The air no longer seemed as clean as it had. As they walked on, Aedan found his breathing becoming shallow. It was not just the sense of contamination. There really was something in the air that was not right.
Finally, one of the soldiers blurted out, “What is that smell?”
“Probably bats,” said Tyne. “Stop breathing and it will go away.” Aedan was close enough to hear her mumble, “And so will you.”
Fergal again drew to a halt and everyone stopped.
“What is it?” Merter asked from under Osric’s shoulder.
“I think you’d better take a look.”
After setting Osric down, Merter walked to where Fergal stood. Aedan, of course, was already there.
“They look like the tree trunks we saw in the streets …” Merter froze. “Oh no!” he whispered.
Fergal raised his lamp and Aedan did likewise. Ahead of them stretched acres of what they now understood to be tree-sized droppings, fresh droppings.
“It was what I was worried about,” said Fergal. “Where else would something that big make its lair?”
High up in the round tower, choking clouds swirled in the breeze. From shutterless windows, rusty afternoon light spilled across the council room, illuminating the haze and creating thick bars of curling gold. A stone shifted and then dropped, releasing another small cloud into the air.
The dust did not settle quickly, but when it did, it revealed a room that was vastly changed. Where the narrow opening to the stairwell had been, there was now what could only be described as a colossal burrow. This tunnel reached down almost fifty feet before it was utterly clogged with rocks and crumbled mortar.
Another stone came loose and bounded into the void.
The sound was hollow.
From high in the air, a richly coloured mountain barbet dropped onto the windowsill in a flurry of deep ochres and hazy blues. He was a young bird. As he cast a plucky eye over the strange shapes surrounding him, he decided he was impressed – no – satisfied with his discovery. After a few more glances here and there, he settled and began to preen himself. Between every few draws of his beak he would tilt his head to the side and babble to himself of his own growing finery and of the magnificence of his new roost. And it was his.
For nowhere in the building behind him or in the city beneath was there another creature to be seen.
Far below, deep in the earth, Tyne, Merter and Osric were all heaving for breath, but none called for a slackening of pace as they ran. The foul stench had passed but the memory had not. If anything, the dread had grown. Their heads turned constantly, but the only breaks to the monotony of the cave floor were the many water channels. The ground fell away slightly and the lights of their oil lamps revealed a glistening surface, dark as slate but smoother.
“Oh – water,” said Fergal, stumbling to a halt in front of a wide, dark lake. “So still it almost caught me out, or in.”
“Bridge to the left,” said Merter.
“I don’t see it.”
“Trust me, Fergal. It’s there.”
They ran along the side to the left, and after a while, the lines of a stone bridge emerged.
“How did you see it from that far away?” Tyne demanded.
“Peripheral vision. Better perception in darkness when not looking directly –”
“Yes, yes, I know all that. But I saw nothing. I’m convinced there is a cat hiding somewhere up in your family tree.”
The bridge was long and wide, spanning a body of water that was a few hundred yards across and could have been anywhere between a foot and a mile deep.
When they reached the land on the other side, they passed a cart that still held its load – and it sparkled. This time Aedan ignored it and ran on. He didn’t want another confrontation with Liru. The soldiers, however, lingered, and when they caught up, their pockets were bulging. The flaps of their coats were down and nothing showed, but they were unable to conceal the glittering that escaped from their eyes.
The ground began to rise again, more steeply now. It was too much for the staggering Osric and his bearers.
“We can’t slow down for them,” one of the soldiers said, his voice raspy and dry.
“Good point,” said Fergal. “Why don’t you three run along, and we’ll catch up.”
Nobody ran on. They all knew that Fergal was the only one capable of finding a way out.
“It’s time we took charge here,” the soldier announced, reaching for his sword. But Merter slipped across like a shadow and had his knife at the man’s throat before the sword was halfway drawn.
Aedan stared. He had never seen anyone move that fast.
“Want to play?” Merter growled.
The soldier raised his hands slowly. Merter took the sword, handing it to Tyne; then in another catlike burst, he knocked the man back and snatched the weapons from his two injured comrades before they were able to mount any resistance.
“Osric,” Merter said. “May I kill them?”
When the general spoke, he sounded tired and his teeth were clearly gritted against tremendous pain. “It would probably be justice, but the procedure for punishing their crimes is a little more involved. My conscience could not accept such executions, though a part of me wishes you hadn’t troubled yourself to ask.”
Merter’s knife hovered. Everyone held their breaths and stared. Slowly, the blade descended, but it was not re-sheathed. Merter tucked it against his forearm and carried it there as they resumed the climb. The confiscated weapons were left and forgotten, but the tension was not, and it held a keener edge than any of the abandoned steel.
They had climbed only a hundred feet when Merter pointed.
“Could that be a way out?” he asked.
It was still hidden in darkness, but as they approached, the light revealed a towering wooden structure that rose to the height of the ceiling that was now only just discernible three hundred feet or more above them. The wooden beams were thick, and though they had suffered from the passage of time, they retained enough strength to hold together.
“I don’t think it’s a way out,” said Fergal. “There’s only one other thing it can be, and one way to be sure. Hide your lamps under your cloaks for a moment; try not to set yourselves alight.”
