The Last Portal

by Robert Cole

Chris could hear his mother and father discussing him in the kitchen. If he was quiet, he could sneak over and listen by the door. But as he crept closer he found it difficult to recognise their voices. They sounded very nasal, and tended to hiss when they spoke.

  “He’ss a boy, he’ss a boy,” his mother was saying.

  “Yess, I ssee,” his father said in a deeper and rather guttural voice.

  “What’ss a boy doing wasshed up on the sshore?” his mother said.

  “Maybe he’ss a fissherboy?”

  “No, no fissherboyss don’t dresss like that. And hiss handss are ssoft.”

  “True, true hiss hands are ssoft. Not hard like a fisherboy’ss handss.”

  Chris jolted awake. He wasn’t at home sneaking up on his parents. He was lost and hungry in another dimension with little chance of ever finding his way home. And who knew what creatures were about to attack him. He kept very still with his eyes shut, hoping they would go away.

  “Lovely clothess,” the female voice continued.

  “Yess, lovely clothess,” the deeper voice agreed.

  “Besst quality, yess, besst quality,” the female voice hissed. “Musst be from a rich family over the other sside of the lake.”

  “Yess, musst be,” the deeper voice agreed.

  “Lookss very thin.”

  “Yess. Lookss very thin.”

  “Maybe he would like ssome nice fressh fissh?”

  “Yess, maybe he would like ssome nice fressh fissh.”

  “Sshall we wake him and assk?”

  “Yess, let’ss wake him.”

  Chris was nudged gently on his shoulder. With little choice, he rolled over and sat up facing the direction of the voices. He found himself staring at two of the most peculiar creatures he had ever seen. They were smaller than him, covered in dark hair, with long noses that looked more like snouts. But the strangest feature was their eyes, which were completely black and actually protruded slightly from their eye sockets.

  “Who are you?” he blurted, rather too loudly.

  The slightly lighter coloured creature took a step toward him. “Very impolite.”

  “Yess,” the darker haired creature knitted his hairy eyebrows, so they formed one long black line. “Maybe he’ss jusst sscared?”

  “Yess, we sshould introduce oursselvess. That may help.”

  “Yess that’ss a good idea.”

  The lighter-coloured creature smiled, revealing a row of yellow teeth, then bowed. “My name iss Casss,” she hissed.

  “And mine iss Dusss.” The darker-coloured creature also bowed, revealing similar rows of yellow teeth.

  “We are the Nethral,” Cass announced, in a rather proud tone.

  This was obviously meant to mean something, but Chris had no idea who they were. “My name is Chris,” he said finally, not knowing what else to say.

  “Oh that’ss a funny name,” Cass said, her voice suddenly quickening and climbing an octave.

  “Yess,” Duss agreed, “a very funny name. Where do you come from?”

  “From the other side of the lake,” Chris said cautiously. “I fell off a fishing boat in the storm.”

  “Oh you musst be a good sswimmer then,” said Cass. “Don’t like sswimming mysself.”

  “No, no,” agreed Duss. “We don’t like the water.”

  Chris nodded, not knowing what to make of these two creatures. Were they just acting silly, or was this their natural behaviour? Yet, he could detect no hidden thoughts behind their words.

  “Have you seen any other people or kids that look like me?” he asked, deciding to steer the conversation in a more sensible direction. “Or maybe some wreckage washed up on the beach?”

  Duss and Cass looked at each other, then shook their heads vigorously. Too vigorously, Chris thought. It was almost comical. If this was Earth, he would have thought they were mocking him.

  “We’ve not sseen anyone,” Cass said.

  “But we’ve not been looking,” Duss added, tilting his head slightly to one side.

  “Yess, yess, that’ss true… we’ve not been looking,” Cass confirmed.

  Chris leaned back trying to take stock of his situation. His senses told him these creatures were totally harmless. He felt dizzy, hungry and sore. The sun was still out, but it looked like late afternoon, and there was no way of knowing if the others had made it to shore, or how far away they were. He felt in his pockets. The key was still there. And his clothes were nearly dry.

