Night, and rain as dark as the night. Men travelling softfoot, true to the discipline of silence. Keeping close, very close, near enough to touch, near enough to smell. In the dark, it would be the easiest thing in the world to get lost.
Actually they were lost, for it was impossible to tell one's location on a night so dark. But while they kept going uphill they were getting closer and closer to their goal. At dawn they would send someone up a tree to establish the precise direction to the mountain where they would rendezvous with their fellows.
So, while it was dark, and cold, and wet, and raining, they were far from disheartened. They were dressed for the weather. And, as their packs were back at their encampment, they were travelling light, carrying only their weapons (swords, knives, bows and quivers of arrows), a single waterbottle each, and a day's rations. Easy workl
And, since they had been on the march for half the night already, they had long since worked themselves into the rhythm of travel. One and all, they felt they could walk forever. A novice had the lead, Sarazin was in the middle, and Fox (who had joined these exercises so he could judge his son and gauge his suitability for a command responsi- bility) was taking up the rear.
There were ten of them. Ten fit, healthy men who were – though a civilian might not think it possible – content with their lot. Though, if any of the ten had suddenly been granted three magical wishes, he would doubtless have used one as a matter of urgency to kill off his lice. Then the nightmare started.
One moment they were moving along nice and easy through the night rain. The next moment, there was a scream. Then a shatter-crack as a tree was torn apart. Then Bubbling cries of agony from the leading man. Screams of panic from the others. A shout from Fox: 'Scatter!'
A superfluous shout, since they were running already. All of them – save the leading man, who was dying. Sarazin fled as fast as the others. Then was snatched by a monster. 'Yeh-garnl' he screamed, kicking and struggling.
The brute smashed him around the ears. He grabbed its – arm? Limb? Tentacle? No: its branch. He had run into a tree. He stooped beneath the branches, went to ground, then lay very still, listening, staring fearfully into the dark.
He tried to hush his own harsh breathing. His chest was tight. He could hear pattering rain. Sounds of violent retreat, already diminishing. Some of his comrades were still running. What had happened?
Something had attacked the leading man. But what? A boar? Wolves? An enemy marauder? A vampire? A were- wolf? A gigantic wildcat? -Whatever attacked him smashed a tree. -J heard it! The tree was torn apart!
– Nor a wolf, then. Not a werewolf, even. Or a vam- pire. Or a cat. Or a man. A bear? Could a bear smash a tree? Don't think so. Not a bear-type thing to do, anyway. -So what was out there? -Giant? Possibly. The boot!
Yes. Sarazin remembered the gigantic boot in which he had once sheltered for a night during earlier travels through Chenameg. The owner of such a thing would be able to smash trees with ease. What else had such strength?
– Dragons. Perhaps. But there was no roar, no flame. -So it was a giant. Must have been! Nothing else makes sense. So thinking, Sarazin began to shudder.
He waited for a long time, listening. He could no longer hear any sounds of flight, struggle or agony. Only the wind, the rain, the night-talk of the forest. He was very cold by now. -What to do?
In the end, he could no longer bear simply to lie there, waiting helplessly. He got to his feet. Then, shadow-silent, he eased away through the forest. Then halted. Which way should he go? Cautiously, he gave an owl-voiced code-call. Then thought: -Do owls hunt in the rain?
No matter: the rain was dying down. Sarazin waited until he thought it had stopped – the constant rain-drip from the trees above made the precise moment difficult to judge – then gave the owl-voiced call again. Listened. -Answer me, answer me! No reply.
Sarazin called again. An owl-voiced reply came. Distant. The others must have moved off quickly. Sarazin called again. Listened. -Speak to me! He was answered.
Stealthily, he headed towards the signal. After going for some considerable distance, he stopped. He was about to call again when one of his comrades called to him. From somewhere very close at hand. -Where are you? Where?
He listened intently. Finally, the call came again. From a tree directly above. Sarazin looked up. Up through the dark scaffolding of branches lit here and there by stars. And saw a small, dark shape. Which called to him, giving an owl-voiced cry. Then spread its wings and flapped to the next tree. -Pox! Pox and bitches! Dog-dung soup! What now?
