Dawn of Wonder (The Wakening Book 1) (63 page)

Then they were enclosed. It was rock on all sides.

“Fergal,” Tyne said, “Is this cubicle hanging from
chains?”

“Most likely.”

“But they would be made of iron or steel, and
everything iron in this place is rusted …”

“Rust works its way in from the outer surface. As
with the main door of the archive room, heavy chain links will still have a
good deal of strength in the core.”

“Are you sure about that?”

Fergal shifted. He was about to reply when there
was a sharp clink of metal above them. The floor trembled and brought all
conversation to an end. Everyone was holding onto something.

Another opening appeared where the first had been,
dark and cold, rising up from the ground until it swallowed the entire wall. For
a long time they descended in breathless silence until a rocky floor reached
the level of their feet. They all lost their balance as the moving platform
jolted and came to rest with a cavernous boom that echoed out around them as if
they were in the belly of a mountain. And perhaps they were.

They had been carried deep under Kultûhm, into a
place they hadn’t known existed.

Fergal led the way onto a landing. The others
followed, holding the oil lamps out, shielding their eyes and peering into the
darkness beyond.

The cubicle that had lowered them was enclosed on
three sides by a hollowed stone pillar. Above the ceiling of this moving
cubicle, they could now see the four steel bars were fastened to chains that
reached far up beyond the glow of their lamps. Aedan guessed that they ran over
a giant pulley and attached to a counterweight somewhere, but was at a loss as
to how it all worked. He wondered why the platform had not shot up like a
startled pheasant the moment they stepped off, but then realised a simple latch
would solve that problem.

As his eyes adjusted, he saw a number of carriage-sized
stone blocks all around. It looked as if they had been intended as
counterweights, with chains and braces lying nearby. The skill in engineering that
these people had possessed was like nothing he had ever seen in Castath. And
all of this almost a thousand years ago.

The sound of running water drew his attention to a
channel nearby. Beside it was a deep pit, and beyond that the stark white
curves of a partly assembled skeleton. It was even bigger than the specimen he
had seen in the museum, and altogether different in form. It looked like it had
been some type of giant lizard – flat, broad and ugly. The teeth were almost as
long as he was tall. Looking at it gave him an icy feeling.

“Where are we?” Tyne asked.

Fergal looked around at the hulking shapes of unfinished
stone machines, the tools, the aged bones, the channels of dark water, and the great
pillars of rock that stood around them like the legs of titans and reached far
up to a roof only betrayed by faint, jagged contours.

“I have never learned of this place,” he said. “I
doubt that any living man has. If the cavity was natural to begin with, it has
been vastly altered – those abandoned tools suggest that much work was still in
progress.”

“Fergal, please,” Tyne interrupted, glancing up
from Osric who was breathing hard and shivering, “that might be interesting but
–”

“Which means that there is bound to be a workers’
exit.”

“Can’t we just use another one of these moving
platforms – they do go up, don’t they?”

“It looks, I’m afraid to say, that they don’t go
anywhere. As far as the light reveals, ours seems to be the only one that was
finished. We will, most probably, have to walk out, but first we need to get
our bearings.”

“With what reference? Not even Merter could have
kept a bearing down that stairwell.”

Fergal picked up a discarded rib the size of a
spear and began to draw in a dusty bowl. “The archive room had a door in the wall
that would be opposite us if we were to look out from our alcove. It was the
door we tried on our way in, about here.” He drew a line. “And at that time we
were walking west I believe. Merter?”

“A point to the north perhaps, but I’d settle for west.”

Using that as a reference, Fergal drew in the
compass lines, and beside it, a rough layout of the city.

“These blocks” – he indicated the pale shapes
around them – “which I presume to be ballast blocks, are limestone, not found
in a cavern of granite. It means that there has to be a large access point for
this cave on one of the main city arteries, but not too near the city gate
where a build-up would cause problems.”

That reminded Aedan of something. “There
was
a trapdoor in the ground near the main gate,” he said. “We saw it the first
time we passed through.”

