“She seems to have taken an interest in you,” Trajan said quietly.
Meric stared straight ahead.
“You did not know she was my daughter?” Trajan asked.
“No.”
“I gave up trying to ban her from the fighting. The most I could do was insist she went in fully armored–which she abhors, of course. Meliai has a natural aversion to all things unnatural. I fear I didn’t do enough to restrain her will as a child. After her mother died, I wasn’t equal to the task. It’s one thing to unite rival tribes. It’s another to raise a child alone. I was glad she spent so many hours in the forest. Did I say she was my daughter? No. She’s the daughter of the rivers and the trees, the mountains and the valleys. She’s more like her mother than even her mother was. She’s still mad I knocked you cold at the ravine.”
“You hit me?” Meric asked.
Trajan nodded.
“I wanted you alive.”
“After killing my friends?”
For the first time, rage flared in Trajan’s face.
“Did I put poison in their mouths? I told them to drop their weapons and live. Their own programming killed them. Always the same. Always.”
There was a brief silence. Meric thought of Meliai again.
“Why was she angry? If you hadn’t hit me, I might’ve killed her,” Meric said.
“Oh, I don’t believe that. You had your chance, and you let it pass. Perhaps you knew in your heart it wasn’t right. Still, it was a duel between warriors. I shamed her by interfering. I made her look weak. Meliai is too proud to be practical.”
Meric glanced back. Meliai’s eyebrows went up in question. He stumbled over a root in the ground and cursed, turning back to the front.
“Here we are,” Trajan said.
Meric paused in surprise and flashed the Sign of Feality. Just ahead, a massive black mammoth was tethered to a six-wheeled steamcar.
“Magnificent beast, isn’t she? Why do you sign yourself?” Trajan asked.
“The spawn of Azoza,” Meric said.
Trajan laughed.
“If they’re the spawn of demons, so are we. Our ancestors engineered these beasts. They were kept in walled menageries as entertainment for children, if you can believe that. When the world fell, some went free. Now the big bastards are thriving. I’ve been trying to domesticate them. Training them to pull steamcars–less noise, no steam, and the animals are better on water. Maybe we’ll even ride them into battle one day.”
Meric could only imagine the charge of a dozen stampeding mammoths. No century could stand up to that. Still, it wouldn’t get the savages any closer to Panchaea. The turrets on the perimeter-wall would disintegrate mammoths as easily as anything else.
Two more savages came around the steamcar, bringing their total escort to nine. One caught Meric’s attention. His muscles went into a state of fearful readiness. His hands twitched for an atomblade. Five steps away stood the giant who’d struck Avigon, killed Horus, and helped break Meric’s pentacrus–with the same monstrous spiked hammer strapped to his back. The warpaint was gone, the scars clearer. Despite his ferocity at the ravine, his ocean-blue eyes regarded Meric placidly.
“Azog, Meric,” Trajan introduced them, noting Meric’s reaction.
Azog made the greeting gesture.
“We’ve already met. Your palms weren’t so open the first time,” Meric said.
Azog’s eyebrows went up.
“I was not aware. In your armor, you’re hard to tell apart. I missed your last fight–of which I’ve heard tell. I myself was occupied in the forest.”
“Slaying the wounded?” Meric asked, looking at him with loathing. Only the steamcars with the Priests and Frost’s wounded had been left in the forest.
Azog shook his head.
“Most slew themselves. Some were cut down unjustly, but not by me. Such is the gaija of war. Your vehemence is unwarranted, brother. Rejoice for those who were lost–they sing with the Goddess while we toil in the mud. We are born in the mouth of Death, and all our lives we walk down Death’s throat. When Death swallows us, it is no mean thing. We remember then what was forgotten at birth.”
“What I remember is you killing my friends,” Meric said quietly, but he climbed into the steamcar after Trajan with muted feelings. Azog was calm and well-spoken. It was hard to reconcile the man with the monster.
The mammoth rumbled forward, pulling the steamcar. The vehicle was fully enclosed, save for a half-wall that folded down at the front and back, forming wide windows. The material was unidentifiable; stronger than metal, lighter than wood. Trajan must’ve plundered it from some unlucky Plebian soldiers.
