by David Cook
Teldin, his nerves shaken by the neogi’s appearance, steered the giff away from their hosts. “What do you think we should do?”
The two fell into private conference, leaving the gnomes to argue. Neither group paid notice of the other. Gomja wanted to mount an immediate counterattack, arguing that attacking was the only way to win. Teldin glanced at the gnomes with their hodgepodge of weapons and overruled the giff. They needed to stall the attackers until the gnomes could recover from the surprise. A violent rumble from the central shaft brought Teldin and Gomja’s hurried discussion to an end. Before the gnomes would pay attention however, Teldin had to separate Snowball and Niggil, by now almost to blows.
“Listen to me!” the human shouted, infuriated with the dissension among the tinkers. “Listen! You’re going to lose Mount Nevermind if you keep arguing like you’ve been. You,” Teldin commanded, pointing at Broz, who stood in the back, “you find your leaders and tell them Mount Nevermind has been attacked by the neogi, who will kill every gnome in the place unless action is taken right away. Stress that all the guilds must work together to win. Now get going!” Cowed by the anger in Teldin’s voice, Broz nodded in understanding, his jaw slack. Still, the appointed messenger did not move until Teldin took a threatening step toward him. All at once, the fat, short gnome found his legs and darted away.
Teldin turned back to the rest of the gnomes, who were already beginning another argument, and laid his strong hands on the shoulders of Snowball and Niggil. The latter, terrified of the human, tried to squirm away. “Now the rest you, listen!” Teldin shouted over the noise. “Sergeant Gomja and I will try to set up some defense. Everyone in my half of the room stand with Snowball.” Teldin gave the gnome an encouraging shake. “The rest of you are to go with Niggil and Sergeant Gomja and do exactly as the sergeant tells you. Any questions?”
The mouth of every gnome opened to speak, and Teldin realized he had just made a serious tactical error.
“Good!” the giff bellowed in a parade-ground shout before a single word could be spoken.
“Then everyone’s in agreement!” the human continued with a nod toward his companion. “So let’s go!” That said, Teldin and Gomja hustled the gnomes into the hail, moving them along before any could think of even a single question or new idea.
Teldin nodded the giff aside. “Gomja, you know more about fighting than I do, so you’ll have to take whatever’s hardest.” The farmer felt some shame at the statement, feeling as though he were putting his friend at unnecessary risk.
“Thank you, sir,” the sergeant said brightly. “That would be the main shaft. Lots of ways for the enemy to get down. Don’t worry, I’ll take care of it, sir.”
“I know you will,” Teldin agreed, though he lacked the giff’s confidence in their situation. The neogi were coming for him, and a lot of people were going to get hurt because of it. The farmer felt like a plague carrier, involuntarily spreading death wherever he went. “Where should I go?”
The giff wrinkled his brow in thought, more used to following orders than making plans. “The staircases, I guess, sir. See if you can block those so the enemy can’t get down that way.
“All right,” the farmer agreed. He was not at all certain how he would accomplish it. “Good luck, Sergeant Gomja.” The giff was already beyond earshot, herding his unruly band down the hail.
Grabbing Snowball and his troops, Teldin set off to the left, toward the supposedly “improved” staircases. Teldin tried to formulate a plan. All that seemed to come to mind was to gather the gnomes in the area and organize a barricade. The human explained his simple idea to Snowball, playing on the gnome’s vanity for cooperation. With a promised rank of second-in-command, the gnome eagerly helped work out the plan.
At the staircase, Teldin saw the improvements added by the engineers to “make the stairs faster.” The width of each step had been cut in half and replaced by a smooth, semicircular groove. The curling, circular staircase was now half stairs, half slide. Pistons could be triggered at each level to divert the slide into the hallway, where the descendee shot across the floor and into a thick wall of mattresses, hopefully to come to a safe stop. Even as he worked to organize the barricade, gnomes from the upper levels shot by and disappeared, shrieking into the distance. Teldin didn’t know if their screams were caused by the neogi or their hair-raising method of transport. Stopping as many as he could, the human, with Snowball’s assistance, pressed the newcomers into service. Two of his crew, sent hustling off to look for an armory, came back with a mismatched assortment of weapons: swords, axes, hammers, and things Teldin could not identify. The farmer had to break up several arguments over who got to wield which weapon.
