Beyond the Gate

Chapter 27

Two hours before dawn, Gallen woke Orick with a kick. And Orick lay on the floor while Ceravanne packed, listening to the others talk in the main room of the guard shack. Maggie had chanced a small fire in the guard house and made a quick breakfast of cooked oats with cinnamon. It was their first hot meal in days, and to tell the truth, they would not have risked the smoke from a fire except that they had eaten all else. The cheeses were gone, as were the wine and corn, the plums and peaches. They were down to apples and oats, and they couldn’t tell when they’d eat a cooked meal again. So it was the oats.

Orick had been living off his store of winter fat for days now, and he was beginning to feel a gnawing hunger that the others would soon share. Yet bears are tough, and Orick knew that the hunger that was a mere annoyance for him would quickly become dangerous for the others.

He was lying on the floor, thinking of these things, when Gallen came back and kicked him again. “Wake up, sleepy,” Gallen said, laughing. Orick felt as if he’d hardly slept at all, and he grumbled to Gallen, “Why must you rouse me so early? I’m dead tired.”

“Better dead tired than merely dead,” Gallen said, squatting beside Orick’s ear. “We ran a good bit last night, but the next few kilometers of road are well exposed. Once dawn comes it won’t be safe to travel that road for the wingmen, and we must make good time today. I fear the Derrits will be hunting us tonight.”

“Och, I thought we left them all behind?” Orick grumbled.

“The Derrits and the wingmen own these mountains. The wingmen flocks are everywhere, and as for the Derrits, you saw how big they are. You saw their stride,” Gallen warned. “They can run a hundred kilometers in a night without breaking a sweat, and they can track by scent as well as any wolf. We ran for six hours last night, but if a Derrit hunting pack gathers, they’ll reach this spot in less than two.”

“Do you think they’ll come after us?”

“I think they’d have come for us last night, except that you and I made a good accounting against some of their number. But they won’t be satisfied to eat the dead we left behind.” Gallen leaned closer and whispered so that Maggie and Ceravanne wouldn’t hear. “I told you once that this road is a place of terror for the Inhuman. They would not likely brave it this time of year. In the fall, Derrits do their hunting for the winter. They kill men and animals, and bury them in a cache to eat later. In one of my former lives, I was a soldier who hunted Derrits here. Thirty-two men were in my command, and a dozen Derrits fell upon us in an ambush, slaughtering them. They buried my men in a huge pit, piling the dirt upon them all. I was sorely wounded, and I was buried with them. I dug myself out of the grave after four days, and for the next week I dragged myself across this rocky road; trying to escape, until the Derrits came for me again. It was only by chance that they lost my scent, passed me as I hid in the night. The next day I was able to make it down into the river, float for hours in the icy water until the Derrits had no opportunity to catch my scent again. A fear of this place must bum in the memory of every Inhuman.”

“So you think the Derrits will come for us? We only heard one other Derrit back there.”

Gallen leaned close, watching through the open door as Ceravanne and Maggie hunched over the cooking fire. “I did not want to tell you, but twice I had Ceravanne turn aside into smaller hallways because my mantle smelled Derrits ahead. We heard one, but I smelled dozens. Believe me, we’ll not get away from them this easily.”

“Are you going to tell the women?” Orick asked.

“I think Ceravanne already knows the risk, but I do not want to frighten Maggie. What will come, will come, and perhaps our best efforts will avail us nothing. So now, my friend, if you will pick your shaggy carcass up off the floor, I think we should eat quickly, and then be running.”

Orick obliged him, and in moments they were off, jogging on nearly empty stomachs through a maze of gray canyons, over the barren road. Their only light came from stars and moon, and just as the sky began to lighten, the road dipped precipitously, leading them deep into the gorge.