  “Would you like ssome nice fissh?” Cass offered. Like Duss, her face was tilted to the side.

  This must be some peculiar mannerism unique to these creatures, Chris thought. He could read only innocence and goodwill in her thoughts. “Yes,” he said. “I’d love some.”

  Chris was led a short distance along the beach to where a column of smoke was visible. Behind some boulders, a small area had been cleared and a large smoky fire constructed, which was piled high with green leaves. Several rows of fish were strung across the billowing column of smoke.

  Cass went over to these fish and selected one. “Try thiss,” she hissed, handing him a large silvery fish with skin like leather. “Thiss iss a delicacy among our people.”

  She took another fish and peeled the skin away with her teeth. Chris, deciding not to risk his taste buds, dug his nails into the tail section and found the skin peeled away easily, revealing a deep smoky-brown flesh. Not normally a fan of fish, Chris picked off a piece. It had a flaky texture and tasted a bit like beef. He took a big bite, only to find it did have one characteristic of fish - bones.

  Cass pulled a large tuber from the coals of the fire and presented it to Chris. It had the texture of a potato and tasted delicious, like a cross between a pumpkin and a sweet potato.

  “We’re on a fisshing trip,” Duss explained, as Chris greedily devoured his fish. “But we don’t come up on the ssurface very often anymore.”

  Chris stopped eating and looked across at Duss. He sensed there was a deeper meaning to his words than mere polite conversation. “So you live underground all the time?” he queried, noticing for the first time that the fingers on these creatures’ hands were partly fused together, so they looked more like shovels than hands, and each finger ended in a thick, sharp nail.

  “Yess, our home iss the underworld,” Duss continued. “We come up to the ssurface for fissh and fressh fruit from the treess,” Duss continued. “But there hass been many bad thingss happening on the ssurface recently. It’ss no longer a ssafe place.”

  “Yess,” Cass agreed. “No longer ssafe.”

  “What things?” Chris asked.

  “Bad thingss.” Duss shook his large furry head as though the memories were very painful. “There hass been much fighting… much killing.”

  Images crowded into Chris’s head of burning villages, weapon fire, children and women dying.

  “We don’t really undersstand why it hass all happened,” Duss continued, looking across at Chris. “Do you undersstand thesse thingss?”

  Confusion, fear, horror; all these emotions Chris felt in the minds of these creatures. They had witnessed terrible things and understood none of them. “I don’t know much.” He paused, not knowing what else to say. “But I do know this planet is in heaps of trouble, and some dude is causing it.”

  Cass and Duss continued looking at him, but he detected no understanding.

  “I mean…there’s a dangerous person trying to control this world.”

  “Zelnoff?” Duss asked.

  Chris stopped, wondering if he had already said too much. “Yes, Zelnoff. You’ve heard of him?”

  “Not until recently,” Cass said. “Then the ssurface people sstarted acting sstrangely. Many fightss, killingss, whole villagess gone. We don’t undersstand thiss.”

  “No,” Duss said, “we don’t undersstand thesse thingss.”

  Chris nodded. “I think Zelnoff is trying to conquer Cathora. But he hasn’t won yet. There’s still people fighting him.”

>   “You mean Kaloc?” Duss asked.

  “Kaloc?”

  “We haven’t sseen him, but we have heard he’ss ssome type of Guardian,” Duss said.

  “Yess, yess, he hass sspecial powerss to fight Zelnoff,” Cass added, looking over at Duss as she spoke.

  “What powers?” Chris asked.

  “We don’t know,” said Cass, “but I think he’ss fighting Zelnoff and trying to protect the planet.”

  “Hmm…” Chris wiped his mouth with his sleeve and flung the remains of the fish into the fire. “You know where this Kaloc lives?”

  “No one knowss where he livess. We have only heard rumourss about him,” Cass said.

  “What rumours?” Chris asked.

  “That he livess ssomewhere around here, but no one knowss where,” Cass replied.

  “We didn’t know anything about Zelnoff, or Kaloc or Guardianss until recently,” Duss said. “Now there’ss rumourss everywhere about warss, people dying, sstrange happeningss. We don’t know what’ss the truth anymore.” He shook his head miserably. “We don’t undersstand.”

