The Feline Wizard

CHAPTER 11

True to Balkis' word, the ant ran twice as fast as they, and so did its mates. The air filled with chittering as ants came pouring from other hills, darting across their path.

“There!” Anthony pointed toward a spire of rock off to their left, only ten feet ahead. “Surely they cannot climb stone!”

Balkis had seen ants climb vertical tree trunks, but these were so much larger that perhaps they could not stick as well—and they were almost at her heels. With a cry of loathing, she swerved after Anthony.

The ant swerved, too, and its mandibles caught in her robe. She screamed and yanked; the cloth tore, and she ran even faster.

Ahead, ants angled to cut her off. Others closed in from the sides.

Anthony shot up the spire, finding handholds with the ease of a mountaineer who has spent his life among sheer rocks. Eight feet up, he reached down. Mandibles clashed behind her, and Balkis leaped. The ant ran up the stone right behind her, but she caught Anthony's hand, he lifted as her feet scrambled, and the ant fell back, too heavy in truth for the acrobatics its smaller cousins managed without noticing. But more ants crowded around, more and more, pushing their front rank up by sheer mass of numbers.

“They will reach us yet!” Anthony unlimbered his sling.

“That will do little good against such a horde!” Balkis cried.

“We cannot sit and wait for them to come! You fight with your weapons, and I shall fight with mine!” Anthony set a stone in the cup and whirled it around his head.

It would buy them time, if nothing else—and Balkis needed time indeed, to craft a spell.

Again she stalled. She floundered after a rhyme for ‘come,’ but while she floundered, Anthony called out,

“And sleep within your deep and earthen bower!”

The tide of insects ebbed astonishingly as the ones at the back began to sink into the ground. They scrabbled for a foothold, but the soil gave way beneath them faster than they could dig. The ones that had been standing on them touched the ground and immediately sank, too. In minutes there were no ants visible, only churning earth; then it, too, was still.

“Quickly, down!” Balkis started climbing toward the ground. “Before they can dig their way out!”

“No, wait!” Anthony reached down to catch her wrist, pulling up to stop her. He pointed ahead, and Balkis, looking, saw a buck burst from a screen of bushes. A dozen ants shot after it, moving so fast their legs were blurs.

“No, look away,” Anthony said grimly.

“I have seen beeves slaughtered, and deer butchered.” Nonetheless, Balkis looked away as the ants surrounded the deer. She heard their furious chittering and its single bleat of terror.

“There is naught to see now but a mass of ants,” Anthony reported.

Balkis turned back in time to see the throng of ants break apart, each with a slab of meat in its mandibles, gliding away toward their anthill, much more slowly now but still as fast as a human could run, leaving only a picked and gleaming skeleton behind them.

Balkis stared in horror and shivered with the chill that wrapped her back and shoulders.

“We dare not move at all in this valley!” Anthony said with a shudder. “How came we so far alive?”

“It was early morning,” Balkis said. “Perhaps the ants do not come out until the sun does.”

“Oh, for a cloud!” Anthony groaned.

The earth began to churn again, all about the spire, and antennae began to poke through.

Instead of increasing, what overcast there was lifted— and they saw a grim granite castle lowering at them atop another hill.

“This is why they have built their strongholds!” Anthony cried. “Not against one another but against the ants!”

“If we can reach that fortress, we shall be safe!”

Anthony swept his hand in a gesture including all the ants who were rising about them again. “How are we to wade through these?”

Inspiration struck, and Balkis cried, “The nuggets! It is not us alone whom they chase! Oh aye, they want meat, but they lust after gold far more! Throw the nuggets, Anthony! Throw them as far and as hard as you can!”

Anthony groaned. “You know not what you ask! Never have I seen such nuggets as these, only the golden pebbles in the stream! I have dreamed of having fortune enough so that my father and brothers need never toil again, and so we might journey as the traders do to visit fabulous lands such as Maracanda!”

“You shall gain your wish without gold!” Balkis cried. “Labor shall not harm your kin, and we are already on the road to Maracanda, with many fabulous sights on the way, I doubt not! Throw the gold, Anthony, please!”

With a groan wrenched up from the core of his soul, Anthony threw a lump of gold as high and as far as he could. The ants must have scented it somehow, for they turned and charged after it as it passed overhead. It fell to earth, and the ants piled into a churning, heaving heap, fighting over the ounce of metal.

“Quickly!” Balkis cried. “We must flee!” She scrambled down and ran toward the castle. Anthony dropped, leaped, dropped again, landed three yards behind her, and caught up quickly.

