“Can you just imagine what’s going through the minds of everyone on Team Irtiu? What a grave disappointment for Thalassa, who has to be feeling the heat right now at the loss of so many potential AG kill points, plus all the bonus points earned by each potential kill!” a second announcer continues. “Curiously, Gwen Lark herself chose to forfeit the AG kill points by letting all those Contenders return to safety—”
“Yes, truly, an unexpected turn of events!” a third announcer interrupts. “But, getting back to everyone’s favorite Earth Bride—I am stunned! Are you stunned, Grail Games worshippers? Because I’m speechless, even as I continue to speak! What a powerful vocal talent! No one could’ve predicted a month ago that this delightfully unconventional and—dare I say—at times, even comical Imperial Bride from Earth has been hiding this stunning power voice from us! Oh, the wager feeds must be going wild right now! Who will you bet on now, Grail Games worshippers? Why, this changes everything!”
“That’s right, Grail Games worshippers, my bet is on Gwen Lark to carry her Category—that is, if she manages to survive the hazards of the three remaining stages of the competition, which is still rather doubtful, not to mention the revenge that’s coming from Thalassa and her champion team, and let’s not forget Deneb Gratu—”
I force myself to ignore the running commentary. And I look at my teammates.
“Your voice . . .” Chihar begins to speak carefully.
“Look, I was desperate and I got lucky,” I say, interrupting him.
“I don’t believe in luck.” Avaneh the Warrior watches me closely with her uncanny hard gaze. “That was skill. Unusual skill.”
How did I not see that she’s even more dangerous than Tuar?
As for the Athlete, Tuar looks at me with a thoughtful frown. “Impressive, yes. But why didn’t you take all those kills?” he asks. “You took over, but you let them go. Why?”
But I only shake my head. “I don’t know. I—”
“Hey! All of you!” Kateb’s voice sounds from the direction of the pyramid interior, where he and Lolu and Zaap wait for us on a different levitating block at a lower level. “That was a fine performance, Gwen Lark, but you’ve got everyone’s attention now, and we need to get out of here. This way! Come!”
I glance down, glad for the interruption. “Yes, agreed.” And then I add to the teammates who share my stone. “We can talk later.”
From that point on, things happen quickly. Kateb’s right, everyone has noticed what I did, and everyone is suddenly paying attention, and not in a good way. . . . Our best bet is to head deep into the interior of the pyramid stone field, where we can get lost in the deep twilight, while keeping out of the way of too many hostile crews such as Team Irtiu.
And so we change stones, meet up with Kateb and the others, and together begin the horizontal climb into the bowels of the pyramid.
As we move, there’s little talking. No one is bringing up what happened, but often my teammates glance at me with a mixture of curiosity and newfound respect. And when I catch them staring, there seems to be some uncertainty, even a trace of fear.
Could they really be afraid of me?
It occurs to me, Brie stopped talking about needing a bathroom break, so I guess she took care of her business discreetly somewhere among the stones. At this point I am exhausted, thirsty, hungry, and could use a bathroom break myself. But after all the things I’ve said about the sanctity of the ancient Great Pyramid, I need to set an example. . . .
“If we keep moving straight through the pyramid, we will end up on the ocean side, where the sewers are located,” I say.
Moving at my side, Brie says nothing. However, this time Lolu speaks up. “Go on the stones, it won’t harm them.”
“It will harm my conscience,” I say stubbornly. “I will not deface this ancient treasure.”
“Suit yourself,” Brie mutters, not meeting my gaze.
Oh yes, she definitely went when I wasn’t looking, I think.
But—can I really blame her? Seriously, I’m being an idiot.
Our plan of action at this point is simple. We keep going until we cut through to the outside and find the sewers, then eat and rest briefly, and finally return deep into the floating block field to locate a Safe Base.
An hour later, just as the bells ring to indicate the shifting of stones in the pyramid, we reach our first objective. We emerge outside on the upper slope of the pyramid that faces the Djetatlan Ocean, stretching immense and silvery-blue to the horizon.