They did as they were told.
“Can you see it? Above the tower?”
Aedan peered up into the darkness. The faintest point of light reflected back at them, though there was nothing to reflect.
“Looks like a sliver of daylight,” said Merter.
It faded.
“Daylight would have remained,” Fergal explained. “This tower was built to retrieve an earthstar. The gems absorb and radiate light for a short time. That’s how the Gellerac discovered them, and entirely by accident.”
“Why didn’t they take it?” Aedan asked. “The tower seems to be right there?”
“It was always an official ceremony. One of many things that I imagine were interrupted. Let us be gone.”
They continued up the steep slope, but a noise from behind drew Aedan’s attention. He turned and stared. The uninjured soldier had remained at the tower. He was already thirty feet up the ladder, lamp swinging.
“Look,” Aedan called. “He’s going for the earthstar.”
They stopped and faced around.
“Don’t shout,” said Fergal. “We can’t risk the noise. He has made his choice.”
They turned and left the lone soldier rising into the inky darkness behind them.
The cave narrowed and looked as if it was about to split.
Merter stopped. “Quiet,” he said.
The party drew to a halt. Aedan tried to still his breathing.
“What was it?” Fergal whispered after a while.
“I thought I heard a fall of stones. It sounded far off, a long way behind the wooden scaffolding.”
The sudden pounding of blood in Aedan’s ears made it difficult to hear anything else.
“Put out a
ll the lamps but Fergal’s,” Merter whispered.
The darkness swamped in on them.
“Now be careful with your feet. Lift them high so you don’t kick a stone. Fergal, lead on.”
They reached the split. There were abandoned tools and mounds of broken rock on both sides. Fergal stood in silence, looking one way then the other.
“Merter,” he whispered, “What do you see?”
After a brief pause the ranger captain replied. “Left, I can see lots of edged objects, maybe tools in racks, right nothing. I think –”
This time there was no need for him to call for silence. They all heard it, a deep wash of parting water. They spun around. The lake was hidden in darkness, but the climbing soldier was a starry beacon.
Aedan hoped the climber would be seen first. He was too frightened to even recognise the selfishness of the thought. He hurried after Fergal, almost pushing him in his haste.
They took the left split, and sure enough, Fergal’s pale lamplight fell on rows of shelves, part-filled with mining and construction tools. Aedan realised that it would be logical for this to be located near a main entrance. The cave narrowed further. The ceiling dropped until it was less than a hundred feet above them.
They passed a large metal cage, jumped a water channel and stopped before a deep rectangular pit. The lamp revealed skeletons strewn across its floor, but unlike the other skeletons, these were crushed, absolutely flattened as if they had been painstakingly hammered until no ridge or mound projected upward above half an inch.
Beyond the pit was a solid rock wall.
A horrible realisation took hold of Aedan. Fergal had been wrong.
For all his brilliance, he had brought them to a dead end.
A faraway shriek of terror caused the whole party to turn back as one. In the distance, they could still see the soldier on the ladder. He was more than half way up, but something was amiss. The lamp had fallen, burst open on the beams and set the wood alight.
“Clumsy fool,” Tyne muttered.
“I don’t think it was clumsiness,” said Merter quietly. “Watch the tower.”
As the soldier clung to the ladder and managed to get his dangling feet back onto the rungs, the entire structure shook and he was nearly flung into the air. With one desperate hand he managed to retain his hold. This time he wound his arms and legs around the beams like a frightened toddler clinging to his father’s leg. The flames spread quickly through the dust-dry timber. Something big shifted beneath the tower, a shadow it seemed, but it did not waver with the flames as a shadow would have done.
A crack of splitting beams echoed through the cave. The tower shuddered and leaned. Sounds of rippling fire travelled across the space, fire that cast its glare over the lake that now shimmered with countless reflections. An arching pillar of smoke stood up from the ground, weaving and leaning, but then Aedan realised that the fire had not yet reached the ground.
It could not be smoke.
He heard someone whimper nearby as all began to grasp the full size and form of the beast in whose lair they were trapped.
It had the long supple lines of a serpent, but the impossible size of a mythical dragon, and its shape was different too – broader, more lizard like, and far more powerful. The hide was an armour of scales black as midnight, interrupted only on the underside by a pattern of sickly off-white bands that looked almost like a host of grasping arms. The monster reared over a hundred feet into the air, and that was probably less than half its body.
Instead of trying to think of some way out, Aedan stared, transfixed by the sight before him, the lurid terror holding him in a vice.
Flames reached the soldier and his screams tore through the air. The dark pillar rose up behind him, no longer hidden in shadow, bright flames reflecting off its metallic hide. The soldier drew himself up, set his feet on a rung and leapt away from the inferno. He did not travel far. The animal’s lunge was precise, the speed blinding, and the soldier’s scream was cut off.
There was more than one breath of horror.
Aedan turned to Fergal. But Fergal was not to be seen. The light from the burning tower had rendered his lamp unnecessary, and he had moved off without anyone noticing. Aedan started back towards the cage they had passed earlier. He saw Fergal standing in the shadow, staring at a puddle of water that had formed beneath a leak above him, twirling his beard.