As he questioned Snowball, Teldin learned there were four staircases on this level. With only one barricaded and guarded, there was little time to waste. The farmer took a random guess and appointed the most sensible-looking gnome of the lot to command this station. After carefully explaining what he wanted done, the human assigned a few of his crew to remain on guard, then gathered the rest, some of whom already had managed to wander away, and hurried to the next stair. From somewhere above, the booms and crashes of battle seemed to grow louder.
At the second staircase, the task was complicated by the discovery of a bizarrely built catapult, a ballista designed to fire ten bolts at once, so that they went “around corners, too,” according to one of the crewmen who dragged the device through the halls. The engineers had been wheeling it toward the center when Snowball had found them. “It’s just what we need!” the doorkeeper shouted, and, before Teldin could stop him, the artillerists were drafted to their cause. At the staircase, the yeoman tried to arrange it so the ballista was as far from everyone as possible, but the gnomes insisted on placing the device in the front lines. With grave misgivings, Teldin continued to the third staircase.
While they were in the midst of setting up defenses at the next station, a gnome, riding the slide from above, suddenly diverted to their level and shot through their numbers. Skidding across the floor, he slammed into the wall of mattresses with a loud phlooph! and a swirl of feathers. Once pulled from the padding, the refugee staggered back to the landing to inspect the slide. Teldin and the other gnomes, curious to see what the new arrival was looking at, packed themselves in the doorway. A trickle of water appeared from around the curve of the staircase and ran down the center of the slide.
“Oops,” the new arrival said, spotting the water. Ears perked up among the group.
“Oops?” Teldin asked. With his back to Snowball and the other gnomes, the human did not notice that those at the rear of the group had already turned to run. “Oops” was a universal danger signal for gnomes. Behind Teldin, Snowball and the few gnomes still remaining edged carefully away from the landing.
The gnome looked up. “Yep, oops,” the little fellow answered, nodding his head. “Looks like the Water Guild tried to flush out the enemy.” In the distance there was a faint rumbling noise. The trickle of water had widened a little in that time.
“Flush out? How?” Teldin asked, not understanding what the gnome meant. Snowball, the only gnome of Teldin’s crew that remained, quietly turned and ran.
“Well, I’m not a Water Guildsman, mind you,” the gnome began, his speech gradually increasing in speed, “but I would guess that they opened the main valves on the water mains from the big lake and now there are, let’s see —” The gnome stopped to make some calculations, wiggling his fingers as he thought — “a lot of water coming down! Bye!” Before the human could argue, the gnome leaped on the slide and disappeared.
“Wait!” Teldin shouted. “Do you mean that —”
“Yes!” echoed back the reply, almost drowned out by the growing rumble from above. That was enough for the farmer. Turning to warn his crew, he discovered they were all gone. “Snowball,” he screamed, “damn it, get back here!”
Then the flush-out hit. At first it was only a wave washing about Teldin’s legs. The sta
ircase behind him had turned into a waterfall, water splashing down the steps and swirling down the coiled shaft. Most of the flood roared past to disappear farther down the stairwell. Then, all at once, the pressure became too great and the cascade became a solid blast. The algae-rich lake water burst through the doorway and slammed the farmer full in the face. Without a chance to even struggle for his footing, Teldin was swept backward down the hail. He floundered and struggled, trying not to drown, but the surging water bashed him from wall to wall, rounding corners in an endless rush. Teldin choked and sputtered and struggled to break the surface, but the hallway was filled. The current dragged him along the tunnel’s rough rock face, which ripped his shirt and skin on its sandpaper-like surface. His body hurtled into doorjambs and debris, battering the farmer nearly senseless.
Finally, half-drowned and scraped raw, Teldin broke the surface, gagging and sputtering. The crest of the flood had passed, but the current carried the limp human swiftly through the corridors. He was barely aware of what was happening and feebly clawed at passing projections, trying to stop his progress.