Behind them they could hear the frenzy of chittering slacken, settle, then boil up again, louder than before and still growing. Balkis risked a quick look over her shoulder and saw half the ants racing after them; the other half lay in bits and pieces, with a lone specimen limping toward his burrow to put the nugget back among the tailings.

“Throw another nugget, Anthony!” she cried. “Nothing else will slow them enough to save us!”

Anthony looked, saw the vanguard halfway to them already, and could have sworn the ant in the lead was the one who had first chased him. Ridiculous, of course, when they all looked alike. But they were coming fast, so with great reluctance, he took another nugget from his pouch, whirled it in his sling, and sent it spinning over the heads of their pursuers.

The result was electric—each ant turned as the lump of metal passed overhead, the ones in front scrambling over the ones behind, who were slower to scent the gold. Within moments they were all racing away from Balkis and Anthony. The winner pounced as the nugget fell to earth, and all the others pounced on him. Again they piled up, churning and tearing at one another, their chittering filling the air—but the heap was only half as high as the one before.

“Run!” Balkis cried, and Anthony shook himself out of his horrified trance to race beside her for the castle.

So it was that they ran and then stopped to throw another nugget whenever they heard the high, mindless chittering of pursuit. At last they were climbing the hill and voices were calling from the wall, calling and being answered, and the gates swung open as they neared. Anthony turned to throw one last nugget, then they dashed into the castle.

“Thank you, oh, thank you!” Balkis fought to keep the sob from her voice.

“Thank you from the bottoms of our hearts,” Anthony said, holding out his hand.

The porter grinned and clasped it. “There would have been little left of you if we had not. Welcome to Castle Formi-gard, young travelers.” His voice was oddly hushed. “I pray you, speak softly, for most of our folk have only now fallen asleep, and we would be loath to wake them. Time enough to tell them of your arrival when they waken this evening.”

He was bronze-skinned, clean-shaven, and hook-nosed, wearing leather armor over desert robes and a turban with a leather neck-guard. Under his arm he cradled a crossbow, cocked and loaded. A quick look around showed Balkis that all the other guards were dressed and armed in the same fashion, though their robes were black, gray, or brown, and his was blue—presumably a symbol of rank.

His words surprised her—not only to find that the people were asleep in the coolness of the early morning, but also because he spoke in the language of Maracanda—a very deep dialect, one that took a great deal of effort to puzzle out, but the language of Prester John nonetheless.

Anthony, however, shifted into the same tongue with no effort at all, though his accent was just as barbarous. “You speak the language of the caravans!”

The porter grinned. “It is the language of Maracanda, young man, and all travelers and merchants learn it sooner or later, for every one of these lands that pay tribute to Prester John and accept his protection speak his language.”

“You are of his empire, then?” Balkis asked.

“Our kings have boasted of their place at his table for two hundred years and more,” the guard said. “His language may not be ours, but we all know it well enough to speak to strangers—as indeed we must in this valley, for each castle holds folk from a different kingdom, each sent here to help harvest the gold of the ants for Prester John. We must league with one another to survive, and admit one another to our castles without regard to nationality, or we would all be ants' meat”

“Praise Heaven for that!” Anthony said fervently.

The guard nodded, his smile touched with amusement. “Otherwise we might not have been so quick to admit you, eh? But the ants are the enemy here, and other rivalries seem to grow dim in this valley” He turned to call softly to a gray-robe. “Ahmed! Take these strangers to the kitchens, for they must hunger!”

Turning back to Balkis and Anthony, he touched forehead, lips, and breast with his fingers as he bowed. “Peace be with you, my friends.”

“Peace be with you, and thank you for your hospitality.” Anthony imitated the gesture, rather clumsily, but well enough so Balkis could tell it wasn't new to him.

She imitated it herself with considerably more grace, echoing, “Peace be to you,” then turned away to follow the guide.

“He is a Muslim!” Anthony whispered to her.

“I would guess they all are,” Balkis agreed.

“But Prester John is a Christian king!”

“All may worship as they please in his empire,” Balkis told him. “There are Buddhists among his folk, too, and even folk whose religion is so primitive that they see spirits in every rock and tree. He has sent missionaries among them, of course, but he will not constrain any to believe as he does.”

“A most prudent emperor,” Anthony mused. “No doubt folk would fight against his rule if they thought he sought to banish their gods.”

Balkis looked up at him with new appreciation. Anthony was showing considerably more intelligence than he had led her to believe, even more than she had seen in him herself.

The guide led them through a vast dining hall into a mammoth kitchen, where cooks and scullery workers were just finishing cleaning up after the morning meal and sitting down to dine themselves. They were quite willing to welcome two more to their table.

