"Good morning," she said, smiling.
"Good morning. What a trek we had."
"I believe I walked farther yesterday than in all the rest of my life."
She rose to a kneeling position and kissed me lightly on the lips. Then she sat beside me and we gazed at one another.
"This is the first time we've really seen each other in the light," she said.
"I trust I pass muster. Remember, I've been many weeks on the road."
"Actually, you're quite handsome," she replied, as if making up her mind. She suddenly blushed and turned her head down.
"And you are a beautiful woman."
"As beautiful as Mirdath?"
I laughed to cover my uncertainty, for Mirdath had been exceptionally lovely, but Naani was very pretty, and given leisure to prepare herself, might have been beautiful indeed. More than that, though neither of us looked our best at that time, she had a beautiful soul.
"Why are you laughing?" she demanded.
"You're the only woman in the world in competition with herself."
She grinned and reached over and kissed me again. The truth was we could not stop staring at one another. For myself, I was filled with awe at finding my love through all the ages and darkness. To look upon her face, so new to me, and see expressions and mannerisms so familiar, made me both shy and bold at once. The experience was like meeting a stranger with whom one feels immediately comfortable.
"I watched you while you slept this morning," she said.
"I know."
"You know? Were you awake?"
"No. But somehow I knew you were watching me. Next time, I'll wake up and catch you at it. I suppose that's when you made your decision about my looks."
Her laughter was light and lovely. "Yes, it is. You think me wicked."
"I think you holy."
Her eyes glowed with an almost supernatural light, as if her soul glistened through those lovely blue windows. I think mine did the same. After a while, she lay beside me and we held one another a long while, though my armor must have been uncomfortable for her. Finally, she went back to where the water and tablets lay.
"I should check the boulder," I said, starting to rise.
"I already have, several times. I haven't seen any monsters in the gorge. Sit back. Let me spoil you with this elaborate breakfast."
Because she was so adorable, I laughed and did as she asked. She brought me the cup of water, placed my head on her knees, and helped me drink. One at a time, she took the tablets, kissed them, and gave me two to kiss and eat, while she ate the others.
"A six-course dinner," she said, "Two tablets for you, two for me, and two cups of water."
"A meal well-served," I replied, using a saying from the old days. Often, we seemed to move back and forth through time, using first one manner of expression and then the other. It felt both familiar and strange, for the language the people of the pyramid used was alien to any tongue of the past.
When we were done, Naani said, "You should probably try to stand."
I laughed. "I'll do more than try—ah!" The moment I sought to rise, my whole body was racked with pain from my battle with the four-armed man.
"I thought you might be stiff," she said. "I have the ointment ready."
She helped me off with my upper armor, then made me lie down again upon the cloak. As she rubbed in the salve with the care of a mother with a child, I listened to the low muttering of the fire-hole and slipped back into a doze. By the end of the hour, when she woke me, much of my soreness had vanished, and I felt I could handle myself again against any dangers that might come.
"You're more powerfully built than the men of the Lesser Redoubt," she said. "I can scarcely put my hand around your biceps. Are all your people like this?"
"Not all, but some. Being so long with so little Earth Current probably affected your people's size. But I've always enjoyed exercise."
"That hasn't changed from your time as Andrew."
"No, I suppose not, though I doubt I'm as strong as I was then."
"Who did you say was in competition with themselves?"
I laughed. "Serves me right."
We descended from the cave to the bottom of the gorge, Naani struggling with her fear of heights all the way down. We journeyed for six hours before halting to rest and eat. During our stop, I bathed her feet in warm water in a stone basin, and rubbed them with ointment, for her makeshift shoes never completely protected her.
The fire-holes burned and muttered all around us during that part of the journey, their red glow sending our shadows dancing against the rocks. The air grew warmer and steam spurted, whistling, from between the boulders. We caught whiffs of sulphur, though nothing overpowering enough to affect our breathing. The grim walls of the gorge rose measureless on either side.
Naani took delight in the numerous fires. "It's like a lighted lane, leading us home," she said. "And there aren't any Evil Forces here, Andros. I feel nothing at all."
"Really?" I stopped and listened. "I sense a vague lifting of my spirit, but nothing more. I’ve long suspected that your Night Hearing was more powerful than my own, though. Perhaps this proves it."
She was in such good humor I did not tell her we were approaching the country of the slugs, but after we had gone another six hours, I insisted we stop to sleep, for I wanted to travel straight through that dismal portion.
By coincidence, we came upon the same cave where I had slept after escaping the slugs' domain. I recognized it at once, though how I distinguished it from all the other burrows and holes I had slept in, I do not know. For some reason, finding it delighted me. Having waited there a hundred thousand years or more, it was unlikely to have moved—but I pointed it out to Naani, along with the fire-hole and the spring where I had washed.
She took this in with great interest, as if I were relating a story from my childhood. Standing beside the fire, she said, "It must have been lonely."
"The thought of you sustained me."
She reached up and hugged my neck, her eyes suddenly moist with a gratitude I could scarcely bear, for I felt unworthy of it.
