The beast’s power was staggering. Had they not been tucked into the corners, every person would have been crushed.
The hissing and thumping that shook the ground gradually receded. When the air cleared, the smell remained. Everything was coated in slime. The table had been reduced to chips and powder, statues and ornaments were toppled and shattered, and huge stones had been wrenched from the mortar around the doorway as if they were no more than pebbles in mud. The entrance had been doubled in size.
They got to their feet, rubbing their eyes and swaying. Osric remained on the ground. He looked only barely conscious. He had not quite escaped the thrashings.
Merter called for silence.
Everyone listened.
The retreating sounds were still fading, then they ended abruptly. It was just a hint, but it was unmistakable – a distant clatter, much like what might be produced by an axe falling on tiles.
Merter ran to the window and thrust his head out. “Nothing,” he said. “It’s still in the building.”
A deep scraping rush echoed up from the enlarged entrance.
“Back to the archive room!” Merter shouted. “Down the stairwell. Go, go, go!”
He and Tyne grabbed Osric by the arms and dragged his heavy body across the floor to the narrow stairwell opening across the room from the main entrance. This time the soldiers understood all too well and dashed ahead. Aedan and Fergal brought up the rear, spears pointed backwards, tips shuddering.
As they turned towards the arched stone doorway, the light in the room behind them darkened. Aedan pushed Fergal through and dived after him as something struck against the frame, releasing a cloud of dust. Clearly, the beast’s head was too large to pass through, but the next instant heavy stones were falling all around Aedan, one bruising his thigh and another narrowly missing his head. With a shout of pain, he twisted around and stared at the monstrous shape moving through the billows of dust, striking, twisting, plunging, only inches from his boots. It was actually digging through the stone wall, enlarging the entrance.
He scrambled to his feet and tried to leap down the stairs, but something held him fast. Spinning around, he saw that part of his cloak had been trapped under a large rock. He knew he should unhook the cloak, but before he could do so, the frame shuddered and this time something living brushed his shoulder. It drove him to a panic. He pulled and strained to tear the cloak free, half shouting, half crying, as he imagined the beast gathering for another lunge.
A hand grasped his arm and pulled. The cloak tore off at the clasp, and he and Fergal lurched forward, tumbling down several stairs ahead of a terrific explosion of stone and dust.
Fergal pulled him to his feet and they edged down into the blackness of the stairwell – all torches having been lost above. They soon caught up with the others.
“There’s another way out of the archive room,” Fergal shouted over the hammering of falling rock. “Don’t wait here. When the boulders start to roll down the stairs, they won’t stop until they reach the bottom.”
They continued on through the darkness, increasing the pace when a load of apple-sized rocks came tumbling past, striking against legs and ankles.
“Hurry,” said Fergal, as an ominous pounding began to fill the space. “How far are we Merter?”
“About half way.”
The thumping behind them grew with every bound – it could only be a falling boulder.
“We’re not going to make it,” Fergal shouted. “Everyone press up against the inside wall.”
There was no time for explanations. Aedan did as he was told.
It was no longer thumping but smashing its way down the stairs towards them. A boulder large enough to do that could kill them all. Aedan turned his face away and held his breath. There was a shuddering impact just to the side and something rushed past his head, the wind pulling at his hair; then a scrape and a grunt of pain below him, a few more collisions, a scream, and the sound faded.
“Fergal?” he asked.
“Just a scratch,” Fergal said, then raised his voice, “Who was hurt?”
“One of the soldiers,” Merter’s voice echoed up. “Sounds like a broken arm.”
There was no need for further instructions. They were moving again, as fast as the darkness would allow. After a few steps, Aedan missed his footing and stumbled forward, striking the outer wall. He realised that the falling boulder must have made some large cavities in the stairs.
The sounds of digging had grown muffled, but it was obvious that the creature’s efforts had not diminished in the least. Soon, the echoes of heavy tumbling objects reached them again. This time it sounded like there were many boulders.
“How far, Merter?” Fergal called.
“We’re here.”
Fergal and Aedan took the last few stairs as the light grew, then they stumbled into the archive room still bright with oil lamps.
“Move!” Fergal shouted. “Away from the door.”
He pulled Aedan and Liru to the side and the others darted out of the way as three rocks, one almost as high as a man’s waist, rushed through the opening, smashing into the shelves on the far side of the room.
The soldiers were too shaken to speak, and they stared, trembling. Even the injuries were ignored. Nobody looked for the crown which would be somewhere under the rubble.
Merter and Aedan had their eyes on the cavernous museum door on the far side of the chamber, but the snake had not emerged.
“What was that thing up there?” Tyne asked, her voice shrill.
Nobody knew.
Fergal hurried away. “There are five alcoves in this wall,” he said. “In one of them a hidden exit was planned, but I don’t know if it was completed. Perhaps it is concealed by a shelf, or worked into the floor. I’ll take the one nearest the museum, the rest of you take the others. Merter, please keep an eye on the museum. There’s no telling where the snake could be now.”
