Of Machines & Magics (8 page)

“Now, past the wasps. Hmm. There’s a side valley to the south. Half a league along there is a cave, it has a perfectly round entrance. It’s of no use to haul produce through and I can tell you some of our young people went that way to leave the valley when it became too cold to grow anything but parbalows.”

“In spite of your make believe, they left here for good?”

The other shrugged. “None returned to tell us how much better it was beyond.”

Chapter 7

They stood on a ledge below the cave mouth. As they had been told, it was perfectly round; too round to be anything but artificial—a reassuring realization.

Calistrope looked studious, “Do we go then?” he asked. The other two nodded. “Very well. Now, a moment,” Calistrope felt around in his bag and came out with a ball of thread. He wound the end around the stem of a convenient shrub and knotted it. “I think we have enough residual magic up here to make it stretch as far as we need it. Ponderos, the light if you please.”

One by one they clambered up to the cave and stood inside the opening. It was perfectly circular inside as well and almost perfectly smooth, regular undulations in the tunnel’s surface made it easier to climb the incline which they faced just inside. Eager to be on their way, they pressed ahead, the tunnel bored onward in long straight stretches with short curved sections where it changed direction. The changes in direction and slope were minor though, the tunnel always tending to the heading they desired. This was the case for more than a league at which point it swung around in a vast curve and split into four different routes.

“A pity that whoever bored this did not post signs,” Ponderos grumbled. “That way seems to curve around again, perhaps towards the main valley.”

They ventured along the new tunnel and eventually came to a dead end, the
cul-de-sac
being a perfect hemisphere bulging into the circular tunnel and closing it off, as if a large dull stone globe had been rolled into the tunnel.

“Now where?”

“Back again, oh!” Calistrope pointed upwards. “What about there?”

In the ceiling was an oval hole, the product of a second, higher, circular tunnel intersecting the one they occupied.

“Here,” said Ponderos to Roli, “I’ll lift you up and you can see what direction it goes. Here’s the lamp.”

Ponderos cupped his hands and Roli stepped onto his palms. Ponderos lifted him effortlessly and Roli disappeared down to the waist in the ceiling.

“Well?”

“Perfectly straight as far as I can see that way,” he shuffled round. “And that way… Let me down, quick.”

Ponderos lowered the boy and lifted his eyebrows.

“Get away from the hole, in case it sees us.”

They moved away and stopped with their backs to the hemispherical plug. Above them, something slid across the hole, a silvery grey hide bulged through slightly and dripped a viscous lubricant into the lower passage. The flexible surface moved slowly past the oval aperture for several minutes, thick liquid dripped from the edge and a ring of gelid stuff collected on the floor beneath the edges of the hole before the creature finally went.

“One of the builders, do you think, Ponderos?” Calistrope murmured. “That is why there are no signs, they can’t read.”

“I think you’re right,” Roli said. “That must have been its back end, there were no features, no jaws or eyes or anything.

“So it goes backwards,” suggested Ponderos.

“I’d imagine so,” Calistrope reached out to rap his knuckles against the tunnel’s end. “I mean, if it came this far and changed its mind, it would have to have backed up from here. That’s strange.”

“And what is that?”

“This wall gives a little. It isn’t tunnel wall, not this end part.”

Ponderos touched it. “Leathery,” he poked it vigorously. “I wonder where it goes beyond here.”

“Don’t do that,” warned Roli. “Something’s in there.” As he spoke a small tear started near the top and began to lengthen. They backed away. A silvery bullet shaped head poked through and bent this way and that. Small but wicked looking jaws opened and snapped audibly shut. Another head appeared above the first and a second tear started to one side.

“Babies,” said Ponderos calmly. “And wicked looking things they are, too. Roli, up again—into the roof. You as well, Calistrope—I don’t want to be caught down here with those things snapping around my legs.”

Ponderos boosted Roli through the hole in the ceiling and then Calistrope. There was a slurping sound behind Ponderos and he turned to see a thick greasy substance oozing out of the tears which had now spread from side to side. Wriggling and twitching, the tunnel-makers’ young slid towards Ponderos.

Calistrope leaned down and held his hand out for Ponderos to grasp. Calistrope pulled the other up to the lip and Ponderos then climbed the rest of the way by himself. “Where’s Roli?” he asked as he stood up.

