Kevin J Anderson (24 page)

The dawn grew brighter, but the narrow trail forced them to pick their path with care. Below, still in deep shadow, gurgled the rushing stream; the sheer cliffs forced them to continue in single file. The monsters might be able to catch up, but the riders could battle well on this narrow path.

Drodanis didn't gain distance too rapidly. He wanted Siryyk to see exactly where they had come from. Seeing only a few riders, the manticore would suspect vengeance-seeking survivors from their earlier skirmish with the Black Falcons ― and would follow straight into the waiting arms of Delrael's army hidden on top of the bluffs.

Drodanis looked ahead and behind as they moved along. He counted eighteen. "We lost two, then," he said.

The rider ahead turned back and nodded. "Acceptable losses."

Drodanis watched the still-burning fires in Siryyk's encampment. Not many of the monsters seemed to be following them. They were probably getting together for a massive march. Just as Drodanis had hoped.

He felt exuberant. He wondered how he could have stayed away from the Game for so long. He felt more important now than he had since before Fielle and Cayon had died. He'd forgotten why he was a character on Gamearth. Now he remembered what it was all about.

Blood spattered his face, and his arms ached from the effort of the fight, but Drodanis grinned. He would not have traded this night for anything.

Siryyk the manticore stood with his lips peeled back. Anger made a deep gurgle in his throat as he tried, but failed, to find words that expressed his outrage. Whoever kept attacking them seemed to have only a few fighters ― but still Siryyk's army continued to fail.

A third of his fighters burned to death in a forest fire, then seventy three monsters killed by a group of black-clad human riders. After the human riders had fled, Siryyk himself had counted the fallen enemy. Ten humans! They had killed seventy three monsters and lost only ten of their own!

Now all of Siryyk's supplies were burning after another attack.

His scorpion tail blazed blue. He padded forward to a blazing tent and clawed away the fabric that sheltered their meat and grain. The fire burned his fingers, but he didn't feel it. He winced as he attempted to hurl smoking sacks away from the blaze.

His head ached and burned, and the vision in one eye seemed milky. Siryyk knew that his entire face swelled and festered from the venomous smoke Enrod had blasted into his eyes. Another twenty of Siryyk's fighters had died then.

Scartaris had controlled all their minds when he assembled the tremendous horde ― but Scartaris had apparently not deemed it necessary to create an army of fighters with minimal skill or intelligence.

General Korux came up to him. "Siryyk, we have located the ones who attacked us. We can see them on a quest-path going across the cliff. Do you wish us to follow them?"

The manticore whirled. Other monsters leaped out of the way of his swinging electric tail. "Of course!" But then he stopped. "No, show me."

Korux led him to the edge of the plateau, where he looked into the growing dawn to see tiny figures working their way along the sheer rock wall. "Bring me Professor Verne instead. Have a Slac team bring the cannon around to the edge. Do we have any firepowder left?"

"We lost half of it, but I made sure it was not all stored together. Just in case of such an incident." He rubbed his rough hands together as if congratulating himself. "We still have enough to fire the cannon several times."

"Do it, then."

Siryyk paced and watched as the huge black cylinder trimmed with frilly bronze "stabilizing struts" rolled forward on its tall wheels. The Slac steered it and tilted its barrel toward the black figures fleeing along the cliff wall.

Korux came up with his scaled hand warpped into the folds of Professor Verne's torn shirt. The professor shivered and struggled. His hands were bound behind him and bled at the wrists. Since his escape attempt, they had kept Verne bound and hidden most of the time. Siryyk flared his nostrils. How ironic it would have been if the human fighters had burned the tent and killed the professor.

"I thought you might like to watch," the manticore said. "We're going to test your cannon on a real target."

Verne saw the escaping riders and stammered, but he apparently could think of nothing to say.

"Why are they moving so slowly?" Siryyk asked. He felt suspicion growing in him.

"Gives us time to load the cannon," Korux said. He gestured at the Slac who were already pouring firepowder into the breech and hoisting up one of the huge cannonballs.