Aedan entered an alcove and Liru took the one alongside. He began by pulling a large rug off the floor and inspecting the paving stones for any kind of groove that might indicate a trapdoor, but the grouting between blocks was solid.
Boulders continued to tumble down the stairs. He suspected that eventually that giant beast would be able to dig its way to them. He also knew that if the snake had not been properly roused earlier, this din was likely to finish the job.
He tried to concentrate. The walls were next, but packed shelves covered them. He began clearing, placing the armloads of tablets on the floor as gently as his haste would allow. From one of the other alcoves there was a tinkling crash of shattering clay. Someone, clearly, had decided that it was time for sacrifices to be made. Aedan stepped back and looked over. It was Tyne.
“Nothing here,” she said, and marched into another alcove.
Fergal’s indignant face showed itself briefly.
“Here,” called Liru. “I think I have it.”
Aedan dropped the tablets he was holding with a clatter and darted across, the others close behind. Liru was pointing to a brass lever.
“Wait! Don’t touch it yet,” Fergal cried, pounding into the alcove. He looked at the lever and darted from wall to wall, examining the joins. When he noticed the steel bars in the corners he nodded.
“Well?” said Tyne, her impatience in no way concealed. “Are we going to open this door or not?”
“It’s not a door,” Fergal replied. “Everyone, collect your lamps and get in here.”
Osric was conscious but stunned, and had to be supported. It was only the soldiers who hung back with distrustful expressions.
“Suit yourselves,” Fergal said, and pulled the lever.
Nothing happened.
“You’re right,” said Tyne. “Definitely not a door. I’m going to try another alcove.”
“Patience, dear. Counterweights can have delays.”
“Well right now, a delay –”
The floor shuddered and dropped, causing everyone to reach out f
or a support. The walls began to slide up behind the standing shelves, as the ground beneath them sank. In front of them, the floor of the archive room rose, slowly closing off the entrance.
The soldiers were still watching from the archive room. Something caused all three to look towards the museum. As if stung, they spun away and shot across the floor, screaming, fighting each other to get ahead. They dived through the shrinking gap between the archive floor and the ceiling of the cubicle, tumbling onto the heads and shoulders of the rest of the party. One landed on Osric. Tyne gripped his collar and flung him off none too gently. But neither he nor the other two had eyes for anything other than the disappearing entrance.
Then they were enclosed. It was rock on all sides.
“Fergal,” Tyne said, “Is this cubicle hanging from chains?”
“Most likely.”
“But they would be made of iron or steel, and everything iron in this place is rusted …”
“Rust works its way in from the outer surface. As with the main door of the archive room, heavy chain links will still have a good deal of strength in the core.”
“Are you sure about that?”
Fergal shifted. He was about to reply when there was a sharp clink of metal above them. The floor trembled and brought all conversation to an end. Everyone was holding onto something.
Another opening appeared where the first had been, dark and cold, rising up from the ground until it swallowed the entire wall. For a long time they descended in breathless silence until a rocky floor reached the level of their feet. They all lost their balance as the moving platform jolted and came to rest with a cavernous boom that echoed out around them as if they were in the belly of a mountain. And perhaps they were.
They had been carried deep under Kultûhm, into a place they hadn’t known existed.
Fergal led the way onto a landing. The others followed, holding the oil lamps out, shielding their eyes and peering into the darkness beyond.
The cubicle that had lowered them was enclosed on three sides by a hollowed stone pillar. Above the ceiling of this moving cubicle, they could now see the four steel bars were fastened to chains that reached far up beyond the glow of their lamps. Aedan guessed that they ran over a giant pulley and attached to a counterweight somewhere, but was at a loss as to how it all worked. He wondered why the platform had not shot up like a startled pheasant the moment they stepped off, but then realised a simple latch would solve that problem.
As his eyes adjusted, he saw a number of carriage-sized stone blocks all around. It looked as if they had been intended as counterweights, with chains and braces lying nearby. The skill in engineering that these people had possessed was like nothing he had ever seen in Castath. And all of this almost a thousand years ago.
The sound of running water drew his attention to a channel nearby. Beside it was a deep pit, and beyond that the stark white curves of a partly assembled skeleton. It was even bigger than the specimen he had seen in the museum, and altogether different in form. It looked like it had been some type of giant lizard – flat, broad and ugly. The teeth were almost as long as he was tall. Looking at it gave him an icy feeling.
“Where are we?” Tyne asked.
Fergal looked around at the hulking shapes of unfinished stone machines, the tools, the aged bones, the channels of dark water, and the great pillars of rock that stood around them like the legs of titans and reached far up to a roof only betrayed by faint, jagged contours.
“I have never learned of this place,” he said. “I doubt that any living man has. If the cavity was natural to begin with, it has been vastly altered – those abandoned tools suggest that much work was still in progress.”
“Fergal, please,” Tyne interrupted, glancing up from Osric who was breathing hard and shivering, “that might be interesting but –”
“Which means that there is bound to be a workers’ exit.”
“Can’t we just use another one of these moving platforms – they do go up, don’t they?”
