Beyond the Gate

Chapter 25

“I don’t like it,” Ceravanne said the next morning, in the great hall.

“The Tower Road is our best chance,” Gallen urged, standing over the corpse of a dead scout. “The servants of the Inhuman have little knowledge of it. I remember it as a dark and dangerous track, a place of terror-one I would not willingly brave again. I was lost in the tunnels under the city of Indallian once, for many days-and so I think that the servants of the Inhuman will avoid the place. But you, Ceravanne, must have used the road. You were the queen of this land.”

“That was five hundred years ago,” Ceravanne said. “Even then, the road through the Hollow Hills was a maze. Few dared the tunnels without guides. And now, who knows what might live there? Derrits at the least would lurk in those caves, but many another folk are accustomed to the dark. What if the Tekkar have established an outpost? And even when the road lies aboveground, one must beware of wingmen. They’ve a strong taste for blood.”

“Yet the valleys of Moree are awash with the armies of the Inhuman,” Gallen said. “The word has gone out that a Lord Protector seeks Moree. Scouts by the hundreds are scouring the land for us, and by our poor chance, great armies are moving through the night. We cannot go over the open roads. Already, one scout has found our wagon tracks. We must get through to Moree.”

“And you think that it is better to face a hidden danger than a known one?”

“When the known danger is overwhelming, yes,” Gallen said.

“I don’t understand,” Orick said. “What are you two arguing about?” Gallen had done a bit of scouting last night, and had decided to use an old trail, the Tower Road, to get closer to Moree. The rest of the group was willing to follow him blindly, but Ceravanne had blown up at the news.

She said, “The Tower Road is an old road that united Ophat with the underground city of Indallian, which lies west of here, under the Hollow Hills. From there, the road leads farther west, through the Telgood Mountains to the very edge of Moree itself.”

“I don’t understand,” Orick said. “I thought we were already in Indallian. Is Indallian a city, or a country?”

“Both,” Ceravanne said. “Long ago, there were many city-states in this part of the world, so the name of the Capitol was often the same as that of a country. We are already within the ancient borders of the land of Indallian, now Gallen wants to go through the city, under the Hollow Hills. But as Fenorah warned, the city is a perilous place, and has been for centuries. None go there nowadays.”

Ceravanne looked about the room to the others. “We could take the Tower Road.” She sighed. “But much of it lies underground-through forty kilometers of stone. You, Caldurian, what do you say?”

“Indallian is legend to me,” Tallea said. “I not know if holds danger.” Yet she feared it. Many races lived underground, and they could see in the dark. As aboveground, the most peaceful peoples tended to die out, while the fierce races thrived. And if Tallea had to fight underground, she knew she would be at a disadvantage. Indeed, her wounds were not all healed yet, though she found she could swing her sword.

“It is not a legend to me,” Ceravanne said. “For eight thousand years, the city called to various peoples, and the Hollow Hills were carved with measureless tunnels. For long, it was but a peaceful city where folk of the underworld lived in harmony. Then the emeralds were discovered, and peoples flocked to the city in ever greater numbers. Even in its glory, when the city of Indallian was under my full sway, it was said that ‘no man knows Indallian,’ for no one could explore all of the many caverns in one lifetime. Indeed, there were rumors of strange and malevolent peoples inhabiting the far bounds of the realm even then.

“And I will be honest with you all,” Ceravanne concluded, visibly shaking. “I fear that place.”

“Still, three hundred years ago, I heard rumors,” Gallen said, “that one could travel the Tower Road for over five hundred kilometers-from Ophat to White Reed. And that is a crucial stretch in our journey. And you must consider this-the Telgood Mountains form a formidable obstacle. No army could cross it on foot, not even an army of Tekkar, so the mountains themselves will form a wall to protect us.”

“So that is why you brought us to this entrance,” Ceravanne said, gazing away toward the back halls. “I suspected as much. Yet the road is dangerous. In many places aboveground, it will have crumbled away. And belowground, many of the caverns have fallen in, floors have collapsed into chambers beneath. There is good reason that no one has taken that track in ages. And when we do reach the city of Indallian, what will we do for light?”

Gallen reached into the pocket of his robe, pulled out a small crystal globe, and squeezed it. A brilliant white light shone from his gloved fingers. “I see,” Ceravanne breathed. “Technologies from other worlds. And you are determined to leave the travelbeast behind?”

“I am,” Gallen said. “The closer we get to Moree, the more impossible it becomes to travel openly, and the beast only marks us. Do you think you can guide us?”

“Perhaps.” Ceravanne breathed deeply. “The road is easy enough to follow aboveground, and I know some paths below, though I am not certain they will be open.”

And with that, they were off. Gallen went out to the travelbeast and whispered in its ear, pointing back north, and in a moment it nodded its shaggy head and raced down the mountain road.

Then they packed, and headed to a hallway where a statue of a giant stood guard beside a great stone door. Gallen pulled mightily on the handle, and cold air hit them, smelling of dampness and minerals. Ceravanne held up Gallen’s glowing globe, and gazed down a stair that curved into the dark, and they began to descend, and to Tallea, the Tharrin looked as if she were a goddess, carrying a star in her hand.

“Wait,” Gallen said, and his voice echoed through the corridors. He went back to the room, hoisted the dead scout on his back. “We’ll leave it down below, where other scouts will not find it.”

