Lords of the Seventh Swarm

Chapter 40

Thomas Flynn stalked behind Lord Felph, following a trail of corpses through the tangle. Between the boles of vast trees, smoke hung in the air in iridescent wisps, reflecting the light of Thomas’s glow globe.

The air was remarkably cool despite the smoke. The fighting had died down two hours ago, yet Felph and Thomas often passed roving patrols of Vanquishers who still hunted for Maggie and Gallen.

Though Felph hurried, his journey through Teeawah took longer than anticipated. He’d pinpointed the course he wanted to follow, using a map provided by the dronon, but following the precise route proved impossible. The Vanquishers simply flew when they wanted to travel up or down, so Felph ended up traveling twice the distance as the Vanquishers to reach the ancient city.

On the trail in, they passed the corpses of fantastic monsters-the purple-black sfuz with their thin legs, the long pale corpse of a mistwife, some previously undiscovered creature Thomas called a troll-for it had greenish skin and hair that looked like roots, all with a nose at least two feet long. Dronon dead littered the path in places, primarily asphyxiated by the flames thrown by their own incendiary rifles. Felph robbed their corpses of pulp guns, gave a spare to Thomas.

Only once did they spot a sfuz-a frantic creature so busy dragging a Vanquisher’s corpse it did not notice Felph till he shot it. Thomas felt surprised at how the sfuz had not seen them, for they had not hidden their light. Perhaps in this battle, with its massive carnage on both sides, the mind of this poor wretched beast had snapped.

In its death throes, the sfuz protectively wrapped four legs around its head. Thomas gazed deep into its indigo eyes. Fires had burned here. Three spots in the turf still smoldered from incendiary fires, trailing thin white plumes of smoke.

Felph halted, watching the sfuz, his leg propped up on the thorax of a dead Vanquisher. He sniffed.

“How long have you been working for Karthenor?” Felph asked.

Thomas could not answer. Karthenor had ordered Thomas to be silent earlier in the morning. Thomas’s Guide would not recognize Felph’s request.

“Are you a slave, fresh captured?” Felph asked.

Thomas nodded.

Felph considered. “Do you think a man should work for what he gets, or just take it? Receive reward without sweat?”

Thomas shook his head no.

Felph watched Thomas thoughtfully. “Me neither.”

Thomas wondered if Felph planned to free him. Perhaps so, but if he did, he wasn’t saying. Rather forcefully Felph said, “I don’t think it should happen. In fact, I don’t believe it ever does. Remember, Thomas, everything has its price. Everything. Even you. Karthenor believes he has captured a prize. But you will cost him. It is a law of nature, and nature will not be violated.”

Aye, everything has a cost, Thomas silently agreed, but my ignorance cost me more than it’s worth. Give me a hand, man. If you removed this Guide, I’d write a song to immortalize the deed!

Felph studied Thomas’s eyes. Go on, man, save me! You can read everything I want to say from my eyes.

“Indeed,” Felph said, “everything has a price. Even compassion. I would free you if I could. I have the tools in my palace. But I cannot do so now. Perhaps I will never be in a position to do so. But remember, my friend, you are free if you so desire to be. Karthenor may force you to do his will-his Guide might control your actions even past the moment when your brain ceases to function-but so long as you do not let his will supplant yours, you are always free.

Lord Felph stroked his thin beard, a gesture that somehow made him look much older, then he turned away and headed down the trail, as if he’d decided to let Thomas be.

Thomas despaired. Freedom of thought was not much at all. Freedom of thought was an itch, begging to be scratched. And Thomas wondered if the moment would come when Karthenor’s will would supplant his own.

We two are too much alike, Thomas realized. With very little difficulty, he and I could be the same man.

Felph led the way deeper into the tangle. Their path led past several dozen dead sfuz, up a steep incline where rainwater washed down, making a thin stream that ran with green and purple blood.

The time of day or night did not matter, though Thomas felt weary. The interminable darkness told his body to rest despite the fact Thomas had been awake for only ten hours that day.

All around, the hoary shadows of the tangle assaulted him, the tatters of roots hanging from above, the musky mineral scent of mold and rot, the constant dripping. The scenery seemed appropriate for a nightmare, and every two hundred meters they chanced on some new horror, some new site of a slaughter, until at long last they trudged up a path and came to the golden cliffs of Teeawah.

There holes opened in the rock like giant eyes. Smoke curled out from them, and from the openings hung the bodies of sfuz, chopped in half by gunfire.

Lord Felph jogged up to the holes, raising his glow globe over his head, peering into the dark recesses of the lair. At one point, he held up the light, then pointed his gun into the shadows and fired-an almost nonchalant gesture. From inside the cave, a shrill whistle erupted, the death cry of a sfuz.

“Here is a passage!” Felph shouted. “Back behind these bodies.” He jumped up into the oval opening, climbed in. For one second Thomas saw the opening lit from inside. Felph seemed to be the pupil of a great burning eye, then the image faded as Felph hurried inside.

Thomas came up, surveyed the inside of the fortress. The bodies of a dozen sfuz sprawled on the floor, wrapped in their own arms and legs. These did not ooze blood. They’d been asphyxiated.

The hollow chamber here was shaped, something like an egg. Thomas had imagined there would be furnishings inside, as if it were a home back on Tihrglas with a butter churn in one corner and a sofa near the fireplace.

What he saw repulsed him. The floors lay bare of furnishings, but in every corner bones and dung lay in fetid heaps. All along the wall were odd trophies-dozens of flesh-covered heads from some large creatures, like ogres, each with a huge horn on its forehead; a collection of animal tails were tacked in another line; an assortment of dried turds and testicles were pinned into the stone with wooden thorns. It wasn’t until Thomas whiffed the ungodly odor from these items that he realized they weren’t to look at-these items were here to smell.

Maybe the sfuz relished these bouquets as humans would the scent of flowers. Or more likely, this room seemed to form a library of scents, where young hunters could learn to track prey.

“Here’s what we’re looking for,” Felph said, holding his light to a large passage that opened near the wall. “A common area. The Quaieewoohs connect these from various points. They twist a lot, and can be tricky.”

With that, he held his glow globe aloft, began searching along a wide passage with a low ceiling that Ied deep into the city. Everywhere, side passages led to small rooms.

Felph ignored these as he clambered over asphyxiated sfuz.

“Let me tell you something,” Felph huffed. “We have perhaps two hours before these dead sfuz begin to reanimate. By then, we’d best be well away.” It was such an odd thing to say, and the young lord said it with such sincerity, the, notion took Thomas’s breath. Did he really believe these dead would rise again?

In the past weeks, Thomas had seen so many wonders, he couldn’t question this. If you told me they’d all transform into hummingbirds, Thomas thought, it wouldn’t faze me.

They found another large passage that merged with the one they were in, like streams meeting to form a river, becoming one enormous tunnel, heading downward.

Here, in the depths of the city, the numbers of dead diminished. It was as if all the sfuz had gone to do battle. Yet ahead, Thomas heard an odd whistling, and Felph immediately fell into a crouch, waving his weapon.

“Well,” Felph whispered. “It seems we have company. The sfuz must be guarding their waters. Get your weapon ready to fire.”

Thomas did as ordered, though he’d never fired a pulp pistol. It was similar enough to Gallen’s incendiary rifle, he thought he knew, how to handle it.

He held it stiffly, at arm’s length, afraid of its explosive power. Felph frowned at his stance.

They descended down the wide corridor to meet the sfuz.