Then he heard an echoing roar, deeper than the high-pitched crash of the waves, a roar that came from somewhere ahead. Teldin turned to see the end of the corridor, where it opened into the central shaft of Mount Nevermind. The carrying flood swept out onto the ledge and plunged over the edge into darkness. Desperately Teldin tried to brace his feet on the bottom, only to have them swept out from under him. He splashing and clutched at a shape, but it was only a crate that bobbed underneath his grasp. Rolling around, the farmer saw he was only seconds from the edge of the chasm.
At the very edge Teldin saw a barrel-lift just to the left. He lunging outward, and his fingers grazed the wooden rim, then slipped away. With a frantic flail, his arm wrapped around a rope. The farmer clung to the slender line, his body swinging out over open space. Water from above battered the human, as if trying to knock him loose. A small body smashed against his shoulder and disappeared into the darkness.
Looking through the spray, Teldin saw the barrel he had lunged for just above him. The rope he clung to was the other half of the lift and somewhere above it looped over a big pulley and ended at the barrel. Somewhere below was the counterweight.
Teldin wrapped his legs around the hemp, then began to carefully slide down. The rope creaked and groaned, but the farmer paid it no mind until he realized, to his amazement, that he was moving up, not down. Even as his dazed brain tried to figure this out, the barrel on the other end dropped past him. The wooden gondola was filled to the brim with water, and as more crashed into it from above, the force drove it down farther and faster. Teldin, in turn, rose higher and faster. Before he could stop it, the lean human was rocketing to the upper levels.
Teldin wanted to scream, but the cry was driven back into his throat. Looking up, he saw a massive disk forming out of the darkness. As he sped toward it, the drenched climber suddenly realized it was the pulley. He thought briefly about his hands being dragged over the metal wheel. With a wild, frantic kick he swung the rope toward the outer edge of the shaft, and at the height of the swing, Teldin let go, praying the momentum was enough to carry him to safety.
The wild lunge carried Teldin to one of the landings. He tried to land on his feet, but, soaking wet and slippery, he crashed to the floor. With an almost audible crack, his temple hit the stone. Teldin’s eyes suddenly flashed bright sparks, then darkness settled upon him.
Chapter Twenty-one
“To the Chamber of Pain take meat you shall,” the leading neogi whispered to the red-brown brute carrying Teldin. The human, stripped of his weapon and slung over the beast’s shoulder, craned around to see the neogi scuttling about. Teldin’s head throbbed and he had trouble focusing. The horrid little creature swam before his eyes.
Hanging limply across the umber hulk’s shoulder, such as it was, Teldin’s chest banged against the creature’s bony hide. Gradually his head stopped swimming and he could see around him again, albeit upside-down and across the back of a smelly, plate-covered creature. From his position, though, the human had a fairly good view of the back of the beast’s feet, and somehow he was not surprised to see the creature’s talons gouging the solid rock floor like soft sand. Each glimpse of the cracked, yellow claws accentuated the agony of the equally powerful hand that dug into Teldin’s back, holding him in place.
Teldin caught fleeting upside-down glimpses of the corridors and rooms they passed, but he had no idea where he was. He counted five of his captors. At least one neogi and four freakish umber hulks were in his group, of that much he was certain. The escort plodded through the halls, the noise of cracking stone and clicking mandibles echoing with every step. Just as Teldin thought he knew where he was, the caravan reached a stair, still dripping from the gnomish flood, and disoriented him again.
After climbing several levels, the group struck off through the corridors again. The pace was brisk; apparently, the neogi was trying to spirit its captive out of the gnome warrens as quickly as possible. Along the route were clear signs of battle: shattered walls, broken machines, bloodstains, and bodies. Most of the dead were gnomes; only a few were umber hulks, and none were neogi. In several instances, the neogi leader ordered its slaves to collect the corpses until the beasts were loaded down with bodies. Bloody streaks darkened their rust-brown hides.
When the sanguinary caravan finally reached the outdoors, Teldin found himself once again looking at the crater lake. The neogi’s choice of direction was now clear, for hovering over the water below was a massive ship – or creature. From his vantage point, Teldin couldn’t be sure.
