“Kawasi? I am going over tomorrow. Will you show me the way?”
She got up and walked outside and he followed, fearful that she would leave him once more. “Kawasi? I must go.”
“I know, but how can I send you to death? For there is no way—no way he can be freed.”
“Will you show me? Or must I chance the kiva?”
“Oh, no!” She hesitated again and then replied, “So be it. You are stubborn. Nothing I can say—”
“Nothing.”
“I will show you. I will take you over with me, but then I go to my people. What you shall do, I do not know. One thing: There is one whom you must fear.
“He is tall, taller than you, and very strong. He has great power also. He enters the Forbidden as he wishes, and we fear he knows much of us. We think he controls the spies among us and influences those who talk of leaving to join the Lords of Shibalba. You will know him if you see him. He has presence, a commanding presence. No one disobey him.” She paused. “He sent for me by one of his people. I refused, but he sent word he was coming for me and to destroy us.”
“He has a name?”
“Zipacna. Whatever you do, beware of Zipacna!”
CHAPTER 31
Tomorrow! There was no more to be said. He was committed. Leaving Kawasi in the inner room, he bedded down near the drafting table with Chief at the opening, near him. There he could look out at the stars, perhaps for the last time.
What kind of thinking was that? Nonsense! He would make it. He would find Erik, and they would come back, and so would whoever Erik had with him, no matter how many.
Yet this might be his last night on earth as he had known it, for when he returned, if he returned, would it ever seem the same again?
He smiled grimly into the darkness, and said, half-aloud, “You’ve been a damned fool before, Mike, but this one takes the cake!”
Looking across the river at the vast bulk of No Man’s, he shuddered. The shudder was involuntary, brought on by what unknown presentiment of fear he knew not. No Man’s, black, ominous, mysterious. The time was now.
Nothing, not even the wild windswept vastness of the Chang-Tang would be like this, nor even those strange trails he had followed to the hidden monasteries of the Bon-po, nor his visit to the lost castle of Kesar of Ling. Nothing could be like this.
There had been magic there, too, and he had not known then what to expect, yet it somehow had seemed fated from his first meeting with the wizened little man in the streets of what was then called Suchow, east of the Jade Gate.
He had walked knife-edge ridges, followed trails that skirted a gorge three thousand feet deep, with nothing but death promised at the journey’s end.
He had survived, and he would survive now. But this was a story he would never write, as he had not written those others. There were some things a man kept to himself, always. Some stories had to remain buried inside you. Before that trip into the Kunluns, he had not believed that, but now he knew it was true.
Lying awake, his dreams lit by the candles of the stars, he thought it out carefully. Every sense must be alert. He must make no misstep. He must enter the Forbidden and walk slowly and quietly across the outer court to the Hall of Archives. Once inside the Hall, he must find the area of maps at once and seek out the chart of the Forbidden.
He must be ever wary of those Death Doors. He must find Erik and free him, and then they must escape by the quickest possible route.
What of Kawasi?
He sat up suddenly. What of Kawasi? She was returning with him, going to her people, but what then? What of him? What of them together? Did she know how he felt? He had not spoken. Well, after a fashion he had. After he had freed Erik, would she come with him? Could she come? Dared she leave her people, whose welfare was in her hands?
Something seemed to stir in the night, a vast, weird sensation such as he had never felt. It was as if the whole earth gave a slow sigh, and then subsided.
For a moment he thought he felt an earthquake, but the earth did not tremble. No rocks fell.
He lunged to his feet, somehow shocked and frightened. Frightened of what?
Kawasi was beside him. “Oh, Mike! It is happening!”
“What’s happening?” He was irritated because he did not know. He could not explain. It was unlike anything he had experienced.
“It is what I spoke of! Do you remember? How I said sometimes the openings are all closed? And it lasts for many years? Thirty, forty years or more?”
“I remember your mentioning it, of course, but—”
“I have been told of it. This…what just happened, this happens before. When it happens again, it is for a long time, maybe forever. I do not know what it is. Perhaps time itself shudders, perhaps space. Perhaps what happens here is in time with something else. Just as there are earthquakes, may there not be—”
“How much time do we have?” Suddenly he was very cool, very alert.
“I do not know. It is quick. Twenty-four of your hours, perhaps forty-eight. No more, I am sure. Whatever you would do, you must do before then. You must find Erik and get him out, or stay the rest of your life on the Other Side.”
“I’d be with you.”
Even as he said it he knew he was selfish. He wanted to be with her, but he wanted her on his side of the curtain. He wanted her with him, in his world.
He wanted to take care of her, to make a place for her, and over here he could do it. Over there he would know nothing, he would be out of the picture, at least for a long time.
“We can’t wait, then. We’ve got to go now.”
“All right,” she said.
Even as she spoke he told himself he was a fool. This was the perfect alibi. If the curtain was drawn, if the ways were closed off for thirty years, what could he do?