“Where are we going?” Meric asked.
“Somewhere you’ll feel right at home,” Trajan said with a secretive smile.
The mammoth plodded for hours along a curving downward slope.
Nog, whose pallet passed for refined among the savages, prided himself on his cooking. For dinner, he concocted an odd dish, talking incessantly and handing scraps up to Mobius, who was perched on his shoulder. The seasoning was unfamiliar; Meric couldn’t decide if he liked it. Only two savages rode in the steamcar at a time. The rest rotated in and out, walking in a guarded perimeter. The mammoth was pulling a lot of weight, and the walkers could easily keep pace.
“Expecting trouble?” Meric asked, gesturing at the guards through the rear half-wall.
“Not from your people,” Trajan said.
“Who then?”
“Blackhearts. Mudspears. Maybe even Bloodrats.”
Meric shot him a puzzled look.
“To you a savage is a savage, but there are a dozen tribes spread through these lands–some with bitter feuds. The Blackhearts and the Mobigon will kill each other on sight, all because of a prized pig stolen before any of us were born. When I left Panchaea, I brought the Treeborn and Mudspears together. Not all of the Mudspears could bring themselves to trust a ‘sorcerer’ though, even with what I could provide. The tribe fractured. A certain faction may resent our passage. Nine fighters should be enough to discourage unfriendly interest. Nine is an auspicious number among the People.”
“You admit to sorcery then,” Meric said.
Trajan sighed.
“It’s how the People view me, Meric. ‘Sorcerer’ is just a word. A label for things poorly understand. Here’s one aspect of my sorcery–the very thing that brought down the mountain.”
Trajan lifted a rectangular package from a trunk in the front of the steamcar.
Meric backed away. His boldness did not extend to magic.
“Keep your relics to yourself.”
“Ha! And you think they’re savages. A few ingredients dug up from the ground, put together in the right combination–that’s all this is. Don’t worry, it’s stable. I bring a bit for emergencies. Fallen trees, boulders in the path–can’t always go around. Ambushers too, if it comes to that. Triggering the landslide took my whole supply, just about. In that case, what you call sorcery was clever planning, a bit of foresight, and a lot of luck.”
Trajan re-secured the explosive.
“You said you provided something to unite the tribes. It was explosives then?” Meric asked.
“No. The ingredients for this particular ‘magic’ are limited, and putting them together is dangerous. I united the tribes with other goods. Tools. Armor. Atomblades.”
Meric snorted.
“By stealing from murdered soldiers,” he said.
“Some of our supplies come from the dead. Only some.”
“No man can forge an atomblade,” Meric said, eyes narrowing.
“Quite right,” Trajan said.
Meric shook his head and turned away, disgusted with himself for even talking to the man. He refused to be drawn further into conversation.
When they stopped for the night, he lay awake in the steamcar, wondering how he might escape. They’d left the mountains behind. His wrists were bound and tied to a handhold, but suppose he could sl
ip his bonds? Finding his way back to Panchaea would be problematic. Frustrated, he drifted to sleep, suffering odd, inexplicable dreams.
At noon the next day, they reached a river. They had passed smaller creeks, but this was different. Much too strong to wade across.
“Where is the blasted thing? The Great River may not be so great here, but it’s more than enough to wash us away,” Trajan muttered, standing by the door and looking out as the mammoth plodded along the riverbank. Suddenly he gave a cry of joy. Outside, the savages tore at a pile of shrubbery. A white pontoon was dug out of concealment. It was long and wide, but not very thick. Peering out of the steamcar, Meric laughed. Trajan gave him a look.
“Why did you bring the beast all this way if we’re just going to leave the steamcar here?” Meric asked.
“Leave? We’re not leaving anything,” Trajan said.
“You can’t possibly hope to load it onto that platform. It’ll sink the moment the mammoth steps aboard.”
“Ye of little faith. This is a divine raft. The real trick is getting the mammoth to believe that,” Trajan said, amusement wrinkling his features.
The savages positioned the pontoon in a shallow pool by the riverbank. The steamcar started toward it.