Then they began their descent. The stair went on and on, and Ceravanne led through the dark at almost a run. Their footsteps echoed off the stone. Tallea was acutely conscious of the noise they made, and she strained her ears for sound of pursuit.

Twice, during the long race down, they passed side tunnels of poor make that had been dug in more recent years, and from one of them they smelled the acrid stench of Derrit dung and cold ashes.

Beside that door, Gallen cast down the dead scout, leaving it as a meal for the beasts, and once again, as she had over the past several days, Tallea saw the craftiness in what he did. The Derrits would certainly prefer the carrion of a recent kill to hunting a party of armed men with bright lights and sharp swords.

The tunnel seemed endlessly long, and the cold of the rock seeped into her bones. Even as she ran, Tallea could not seem to warm enough to fight this cold.

In two hours they came out of the cavern under the mountain’s shadow and found themselves on a broad road in the sunlight. Over the ages, stones had rolled down the hillside, so that in many places it would have been impassable by horse, but they were able to run and climb on foot.

Tallea’s side ached from her recent wound, and though the sun warmed her a bit, she found that it didn’t warm the wound. Instead, it burned like ice all along its length.

Still, they ran for hours, passing through more tunnels. Gallen took the lead, and twice he warned the others of Derrit traps-deep pits overlaid with a framework of twigs, then covered with hides and dust.

Tallea was glad for Gallen’s sharp eyes, for she herself spent her time watching the skies for sign of wingmen, and secretly she felt relieved each time they were forced to make their way through a tunnel.

Thus, they spent the day running, and camped in a tunnel by dark. Tallea’s wound throbbed through the night, and it heated up, as if it had become infected. She slept poorly, but was forced to run again at dawn.

That day, the road took a long, steady climb, higher into the bleak, gray mountains, so that the air was frigid, and they ran along a ridge that was incredibly steep and long. The mountain rose on their left like a wall, and dropped for five hundred meters below them. In places along the road, they found the splayed prints of mountain sheep, but no other sign of use.

That day they passed two ancient outposts, high stone citadels along Tower Road, and on one crenellated tower, twigs and leaves stuck out like a great nest, three meters across. Only a wingman could have carried such large sticks so far from the valley below.

Gallen called a halt, then crept up the crumbling stone stairs to the tower himself, with Tallea and Orick behind. The nest was old, the twigs whitened by age and rotted so that they could hold no weight, proving that the nest had been abandoned for years. But among the yellowed bones of sheep and deer was a human arm and skull, with tatters from a bloody wool tunic.

They climbed back down, hurried on their way, watching the skies. Gallen rounded one long arm of the mountain ridge, then dropped to the ground, warning the others with a wave of his hand to stay back.

Tallea dropped and crawled forward, and together they looked over the bluff. A wild white river churned through a gorge far below, and pines climbed halfway up the mountains in a green haze.

Sweeping over the canyon in wide, lazy circles, a lone wingman hunted on leather wings. Tallea watched the creature. Its underbelly was pale blue in color, so that it was hard to spot from below, but its back was a mottled gray and green. If it had been sitting high in a tree, with its wings folded, it would have been hard to spot from the ground. But from above, while in flight, it was easily discernible.

“It’s watching the valley,” Gallen said, “hunting for deer or wolves. We’re lucky that it’s below us.”

“Not much eat up here,” Tallea agreed. The wingman would not bother hunting this high road through the barren, gray mountains. She watched the creature, and wondered. According to common wisdom, all of the races on Tremonthin had been adapted from human stock to live on other worlds. But of all the peoples in Babel, she found the wingmen to be the strangest. They did not look humanoid at all. The creature was large, perhaps ten meters from wing tip to wing tip-much larger than scouts. It had a broad tail that it used as a rudder as it flew, and fierce, razor-sharp hooks of a bloody red were attached to its wings. Its long flat head was filled with great teeth that Tallea could see even from this far distance, and its scaly hide was nearly proof against a blade. And it was said that the wingmen saw other peoples not as kin, but only as food. One could sometimes reason with a Derrit, but never with a wingman.

They watched the creature circling the valley. It did not move farther west or east, nor did it seem inclined to climb higher. “I think,” Gallen whispered, “that it must have seen some prey down there in the trees. It’s probably waiting for it to come back into the open. It could keep circling like this all day.”

“Agreed,” Tallea said.

“We’ll keep low, crawl on our bellies if we must. We’re only eight kilometers from the gate down into the city of Indallian.”

Tallea looked ahead, feeling exultant. They had traveled far and fast in the past two days. The road snaked along the ridge, vertical cliffs above and below, following a U-shaped bend in the mountain. But Gallen was right-in the distance the road met with a great iron door in the rock, a door that stood closed.

“This foolish,” Tallea said. “We don’t even have bow.”

“There is only one wingman,” Gallen said, “not a flock. And I have my incendiary rifle.” Tallea had seen how much damage that weapon had caused on the ship, and she didn’t doubt that it would send a wingman tumbling in flames.

“How many fire arrows have?” Tallea asked.

“Six,” Gallen whispered. “And I may need to save two of those-one to slay the Harvester, one for the Inhuman.”

Tallea nodded grimly. Only one wingman-as far as she could see. But there might be dozens more around the next ridge, out of sight, or others roosting in trees below. It was autumn, when the wingmen often flocked together to head south.

“What of door?” Tallea asked, nodding toward the iron door in the distance. “What if is locked?”

