by Hugh Cook
Drake's wound healed to a crinkled red scar. His fever abated. Abandoning his bed (yes, by now he recognized a heap of stones and sand as a bed) he explored. Questing. Seeking. Searching for a way out of this warren, a way back to civilization. He found rooms packed with dusty old bones. A mortu
ary, where the unkempt dead, anointed with wild honey, lay waiting for the Funeral Winds. A strange globular room with silver walls where his weight left him, and he hung weightless in the air like a fish in water.
He took stairs which descended as well as those which went up, thinking there might be tunnels which travelled deep underground before breaking out to freedom. He found dank, gloomy, ill-lit places flooded with slimy water.
Once, he found a door which opened on a huge, utterly silent hall perhaps three leagues in length, where a dozen bulbous grey shapes, each hundreds of paces long, lay half-submerged in pitch-black water.
'Grief of suns!' said Drake. 'Will I never get out of here?'
He lost his way a dozen times, and once wandered for a whole day in waterless tunnels before chancing his steps back to the inhabited areas. Nothing daunted, he set out again – but this time he carried a chunk of charcoal with which to mark his way on the walls.
At last, he squeezed out through a narrow vent to stand in harsh clifftop sunshine. He had won a view of some of the meanest terrain in creation, a desolation of stone pillars, razor-sharp shadows, thornbush, cactus, sparce acacia, gulleys, buttes, sinkholes, escarpments and ravines.There was no sign of water.'Desolation,' muttered Drake.
He had never before seen a landscape so lonely. Utterly unmarked by human hand. He longed to be on Stokos again, ah yes, back on his home island where the terrain had been civilized by mines, quarries, slag heaps, ash pits, and other comforting signs of human activity.I'd die of loneliness if I tried to walk across this.
He saw something glinting a few paces away. What? His hot black shadow crabbed across the rocks as he ventured to the glitter. It proved to be a chunk of sharp-cut white crystals. Very hard.
'That quartz stuff Disaster talked about,' said Drake.
And wished he had Disaster with him. Or Ika Thole, yes, or even dim-witted Harly Burpskin.
'Anyone,' said Drake, 'as long as we've language in common.'
He was talking to himself a lot, these days. Was that a sign of madness?'I'll talk when I want!' yelled Drake, suddenly angry.
And he hurled the chunk of quartz into the wilderness. Then it occurred to him that maybe the stuff was worth having. Disaster had called it 'cheap', but perhaps Drake could bluff an unwary buyer into thinking it valuable.'Where did my quartz go?' he said.
He scrambled onto a small rock, and, from that eminence, swiftly discovered his quartz, which he duly retrieved.'A bigger rock,' said Drake. 'That's the thing.'
Yes. From a bigger rock he might see – well, running water, if he was lucky. Or maybe an old road which he could follow east through the wilderness,- in the general direction of Drangsturm.
Drake dared a perilous scramble to the top of the nearest house-sized rock. From there, high above thorn bushes and other rubbish, he had a much better view.No road. But. . .
Was that a building he saw? Yes. Half a league distant lay a square tower of thrice tree-height, built from massive white, blue and ochre blocks. A spike rose from each of its rooftop corners. Drake studied it doubtfully.Could it be . . .?Surely not!
And yet . . . it did look remarkably like the legendary Wishing Tower known to every child of Stokos from fairy stories. And he was on Argan, was he not? Argan, the true homeland of all improbable things?
'Improbability is not impossibility,' said Drake to himself, and, abandoning his chunk of quartz, he set off for the tower with all possible speed, i.e. slowly – the ground being regular leg-breaking territory.
At first he was all enthusiasm, dreaming of the marvellous things he would wish for. Fresh vegetables! A real live cucumber! A piece of lettuce! Then – well, the larger things. The throne of Stokos. The fair Zanya Kliedervaust, she of the red skin and the high-lofted breasts. And more height, yes, at least five extra hands of height.
'That would make me near as tall as Sully Yot,' said Drake. He remembered his last encounter with Yot, in Androlmarphos, when the crazy wart:faced fellow had tried to stab him. What on earth had made him do a weird thing like that?
'I'd never have credited him with the nerve to gut a cat,' muttered Drake.