Before they could take the road down, Gallen stopped, and they stood panting while Gallen gazed far behind along the mountain slopes. A light snow dusted the tops of the peaks silver in the moonlight, and down near the bottoms were dark clots of pine forest running the slopes. But Gallen watched the gray middle slopes, almost featureless in the night, where the ancient road was bordered on one side by a precipice, on the other by walls of dark stone. The mountain chain here formed a huge S, so that though they had run perhaps forty kilometers since sunset, they were only fifteen kilometers as the wingman flies from the gates of the city, and with his mantle Gallen was able to see much of that road from this last bluff.

He stood for a long minute, then his breath caught in his chest, and his face became hard, impassive. Orick knew that look.

“What is it?” Ceravanne said, panting. “What do you see?”

Gallen looked up at the sky. It was growing light, a dimming of stars on the horizon. “They’re after us,” he said.

“How many in the hunting pack?” Ceravanne said, looking back up the trail.

“Twenty … or more.” Gallen pulled out his incendiary rifle, checked it. He had only two shots left, as they all well knew.

“So many?” Ceravanne asked in dismay. “We’d hardly make a meal for a dozen of them.”

“They’re hungry,” Gallen said, slipping his rifle back into its holster. “Let’s go. They’ll have to hole up for the day in that guard shack. But they’ll be after us again tonight.”

He turned and sprinted down the road, into the depths of the gorge where the dark trunks of massive pine trees rose above them, and the road was overshadowed by vine maple and ironwood. On the slopes above, the world had seemed dead, sterile, but Orick was surprised that down here there was plenty of game-rabbits, squirrels, jays-things too small for the Derrits to bother with, all of them rustling through the detritus as they searched for their morning meals.

For that day they ran, scurrying from thicket to thicket like mice as Gallen watched for signs of wingmen.

So it was that near dusk, Gallen led them into the woods along the river. From high above, Orick had seen the river as nothing more than a silver ribbon in the canyon below, but down here he could see that it was more. Now, in the early fall, a cool flow rushed over boulders, flowed rippling across gravel bars. But all along the riverbank were great logs, cast up on the shores by the raging floods that tore down this canyon in winters past. Often, the river had gouged passageways through narrow chasms or left huge piles of flotsam. For nearly two hours after dark, the group made its way downstream through this mess. Then well after dark, under the light of the triple moons, Gallen led them all into the water, and they waded back upstream for several kilometers, often sloshing through pools that were chest-deep, until they passed the point where they’d first set foot off the road.

The water did not seem very cold to Orick, but all of his human friends complained of it, and Ceravanne often slipped on the mossy rocks.

When the women could wade no more, Orick let them sit astride his back, and carried them surefooted up to a tiny tributary creek that had become only a small flow of water. In the spring the creek must have been much larger, for it had eroded a deep and narrow gorge into the hillside.

“This will have to do for the night,” Gallen whispered when they stopped at last, sheltered in a tiny nook. He pulled out the blankets from the packs, and they made a dismal camp behind a small tree.

Orick looked up and down through the gorge. He estimated that the walls were perhaps a hundred feet high here, and twelve feet wide. “I’m not very cozy with your strategy, Gallen,” Orick whispered. “Sure, the Derrits could easily swagger through here two abreast.”

“Aye,” Gallen said, “that they could. But I’m hoping that they’ll think we’ve headed downstream through the woods. The road takes us downstream, to the southeast, and I’m hoping they’ll believe we’ve still gone that way. If they waste enough time hunting downstream, then we’ll win through the night and they’ll have to continue the hunt tomorrow. But even if we don’t fool them, at the very least they’ll have to split up and check the banks both upstream and down. That leaves us maybe five or ten to contend with at a time-not twenty.”

“I thought the three we fought gave us more than ample exercise,” Orick grumbled. “I really would prefer to leave these ones alone.”

“Well, go to sleep,” Gallen said, “and maybe you’ll get your wish.”

Orick tried to stay up the night, but in time he settled onto his paws. His heart was hammering heavy in his chest, and he was cold and hungry and miserable, but he thought of Tallea lying dead in the city of Indallian, naught but Derrit food, and though he missed his friend, he was glad to be alive.