  “No, we no longer undersstand,” Cass added, munching into her tuber with big greedy bites.

  Chris could sense their growing frustration and despair. “Have you heard of Batarr?” he asked, finishing his tuber and throwing it into the fire.

  This drew an immediate reaction. Cass stopped in mid-chew and looked across at Chris. “Yess, yess Batarr iss another Guardian, I have heard people talk about him.”

  “Well, he was also on the fishing boat with me.”

  “He went fisshing with you?” Duss asked.

  “Arr…not exactly. We were trying to cross the lake when the storm struck.”

  Both Nethral were now watching him. Their furry eyebrows knitted into thick lines across their faces. Chris felt the questions forming in their minds.

  “We were trying to find Zelnoff. Ah…I mean Batarr was trying to find Zelnoff.”

  “Sso doess Batarr know where Zelnoff iss?” Cass asked, her head tilted to one side.

  “No, we were hoping to find that out when we got here.”

  Cass and Duss looked at each other, but said nothing. Chris read surprise in their thoughts, but nothing else. “Batarr was going to gather a larger force on route,” he added.

  “Ssoldierss…sso he had ssoldiers with him?” Duss asked, also tilting his head sideways, indicating this was an important development.

  “Yeah… a few. We were travelling in three boats…two sank. I was on the third.”

  “And you were with thesse ssoldierss?” Duss asked.

  “Not me personally,” Chris replied. “I was just helping with supplies, cooking, that sort of thing.”

  “You are very young for ssuch a venture,” Cass commented.

  “I had friends that let me come along,” Chris lied.

  There was a pause, while Duss and Cass tried to digest this information.

  “Sso you really need to find out what happened to your friendss,” Cass said finally.

  Chris nodded.

  “We will help,” she said, looking across at Duss.

  “Yess, yess, you’re too young to do thiss by yoursself,” Duss said. “We will find your friendss for you.”

  Chris felt profound relief. “Thanks,” he said smiling broadly, “I was hoping you would say that.”

  By the time they had finished eating, the light was fading. Chris helped Duss and Cass gather the rows of fish that had been smoking over the fire. They were nervous about sleeping in the open at night and suggested that Chris should sleep with them underground, where it was warmer and safer. Thinking that they must know a small cave somewhere, he gladly accepted. Instead, they led him to the back of a shallow cave a short distance away and rolled away a large rock. Behind the rock was a hole, just large enough to fit a child. Cass immediately climbed in and signalled for Chris to follow. After some hesitation, he followed, wondering what he was letting himself in for.

  The tunnel was narrow and steep and he had to crawl on his stomach. Behind him, Duss sealed the entrance, completing the blackness. But when Chris’s eyes adjusted he could see Cass further down the tunnel silhouetted against a faint light. The tunnel soon widened and opened up into a cavern that rose high above their heads. This cavern was lit entirely by what Chris would have called glow-worms on Earth, except it wasn’t just the worms that were producing the light. Numerous insects buzzed around the worms with bright luminescent abdomens, and larger creatures, resembling insect bats, flew amongst these insects with luminescent wings. Essentially, the whole roof was a mass of whirling and darting lights.

  “Pretty, issn’t it?” Cass said, as she came up alongside him.

  “It’s amazing,” Chris marvelled.

  Cass nodded that she understood. “Ssurface dwellerss don’t realisse what iss down here, but under thesse mountainss are countlesss communitiess of creaturess and plantss, and magnificent cavernss that glissten with beauty, far away from the horrible thingss that are happening on the ssurface.”

  Duss appeared next to them. “Yess,” he nodded enthusiastically. “Thiss iss our world, our people have lived down here for ass long ass time itsself. We know thiss world and we protect it, and it protectss uss.”

  Chris stared up at the roof until the pain in his neck forced his head level again. “How many caves are there like this?”

  “They’re all like thiss,” Duss said proudly, his voice raised an octave. “And no one knowss, not even uss, how far they extend.”

