The Dark City

23

Kest’s creatures attacked them. But Flain had a maze built before the House, and the beasts and birds of nightmare wandered in it and howled.

Then Kest arose, and wept. “The damage I have done,” he said, “I will make good. The monsters I have made I will destroy.”

And he took up his weapons and walked through them all into the dark.

Book of the Seven Moons

THEY ALL STARED AT HIM IN AMAZEMENT. Then the Sekoi gave a low purr of laughter.

“You knew?” Raffi gasped.

“From the beginning.” Galen rubbed his leg calmly. “From the first time we saw her at the tree.”

Carys was staring at him. “You couldn’t have!”

“And as we went on I grew more certain. She writes an interesting journal, Raffi. You should read it.”

“You . . .” She shook her head, disbelieving. “You deciphered it?”

“A few times.” He smiled sourly. “I’m sorry, Carys, but you were the one who was deceived. I kept you with us because I knew you’d be useful. You could keep the Watch away from us; get us where we needed to go. So it proved. At the gates, for instance.”

Bewildered, she sat down. The Sekoi was purring in ecstasy, all its fur bristling. “Wonderful,” it murmured. “Wonderful.”

“I made sure you went under the first wagon. I knew there was no real way into the city, but I thought you’d persuade them. I also thought you might be useful if any of us were caught.” He rubbed his sore neck. “Luckily for me.”

There was nothing, nothing she could say. The shock of it was like a cold downpour; it left her shivering. All this time she thought she had been so clever . . . She shuddered with the thought of her pride. All that time. Now she knew how Raffi must have felt.

He looked furious. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Galen glared at him hard. “Because I’m the master, boy. I keep the secrets. And besides, you’d have given it away a hundred times. You can’t lie well enough.”

Astounded, Raffi collapsed into silence. Galen leaned forward. “But I’m surprised, Carys, that you’ve already told these two. When I saw you in that cell I presumed you’d have pretended to be caught. So whose side are you really on?”

She was silent. They all watched her. Then she said quietly, “I’d only ever known the Watch, Galen, until I met you. I’d never spoken to keepers before. You did some things . . .”

He nodded, his long hair falling. “They told you it was all illusion.”

“But why?” She looked up at him, face flushed. “I’m beginning to see some of the things they told us aren’t true. I’m not sure anymore what I should believe. And then, when you were caught . . .” She shrugged. “I just wanted to get you out.”

Galen looked at her, and something in his eyes softened.

The Sekoi squirmed uneasily. “Very touching,” it muttered. “Forgive me for saying this, but, keeper, you realize this may all be lies. She may still want us to take her to the Crow. That’s why she got you out.”

“I do,” Carys said.

“Yes, but only to solve your doubts? Or might you not turn on us all when you find him? To capture the Crow would bring you a great deal of gold, no doubt.” Its eyes gleamed yellow.

“For myself,” she snapped.

“Prove it,” Galen said quietly.

“How?”

“Leave your weapon here.”

She stared at him, astonished. “That’s madness! The city is full of dangers; we’d have no protection.”

“Do it as an act of faith.” His dark eyes watched her carefully. “Keepers carry no weapons.”

“They do,” she retorted. “Invisible ones.”

“I have none, Carys.”

She glanced away. “Yes, but just to leave it here! It’s so stupid!”

“It will show us that you mean what you say.”

She turned; for a long moment she stared at him, then at Raffi, who said nothing. Finally she pulled the bow off her back and threw it down. “I must be totally insane!”

Disgusted, she flung the spare bolts after it. “No wonder the Order’s been wiped out!”

“It hasn’t. Not yet.” Galen took the globe from Raffi and fingered it. “And it never will. Not while we have faith.”

As he said it an enormous crack burst in the sky outside, making them all jump. The Sekoi slithered to the window; as it looked out, they saw its face was rippled with red light.

“You’d better see this,” it hissed.

Raffi pushed in. Another whooshing sound shot up; he saw a burst of red flame high in the dark; it fell in flakes behind the high walls.

“What was it?”

“Watch-flares.” The Sekoi pulled its head in. “They’ve found the men under the arch. We need to move.”

“Carefully though.” Carys followed. “They’ll double the patrols.”

She slid out behind the Sekoi, but halfway through the window Raffi saw her look back at the crossbow; a hopeless, bitter look. Then he climbed after her.

Galen hurried them. They moved through broken palaces like shadows. But soon the buildings were left behind; they came to a desolation of smoke, rising and hissing from cracks; shattered walls broke up the way. There were no streets here; the destruction had left only tumbled masses of stone. They hurried by the smashed pieces of an enormous statue; Raffi saw a hand as big as a room, lying pointing to the sky and, still in its original place, a huge bare foot, so vast that the toes were like small hills they had to scramble over.

