The High House (34 page)

“Why is it called Innman Tor?” Carter asked.

“Extraneous conversation is forbidden until after registration,” Peelhammer said. Then, with a sudden sorrowful look, he added, “Them’s the rules.”

“You have considerable rules, sir,” Duskin said.

The brothers exchanged glances, and Carter laid his hand lightly within the pocket where he kept his pistol. He saw Duskin nod and move his own hand near his weapon.

The corridors were without windows, and the lamps, defying the care shown to the rest of the hall, cast their light through age-yellowed glass. They passed other inhabitants, all resembling the soldiers, the men dressed in colorless robes, the women in brown dresses, devoid of baubles or embroidery. The young girls hacked their hair in a short, shapeless fashion, and neither skipped nor smiled as they traipsed the halls. Strangest of all were a group of children no older than six, all bedecked in brown robes like somber monks, their faces wise as monkeys, silently following a grim, ancient crone, their apparent teacher, likewise clad.

After marching an hour through the gloom, they reached a passage built of brown stone, where the men were ushered into a room Peelhammer called a way station, consisting of stone walls and a half-dozen cots covered with dirty blankets.

“We rest here for the night,” Peelhammer said.

Carter tested the bed and found it uncomfortably soft. “I prefer my own bedroll,” he said, laying it out on the stone floor.

“We will sleep outside,” Capecot said.

“Are we your prisoners, then?” Carter asked. “Do we require a guard?”

“Just regulations,” Capecot said. “We have some food, if you would like it.”

“We would,” Duskin replied. “Our own supplies are meager.”

The soldiers did not offer to eat with them, but gave them a flask, a sack of brown bread, and a bronze fruit they called oboa before retreating beyond the door, which they left open. Carter and Duskin moved to the far wall so they could speak without being overheard, and sat on the floor to eat.

“We should take turns keeping a watch tonight,” Carter spoke in a low voice.

“Better to tie them up and be on our way,” Duskin replied.

“I’ve considered it, but we’ve seen too many people, and our dress marks us.”

Duskin bit into the brown bread and blanched. “This is like chewing mud!”

Carter took a sip from the flask, then sniffed it. “No more bland than this. It tastes neither of water nor wine. Our own supplies are better.”

All the food was equally insipid, and they reverted to eating dried strips of meat from their pack. Thereafter, Duskin took the first watch, while Carter flung himself into sleep, refusing to deliberate the intentions of their captors.

* * *

The next morning the guards made no haste to depart and the brothers were awake and ready before Capecot summoned them. They breakfasted together, a cheerless affair, the soldiers still closemouthed, yet were it not for regulations, Carter thought Peelhammer might have proved companionable. Studied closer, he had the expression of a fearful man overburdened by a harsh master.

They set off at once, following the nondescript corridors deeper into Innman Tor. By noon the passage had widened, and they stepped suddenly through double doors into open air beneath a rainswept sky. Lightning flashed above their heads, the thunder rolled; a light drizzle misted their upturned faces. They stood upon a field miles long and equally wide, an inner court despite its size, bounded on all sides by the High House. In its center stood a jagged, sandstone hill sculpted into a watery face like a shrouded ghost, with cave openings marking its empty eye sockets. A dusty town surrounded the hill, its houses the same color as the bare stone. There were crops in the fields all around, but even they lay brown as grass after frost. A gravel road led to the town from the passage the men had exited.

“This must be the tor where the country gets its name,” Carter said.

“A bleak country it is, then,” Duskin said.

Forgetting himself, Peelhammer replied, “It wasn’t always so. Before they carved it, it was a beautiful hill.”

“Who are ‘they’?” Carter asked.

“Never you mind. You’ll see in time.”

They followed the gravel road to a train station, where a pale yellow engine puffed black soot. A score of brown-garbed men and women were being escorted into boxcars by armored soldiers. Standing beside the engine were two men in the dark coats of anarchists; they were half turned away, their attention fixed on those boarding the train, and Carter and Duskin ducked their heads and shuffled past.

“Worse and worse,” Carter murmured. “I think you were right. We should have bolted when we had the chance.”