“Gallen,” Orick whispered, for both Maggie and Ceravanne had fallen asleep and were already snoring lightly.

“Aye?” Gallen asked.

“You’ve got Tallea’s memories stored in your mantle, right?”

“Aye,” Gallen said.

“Well,” Orick wondered aloud, “how many people’s memories can be stored in that thing?”

“Just one.”

“And what would you do, I mean, if tonight a Derrit caught you? You couldn’t save yourself the way you saved Tallea, could you?”

“Not without erasing her memories,” Gallen said. “The memory crystal holds a lot, but I’m part of the Inhuman now, and I’ve probably got more memories than this one crystal can handle.”

“So would you do it? Would you erase her memories to save yourself?”

Gallen thought for a moment. “The Inhuman in me would. Most of those people desperately want more life. They crave it. But the Gallen O’Day in me wouldn’t do it.”

Orick grunted. “I think that if you have to do it, you should. You should live for Maggie. Tallea would understand that, and she would forgive you.”

“I’m not sure that I would forgive myself,” Gallen whispered. “It’s an unpleasant thing to have to consider. Go to sleep, now.”

“No, you go to sleep,” Orick said. “I’ll take watch for a bit.”

Orick lay watching quietly for a minute. Maggie had kept watch last night, so Orick was hoping to split it tonight with Gallen. Orick figured that the lad was worn to the nap, and he needed some time off, so tomorrow he considered taking watch with Maggie.

For a long time, he stared down the slope, and only the croaking of a lone tree frog kept him company.

Orick closed his eyes to rest them for a moment, and when next he woke, there was a fierce wind blowing down through the canyons. It did not buffet the small group much, sheltered as they were, but it was singing through the rocks and the trees.

He looked over at Gallen, who sat up awake and alert. “Any sign of them?” Orick asked, and Gallen looked over at him.

“I heard five or six of them walking upriver about an hour ago,” Gallen said, “but the wind must have blown our scent away. Go back to sleep. It’s nearly dawn.”

Orick could not go back to sleep, since he felt so guilty about falling asleep during his watch, so he asked Gallen to catch some more shut-eye, then in an hour he woke them all. They ate a cold breakfast of the last of the apples.

“That was a good trick you gave them,” Orick said after finishing his two apples. He eyed the cores that the others were eating as he talked. Without any more food to keep them going, he wanted to accentuate the positive. “You knew the wind would blow the scent away?”

“I hoped it would,” Gallen admitted. “I’ve been through these canyons many times, and often at night the cold mountain air funnels down these slopes. It was a chance we had to take.”

“Well,” Orick said, “you’ve pulled us out for the day, but what about tonight?” He only hoped that Gallen had some kind of plan.

“That is a tough one,” Gallen admitted.

“Farra Kuur?” Ceravanne asked, tossing Orick an apple core.

“Yes,” Gallen said, “that is what I was hoping.”

“It’s a long stretch of road before us,” Ceravanne considered. “We’ll be hard-pressed to make it.”

“Farra what?” Maggie asked.

“Farra Kuur,” Gallen said. “A few kilometers south of here, the canyons narrow again, and down the road fifty or sixty kilometers, there was a fortress called Farra Kuur, virtually impenetrable. If we can make it there, and if the bridge is down after all these years, we should be able to hold the Derrits off for another night.”

“If the bridge is down?” Orick said.

“Drawbridges,” Gallen said. “Farra Kuur is burrowed into the spur of a mountain between two very steep chasms. Drawbridges were carved from great sheets of stone to span the gap, and the Makers created giant gears to raise and lower them.”

“Certainly the bridges aren’t in working order,” Ceravanne said.

“They were three hundred years ago,” Gallen said hopefully. “And the gears and chains were all well oiled back then. The Makers build for permanence. But even if the bridges aren’t working now, so long as the bridges are down, we should make it into Farra Kuur. And once we’re there … well, we’ll see what I can do.”