Since the cave was close to the ground, we did not have to deal with Naani's fear of heights. We again blocked the opening with boulders, and even filled in the spaces with smaller stones to keep any creeping creatures out. Though this left us in total darkness, we felt quite secure.
She fell asleep almost at once, her breath rising and falling softly, but I lay awake for a while. Every day, as I recognized more and more of Mirdath within her, my love for Naani grew, along with my fear of being unable to protect her. In a single moment, some evil like the Yellow Man could take her from me. My chest tightened; I could scarcely breathe.
Sleep is the friend that carries us away from the unbearable, and at last, when I could stand the terror no more, I plunged into slumber.
***
We woke eight hours later, and when I removed the boulders the region lay unoccupied except for a rat-creature, gorged from eating serpents, sleeping beside the flames. After breakfast, I led Naani to the hot pool beside the fire-hole, and she exclaimed when she saw the beast.
"Consider it a friend," I said. "It eats snakes and avoids people."
"I can do without those kind of friends." She shuddered, but ignored it from then on.
I made her sit beside the pool while I bathed her feet, for though she was starting to develop calluses along her heels, her soles were still tender in places. Her feet, scarcely longer than my hands, were so slender and dainty, and I was so taken with love for her I kissed them reverently, which made her laugh. After drying them with my pocket cloth, I rubbed them with ointment while Naani sat silent.
We set off again, traveling at a good pace. I estimated it would take three hours to reach the dank region of the slugs and twelve to pass through it. Without making too much of it, I told Naani of the coming trial.
She squeezed my hand. "You came through it to find me. We'll make it back through t
ogether."
Toward the middle of the third hour the air grew heavy with fumes, and we found ourselves groping through an endless, smokey gloom, our throats raw, our only beacon the occasional, dim glow of a fire-hole. We went in silence, Naani walking behind me, I often reaching back to make certain she was there. I wanted to keep her hand in mine, to know if something tried to seize her, but I could not do so and still respond to dangers from the front.
As terrifying as the darkness had been when I had first gone this way, it was nothing compared to the fear I now experienced at the thought of losing Naani. Time after time I forced myself to concentrate on my path, to avoid thinking of her being spirited off into the gloom, for I knew if I ever did lose her that I would never be able find her again.
After two hours I caught a whiff of the terrible stench signifying a slug. My chest tightened in apprehension for my beloved, and I removed my armored glove so I could feel her touch. I reached back, found her hand, and drew her down among the boulders.
"We have to wait here," I whispered.
Gradually, the reek grew to an almost smothering intensity. Naani struggled to avoid gagging; I could feel her hand trembling slightly in my own. The bitter fumes made us so breathless that I feared I might pass out, leaving my love to shift for herself. My eyes watered and my head grew light; the darkness took on a dream quality. In order to remain conscious, I concentrated on my surroundings, listening to the water dripping on my armor from the heights, running my ungloved hand over the slime covering the surrounding rocks. The moments seemed to drag by.
Finally, after what seemed a lifetime, the scent diminished and we continued on.
After having come this way before, I mistakenly thought it would be easier the second time. Strange, the mind's capacity to forget past terrors. Even when no slugs were near, the place smelled of the open grave, and the few fires we passed gave us little comfort, for we had to keep concealed to avoid being seen in the light.
As we passed a pit burning crimson from a hole deep in the earth, I reached back and caught Naani by the arm.
"Look," I whispered, pointing beyond the fire toward the right side of the gorge. She stared momentarily, then gave a muffled gasp. Her hand flew to her mouth as she saw the slug, its hide glistening with moisture in the firelight, its head moving back and forth, its body, huge as the black hull of a ship, stretching silent and slow through the darkness. Despite its eye stalks it moved as if blind. Regardless whether it could see, it was horrible, and I feared it could smell us.
I pulled Naani down among the boulders, and she clutched both my hands, not so much to be comforted, but to keep me from doing anything rash, as if she feared my rushing out to try to kill that tremendous beast. No doubt she remembered Andrew's brashness and quick temper, not realizing that Andros, though still headstrong, possessed more restraint. Besides, the only thing I wanted was to get as far from that place as possible.
As we peered between the cracks in the boulders, the slug gradually swayed its tremendous head toward the wall and climbed upward, its muscles carrying it forward in a rippling wave. It soon became motionless except for an occasional lifting of its tapering tail, its head lost in the upper darkness, its body, a black ridge of soft, dreadful life flowing out of the shadows. Eventually Naani and I crept between the boulders and slipped away.
We traveled unmolested another two hours before Naani halted me with a touch.
"There's something coming," she whispered.
Since I now knew her senses were more sensitive than my own, I listened, and realized she was right. We were in an utterly black part of the gorge, without a fire-hole in sight, and I made Naani crouch behind a boulder while I huddled over her, covering her with my armor.
We waited a long time, I holding my diskos ready the whole while. The stench gradually increased until it became so dreadful we could scarcely breathe. We sensed some creature, no doubt one of the slugs, passing before us, silent save for what seemed to be the slow, enormous pumping of its lungs. We could not absolutely identify the sound, however, since the passage diffused it into horrid, whispering echoes that made it impossible to tell if it originated directly before us or high in the night where the mountains joined over the gorge to form the gargantuan roof.
