“Varkon!” Tyler yelled.
The snow lion pounced. Its body stretched through the air with the grace of a bird, razor claws extended. And what speed! Tyler could do little more than stand dumb with his hands clasped feebly ahead of his face.
His legs were kicked out violently from beneath him. Abruptly he crashed onto his back. The lion sailed over him with a swish of wind, landed neatly on the snow, and then with one leap bounded away again into the darkness, leaving behind only a deep snarl of frustration.
Tyler realised he was yelling. One of his ankles was roaring with pain, and the rest of his body prickled with shock. Varkon crouched and hauled him to his feet.
“We must go on. Can you walk?”
Tyler winced. “I guess so, but it’s going to hurt.”
“Pain fades with time. Death will be a little more permanent. Let’s move – there’s no telling when that creature will return.”
They pushed onwards, Tyler limping badly as he tried not to inch any weight onto the ball of his foot. Varkon lagged behind so that he could see his charge at all times and better protect him. The ghatu showed no sympathy.
The slavish march continued as the moon drifted across the sky. Tyler’s agony endured. On one brief rest he crammed snow into his boot to ice his heel. It blocked the pain for a time, but eventually the ice melted, and he was left with a flood of cold water churning horribly around his foot. Pain gnawed at his strength. This nightmare had lasted for too long. The world tilted.
With a groan he crashed to the snow, falling to his knees. “I can’t anymore, Varkon. I just can’t.”
For a long moment Varkon paused, seemingly considering his options. His great figure loomed from above like one of the tall pines. Finally he bent and scooped Tyler into his colossal grasp.
“Rest …” whispered Tyler with relief as his fingers fumbled for the warmth of the spider-stone.
Araus stood on the beach. The sun whipped at her flaxen hair, and the breeze played with the ribbons on her dress. He was there. They kissed.
The hawk flew by again, slowly this time. She withdrew deeply into the leaves, ruffling her feathers nervously and darting her head.
Six ravens – that was bad luck. He thumbed his tongue into his cheek and scratched his nose. Perhaps not the most attractive action, but he couldn’t care less anymore. One last time he went over the options. Somehow he had always known it would come to this …
Low. Fast. Whipping along the trunk. Must find light. Light? Maybe higher? Yes. Yes. He rested, his scaly body drawing in the heat. He licked out a long, forked tongue. Good.
He was in the darkness; it was infinite. Tyler was immersed in it, drowning in the remains of his courage. The darkness began to pulse, to squeeze, pushing against him and compacting. He struggled, but there was no hope of escape. It crushed harder, pressing against his temples and shutting out his air. He could not scream. His eyes lolled madly in their sockets.
“DIE!” The voice pierced Tyler’s head like a hot bit of iron.
“Derek!” Tyler shouted as he woke. “My home!”
He was feverish. Sweat drenched his body, and his breathing was ragged, but worst of all he was completely disorientated. He had no idea where he was. A hand gripped his shoulder. It was a compassionless, heavy hand, but it helped all the same. “Tyler! Tyler! What’s wrong?”
The fever eased at the sound of Varkon’s voice, and Tyler found it surprisingly cheering. He opened his eyes and struggled to sit up, but Varkon pushed him down. “Rest child. You must be still.”
“I’m all right now, Varkon. I feel better. I can sit.”
Varkon ignored these assurances. “Go back to sleep. Please.”
“Varkon, let go!” Tyler cried, pushing roughly upwards as he sat. His face felt cool. He reached up to touch it, and it was wet. He drew his hand away – blood. “Varkon? What happened? Where did this come from?”
The ghatu’s hand fell back onto Tyler’s shoulder.
“Child, lie down. Please, if you could only …” He sighed. “Blood is running from your nose, your ears.”
Tyler touched his ears unbelievingly. Sure enough they were coated with blood, which was already beginning to dry and harden. Perhaps it was the sight of his own blood, but all of a sudden he felt faint, and he sat back heavily. For Varkon to be worried, he must look awful.
“You must sleep. I’ve been pushing too hard.”