Orick didn’t want to talk about the battle that would inevitably come tonight even if they made it to Farra Kuur, so he said, “Making it to this fortress of yours sounds like a fine idea, but it won’t do us much good if we starve. You wouldn’t happen to know where we might find some food around here?”

“Keep watch for mushrooms, berries, nuts,” Gallen told him, “pick anything you find. We’ll be running through the forest all day, and if we’re lucky, maybe a young deer will impale itself on my sword,” he joked.

“Are you sure that’s wise, eating these strange berries?” Orick asked. He’d seen some small red berries the day before, but he’d been afraid to harvest any, not knowing if they were poisonous. And he didn’t even want to chance the mushrooms he’d seen, for none were of varieties familiar to him.

“All mushrooms, berries, and fruits that you will find here on Tremonthin are edible-” Ceravanne said, “but one. The deathfruit grows on a bush low to the ground, and is dark purple, darker than a plum. It is to be eaten only by those who are sick or horribly injured, those who seek death.”

Orick considered this good news, and they took off, climbing up the narrow gorge till they hit the road once again, and for most of the day, Orick foraged as he ran, eating a snail here, swallowing a few acorns there, nibbling a mushroom.

That day they ran among rounded hills beside where the river flowed, and once they stopped by the riverbank where the soil had a blue tinge so that Ceravanne could harvest some of the Healing Earth. They took off again, but shortly after that they lost the road altogether, for lush grasses and woods now covered the ancient road as if it had never been.

Still, Gallen kept a straight course, and on some high hills they would find themselves climbing over the remnants of a stone road that was worn and cracked, until well before noon they came to an ancient fortress that lay nearly all in ruins. One of its walls stood intact, rose to an incredible height of perhaps two hundred feet.

“Druin’s Tower,” Gallen called it, and he stood on the hill and studied the landmark wistfully, as did Ceravanne.

“Who was Druin?” Maggie asked.

Ceravanne answered. “Druin was a kindly scholar who united many people. He built this tower to study the stars, and he delved in forbidden technologies, hoping to carry the peoples of this land away with him to other worlds. But then he became old, and bitter, and turned away from peace, manufacturing weapons of war.”

“I did not manufacture weapons,” Gallen growled, gazing hard at Ceravanne, and it was as if another person spoke from his mouth. The memories the Inhuman had given Gallen were so strong, that for one moment, Druin spoke. “The Fengari workers turned against me, making cannons without my knowledge.”

Ceravanne studied Gallen a moment. “The Immortals studied your memories most carefully, Druin. You were not guiltless in this affair.”

“I was guiltless!” Gallen spat, and then he seemed to struggle for control and said heavily, in his own voice, “But that was long ago.”

“The memories of the dead can be easily edited,” Ceravanne said softly. “Druin’s memories are in the archives at the City of Life. Someday you may see for yourself and learn the truth of it. Druin was a great man, a man of peace for most of his days, but his goodness died before he did.”

“And if you read those memories and find that you have wronged him?” Gallen asked.

“We can review the records, and if he deserves a new life, then he will be granted one. But you must understand, Gallen, that he violated our strictest laws. Certain technologies are forbidden on this world, yet Druin sought them out. He may have been a well-meaning criminal, but he was a criminal nonetheless.”

Gallen turned away from her, as if to lay the matter aside. The icy-gray river they’d been following flowed down below them through a green valley, where it joined an even broader muddy flow that came in from the north. For a moment, they sat and rested. There were no roads, no signs of homes or settlements. All of that was long gone. Gallen spotted some distant wingmen circling closer toward them, so they headed out for the shelter of the trees.

Orick could smell the garlicky scent of Derrits throughout most of the morning along the road, so he knew that they had gone ahead during the night. But an hour before noon they were climbing back up a long hill when the group passed an old mining tunnel carved into the stone cliff face alongside the road. There the odor of Derrits became so strong that even Maggie and Ceravanne could smell it.

