Michael Cobley - Humanity's Fire book 1

by Seeds of Earth

  'The test demands . . . demands the correct path to

  death,' Chel said hoarsely. 'Each pillar is a meditation

  focus that fills the meditator with a particular creed of

  thought, an overriding set of beliefs and instincts.'

  Levered up into a seated position, he pointed with his

  good hand at the pillars one by one. 'Fear, escaping from

  enemies; dominance, destroying or preying on the weak;

  arrogance, reaching out for godhood; serenity, change-

  less and creating no change.' The Uvovo gave an

  unsteady smile, if I had been a fully husked Listener, or

  had approached with all these new senses open, and

  chosen the wrong pillar, I would have been over-

  whelmed by it and, soon after, dead from whatever trap

  the doors conceal.'

  'We'll be calling you "lucky Chel" next,' Greg said.

  i would wear the title gladly,' the Uvovo said, getting

  to his feet. 'Once we are through safely. Now I must

  open myself to the pillar of serenity . . .'

  'And that's the correct one, is it?'

  'So the Iterants of the Eternal say.'

  'How much will it affect you?' said Greg. 'Will you

  be safe?'

  it is only a temporary veil over the mind and fades

  soon after.'

  'You hope.'

  'Exactly so.'

  Greg stood over to one side as Chel approached one

  of the rearmost pillars, facing it with all three pairs of

  eyes now open, hands clasped across his chest. In the

  frozen stillness Greg resisted the urge to stamp his

  chill-bitten toes, instead rocking back and forth on the

  balls of his feet, keeping the circulation going. Then,

  before he knew it, Chel was heading towards the

  middle door of the three, arm half-extended, hand

  raised palm-outwards. He moved with a swift, gliding

  gait and reached the door before Greg was even

  halfway there. At his touch the carven stone block

  swung inwards and the Uvovo continued on through

  without breaking step.

  Just as Greg reached the doorway there was a

  swelling pulse of pale green light and fearing the worst

  he stopped at the threshold, peering in. But at the other

  end of a short passage he saw Chel standing a few paces

  onward, swinging his torch beam around and above

  him, gazing into the pitch-darkness.

  'The way is open, Gregori,' said the Uvovo in a

  dreamlike voice. 'Join me.'

  Nevertheless he felt a prickling sweat as he hurried

  through to the other side.

  'Such power waits here, Gregori, a vast slumbering

  might.' Chel's voice was measured yet slightly drowsy.

  'The legacy of the Great Ancients.'

  For a moment or two Greg didn't respond as he

  looked about him, trying to comprehend what he was

  seeing.They seemed to be in the huge circular chamber

  shown in the deepscan images, standing near the sheer

  wall which rose perhaps 30 metres to a level ceiling.

  There was a second waist-high wall, 4 metres in and

  made of rough blocks, which ran round the chamber. By

  torchlight he saw no decoration on the walls or ceiling,

  but when he looked over the low wall he was amazed to

  see patterns incised into the dark, polished stone,

  strange interlocking, semi-geometrical designs, symbols

  and characters quite unlike the glyphs and ideograms of

  the Uvovo language, completely covering the circular

  floor as far as he could see by his torch's beam. From the

  scan printouts he had guessed the chamber to be roughly

  250 metres across, which made this vast, ceremonial

  decoration a staggering find, not to say a mysterious

  one.

  Following the low wall, he considered climbing over

  for a closer look, but then further along, just visible by

  his torch, was a gap. As he drew nearer he saw that

  there was a wide platform set into the main wall at

  about head-height with steps leading up to it. He

  glanced back at Chel, thinking to draw his attention to

  it, but the Uvovo was seated cross-legged on the stone

  floor, eyes closed, his torch lying beside him, throwing a

  fan-shaped shaft of light across the stone.

  He'll see it all when he comes out of that trance, he

  thought and climbed the steps two at a time. The steps

  split halfway up into two stairways flanking a curved

  shelf which jutted from the platform like a pulpit. The

  platform itself was about 2 metres deep and empty but

  on the jutting shelf was a square plinth with an odd

  pyramidal depression in its flat top. Standing there he

  could almost feel the ancient darkness congeal about

  him. The air was cold and still, yet it didn't seem in the

  least bit stale.

  Was this an altar} he wondered. Or a vantage point,

  since the great circular floor was the undoubted focus of

  this immense chamber?

  Greg descended the stairs. The gap in the low wall lay

  directly before him and without pause he walked out

  onto the fabulously inscribed floor.