If he could stall, just delay a little, he could keep her over here and he would not be duty-bound to go after Erik. He would have Kawasi and they would be free to build a life here, in his world.
“Mike? If we are going…?”
“All right,” he said, and they went down the mountain in the darkness, down the canyon into the place that Johnny found.
His mouth was dry and his throat tight. He was scared.
Yet at the same time something was swelling within him, some strange eagerness, some anticipation for what was to come.
Now! he told himself. Now you’ll find out! Now for the ultimate, the final adventure!
Adventure? The word had always irritated him. It was so cheaply used, a cheap, romantic word on the lips of those who had never experienced anything like it. Being adrift in an open boat at sea was an “adventure,” but who wanted it?
Kawasi went quickly down the canyon and he followed. It was not quite as dark as it had been, or was it just that his eyes were growing accustomed to the night? No, the moon must be rising beyond the mountains.
He had always believed he was good in the mountains, but Kawasi was better. She moved like a ghost over the broken rock, scattered pebbles, and among the low-growing brush, moved almost without a sound.
She was of that world, if it existed, and there must be a simple, logical explanation. We are a people, he reflected, who thrive on explanations. No matter what happens someone comes forward with a simple explanation and the mystery vanishes or is thrust into its respective pigeonhole and conveniently forgotten. Of course, if there are a dozen people present, there will be not one but several explanations, and the one presented by the person with the most authority will be accepted.
Kawasi stopped suddenly, lifting a hand, listening. He heard nothing. What was he getting into? All his life he had heard of time warps, had known that our seemingly orderly world was actually far from orderly.
Standing slightly behind her, aware of little more than vague darkness, Mike Raglan tried to bring
himself back to reality. He was a young man, with a beautiful girl, alone in a desert, and supposedly she was about to lead him into another world, a world that existed parallel with his own.
“It is here,” she whispered. “Take my hand.”
She stepped forward quickly and he had a quick, flashing vision of a tunnellike opening at his feet, and then he fell.
There was a moment of gasping horror as he seemed to be falling into a pit, and then he struck the ground, face down.
A moment he lay still; then, lifting his head, he spat dust from his mouth and tried to sit up.
A hand pressed down, and someone hissed, “Ssh!” warningly.
He lay still, swearing to himself, but in the midst of the swearing he heard movement and was suddenly alert. Someone was near them. Someone was approaching.
He felt movement beside him on the ground. It was Kawasi. Her fingers gripped his, warning him again. He lay perfectly still, wanting to reach for his gun, yet dreading the thought of what a pistol shot would do to the night. It would certainly bring enemies, if any were about. He would be rid of one, perhaps, only to have a dozen or a hundred come down upon them.
His chest felt tight and uncomfortable and he was suddenly conscious of his breathing. His breath was coming in gasps as if he had been running. He fought to stifle the sound.
He was immediately aware of something else. He was lying upon grass!
Not rock, but grass. Above all, he could smell it. He could smell the dampness of nearby water, too. And there was a vague smell of something burning.
He could feel Kawasi beside him, her hand clutching his, warning him. Who was approaching? And where did this grass come from? There was some in the bottom of the Hole, but a coarser grass than this.
A voice spoke, but he could not understand the words, and then there was a reply from a greater distance. The footsteps ceased to move, and mentally Raglan gathered himself, preparing to leap to his feet.
Footsteps again, retreating now, and then again the voices, speaking in some foreign tongue. He had a smattering of languages, never staying long enough in one place to be proficient, but this was unlike anything he knew. It was, he decided, more like Castilian Spanish than anything he could remember. Like, he reflected, but unlike.
A stick cracked as if being broken for a fire. Almost without a sound, Kawasi got to her feet and he followed. Still holding his hand she started off, keeping to the darkness. Suddenly he could see the fire, a low blaze with several men lying about, wearing blue.
The Varanel!
A border guard, or something of the kind. But why here? Why—He paused so suddenly that his grip stopped her. It hit him so hard he caught his breath.
They were on the Other Side!
Impossible! It was…! “Come!” she whispered, and he followed, careful not to stumble. They were still walking on grass, moving toward what appeared to be trees. Once among the trees she stopped. “Something is wrong!” she whispered. “Something is very wrong! What are they doing here?”
There was something close to panic in her tone. He looked around, and dark though it was he could see what must be the sky, although he saw no stars. Towering above the forest on the edge of which they stood was a cliff that must rise a thousand feet sheer from the ground. There was nothing like that near the mesa of the ruin.
“Where are we?” he asked.
“My village is near. Only a few miles. And these—these people have never come so close!”
“Kawasi, I do not know your situation, nor that of your people, but that is an army patrol encamped for the night or on guard here. Any soldier would recognize the signs at once. Either the approaches to your village are being guarded or they are preparing an attack.”