The afternoon daylight strikes hard, and the wind carrying wet spray is invigorating, but first we need to deal with the motion of the hovering blocks all around us.
“Nice timing!” Zaap says, leaping easily from one stone to another as it moves from under him. Even after all these grueling hours of climbing, the boy appears untired. I seriously envy him, and most of the others. If it wasn’t for my hovering equipment bag which I use to support me, I don’t know what I’d do. . . .
“Yes, we’re lucky to be on the outer stones during this latest rearrangement,” Kokayi says cheerfully.
Chihar nods, keeping his footing atop the gliding stone block and retaining his balance with the help of his own hovering bag. “Fewer chances of getting crushed. One thing less to worry about.”
Another thing less to worry about is the apparent lack of Contenders on this side of the pyramid. Everyone is still either on the opposite slope where the meals were served, or somewhere in the interior. I can see a White and a Green, further downslope, and that’s it.
Lucky us. And now that the pyramid has stopped moving and fixed itself in the latest configuration, it’s time to look for those sewers.
“Congratulations, Lark, there’s your toilets,” Brie says as we stare down.
The sewer ducts are plain silvery metal pipes that rise directly from the ocean surf below, like strange organ pipes of different heights. . . . They appear to float in the air, each one anchored only to a single hovering stone block. They are scattered along the slope, but most of them taper off halfway between the pyramid base and the summit. Their bottom ends are planted at some distance inside the interior, where this side of the pyramid hovers over the waterline, so that as they rise, their tops end up next to the outer stones at the vertical pyramid midpoint. The pipes are not capped, so you simply get close to one and do your business. The waste empties down directly into the ocean. . . .
I sigh, then climb down a couple of blocks to the nearest sewer duct. My teammates turn away and ignore me politely as I use it, for all the world to see via nano-cameras, without any privacy blanket to cover me. . . . Ugh. At least for now—while mooning all of Atlantida—I get to keep my so-called personal integrity and not vandalize one of the last remaining Wonders of the Ancient World. . . .
When I climb back up to the stone level with the rest of my teammates, everyone’s settled and spread out among three stone slabs, and the meal packets and water flasks are out.
“Happy now?” Brie asks, sitting on the edge of a block, and dangling her feet over the precipice.
I make some kind of noncommittal noise and find a spot between Chihar and Zaap, and across from her. Then I take out my own food and sit down cross-legged on the hard limestone slab, feeling its surface warmed by the bright rays of Hel beating down. At the same time the ever-present crisp wind blows in our faces, cooling our inevitable sunburn.
A wave of sudden exhaustion comes over me. And with it comes the full awareness of bodily discomfort and pain. . . . My left shoulder, where I received the bludgeon strike, throbs dully, and there’s probably going to be an ugly bruise. . . . I tip my water flask to my parched lips to take two carefully measured sips. Then I examine my hands, the skin of my palms and tips of my fingers scraped raw and bloodied from gripping stone all day. Glancing around, I see that the others also have hand injuries from constant climbing, some more than others.
Kokayi notices me examining my palms and tosses me a small tube of medical oi
ntment. “Apply it over your raw skin, my Imperial Lady,” he says. “It’s a medicated skin sealant. We use it in my profession to preserve hands during acrobat routines.” He shows me his own hands, and they’re almost unscathed.
I smear the sealant over my hands and feel an instant cooling relief. “Thanks, it helps.”
Kokayi nods. “Pass it around. The rest of you could use it too.”
The ointment gets shared, and then we finish eating quickly, without much chitchat. On this pyramid side, the sound of ocean overwhelms the distant sounds of the audience from the cliffs, so it seems deceptively calm, even safe, with the constant wind and Hel shining down. . . . If you let your mind float away, it could be just a day at the beach.
A dangerous illusion. . . .
“Imperial Lady, we should probably start moving,” Chihar says, looking seriously at me.