  A sudden, fleeting sensation passed over him and he

  could feel hairs prickle on his scalp and the backs of his

  hands. It didn't feel any colder out there yet there was an

  instinctive uneasiness quivering in him. Frowning, he

  crouched down with his torch to get a good look at the

  patterns. The lines were smooth and precise and had

  been incised in the stone with a fine, sharp implement,

  yet the edges of every groove were rounded and worn

  while the untouched stone surfaces looked pitted and

  eroded. He reached down and touched the stone, which

  turned out to be slightly warm. Then with a fingertip he

  traced one of the pattern lines, a long curve with several

  small loops, feeling the rounded edges and the rougher

  stone on either side ...

  Next thing he knew a bright gleam appeared in the

  groove beneath his finger and began to race along it in

  both directions. He snatched his hand away but it kept

  spreading like a silver thread dividing and coiling and

  entwining and surrounding. Seized by dread he stood,

  intending to head for the gap in the low wall .. . and

  was stopped by an invisible barrier. Fearful, he turned,

  took a step and came up against another one. It was

  solid and entirely transparent: shining his torch at it

  caused a faint ripple effect that quickly faded. Trying not

  to panic, he turned, pointing his torch, and saw an open

  area but before he could take a step he heard Chel speak

  urgently nearby: 'Gregori, as you value your life stay

  exactly where you are - don't move!'

  27

  CHEL

  The meditation pillar for serenity had made everything

  so clear to him. With all eyes open and his every sense

  ready, Chel had looked into the pillar and the pillar had

  sung to him a gorgeous, interlocking river of concepts

  and revelations that flooded his thoughts with intrinsic

  truth. Be changeless and leave the world unchanged, the

  highest aspiration, the supernal truth.


  And of course, if all paths lead to death it does not

  matter which door you take, thus when he chose the

  middle door it let him through without hindrance. A

  few steps on and he had to stop, his senses over-

  whelmed - the huge chamber was alive to his eyes! The

  glow of torches, the walls decorated with brightly

  coloured hangings, the pulse and pattern of energies,

  messages sent and received, visitors coming and going,

  greetings and farewells, conversations, commands and

  prayers. With the eyes of serenity Chel could see the

  changes wrought by the past: changeless he could per-

  ceive the warpwell in all its slumbering glory, its use as

  a journeying portal expertly operated by those ancient

  Uvovo.

  He tried to communicate something of this to

  Gregori, who had then wandered past him, eyes blind to

  all the glory yet clearly still struck by the chamber's

  dimensions and the subdued undercurrents of the warp-

  well's mighty purpose. In Chel's eyes, the well's surface

  was a murkily opaque layer, a thick translucent plate

  covering nebulous depths. Not dead but not awake, the

  warpwell slept.

  Chel had sat down on the stone floor to rest his limbs

  and allow his thoughts to drift into a true changeless

  state. But something was amiss, something was holding

  his mind back, keeping it from the soothing, joyous cer-

  tainty of indivisible serenity. And whereas before, just

  minutes ago, every precept of the serenity path had

  stood pure and whole in his mind, now they seemed

  vague, uncertain. Troubled, he strove to reclaim that

  cherished state of being, to shore up its bulwarks and

  reaffirm its foundations . . .

  Then through all these muddled thoughts he heard,

  clear and sharp, the impact of Gregori's first footfall

  upon the surface of the warpwell.

  He scrambled to his feet, the serenity meditation

  falling away like misty tatters. The reverberations of

  those footsteps were like hammerblows and were being

  channelled downwards by the patterns in the stone. And

  glittering webs were shimmering in the gloom beneath

  the warpwell's opaque covering plate. Something, some

  part of the well was responding and if it was in self-

  defence ...

  He dashed along the walkway. Gregori was several

  paces out on the surface, his torch aimed at the stone as

  he crouched down and touched the patterning. At once,

  glowing tendrils spiralled downwards beneath the

  human while restricting veils sprang up around him:

  meanwhile, wider, surrounding patterns were starting

  to glow. The warpwell was trying to protect itself from

  its enemies . . . and its last enemies were the Dreamless,

  artificial, inorganic entities, and Gregori's boots con-

  tained artificial elements.

  Gregori had just realised that something was very

  wrong when he collided with the pattern walls. Quickly,

  Chel leaped onto the wall and called to him;

  'Gregori, as you value your life stay exactly where

  you are - don't move!'

  The Human froze and looked his way. 'Chel, what's

  happening?'

  'You are standing on an artefact built by the Great

  Ancients at the world's dawn. Its defences have awoken

  and will kill you if you don't get back over this wall -

  now, remove your boots, your socks too. Roll up your

  jacket sleeves, as high as they will go, and your trouser

  legs.'

  Wordlessly, Gregori did so and finished with his

  boots hanging around his neck. He grinned.

  'This feels like getting ready for some obscure coun-

  try dancing ritual.'

  Chel stared at him - sometimes Human humour was

  incomprehensible, but especially so now.

  'Turn to your left,' he said. 'Reach out and feel your

  way along the pattern walls.'

  'Why am I doing this?' Gregori said as he began.