The suns were shining bright and full, hidden only by the thinnest gauze of high clouds. Everyone crept quietly past the mine, and when they were well past, Gallen stopped and looked back toward it longingly.

“Give me the glow globe,” Gallen said to Ceravanne.

“You aren’t going in there?” Maggie hissed, grabbing Gallen’s arm.

Gallen’s face was pale, wooden. “They’ve got too much of a lead on us,” he said. “I don’t want them so close.”

“What kind of plan do you have rolling around in that head of yours?” Maggie asked.

“I was thinking,” Gallen answered, “that it would be interesting to see if they’ve posted a guard. Derrits normally don’t and I’m thinking I could kill two or three before any of them wake.”

“No!” Maggie said. “It’s not worth the risk!”

Gallen licked his lips. “The Derrits are not above eating their own kind. If I kill a couple, it leaves that much more food for the others to eat.”

Ceravanne had fished the glow globe out of her pack, and she handed it to Gallen. “He’s right,” she said. “A well-fed Derrit is not as ferocious as a hungry one.”

“Go ahead on up the road,” Gallen said to Orick. “Derrits don’t like the sun, but if they’re angered, they might come out after us, and there’s no sense being within arm’s length if you don’t have to.”

“I’ll come with you,” Orick whispered.

“No, thank you.” Gallen sighed. “With my cloak covering my scent, they won’t smell me coming, and with my mantle, I can fight in the dark, so I won’t alert them that way. I’d prefer to keep those advantages.”

Orick’s heart was sore to follow Gallen, but he knew it would not be wise, so he took the lesser course of action, and he hurried Maggie and Ceravanne up the road a couple of kilometers, where it turned around a wide bend, then had them hide in some bushes.

Gallen waited till they were set, then crept back to the huge entrance of the mine. It seemed he had hardly stepped in when they heard the bloodcurdling roar of Derrits.

Gallen staggered back out the door as if he’d been knocked backward, and he had his sword up in one hand, the glow globe blaring in the other. A huge yellow Derrit lunged through the narrow doorway after him, a stream of red blood at its throat, raking the air with its claws.

Gallen ducked beneath its grasp, slashed at its belly, then turned and ran. The Derrit careened around drunkenly for a second, then fell to the ground, and Gallen did not stop to watch it, for four other Derrits were lunging through the doors.

One of them stopped in the sunlight, raised his long snout skyward and roared his contempt, while three of the smaller Derrits gave chase to Gallen.

They were so swift, he could not hope to outrun them. Gallen sprinted for a hundred yards, pocketed his glow globe, then reached back and drew his incendiary rifle, whirled and fired.

A meteor of white plasma struck the first Derrit full in the face, and bits of plasma splashed backward, where they dropped and burned into the stone road and into the Derrits behind. The fire of it was bright as the sun, and even the Derrits inside the tunnel shrieked and grabbed their eyes, wailing like the damned.

The single shot managed to fry two of the Derrits and bum the leg of a third. Those monsters who were still alive stayed back in the mine.

Moments later, Gallen hurried up to Orick and the others, sweat dripping from his face, fresh blood spattered all across his robes. Behind him, the plasma fires from his rifle were still burning.

“They had a guard,” Gallen said, shaking his head, stopping to catch his breath. He glanced back. “They sure don’t like the incendiary rifle. Too bad we have only one shot left.”

“Maybe this little display will have them thinking better about following our trail,” Orick said hopefully.

Ceravanne shook her head. “Derrits are not easily dismayed, and they are a cunning people. They will try to outwit us.”

Gallen merely grunted. “They will have to catch us first,” he said and set off at a run.

That afternoon their trail took them through a land of broken hills, a wild land, with little game in it. They did see some rabbits from time to time, and once they saw three dark wolves fading away into the shadows under some trees.