  For the first time, Chris heard Duss laugh. “One can sspend oness whole life travelling through thesse cavess and not find their end.”

  “So they extend right under these mountains?”

  “Ssome ssay they never end,” Cass said. “They continue throughout the whole planet. They are our home, our world.”

  “Yess, yess,” Duss agreed with a certain awe, “Our world, our life.”

  They showed Chris to their camp in a corner of the cavern. For several hours they continued to talk, while they drank an elixir distilled from one of the many plants that grew in the underworld. Chris could not identify the taste. It was sweet and tangy at the same time, with a refreshing after-taste of lemons. He drank greedily as they talked for hours about the history of the Nethral. Apparently, they were the oldest race on the planet. Their fierce sense of independence stemmed from their belief that they were the first species to develop speech and a written language, and they lived in a world and a society that was infinitely more beautiful and caring than what had evolved on the surface. Considering what he had already witnessed since his arrival, Chris found it hard to disagree with them.

  Eventually the conversation waned and Cass and Duss turned in for the night. Chris was given some blankets, although, unlike the surface at night, the underworld was not cold. Cass and Duss bade him goodnight and he was left to contemplate all that had happened to him over the last few days. Yet, despite all these experiences, his last thoughts were of Susie and Joe and his home back on Earth. He wondered if his parents were missing him, or was Batarr right, and after living weeks on this planet he could still be returned to Earth without any passage of time. Either way, he still wished none of this had ever happened.

  When he awoke, Cass and Duss were already busy preparing for the day’s activities.

  “It’ll be light on the ssurface ssoon,” Duss said, handing Chris some breakfast of fruit and fish. “We musst make hasste.”

  Unlike the previous night, Cass and Duss had a more business-like manner. They had already packed the supplies and waited impatiently for Chris to finish his meal before they set off. They reached the cave just on sunrise and immediately started for the beach. Since it was unclear where on the coast the fishing boat would have landed, Cass and Duss decided to climb a nearby hill which offered expansive views of the coastline in both directions. By the time they were half way up, however, it was clear that wreckage was strewn over a wide area. When the
y reached the top, Cass and Duss, with their large sensitive eyes, immediately pointed to a distant speck on the horizon.

  “I think it’ss a fisshing boat that hass been beached,” Cass said.

  “Yess, a large boat definitely,” Duss continued, shading his eyes with one of his spade-like hands.

  Chris knew there was nothing wrong with his eyes, but he could see nothing more than a dot on a beach. “Are you sure it’s a fishing boat?”

  “Yess, yess… and the back hass been broken off,” Cass said.

  In the end, Chris had to put his trust in their superior eyesight. It took the rest of the day to cover the distance to the boat. On the way, they saw more wreckage and, much to Chris’s unease, the bodies of several of Batarr’s soldiers. Many of these bodies had been partly eaten; others were attracting the attention of scavenging animals and bird-like creatures similar to vultures in Earth. All of the bodies were already bloated from many hours in the water.

  They reached the fishing boat at sunset. The ropes that had been used by the Wassin to tow the boat were still attached. Chris rushed on board, but was disappointed to find that the cabin was deserted and all the supplies had been removed. When he searched the gallery, he found a note pinned to the table. It was written in Susie’s handwriting and read:

  Hi Chris,

  Somehow we survived, and the Wassin even managed to save some of the soldiers from the other fishing boats. We have around 100 soldiers, including Altac and Sasli. Batarr says that he thinks you are safe and somewhere along the coast. We searched until dark, but found no trace of you. Batarr refused to search any longer saying that his soldiers were too exposed on the beach and may alert Zelnoff to his presence. Despite our complaints, he wouldn’t stay any longer (we are both really angry with him). Sasli is still looking for you.

  Guess what, Batarr has a second key that is identical to yours and also changes colour. Cool Huh. The bad news is we still have to locate Zelnoff for him, so we have to leave for Mount Caporel (we both wanted to stay and find you, but he wouldn’t listen). Batarr is hoping to recruit more volunteers on the way. We have left supplies under your bunk. Just stay here until we get back.