"Aim high," Siryyk said. "It's a long distance. And we must strike the right place to cause the most damage."

The Slac team took turns sighting along the barrel, adjusting and readjusting. Korux finally stood behind the cannon, nodded, and went back to one of the scattered campfires. He returned carrying a burning brand in his hand.

"It's ready, Siryyk."

"Any advice, Professor?" the manticore asked.

Verne mumbled, and then shrugged. "Fire the cannon if you like, but it will fail. Your powder is damp and cold. You could damage the cannon by using it now."

Siryyk laughed. "A nice try, Professor. But ridiculous. Korux ― you may fire!"

The Slac general brought the end of his brand to the touch-hole, then dropped it and leaped backward, covering his ears. A huge explosion knocked the cannon backward a full ten feet, rolling over one of the Slac and crushing his legs.

Siryyk decided he would have to remember to chock the wheels with stones next time.

He stared across the gorge with his one good eye. It would take a second or two for the ball to find its target. The time stretched out, longer and longer. He saw the distant explosion well before he heard the crack and rumble of impact.

Directly above the line of human fighters, the cannonball struck the overhanging rock. The rock splintered and, with a slow rumble, an entire side of the cliff came down in an avalanche.

Some of the monsters cheered. Korux clapped his hands. The smoke and rock continued to slide downward into the gorge below. The entire ledge broke away, sloughing down as it gathered momentum. The grinding avalanche knocked away every single character on the path, crushing them, sweeping them toward the foaming river far below. Dust clouds swirled and sank downward.

The manticore turned, grinning a twisted smile at Professor Verne. Verne stood with his jaw hanging open, eyes wide, and his face completely ashen.

"Your cannon is not very sporting, Professor," Siryyk said. "But it's quite fun nevertheless."

――――

INTERLUDE: OUTSIDE

Tyrone rattled the knob on the front door, then fiddled with the lock and tried again. "Your door's stuck, David."

David remained sitting on the floor with his back against the easy chair. He drew his knees up against his chest. Even with his sweater back on, he felt cold, and the fire did nothing to warm him. He didn't look at Tyrone.

Tyrone yanked and tugged at the door, banging it with his fist. "I just wanted to get some cookies out of the car. What did you do, David?"

"I didn't do anything." His voice remained low enough to vanish in the noise from the fire.

Scott looked at him strangely, then stood up from the carpet. He walked through the kitchen to the door that led into the garage.
Yes
, David thought,
Scott knows. He's figured it out
.

Melanie remained hunched protectively by the map, making sure David stayed away from it. He sat off to the side like a pariah. His cheek still stung, though the bandage had stopped all the bleeding.

Scott rattled the door to the garage, but it too was locked. He hurried to the patio door, but couldn't open the latch.

"The Game won't let you out of here until it's finished," David said. But Scott went through all the motions anyway. David felt tired and defeated, still angry at the Game and at his companions.

"We're locked in!" Scott finally said.

Tyrone appeared astonished, but not quite afraid. "How did the doors get locked? We were all sitting right here."

Scott went to pick up the phone. He hesitated with it in his hand, as if afraid to lift it to his ear.

"The line's dead," David said.

Scott listened into the phone, shook the receiver and put it to his ear a second time. He refused to hang it up. His eyes grew wider.

"Tyrone," he suggested, "why don't you turn on the TV?"

"What for? Shouldn't we get back to the game?"

"Just turn on the television!"

Tyrone shrugged and walked across the family room. He found the remote control and stepped back, looking to find the power switch. He pushed it. With a buzz, the television came on, but they heard no sound. In a moment, a colorful picture appeared, a test pattern made up of bright hexagons.

"This is really getting wild!" Tyrone whispered.

Melanie glanced at the television, then looked back at the map.

"What did you expect?" David asked.

"Shut it off, Tyrone."

Instead, Tyrone flicked through the channels, but the same pattern showed on each one.

