corridor with arched supports. Shattered glass skylights allowed intermittent patches of sunlight to find its way in. Water from broken underground pipes trickled into a canal that followed the curve of the platform she was standing on. Wondrous trumpet-shaped growths sprung from the platform ledge surrounding the canal, while multicolored lichens patterned the foundation of adjacent walls. The layout reminded Eva of the subferry station in New Attica.
She closed her eyes and let her thoughts drift, in the hopes of communicating with any nearby life-forms. Though she was not in the forest, Eva still sensed the presence of beings.
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