by Oisin McGann
‘On, Plessebel, ya ol’ hag, there!’ he called to his mount. ‘Hup, girl!’
Plessebel moved with a smooth, winding motion, crossing the yard to the wall of cobrush trees that lined the hillside. Rug wondered how they were going to penetrate the tangled mass. But as they reached the tree-line, the gruncheg suddenly lifted the front half of her body and Rug found himself being hoisted up into the air. The creature’s front legs found a gap high up in the mesh of branches and caught hold with the claw-like toes on the ends of her feet. Then Rug was tipped back, held in only by his straps, as the gruncheg pulled the front half of her body up into this gap and lifted the back half up off the ground. Through the gap was what appeared to be a path beaten through the tangle, the branches so interwoven that they created a rigid track which the gruncheg now followed upwards. Rug tipped himself forwards as the animal levelled out and grabbed the pommel of the saddle when Plessebel suddenly lurched forward, quickly picking up speed.
They came out on the roof of the forest and all around them Rug could see signs of more of these tracks, spreading in a network across the top of the forest. The spines along Plessebel’s sides extended and Rug was startled to see flaps of skin unfolding between them. These sheets of skin were held aloft and angled to catch the wind. The word escaped him at first, and then he remembered. Sails. The grunchegs had sails.
He stared in amazement. It made perfect sense if you had the body to do it. Instead of struggling through the thick forest, you could run right across the top of it. He heard Lorkrin and Taya whoop as their mount eased into a run behind him and he held on tighter as Trankelfrith whipped the reins and let Plessebel have her head. The sails were angled to not only push her forwards, but also to lift her slightly, taking some of the weight of her body. The sensation was like running downhill.
There was little of the constant fog up at this height and Rug could see further than he could ever remember seeing before. On all sides, the trees stretched away over rolling hills. Then it all disappeared as Plessebel swept down into a dip in the path and he was surrounded by the long-leaved treetops again. They were moving at great speed, faster than any man could run and perhaps as fast as a horse, though the only horses he could remember had been back in the Reisenick town.
He clung on, trying to quell the sickening sense of constantly being off balance as the gruncheg dipped and climbed, swerved and banked, her long body following the contours of the path. He was thrown one way and then the other into the straps, tipping from side to side, trying to take his weight in the stirrups and gripping the pommel, feeling as if he was about to be flung off the gruncheg’s back by a tight turn or a steep climb. Taya and Lorkrin’s voices laughed and screamed behind him, relishing the ride until Draegar told them to quieten down for fear of alerting any Reisenicks below them. The drumming of Plessebel’s feet caused a constant quiver through her body and added to the ill feeling in Rug’s head and belly. Trying to take a leaf from Lorkrin and Taya’s book, he let out a laugh and discovered that he immediately felt better. He laughed again and realised that he did not even recognise the sound. It felt good, he decided and let out a whoop as they descended into another precipitous hollow. Trankelfrith looked back at him and guffawed, then spat a green lump of hajam weed out over the trees and bit a new chunk off a wad from his pocket.
‘Hang on in there, ya angular gank,’ he shouted around the mouthful of weed. ‘We’ll make a leather-cheeked grun-chegger out of you yet!’
14 BLINDWATER, BREAD MOULD AND MAGGOTS
Paternasse tripped and fell forwards, hitting the ground with a pained grunt.
‘I’m all walked out,’ he groaned. ‘I have to stop.’
‘We don’t even know where we’re going,’ Noogan whined. ‘We could end up right back where we started.’
‘We’re still headed north,’ the old miner assured him. ‘But we’re windin’ back and forth for sure. We’ve probably walked twice the distance we could’ve covered in a straight line.’
‘My feet are killing me,’ Nayalla added, her voice distorted by the fangs that filled her mouth, her eyes hidden in the folded contours of her face and forehead.