Gallen bit his lip and did not answer.

Tallea’s wound was icy as it rubbed against the cold stone, and she felt deeply troubled. She recalled how the cold blade of the giant had pierced her aboard ship, and it almost felt to her as if the wound were alive, calling out for her demise.

She looked up the road ahead. The thin afternoon sun shone all along its length. There were few shadows thrown from rocks to hide in. Gallen’s robe had turned slate-gray, the color of the stones, and Tallea wished that all of them wore such robes to hide them.

“All right,” she agreed. “We go on bellies.”

Gallen signaled the others to come forward and drop low, and he crawled to the far edge of the road, inching along the stone wall.

The others followed. Tallea took up the rear guard, and the arduous journey began. The stones here had a peculiar, powdery scent, and they were cold and sharp, cutting into Tallea’s hands and knees, and the coldness of the stone was peculiar. Tallea calculated by the angle of the suns that light had been shining on the road for hours, yet it had not warmed. Apparently, the cold in the rocks went too deep for that.

Orick took the journey easily enough, inching forward, his big rump in the air.

After two kilometers, Tallea began to notice blood on the trail. Maggie had cut her hand on sharp rocks. It was rumored that the wingmen could smell blood at great distances, but it was only a small amount. Still, Tallea felt uneasy.

Another kilometer down the road, Derrit spoor was on the ledge, the first Tallea had seen in nearly two days, and it was fresh.

Normally the sight would not have left her feeling so uncomfortable, but at the moment, Tallea was struggling to hug the rock wall as closely as possible, afraid that the wingman might spot them. She couldn’t bear the thought of fighting a Derrit.

She could do nothing but crawl ahead. A croaking sound echoed up from the valley below, one wingman calling to another. Gallen waved his hand, called a stop. He inched forward to the edge of the cliff, and alarm became evident on his face.

He inched back, held up three fingers. Three wingmen now. Tallea looked up at Maggie’s hand. Fresh blood was dripping from the deep wound in her palm. Tallea gestured at her, pointed to her nose and mouthed the words, “Smell your blood. They smell blood.”

Maggie’s face paled, and she clenched her other hand over the wound. Ceravanne brought out a small piece of white cloth from her pack, gave it to Maggie to use as a bandage.

In a moment, they were on their knees again, scurrying ever faster along the road. They made it past the bend in the road, almost five kilometers, when Gallen suddenly stopped. A lone wingman rose, riding the thermal updrafts from the valley below.

Tallea and the others froze, crouched against the stone wall, and the wingman rose on up. Like many animals, the wingman looked mostly for signs of movement, and at the moment, the creature was in full sunlight, while they were in shadows.

Tallea’s heart pounded, and she tried to still her breathing, tried to stop the pounding, as the wingman flew along the ridge, then swept up over the mountain, sniffing loudly for the scent of blood.

Then Gallen was on his feet, motioning to them. “Run!” Orick raced ahead of Gallen, running toward the door faster than any human could, while Maggie and Ceravanne hurried forward.

Tallea jumped up so quickly that one of her mending muscles must have ripped, for she felt a searing pain in her side. Still, she managed to run forward for nearly two minutes.

Suddenly Gallen shouted, turned toward Tallea and fired near her head. A searing ball of flame shot three meters over her, hotter than any oven, and a croaking scream sounded. She turned to see a wingman, mouth open, swooping toward her, the white flames from Gallen’s rifle billowing in its mouth. The wingman crashed into the road not five meters behind her, bounced, and flopped over the cliff.

They were nearly to the door. Tallea lurched forward, and saw more wingmen rising up from the valley floor, searching for the cause of the commotion. Five of them.

Gallen leapt over a smattering of fallen rocks, but Ceravanne tripped on one, fell onto others. Maggie grabbed her arm and nearly carried her, and Ceravanne was weeping from the pain.

Orick reached the iron door and stood looking at it.

Tallea felt a shadow, ducked and pulled her sword, swinging. A wingman was diving straight down from the precipice above, swooping over her, and it had extended the long red claw on its wing tip, hoping to snag her and sweep her off the road, over the bluff.

She twisted her sword inward, hoping to strike through flesh and bone instead of just claw. Her sword tip struck the scaly leather of its wing, and she was surprised at the fierce jolt, for it cut the beast but also tore the sword from her hand.

The wingman screamed in pain and swept past her, careening onto the road. Her sword clattered over the cliff, and Tallea drew her dagger, leapt past the wingman as it tried to get up.

She looked back, and the wingman screamed in anger, a roar that seemed to shake the very stone, and then it was after her, loping on clumsy feet, dragging its shattered wing.

Ahead of her, Gallen and Orick were at the iron door. They both pulled at its enormous handles to no avail. And then Maggie was with them, and Ceravanne, and they all stood in a tight knot.

A wingman swooped up from the valley in front of Tallea, trying to cut her off from the rest of the group, but she ducked under it, and suddenly all of them stood together outside the iron door.

Gallen held his incendiary rifle, looked back down the road. The wounded wingman was eight meters away, and when Gallen confronted it with his weapon, the wingman hissed and stopped.

“You don’t want to die,” Gallen shouted at the creature, aiming his weapon at it. The wingman shrieked, raising its long neck into the air, teeth flashing. It watched Gallen with intelligent eyes, bright red, gleaming like rubies.

“Leave now, or die!” Gallen shouted.