“No! I never want to sleep again.” It was an odd thing to say, and they both knew it. Varkon frowned and waited for an explanation. “Varkon, this is going to sound strange.”
“I’m listening.”
“I have been having dreams lately. Some of them are beautiful, happy even. Some are horrible. So horrible.” Tyler shuddered. “I dream as though I am another person or animal. It feels so real. Twice now the Dhimori has been in one of these dreams, in the darkness.” Tyler covered his face with sudden reproach. He had promised not to appear weak in front of Varkon. “This is stupid. They’re only nightmares.”
“Why didn’t you tell me this sooner?”
“They are just dreams.”
“Perhaps. When did they begin?”
“The first one was when I passed out, after falling into the river that first night.”
“Nothing like this has ever happened to you before?”
“No. It feels as though I actually am the person, nymph, or animal. I see, smell, feel, and taste everything they do.”
“I thought you knew nothing about nÿmphs.”
“But I’ve dreamt of one. Or at least I think so.”
Varkon’s eyes narrowed. “I won’t pretend I understand what this could mean, but you should’ve told me of this long before. You have strength, Tyler, but don’t let this be you downfall by confusing it with your pride. We must both find our way to Ithrim, and thus we must share the burden equally if we are to make it.”
Tyler nodded, emotion in his eyes at his companion’s unexpected compassion.
“Now,” said Varkon. “The spider-bite could be the cause, or you may simply be suffering from shock. How do you feel?”
Tyler stretched his back experimentally. “Much improved, actually.” Varkon eyed him severely. There was an awkward pause before Tyler realised what the ghatu was reluctant to ask. “Don’t worry, Varkon, I can walk.”
“We can stay here longer, otherwise.”
“No, I feel better.” It was true, although he was hardly back to his old self.
Varkon gave him a nod, which looked strangely like approval. “Well, Tyler.” So the ghatu did know his name. “The sun has been up a while now, and I am concerned. My brothers and sisters cannot be far behind. Even so, the pace will be easier. Tiredness may be the cause of these dreams … and the blood. Wipe that muck from your face. You will feel much better for it.”
They continued walking but at a considerably slower pace. Tyler noticed he was not the only one who was struggling today; Varkon was also subdued. When was the last time his companion had slept?
The land folded into a series of undulating mounds. Tyler preferred the journey uphill much more than the trudge down. Although his heel was greatly improved, it still hurt badly if he applied too much weight to it – which was unavoidable when travelling down a slope.
After several forced stops for one reason or another, Varkon decided to end their hike early. For dinner they ate the last of the krus. Varkon promised to search for more the next day and said he would teach Tyler how to spot and dig for them. Tyler smiled politely and secretly hoped for better fare.
Tyler didn’t dream that night. Or at least if he did, he couldn’t remember. Varkon celebrated the news and vowed to spend one more day at a relaxed pace so that Tyler could fully recover.
It was noon when they arrived at a barren crease in the land that stretched from north to south. It appeared to be an old riv
erbed, but no trees had yet taken root upon its sandy stretch or its banks on either side.
“This place makes me uneasy,” said Varkon as he peered doubtfully from the trees. They could see for quite a distance up and down this odd rift in the otherwise continuous forest.
“See anything suspicious? The Dhimori, perhaps?”
“No,” said Varkon, missing Tyler’s sarcasm. “But I am sure that ghatuan eyes are much dimmer than a mukwa’s during the day.”
Suddenly keen to prove his worth, Tyler screwed up his face into a tight grimace and stared outwards to the distance. “I can’t see anything,” he said with disappointment.
“But anybody could be watching unnoticed, from a hideaway among those trees. This could be the reason why we have not been caught yet: our pursuers have been waiting for us here.”
Again Tyler looked at the wall of swaying pines on the other side of the riverbed. Varkon was right: this was extremely dangerous. “Is there any other way across?” he asked.
“There may not be. We could well walk for days or weeks to the south, only to discover that this old riverbed continues until the sea. Or we could follow it to the north and find that it curves back to meet the river from which we have just ventured.”