But it was too late for that, with soldiers all around. Their very numbers were a wonder; they far outmanned the townspeople. The brothers were led through the garrisoned town, down squalid streets displaying not so much poverty as a meanness of spirit, always filled with soldiers laughing, talking, sitting, and eating. During the journey, Carter abruptly halted, staring intently at a line of warriors marching past.

“What is it?” Duskin asked.

Carter continued to stare, then abruptly withdrew from his trance. “Eh, did you speak?”

“What were you looking at?”

“Something that may help us.” But Capecot was beside them by then, and Carter only said, “I’ll explain later.”

Up they went, to the tor itself, along a rough-cut stair that left them at the mercy of the rising wind. Breathless, they entered the left eye socket into a smooth tunnel. The air was dry, despite the rain, as if all the moisture had been sucked from it, and the wind passing through the cave mouth gave the spectral head a moaning voice.

The tunnel led into a large chamber, where an old man sat on a wooden throne atop a thin dais. He wore the conventional brown garb of his people, and looked more clerk than king, his white, thatched hair sticking out all around, his spectacles slipping down the bridge of his nose. Old and soft and afraid he seemed. He did not remain on his niggardly throne, but stood, gave a half bow, and directed the men to a rough-hewn table. “Good day, gentlemen.” His voice was thin and quivered when he spoke. “I am Settlefrost, Administrator in Charge of Distribution, Redistribution, Procurement, and Relinquishment for the High Kingdom of Innman Tor, and of Querny, Lippenhost, and the Downs of Gen. Word has reached me of your coming.”

Carter glanced at Peelhammer and Capecot. “Your soldiers are efficient. I am Carter Anderson, this is my brother, Duskin. I am Master of Evenmere.”

Settlefrost’s face went pale. “My soldiers are … not as efficient as I would like. Sergeant Peelhammer, you may return to your post.”

Peelhammer hesitated, studying Carter wistfully, as if he wished to speak, but he only nodded and tramped away, Capecot at his heels.

Once they were gone, Settlefrost stood up and paced the floor. “I knew you would come, I just knew it,” he said, wringing his hands. “I told them it couldn’t be done, that they’d never get away with it. And here it is and you’ve come to punish me and I deserve it. It’s death, I suppose. At first I thought it was good. We were organizing, and they said it would make everything better for everyone. We would all be part of the Brotherhood, all equal, man, woman, and child, and everyone would be happy. And it went well at first. After they took our king away we built the train, and painted all the halls, had work for everyone and all sorts of managers and administrators. It was going to be grand. You do understand we meant well?”

Carter was baffled by this string of words, but he said, “Such things usually begin that way.”

“Yes,” the man said, relief in his voice. “We were doing something lofty, and there were banners and festivals and plenty of food for everyone. And then the men in their low hats and greatcoats came, and all the soldiers recruited from our own people, though I don’t know how there could be so many. Things began to happen. All the money spent on festivals never seemed to bring in any revenue. We tried work programs, economic reforms, but the more we struggled, the worse things became. We raised taxes time and again. We set up gambling houses to generate income to increase the wages of the teachers of our schools so our children could grasp the anarchists’ Grand Design, and they learned less and less. We had studies and commissions and endless rhetoric, all part of what the Bobby called the ‘Great Chain of Communication,’ and much was said and nothing done. In the name of intellectual freedom, under the anarchists’ insistence on the realistic portrayal of human suffering, our writers and artists described the basest depravity of man, until our people considered it customary. There seemed to be no help for it. When we ran out of colorful paint we used brown, and when we ran out of dye for our clothing, we used brown again. And one morning we awoke and found Innman Tor this glowering ghost, the whole tor changed overnight! It wasn’t our fault! There were too many soldiers!”

Carter stared hard at the frightened man. “You built it all on sand, knowing the anarchists were stripping your land of its wealth. Wouldn’t anyone stand up to them? Was there no substance within the people themselves?”

“Once, oh, once there was! I swear it!”

“You’re a prisoner here, aren’t you?” Carter asked.

Settlefrost looked around wildly. “Don’t say it loud,” he whispered. “I’m supposed to be the Leader.”

“How long have they kept you here?”