She and Mirkrin had adopted the appearance of skacks in an effort to ward off attacks by the new predator that was stalking them. No one wanted to talk about Dalegin and what had happened to him, as if to talk about it would bring it on themselves. They had fled from the sight, running until they were so tired that they could only stumble on, still driven by their dread. Paternasse and Noogan had been particularly distraught and even now their faces wore expressions of hopelessness and defeat, as if seeing their friend’s mutilated body had finally broken their spirits.
The onset of another earthquake had sent the four of them cowering into each other’s arms and it had taken them a long time to find the will to start walking again once it stopped. Paternasse assured them that he was leading them northwards, but the others were dubious. They felt hopelessly lost. Their nerves on edge, they stared fearfully into the darkness, waiting for the attack of some unseen monster, or the first shudder of the next quake – the one they were sure would bring the weakened rock down on top of them. They were all suffering the effects of thirst and were aching with hunger. Noogan had even tried licking the moisture from the walls, but found it only made the unbearable, gagging dryness even worse. They had no idea how long they had been wandering through the caves, but it felt like weeks. The fear and fatigue had taken their toll and for the first time the four survivors were losing hope of ever seeing daylight again.
The two Myunans sank down beside the miners and let their tired bodies shed their fearsome shapes. Nayalla was shivering and Mirkrin held her close to try and warm her up, but he had little warmth to offer.
‘I don’t think it’s followed us,’ Nayalla said hopefully.
‘How do we know?’ Mirkrin shook his head. ‘Whoever or whatever it is, this is its hunting ground. It could just be stalking us, biding its time.’
‘We’re going to be all right,’ she insisted in a determined tone.
‘That’s easy for you to say,’ Noogan shivered. ‘It only takes the bones. You don’t have any bones.’
‘It still has to open us up to find out!’ Nayalla snapped back at him.
‘I’d really like to change the subject,’ Mirkrin interjected.
‘We need to bunch up when we stop,’ Paternasse croaked. ‘Try and conserve our heat. The cold could get us even before the thirst does.’
‘I don’t know if I can keep goin’,’ Noogan mumbled. ‘I feel dizzy, and my head’s sore.’
‘That’s the thirst. Hang on in there, lad. You’re strong. There’s plenty of life left in yuh yet.’
Mirkrin said nothing, but he kept his eyes closed against the stone walls that threatened to close in and crush him. He forced himself to breath normally, opening his tightened chest and taking slow, deep breaths.
‘There’s that sound again,’ Nayalla said suddenly, lifting her head. ‘Do you hear it?’
Eager for a distraction, Mirkrin listened intently.
‘Yeah,’ he nodded finally. ‘Yeah, a rumbling noise.’
‘Water.’ Paternasse lifted himself up on his elbows. ‘It’s got to be water. An underground river or something.’
Forgetting their exhaustion, they clambered up onto their feet.
‘Sounds like it’s coming from down there,’ Paternasse pointed towards a fissure in the wall.
‘Come on then,’ Nayalla stepped towards it.
‘Wait! Hold on there!’ Noogan exclaimed. ‘The last time we heard this, something killed Dal. How do we know that bloody thing’s not the one making the noise?’
‘It’s not an animal sound,’ Nayalla replied. ‘It’s water all right. But you’ve got a point. If it’s the only water around, it would make sense for the thing to stay close by.’
‘We don’t have a choice,’ Paternasse sighed. ‘We have to find out.’
The Myunans took their tools f
rom their bags and set to work resurrecting their skack-like forms. Noogan watched, no longer embarrassed or disturbed, but comforted by the sight of the shape-changers distorting their flesh. If the Myunans could use their talents to fend off the creature hunting them, then he was glad to have them around and grateful for their strange ways.
The fissure looked new, as if it might have been created by one of the recent tremors. The rumbling echoed up from its depths and even Paternasse could hear it now.
‘It’s big,’ he said. ‘A river, I think.’
The jar with the silvery powder was running low, but no one commented on it. They had lost the lantern somewhere back in the Seneschal’s tunnels and their only other source of light was the little spirit lamp in Noogan’s helmet. Nobody wanted to think about what would happen when their torches ran out. Mirkrin insisted on leading the way, despite Nayalla’s protests, and he found himself trembling as he worked his way forward down the narrow tunnel. The fissure was only just wider than his shoulders and at times he had to turn sideways to get through. With the torch tied to his forearm, his long, serrated claws were useful for gripping the wet rock as he went, but the extended shins of a skack were not cut out for walking through narrow, awkward spaces.