“Fergal?”
“Bring the others over will you, Aedan.”
Aedan’s mind was spinning, so he made no attempt to reason, simply ran back and passed on the message. When they arrived, Fergal ordered everyone into the cage.
“It won’t work,” Tyne objected, “That thing will tear through this cage like it’s made of straw.”
Fergal ignored her. He was pulling on a rusted chain nearby, producing some shrill screechings above him. Aedan cringed and spun to look behind him, searching the area around the fire which was now a tumbling inferno lighting the cave for half a mile in each direction and glaring off a thousand sparkling surfaces. But there was no sign of movement.
Or was there?
A ridge of dark rock stood between them and the blaze. Aedan didn’t remember that ridge.
“Fergal,” he called in a trembling voice. “Fergal, hurry!”
Fergal released the chain, stepped into the cage and closed the barred door with another shriek of metal. Aedan winced.
“We’re in a trap,” Tyne whispered. “Why are we here?”
“Patience, Tyne,” Fergal said. “Nothing more we can do, and panic won’t aid our cause. Like I said, counterweights can take time.”
A reverberating thunder filled the air as the tower split and began to collapse. Flame-wreathed timbers hurtled to ground with a slowness conjured by distance until they plunged into the growing hill of coals.
Something snatched Aedan’s attention away. There was a clatter of chains above, a violent lurch that had everyone staggering to regain their balance, and the cage lifted and began to rise into the air.
“How did you work it out?” Aedan managed, trying to mask his terror with interest.
“It was the pit with those crushed skeletons that gave it away,” said Fergal. “That’s where the counterweight comes to rest. The dripping water was the clue to explaining the water channels – weight equalisation. The chain I pulled must open a sluice in a channel above the cave. Water rushes into what I presume is a hollowed out limestone block until its weight is greater than ours, and we begin to rise.”
Aedan was pretending to listen while his eyes searched the ground below.
Fergal continued, “The movement probably causes the sluice to close so we don’t accelerate as we rise. At the top there is likely to be another set of chains to adjust the water-level in the ballast block according to the load going down. Simple, but most good designs are.”
Aedan realised Fergal had stopped talking. He didn’t want to reveal that he had missed every point, so he asked, “How were you able to think that out while the soldier was trying to escape?”
“I could not bear watching again. I had to turn my thoughts elsewhere.”
“Fergal,” said Merter, “I think silence would be wise. Look.”
At first Aedan didn’t see what Merter was referring to. The Fire still raged in the distance. Though the light was glaring, the dark rock and undulating surfaces still hid much in shadow. There was the lake, its waters beginning to settle, the rows of carved stone columns – a motionless army – and the dark cave floor, slate-like in the shadows. Apart from that pronounced ridge about half way along, there were no distinct features.
Then the ridge shifted.
The simultaneous flinching of every occupant caused the cage to sway and creak. Aedan looked up and wondered how deeply the rust had sunk into those chains.
He looked back. The ridge was gone.
They were now a good fifty feet in the air, and an arch of the cave ceiling began to obscure the view. The steel floor blocked the low
er angle. After a few more feet they were no longer able to see anything beneath them.
“Weapons out,” Osric wheezed.
Aedan understood, though he had no illusions of matching Osric’s throw. The look of calculation he had seen in those yellow eyes had convinced him that such a trick could not be repeated.
They readied themselves, blades pointing out through the bars like the spines of a hedgehog, but this was an unhappily plucked hedgehog. With the soldiers disarmed and Osric unable to rise from the ground, the defence did not look reassuring.
Chains clinked and creaked. The counterweight appeared from above, passed them not far to the side and dropped away at a speed equal to their ascent. Aedan was able to glimpse the pool of water in its hollowed out centre before it disappeared from view.
With the fire light cut off, they rose into a darkness relieved only by Fergal’s oil lamp. He snuffed it, and all was lost to the eye but the faintest outlines.
Creak, rattle, clink, clink, clink …
If there was movement taking place beneath them, the growing noise of the chains masked it. Still they listened, straining their senses to the limits of that divide between the real and the imagined.
Aedan was just beginning to relax when his ears were assaulted by a hiss like the spray of a tempest. He gripped the bar in front of him just as something slammed against the base of the cage and threw it upwards. For a perilous moment, they hung in the air, the floor no longer beneath their feet, and then steel and flesh fell as one and came to a jarring halt as the chains locked taut.
But not all of them.
The cage staggered and listed over to the side as one of the ancient links broke free and the chain tumbled down onto the roof bars with a deafening clatter.
Everyone slid over the floor and came to a stop with arms and legs stuck out through the bars, wriggling, squirming to work their way back in. Aedan almost impaled himself on his sword. It slipped from his grasp, but snagged at the edge where he managed to retrieve it. Liru was less fortunate; hers flew out beyond reach and fell away.
They scrambled to their feet as best they could, braced themselves, and waited. Aedan’s arm was scratched raw from the rusty metal surfaces.
Dawn of Wonder (The Wakening Book 1) Page 62