“You’re mad!” Meric exclaimed.
“You seem fond of that word,” said Trajan.
The mammoth trumpeted nervously, but the savages coaxed it forward. Slowly, the steamcar rumbled onto the pontoon. When the wagon was aboard, the pontoon drifted into the river.
“Godsblood,” Meric whispered, expecting to sink any moment.
“Didn’t I tell you? Divine crafting,” Trajan said, smiling at Meric’s astonishment.
“Only the Plutarchs…” Meric began.
“What? Can call for divine goods? Oh, but that would mean I am a Plutarch. Careful, Meric, you might accidentally tell the truth. Soon it will be unavoidable anyway.”
The certainty in his voice gave Meric a bad feeling. It wasn’t until they were offloading on the far bank that he realized Trajan had given him the exact clue he needed: the Great River may not be so great here, but it’s more than enough to wash us away.
The Great River. Donum Lacrimarum, as the Priests called it.
The same river which flowed through Panchaea.
All he had to do was get loose and follow it a hundred or more kilometers south … and avoid death by savages and demons and wild beasts. As the savages concealed the pontoon again in a dip by the riverbank, Meric marked the spot, noting little features of the land, fixing their position in his mind’s eye.
Now if I can just get free…
He kept his eyes open for landmarks. No more rivers appeared, though he did note an abundance of whitecrown caps, the same mushroom which had so distressed Horus on their trip north.
They look a lot like Pietops, Gnost had said.
The similarity wouldn’t trouble Horus now.
Another day passed. Meric was allowed to walk for exercise. Nog told him he’d once spotted a mythical white lion in a cave to the east. Meliai and the others rolled their eyes; the cook ignored them, glad to have someone who hadn’t heard his stories. Meric asked about Mobius. One of Nog’s three daughters had found the squirrel as a baby, unconscious from a fall. Nog had nursed the animal back to health.
The mammoth finally halted at a small hill in a verdant valley. The savages cleared away loose branches from a patch of dense underbrush. They heaved aside wooden panels covered with dirt and grass. Behind them, almost as tall as the little hill itself, was a door.
“What is this?” Meric asked, wary.
“An entrance to the underworld,” said Hestia, a lithe female savage with short black hair and dark eyes, regarding the door with anxiety.
“There’s more truth in that than you know,” Trajan said, disappearing within.
A hollow chamber had been carved out of the hill. The floor was concrete. A four-by-four meter platform was set into a niche a meter deep in the floor. Trajan stepped down onto it and picked up a yellow box cabled to the platform.
“Bring him,” he said.
Ropes bound Meric’s wrists and ankles, allowing for only short steps. Azog and Nog followed him onto the platform. The others remained behind. Trajan pressed a button on the box. With a jerk, the platform descended. In Nog’s pack, Mobius twittered unappreciatively.
“Godsblood,” Meric cursed.
The earth swallowed them. Meric could’ve covered the entrance above with his thumb. A button clicked, and a white light glared from the yellow box in Trajan’s hands.
“What’s happening?” Meric asked.
“Truth approaches,” Trajan said, smiling sadly.
Deep underground, the lift jerked to a halt.
A black corridor led away. Trajan flipped a switch on the wall, and a string of fluorescent lights flickered to life. A layer of dust covered the concrete floor. The sounds of the forest were replaced by a deep, humming vibration, emanating from somewhere beneath the floor. Trajan led the way forward. The corridor ended at a metal door. He pushed it open. Nog and Azog stopped, however.
“You’ll be ghost food in there,” Nog said.
“The sickness of the ancients lingers here,” Azog said, blue eyes alarmed. This from the same man who’d broken Meric’s hedgehog with thunderous hammer blows. Meric had always heard Trajan consorted with demons. Perhaps this was where he met them.
“Come along, Meric,” Trajan said.
Tense and wary, Meric followed. The dust grew thicker. The corridor was hazy–was that smoke ahead? Trajan pushed open a second door–and Meric stopped dead. Ahead lay a cavernous chamber.
It was filled with Fog.
