Paragaea (34 page)

The master of beasts pointed out interesting bits of geography as they went along. The other guards paid him no mind, and it was clear that Yasen was grateful for a fresh—and more or less captive—audience. One afternoon, on the horizon ahead, a strange cloud roiled, where before there had been only blue sky. Their path took them underneath, and they were surprised when they were pelted by salty drops of rain, and flapping, gawking, live fish.

“Think nothing of it,” the master of beasts said in response to their startled looks. “It happens in this spot, from time to time. But have no fear; it doesn't signal the coming of the raining season. Instead it just means we'll have a bit of variety in our diet, yes?”

Leena slid close to Hieronymus and Benu, leaning against the forward railing and looking up at the unearthly cloud overhead.

“There must be a gate to Earth at the cloud's center,” Leena said guardedly.

“Undoubtedly,” Benu said.

“If only I could reach it.” Leena smacked a fist into the palm of her other hand.

“What would that accomplish?” Hieronymus asked. “If you were somehow able to get hundreds of feet up in midair, you have no way of knowing when or where the other end of the gate opens. It could be into the distant past of Earth, or its far future. In fact, the only thing you would know for certain traversing the gate is that you will likely find yourself somewhere far beneath the ocean's surface, and you'd likely drown before you made it through.”

“Cheer up,” Balam called, holding a flapping sea bass in his hands, still slick with brine. “Look what we're having for dinner.”

“Delightful,” Hieronymus grumbled. “More fish.”

Finally, after weeks on the trunk road, their route led them to the foothills of the Lathe Mountains.

“There,” Benu said, pointing to the snowcapped mountains rising in purple majesty above the lowlands. “Deep within the greatest of the Lathes, we will find the hidden city of Hele.”

“I hope you find what you seek,” Yasen said, “but I don't envy you going down into that benighted hole. I've never been myself, but my scant dealings with the Heleans who come to the surface to do trade with outsiders have convinced me my time would be better spent in other pursuits.”

“If it brings us one step nearer to our goal,” Leena said, resolute, “then I would walk through the gates of hell itself.”

“You might just, my dear,” Yasen said, his tone guarded. “You might just.”

The trade route wound up into foothills a short span, reaching a depot of some sort at the base of the largest mountain before turning back and angling towards the lowlands.

At the depot there was a wide loading dock, cantilevered out from the mountainside, so that one side was flush with the living rock while the other rose some seven meters off the ground. Where the dock met the mountain, there was a slant-roofed structure, beside which was parked some manner of tram on a track, its cargo bins empty and waiting.

As the indrik convoy approached, a motley collection of stevedores emerged from the slant-roofed structure, went to stand at the end of the dock, and waited patiently for the indriks to pull up, one by one. After they had arranged themselves in their lines, the foreman stepped from the structure to survey their progress.

The stevedores of Hele began to unload the indriks, loading up the spring-driven trams, which ran on tracks running back and forth up the gentle mountain slope before finally disappearing into a tunnel entrance high overhead. Most of the stevedores were metamen of various races—Canid, Arcas, Struthio, even Sinaa—though their foreman was a slight human with green skin who huddled under a broad parasol, shielding his eyes against the faint afternoon sun.

Yasen Kai-Mustaf climbed from the howdah, and went to speak with the foreman, while Leena and the other guards milled around the dock, stretching their legs and marveling at the bulk of the mountain rising above them.

Once the foreman had finished transacting his business with Yasen, Hieronymus, Leena, and Balam stepped forward, waving for the green-skinned man's attention.

“Yaas?” the foreman drawled daintily, motioning distractedly for them to speak.

“We require admittance to Hele,” Balam said.

“Oh,
do
you?” the foreman blinked at them slowly, his expression unreadable. He turned to Hieronymus and Leena, and said, with a slight tinge of disgust in his voice, “Am I to take it that the…jaguar…speaks for you all?”

“Yes,” Balam said, becoming annoyed, “I do.”

The foreman glanced over his shoulder at Balam, and wrinkled his nose in distate.

“We-ell, I'm afraid that Hele does not welcome visitors, only workers.”

“We can work,” Leena said, straightening.

“Oh,
can
you?”

“We're honest travelers in search of employment, sir,” Hieronymus said, managing to sound surprisingly deferential.