He paused, breathing heavily. This was hard work! The terrain was so rucked, hillocky and chopped about that a stone's throw of thirty paces meant a weary scramble of thrice that distance for the footsore traveller. The sun was heavy on his head. A bead of sweat rolled into his right eye. It stung, fiercely. Give up? No, never!
Drake struggled onward, shrinking as he went. Crushed by the sun.
'Man,' muttered Drake, 'and I was short enough to start with.'
Rock caught and amplified the heat. He smelt hot, pungent herbs. Their scent made him dizzy. How immense was the world! This desolate place, far beyond all voices, was teaching him how he really measured up against the universe.Like an ant, man. An ant trying to walk across Stokos.
A shadow flickered over the ground. Shadow of a winged creature. A monster? Alarmed, Drake glanced skywards. No, not a monster – a buzzard. It started to circle.
'Piss off, you whore-faced puttock!' said Drake. The buzzard, a professional pessimist, continued to circle. Drake realized its diligence might well be rewarded. If
he broke an ankle out here, he was finished. Momentarily, he regretted ever leaving the safety of the tunnels of Ling. Leg-breaking apart – what would he do if he met one of the Swarms?
T don't believe they exist,' said Drake. 'Who says they do? Wizards, that's all!'
Maybe Drangsturm was a great big con, yes. Maybe there was wealth beyond the flame trench, aye, gold, silver, stuff like that. Probably wizards kept people away from it by making up tales of monsters. Likely they roamed the terror-lands at will, picking up chunks of gold and similar riches.'Swarms?' saidDrake. 'Bah! Humbug!'
Much, much later, grazed by rock, stung by hornet, pricked by thorn and burnt by the sun into the bargain, he gained the doorway which pierced the lower level of the ancient square-built monument, and knew at once that this was not the fairy-tale tower he had hoped for.
Unlike the Wishing Tower, this one was not inhabited by a magic dwarf, a talking rabbit, a blue-nosed leprechaun and a friendly little elf. Peering into the gloom he saw, instead, four hideous totem poles of dull metal, closely resembling the Guardian Machines described by old teachings preserved by the metalworking guilds of Stokos.'Guardian Machines,' saidDrake.
He had been taught about them in his theory classes about three years previously. What had he learnt, exactly? That they were dangerous, yes .Still. . . these ones looked pretty dead.'You awake?' yelled Drake.
The totem poles sat in sullen silence. Maybe they weren't Guardian Machines at all. Maybe they were art. Drake had heard about art – bits of odd-shaped stuff set up in special rooms for people to gawk at. It was said to be real big in Veda, the city of the sages.
Drake stepped through the doorway. Dead leaves crunched underfoot. Inside, it was cool and shady. But dry. He wished he had water.
Look around. Investigate.
Four steep stairways spiralling up into the shadows. Some barely perceptible activity going on at his feet – yes, a tribe of red ants were practising genocide on some of their black-skinned cousins. And overhead . . . looking up, Drake saw a spider the size of a dog, which sat in a ceiling-spanning bat-catching web and glowered at him. Hastily he armed himself with a hefty stick in case the spider got any unfortunate ideas.
Then, since he had the stick in his hands, he hit himself on both shins, which hurt, but would help teach him that he was too old to believe in fairy tales.What now?Retreat or explore.
The view, that's the thing. From the roof, we'll see roads and stuff. Or a ruined city, maybe.
; So thinking, Drake made for the nearest stairway. He was almost there when one of the metal totem poles, which was indeed a Guardian Machine, ground into life with an enormous racket of gears. Spitting blue sparks, it advanced. Drake went haring up the winding stairs – and slammed into an invisible wall, almost knocking himself out.'Break!' screamed Drake.
He hammered the invisible barrier, butted it, stuck it with his stick, kicked it – all to no effect. Downstairs the Guardian Machine was hissing and roaring.'Give, you ganch!' yelled Drake.
But it wouldn't. It yielded inwards slightly, but that was all. He scratched it, finding its surface cold and slippery. Beyond lay a skeleton, and the stairs leading upwards.No escape!
'Olwek ba-velchV said Drake savagely, then turned to face the Guardian Machine.