  Susie and Joe

  Chris felt relieved at the news, but there was no way he was staying behind. He found a small hunting knife and collected the supplies that they had left. Searching through the cupboards in the galley, he also found a hessian bag tried with a cord. He filled the bag with the supplies then used a length of rope to strap it to his back.

  Cass and Duss had been examining the beach in front of the boat. They confirmed that a party of about one hundred surface people had headed into the surrounding forest.

  “From the look of their trackss, they sset out at firsst light,” Duss said, examining the footprints that led into the trees.

  “Many large ssurface people,” Cass added. “And from the deep impresssionss, ssome are carrying heavy loadss.”

  “Yess, yess,” Duss agreed, crouching down and examining the tracks more closely. “They have at leasst a twelve-hour head sstart. Do you know where they’re going?”

  Chris read out the note.

  “Yess, yess we know Mount Caporel,” Cass said. “It’ll take them over a week to reach it.”

  “Do you know the way?” Chris asked.

  “There is only one route through thesse mountainss from here. It iss very ssteep and dangerouss and there hass been much fighting along it recently,” Duss said.

  “It’s not ssafe,” Cass agreed.

  “Batarr iss obvioussly in a hurry and we cannot travel as fasst ass they can,” Duss continued thoughtfully. “But there may be another way of catching them. We have tunnelss all over thiss area. One of them ssurfacess near here and alsso interssectss the route to Mount Caporel.”

  “Yeah…” Chris perked up. “How long will it take to reach Mount Caporel?” “If we can find the right tunnelss,” Duss paused and Chris got the impression of a mind quickly calculating travel times and distances. “It sshould take uss about five dayss.”

  “Yess, yess,” Cass agreed, “we sshould ssurface well ahead of them.”

  “Cool.” Chris smiled.

  By this time, the sun had already set behind the mountains. Like the previous day, Chris felt an increasing level of agitation among Duss and Cass as night drew closer. They quickly led Chris along the beach to a series of rock outcrops, and then followed these formations into the forest. When they stopped it was almost dark. The smaller of the moons, Sarous, was already high in the sky, bathing the forest in a silvery twilight.

  “The entrance iss around here.” Cass pointed to a series of shallow caves.

  “No, over here.” Duss moved off to the right and began scratching amongst some boulders.

  “I remember it wass closser to the cliff,” Cass insisted, pointing to an overhanging rock face a little distance away.

  “No, no, I remember thiss tree,” Duss insisted.

  Chris sat down on a rock, somewhat bemused by their conversation. Absent-mindedly, he was playing with the key, flicking it over between the knuckles of his fingers − something he wasn’t good at. Inevitably it ended up on the ground. But despite the near darkness he was surprised how easily he could see its outline. Curious, he held the key up against the dark backdrop of the forest. It was glowing, like back on Earth when the tree struck his house and on the fishing boat in the storm. As he watched, the glow quickly intensified.

  He pocketed the key as the sounds of distant growls started to drift though the forest. These noises had an immediate impact on Duss and Cass. They began sniffing the air with their long snouts and their searching became more frantic. Pushing back a sudden tightening in his chest, Chris unstrapped his bag and took out the hunting knife. He could clearly read the thoughts of Duss and Cass. They were very scared of a creature called a Prower. He received an impression of a large black, cat-like animal, similar in appearance to a leopard, but shorter and very powerful. It particularly liked the taste of Nethral. He thought these might be the wolf-like animals that Batarr had warned them about.

  Duss and Cass began clawing around some rocks at the front of a shallow cave. Chris backed towards them, at the same time keeping an eye on the surrounding forest. The growls were becoming much more frequent and closer. He pulled out the key again. Its glow now lit up the surrounding forest. For the first time he could see the Prower. Pairs of red eyes stared back at him from the trees and bushes, and black shapes crouched on nearby rocks. He held the knife in his other hand and placed himself between the Nethral and the advancing Prower.