“Troop tunnel,” said Fergal. “Allowed soldiers to
reach the gate quickly from the barracks. It wouldn’t lead down here. The four
regions in the city that have both the broad roads and space required for a
mining and construction entrance are the palace, the barracks, the area beneath
the market, and the south quarter.” He indicated each on his rough map. “The
palace is not an option for a workers’ entrance. The barracks are here.” He
thought for a while. “I’m going to rule that out because of the Gellerac love
of military efficiency – queues of miners would interfere with smooth
deployment. That leaves the market and south quarter.” He fell silent again.

“Wouldn’t the market be too cluttered for big
loads of stone?” asked Tyne.

Fergal looked at her, or at a point somewhere
beyond her, and absently twisted his fingers in his beard.

“Fergal?”

“In Castath, that would be the logical conclusion,
but the Gellerac had a culture of social elitism that is difficult for us to
grasp. The southern suburbs had wide streets because that was where the wealthy
settled. Whoever commissioned this entrance would have had to choose between
the congestion near the market and the outrage of the wealthy. I think … yes, I
think I’m going to go with the market.”

“You don’t sound convinced.”

“Quite true, Tyne, quite true.”

“Well what if you’re wrong?”

“Then I will be convinced it was the other way.
Now …” he said, pointing back to his map, “we are currently here, except that
we are a few hundred feet beneath the surface. My map, I’m sure you will appreciate,
cannot represent that dimension. Which means that our most hopeful bearing
would be that way.” He pointed out into the darkness, roughly in line with the
grinning lizard skeleton. “Osric, are you able to walk?”

“Of course!” Osric pushed himself to his feet,
took a step, and crashed into the ground like a felled pine.

“We’ll get him there,” said Tyne. “Merter and I
can manage.”

“Wouldn’t it be better if I –”

“No, Fergal. I am more than strong enough, and
your place is with directions.”

Aedan turned to Liru and lowered his voice. “Can’t
argue about her being strong enough, but I think what she really means by the
second part is that
her
place is with Osric.”

“So you’ve noticed too,” said Liru.

“I think even the horses noticed.”

Liru’s typical smiles were subtle twitches that
were hard to spot in broad daylight. Where she stood in shadow, she was all but
invisible. Aedan wondered if there would be brightening of her expression now. It
wasn’t likely, considering what they had just witnessed in the council room,
but it made him realise how long it had been since she had smiled at him.

He took his place in the line that formed and
moved out. Maintaining a bearing was imperative, so they were careful to fix a
line through three points at any given time and, when they reached the first,
to pick another at the edge of their lamp range.

As they walked, they passed more of the giant
counterweighted machines, some using levers like oversized seesaws, others
chains, some having a part of the mechanism reaching up to the rocky ceiling, but
none ready for use. There were many bridged walkways allowing passage over the channels.
These channels were beginning to look like veins the way they distributed the
water so evenly.

Tools – picks, shovels, chisels, sledgehammers and
numerous contraptions Aedan could not identify – were lying where they had been
dropped. Carts were abandoned, their stone payloads lying beneath them in neat
piles where they had fallen through the corroded trays. There were three more
towering skeletons and many bones still embedded in rock, but no human remains,
suggesting that the cave had been successfully evacuated.

Apart from the gurgle of water, an occasional scuff
of a boot on the rocky floor or the unintentional kicking of a pebble that
skittered away into darkness, the cave was silent. Yet it had a sound, or at
least a feeling of great depth that whispered through the emptiness.

Then the skeletons began to grow more numerous,
and this time they were human. There were many, and they were all laid out in
rows, occasionally overlapping. It was a peculiar arrangement, and Aedan
wondered if it had to do with some Gellerac superstition. Could this be their
cemetery?

“Fergal,” he called. “Why were they placed like
this?”

Fergal stopped and turned. He did not answer
immediately, and when he did, his voice was raw.

“They weren’t placed in the sense that you are
thinking. These skeletons are lined up because the dung in which they were
encased has decomposed.” All eyes were drawn across a pale graveyard. “Kultûhm,”
he said, “was abandoned, but a great many did not escape.”