The wingman watched him a second, its eyes filled with rage, then leapt over the side of the road, flapping clumsily toward the valley below.

“Who says you can’t reason with a wingman?” Gallen asked, smiling toward Ceravanne. Then a huge stone fell and shattered at his feet.

Tallea looked up. A wingman was in the air, two hundred meters above them, and another swept over the ridge and dropped a large stone.

“Get under cover!” Gallen cried. And Tallea went to the door, pulled at it.

“It’s locked!” Ceravanne said. “We need the key.”

“But who would have locked it?” Maggie asked.

Tallea looked at the door. The lock was a mess of rust. Above the door was fancy scrollwork all along the lintel, images of twin suns rising above fields of wheat. At one time, gems might have adorned the centerpiece of each sun, but the gems had long ago been pried free.

Gallen studied the door for half a second. “Everyone grab the handles and pull,” he said. “This lock can’t hold us.”

But despite their efforts, the door would not open.

“Watch out!” Ceravanne called, and she pushed Tallea backward. Tallea looked up, saw a wingman swooping toward them, a rock tumbling in the air, and she marveled to see such a deadly rain fall from such beautiful blue skies.

She dodged, and the stone hit the lintel of the door with a clang, then split and bounced to the ground. Rust drifted off the door in a thin sheet.

“Hey,” Orick grumbled. “I’m not handy at pulling doors open, but I’m pretty good at knocking them down!”

The bear ran back to the ledge, then charged the door, slamming all of his weight against it.

The door creaked, and there was a snapping, and when Orick dizzily backed away from it, the door had cracked open a finger’s width.

Three wingmen slid overhead, dropping stones in rapid succession, and Gallen stared up at them, raised his weapon as if trying to decide whether to use the last of his ammunition. Orick backed up and roared as he charged the door again.

The lock snapped, and one half of the door buckled under his weight. The bear climbed up onto all fours groggily and shook himself.

And then a wingman swept over the cliff top and shrieked, a long wail of alarm. Tallea was not certain, but she could almost distinguish words in that scream. Out above the valley, all of the remaining wingmen veered toward them and flapped their wings, gaining speed. They knew that this would be their last chance.

“Inside!” Gallen shouted, and several people ran for the door. But Gallen went to the edge of the road, his rifle in hand.

Tallea rushed up beside him. “Take my sword,” he yelled, and she drew the weapon from his sheath. She felt it quivering in her hand, as if it were alive, and it emitted a soft and eager humming.

Tallea glanced back. Ceravanne and Maggie were already inside the iron door, but Orick was trying to squeeze his own bulk through the narrow passage, shoving mightily with his back feet, leaving claw marks in the stone.

Gallen fired at the four wingmen who flew forward in a loose formation, and it seemed that the sun blazed from his weapon. A fierce wall of heat struck Tallea’s face, and the light burst out over the canyon sky, catching the foremost of the wingmen so that he tumbled downward in flames.

Two of them veered off, to avoid colliding with their dying kin, but the third came on.

Gallen fired once more, and the wingman tried to drop beneath his shot. The flames surged past the creature, but they had come too close. Even in passing, the heat was so great that it left a huge black smoking blemish on the creature’s back.

The wingman screamed out in pain, diving toward the ribbon of blue river that shone in the forest far below.

Tallea looked back to the door. Orick was still trying to push through. Gallen shouted, “Get in!”

He raced to the door and charged into Orick, hitting him at full speed. Gallen bounced back, but Orick slid through the opening. Two more wingmen were sweeping from the ridge above, and Tallea ran to Gallen’s side, leapt through the opening.

A huge stone hit the door and shattered, then Gallen leapt through.

The group sat inside the door for a moment, panting, looking at one another. Maggie’s hand was bleeding, and Orick had lost a tuft of hair. Ceravanne may have suffered a sprained ankle, but Immortals healed so quickly that it would cause her no grief. A rock chip bad struck Gallen in the chin, and he was bleeding.

Outside, the wingmen screamed in frustration, hurling rocks against the doors, but none dared land for the hunt.

Gallen sat panting for a moment, and Ceravanne held aloft the light globe. “Welcome to the city of Indallian,” she said, and her voice was tight with emotion. “It has been long since I’ve given such a greeting.”

Tallea looked up. The room flashed and reflected Ceravanne’s light. They were in an incredibly large chamber, where gracefully carved stone rose high. In the distant past, the room had been painted cream or ivory, and stonework floral patterns had been painted in their own bright hues. High up, three magnificent silver chandeliers graced the ceiling, each with hundreds of sconces. Bright crystals at their base reflected back the light, throwing prismatic colors sparkling across the walls.

Beneath each chandelier was a high, arching passage that led deeper into the mountain.

The place smelled of dust and earth, and for once Tallea almost rejoiced at the cold, in spite of the tearing pain in her side, for at least they had escaped the wingmen. Yet there was more here than barren passages. Unlike the tunnels they had wandered before, this place still carried the faint scent of people, of ancient sweat and food, of tapestries moldering in distant halls.

“Hey,” Orick said. “Are you certain that no one lives here?”

“Great is the lure of the city of Indallian,” Ceravanne whispered. “I suppose that many people may live here yet. Miners may have ventured here in hopes of finding riches … other beings.”

“That lock was rusted,” Orick said, “but the door hasn’t been closed for hundreds of years. Thirty or fifty maybe.”