“Well.” The foreman sighed deeply. “We
are
somewhat short-handed at the present instant, and this current load
is
a large one. We've had…labor difficulties, I suppose you could say…recently, and have had to work at half-strength.” He sighed again, and looked them up and down appraisingly. Benu came to stand beside his companions, and the green-skinned man sneered slightly. “Well, I
suppose
if you are willing to hire on as stevedores and help get this shipment into the city in one trip, I can take you on provisionally, and see about getting you temporary access chits once we reach the city.”

“Agreed,” Balam said, and stuck out his hand.

The foreman looked down at the jaguar man's hand as though it were a dead fish, and shuddered. Then he waved them towards the other side of the dock. “Well, go
to
, go to.”

The four bid farewell to the master of beasts, and were surprised when even the Kobolt and Rephaim grunted their good-byes. Once they had
retrieved their things from the howdah, they joined the stevedores in loading up the tram.

When the last of the freight had been loaded onto the tram, the four joined the rest of the stevedores in the rear car, and the tram began to inch its slow way up the mountain.

From the ground, it had looked as though the distance was short, the tunnel entrance just a short ride from the bottom. As the tram inched along, though, it seemed to Leena as though time slowed and distance elongated; they moved farther and farther from the bottom, but the top still seemed so far away.

Balam caught the eye of one of the Sinaa stevedores, and tried to engage him in conversation.

“Mat'? Mat'ata'das'ul?”

The Sinaa averted his eyes, and would not meet Balam's gaze.

“Mat'uk'odat?” Balam said, leaning forward, glancing at another of the Sinaa.

This jaguar man, too, turned away, covering his eyes.

“Mat'tar'let Per,” Balam said, glowering.

The Sinaa all turned away from him, their expressions hard, but one of them nodded faintly.

“What is it?” Leena whispered, leaning in close.

“They are Black Sun Genesis,” Balam hissed through clenched teeth. “They consider any metaman who does not follow the ‘teachings' of Per to be unclean, and will not respond.” He sneered, baring his teeth. “I lost my throne, my kingdom, and my daughter to nonsense like this. I didn't think I'd have to face it here.”

“Courage, friend,” Hieronymus said, laying a hand on Balam's knee. “We'll be on our way in no time, you watch, and all of this far behind us.”

Finally, the tram reached the tunnel mouth, and they began to descend once again, this time down into the cool heart of the mountains. The tunnel was darkened, lit only by a faint glow from up ahead.

The tram rattled and clanked out of the darkness, and there before them was the hidden city, now revealed. Down in the sunless caverns, in a perpetual twilight illuminated by bioluminescence from lichens that grew on the damp walls, crouched the hidden city of Hele.

The city was constructed in nine rings, concentric circles rising one atop another, with a spire rising up from the innermost ring. It looked to Leena like a series of Matrioshka nesting dolls, all with their top halves removed. Water ran in a gentle fall from a fissure in a high wall, and became a slow-moving, murky green river running around the outermost ring, the river Dys.

“The water,” explained Benu, who had been in Hele in ancient days, “is suffused with a strain of algae which, when consumed over the span of years, imparts to the skin a greenish tint, which accounts for the unusual skin tones of our friend the foreman. Hele is a wealthy city, made so by the minerals dug up from its deep mines, and the fine porcelains and ceramics manufactured from the clay found in the lower reaches. Still, the city has reportedly fallen from its earlier grandeur, become decadent in its old age. Most of the hard labor in the city is now performed by immigrants, many of them metamen who have come to Hele in search of a better life.” Benu nodded to their fellow stevedores, who sat on the tram's benches with slumped shoulders. “The native Heleans spend much of their time in recreation, their favorite game a type of bowling sport using stone pins and a fired-clay ball, leaving the industry which maintains their culture to the hands of outsiders.”

Opening off of the central cavern were innumerable caves, tunnels, and channels, snaking in and out like the passage of termites through rotten wood.

“There,” Hieronymus said, pointing to the spire rising from the highest ring, his voice lowered in a whisper pitched so only the companions
could hear. “There must be the palace of the coregents of Hele. There we will find the object of our quest.”

Leena's hands tightened into fists, and in a voice barely above a breath, she whispered, “The Carneol.”