Which, by the sound of it, was still at the bottom of the stairs, grinding, hissing and tearing. As he listened, the sounds lessened. Then died. Cautiously, he crept downstairs until he could see the metal monster at the foot of the stairs. Obviously, it was unable to climb. But it scarcely looked short of patience. He suspected it could happily wait until ants carried away the dust of his bones – as they would indeed unless he could escape.
There was room to squeeze past the machine.If he was quick-
Drake dared one step downwards. The machine roared and spat at him. Lightning slammed into his gut, knocking him backwards. He could not breathe! Paralysed, he lay with arms out flung, mouth gaping. Then managed to gasp a thimble-sized breath of air.
As the machine roared and whined, gathering strength for another homicide attempt, Drake very slowly and very painfully rolled over and began to crawl back up the spiral staircase. The machine shot at him as soon as it could -which was just a fraction too late.
Back at the invisible wall, Drake rested, collecting his wits. There was no way Out down the stairs, that was for sure. There were no windows, but light was definitely coming down from the top of the stairs.
He studied the skeleton. Somehow, someone had got beyond the invisible wall. And had died there.
Drake reviewed the Inner Principles of the Old Science which he had learnt as part of his apprenticeship studies. He recited the Beginning:
'Cause has effect; effect has control; control requires search; search elucidates cause.'Then he recalled the first Rule of Investigation:'Desribe what you see, for perception controls process.'
Drake had never put much stock in theory. In fact, he had always hated it – particularly since, being totally illiterate, he had had to memorize the whole 23,427 words of it. Being dubious about the validity of the Power Theory of Knowledge, he still resented the waste of all those bright sunny afternoons which could have been spent in healthy amuse-mentslikestreet-fighting.orinthepracticeofreligion – but the Scientific Approach now seemed to be his only hope.So he began an Investigation.He described: 'Low light. . . cool. . . was warmer outside . . . stairs . . . going up . . . cracks . . . some brown stuff. . . stain? . . . bones beyond invisible . . . no, not like air . . . bit blurred . . . push . . . yields . . . slippery . . . cold … no shadow . . . fits to wall… no visible seam . . . wall same block-pattern as stairs . . . except . . . yes . . . plate of white metal set in wall … no rust . . . pattern of five raised circles set on metal plate . . . raised circles are . . . are moveable . . .'
As Drake fingered the raised circles set in the metal plate, something changed. What? He stood absolutely still, listening. Then realized a faint hum, which he had dismissed as a noise within his own head, had ceased to be. He could hear … a tiny creak from his own knees . . . the complex sounds of deglutition as he swallowed some saliva . . . and that was it.
Drake mobilized some more saliva in his mouth, then spat.
His spittle splattered against the skeleton's skull. Reaching out, he found the invisible barrier had gone. He glanced at the metal plate in the wall, and the raised circles he had fingered. Cause and effect. Yes.'Score one for theory,' muttered Drake.
With reluctance, for he hated to concede anything to Gouda Muck – or, indeed, to any other of that age group.
'But I'll give him this,' muttered Drake. 'Even if he was mad, the old bugger did make bloody good swords.'
And he took a couple of steps forward.Then stopped.He could hear something. What? Yes: that hum.'Oh no,' said Drake. 'Oh no, tell me it's not so.'
But, on turning and trying to retreat back downstairs, he found the invisible barrier barring his way. He did another Investigation, a comprehensive one. There was no magical cause-and-effect device on this side of the barrier. Now he knew why the bones were there.'The poor old sod starved to death,' said Drake.
And, looking at the yellow bones, had a sudden intimation of his own inevitable death. Even if he got out of this alive, he would die some day. For the first time in his life, he truly understood his own mortality.
'That's the trouble with bloody-well being sober all the time,' said Drake. 'You gets some weird old thoughts breaking loose.'
Yes. The sooner he got back to civilization and got decently drunk again, the better. If he stayed here much longer, brooding about Knowledge Theory and Mortality and such, he'd be a regular mad philosopher by the time he escaped. Stokos had had two of them, and a sorry old sight they were, too.
'Onwards!' said Drake boldly, appropriating for his own purposes the motto of the Guild of Navigators, which was not strictly his to use at all.
He swiftly found himself in a machine-cluttered room at the top of the tower. He could not tell what these amazing devices did, or where they were from, or what they were worth – but none attacked him, so he didn't rightly care.