The stench grew. Shadows of draxi swooped overhead, their screams keen. Raffi slipped and slithered behind the others, glad that Galen had the globe; he had fallen so often he would have broken it.

Now they ran over a wide square, their feet scuffling on the stones, and in the middle came to a pillar so tall its top was lost in the black sky. Galen stopped to look at it; every side was covered with cryptic letters.

Raffi caught his arm. “We can’t stop.”

“Look at it. Centuries old. The secrets it has.”

“Hurry!” the Sekoi hissed from the dark. “I can smell them. They’re close!”

They raced across the square. On the far side was an inky stillness; plunging into it, Raffi heard Carys shout, then he felt the steaming water soak his knees. He scrambled back.

“Flooded,” the Sekoi spat.

They gazed at an eerie landscape. An archway and some broken pillars rose from the water. Vapor hung above the surface and some leathery vegetation had managed to sprout here; it grew over the broken walls like a creeping rash. Steam gathered around them; where they stood, the ground was reverting to marsh, stinking of sulfur and the invisible heat.

Raffi tugged his feet out.

“We’ll have to go around.” Galen glanced back. “Take care. The ground may not be safe.”

They had reached the heart of Tasceron, and it was a morass of ruined halls. Here and there carvings rose, half a body, a broken face; strange obelisks and doorways that led nowhere, standing on their own in the dim lake. Carefully they made their way around the edge of the swamp, climbing over walls and through gaps and holes.

Finally Galen stopped. He bent over the chart. “We’re close. We need to find a tree.”

“Here!” The Sekoi looked around, wondering.

“Yes. A calarna tree.”

Raffi stared at him. The calarna was the first tree, the tree of Flain. It had given its branches for the House of Trees. Were they that close?

“Spread out.” Galen crumpled the paper. “Quickly.”

Turning, Raffi ducked under the wall into a blackened garden. Brambles were waist-high; he forced his way into them, arms up, dodging the swinging, slashing thorns. Then a stifled yell stopped him.

“Galen! Over here!”

Tearing his coat in his hurry, he backed out and found Carys at the stump of something warped and ill-shapen. Galen shoved her aside and bent down to it. He gave a hiss of satisfaction.

“This was it.”

“Keeper.” The Sekoi’s voice was quiet and cold. They looked up at it; its yellow eyes were narrowed.

“We’re being watched.”

“Sense-lines, Raffi!” Galen growled. “Now!”

Silent, he sent them out, and touched the flickers of men, many of them, running silent as ghosts through the ruined arcades. Galen was on hands and knees, groping on the ground. “Hurry! It’s got to be here! An opening of some kind!”

A slither of stones behind them. The Sekoi’s fur prickled.

“No time to look, keeper.”

“We have to find it!”

Carys crouched beside him. “Should have kept my bow,” she whispered.

Desperate, they groped hurriedly in the dark among the smashed wreckage of rooms; broken pots, cups, tiles, brick and mosaic, shards of glass that glinted in the steamy haze.

Digging a splinter from his skin, Raffi felt the sense-lines snap, one by one. “They’re here!” he gasped.

“I don’t care!” Galen roared. “Find it!”

Sweating with worry, dizzy with the effort of keeping the lines out, Raffi swept a clutter of rubble aside and saw with a leap of his heart a face in the mossed floor. It was a mask of beaten copper, a huge thing, riveted down, and on its forehead, almost trodden out, a ring of six small circles, and in the middle, the seventh.

“The moons!”

“What?” Galen was there; his firm hands on the mask, fingers stretched flat, feeling for marks and symbols Raffi couldn’t see, pushing and prodding.

Behind them, a whistle sounded; another answered, far to the left.

Then a voice rang out, loud in the darkness. “Galen Harn! Listen to me!”

Carys’s head jerked up.

“Galen Harn!” the voice roared again. “This is the end for you! My men are all around you, keeper, so come out and bring your friends with you. Don’t try anything. We’re all armed.”

Galen’s fingers stopped. Under his hands the slab had moved; with a hoarse whisper it lifted, just a fraction. Out of the black slit came a dry, musty smell.

“Get something,” he muttered. “Heave it up!”

The Sekoi jammed a branch under; it splintered but was enough to heave the stone wide; below it they saw a hot steamy darkness that daunted them all till the castellan yelled again.

“Come out, keeper! Or we come in!”

“Down,” Galen said.

Raffi slid in first, feeling Carys follow. There were steps; his feet found them and he went down fast, afraid of falling. Above him, bodies slithered, dust fell.

Then the slab came down, and shut tight.

“Keep silent,” Galen hissed. “Don’t move!”

Around Raffi, the silence breathed. He could feel Carys’s elbow in his chest; looking down he saw only blackness, but far down, something plopped into a pool, a tiny, far-off sound.