Anthony stared at his plate—meat, noodles, and vegetables all mixed together with a fragrant sauce. “What a hearty breakfast!”

The kitchen workers laughed—softly, of course. “This is our supper, young man,” said a wrinkled woman across from him. “When your day begins, ours ends.”

“How odd!” But Balkis picked up her chopsticks without much surprise.

Anthony asked, “Is the daytime sun as hot here as it is in the desert?”

That brought another laugh, and the old woman said, “No, young man, it is the ants! They are our reason for being here, but also our reason for working by night, for that is when they stay belowground, deep in their burrows.”

“I see,” Anthony said thoughtfully. “So during the hours of darkness, they hide in the earth?”

“Not hide,” said a plump man beside him. “That is when they work. From sunset until the third hour of the day, they dig for the purest gold and bring it up to pile in the dirt of their anthills—but when the sun is high enough to begin to heat the land, they come up to hunt and feed.”

“Therefore you must stay in your fortress by day,” Anthony said, understanding, “and if sunrise finds you too far from your own castle, you seek refuge in whichever is nearest.”

The people nodded, and the plump man said, “That is why there can be no enmity between castles, no matter how long the blood-feuds between kings have been living in our homelands.”

“And by night,” Balkis asked, “you can leave your fortified places?”

The others nodded, and the old woman said, “That is when we work, and all take their turns outside the walls as well as in the kitchens or at repairs.”

“None dare appear so long as the ants are aboveground,” said another, “because of their strength and ferocity.”

“So if we were to go to the battlements, we would see ants ranging the valley, but none besieging the castle?” Anthony asked.

“Oh, some,” the old woman said. “There are always a few, like hopeful pups sitting by their master's table, hoping for a bone or a bit of meat to drop—but most know it is fruitless. Mind you, they tried to climb our walls when first our ancestors built these castles, but they fell off, and gave up quickly enough.”

Balkis and Anthony went up to look. Sure enough, there were a few ants hovering hopefully by the gates—but only a few. Balkis looked up at Anthony's frown and asked, “What troubles you?”

“That one.” Anthony pointed to the ant closest to the gate; it seemed to be exploring the wood with its antennae. “I know it is silly, but I cannot help feeling that it is the one who found me taking its gold, the one who was first to chase us.”

Balkis brought up her sleeve to hide her smile.

“Yes, I know it is foolish.” Anthony gave her a sheepish grin. “After all, we cannot tell one from another, and why should that one hold interest in me when none others do?”

“I suspect that the imagination you say you lack is too active.” Balkis took his arm, letting her smile show. “But we must rest while we can, for I've no doubt we shall have to be on our way at sunset. Come, let us find our guest chambers and sleep.”

The dunes rolled below them, Stegoman's shadow slipping over their contours like an iron over wrinkled cloth. Then Matt saw another shadow against the plane of the road.

“Traveler,” he called to Stegoman. “Let's stop and talk.”

But Stegoman peered down with eyes far sharper than Mart's and said, “I mislike the look of him. I pray thee, wizard, pass this one by.”

Mart's interest sharpened. “Something odd about him? Let's have a closer look.”

“You might frighten him into silence,” Stegoman cautioned.

“That's what you want, isn't it?”

Stegoman thought that over for a moment, then said, “It is,” and banked to sail back at a lower altitude. He passed the lone figure much closer, then banked into another U-turn and sailed over scarcely fifty feet above its head. Matt saw a solitary stranger in a cowled robe, staff in hand, pausing to look up—and showing not the slightest sign of fear. That bothered him, but he thought, Hey, maybe the man is long on bravery and short on sense. “Doesn't look all that unusual, Stegoman,” he said. “What do you think is the matter?”

“It takes one to know one,” the dragon said, “and this fellow seems distinctly cold-blooded.”

“Oh, how can you tell that from this altitude?” Matt scoffed. “No point in hiding, since he doesn't seem scared of us. Just land ten yards away from him, would you?”

“I do this under protest,” Stegoman grumbled, and spiraled down to land. It was no accident that he ended up with a short run directly at the traveler, but the man didn't even flinch, and the dragon did indeed come to a halt thirty feet from him. Matt dismounted and went up to the stranger, reflecting that his cowl was very deep—even on the ground Matt couldn't see his face. “Excuse me, have you seen—”

The stranger folded back his hood, revealing a snake's head.

Matt stood frozen in shock a moment, but came out of it when the snake grinned, unfolding two dripping fangs. Then it struck.