Whatever the thing was, it looked like a gigantic spider, divided into three parts. The rear section, blood red and larger than the rest, was egg-shaped with an underbelly, if one could call it that, lined with veinlike courses. This abdomen loomed fat and plump in the starlit sky over the tiny Unquenchable. From its broad end protruded a smaller section, looking much like the head. A thick, curved, gray mantle covered the forward part while glowing hemispherical ports gave the impression of malevolent eyes glaring down at its prey, the hapless little sidewheeler.
A tight cluster of slender spars, jointed like gigantic legs, were affixed at the front of the head. Four swept to the rear, arching above and below the main hull, and each tapered to a point. Four others reached out to the front, probing into the darkness. Teldin could only see the spars as the spider’s legs, completing the image of an immense, bloated arachnid hovering in the sky. Gossamer sails, woven like vast cobwebs, stretched between the tips, trembling on the slightest breeze. More webs, strung like ladders, reached from the abdomen of the hovering thing to the shore. The ship was a maleficent spider weaving its web over the helpless Unquenchable.
Teldin’s ride, forced as it was, became rougher as the umber hulk scrambled down the talus slope. For once the yeoman was thankful for the creature’s gripping claws, though its bony hide scraped his chest nearly raw. Finally it reached the bottom of the slope and grabbed a webbed ladder. The farmer expected the massive beast to tear through the thin hawsers but the cables were far stronger than they seemed. The ladder swayed and tossed as the immense bulk ascended toward the ship’s belly. Teldin could clearly see the gnome sidewheeler floating in the water below. While he knew it was undamaged, the ship looked like little more than floating wreckage.
The swaying stopped and darkess closed about Teldin as the umber hulk struggled off the ladder and into the neogi ship’s hold. Apparently the neogi did not feel the need for lights, since none of several commands the leader hissed involved illumination. The words were foreign, but Teldin felt he understood them. “Dead meat take to food lockers,” the foul thing told its slaves. “Live meat take to Chamber of Pain. Live meat guard well, and see it escape does not.”
“I obey, small lord,” rumbled Teldin’s keeper, its chest trembling beneath his legs.
“Do it, lordservant.” A scrabbling series of clicks told Teldin the neogi ha
d departed. He was unable to follow their progress in the darkness, and Teldin could do nothing but let himself be carried to some new destination. Somewhere along the way, the umber hulk climbed a ladder, pressing its claws into Teldin’s back and causing warm blood to seep into the weave of his shirt. Held helpless, he gave up his ideas of escape.
The umber hulk reached another deck, no brighter than the previous, walked a short distance, then stopped. Teldin heard the rattling of a lock, then the faint creak of a well-oiled door. With a savage clench to the ankles, the beast swung the human off its back and hurled him through the doorway to crash to the floor, skinning his body even more. Teldin heard the door slam and the lock drop into place.
Teldin huddled on the floor in the darkness for he didn’t know how long, his mind shut down in shock. Eventually self-preservation took hold and the farmer pulled himself up. “Don’t sit there! Do something!” he cursed under his breath. Teldin carefully began to crawl on his raw knees across the prison’s floor, feeling his way. Groping along this way, the captive bumped into several tables, each of them bare, though he could feel the tops were scarred and scored. There was a smell in the air, the faded suggestion of a sweetly thick odor. What was it that seemed so familiar? As he surveyed the cell’s dimensions, the mule skinner in Teldin remembered the odor, a long-forgotten scent from the war. It was blood, dried and stale to be sure, but blood just the same. Suddenly fearful in the darkness, Teldin pressed himself against the wall, trying to melt into it, fighting the panic that rose from his core.
“Keep going!” the farmer snarled at himself, whispering the words through clenched teeth. He thought of Amdar, scowling at his weak son, remembering the disappointment so clearly etched in his father’s face. The grim memory stiffened Teldin’s resolve; he would not fail this time. He would meet every one of his dead father’s expectations. Painfully, slowly, the trembling yeoman moved forward, fingers following the wall. He desperately tried not to think about the smell, the blood, the scarred tables, the “human meat,” as the neogi had called him. Scratching the metallic surface, the farmer finally touched something different. Fingers eagerly caressed the surface until it was cleat that it was the hinge of the door. There was almost a sense of hopes that the joints might offer some chance of escape.