“Then whoever closed the city is surely dead and gone,” Maggie said hopefully.

“Do not be so certain,” Ceravanne said. “Many peoples are fashioned to live long. Even a Derrit, with its thick hide, is likely to live three or four centuries.”

“But would a Derrit be smart enough to lock a door?” Maggie asked.

“Don’t be deceived,” Ceravanne whispered. “Derrits are not dumb animals. They are foul, and live in their own filth, and they may eat you. But they are also clever and cunning. They were made to be workers on a brutal world, where conditions are harsh.”

“But why would you make them that way?” Orick asked.

“I cannot speak for their makers, for the Derrits were formed long before I was born,” Ceravanne said. “But I believe that it was not the creator’s intent to form such foul beings. Often, peoples who have been created fail as a species. Their love for one another is too fragile. Their passions too untamable. Such peoples usually die out. But while the Derrits are a failure as a species, either unwilling or unable to lift their own kind by sharing their culture, they are successful as individuals.”

“More than successful, I would say,” Gallen put in. “For thousands of years, other peoples here in Babel have hunted them, trying to get rid of their kind. But it has proven damned near impossible to rid this world of them.”

“So they’re forced to live here in these lonely mountains?” Maggie asked.

“In the winter, when the snow comes on, they often move to lower valleys,” Gallen said. “Where they sneak into barns and throttle sheep, or steal children from their beds.”

“Let us speak no more about them,” Ceravanne whispered.

“Yes,” Gallen whispered. “They are unpleasant to think about.”

Ceravanne raised the light toward the middle hallway, and began limping toward it. “Are you all right?” Gallen asked, taking her arm tenderly.

“Bloody, but unbowed,” Ceravanne said, smiling. And Tallea followed them down into the darkness, holding her own aching gut. The pain was bad, but tolerable for a Caldurian.

Long they journeyed into the heart of the ancient city of Indallian, until Tallea felt certain that darkness must have fallen outside, but Ceravanne led them on. Several times they found corridors that were blocked by falling rubble, and once the floor had caved in beneath them to a deep shaft where great caverns had been excavated.

Ceravanne kept having to turn aside into new hallways, and once she stopped and threw her hands up, crying, “This isn’t the way.” They had been traveling down a well-made corridor, but suddenly it turned into a crude cave, chiseled by rough hands. Ceravanne walked back a hundred meters, found a side passage that none of them had noticed, for it was purposely concealed behind a large stone slab. It took them in a new direction, and Ceravanne seemed less and less certain of this new path with each footstep.

Finally, she called a halt.

Tallea put down her pack, and the group sat wearily. They began eating a small dinner of apples and jerky. Their provisions were failing. In two or three more days, Tallea figured they would be down to scraps.

Ceravanne looked around the corridor worriedly, and Gallen whispered into her ear, “Perhaps we should scout ahead, while the others rest.”

Ceravanne bit her lower lip, looked ahead down the passage. “Perhaps we should.”

Maggie took two candles from her pack, lit them, and in moments Gallen and Ceravanne departed. Orick grumbled about the small dinner, and lay in a comer. Tallea went to him. “You can have my apple core,” she offered.

“Ah, I’ve plenty of winter fat to eat,” he muttered, but when she put the apple core under his nose, he gingerly took it in his teeth, gulped it down.

Tallea lay down beside him. She was falling asleep when Orick began muttering his nightly prayers. Cold from the stone seemed to be seeping into her wound, and Tallea lay wondering why the hosts of the Inhuman would remember this as a place of terror.

Tallea’s muscles had been strengthening daily, and she stretched her arms in spite of her fresh wound, hoping that she would soon be ready to begin exercise. She considered sparring with Gallen, wished that her ribs would stand for it, but she was still too weak. Perhaps in a couple of days she would be ready.

She listened long, and realized that in the distance she could hear a sound like wind rushing through trees. But it could only have been water cascading through some underground chasm. For a while she thought of searching for the source of the sound, so that she could refill the water bags. But instead she lay still, thinking to do it in the morning, and fell asleep to the gurgling of water.

Hours later, when she wakened, Gallen and Ceravanne were just getting back. Ceravanne seemed greatly relieved, and when Tallea put her head up, Gallen explained. “We’ve been lost in a side corridor, but Ceravanne found the main road once again.”

Tallea lay back down, and Gallen went to sleep beside Maggie while Ceravanne lay beside Tallea.

Tallea closed her eyes, and lay for a long while, but something felt wrong. She looked around, counted those sleeping nearby. Everyone was there, the candles were still flickering.

She sniffed, but could feel no strange air currents. And she held her breath. Aside from the soft snoring of Orick, there was no sound.

And then it hit her: no sound. She could not hear the rushing waters. Which meant that either the underground brook had subsided in a matter of hours, or else … someone had closed off a door, masking the sound.

Tallea loosened her knife in its sheath, and lay for the rest of the long night with her eyes open, perfectly still. Once, she thought she heard a distant thud, as if someone had stubbed a foot on the floor, but there was nothing else.

Still, when Gallen woke hours later, she whispered in his ear: “Take care. We may have visitors.” And as they quietly slipped away from their resting place, Tallea listened down each side corridor for the sound of running water.