“So I guess we will have to cross it here,” said Tyler resolutely. “We should wait until its dark.”
“Ghatu can see better at night. It would be better to go as soon as we can. Is your foot better? Can you run?”
Tyler shifted his weight experimentally. “I can run, but perhaps only for a while.”
Varkon nodded. “Very well. Are you ready?”
Tyler nodded. “As I’ll ever be.”
“Good. On my signal … Now!” hissed Varkon.
They burst from the pine cover and raced the few paces needed to reach the dry trench where the river used to flow. Varkon bounded over the edge and landed almost in the centre of the cracked riverbed. Tyler followed with a little more caution. The forest loomed close ahead. They were easily going to make it. Varkon crashed into the trees first, plunging within the safety of the branches as though he was diving into a pool. Tyler followed soon afterwards.
“Varkon?” Tyler gasped, breathing hard as the pine needles tickled his cheeks. There was no reply. Tyler walked a few steps further forward and then stopped. “Varkon?”
Still no answer. He took another step – to nothing. The ground caved suddenly inwards. Tyler gasped and thrashed his arms as if this would somehow help keep him floating in the air. His efforts were unrewarding. He dropped for a short time before reintroducing himself to the ground with a soft whack.
His heel swelled with fresh pain from the unexpected impact. He crawled to his knees and took in the fact that he was now located at the bottom of a large, man-made hole. Tyler used to dig similar traps for Derek, but needless to say they were never quite so deep – perhaps a foot at the most. The edge of this hole hung a lethal fourteen feet above him. It was lucky he hadn’t seriously hurt himself.
The sun hung directly above, shining as constantly as ever through the branches to illuminate Tyler’s little space.
“Varkon!” Tyler shouted. “Varkon, help!” There was no reply.
Tyler continued to shout for a while longer, but it was hopeless. It occurred to him that Varkon had probably fallen into a hole as well, and at the speed the ghatu had been moving when he had entered the woods, he was probably lying somewhere in a heap, knocked out and thus unresponsive.
The top of his hole was too high to jump to, but Tyler tried anyway, hands clawing for a crack that he could use to scamper out. Eventually he gave up and sat down with a thud. Unfortunately whoever had constructed his horrible hole had done an exceedingly good job, but he wasn’t going to accept his fate without a fight.
He swung a calculating gaze around his prison but found only purple bulging roots and brown soil. The bottom of the hole was covered with a thin layer of hay. “That’s helpful,” he whispered bitterly. “At least whoever built this wanted me to be comfortable after I broke my neck from the fall.”
He sifted through the straw, searching for something hard that he could use to dig himself out with, but the architects of this place had been meticulous. Perhaps the ghatu had dug a scattering of traps, and at night they would check on them. He glanced upwards; the sun had slipped out of sight, and his hole was now plunged into shadow.
But why would the ghatu spend vast amounts of time digging holes on the off chance that Varkon or Tyler would fall into one? What were the chances that both he and his companion would fall into different holes so that they had no chance of helping one another?
“Varkon?” he cried out again, hopefully. Nothing.
Well, he’d be damned if he was going to sit about idly. His hole could have been dug years ago and forgotten for some reason. Tyler wasn’t sure which was worse: being captured by the Dhimori or starving slowly to death.
There was a scuffle from above, but before he could turn to look, something cracked against his head, and he knew no more.
CHAPTER SEVEN
THE PIT
Tyler groaned and opened his eyes. For a time nothing registered. He stared blankly up at the rustling branches above him, and the sky. The sky … That meant he was on his back. Good, his brain was still working – although it appeared somebody had carefully replaced it with a brick. He groaned again, louder this time, and put up a tentative hand to touch the back of his head. Pain blasted through his skull. He could feel an impressive lump there as big as a finger knuckle. Gurgling with shock, he managed to sit up and look around with cross-eyed bliss.
He was in a small cage clamped around the trunk of a tree around thirty or so feet from the ground. His heart leapt at a familiar silhouette.
“Varkon!”