On the last channel, though, the pattern dissolved into static. As they watched, a vague figure of a young man snapped in and out of focus, as if from a signal very far away. Through the roaring distortion, David heard faint words. "Where am I? Let me go back! Is all this
real
?"

Melanie crept forward on her knees, but seemed afraid to touch the picture. "Oh no," she whispered.

"Are you the Rulewoman?" the image said, then it vanished, leaving only a featureless image of multicolored electrical snow.

Scott put the phone to his ear again, listened, and his eyes fairly bugged out of their sockets. "My god, it's Lellyn!" Scott slammed the phone back down and unclipped the cord from the wall.

Then he grabbed the TV remote out of Tyrone's hands and punched the power button off.

David let his eyes fall closed and tried to picture other times when he had been away from the Game, when he went to stay with his mother in the summer and the group had to postpone their weekly adventures. The times he had spent with his father along the beach or going into the city, or tagging along at some of his dad's business picnics.

His mom always wanted to play cards or cribbage with him. His dad, trying to make him into the stereotypical version of the all-American boy, insisted that he play baseball or football or just plain catch. His father disliked David's obsession with role-playing games, as if that wasn't an "acceptable" thing to play.

But this game had gone far beyond any of that.

Tyrone held up his half-empty plate of dip, extending it toward Scott. "You want some more dip while we figure this out?"

"No, dammit!" Scott smacked the plate out of Tyrone's hands, and it toppled onto the carpet. "Can't you get it through your thick head what's going on here? This is serious, man!"

Tyrone looked shocked and upset. His big brown eyes swam with a turmoil of emotions, fighting back tears.

David got to his knees and crawled toward the map. Melanie stiffened into a defensive position. She splayed her hands out like protective claws, but David ignored her.

Tyrone got some paper towels from the kitchen and cleaned up the mess on the carpet, glaring at Scott. "Just leave it," David said. "We've got more important things to do."

Scott and Tyrone both stared at him. David brought his voice back to a normal level. "We have to play this through to the end."

He picked up the dice from the carpet and extended them toward Scott. "Now it's clear
exactly
what the stakes are."

――――

BROKEN RULES

"We all carry the greatest power on Gamearth. We have our minds, we have our imaginations. With these tools we can accomplish anything."

― handwritten note found in abandoned quarters of Mayer, daughter of Dirac

Throughout the night, the gusty mountain wind lifted a metal flange and banged it against the Outsider's ship, sending echoes and screeches through the corridors. Mayer attempted to track down the source, furious at the annoyance. But the sound traveled through the bulkheads, distorted and magnified by the thin walls, and she could not find where the noise came from.

Finally, without the energy to go farther, she curled up in a sheltered corner where the air remained still but cold. Her nose was red and numb. She tried to rest with her fingers curled together and fists under her chest to keep warm. The air inside the ship seemed frigid enough to be brittle.

Mayer sniffled and closed her eyes. She concentrated on keeping her teeth from chattering. "I can endure this," she said. "Other characters do it."

She cursed herself for not having worn warmer clothes, for not having brought some sort of heater (which might or might not have worked here anyway). She hadn't the slightest idea how to start a fire from scratch, without matches or a galvanic igniter. She had been too wrapped up in the solving Sitnalta's crisis, and she had ignored the mundane matters of preparation and survival.

After a long time, her body warmed the floor enough that she did not feel completely uncomfortable. Mayer fell asleep.

For the past several nights she had done the same, while during the day she continued her excavation work. Each time the sun set and darkness fell like a dropped curtain over the mountain terrain, the warmth leaked away into the night.

The brooding Slac citadel loomed over the ruined ship. Mayer could have found shelter there, but she felt more comfortable away from the claustrophobic chambers with spikes on the doors and windows. Not that stories of ancient Slac and their torturings of human characters frightened her. But she preferred the tarnished metal, the indecipherable angles and controls, and the winding corridors of the ship. It seemed more like Sitnalta.

When daylight leaked through the cracks of the hull, Mayer blinked her eyes and felt the stiff aches of her body. The wind outside had died down with dawn, and the persistent flange ceased its squeaking rhythm.