  The leader of the Prower moved into the light and stared at Chris. It had black fur, a wide head with hungry red eyes and a short snort, ringed by sharp teeth. There was a moment of contact when their eyes were locked together. He felt its animal instincts; its drive to kill, to eat. He focused all his energy, all his will, into driving back the creature. It roared. A terrifying roar filled with malice and hunger. The rest of the pack advanced from the shadows. Duss and Cass gave several frightened whimpers behind him and renewed their frantic digging. Chris hadn’t taken his eyes off the leader.

  The creature roared again, but this time the roar was not so certain, not so powerful. The pack failed to advance further out of the shadows. Chris, by now, had lost all fear, all sense of self-preservation. His mind was locked against the mind of the leader of the Prower. He advanced on the leader, closing within a short distance. Cass and Duss were screaming at him from behind but Chris was committed. Nothing else mattered. The creature took a step backwards, still growling. Chris felt its growing uncertainty, its confusion, and its hunger. Then, finally, fear. The Prower leader took a further step back, spun around, and was gone. The whole pack turned and followed, howling into the night. The light of the key immediately dimmed and extinguished.

  Cass and Duss ran up to him and tugged him back.

  “Come on…” Duss pulled him toward the hole they had uncovered. “We’re very lucky.
I have never sseen the Prower run off like that when they were sso closse. I thought we were finisshed. We musst go underground before they come back.” He shook his head in disbelief. “No one will ever believe uss when we tell them thiss happened.”

  Cass tugged at his other arm. Chris could feel the questions rising in her mind. “I sstill don’t believe it. A pack that ssize doessn’t jusst turn around and run off. What were you doing walking toward them like that?”

  “Maybe the light scared them away?” Chris suggested.

  “What light?”

  Chris realised that neither had seen the light from his key. He wasn’t even sure if the Prower had seen it. “I mean the moonlight,” he said stupidly.

  “Come on,” Duss urged, as he stuck his head out of the hole.

  Chris scrambled down behind him. Cass followed, sealing the entrance with a large rock. As before, the tunnel was small and narrow and he had to crawl some way before it widened. They emerged into a slightly smaller cavern than the previous night’s, but still teeming with glow-worm and insect life. Along one side ran a stream surrounded by a thick mat of ferns, and many strange plants Chris couldn’t identify.

  He walked over to the stream and splashed some water on his face. The encounter with the Prower had left him drained and shaken, but there was also a sense of exhilaration, of power. Cass came over and sat down on a rock next to him.

  “I have never sseen Prower behave like that,” she said thoughtfully, watching Chris splash some more water on his face.

  Chris didn’t answer. He couldn’t tell her that the Prower had fled because he mentally faced down their leader.

  “Have you ever sseen Prower behave like that?” she asked.

  “I think that the Prower, where I come from, behave quite differently,” Chris replied.

  Cass leaned forward on the rock, placing her short arms on her even shorter legs. “In what way?”

  “Ah… I think they are more scared of people, so I wasn’t really surprised when they fled.”

  Cass took a moment to consider his answer. “And where did you ssay you came from?”

  “From the other side of the lake. A very long way from here.”

  “Exactly where?”

  “Arr… well past the other side of the lake. In fact, over the other side of the planet.”

  “Oh...you are a long way from home then.”

  Chris looked directly at Cass. “Yes I am.”

  Her head was tilted to one side as she tried to comprehend his answer. “When we firsst told you who we were, you acted as though you had never heard of the Nethral.”

  Chris read her thoughts immediately. Nearly everyone on this planet had heard of the Nethral, although most believed they were a myth and very few surface people had actually seen them. “I was very confused when I first woke up. I didn’t even know where I was.”

  She nodded slowly.

  Chris could see she wasn’t convinced. “Where do we go from here?” he asked, deciding to change the subject.

  She pointed along the stream. “If we follow thiss sstream for a few hourss it will lead to a large lake. From there we can take lotss of routess to reach your friendss.”

  Chris nodded, relieved, for now at least, the questions were over.