Gallen and the women were wilting from lack of food and from the fast pace, so Orick made it his job to find something edible. Often that day, he imagined himself in Gallen’s shoes, playing the hero. But he wasn’t Gallen, he realized, and food is what they were lacking now.

While Gallen watched for wingmen and Derrits, Orick watched for mushrooms and pine cones, wild onions and berries. So it was that he managed to scrounge some snacks on the run, and near sunset, as he crossed a large stone bridge over the river, he smelled wild blackberries, and led the others upriver a hundred yards to a patch of berries that hung thick from the vines.

They picked what they could, stuffing as many berries as possible into their mouths, and when they set off again a few minutes later, it was with renewed vigor.

At dusk the road left the riverbanks and began to meander up through some dark hills, thick with scrub and the stone ruins of old buildings.

Gallen kept them running till well after dark. Clouds were blowing in, and it looked as if it would rain.

An hour after sundown, they topped a rise and found themselves once again on a high canyon wall. Gallen called the others together for a council.

“If I guess right,” he said, “the Derrits cannot be far behind us. We can either leave the road now and try to hide, or we can hope that the bridge is down at Farra Kuur, and try to fend them off there. Either plan may fail, so I ask you, which do you prefer?”

Orick looked down the cliff toward the river, then looked up at the sky. Their trail was still fresh, and the rains had not come yet, and might not come for hours. To run in hopes that the Derrits would lose their scent seemed foolhardy. Yet the path ahead was unknown. What if the bridge wasn’t down, or what if it had been destroyed over the centuries? What if Derrits also lived in this fortress? There seemed to be no easy solution.

“The river here is not as wide as it was last night in the woods, and there are fewer places to hide,” Ceravanne said. “You still have one shot for your rifle, and the Derrits will be loath to charge us so long as you wield that weapon. I think we should go ahead.”

“I’m not sure,” Orick grumbled. “How long could the bridges last at Farra Kuur before they weather away? At least if we leave the road now, we know what kind of a mess we’ve gotten ourselves into!”

Gallen looked at Maggie, who just shrugged.

“Farra Kuur, I vote, then,” Gallen said. “Even if we get backed into a corner, the road behind us offers little room for the Derrits to maneuver. I think that up there, I might be able to hold them off until morning.”

He nodded ahead, and Orick worried. Gallen had slept only lightly the night before. He was in no shape for battle. Still, Gallen had six thousand years of experience on this world, and Orick had but a few weeks. Orick had to bow to Gallen’s wisdom.

They ran then. Blackberry vines crossed the road under their feet, attesting to the fact that even the game did not use this road as a trail, and as they ran, a burrow owl glided ahead before them, watching for any mice that they might disturb.

The moons were up enough so that they shed some wan light, and the four of them ran with their hearts, until at last they rounded a bend and saw a huge cliff face jutting out from the arm of the mountains, with broken towers crumbling along its rim, and all of the towers were riddled with dark holes that once had been windows. It was difficult at first to see much else, for the moonlight shone only on the upper towers, while the valley before them was in shadow, but the towers looked almost like living things, like giants tall and ready for battle, and Orick realized that indeed the whole face of the cliff was sculpted with their images. Four giants, their eyes hollowed out by age, their great beards hanging down to their belts, stood ready with huge axes in their hands, ever vigilant, ever ready for battle. Orick’s eyes focused on those images.

As they ran, Gallen shouted in triumph, “The bridge is down! Hurry across!”

Behind them Orick heard the roar of Derrits.

Gallen spun about and shouted at Maggie, “Take the light. I’ll hold them off!” He passed her the globe from his pocket.

Maggie squeezed the glow globe, and its bright white light flooded over the ridge. Then Ceravanne and Maggie rushed headlong, running faster than before, their stained cloaks flapping in the breeze, carrying a piece of the sun in their hand as they raced toward the dark tower.

Orick stayed beside Gallen. It was dark, with a thin blanket of clouds above, but not too dark for a bear to see by.