I notice, his manner has become more inquisitive, more intense, ever since he’s heard me use the full power of my voice. I think, of all the others here, Chihar has some idea of the true nature of my voice, and the two of us will have to discuss it at some point.
Even among the Atlantean general population, the Logos voice is semi-legendary. Atlanteans expect to find it only in their divine Imperial rulers, so there’s absolutely no expectation to find it in anyone else. I’m an anomaly—a freak of nature—and few would ever suspect me of having it, or even recognize it—not even after that power voice demonstration. However, the average Atlantean would know that my voice is unusual, enough to be curious.
In short, questions are brewing, and they will come. When they do, I’d better have some kind of explanation ready for Chihar and the rest of my teammates.
“Yes, I think we’ve rested enough. Time to find a Safe Base,” I say, packing away what’s left of my meal.
Everyone gets up, and several people take advantage of the nearby sewer system.
Then we begin the climb back into the pyramid interior.
Once again the dark twilight of the levitating stone field deepens as we go in, and the pyramid swallows us in its scattered granite and limestone guts.
At some point our flashlight devices come out, and we cast wild shifting shadows among the stones.
Distant sounds of the Games commentators and the audience keep us vaguely oriented in terms of direction, but overall we move aimlessly, once again paying close attention to the stones, in vague hopes of encountering any kind of symbol. Monotony adds to the exhaustion, and every now and then one of the team members appears to find something etched on a stone surface. We gather to look, but always it’s a false alarm.
“Not even one lousy hieroglyph!” Brie grumbles. “What kind of Ancient Egyptian monument is this anyway?”
“Well,” I say, “Khufu’s Great Pyramid doesn’t really have any writings—at least none discovered back on Earth. If I recall correctly, they found three red squiggles on the floor of the deepest chamber below the Queen’s Chamber. But they were hieratic numeral signs—in other words, numbers, probably cubit measurements, and no one on Earth knows for sure. If you want pretty hieroglyphs, you need to look at other pyramids, especially later ones.”
“Great,” Brie says. “We get to play around inside a boring monument, as we die.”
“What?” My anger flares, despite my tiredness. “This—all of this—is not boring! How can you even say that? Every historical stone here reflects the depths of mystery and antiquity! Countless centuries of human effort, tradition, and priceless culture! It’s the most amazing thing to even be here—to be able to look not just inside the structure but between each stone—”
“Yes, we know, it’s an Ancient Wonder. Sorry, Lark.” Brie snorts mildly, then looks away from me.
I take a deep breath to calm myself. What the hell is wrong with me? We’re in a life-and-death situation, people are dying, and I’m going off about the historical value of ancient ruins?
“I’m sorry,” I say in a dark, focused tone, so that Chihar and Kateb glance at me curiously, while Brie raises her brows. “You’re right. We’re here to accomplish a specific task, to fight and survive. So I need to stop reacting like this. It’s—ancient history. It doesn’t matter. At least, not now.”
And then I add, projecting more calm, “Obviously back on Earth we knew only a tiny fraction of what the Atlanteans seem to know about this monument, the secrets it contains, even though it was built long after they already left Earth. If they tell us to look for symbols, we look for symbols.”
Brie pauses to examine me carefully, then nods. “Whatever you say, boss.”
But her level of sarcasm seems to be set on low.
A few grueling hours and pyramid rearrangements later, we come upon a Safe Base when we least anticipate it. Not sure where we expected to find one, but certainly not this close to the exterior of the pyramid.
It’s early evening, and Hel is beginning to set, painting the sky with teal twilight—which we can see, since we’re back outside once more, crawling around the staircase slope on the left side of the pyramid if you face the cliffs.
A few other Contenders are on this side with us, above and below, but at this stage no one seems to be up for combat. It’s more exhausting than I can describe, to spend all day moving around in a three-dimensional arena space that unpredictably changes around you every hour. Everyone is conserving energy for the remaining three grueling days of this ordeal.