He was lost by night in unfamiliar territory to which he had no map. He had food – though not much – but no tent, no tinder box. For once, he did not even have an ill-mannered dwarf bumbling around at knee-height, for Glambrax had been left behind at the hunting lodge. He was utterly alone. His comrades were out there, somewhere, in the darkness. But then so too was a large, bad-tempered giant with a homicidal disposition. -How long till dawn? -Half a night? Less, by my judgment.
Sarazin analysed his situation by applying the Rule of Objectivity: if someone else was in your predicament, what advice would you give them? He drew a blank. Then he remembered Thodric Jarl lecturing on the Laws of Panic: 'When all else fails, try doing nothing.'
It had sounded stupid at the time, but now, recalled in a time of dire need, it sounded uncommonly sensible. Sarazin settled himself down at the foot of the nearest tree.
He hoped to sleep – but unfortunately, it was far too cold for that. He was shivering again, and would shiver till dawn unless he died of it.
Dawn. The sun rose into a blue sky from which all traces of cloud and rain had vanished. Sean Kelebes Sarazin set out for higher ground, taking care to leave clear tracks of scuffed footmarks, bent twigs and torn leaves which could be followed by his comrades – and by himself, if he had cause to retrace his steps. He hoped giants could not stoop low enough to read a trail.
After a while, he came upon a tree which looked good for climbing, and shinned up it. Long before he reached the top, the branches grew too thin to support his weight. Still, he thought he glimpsed a mountain. He climbed down again. -Keep on uphill, that's the thing.
Indeed. He'd sight the rendezvous mountain sooner or later. Or come across a trail-sign to point him to his comrades. To tell his own people where he was going, he broke up some rotten branches and laid out an arrow on the ground, pointing in his direction of travel. With luck, a hostile giant would never notice such an insignificant mark. -Now let's be moving. So thinking, Sarazin set off again.
He had gone scarcely a hundred paces when, as he was about to step into an open glade, he halted. He thought he had seen something move. -Yes. Just ahead. In the grass.
The grass lay green and innocent in the autumn sunlight. But something was moving in the grass. What? Sarazin stared at the grass fearfully. -A snake, that's all.
Sarazin smiled, relaxed, advanced. The slim green snake reared up in front of him, swayed this way and that, then sank back to the ground. He took another step forward.
The snake went into reverse, weaving itself through the grass almost soundlessly. Its every movement perfectly fluid. Effortless.
For as long as he could remember, Sarazin had always admired snakes for their beauty, their poise, their sophisti- cation, their perfect mastery of style. Now that he had met the snake the forest no longer seemed so alien, so lonely. -A good omen.
The glade opened on to another one where the grass was higher, more plentiful. Sarazin stretched, yawned, grinned at the sunlight, waded into the tall grass, put a foot into something soft, into- -mud?
But was already committed, his weight following his foot, something crunching under his weight, grass parting beneath his hands as he saw, to see was to know, to know was- -to die? Then someone screamed. -Me?
No, it was not Sarazin screaming, even though he stood with one foot firmly planted in the carcass of a ruptured man-corpse, even though that corpse was a comrade's, eyes death-staring at the sky. -Blood? -Tracks?
Neither. No blood. No tracks. Nothing to show how the man had got here. And his legs were missing. So he hadn't walked here. And the arms were gone. Something had been hungry! Or angry. Very angry. And had dropped the corpse from the sky. Or had thrown it. -Which? -Dropped? Thrown? -By giant? By dragon? -And who screamed just then?
Sarazin looked up. Overhead were a few slim branches which could have supported nothing heavier than a nest- raiding hedgehog. Another scream ruptured the forest.
Sarazin was shocked to realise he was totally exposed to view. He dropped to his gut. Dropped straight down to the wet green grass. Then, emulating the snake, he writhed through the grass to the trees. He crawled into the nearest bit of rough and tangled undergrowth. Then peered around, seeing very little since the same shrubbery which sheltered him cut down his vision in all directions. Then he saw a man running.
A man fleeing, all weapons gone, an empty quiver bouncing on his back. Running, running, running, then- Down went the man.