Settlefrost propped his soft face in his hands. “Almost from the beginning. They let me out sometimes to give speeches, but the anarchists and their soldiers run it all. They came five years ago, and there was no Master to appeal to once we saw our mistake. They guard all the ways in and out of the country. And lately they’ve grown stronger, locking doors that can’t be unlocked, unlocking doors we thought forever shut. At night things creep up from some foul basement—living things, but not human. People have begun to disappear. We’re all afraid.”

“Do the anarchists know we’re here?” Duskin asked.

“Ah—that is, we had orders to inform them if strangers appeared. Word was sent this morning. You must understand, no one told me you were the Master.”

Duskin slammed his palm against the table, his eyes afire. “You speak of mercy and plot treachery!”

“Forgive me!” Settlefrost cried.

“How can we escape?” Carter asked.

“There is only one way down.”

They rose, and hurried back through the tunnel, Settlefrost at their heels. Looking out from the top of the stairs they saw the dark coats of anarchists crossing the fields in groups of five and six, approaching the town from all directions. Within the village itself other anarchists led hundreds of soldiers toward the tor.

“You are lost!” Settlefrost cried. “If I had known you were the Master—”

“You would have betrayed us anyway,” Carter said.”You have deluded your own people.”

“But the anarchists will have it all their way,” Settlefrost said. “Is there nothing you can do?”

A group of soldiers were climbing the stairs, waving and shouting at them. “There is one thing I might try,” Carter said. “If it succeeds, it may cost you much of what you have built.”

“Anything!” Settlefrost said.

“What do you plan?” Duskin asked.

“I will use the Word of Hope, which is a Word that heartens and ends confusion, to separate the true from the false.”

“What do you mean?” Settlefrost demanded.

Carter looked upon him with pity. “You poor fool. Your people have deceived themselves. Have they seen nothing around them? I noticed it when we arrived. Half your soldiers have no shadows.”

A gunshot powdered the sandstone to their left and ricocheted into the sky. The men retreated into the shade of the opening. “Be ready,” Carter said. “I don’t know how much will fade.”

He drew the Word of Power,
Rahmurrim
, from his mind, and held it before his imagination, until he thought he felt the heat from the burning letters. Each time he used the Words it became easier to wield them. It rose within him like magma against mountain-stone, but he restrained it, containing its force, allowing it to build pressure. When he could do so no more, he released it, and it erupted like flowing iron, the pent energy more potent than he had ever experienced before. Both Duskin and Settlefrost had withdrawn from him, and he was glad, for when he cried the Word, the whole tor shook, sending the ascending guards tumbling backward like wooden soldiers.

It resonated across the dry fields, and for an instant after its last echoes fled, nothing occurred; then the surface of the ghastly tor began to tremble and bubble, and the face to melt as candle wax.

“We have to get down!” Carter cried.

They scrambled down the stairs, its steps rapidly turning to mud, until all that remained was a slope too slippery to support them. They tumbled helplessly through the evaporating muck, which refused to cling to their bodies, but blew away like vapor.

They slid to the bottom and landed at last on hard earth. Carter picked himself up, found himself surprisingly unharmed, and helped Duskin and Settlefrost to their feet. Behind them, the hollow eyes of the tor had nearly melted closed; already it was half its former height. Before them the soldiers who had not fled were writhing upon the ground; steam wafted from them, as they, too, melted. They did not appear to suffer, for they made no outcry, but dissolved like burning toys, soulless, impassive, and Carter noticed Capecot among them. He neither saw nor expected Peelhammer, who had possessed a shadow, to be with them.

The town was dissipating, the roofs steaming and sagging, the cobblestone streets sinking into the earth. Only the older buildings, built before the coming of the anarchists, remained whole. A filthy, brown residue of smoke billowed into the sky, while a bell sounded continual alarm from a tower near the train station.

An anarchist, gun in hand, appeared from around the corner of a dwindling house. As he aimed toward the brothers, Carter unsheathed the Lightning Sword. As if in response to danger, it shone brilliantly. Though Carter could look upon it without harm, Duskin and Settlefrost hid their eyes; the anarchist hurled his gun away and bolted down the street.