The air no longer seemed as clean as it had. As
they walked on, Aedan found his breathing becoming shallow. It was not just the
sense
of contamination. There really was something in the air that was
not right.

Finally, one of the soldiers blurted out, “What is
that smell?”

“Probably bats,” said Tyne. “Stop breathing and it
will go away.” Aedan was close enough to hear her mumble, “And so will you.”

Fergal again drew to a halt and everyone stopped.

“What is it?” Merter asked from under Osric’s
shoulder.

“I think you’d better take a look.”

After setting Osric down, Merter walked to where Fergal
stood. Aedan, of course, was already there.

“They look like the tree trunks we saw in the
streets …” Merter froze. “Oh no!” he whispered.

Fergal raised his lamp and Aedan did likewise. Ahead
of them stretched acres of what they now understood to be tree-sized droppings,
fresh droppings.

“It was what I was worried about,” said Fergal.
“Where else would something that big make its lair?”

High up in the round tower, choking clouds swirled in
the breeze. From shutterless windows, rusty afternoon light spilled across the council
room, illuminating the haze and creating thick bars of curling gold. A stone
shifted and then dropped, releasing another small cloud into the air.

The dust did not settle quickly, but when it did,
it revealed a room that was vastly changed. Where the narrow opening to the
stairwell had been, there was now what could only be described as a colossal
burrow. This tunnel reached down almost fifty feet before it was utterly
clogged with rocks and crumbled mortar.

Another stone came loose and bounded into the
void.

The sound was hollow.

From high in the air, a richly coloured mountain
barbet dropped onto the windowsill in a flurry of deep ochres and hazy blues.
He was a young bird. As he cast a plucky eye over the strange shapes surrounding
him, he decided he was impressed – no – satisfied with his discovery. After a
few more glances here and there, he settled and began to preen himself. Between
every few draws of his beak he would tilt his head to the side and babble to
himself of his own growing finery and of the magnificence of his new roost. And
it
was
his.

For nowhere in the building behind him or in the
city beneath was there another creature to be seen.

Far below, deep in the earth, Tyne, Merter and Osric
were all heaving for breath, but none called for a slackening of pace as they ran.
The foul stench had passed but the memory had not. If anything, the dread had
grown. Their heads turned constantly, but the only breaks to the monotony of
the cave floor were the many water channels. The ground fell away slightly and
the lights of their oil lamps revealed a glistening surface, dark as slate but
smoother.

“Oh – water,” said Fergal, stumbling to a halt in
front of a wide, dark lake. “So still it almost caught me out, or in.”

“Bridge to the left,” said Merter.

“I don’t see it.”

“Trust me, Fergal. It’s there.”

They ran along the side to the left, and after a
while, the lines of a stone bridge emerged.

“How did you see it from that far away?” Tyne
demanded.

“Peripheral vision. Better perception in darkness
when not looking directly –”

“Yes, yes, I know all that. But I saw nothing. I’m
convinced there is a cat hiding somewhere up in your family tree.”

The bridge was long and wide, spanning a body of
water that was a few hundred yards across and could have been anywhere between
a foot and a mile deep.

When they reached the land on the other side, they
passed a cart that still held its load – and it sparkled. This time Aedan
ignored it and ran on. He didn’t want another confrontation with Liru. The
soldiers, however, lingered, and when they caught up, their pockets were
bulging. The flaps of their coats were down and nothing showed, but they were
unable to conceal the glittering that escaped from their eyes.

The ground began to rise again, more steeply now. It
was too much for the staggering Osric and his bearers.

“We can’t slow down for them,” one of the soldiers
said, his voice raspy and dry.

“Good point,” said Fergal. “Why don’t you three
run along, and we’ll catch up.”

Nobody ran on. They all knew that Fergal was the
only one capable of finding a way out.

“It’s time we took charge here,” the soldier
announced, reaching for his sword. But Merter slipped across like a shadow and had
his knife at the man’s throat before the sword was halfway drawn.