“Reconnoitering,” said Calistrope. “That way,” he pointed in the direction opposite to that taken by the adult worm. Calistrope picked up the light globe and they followed after—no more than a score of paces and around a curve to where daylight glowed.

This was where Roli had stopped; they looked out over his shoulder.

Directly in front of them was the rough papery grey surface of the wasps’ nest. Beneath, on the same narrow ledge they had used before, was a wasp on sentry duty and strewn around it and on other ledges were bits of wasp—limbs, black and yellow chitin and fur. Two long strips had been torn from the side of the nest and wriggling grubs and translucent white eggs were visible. Insects were already repairing the damage from the inside.

“There’s been a battle out here,” Ponderos said.

“I would guess the worm we saw earlier has reached out of here and stolen a tasty snack,” Calistrope stroked his chin. “There are signs of earlier depredations as well. I daresay it has been going on for a long time.

“We have been noticed,” Ponderos warned them.

Sentry wasps had been signaled in some way and were crawling into the restricted space between nest and cliff. Glittering eyes stared up at them as the insects closed.

“We’d better follow the worm or go back the way we came, perhaps try one of the other branches.”

A few minutes later, they stood at the edge of the hole looking down at the ten or twelve young worms below. Each was two or three spans in length and each was enthusiastically attacking its siblings.

A buzz behind them attracted their attention from the savage little worms. Two wasps were crawling along the tunnel towards them, wings partly spread in the confined space. Ahead, from the far side of the hole in the floor, came a rumbling, rasping sound; movement was just visible in the gloom. The tunnel worm was returning and judging from its young, the creature must have a pair of powerful jaws at this end of the body

Several long seconds passed.

Which way lay the best hope for escape?

Roli and Calistrope raised their swords almost simultaneously and took a step towards the menacing sentinel wasps.

“No,” shouted Ponderos. “This way.”

In the passage below them, four or five of the infant worms lay twitching—paralyzed by their siblings’ venom. Others were already partly eaten.

Ponderos leapt down to the floor below. Roli And Calistrope followed. Swords whirled, cut… snick… snick… snick, three more of the aggressive creatures lay dismembered and dead; some of the newly hatched creatures reared up from feasting on brother or sister to watch the humans, perhaps considering attack, perhaps just caution. A sharp sword dispatched one and dissuaded the others.

By the time the adult worm’s head stopped above the opening, they were ten or twelve paces back down the tunnel and ready to run if necessary. The wasps’ wings created a high pitched whine as they rushed to the attack but despite their single-minded ferocity, they were outmatched by the worm’s armored front end. There was a sense of flickering movement, scraps of wasp fell through the opening to be seized on by the youngsters underneath and then the worm itself thrust its head through the intersection.

Gaping jaws capable of dealing with rock snapped open and closed, tiny black eyes ringed the vicious mouth, and these regarded the men malevolently. The worm wriggled and pushed a little further through the hole, swinging its head back and forth, but it was clear it was not supple enough to make the almost 180-degree turn necessary to reach them.

“Ah,” breathed Calistrope when it became clear that they were safe.

“Thank the fates,” added Roli.

Ponderos grunted as the worm began to work its way back. “It knows we’re here now. It knows these tunnels too; it hollowed them out, after all. Sooner or later it is going to sidle up behind us and that will be that.”

“Then our course is obvious,” Roli replied. “We get out of here, back to the wasps’ nest.”

As before, Ponderos boosted them through the hole in the roof and they, in turn, hoisted the big man to the upper level.

Roli leaned out with his arm outstretched. “I can almost touch it from here,” he drew his sword and poked the tip into the grey papery wall of the wasps’ nest. “It’s all damp,” he said.

“Well yes. I expect it’s where the worm tore it open a little while ago,” said Ponderos.

“Well,” Roli became excited, “we could cut it open again and jump across, make it down through the inside of the nest—come out at the bottom.”

“Very good thinking. As soon as we damage the nest, it will be seething with angry insects.”

“No, no it won’t,” Roli was rather put out. “The guards are all on the outside, once they’re grown they never go into the nest again—well hardly ever. There are workers in there, nursemaids, caretakers, cleaners and the queen of course but she’ll be near the top.”

Calistrope turned to Ponderos, skepticism written large in his expression. “Is he right Ponderos? Would we be safe in there?”

