by Chris Walley
“Now go through the next door. But remember, there is more than one danger in this place.”
Merral walked to the door facing him and grasped the handle beside it.
“Okay,” he said, his voice shaking. “Let’s get this over with.”
42
The door opened vertically. It had lifted only a fraction before Merral saw a mist seep out from the chamber and felt cold air round his ankles. With the chilled air came a dreadful smell. The whole ship smelled, but this was something stronger: a putrid, rancid combination of a hundred separate odors of death and decay. It was so overwhelming that, for a moment, Merral wondered if the air was breathable.
As the door opened fully and the mist swirled around his legs, he looked around, feeling every muscle tensed for action. He stood at the edge of a large and gloomy chamber. Although the chamber was surprisingly high, wide, and long, it was crowded. Poking through the mist, like islands in some sea, was a scattered miscellany of dark structures—pillars, columns, and slabs—some rising to more than his height. Around the sides of the chamber, numerous fittings—perhaps cabinets or lockers—rose up to the roof, where large beams spanned the ceiling like the ribs of some gargantuan animal. The only lighting came from a dozen or so small, spherical lights of different sizes, ranging in color from orange to an icy blue, that were apparently randomly arranged below the roof. The combination of these strange lights, which seemed to be floating in space, the numerous structures, and the mist made the gloom of the chamber uneven, giving pools of inky shadow and patches of gray twilight. There were sounds too: a soft rattling and chattering, and Merral felt certain that, beyond the range of his hearing, there were other noises. In these sounds, he sensed a strangely tense and expectant tone.
I am awaited.
Shivering from cold and fear, Merral looked around urgently, sensing that he was being watched and aware that any one of a hundred places in this dreadful room could conceal peril. There was far more to this chamber than what he could see, feel, and touch. The darkness was not just the absence of physical light; it was an icy shadow that seemed to cloud his mind. He tried to think of Ynysmant, his family, Anya, and sunlight and open fields and woods, but here they were all distant memories, faint and muted. Light and life have faded here. He shuddered.
“Where am I?” he asked aloud and he heard his voice tremble. “Where have I come to?”
The voice behind him spoke slowly. “You have come to the edge of your world and to the entrance of that realm where the light does not come. Now go forward.”
Merral took a step forward, and as he did, he crunched something underfoot. He glanced down, kicking with his feet to try and clear the mist, glimpsing white and gray fragments on the floor.
“It’s dirty,” he said under his breath and stepped forward again, wading through the mist as if he were fording a stream.
Merral saw before him a wide passageway that ran between some of the structures to the center of the chamber. There was more light there, and he could make out a short, strange column rising up out of the vapor. Beyond it was a series of steps that led up to a platform on which there was a seat.
Something sat on the seat; something that he wanted to look away from; something that instead dragged his unwilling eyes toward it. It was tall and thin and had the color of a dead leaf. Its form was human, but as Merral stared at it, he saw it move and knew, with a sure stab of dread, that it was not human. As he gazed reluctantly at the thing at the heart of the chamber, he saw it slowly raise a gaunt brown arm and make some sort of gesture. A command, he realized.
“Be careful,” warned the voice behind him.
From somewhere ahead there came the faintest of noises: a soft, rhythmic, swishing sound. Suddenly, in an agony of fear, Merral saw something moving through the vapor toward him from the center of the room. A thing that moved in an unhurried way with a slow rippling of wide wings that caused the vapor to flow off its dark back.
Merral spun round, looking for somewhere to flee.
“Stand firm,” came the order.
Merral turned back to face the oncoming creature, realizing through his fear that he faced the same being that had attacked Felicity. Behind the wide wings he could make out a long tail swinging from side to side.
Wanting to run but knowing that he had to stand his ground, Merral pressed the button on the bush knife and the blade shot out. The teeth are on the underside, he reminded himself, trying to work out the implications for defending himself.
The thing came closer.
Guided more by instinct than reason, Merral grasped the bush knife’s handle firmly in both hands and swung the blade high above his head.
The creature slowed down until it was barely moving, suspended in the midst of the vapor as if it were treading water.
It’s planning its attack. I must let it get close, but not too close. And I must strike at just the right moment.
Perhaps two paces away, the sheet-dragon came to a dead stop. Then the wings began to beat slightly faster and the broad front of the creature bent slowly upward so its front edge rose up out of the vapor.
A widely spaced pair of dark beady eyes seemed to survey him. He tensed, barely breathing, and considered stepping forward and striking the creature but held back. The eyes continued their cold gaze and on the upturned tip of the underside he could make out the start of the bleached slit of the long mouth. As the creature bobbed up and down, he could see—just below the vapor’s surface—the first pair of the clawlike limbs around the mouth.
Suddenly there was movement. The head turned to the right and the beast swung its body around, a triangular wing tilting high up out of the mist as it banked.
It was leaving.
As the dragon turned away, the long tail swinging leisurely round after it, Merral relaxed his muscles. He lowered the blade and began to breathe again.
The tail lashed out.
Merral felt something wrap itself round his knees. He was tugged forward and tumbled into the cold mist. As he fell, the blade flew out of his grasp.