For the next few hours they hurried along down passageways that were unimpeded, past storage rooms and old quarters where thousands of people had been housed. They were entering a section of Indallian that had been far more than the mere service tunnels or mining camps found at the east entrance. This was the full-fledged city, in its ancient glory, and often they passed through huge chambers where sunlight shone down through shafts in the ceiling upon vast reflecting pools, or where wooden bedposts still sat in the musty ground, petrified.

In these areas, where ancient shafts and fire holes littered the ceiling, they had little need for Gallen’s light, and Ceravanne nearly ran through the halls, filled with a new intensity. “This district was called Westfall,” she said as they passed through one great chamber where an underground river rushed through a stone causeway, spilling out into the light. “Children used to bathe here, laughing under the icy water.”

And in the next chamber, vast brick ovens sat next to each other. “Here the bakers worked night and day, cooking loaves for the household.”

And in the next great chamber, the tallest and grandest of all, sunlight shone down through five holes in the roof, two at one end of the hall, and three at the far end. There were long reflecting pools under each light, and all along the great chamber were statues of ancient warriors lining the central hall-short, fat pikemen of the Poduni race; Tacian giants with great hammers; the tall Boonta men with long spears and their narrow shields, an army of warriors representing many nations.

And at the end of the hallway were two thrones. “And here,” Ceravanne said nervously, “is where I ruled, beside my brave Belorian.”

She stopped, and looked away shyly. Above each throne was a vast statue of marble that had once been overlaid with gold, but the images had been defaced by thieves, all of the gold chiseled away.

Maggie gasped, and rushed forward to the statues, as did each of them. The statue on the right bore the image of Ceravanne, as one would imagine she would look in a few years. But the image on the left …

“Gallen?” Maggie called, and she looked back at Gallen, horror and confusion on her face. Ceravanne strode forward, clenching Gallen’s glow globe so that the light shone from it fiercely, and she held it up to the statue.

The image was chipped and scarred. The hair had been cut shorter than Gallen’s and the bearded face belonged to an older man. But there could be no mistake: the eyes, the chin, the nose, were all Gallen’s.

“Belorian?” Maggie asked, still confused.

“When the Rodim slew him,” Ceravanne said softly, “they destroyed his memories, so that he could never be reborn with those memories intact. But they did not obliterate his body. His genome was stored, so that his seed could be propagated, undefiled.”

Tallea heard Gallen gasp. “You mean I’m-But how?”

“When the Dronon came, it was a dark time. Across the galaxy, the cry came out. ‘We need more Lord Protectors.’ And of all the Lord Protectors on our world, Belorian was judged the most worthy of cloning.

“And so, the Lady Semarritte sent technicians to our world, and they took what they needed. Seeds for the future, as they also harvested seeds from other worlds.”

Ceravanne looked up at Gallen, and there were tears in her eyes. “I do not know your circumstances, but I can guess: you were born on a backward world, much like ours. Your mother and father had no other children, and it was voiced abroad that they were desperate.”

“I never heard that,” Gallen whispered.

“I did,” Maggie countered. “My mother told me of it, when I was small.”

“And so when you were born, no one worried that you did not look too much like your mother or father, for you were a gift from heaven. And you were a smart child, bright and resourceful, strong and fiercely independent,” Ceravanne said. “That is the way it happens.

“In a time of peace, you would have become a trader, perhaps-fiercely competitive. But you were born during uneasy times.

“Gallen, it is no accident that you are a Lord Protector. Maggie told me how Veriasse found you only a few weeks ago, that he ‘chanced’ upon you in an inn. But though it is our good fortune that he found you, I suspect that little chance was involved. I suspect that he knew a seed had been planted in the town of Clere, so he sought for you in the town of your birth.

“And I am grateful that the Lady Everynne-when she learned the truth-sent you back to us, in the hour of our greatest need.”

“I am a clone?” Gallen asked, and there was still disbelief in his blue eyes.

“Ah,” Orick grunted, studying Gallen. “Now I see. The Bock never would tell us that Gallen was human!”

“He’s not-quite,” Ceravanne said. “Belorian was from a race of people called the Denars.”

“The Denars?” Gallen asked.

“A race designed to be Lord Protectors,” Ceravanne said. “The first race designed to be so. It is not by chance that your hands are quick or your mind is nimble. You were born with great gifts, and a desire to use them in the service of your fellow man.”

Gallen folded his arms and looked up at the statue for a long minute. Then he spoke to Ceravanne, and his voice was husky with resentment and accusation. “You know these corridors. You brought me here on purpose, when you could have bypassed this chamber.”

“All these past few days,” Ceravanne said softly, “the memories the Inhuman gave you have been telling you what it wants you to become. I thought it best that you find out what you are.”

“I think, rather, you are showing me what you want me to become.” Gallen grunted as if it did not matter to him at all, and nodded. “Let’s go, then.”

And Ceravanne led them from the great hall, down some long corridors. They were near the borders of the city, and now they rushed for the east gate, but a few kilometers away.

Gallen looked back once, and his eyes were full of tears, and Tallea pitied him for being a pawn in such a large game. He seemed to be running blindly, so she ran ahead of him, taking the lead in case there was danger.

They were jogging down a corridor, and entered a broad room when she smelled it-the garlicky scent of Derrits, thick as smoke.

She halted and turned, and there in the shadows, the great beasts were lying: three of them rose up on their knuckles and growled, each of them more than twice the height of a man.