He had tripped, had caught his foot on a root and had gone down hard. But he was up again on the instant, up and off. Ten paces, twenty. The forest ahead of him was thick and dark. He plunged in without hesitation. And the forest- Thrashed. Tore itself in tumult. Screamed. Raged in demolition. -The trees! It's the trees! Eating people! Sarazin shrank to the earth in terror. Amidst the shatter-thrashing forest there was the graunch of rending wood. Then a tree was falling, falling, crashing towards him, no chance to run- Branches in all directions Sarazin flung his arms around his face to save his eyes, wrapped his fingers into fists, ground arms and fists to the ground, and gasped And was lashed by whip-quick branches flailing against his scalp, his leathers, back, arse and ankles. He lay still. Listening to his body. He felt nothing. He was paralysed! His back was broken! No, not so – he could still feel his toes in his boots. His left foot was sore where the nail of his great toe, ingrowing, had started to become inflamed and infected. His knees hurt, too.
A good sign. An excellent sign. Pain! Ah, most beautiful sensation! But where was the rest of the pain? The lacerating agony of smashed flesh and cracked bones? Absent. For a good reason, too. Only the thinnest, uppermost branches of the tree had fallen as far as his body.
Sarazin, remembering the tree was a man-eater, flinched from those branches. Then came to his senses. Possibly there were such things as man-eating trees. He lived, after all, on the continent of Argan, where it is always dangerous to claim that a given improbability is impossible. However – a suicidal man-eating tree? That would be compounding the improbabilities beyond reason. -Something knocked this tree over. -Something big. Very big. Very very big. -Our giant. Our dragon. Or whatever our enemy is.
It could hardly be a bear, for a tree the size of the one which had fallen could have made the keel of a sizeable ship, a keel capable of standing the storm-stress of a major sea. No bear could demolish such. -A giant. I'd lay odds to it. -No. Two giants. Minimum.
For a man had come running from danger and had run straight into death waiting in undergrowth ahead of him. So there were at least two monsters on the loose in the forest. Maybe three.
Sarazin shuddered, remembering the walking rocks which had run amok in the streets of Androlmarphos after the death-stone had destroyed part of the walls of that city. He had toured the ruined city afterwards, had seen the devastation wrought by their strength. Was it rocks, then? Rocks and not giants? If so, then a death- stone must have been used in the neighbourhood to bring the rocks to life. -Is it wizards, then?
Through long acquaintance with Thodric Jarl, Sarazin had learnt at least a little of the Rovac warrior's fear of wizards, those Powers in the World of Events who were not bound by ordinary human limitations.
– So I still have a choice of enemies. A couple of giants. Or some walking rocks. Or a duo of dragons.
So thinking, Sarazin lay still. Waiting. Listening. He slid a hand to his crotch to harass the lice which were tor- menting him. He could have sworn he had successfully deloused himself before setting off from the hunting lodge. But lice spread rapidly.
– Never mind. Once I'm back safe I'll boil them to death. My own body in boiling water if that's what it takes! He waited. Watching. Listening. Thinking.
– We of the Common People, in symbol of our Revolutionary Ideals, share each with each these our Holy Lice, in token of the pledge of our blood to overthrow tyranny and rhubarb our bullshit, to wank our turnips and cream off our peas. -Gah!
– I hope this Common People nonsense ends quick when Fox is king of Chenameg. Or president, or whatever it is. Same difference. Anyway, we'll see.
Then a dreadful thought occurred to him. What if Fox was dead? Killed by the giant, the dragon, the rock or whatever it was? That would be unendurable. To have regained his father – then to have the man snatched away again. -Blood! -What was that!?
Something big, heavy, tree-crunching clumsy, was smashing its way through the vegetation towards him. He snake-crawled through the undergrowth. Slowly, for twigs snatched at him, roots juddered against his knees, swatches of leaves must be pushed aside. Then he put one fist straight into a patch of nettles, swore, heard the world rupture behind him, got to his feet and fled.
Like a stone hurled from a slingshot Sarazin bolted from the undergrowth to the sunlit clearways of the forest. He ran. Tiring rapidly, for he was running uphill and the slope was steep. -Must turn. He did turn. Saw what was behind him. A lurching grey creature blotched with orange. A lichen-patched rock? No, some kind of animal. A sausage-shaped body terminating in a gaping mouth, a mouth of sun-white teeth a shark would have envied. Sarazin had plenty of time to observe all this, for the creature had slowed, perhaps because he had halted.
While it had slowed, it was still advancing. How? On legs? It had no legs! It flowed over the ground. But not like a snake, oh no, for such was its weight that the ground quaked beneath it. Length? About that of a sea dragon. Girth? About that of a man's outstretched arms. Weight?