The noise slowly subsided and the odor lessened. I imagined the slug making its way down the gorge toward some lonely cavern. It occurred to me that if Naani's people came this way when they left the Great Pyramid to establish the Lesser Redoubt they showed tremendous courage in entering the gorge without knowing what lay on the other side. It seemed to me that either the canyon was less terrible then, or they had taken another route.
After the monster had been gone quite a while, we padded onward, always listening, ever wary of the slugs' scent. In the fifth hour we reached the mouth of the intersecting cavern I had passed during my original journey, only faintly visible in the dim light of a fire-hole. I paused and pointed the opening out to Naani.
"Do you know where it goes?" she asked.
I shrugged. "I think it must be the slug's home. Perhaps they use it to come up from the lower regions of the earth."
Naani kept close to me as I whispered, for the gaping opening filled us both with fear. Still, coming as we did from a people who had glimpsed many mysteries through the embrasures of the redoubts, we were drawn by curiosity, and looked upon the cavern with a mingling of dread and fascination. The light of the fire-hole lit its nearest portions, leaving its monstrous bowels deathly dark.
Abruptly, detecting the movement of an enormous head, I realized that there were slugs gathered around the fire, some coal-black, others pale white, all obscured by the darkness. The one that had raised itself began crawling in our direction, as if it had somehow sensed us. We slipped away with all the speed we could manage, and soon left the fire behind. Nothing dangerous approached us for the next hour, but though we did not mention it to one another until later, an uneasiness fell upon our spirits.
We traveled mostly through complete darkness. Any time we heard murmuring echoes we knew it would not be long before we encountered the dull glare of a fire-pit, looking weird and unworldly in the haze of the fumes. We anticipated these eagerly, though when we finally reached them, we always passed at a distance and drifted quickly back into darkness. I longed to linger within the glow of the light and dreaded our return to the night more each time. But we dared not stop until we won past that terrible vale. We went as quickly as the darkness, the dangers, and the boulder-strewn way allowed, our eyes, throat, and lungs burning from the fumes. Not all the fire-holes produced sound, however, so we were sometimes delighted to see an unsuspected illumination rising before us.
Our uneasiness grew as we went along, until Naani whispered something my spirit had already perceived, though I was loathe to admit it. "Something is following us. I've sensed it for a long time, but it's closer now."
"You're right. I've felt it, too." I thought of the slug that had woke beside the cavern.
I set Naani in front of me, to put my armor between her and danger, and we went on our way. I kept glancing over my shoulder and smelling the air for signs, but I neither saw nor scented anything. Our lack of speed worried me, for between our groping along and bruising ourselves against the boulders, we made poor time.
We soon reached the red glare of a fire-hole, a place I recognized by a jagged stone rising above the flames. At first, I welcomed it like an old friend, but as we drew closer, I remembered that the slugs liked to gather around it. I pushed Naani down among the stones and we crept along as fast as we could.
As we came abreast of the fire-hole, we spied seven slugs lying against the cliff on the far side of the gorge, their heads hidden in the upper darkness, their soft tails spreading across the boulders along the canyon floor. Naani touched my arm and indicated the wall closest to us. I gasped. Three of the brutes rested against that side as well, and a fourth sprawled across an enormous ledge. My heart sank, for they lay all around us, but
Naani squeezed my shoulder and gave me such a determined look that I regained my courage. We crept among the boulders until, after what seemed an eternity, we passed between them. None stirred, and we left them to their slumbers. However, the lack of odor was disturbing, for it meant that some of the slugs did not emit a scent. Knowing we could no longer trust our noses to warn us when one of the creatures drew near left us anxious indeed.
At the edge of the circle of light I looked back up the gorge to try to see what followed us. To my relief, I spied nothing. If we could only get past the country of the slugs, I thought we would be safe.
We passed three fire-pits in the next hour, and paused on the far side each time to look behind us. Though we did not see anything, we both admitted that we sensed something drawing closer. The sensation, coming through my Night Hearing, manifested itself as a gray shape vibrating a few feet from my head, felt rather than seen.
For a long while, we did not see any of the slugs; the air of the gorge grew free of their smell, but remained bitter from the fumes. During the tenth hour, while traveling in a region of almost total darkness, we detected a faint trace of their odor. Somehow, we knew instinctively we were not approaching a monster, but that our pursuer was drawing near.
We pushed forward, suffering numerous falls and bruises for our efforts. We were so afraid that we ignored the pain. Often we paused to listen, but heard only the dismal dripping of the water, until we finally perceived the murmur of a fire-pit. This raised our hopes, but even as we hurried to find the light, the stench grew, and we did not know whether this was the scent of our pursuer, or if more slugs awaited us at the fire. Despite our desperation, we were forced to slow down, to avoid rushing blindly into death.
We soon saw the fire looming dully in the distance. Though the flames lay half-shrouded in smoke and fumes, they gave us enough light so we could move more quickly. We broke into a trot, driven by the fear that our enemy was closing the gap. When we reached the fire-pit, we did not find any slugs, though the stench was now nearly unbearable.
The Night Land, a Story Retold Page 22