The walls of the crack tilted over to the right and he was forced to sidle along the right wall, the skack’s claws becoming too much of a hindrance to sustain, so he let his hands regain their shapes. He slunched his legs back into their natural forms while he was at it. Soon, he was crawling along on his belly and the memories of being trapped beneath the cave-in made themselves felt with merciless clarity. He panted for breath, fighting the urge to claw his way back up the narrow tunnel, or simply to curl up and give in to the panic.
The sound grew steadily louder and he stopped every now and then to listen and make sense of it. The water seemed to be rushing over gravel; the tumult had a hard, gritty quality. He sniffed the air, but could not detect any of the usual smells he associated with underground streams, no fungus or mildew, or crisp, cold dampness. He came upon a slab of broken rock and then beyond it, another. It was clear that the ceiling of the fissure had collapsed and Mirkrin imagined that he felt the pressure increase in the air as if the roof above his head was about to come crashing down. He gritted his teeth and dragged himself up over the pile of debris and held up his torch. The rumbling sound was all he could hear, drowning out the movements of the others behind him, but the empty space around him revealed no sign of water anywhere. And the sound was wrong; it was hard and grating, like spilling gravel. A trickle of dust falling on the back of his neck made him roll over and look up. He screamed and threw his arms across his face, knowing that this time, there would be no one left to dig him out of his grave.
* * * *
For Emos, changing his appearance to that of a Reisenick was the easy part. He cleared the markings from his skin, altered the look of his clothes, gave his elbows and knees a swollen stiffness and increased the size of his hands and feet, squeezing his fingers out thinner and emphasising the knuckles. But the main problem was his face, and the triangular brand that marked it. That could not be wiped off, for it was the mark of the plague and had been put there by Myunans as a warning to others of their kind. Some Reisenicks knew enough about Myunans to recognise the brand for what it was.
He slunched the skin of his face and then pulled back hard on his hair, dragging the flesh of his face right up onto the top of his head and crefting it in place. His eyes, nose and mouth stayed where they were, but he had to use his tools to reduce the stretched look. He used a blending comb to create more hair on the top of his head, sweeping some more from the back to cover the brand. Then he used a scapulet to add the finishing touches to his suitably misshapen Reisenick face. The brand was already starting to itch and he knew that before long, it would begin creeping back down onto his face. But he had time enough to do what he needed to do. He had already checked out the small settlement from the air. Now he had to show his face. Or somebody’s face, at least.
He packed his tools away and scrambled down to the road, which he followed to the gate of the healer’s house. A sign on the gatepost read: ‘Shindles Vidditch, Healer, Apothecary & Bonesetter’. There were three grunchegs coiled up in a corral to one side of the main cabin, and some kind of workshop on the other. He strode right up to the front door of the house and knocked loudly. A young man answered. He was thin and gaunt, with red-rimmed eyes and large gaps between his teeth.
‘Yuh?’
‘I’m looking for Shindles.’
‘Are yuh now? And who might you be?’
‘Tell her it’s the man who brought her the bexemot bone a few years back.’
‘All right then, stay right there,’ the youth instructed him. He went to the top of the stairs down to the cellar and yelled: ‘Aunt Shindles? There’s a fella here says he brought you some bexemot bone some years back, says you know him. Got the look of the Tunditch clan about him.’
‘The Tunditch clan?’ a crackly voice replied and a middle-aged woman with a wizened nose and turned-in foot hobbled up the stairs. She was wearing a look of puzzlement on her face and she glared at Emos in suspicion.
‘Only fella that ever managed to get me bexemot bone was a Myun–’ Her face brightened in realisation. ‘Emos Harprag! That look don’t suit you, boy! What brings you back to these parts?’