  Over the next few days, Chris saw and experienced a world that went well beyond anything he could have imagined. The subterranean world was immense, both in size and beauty. They entered caverns which took several hours to traverse and teemed with animal and plant life. Vast forests and lakes were common place. Waterfalls spouted from every crevice and streams and rivers criss-crossed each cavern, like flowing lines of silver. And amongst all this stood glistening limestone cathedrals made from hundreds of thousands of stalactites and stalagmites, illuminated from above by the eerie phosphorescent glow of millions of worms and insects that never faded, like the glow of the stars except a thousand times more intense.

  Chris wandered through the caverns in a type of dream, gazing at the vast array of colours and sights. Duss and Cass found his behaviour very amusing and they swelled with pride at his many exclamations of amazement and wonder at their subterranean world.

  The local Nethral communities that occupied many of the larger caverns greeted Chris with a mixture of curiosity and astonishment. Initially, when they sighted him, they stepped away into the shadows, muttering to themselves. It was clear that visitors from the surface were either rare or non-existent. But once Cass explained Chris’s circumstances, and rather embarrassingly credited him with saving their lives, they drew closer again, peering at him with the same black protruding orbs. If he stayed perfectly still, without any sudden moves, they would gather around, nostrils flaring at his strange smell. Only then, after a thorough inspection, could he feel their tension ease.

  Cass and Duss turned out to be well known amongst the Nethral communities they passed, and their progress was followed with great interest. Chris would hear countless thoughts flying at him as he passed by. “Doesn’t he have a small nose? Where’s all his hair? Why is he so thin? Where are his parents? His head looks really strange.”

  In all, he found their comments very amusing and at times had difficulty stopping himself laughing out loud. But the Nethral were also very generous, and all three travellers were provided with gifts of food, sweet treats and drinks derived from local fruits and vegetables, all of which tasted like nothing Chris had ever tried before.

  On the morning of their fifth sleep, which Chris assumed was the fifth day underground, the caverns became smaller and less frequent. There were also fewer glow-worms and insects, which reduced the light so much that Chris started tripping over rocks and hitting his head on the many limestone stalactites. The tunnels were also starting to climb steeply, making the going harder. By the end of the day, they had reached the intersection of two tunnels situated in a small poorly lit cavern, covered with a dense mat of moss and lichen.

  “We’ll camp here for the night,” Cass said, throwing her pack on a bed of moss.

  “Yess, yess, thiss iss good place,” Duss agreed, doing likewise.

  “We’re not far from the main route through thesse mountainss to Mount Caporel,” Cass explained. “It’ss already night outsside, sso we’ll camp here till morning.”

  That night, whilst sitting by the light of a small fire, Duss and Cass told many stories about the history of their people.

  “There had been many warss between the ssurface racess and the Nethral,” Cass said, as they sat down to share some fish.

  “In the passt the ssurface people ssent whole armiess into the underworld to try and desstroy uss,” Duss added. “But they never managed to penetrate very far. They either became hopelesssly losst in the maze of tunnelss, or were killed by Nethral ambusshess.”

  “We’ve never been conquered,” Cass said proudly.

  “No, no never conquered,” Duss repeated.

  Chris smiled back, reading a huge sense of pride when they talked of their peoples’ victories over the surface dwellers.

  “And we alsso learnt from thesse experiencess,” Cass went on. “Now we hide our tunnel entrancess and make them only ssmall enough for Nethral to enter.”

  “Thesse dayss we only vissit the ssurface to collect the fissh and fruit we cannot get underground,” Duss said. “Thesse dayss the ssurface iss too dangerouss for the Nethral.”

  Cass nodded slowly, her black orbs fixed on Chris. “We all hope that one day thiss will change, but for now, the ssurface iss a bad place.”

  As the night progressed, the sombre mood changed. Duss and Cass started telling stories of all the different places in the underworld, and the types of animals and plants that lived in them. It appeared that many creatures of the underworld were unique. They had been separated from their ancestors on the surface for so long that they no longer bore much resemblance to them. Still others creatures had no ancestors, living or dead, on the surface.

  “They were created along with the
underworld,” Duss said, “and dwell in the deepesst, darkesst parts, preying on any creature that sstrayss into their domain.”