Muffled yells came from above. Something scuffed on the slab; Raffi had a sudden vision of a Watchman standing on it, and then he saw the man as if he was looking up from the ground through the eyes of the copper mask. He swayed, giddy; Carys grabbed him. She said nothing, but her clutch was tight.

The shouts and scuffs faded.

After a while Galen’s whisper came down. “Go on, Raffi, as quick as you can. They’ll find the entrance soon enough.”

Spreading his hands, Raffi felt for the walls. He could only find one, to his right, so he kept his hand on that and shuffled down. It was hot and airless. The steps seemed wide, their edges broken and unsafe; as he went down and down, he waited for his eyes to get used to the dark, but all he saw was blackness.

His foot met floor. He slid it out carefully. There were no more steps.

“I’m at the bottom.” His voice rang hollow, as if in a great well.

He waited till everyone was down, unable to see at all.

“We should have brought a light.”

“Maybe we did.” Galen’s voice was close; he sounded pleased.

A glow loomed over Raffi’s shoulder; he turned in surprise and saw Galen was holding up the globe. It glimmered faintly, a pale light that showed him Carys and the Sekoi’s sharp face, lit with delight.

“How can you . . . ?” he breathed, but Galen shook his head. “It’s not me. It will show us the way to go.”

Something thumped, far above. Galen pushed past him. “Hurry! This way.”

They realized they were in an extraordinary corridor, so narrow that the walls brushed them on both sides, so high the roof was lost in darkness. Galen walked ahead with the globe; it brightened as he went, throwing huge shadows on the walls. These were of some soft earth, and in them were deep slits, marked with plaques and carved symbols. Some were so high that Raffi realized the corridor floor must have been cut away, year after year.

“What are they?” Carys said.

“Graves,” he said in awe. “The earliest Archkeepers were buried near the House of Trees. Think how old they are, Carys.”

She nodded, but all at once he remembered she was one of the enemy, and was angry with her, and himself, and everything.

They came to a side tunnel; an identical corridor. Ahead, the way forked into two.

“This is the maze,” Galen said abruptly. “Chapter fifty-six, Raffi.”

He said the words aloud, without thinking. “For the way to the House of Trees is a maze of ways and choices. Let the wise man tread it carefully. He knows not where the last wrong turn may take him.”

“And I always thought that meant something else.” Galen shook his head and the green beads glinted at his neck. “But it’s a real maze.”

“How do we get through it?”

“The globe.” Galen held it gently in the opening of each tunnel; in the one to the left it seemed slightly brighter.

“We’ll try here.”

Following them down the slit, Carys muttered, “We ought to leave some trail. To get back out again.”

The Sekoi snorted. “Yes, the Watch might like that.

“I suppose they might.” It sounded as though she was laughing; Raffi glanced back and she winked at him. Behind her, the Sekoi looked unhappy. Troubled, Raffi hurried after Galen.

The maze was complex. They went as fast as they could, but the passageways grew even narrower, and there were so many of them leading off that Galen had to go a little way into each, watching the globe intently. Twice they took the wrong way, and had to go back as it dimmed.

Then from the back the Sekoi hissed, “Listen!”

Something moved, far above. A murmur of sound echoed. “They’re in.” Galen strode on quickly. “There’s not much we can do about it.”

Feeling the soft dust under his feet, Raffi knew the Watch would follow their tracks easily. All they needed was a lantern. He wondered if Carys had known that, and had been teasing him about leaving a trail. He didn’t know. He didn’t know anything about her.

Then he walked into Galen’s back. The keeper lifted the globe. It was brilliant now, pulsing with white light. And they saw that the walls around them were no longer made of soil; instead they were strangely woven together; and as Raffi rubbed the dust off he saw that these were branches, hundreds of branches of different trees that had grown and tangled together. Galen held the globe high and they saw a vast doorway in front of them, its doorposts and lintel made of living calarna trees, black with age, and the mark of the Makers, the seven moons, was carved deep in the scented wood.

After a moment Galen began the words of blessing. Slow and sonorous, they sounded here; the old Makerwords, their meanings almost lost. Raffi made the responses, and the tunnels behind seemed to whisper the sounds back at him, as if all the dead remembered them. The Sekoi fidgeted restlessly, glancing back, and Carys stared up at the doorway as if inside it all her worst nightmares might come true.

Deep under the city, they had found the House of Trees.

The trouble was, Raffi thought, taking the globe from Galen, that they had also shown the Watch exactly where it was.

“Hurry,” the Sekoi murmured.

The keeper went forward quickly and put both hands to the doors. He pushed hard, as if he expected them to be locked or swollen, but to their astonishment the wooden doors rolled smoothly back with a swish of sound.

And out of the House came light.

Blinding light.