Ponderos shrugged. “I couldn’t say. How do you know all this Roli?”

Calistrope’s doubt nettled the boy. “Everybody knows that. It’s common knowledge, you just pick it up.”

“It’s not common knowledge with me, young man. I never heard anything like that,” Calistrope’s tone was sharp.

“When was the last time you busted open a wasps’ nest, eh?”

“Well, I don’t remember…”

“When was the last time you talked to ordinary people?
Ephemerals
, eh?” Roli spoke the word with distaste. “How would
you
know anything about the
real
world, eh?”

“All right,” Ponderos put his hands up, palm out. “That’s enough. Squabbling isn’t going to get us anywhere,” he frowned at Roli, raised his eyebrows at Calistrope and continued before either could respond. “We all have our particular fields of knowledge.”

Roli sulking, sat down in the tunnel mouth and let his legs dangle over the drop. Below to right and left, sentry wasps walked stiff-legged along the narrow ledges; above and below, they scrambled over the nest. There were dozens, scores of them, more flew in watchful patterns in the sky above the nest.

“So?” asked Roli. “What are we going to do?”

“We have climbing rope,” Calistrope replied. “We’ll make it fast up here,” he looked for a suitable anchor, “here, through this crack and around this pillar. And we’ll climb down the face.”

Roli spat and watched the bolus fall between the nest wall and the rock face. He said nothing.

Ponderos asked numbly, “Can we evade the guards?”

“The guards are certainly going to come for us if we start cutting into the nest itself. I suppose we could go back through the tunnel, see if we can find another way.

“Well we can’t sit here and wait for the air to freeze,” Roli was still angry but a moment later the anger had vanished. “Listen, it’s too late now whatever we do.”

They all could hear it. The rasp of chitinous scales on rock coming from behind them.

Swiftly Ponderos unwound the rope from around his waist. “This is very smooth,” he said, coiling the silken glass fiber on the floor. “No time for knots, we’ll have to slide down and risk hand burns,” he secured the end and threw the rest out of the tunnel exit. “Wait…” he said as Roli took hold of the rope. “Just a moment…”

Ponderos looked out; left, right, up, down. “Timing is important. We slide down to the first ledge, where the nest is almost touching the rock and we wait there until the worm pokes its head out. That’s going to attract the wasps’ attention, they may leave
us
alone.”

Ponderos looked out once more, looked back into the darkness of the tunnel where a waft of acidic wind blew into their faces. “Go,” he said.

Roli took hold of the rope, leaned out over the edge and walked himself down the face. He could not maintain a grip however and his hands started to slip, another downward step and his foot failed to grip and he slid the rest of the way.

“Calistrope, your turn,” Calistrope followed his assistant. Hand over hand for two or three ells and then sliding the rest of the way.

Then came Ponderos. He made better progress than the other two but he had more than halfway to go when the worm pushed its head out into the open air.

Calistrope shouted, making frantic but unseen gestures to his friend. “Look out! The worm is here.”

The ugly head bent down to seize Ponderos and missed him by a finger’s breadth. Again it tried, thrusting out and downward and again it missed but caught hold of the rope. It parted as though it had been cut with a pair of shears. Ponderos came off the face with his legs working in seeming slow motion. In the same instant that Ponderos fell, Calistrope took a turn of the rope around a shard of rock. “Hold on,” he shouted as Ponderos hit the edge of the rock shelf and windmilled out into the void.

But he
did
hold on. Calistrope’s belay held and Ponderos swung back against the cliff and stunned, let go. His landing was softened by the timely arrival of a sentinel wasp crawling along a lower ledge; the insect’s body bent and flattened as Ponderos hit it. Some instinct made his hands grasp as they felt substance under them, his finger’s hooked onto the wasp’s legs and again, instinct seemed to make the dying insect hold onto the rock.

Ponderos was saved, bruised and battered but alive. He was bemused but conscious enough to loop the end of the rope under his arms so that Calistrope and Roli could haul him back to them.

Ponderos pushed himself up to hands and knees with little yelps of pain. “Think I’ve cracked a rib,” he muttered. “Maybe two or three. I’ll not be doing any climbing up
or
down for a while,” he got to his feet. “Still, Fortune favors our kind; I would be dead otherwise.”