“It looks, I’m afraid to say, that they don’t go anywhere. As far as the light reveals, ours seems to be the only one that was finished. We will, most probably, have to walk out, but first we need to get our bearings.”
“With what reference? Not even Merter could have kept a bearing down that stairwell.”
Fergal picked up a discarded rib the size of a spear and began to draw in a dusty bowl. “The archive room had a door in the wall that would be opposite us if we were to look out from our alcove. It was the door we tried on our way in, about here.” He drew a line. “And at that time we were walking west I believe. Merter?”
“A point to the north perhaps, but I’d settle for west.”
Using that as a reference, Fergal drew in the compass lines, and beside it, a rough layout of the city.
“These blocks” – he indicated the pale shapes around them – “which I presume to be ballast blocks, are limestone, not found in a cavern of granite. It means that there has to be a large access point for this cave on one of the main city arteries, but not too near the city gate where a build-up would cause problems.”
That reminded Aedan of something. “There was a trapdoor in the ground near the main gate,” he said. “We saw it the first time we passed through.”
“Troop tunnel,” said Fergal. “Allowed soldiers to reach the gate quickly from the barracks. It wouldn’t lead down here. The four regions in the city that have both the broad roads and space required for a mining and construction entrance are the palace, the barracks, the area beneath the market, and the south quarter.” He indicated each on his rough map. “The palace is not an option for a workers’ entrance. The barracks are here.” He thought for a while. “I’m going to rule that out because of the Gellerac love of military efficiency – queues of miners would interfere with smooth deployment. That leaves the market and south quarter.” He fell silent again.
“Wouldn’t the market be too cluttered for big loads of stone?” asked Tyne.
Fergal looked at her, or at a point somewhere beyond her, and absently twisted his fingers in his beard.
“Fergal?”
“In Castath, that would be the logical conclusion, but the Gellerac had a culture of social elitism that is difficult for us to grasp. The southern suburbs had wide streets because that was where the wealthy settled. Whoever commissioned this entrance would have had to choose between the congestion near the market and the outrage of the wealthy. I think … yes, I think I’m going to go with the market.”
“You don’t sound convinced.”
“Quite true, Tyne, quite true.”
“Well what if you’re wrong?”
“Then I will be convinced it was the other way. Now …” he said, pointing back to his map, “we are currently here, except that we are a few hundred feet beneath the surface. My map, I’m sure you will appreciate, cannot represent that dimension. Which means that our most hopeful bearing would be that way.” He pointed out into the darkness, roughly in line with the grinning lizard skeleton. “Osric, are you able to walk?”
“Of course!” Osric pushed himself to his feet, took a step, and crashed into the ground like a felled pine.
“We’ll get him there,” said Tyne. “Merter and I can manage.”
“Wouldn’t it be better if I –”
“No, Fergal. I am more than strong enough, and your place is with directions.”
Aedan turned to Liru and lowered his voice. “Can’t argue about her being strong enough, but I think what she really means by the second part is that her place is with Osric.”
“So you’ve noticed too,” said Liru.
“I think even the horses noticed.”
Liru’s typical smiles were subtle twitches that were hard to spot in broad daylight. Where she stood in shadow, she was all but invisible. Aedan wondered if there would be brightening of her expression now. It wasn’t likely, considering what they had just witnessed in the council room, but it made him realise how long it
had been since she had smiled at him.
He took his place in the line that formed and moved out. Maintaining a bearing was imperative, so they were careful to fix a line through three points at any given time and, when they reached the first, to pick another at the edge of their lamp range.
As they walked, they passed more of the giant counterweighted machines, some using levers like oversized seesaws, others chains, some having a part of the mechanism reaching up to the rocky ceiling, but none ready for use. There were many bridged walkways allowing passage over the channels. These channels were beginning to look like veins the way they distributed the water so evenly.
Tools – picks, shovels, chisels, sledgehammers and numerous contraptions Aedan could not identify – were lying where they had been dropped. Carts were abandoned, their stone payloads lying beneath them in neat piles where they had fallen through the corroded trays. There were three more towering skeletons and many bones still embedded in rock, but no human remains, suggesting that the cave had been successfully evacuated.
Apart from the gurgle of water, an occasional scuff of a boot on the rocky floor or the unintentional kicking of a pebble that skittered away into darkness, the cave was silent. Yet it had a sound, or at least a feeling of great depth that whispered through the emptiness.
Then the skeletons began to grow more numerous, and this time they were human. There were many, and they were all laid out in rows, occasionally overlapping. It was a peculiar arrangement, and Aedan wondered if it had to do with some Gellerac superstition. Could this be their cemetery?
“Fergal,” he called. “Why were they placed like this?”
Fergal stopped and turned. He did not answer immediately, and when he did, his voice was raw.
“They weren’t placed in the sense that you are thinking. These skeletons are lined up because the dung in which they were encased has decomposed.” All eyes were drawn across a pale graveyard. “Kultûhm,” he said, “was abandoned, but a great many did not escape.”
Dawn of Wonder (The Wakening Book 1) Page 61