The dragon’s body rose up high into the air with surprising speed, twisting as it came up so that the long, pulsing crevasse of the mouth faced him. As he plunged under the cold vapor, it crashed down toward him.
As he hit the floor, Merral rolled to one side. Instinct—or panic—took over, and he scrabbled desperately to his feet just as a great wing lashed down past him, glancing off a shoulder. As it did, the vapor was thrust aside and he saw the blade lying at his feet. He bent down and snatched it. As his fingers closed round the handle, he looked up.
And froze rigid.
An arm’s length ahead of him, lifted up by rapidly beating wings, the creature was rearing up vertically out of the vapor. It rose until it hung there, spread out like some monstrous kite, a mere pace away from him. Still bent over, Merral could feel the air from the beating wings brushing past him, was aware of the long tail hanging down into the vapor, the buttonlike eyes staring at him, and—above all—the obscene, wet, vertical slit of a mouth suspended just in front of his face with the eight pairs of claws around it scrabbling in frantic anticipation.
Frozen rigid by terror, he realized that, at any moment, the creature would slide forward and the mouth would be upon him. A part of his brain that had somehow resisted being immobilized by fear told him that, under the vapor, his right hand was holding his bush knife. And another part told him that the creature hadn’t realized it.
There was a whisper in his mind: If I can move fast enough and if my limbs work, I might have the advantage of surprise. The creature gave an extra little flick of its wings and, as if about to embrace Merral, moved closer.
The mouth gaped wider.
Now.
Merral bounded upright, swung the blade high, and with all the force he could find, chopped downward.
“The Lamb!” he cried.
The blade struck the creature midway between the eyes and kept going, cutting down into the f
lesh. Merral reeled back under the impact, tearing the blade free.
The creature, nearly bisected by the blow, flopped down into the mist where it thrashed helplessly from side to side.
“And that,” said Merral in a loud but trembling voice, “was for Felicity.” He was surprised at the bitterness in the words.
On the floor, the convulsions of the creature slowly died away, and the mist rolled back over the bloodless corpse.
“Well struck,” said the envoy’s voice, “but beware the desire for revenge. It has betrayed others. It may betray you.”
“Point taken,” Merral said, wiping his brow. “But I have a soft spot for horses.”
There was a moment’s silence. “Continue,” said the envoy, as if passing over some matter. “There is still work to do. That column in the center must be destroyed.”
“As you say,” Merral answered, reluctantly facing the fact that he had yet to deal with whatever lay in the center of this ghastly chamber. He looked around it, hoping that this was the only such creature. As he did, the strange array of lights suspended from the ceiling caught his attention. They reminded him of something—but what? One pair of lights close together made him think of a binary star system.
Suddenly, he realized what the lights were.
“They are stars!” he said aloud. The central light was Alahir; the others were the adjacent stars. Suddenly, the chamber made sense.
“Of course,” he said. “A steersman steers. This is a map. They navigate Below-Space.”
“Just so,” said the envoy. “A useful service, but one that comes at a price.”
Merral walked slowly forward between the gray line of structures. What were they? Cupboards, lockers, consoles? He did not want to know what was inside them. Suddenly, out of the corner of his eye, he saw something pinned to a vertical surface. He stopped. It was a dead kestrel, its brown wings pinned out wide as if it had been crucified. Hanging next to it was a half-completed silver filigree frame that matched the bird’s body.
Merral nodded in recognition. It seemed years since he and Vero had encountered the dead bird spying on them at Carson’s Sill, but the discovery that such a monstrosity had been begotten here was so unsurprising as to be inevitable.
He walked on, the mist swirling around his legs, his footsteps echoing dully in the heavy silence. He was reluctant to even glance at what was ahead. Finally, aware that he was nearly at the strange column and that he had to face what lay beyond it, he lifted his eyes up.
Immediately ahead of him, now perhaps only five paces away, the column poked up out of the vapor. This close to it, Merral could see that it was different than the other structures in the room. Its multisided surfaces were neither dull nor dirty but had an odd gleam to them, as if the structure was made of some polished metal. The column was chest height, and immediately above it, the air seemed to shimmer and twist as if some strange energy flowed through it.
Keeping his eyes fixed on the column, Merral stepped forward again. It had six sides, he saw. Was it a sort of Gate? And if so, where did it lead? He could see too that the column had patterns engraved upon it, extraordinary loops and spirals that, when you looked at them, had an oddly unsettling effect. That this was indeed the source of some awesome and dread power seemed plain.
“Envoy,” he asked, “is this science or magic?”
“Both,” came the flat answer, “there are depths—and heights—where they merge. But your task is to destroy it.” A faint noise came from beyond the column, and at last Merral summoned the courage to look at the seat and the form the color of dead leaves that sat on it.
Barely a dozen paces away, the large figure with elongated and twisted limbs and a misshapen head with empty eye sockets watched him.
A steersman.
Merral was struck by two successive and contrary impressions: The first was that the steersman was extraordinarily insubstantial. What stared at him from the seat was no more than a dry and hollow husk, something with no more solidity than the discarded carapace of some great insect.