Aedan stared. He had never seen anyone move that
fast.

“Want to play?” Merter growled.

The soldier raised his hands slowly. Merter took
the sword, handing it to Tyne; then in another catlike burst, he knocked the man
back and snatched the weapons from his two injured comrades before they were
able to mount any resistance.

“Osric,” Merter said. “May I kill them?”

When the general spoke, he sounded tired and his
teeth were clearly gritted against tremendous pain. “It would probably be
justice, but the procedure for punishing their crimes is a little more
involved. My conscience could not accept such executions, though a part of me
wishes you hadn’t troubled yourself to ask.”

Merter’s knife hovered. Everyone held their
breaths and stared. Slowly, the blade descended, but it was not re-sheathed.
Merter tucked it against his forearm and carried it there as they resumed the
climb. The confiscated weapons were left and forgotten, but the tension was not,
and it held a keener edge than any of the abandoned steel.

They had climbed only a hundred feet when Merter
pointed.

“Could that be a way out?” he asked.

It was still hidden in darkness, but as they
approached, the light revealed a towering wooden structure that rose to the
height of the ceiling that was now only just discernible three hundred feet or
more above them. The wooden beams were thick, and though they had suffered from
the passage of time, they retained enough strength to hold together.

“I don’t think it’s a way out,” said Fergal.
“There’s only one other thing it can be, and one way to be sure. Hide your lamps
under your cloaks for a moment; try not to set yourselves alight.”

They did as they were told.

“Can you see it? Above the tower?”

Aedan peered up into the darkness. The faintest
point of light reflected back at them, though there was nothing to reflect.

“Looks like a sliver of daylight,” said Merter.

It faded.

“Daylight would have remained,” Fergal explained. “This
tower was built to retrieve an earthstar. The gems absorb and radiate light for
a short time. That’s how the Gellerac discovered them, and entirely by
accident.”

“Why didn’t they take it?” Aedan asked. “The tower
seems to be right there?”

“It was always an official ceremony. One of many
things that I imagine were interrupted. Let us be gone.”

They continued up the steep slope, but a noise
from behind drew Aedan’s attention. He turned and stared. The uninjured soldier
had remained at the tower. He was already thirty feet up the ladder, lamp
swinging.

“Look,” Aedan called. “He’s going for the
earthstar.”

They stopped and faced around.

“Don’t shout,” said Fergal. “We can’t risk the
noise. He has made his choice.”

They turned and left the lone soldier rising into
the inky darkness behind them.

The cave narrowed and looked as if it was about to
split.

Merter stopped. “Quiet,” he said.

The party drew to a halt. Aedan tried to still his
breathing.

“What was it?” Fergal whispered after a while.

“I thought I heard a fall of stones. It sounded
far off, a long way behind the wooden scaffolding.”

The sudden pounding of blood in Aedan’s ears made
it difficult to hear anything else.

“Put out all the lamps but Fergal’s,” Merter
whispered.

The darkness swamped in on them.

“Now be careful with your feet. Lift them high so
you don’t kick a stone. Fergal, lead on.”

They reached the split. There were abandoned tools
and mounds of broken rock on both sides. Fergal stood in silence, looking one
way then the other.

“Merter,” he whispered, “What do you see?”

After a brief pause the ranger captain replied.
“Left, I can see lots of edged objects, maybe tools in racks, right nothing. I
think –”

This time there was no need for him to call for
silence. They all heard it, a deep wash of parting water. They spun around. The
lake was hidden in darkness, but the climbing soldier was a starry beacon.

Aedan hoped the climber would be seen first. He
was too frightened to even recognise the selfishness of the thought. He hurried
after Fergal, almost pushing him in his haste.

They took the left split, and sure enough, Fergal’s
pale lamplight fell on rows of shelves, part-filled with mining and
construction tools. Aedan realised that it would be logical for this to be
located near a main entrance. The cave narrowed further. The ceiling dropped
until it was less than a hundred feet above them.