CHAPTER 9
God had made Panchaea to house the righteous and protect them from the Smiting. The Priests had never mentioned a second Fog-city. Not that the underground chamber was as big as Panchaea. With its walls and ceiling hidden from view, it only seemed to go on forever. Still, any Fog existing outside Panchaea was unthinkable. Even the idea was blasphemous.
“What is this?” Meric whispered.
“An oasis where once there was an ocean. The Plutarchs call it Ozymand,” Trajan said.
Meric blinked.
“Ozymand?” The name was too close for coincidence…
“Yes, Meric. This was once the domain of Ozymandias.”
Meric drew back, wild-eyed. His courage faltered. All his life he’d heard of the terrors of Ozymandias, the demon-king.
“This is an entrance to the underworld,” he whispered.
“Calm yourself. Ozymandias is long dead. There’s no danger here.”
“This can’t be. God made the Fog to house the righteous. Ozymandias was the enemy of man.”
Trajan sighed.
“Ozymandias himself was a man, Meric. Deranged, tyrannical, psychopathic–but a man. You know him as the demon-king who laid siege to Panchaea. There is a grain of truth in that, but only a grain. Ozymandias dwelt here, underground, and ruled over thousands. He alone could access the Fog; no one could challenge him. He was an expert programmer, an Artificer. He did indeed lay siege to Panchaea, but he is long dead now, killed shortly after the siege itself. One of his followers turned on him and butchered him in the Wildlands, where the Fog could not protect him. His people likely abandoned Ozymand soon afterwards.”
I won’t let him muddy my mind, Meric thought.
Ozymandias had sent demons into Panchaea, breaching the perimeter-wall. No mere man could do that. Perhaps that was Trajan’s strategy–get him to accept the small lies and slip in the big ones. He had to reject it or slide toward savagery. His resolution bolstered his courage. Perhaps the unknown Fog had nothing to do with Ozymandias. Still, where had it come from?
Trajan was several steps into the haze. Nog and Azog were down the corridor, unwilling to move past the first door. Which meant…
We’re alone.
The possibility of escape superseded all questions about the Fog. Even bound
, he could overpower Trajan. It would be almost too easy: wait until they were obscured by the Fog, throw his arms over Trajan from behind and choke him with the rope strung between his wrists. Then get loose from his bonds and look for another way out. What if there wasn’t one? He’d have to ambush Nog and Azog, or slip past them. It would be difficult. There’d be no overpowering Azog. But Meric had always been bold. Some things you just couldn’t plan. The notion infected him like a fever. He’d find his way back to the surface, flee into the forest, circle to the river, and follow it all the way home. Perhaps he’d ask the Priests about this place. They’d have a sad tale to tell. A forbidden story. He’d save his questions until then.
I will not fail the Plutarchs, he thought, even as another voice lamented, I’ll never see her green eyes again.
Meric trailed Trajan deeper into the Fog. The dust was thick at their feet. Behind them, the light from the corridor grew hazy. The two savages faded to silhouettes. A soft glow emanated from the Fog. A few more steps…
“The People think this place is cursed,” Trajan said, sensing Meric’s backward glance. “In a way, they’re right. And yet they’ve benefited immensely from it. It was those who made it who suffered most.”
The world had become a gray haze in all directions. Meric drifted closer to the savage-king. Adrenaline kick-started his heart. Trajan was gazing up, talking about the Fog.
“I told you, did I not? Fog once covered–”
Meric’s bound wrists flew over Trajan’s head from behind. He jerked the rope back against the sorcerer’s neck, bringing one knee up into his back, bracing himself for the struggle…
Trajan never moved. The rope split before it touched his skin. Meric stumbled backwards, unbalanced, and tripped over his ankle-rope, tumbling hard into the dust.
“–this land from Ocean to Ocean,” Trajan finished.
The savage-king turned to look at him. Meric’s ankle-rope was sliced neatly in two, though nothing had touched it.
“Black magic,” Meric hissed. He got slowly to his feet, looking into the mirrored shades.
“In the far wall is a ventilation shaft. A ladder inside leads to an exit hatch. No one is guarding it. Why not run for it?” Trajan asked.
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