“Run!” Gallen shouted, and he drew his sword. Tallea would have stood to fight beside him, but her sword was gone, and she had only a knife and her dueling trident-no weapons to pierce Derrit hide.

She rushed down the nearest passage, leading the way, with Ceravanne behind her. The Derrits lunged, their shadows dancing against the far wall. They had huge yellow eyes, and bones tied in their stringy gray hair clattered when they moved. The largest was an enormous male with dirty yellow skin and testicles as large as a stallion’s. He wore a mail shirt, woven from bits of chain mail taken from a dozen human warriors, and he grabbed a massive door to use as a shield. In his other hand, he took an ancient halberd. He roared and charged, and Orick stood beside Gallen and rose on his hind legs. The two of them looked like children, hoping to withstand the monster.

And Tallea stopped and rushed to Gallen’s side. Her Caldurian blood called her, and she could not leave friends in need.

Ceravanne and Maggie needed no urging to run, yet they did not go far-merely crossed the room, then stopped and turned. Ceravanne crushed the glow globe in her hand, squeezing it tighter and tighter, so that its light shone fiercely. Tallea admired the woman’s bravery, for the Tharrin had no protection, and she held the light up only to aid the warriors.

The Derrits howled in pain, and raised their hands to shield their eyes, their pointed yellow teeth flashing. The huge male raised his shield, protecting his eyes. They were a shifting mass, acting as if they would charge, and Tallea dared not turn her back on them. She pulled her dagger and dueling trident, held one in each hand. They were small weapons, hardly big enough to do much damage, but she’d honed them as sharp as steel can be.

The male Derrit roared and surged forward, using his shield to slap Orick aside. The bear went flying like a doll, yelping in pain, and tumbled past Tallea. The male raised his halberd to strike, as if it were a hatchet, and Gallen danced in, struck the giant under the rib cage, and rolled away, his sword dripping blood.

The Derrit swung wide, slamming the halberd into the stone floor so hard that the weapon shattered. The Derrit raised his head and howled at the roof, never taking his amber eyes from Gallen, and swung his shield at Tallea. She ducked under its blow, felt the huge door whistle over her head, and knew that if she’d been hit, the blow would have shattered every bone in her body.

The Derrit howled again, and he must have spoken some command to the others, for the two smaller females rushed out from under his shadow. One of them lunged toward Orick, while the other tried to circle around Gallen, heading toward Ceravanne.

At the same time, the big male roared and leapt for Gallen, swinging the broken haft of the halberd like a club.

And in that moment, time seemed to stop. Tallea could see Orick on the floor, dazed, seconds from death at the teeth of a Derrit. Gallen was swinging madly, slashing open the snout of the big male as it lunged in to bite. The female on the far side of the room, rushing forward on her knuckles, headed toward Ceravanne and Maggie.

And in that moment, Tallea had to decide who she might save. Her little knife and trident were feeble weapons, but they were all she had. Ceravanne was on the far side of the room, and Tallea had served her poorly once before. Her heart was torn-Ceravanne or Orick? She could not make that choice. So she only prayed that she could fight swiftly enough to save them both.

The Derrit grabbed Orick in her claws and pulled him forward with both arms, ready to sink her teeth into him. With a war cry, Tallea leapt onto her broad snout, sinking her trident into the giant’s forehead to use as an anchor, then stabbed the big female in the eye-once, twice.

Blood gushed from the creature’s torn eyelids, and the Derrit shoved Tallea away, knocking her across the room, and Tallea lost her trident, leaving it stuck in the monster’s head.

There was a fierce tearing pain from the old wound in Tallea’s side when she hit the floor, and she rolled to her knees.

Ceravanne began shouting, waving the light, and Tallea looked up, saw the other female Derrit hesitate not three meters from Ceravanne, pawing the air with one hand, shielding her eyes with the other. Ceravanne, though she lacked all skill in weaponry, also found it impossible to leave a friend in need.

Gallen had slashed the big male across the belly and one arm. The Derrit was a bloody mess, but still had some good fight in him. He was swinging his shield with both hands now. The Derrit’s solitary lifestyle showed itself in the creature’s poor fighting form.

The little female that Tallea had wounded began to shriek, and Tallea looked over in surprise to see Orick wrapped around her left leg. He was biting her, ripping her leg into shreds while she tried to pry him off and escape.

“Run!” Gallen said, looking right at Tallea. “Take Maggie to safety!”

Tallea got up, felt as if some ribs had snapped. She ran toward Ceravanne and Maggie, screaming a battle cry, and the female Derrit who’d cornered the women took an experimental grab at Ceravanne, her long yellow hands darting forward.

Tallea rushed up to the Derrit, grabbed a handful of hair near the Derrit’s short tail, and drove her knife deeply into the Derrit’s thigh, just below her left leg, trying to hit the femoral artery.

Tallea pulled her knife out, and though her blade had not made a deep cut, it was a painful one. The Derrit shrieked and lurched away.

The Derrit struggled to turn, hoping to throw Tallea off, but Tallea thrust the knife in again and again. The Derrit screamed in fear, released some acrid-smelling urine, then turned and fled, rushing toward Gallen’s back.

Tallea could not hold the female Derrit from attack, but she dung to her, slowing her down for a moment. Tallea shouted for Gallen, then drove her blade deep into the back of the Derrit’s knee, hoping to cripple her, and then Tallea lost her grasp on the monster and fell.