They passed a large metal cage, jumped a water
channel and stopped before a deep rectangular pit. The lamp revealed skeletons
strewn across its floor, but unlike the other skeletons, these were crushed,
absolutely flattened as if they had been painstakingly hammered until no ridge
or mound projected upward above half an inch.

Beyond the pit was a solid rock wall.

A horrible realisation took hold of Aedan. Fergal
had been wrong.

For all his brilliance, he had brought them to a
dead end.

A faraway shriek of terror caused the whole party
to turn back as one. In the distance, they could still see the soldier on the
ladder. He was more than half way up, but something was amiss. The lamp had
fallen, burst open on the beams and set the wood alight.

“Clumsy fool,” Tyne muttered.

“I don’t think it was clumsiness,” said Merter
quietly. “Watch the tower.”

As the soldier clung to the ladder and managed to
get his dangling feet back onto the rungs, the entire structure shook and he
was nearly flung into the air. With one desperate hand he managed to retain his
hold. This time he wound his arms and legs around the beams like a frightened
toddler clinging to his father’s leg. The flames spread quickly through the
dust-dry timber. Something big shifted beneath the tower, a shadow it seemed,
but it did not waver with the flames as a shadow would have done.

A crack of splitting beams echoed through the
cave. The tower shuddered and leaned. Sounds of rippling fire travelled across
the space, fire that cast its glare over the lake that now shimmered with
countless reflections. An arching pillar of smoke stood up from the ground,
weaving and leaning, but then Aedan realised that the fire had not yet reached
the ground.

It could not be smoke.

He heard someone whimper nearby as all began to
grasp the full size and form of the beast in whose lair they were trapped.

It had the long supple lines of a serpent, but the
impossible size of a mythical dragon, and its shape was different too –
broader, more lizard like, and far more powerful. The hide was an armour of
scales black as midnight, interrupted only on the underside by a pattern of
sickly off-white bands that looked almost like a host of grasping arms. The
monster reared over a hundred feet into the air, and that was probably less
than half its body.

Instead of trying to think of some way out, Aedan
stared, transfixed by the sight before him, the lurid terror holding him in a
vice.

Flames reached the soldier and his screams tore
through the air. The dark pillar rose up behind him, no longer hidden in
shadow, bright flames reflecting off its metallic hide. The soldier drew
himself up, set his feet on a rung and leapt away from the inferno. He did not
travel far. The animal’s lunge was precise, the speed blinding, and the
soldier’s scream was cut off.

There was more than one breath of horror.

Aedan turned to Fergal. But Fergal was not to be
seen. The light from the burning tower had rendered his lamp unnecessary, and
he had moved off without anyone noticing. Aedan started back towards the cage
they had passed earlier. He saw Fergal standing in the shadow, staring at a
puddle of water that had formed beneath a leak above him, twirling his beard.

“Fergal?”

“Bring the others over will you, Aedan.”

Aedan’s mind was spinning, so he made no attempt
to reason, simply ran back and passed on the message. When they arrived, Fergal
ordered everyone into the cage.

“It won’t work,” Tyne objected, “That thing will
tear through this cage like it’s made of straw.”

Fergal ignored her. He was pulling on a rusted
chain nearby, producing some shrill screechings above him. Aedan cringed and
spun to look behind him, searching the area around the fire which was now a
tumbling inferno lighting the cave for half a mile in each direction and
glaring off a thousand sparkling surfaces. But there was no sign of movement.

Or was there?

A ridge of dark rock stood between them and the
blaze. Aedan didn’t remember that ridge.

“Fergal,” he called in a trembling voice. “Fergal,
hurry!”

Fergal released the chain, stepped into the cage
and closed the barred door with another shriek of metal. Aedan winced.

“We’re in a trap,” Tyne whispered. “Why are we
here?”

“Patience, Tyne,” Fergal said. “Nothing more we
can do, and panic won’t aid our cause. Like I said, counterweights can take
time.”

A reverberating thunder filled the air as the
tower split and began to collapse. Flame-wreathed timbers hurtled to ground with
a slowness conjured by distance until they plunged into the growing hill of
coals.