  'I am guessing that replacing the dead materials of

  your boots with the living flesh of your feet may cause

  these defences to either slow down or go into abeyance.'

  'But you don't know.'

  'I can see ... I have seen fragments of the past .. .'

  Fleeting images now to his six open eyes, scattered

  and fading in the rising heartbeat of an ancient, buried

  power. And this is what they are here for, Kuros and the

  Hegemony - this is what we must defend, if it does not

  kill us first.

  'How am I doing, Chel?'

  Gregori had turned a corner and was following a

  long, curving wall through the patterns, but the ominous

  machineries were still escalating beneath him. Were the

  warpwell's Sentinels following some ingrained, inflexible

  purification ritual?

  'Keep going,' Chel said, walking along to stand at the

  gap in the wall, staring at the patterns all around

  Gregori, pushing at them with his mind, trying to wrench

  answers from them. What was this buildup of power

  meant to achieve and how dangerous would it be?

  Gregori was a couple of paces from the gap when

  another pattern wall winked into existence before him.

  'Follow it to the right,' Chel said. 'The other way

  leads back into the pattern.' And a few moments later

  Greg was an arm's-length from Chel, who then stopped

  him from leaping the remaining distance. 'First, drop

  your boots behind you.'

  Gregori unslung his boots from his neck, tossed them

  back the way he had come then grasped Chel's out-

  stretched arm, which hauled him off the warpwell

  pattern.

  'Now what?'

  Chel heard the sudden change in the building energies

  and felt a strange vibrancy in his muscles, his nerves, his

  eyes.

  'Run!'

  They took off in a mad dash back to the entrance.

  Gregori had the longer legs and got there first, ducking

  along the short passage and swinging round into the

  cold chamber, leaning against the wall. Hard on his

  heels, Chel saw he had stopped and dragged him

  towards the stairs.

  'Don't. . . stop . . .'

  They made it to the top of the steps when the warp-

  well defences finally surged, a soundless eruption. Chel's

  eyes were closed but still he felt the edges of that puri-

  fying reflex - for a second at its peak he found he could

  stare through his eyelids and right through the rock of

  Giant's Shoulder, as if it was foggy glass, to see the daz-

  zling webs of energy that were pouring out of just that

  small section of the warpwell pattern to scour the entire

  chamber. Then the ferocious radiance subsided, leaving

  him in the dark.

  Opening just his ordinary eyes he saw Gregori

  crouched at the top of the stairs, eyes wide and blinking.

  'Chel? Are you still there?'

  'I am, friend Gregori - what can you see?'

  'Hmm, a familiar-sounding blur.'

  Chel laughed. 'Your sight will return to normal soon.

  I'm going back down to inspect the chamber - do you

 
wish to accompany me?'

  'I think I'll sit this one out... Aye, and don't do any-

  thing risky, mind. Take it from one who knows.'

  'I shall not be long,' Chel said, descending the steps.

  The warpwell chamber looked exactly as it had before,

  although he was using only his ordinary eyes. The air

  was as icy as before but now it had a faint mineral odour,

  like stone ground down to fine dust. The incised patterns

  on the surface of the well seemed dull and lifeless, and of

  Gregori's boots there was no sign.

  Not dead but not awake, he thought, recalling the

  visions he had seen during the husking, the vast funnel

  of energies reaching out to seize the ships of the Legion

  and the Great Ancients alike, dragging them down into

  the warpwell then further down through the levels of

  hyperspace, through crushing, shredding strata to dark

  and narrow places. Yet still potent. Will it be any use

  against our enemies? Will we have time to puzzle out its

  workings}

  For a moment he was tempted to open his husking

  eyes and gaze upon the fleeting ghosts of the past, but

  instead he replaced the cloth headband, tying it at the

  side. No, he had to meet with Weynl and the other

  Listeners to seek guidance and determine if any useful

  knowledge survived from those far-off times.

  And he would have to give an explanation of some

  kind to Gregori, who had appeared at the door to the

  meditation chamber, his torch a bright knot in the inky

  darkness. Chel grinned and waved, then hurried to join

  his friend, wondering how much he should tell him.

  28

  KAO CHIH

  'Ah hmm, so if I may summarise,' said the droid recy-

  cler, a Voth called Yolog, as he prodded the small pile of

  money with a long, stained finger. 'You wish to hire me

  to recover your corrupted course data, so that both you

  and your fine mech companion may travel onwards to

  the outlaw anchorage of Bryag Station ... and this is all

  you have?'

  Kao Chih smiled and spread his hands.

  'Honourable artisan Yolog, at every stop in the jour-

  ney that awaits us we shall make a point of mentioning

  you and the unequalled excellence of your work. Now if

  you had to buy that kind of advertising, how much

  would it cost? - yet here we are, offering it as part-pay-