Whatever it weighed, it had muscle to match its bulk, for, having leisured uphill for a bit (getting its breath back?), it began to put on speed again. Sarazin fled in panic. Still uphill, uphill, for to turn might be to die. But his strength was gone. Guts cramping. Breath sobbing. Feet stumbling. -Trees clear ahead. -The top of the rise.
Sarazin, with the top of the slope just a few paces uphill, dug in for a final sprint. He darted between close-packed trees. Sunlight opened up in front of him. He leapt for the sunlight. 'Shit!'
He had jumped over a cliff. He was falling. Arms flailing, he tumbled. Then crunched himself into a ball. Not a moment too soon! For he smashed through the wide-flung branches of a cliff-clinging tree. Still falling! "Waaaal' Skloush! Water demolished his world.
Half-stunned, Sarazin flailed feebly, and surfaced. Blinked, gasped, thrashed, put his feet down, touched no bottom. Looked left, right, up, down, his eyes everywhere, like a brute beast which fears the immediate theft of its meal. He was afloat in a deep pool in a miniature valley with cliffs to left and to right. Atop one of those cliffs was the brute which had so recently chased him through the trees. -Jump, then, you bastard. Jump! The thing paused, then vanished. -Does it know a way down?
– Doubtless! Otherwise this would be my lucky day, which it surely isn't.
Sarazin floundered to the edge of the pool. Sloshed through the shallows. Stumbled to the dry. Big tracks were in the dry. Some blunt. Some clawed. Some inscrutable. -Monsters came this way. Men, too.
Men and beasts. Monstrous beasts which had torn turf, had left fresh scratches on granite. Some hundred paces up the valley, something caught the sun. Metal. An arch of metal. Sarazin stumped towards it, hands meantime slapping at his gear, checking what was there and what was missing.
Sword at hand. Quiver still there. Bow gone. Water bottle torn free. Knife present and correct. Win some, lose some. Now what's with this metal thing?
Sarazin halted a good thirty paces short of the metal arch, not keen to go any closer since it was the focus of all the jumbled tracks which were in evidence in the valley. The tracks all went to or came from that arch. Why? It was as wide as a man's outstretched arms, true, but nothing could go through it, surely, for the way was blocked by a sheet of shimmering metal. There was a humming in the air. -Bees? -Monsters?
Sarazin dared a glance behind him. Nothing there. He turned back to the arch. He was coming to the opinion that the arch itself – or the marble plinth on which it stood – was making the humming sound. He dared himself forward. Then halted abruptly as someone step- ped out of the doorway, stepped right out of the grey shimmering metal.
It was Fox. His father. 'Fox…?'
Disorientated, Fox looked left, looked right. Stared at Sarazin. Seemed to have trouble focusing. Then saw him, and staggered towards him. Then another man stepped from the arch. A soldier of the National Liberation Front. Wounded, his scalp half torn away.
Then out through the arch crawled a centipede, a green brute nearly too big to get through that Door. Fox and his companion did not hear the monster as it hauled itself into their sunlight. 'Fox!' screamed Sarazin. 'Behind you!'
His father turned. Saw the centipede. Which was gaining on his companion. Who tried to run. But slipped, tripped, fell. With an inarticulate cry, Fox turned. Lurched towards the fallen man. Then collapsed and went face down in the muck.
The centipede loomed over Fox's doomed comrade, who mewled with fear then screamed in unutterable agony as the monster forked into his flesh. The demolition job would surely distract the centipede for a few moments at best. Then it would turn its attention to Fox. Sarazin, sobbing with terror, scuttled towards his father's comatose body.
A dozen paces and he was there. 'Fox! Fox!' said Sarazin urgently.
Slapped his father's face. Shook him. Glanced from shock-pale Fox to the sun-glittering centipede. Which reared upward, blood dripping from its fighting man- dibles. It screamed with a sky-rending ululation. Then, dread by dread, hauled itself over the ground towards them. You can't have him!' screamed Sarazin.
The scream made the centipede pause. As it wavered, Sarazin made his decision. He would save both their lives. Or they would die together. Sarazin scooped up Fox, slung the man over his shoulder and staggered away towards the pool. Could water save them? It must! It must! How far? Seventy paces? -Oh shit, shit, no, no no!