‘I have a friend who needs your talents,’ Emos replied. ‘And we’ll need your discretion. Learup Ludditch has decided he doesn’t want us in Ainslidge.’
‘Overblown fart-whistle,’ Shindles snorted. ‘You got the money, I got the discretion.’
‘We can pay. I’ll go and get them. It’s an infected leg, badly rotted but I think it can be saved.’
‘Let me do the diagnosin’, you just fetch ’im in.’ She waved her hand, then turning to her nephew, added her orders: ‘Pobe, go get me a flagon o’ blindwater, some of my bread mould and some fresh maggots.’
‘Yes, Aunt Shindles.’
Emos was about to ask about the maggots, but Shindles had already disappeared into one of the rooms. He grimaced at the thought of what was to come. Shindles Vidditch was a gifted healer, but her techniques were … well, eccentric. He hurried back across the yard to the road, shedding his disguise as he made his way as quickly as he could to where the trucks were hidden.
* * * *
‘Mirkrin! Mirkrin, love! It’s all right!’
He did not know how long his wife had been calling to him, but slowly the terror subsided and he looked up from behind his arms. She was hugging him and stroking his hair.
‘Look up,’ she said. ‘It’s not coming down on us. I don’t know what it is, but it’s staying where it is.’
He looked up and cowered back at first, but then his curiosity overcame his fear and he stared up at the ceiling in the torchlight. It was earth, not stone, and it was moving. It was as if something was stirring it, the soil turning in on itself like boiling water. Dust and particles of soil sprinkled down from time to time, but the roof seemed to be staying where it was.
‘It’s krundengrond,’ Paternasse told them over the noise. ‘I’ve only ever heard of it before, but that’s what it has to be. And we’re underneath it.’
‘How can it stay suspended up there like that?’ Nayalla asked. ‘Normal earth would have fallen right in on us if it were that loose.’
‘It’s unholy stuff,’ the old miner replied. ‘Figures, finding it under here with all this other madness. It’s a living thing. It holds together because the soil is its body. I don’t know why it hasn’t filled this space. It’s odd that.’
He looked around, then ran his finger over one of the slabs of stone they were kneeling on and tasted it and then spat it out.
‘Iron,’ he told them. ‘We’re back under iron. Something about it the krundengrond doesn’t like.’
‘I know the feeling,’ Noogan snorted. ‘I thought we were out from under the mountain?’
‘We a
re. The ore must extend further out than anyone thought. That’ll be an eye-opener for the Noranians.’
Paternasse caught a sharp look from Nayalla.
‘That would be if anybody told them, of course,’ he added, hurriedly.
‘Well, there’s no water.’ Mirkrin sat up. ‘Let’s get out of here and back to the passage. That stuff might not like iron, but it might well like Myunan and I don’t really want to find out.’
They all agreed. Being in such a low, tight space was unnerving enough without the ceiling grinding itself up over their heads. They crawled back up through the fissure until they could walk and then hurried back to the main section of cave. It was a relief to return to the quiet. Their ears were still ringing with the sound of the krundengrond.
As they set off up the tunnel again, they failed to notice the swaying light behind them. It winked out after they emerged from the fissure, but not before the creature that carried it had started moving closer to its quarry. It did not need the light. The four animals ahead made enough noise and disturbed enough air and gave off enough heat to make following them pitifully easy. But it was patient. They were aware of it now, and would be on their guard. It would wait until they went to sleep again and then it would take its next victim. There was no rush; the bones of its last kill were slowly dissolving away in its stomach. It would not need to eat again for some time. And they had nowhere to go.
* * * *
Shindles Vidditch gazed down at Cullum’s wound and took a thoughtful gulp from the flagon of blindwater.
‘Hold ’im down,’ she told them.
Khassiel, Jube and Emos grabbed the Forward-Batterer’s shoulders, arms and legs and held him firmly as she poured some of the alcohol over the pus-filled wound. Cullum jerked upwards and screamed. Shindles, unmoved by his obvious agony, studied the area she had just cleaned out and nodded to herself.