  “They are called the Idesss,” Cass said. “And they live in complete darknesss, away from any glow-wormss.”

  “They don’t like glow-wormss,” Duss said.

  “No they don’t like glow-wormss,” Cass continued solemnly.

  “And no Nethral go down there,” Duss said.

  “There are many sstoriess,” Cass said, “about what happened when Nethral go too deep into the underworld.”

  “Bad sstoriess,” Duss said, “terrible sstoriess, whole communitiess have dissappeared when there hass been a quake. And the glow-wormss have gone out.”

  “It iss not wisse to go too deep,” Duss said.

  “No, not wisse at all,” Cass confirmed.

  Chris picked up visions in Duss’s mind of hairless creatures with large heads, dark-green eyes and long spindly limbs. He didn’t know whether they were real images or a product of Duss’s overactive imagination, but the images were hideous and brought back just how far away from Earth he really was.

  Cass and Duss told many more stories about the Nethral and the underworld as the night wore on until Chris couldn’t keep his eyes open. His last sleep in the underworld was deep, and full of the images he had seen in the minds of Duss and Cass.

  The next day they emerged at sunrise from a tunnel at the back of a small cave. The first thing that struck Chris was how cold it was. There was a light dusting of snow on the ground, but the sun was out and there was a gentle breeze. Chris took a deep breath, realising how much he had missed the sun, the breeze, and the smell of the surface, even if this surface smelt markedly different from Earth’s.

  They had emerged into a valley with a large forest that stretched in every direction. Either side were mountains that rose steeply into the cloud cover above. Cass and Duss quickly shouldered their packs and led him down into the bottom of the valley. Chris noticed their levels of apprehension rise sharply once they had entered the forest.

  “Thiss iss the route to Mount Caporel that your friendss have taken,” Duss said, as he pointed along a rocky path that followed the course of the river. “They sshould be coming along here ssometime today, if they are travelling fasst.”

  Despite encouragement from Chris, Cass and Duss would not go any further. Instead, they found a vantage point where they could safely watch the path and sat down to wait.

  They hadn’t waited long when they noticed signs of activity over the next valley. High-flying birds and distant sounds indicated that a large company was approaching, stirring up the valley creatures as it advanced. Chris could feel the agitation growing in his companions. Soon the first soldiers appeared, heavily armed with weapons drawn; they systematically searched all the surrounding trees and shrubs along the riverbank. Once an area had been searched, a second group of soldiers would station themselves there while the first group continued further up the riverbank. A huge beast that looked like a cross between a rhinoceros and a horse emerged from the valley. On its back sat Altac, riding up and down a column of soldiers as he directed their search.

  Cass tapped Chris on his shoulder, then pointed to the distant ridge. Over the rise a large company of soldiers was emerging, flanked by Taal. In the middle, Chris could see the bushy locks of Susie’s hair, and alongside her, with his head lowered, was Joe. Batarr was behind, on another great beast, also directing the soldiers. Chris started to climb to his feet, but was immediately stopped by Duss. He could feel the fear pouring from Duss’s mind.

  “We musstn’t be disscovered by thesse ssurface people,” Duss hissed.

  “No we musstn’t,” Cass agreed, as she gathered up her pack.

  “But before we leave, I would like you to have thiss.” Cass pushed a crystal into Chris’s hand. “It will change to bright green when you are near one of our entrancess. Pleasse keep it ssafe.”

  “Yesss, yess, guard it well,” Duss said. “It will help you find the underworld if you ever need our help.”

  With a rising sense of loss, he turned to thank them. But they had already fled into the undergrowth in the direction of the cave.

  When they were out of sight, Chris waited a few minutes, then started walking toward the approaching company. He hadn’t walked far when two Taal, brandishing their weapons, stopped him. One of them had been on his fishing boat and clearly recognised him. Even in the normally expressionless features of the Taal, Chris could read confusion. He seemed unsure whether he should shoot him, or welcome him back with open arms.

  Chris smiled slightly at his confusion. “Can you please take me back to Batarr and the other Mytar?” he said flatly.

 

  Chapter 6: A Road Less Travelled