There was something between them and the water already. A lesser brute than the centipede, but death all the same. A creature the same as the legless hulk which had chased him through the forest before his cliff-jump. Perhaps the self-same brute. Sarazin dropped his father.
The centipede was nearest, so Sarazin turned to face that threat first. Drew his sword, but could muster no battlecry to match the steel. The weapon-weight was shaky in his hands. He was panting, sobbing, was but a straw's-blow away from collapse.
Smooth, the monster was moving smoothly now, perfectly articulated, graceful even. It closed the distance. And Sarazin struck. Delivering a blow which missed, overbalancing him. The point of his sword dug deep into the turf. He hauled it out, glanced up at the brute, which was striking- 'Gah!' Sarazin swung.
One of the monster's fighting mandibles clipped the sword. Threw it into the air. Where it spun, tumbled in the sun, and flashed into intolerable fire. And the centipede screamed, writhed, thrashed upward, blasted by that fire. Sarazin flung himself to the ground, covering his father with his body as heat washed over them.
Though the bulk of the centipede protected them from the full fury of the flame-wrath, the heat was nearly unbearable. The ground shook as the centipede, mad with pain, beat its body against the ground. Whence came such flame? -From dragons?
Sarazin lifted his head a fraction. The centipede had ceased its head-banging, and was writhing in helpless agony. Dying. Lurid flames danced over its body, purple and red, gold and amber. The other monster? The hulk of its body lay but twenty paces away. From its corpse, a heavy smoke ascended to heaven. 'Fox?' said Sarazin, softly. His father was unconscious. So who was that talking?
Someone was, for he could hear voices: not ghost-soft like the hallucinations which sometimes muttered the odd word to him during a sleepless night of sentry duty. No – these were the harsh, curt voices of the workaday world. Of men in a very big hurry. Foreign voices speak- ing an angry language which clattered brusquely through the sunlight.
Sarazin got to his knees, then to his feet. Sidestepped clear of the centipede and saw a bustle of people gathered around the archway, with more joining them every moment. People were simply stepping out from the shimmering grey screen of metal, as had Fox and his comrade. One pointed at Sarazin and shouted.
Sarazin, temporarily unable to speak, flung his hands wide apart to show he was unarmed. At that moment, there was an ominous roar from one of the cliff tops. Turning, Sarazin half-saw a monster there, a long-legged thing obscenely fashioned. Then one of the strangers gathered by the steel arch lifted his hand and spoke a Word. Fire flashed from hand to cliff.
Cliff top, cliff top trees and monster exploded into flame. The monster thrashed through the air, burning, falling, tumbling. Hit the ground. Stood up, staggered, lurched towards them, fire seething from its flesh. Another Word. Another blast of fire. And the monster dropped, most definitely dead. Carbonised. -Wizard work. -So these are wizards.
Some of them were, at any rate. But as they came striding down the valley – in Sarazin's direction! – he saw most of them were spearsmen dressed in sky-blue uniforms, which had evidently been designed for cere- monial display, but were now severely battle-stained. These soldiers were heavily burdened with packs, and some led donkeys which laboured under weights still greater.
As they drew level with Sarazin, one of the wizards halted by Sarazin. 'Galish?' said the wizard. 'I speak it,' said Sarazin. 'Death.' 'This is a threat?' said Sarazin. 'Or a promise?' 'Death comes. Leave to live.'
With that, the wizard strode away in the company of the sky-blue soldiers. When the last of them had gone by, Sarazin turned back to Fox, who had recovered con- sciousness and was sitting up looking at them. 'Got any water?' said Fox.
His voice a husk. Voice of a man uncertain of his own existence. Hurt. Frightened. Shocked. 'Sorry, no,' said Sarazin.
Feeling his own need. Sweat hot on his forehead. Stinging in his eyes. Throat parched. Limbs shaking.
There's water close, though,' said Sarazin. "Muddy, but that's no worry. I'll get some for you.'
'Good,' said Fox, making an effort to play the manful leader. 'We'll drink then be gone. That Door opens to disaster. More of the Swarms may dare their way into Chenameg if we linger.'
Thus spoke Fox. But, by the time Sarazin had returned with water, Fox had fainted again. And it was some time before he was fit to travel.