The second impression was very different. Suddenly Merral sensed that he stood before a being of extraordinary age. The creature had seen mountains and even worlds form. And with that age came power and authority. He knew too that the being before him was a mighty king seated on a throne. As that thought came into his mind, Merral noticed that the monstrous head wore a small metal crown. In an instant, his first impression was overturned. It was he, not the steersman, who was ephemeral, and insubstantial. It is I who am dust. He trembled.
In that moment of vulnerability, Merral was suddenly aware of the envoy speaking from behind him. “It lies. Go forward in the name of the Lamb and do what must be done. Go.”
Reassured, Merral took three steps forward. He closed the bush knife, clipped it back on his belt, and reached for the explosive charge.
As he touched it, he became aware of the steersman moving in its seat, bending forward with stiff limbs, as if turning to stare at him. As if he had opened a door into the face of a winter’s gale, a bitter torrent of malice suddenly poured over him.
Overwhelmed, Merral stepped back.
“Man, do not be afraid,” the envoy’s voice said. “It can do you no harm unless you let it. Trust in him who is the Lord of all realms. Go forward. Plant the charge on the column and trigger it.”
“I’ll try,” Merral said, finding words difficult and taking two steps forward. Another step and the column would be within reach.
Suddenly he was aware of the steersman rising stiffly from its seat like some monstrous, desiccated insect. With a lurching, brittle motion, the thing walked to the column.
Merral stared at the creature that faced him. The face, long and impossibly narrow, seemed paper-thin, and the eye sockets were spaces in which motes of cold dust circulated. In an instant, Merral’s contrary impressions resolved themselves. The steersman had both power and emptiness: indeed, its very power lay in the emptiness. It was the being that emptied things of life and light and drained all that was good out of them.
Merral tried to suppress his terror. I must do what I have to do.
The steersman moved its fingers, and the sound was like the rustling of dead leaves. Without warning, the creature spoke into his mind.
Ringell . . . Ringell . . . they brought you back?
The words were as clear as if they had been spoken, but he knew the jaws of the steersman had not moved.
Merral said nothing but slipped the explosive charge off his belt and felt for the protective wrapping on its back. I have a task to do, a part to play.
But you are not Ringell, are you? I was misled.
Forcing himself to concentrate, Merral tore off the wrapping on the red package so the adhesive patch faced toward the column surface. There seemed to be a battle going on in his mind. Light and darkness strove against each other like the interplay of sunlight and shadows as clouds raced over a field. One second, Merral wanted to flee, and the next his desire was to complete his task.
I am the king, said the voice in his mind. Stop! Obey me!
“No, you’re not,” Merral said aloud. “The Assembly stands and her Lord reigns.”
Fool! Both the Assembly and her King have forsaken you. I am your king now. Leave while you can.
“Go away,” Merral said aloud. “I have a task to do, a part to play.”
He pressed the charge against the column, feeling a slight and tingling vibration under his fingertips as the inter-molecular cement bonded. Three seconds would do it.
One, two, three.
Stop! You cannot win! Your isolation is over; the breach in the barrier remains. There will be others who will come in vast ships of unimaginable power. And we will come with them.
“I have a task to do, a part to play,” Merral repeated. His stumbling fingers found the protective film over the trigger and he tore it off.
One by one your cozy little worlds will fall. Like leaves in autumn. We will start with Farholm
e.
Merral found the safety pin, pulled it out, and threw it away into the chill mist at his feet.
We will strip the flesh from your people, turn them against each other, and damn their little souls.
Merral’s fingers looped around the firing cord. The words sang in his mind: I have a task to do, a part to play.
We will win. We are your inheritors. The uniting of the realms will take place. The end of the Assembly has come.
A task to do, a part to play . . .
Merral pulled the cord.
Nothing happened, and he stared dully at the package, expecting at least some flashing light to tell him the fuse had been ignited.
It’s a chemical fuse. He turned and started to run back to the door of the chamber the way he had come. A sixty-second fuse . . . I should have counted.
As he raced to the door, the mist parted around him. It seemed thinner now.
The dragon must be just ahead of me. He ran to one side to avoid treading on the body.
Nearly there. Merral glimpsed the tail in the mist at his feet. He stepped over it.
“Look out!” the envoy shouted.
The tail lashed out and snagged his ankle. Merral stumbled and lurched painfully into the nearest structure. He slid to the ground.
Stunned, he lay there for a second before he realized his danger.
I must get up. He pulled his foot free and staggered back to his feet.
He ran on and lunged through the open doorway into the compartment. He turned, tore at the handle with clumsy fingers, and swung it upward. As the door began sliding down, Merral collapsed backward against the wall and slithered down to the floor.
With what seemed an appalling slowness, the door moved down.
“Come on!” he shouted.
The door began to seat itself into the slot in the floor.
A dazzling flash of white lightning shot under it.
There was a stunning clap of noise, and the whole ship seemed to vibrate. Merral felt things strike the compartment door and slide down. The lights failed and then with a few blinks came back on again.