Zaap notices the Safe Base first. Its four-color beacon sends out a soft rainbow glow from the interior, visible from the vantage point of a certain few outer stones. We head for it cautiously, assuming that it might be occupied.
But we’re in luck.
As we climb past about five floating blocks which are aligned in a manner to create a visibility barrier, a larger space reveals itself, like a small pocket inside the floating field of stones.
The Safe Base is vacant. It consists of nothing but a rectangular slab formed by six adjacent stone blocks, with four light beacons mounted on each of the four corners of the slab. The beacons themselves are upright sconces, and their illumination comes from the four stripes of different color light on each sconce, red, blue, green, and yellow, creating the rainbow effect.
There are no walls here, only the open space roughly designated by other floating blocks above and all around. When the pyramid shifts on the hour, the assumption is, this slab will remain permanently fixed in place, with enough clearance overhead so that, as long as we occupy it, we will not get crushed by other random stones set in motion.
There’s one other object here. A small smart board, about four-by-six feet, levitates upright in the middle of the Safe Base, twelve inches above the floor. Next to it is a smaller control pad, also floating.
“Oh, good!” Tuar the Athlete says, seeing it. “We have surveillance!”
“But no blankets,” Zaap mutters.
“Yes, and no fluffy pillows either,” Brie says. “Whatever shall we do?”
But Avaneh the Warrior silently heads directly for the smart screen. She sits in a crouch and turns on the display, and the screen comes alive with feeds in smaller windows.
I watch her slender but muscular neck and the clean-shaven back of her head, covered with intricate tattoos. She is economical and powerful as she moves, long fingers passing over the control panel to scroll through the various feeds. Lolu the Technician comes to squat next to her, and watches silently.
“All right, let’s make ourselves comfortable, and get some rest,” I say, and sit down, pulling my bag down beside me. It hovers, tugging at the straps, and bobbing in the air near my face as I sit, so I sing the command to lower it to the floor. It’ll serve as my pillow tonight, as usual in the Games.
The others follow my lead, bringing their hovering bags down to the slab floor. Chihar and Brie flank me on both sides, settling on the floor next to me. Before sitting down, Kateb and Tuar glance around and overhead at the empty space around us, noting the nearest stones in the neighborhood, their c
onfiguration, in case we’ll need a quick escape route, and also to see the most likely direction of enemy approach.
“Don’t get too cozy, amrevet,” Kokayi says to Brie, seeing her stretched out full-length on the stone. “Never know when we might need to run.” He then sits down in one fluid, limber motion across from her, and assumes the Atlantean version of a lotus position.
Brie opens one eye at him. “Such a ray of Hel-shine.”
But Kokayi the Entertainer grins at her, baring sharp white teeth. He then begins doing deep breathing exercises and periodically raises himself on his hands into an elevated lotus.
I look around at our group—my group.
Tuar the Athlete lies quietly, his muscled bulk seeming compact, now that he’s folded on his side, massive legs bent at the knees and brought up to his chest, head resting on his equipment bag. His dark hair, pulled back tight in its segmented tail, serves as an additional pillow, as it lies like a coiled snake underneath his head. His eyes are closed.
What’s going through his mind? Is he resting, or pretending? Is he making plans to kill all of us?
I don’t know him at all, I think.
I don’t know any of them, not really. I should trust no one.
And yet I find it exhausting, not to trust. So I need to do the next best thing to knowing these people on my team—I need to start learning their personal motivations for being in the Games.
Then I can at least begin to understand them, and be prepared for what’s to come.
Chapter 61
Here’s what I know, what’s been drummed into my head:
Alliances formed in the Games of the Atlantis Grail are fickle, temporary, unreliable—sad, ugly things based on expediency and strategy. Most are centered around power players, and eventual treachery is expected from all parties. Contenders almost never make alliances within their own Category, since they’re direct rivals for the same winning slot. Some Categories offer more alliance value than others, depending on specific circumstances. And all throughout, the common theme is lack of trust. Where there’s no trust, there’s only guesswork, and the best indicator of character is true motive.
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