The Derrits were rushing uphill toward them in a disorganized pack, growling and hissing. They moved at a loping pace, sometimes lurching forward on their knuckles more than their feet, yet they moved at an incredible speed, so that a span of road that had taken Orick twenty minutes to cross took the giants only two. In the darkness, the Derrits’ crude gait reminded Orick of nothing so much as that of an otter, with its head bobbing down and up as it ran. He counted seventeen of the brutes.

Yet when they were a hundred yards away, Gallen shouted at them. “Siisum, gasht! Gasht!”

The Derrits stopped, and stood gazing at Gallen and Orick. The ones in front would not move forward, but those in the back came inching up, shoving the others aside to get a look at the prey.

“Siisum s gasht! Ooongu s gasht!” Gallen shouted, and his voice was a snarling roar that mimicked that of the Derrits.

One of the Derrits called out to Gallen quizzically, a sound of grunts and snarls, yet Orick was sure that he heard words mingled in that growling.

“I told them to stop or die,” Gallen said. “But their leader says that we are warriors of great power, and they want to eat us, to gain our power, so that even in our deaths our power will live on in them. He says that he will not be hungry for me, however, if I only give him you and a woman to eat.”

Orick snarled and stood up on his hind feet. “Siisum a gasht!” he growled.

The Derrits lurched forward a step, as if angered, and Gallen fired his last shot into the pack. The plasma arced up into the night, then dropped in a spray. The whole side of the cliff lit up like noonday, and some of the Derrits screamed and toppled off the road in their haste to escape while others roared and lurched, trying to brush the flaming magma from them. In the light, their yellow hides were suddenly revealed, the white flashing of their fangs.

“Gasht!” Gallen roared, and he held his rifle up menacingly.

Those Derrits who could rushed backward down the hill at full speed, but four of the tribe were either killed outright by the blast, or were burning slowly, or had already toppled over the cliff.

Orick and Gallen turned and headed back toward Farra Kuur, and by the wavering light of the plasma fires, Orick could now see the great stone bridge spanning the chasm ahead, with its ancient guard posts still intact.

Orick started to hurry up the road, but Gallen whispered savagely, “Don’t run! Don’t let the Derrits see you run, or they’ll know we’re afraid, and they’ll try to hunt us again.”

And so they walked slowly up the road, and Orick felt as if a great weight had been lifted. With so many of the Derrits in flames, Gallen seemed confident that the others would not dare to attack again.

They could see the light up ahead, shining from within the walls of Farra Kuur on the far side of the bridge. Maggie and Ceravanne had gone deeper into the fortress, and the light shone from an archway far back along the northern wall.

As Orick approached the bridge, he could hear the sound of water rushing over rocks in the gorge below, could smell the faint vapors of water-and he caught a strange scent, something smoky and oily, a scent he recognized just barely. He was about to shout a warning, when suddenly a dark shadow detached from a comer and stood on the far side of the bridge, a man dressed in the dark, hooded robes of the Tekkar, which went down almost to his knees. And he wore tall black boots.

He held out a strange metallic device pointed at Gallen, and Gallen drew a startled breath at the sight of it. Orick could only guess that it was some type of gun, but it had an odd stock, one that required its user to hold the weapon forward with one hand on a trigger, the other on the stock.

“Well done, Lord Protector.” The Tekkar’s voice was soft, almost a hiss. In the dim light, Orick could see that the man’s face was all a tattoo-of a pale yellow skull. “We’ve been waiting. You’ve saved us from an inconvenience with the Derrits, and for that, we owe you. Now, throw down your weapons, or we’ll execute the women.”

Orick’s heart pounded in his chest, and he considered what to do. He wanted desperately to rush forward and tear off this man’s limbs.

But the Tekkar nodded, and from the archway where the lights shone, seven more Tekkar came out in a tight knot, holding Ceravanne and Maggie. One of the Tekkar held a gun to Maggie’s head.

* * *