What he wanted was a way out. Which he found, soon enough: a square hole in the ceiling. So up he went. And, after he had gazed again on the desolation of the Deep South, he started wondering just how the hell he was going to get back to ground level. If he had a rope, it would be easy.Otherwise . . .
The walls were sheer, impossible to climb. If he jumped, the odds for breaking something were excellent. If he broke something, he was dead.'Hoy!' shouted Drake. 'Anyone here?'
He listened, but heard only a faint hissing, which could have been the sun trying to weld his shadow to the roof. Shading his eyes, he scanned the landscape. Nobody. The clifftops lay only half a league away. From this height, it scarcely looked any distance at all.
Then came the blue of the sea, and, to the north, the humped mass of the island of Ko. There was something odd about Ko. Yes: its ends were curling up in the hot sunshine, floating above the sea. Drake squinted, trying to bring them into focus. No change.
He was horror-struck. It was his fault! He must have somehow unleashed some enormously evil power which had been lurking in this tower. Perhaps that power was, right now, making all the lands and islands of the whole wide world turn up at the edges and curdle.'Nonsense,' he said to himself. 'Impossible!'
Yet: some of those ancient Causes were known to have amazingly grandiose Effects.
'Well,' said Drake, 'we'll worry about the world when we're free in the world to worry. Right now we need a rope.'
And, without waiting to worsen his sunburn, he went below decks to make another Investigation.
He found nothing remotely worth having, but for twenty-seven identical amulets. Each, together with its necklace-chain of smooth-flowing black links, had the weight of a walnut. Each amulet was a cool, glossy lozenge of jet black. On one side, a golden sun disc. On the other, raised silver decorations in the form of seven stars and a crescent moon. On Investigating the silver stars, Drake found the amulets could be made to talk.
'. . . strong voice,' muttered Drake. 'Man's voice . . . strange … no language I know . . . worth a pretty, I bet . . . magic, perhaps? Spells, perhaps? . . . well … no harm trying . . .'
He took the amulets downstairs. Crouching by the yellowed skull of the long-dead stranger, he let the invisible barrier listen to each amulet in turn, knowing well enough that many such charms had magical powers. The barrier held f
irm. Drake attacked it one last time, thumping it hard with his fists.No good.
'Still,' said Drake, putting the amulets round his neck for safe keeping, 'these charm-things will be worth something if I ever get out of here. Yes, wizards would pay for them, if nobody else.'
He was right about that, for each amulet contained the voice of Saba Yavendar himself. The great poet of the days of yore had once lived in this tower for half a millen-ium, and had whiled away some of those long years of exile by making multiple recordings of all his early works, including his Winesong, Lovesong and Warsong.
Wizards valued such things, and the High Speech of wizards was near-identical to the Stabilized Scholastic Standard which Yavendar had recorded in.'Still no rope, though,' said Drake.
But, before he slung the last amulet around his neck, he tested its strength. It was beyond his power to break it.
'With enough of these woman-fancy faggots,' said Drake, 'I could make a chain to get me out of here.'
So he resumed his Investigations, but with no more success than-before. He got angry.
'You see, Muck?' he yelled. 'You see, you groggy old bugger? You can't make rope from Investigations!'
Then stopped yelling, for his throat started hurting. Thirst. Yes. That was it. He was going to thirst to death, and soon. No doubt about it. Since he was definitely doomed to die, he was all the more bitter about those afternoons wasted studying the Theory of Knowledge, the Theory of Lists, the Reductive Crisis of Categorizations and all the rest of that pretentious old rubbish which never yet helped put a sharper edge on a sword, and never would.
'Missed out on all those sacrifices, too,' said Drake, gloomily.
The human sacrifices organized by the temple of Hagon had mostly been in the afternoons. Everyone agreed they were top-notch religious experience, but because of his schoolwork, he had never managed to see one.'All those days breaking my brains,' muttered Drake.
Arid hit a machine with his fist, hard. Then kicked it, but hurt his foot.'Ganch,' said Drake, viciously.The machines were obviously built to last. Otherwise he would have relieved his feelings by smashing them to pieces. Breaking. Smashing. Yes, that rang a bell. What was it? Yes … the final Rule of Investigation:'The last Test of Limits is Destruction.'