“Attack? Oh, no! They must not!” Her voice was anguished. “Oh, Mike! I’ve been too long away! I fear! I fear greatly!”
He put his arm around her. “Take it easy, honey. Now let’s get down to business. How do we get to your place from here?”
Her momentary fear and doubt seemed to ebb away. The need for action dispelled her anxiety for the moment. Taking his hand again, she went swiftly along the edge of the woods. At a pause, he whispered, “Careful! There may be scouts out, or other parties.”
“I do not think so. Nobody ever fights them. Nobody has resisted them for many years.”
And that, he told himself, might be their only advantage. He had noticed that in the strong-arm men he had encountered in the parking lot at the motel. They had not expected resistance, at least not the resistance offered by a fighting man who knew his business.
“It is far?”
“Only a few miles.”
“Will there be a guard?”
“A guard? Oh, no! There has never been need for one. Not for a long, long time.”
So what started the ball rolling, he wondered. Was it Erik? Or had Erik escaped somehow? Was this part of a searching party? Or had they—he caught his breath—decided to do what he had suggested to Gallagher, come through to the other side, in force?
The idea did not greatly worry him. They might overcome a few outlying ranches or take over one of the marinas on Lake Powell, but once the word was out, there were too many homes with weapons, too many citizens who were prepared to defend themselves.
Gallagher, for example, could have a hundred armed men deputized to help within a half hour after realization of the necessity. There was almost no place in the West, and in many parts of the East, where this was not true. No enemy paratroop attack had ever been made into a country where the citizens were armed. And of course, they had the advantage of knowing the country.
With Kawasi leading, almost running now, they wove their way among boulders, up a dry wash, then a narrow path up the face of the cliff. Obviously, she was accustomed to this, but he was not and the altitude was high. It was growing lighter. Daybreak, perhaps? But it was too soon. He glanced at his wristwatch.
Three A.M.?
He swore suddenly, and Kawasi looked around. “What is it?”
“When I came through,” he said, “I was going to mark the place so I could get back. Now I don’t know where I am.”
He was in a world he had never wanted, facing enemies he did not know, and he had no means of escape.
Above all, there was little time. Only a matter of hours until the openings were closed forever, or for more years than he cared to contemplate.
Buster, he told himself, this time you’ve done it! This time you’ve bought the packet!
CHAPTER 32
At their feet was a vast black gulf, and around them great wind-scoured cliffs and jagged spires, an unbelievable chaos bathed in deep shadows and misty gold light. Awed, he stood transfixed by the dark grandeur of the sight. Kawasi tugged at his sleeve. “Come!” she whispered.
Leading him, she plunged down an unseen path into that bowl of blackness, switching back and forth across the face of the cliff into the cool darkness below. Once, during a momentary pause, he glanced back up to see a leaning tower of rock like a great warning finger, a warning of he knew not what danger.
When they reached level ground, she was almost running. Nearby he heard water.
“A stream?” he whispered.
“Irrigation ditch,” she replied. “There are miles of them. This is our land, all down this canyon and on the mesas around us. That is why I am frighten. We did not believe they knew where to find us. For a long time we are undisturbed. Now that is over.”
They reached a well-trodden path, and before them loomed the dark bulk of some kind of a structure. His eyes could dimly find its outlines. A pueblo not unlike those near Taos but vastly larger.
Kawasi walked to what appeared to be a blank wall, moved something with her fingers, and spoke into what must have been a speaking tube.
There was a muffled response and a
moment later a ladder was lowered from the roof above. Kawasi climbed swiftly and he followed. The ladder was withdrawn by a man to whom Kawasi spoke swiftly and sharply. Turning, the man ran into the door of his sleeping quarters. Mike could hear the man talking to someone else, apparently spreading the alarm.
Kawasi did not linger. She led him swiftly along the roof to another ladder, fixed in position. On this second level several men awaited her and she spoke rapidly, evidently explaining the situation and the necessities of the moment. He could see them peering at him; then they moved away, scattering out.
“Do you expect an attack?”
“We must be prepared. This might be only a scouting party.”
“Do you think they know where you are?”
“How can we know? We must act as if they did, and act promptly.”
“It was not a large party. Maybe you shouldn’t let them get away.”
She turned sharply. “What do you mean?”
“If they are the only ones who know where you are, and they could not return with the information…?”
“You mean…kill them?” She was shocked. “They are Varanel. Nobody has ever killed a Varanel!”
“Not even Johnny?”
“Well…perhaps, but it does not seem possible. They are invulnerable!”
“Nobody is invulnerable,” he said, “and if they are a danger to you, why not?”
“We do not attack. We only defend.”
Mike Raglan walked on beside her for several steps. “Often it is better to attack first. Destroy them before they can attack, and before they can return with the news of what they have found.”
The Haunted Mesa (Louis L'Amour's Lost Treasures) Page 24