The ghatu was lying in his own separate cage, in an adjacent tree a stone’s throw away. His face was turned to the side so that only his powerful back was visible, pressed up against his bars, but it was undoubtedly his companion.
“Varkon, wake up! I’m over here!” Tyler shouted happily.
He was poked hard in the ribs. He yelled and jarred his head, and then he yelled again at the pain of moving his skull too quickly.
A little man was standing outside his cage, holding a long blunt stick. The tip of his head was barely three feet high, and his face hung low with loose skin and wizened features. Stranger still, with his spine severely bent, this oddity’s neck was forced to hook violently upwards to keep his eyes level.
So this was the mysterious architect of the trap.
“Hello,” said Tyler gently. “My name—”
The little man jabbed him in the ribs. “Dino umo gun,” it explained viciously.
“That hurt. What—”
The midget whacked his stick into Tyler again. That last jab was especially painful. He crouched over and raised a hand to acknowledge he would not speak out of turn again. The little beast smiled with victory, revealing two rows of tiny teeth. “Ano duno ora,” he called loudly, his pinched lips leaping widely across his cheeks.
“Hut ti gon no wi,” came the voice of another dwarf-like creature as it galloped onto the platform from the crooked ladder. He was similar to the first little man except that he had an indelible air of authority.
“Dis rio!” exclaimed the first man, in greeting.
The newcomer nodded his head in what Tyler supposed must pass for severity.
“Tu far wah tuk,” the first continued, obviously referring to Tyler.
“I mean no harm,” Tyler breathed as soothingly as possible, holding up both his palms.
The man with the stick screeched and thumped Tyler’s stomach much harder than his first two blows. Both impish creatures let out a long cackle of laugher as they watched Tyler roll on the floor in agony.
Nobody could hear him – he was trapped. Only a few more
moments until his fate was assured. The money in his pocket felt suddenly meaningless. He would die here, and no one was going to care.
“Tik Tik,” chirped a loud voice. “Yu wha!”
Tyler blinked open his eyes. So his dreams had not ended. They still filled his sleep like endless voices whispering into his ear.
“Yu wha!”
He groaned as he rose to his feet. His head still hurt, but otherwise he felt fine.
“Yu wha! Lov tuk weha!”
His guard had not moved; he was still standing with his long stick in both hands, eyes staring fixedly at Tyler, and he grinned. Tyler ignored him and peered over the side of his cage to seek the source of the voice, squashing his face close to the bars to peer at the ground. Underneath him the most unusual scene was playing out in almost total silence: about a hundred imps were bartering, buying, and exchanging items in a makeshift marketplace. A dozen stalls had been set up displaying rows of strange vegetables. Most of the food seemed grey and bland, unlike the dazzling colours that peppered Tyler’s memory, but this did not impede the throng of milling imps from eagerly scooping them up.
There was no laughing, shouting, screaming, crying, or music. Except for the initial cry by an ancient imp crooning the sale of her trinkets, Tyler failed to pick up another word. Only the sound of scampering, tiny feet was audible, or the occasional twitter of a bird darting between the branches.
“Tyler!” growled a familiar voice.
He turned to see Varkon, crouching low to fit within the boundaries of his tiny cage. It seemed the imps had considered the ghatu a larger threat – not without merit. He had two armed guards to watch over him. Both smacked down their poles for his daring utterance.
Tyler smiled and gave Varkon a thumbs-up sign. Varkon nodded slowly back, wincing ever so slightly with pain. Tyler realised that the ghatu probably hadn’t the faintest idea what a thumb stuck into the air meant. Varkon’s attention turned to the busy imps far below, and Tyler followed his gaze, happier now that his companion was awake.
Night approached without any change. No torches were put out for people see by; the imps simply disappeared into their nondescript burrows. He glanced at Varkon, who shook his head with unsuppressed weariness and lay down to sleep. Tyler remained watching his companion for a while. Varkon had not been allowed a decent rest for a long time. He vowed that if they were ever freed from this place, he would share the night watch and allow the ghatu his fair share of sleep.
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