Tallea looked, and Gallen was swinging at the big male. With a mighty blow he leapt forward and slashed it across the forehead, seemingly unaware of the female rushing in behind, then suddenly he danced to the side, and swung a terrible blow at her leg.

The female crashed into the big male, knocking them both backward, and in that second Gallen rushed to Orick’s aid, shouting to Tallea, “Flee!”

With a heavy heart Tallea ran, knowing it was the best thing to do. She lacked adequate weapons, and only Gallen was equipped to fight in that room. But few men survived an attack by a single Derrit, while Gallen and Orick had three to contend with.

Tallea found tears in her eyes, and recalled the teachings of her crèche masters: “A warrior cannot afford to weep in battle. It gives your foe the advantage.” And so her masters had beat her, until she could hold back the tears. Yet the tears came now, for her friend Orick was battling without her, and Tallea knew that when this was over, she would have to weave a new rope belt for Orick, for her greatest bond now-beyond all her imaginings-was with the bear.

She passed by a room where wind blew in fiercely from a hole, a deathly chill, and Ceravanne was just behind Tallea, at the back of the group, holding aloft the light to ward off any more Derrits.

Their shadows danced madly upon the floor and the walls of the corridor, and then they ran into an open hallway, where suddenly the floor fell out from beneath Tallea.

There was a flash of darkness, and she found herself hurtling down-a rough hide and dirt falling all around her-then she landed with a jolt, and a searing pain shot through her back and arm.

For one brief moment she lay looking up, and Maggie shouted, “My God!” and was staring down into the pit. It had to be a good five meters to the top, Tallea thought. Ceravanne called, “Are you all right?”

Tallea felt very confused. She could see the light above her, and her ears were ringing. She was breathing hard, panting, and a sweat had broken out on her forehead. She felt as if she’d landed on a rock, and it was digging into her back, but it hurt when she tried to move off it, and something held her in place. She tried to answer, but no words would come out.

“Are you all right?” Ceravanne repeated, and she held the light above her head so that she could see down into the pit.

“Derrit … Derrit trap,” Tallea managed to say, and she felt lucky to say that much. She wanted to count her good fortune at being alive, but when Ceravanne’s light shone on her, Tallea looked down at her own legs. A pointed stake as wide as her hand was poking up through her belly, and another pierced through the meat of her right arm. A third came through her leg just below the hip, but she could not feel it.

She could feel nothing below the waist. Her back was broken. She closed her eyes, listened. There was the roaring of Derrits in the far room, and it was getting closer. Gallen shouted something, and Orick roared in return, and Tallea’s heart sang with joy at the sound. At least Orick will live, she realized, and she looked back up at the concerned faces of the women.

“Leave me,” Tallea said, and her voice came out as a croak, barely audible above the yelling.

“Not yet,” Ceravanne said, and she stood fast beside the pit.

There was more shrieking, more cries, and one final wailing roar. A few moments later Gallen and Orick came and looked down into the pit. Both of them were covered with blood, but little of it was their own.

“Three Derrits?” Tallea asked when she saw Gallen. “Perhaps a record.”

Gallen’s face was sad. Tallea felt light-headed, as if she were floating, and she almost thought she could float up to them, tell them that it was all right.

“What can we do for you?” Gallen asked, and Tallea tried to think of an answer.

“There must be something we can do for you,” Maggie said, but even kind Ceravanne shook her head no.

“We’re losing her,” Maggie whispered.

“Save me!” Tallea found herself asking.

“There is nothing we can do,” Orick said solemnly, and the bear had tears in his eyes. Tallea coughed, tried to speak. “They say, in City of Life, Immortals with mantles can save people. Save me!”

And then Maggie’s eyes opened, and Tallea realized that with all of his lore, even Gallen had not realized what she was asking.

“Not all mantles have this power,” Ceravanne said.

“Of course,” Maggie said. “We can download her memories into Gallen’s mantle!”

“Yes, the rebirthing,” Tallea pleaded.

Gallen held up the cloth woven of black rings, its glittering diadems shining in the light. “Can you catch it?”

Tallea nodded, and Gallen dropped the mantle onto her chest. Feebly, with her left hand, Tallea grasped the mantle and placed it on her forehead. Maggie called, “Command it to save you.”

“Save me,” Tallea begged. “Save me.”

The silver rings sat cold upon her forehead, and she felt no different. She fell asleep for a moment, and she saw bright images: flashes of her childhood when she picnicked at a pond in carefree days. The time she first learned to hone a sword blade. A great meteor that she once observed streaking across the night sky for several minutes.

And then Gallen was beside her, stroking her head. He’d climbed down into the pit, though she had no idea how. He picked up the mantle, showed her a gem in the center where the mantle sat on his forehead, a gem that gleamed palest green with its own light.

“See this,” Gallen said, pointing at the gem. “These are all of the memories that make you. All of your hopes and dreams. And I shall take a hair from your head, to remake you.”

Tallea tried to thank him, but no words came from her mouth.

“Quiet now,” he said, and he kissed her softly on the forehead. “The great wheel turns without you now for a while. Until you wake again.”

She closed her eyes, and for a long time it was a struggle to breathe. She thought of one last thing she wanted to ask of the others, a gift she dearly wanted to give to Orick. But Gallen must have left her, for when she next opened her eyes, it was dark, and the stone floor beneath her was cold, so cold that it felt as if it were sucking all the heat from her.

* * *