Prison of Night

Chapter Thirteen

There were rasps and drips and small, rustling sounds, the somber beat of a drum and a liquid gurgle which could have been the pound of surf but which was, as Dumarest knew, the roar of blood in his ears.

As the drum was the beat of his heart, the rasps and rustles the scrape and movement of boots and clothing. The drips alone came from the outside world, the slow fall of moisture from the roof, its soft slide over time-worn stone.

A cavern which had opened from a tunnel which had led from a smaller cavern which he had reached by a winding fissure. Miles of endless turns and twists and descending floors. The weight of a world pressing in around him.

Darkness broken only by the ghostly shimmer of converted energies, residual forces amplified by the mechanism bought from the entrepreneur which he wore clamped to his eyes. In its field he saw the life-pattern of a lichen, something which moved and crouched against a wall, a shower of tiny motes which provided food for the lurking predator and which fed in turn on things too small for him to spot.

Water splashed as he pressed on his way. If the Sungari were here surely they would have noticed him by now. If the Sungari existed. If he were not plunging hopelessly into the empty world of caverns and tunnels which lay beneath the mountains.

And yet the flying creatures had come from somewhere.

There had to be a hive.

He stumbled and fell and climbed carefully to his feet. The apparatus on his eyes confused him a little but, if he should break it, he would be lost in total darkness to wander blindly through an unknown world. Halting he touched his waist, found the laser holstered there and drew it. Closing his eyes he fired at the ground directly ahead. Adjusting the gain from the light-amplifier he peered from between shielding fingers.

And looked at a palace of marvels.

Light streamed from the place which had received the bolt of energy, the stone still radiating in the visible spectrum, blazing like a sun in the infrared, emitting energy which was caught and retained by the walls and roof to register as a host of scintillating rainbows, each node a sparkling gem, each irregularity a vortex of luminous wonder.

A signal to the Sungari if they should exist.

Dumarest stood waiting, wondering if again the signal would fade to linger as a ghostly luminescence long after he had moved on. Another failure which would join the others he had placed along the path from the upper air.

And then, in his brain, something turned.

It was a numbing pressure which shifted as a worm would shift in loam, as butter would slide over butter, a wave move in the ocean, a hand turn in a hand. A thing which sent him to his knees, head bowed, sweat starting from face and neck to fall and sting his eyes to gather in droplets beneath his arms.

He heard the crying, the thin, pitiful wailing which seemed always to be with him.

And, abruptly, he was in space.

It was there, the stars, the fuzz of distant nebulae, the sheets and curtains of luminescence unhampered by the dulling effects of atmosphere. The void was all around him and he floated, alone in the empty universe as the air gushed from his lungs and the eyes bulged in their sockets and his internal organs began to burst under the pressure of boiling blood.

Dying as he had once died before.

As Chagney had died; died and still drifted, his empty eyes staring at blazing stars, his skin burned by the kiss of blasting radiations, dehydrated, frozen in stasis, still living, perhaps, somehow still aware.

And crying… crying…

"No!" His voice was a gasp of pain. "No! No!"

Another voice, strange, remote, whispering in the recesses of his brain.

"A sensitive-quickly, the apparatus is erratic. Some malfunction and loss of integration … foreign elements … adjust… align… so!"

Coolness and the aching died. Peace came, the sickening movement within movement vanishing as did the blaze of stars, the fear, the crying, the pain.

Dumarest lifted his head and rose, trembling, aware of the aftermath of strain-aware too that his eyes were no longer covered by the amplifying apparatus.

Then how was it he could see?

The walls glowed with a soft nacreous light to either side. The floor was a dusty amber lined with green. The roof was bathed in an azure haze. The figure of the monk standing before him was a familiar brown.

A monk?

He stepped forward and stared into the cowl seeing a calm and placid face. Brother Jerome? Once he had known the High Monk, but Jerome was dead.

"And so no longer exists in the form you knew," said the figure. "But the shape is one you find comforting and trust. Why are you here?"

"I am looking for the Sungari."

"And have found them. We are the Sungari. You have broken the Pact."

With good reason, how else was he to ask for aid? And what good was a Pact when no one knew what it was all about? And how was it that an individual claimed plurality? And what was the real shape of the Sungari?

"You will never know," said the monk evenly. "And it is best that you do not. Yes, we have the ability to read brains. Those who first came to this world and contacted us used sensitives to communicate. We arranged a mutually agreeable settlement which you must know. Why did you not communicate earlier? We were watching you and your primitive attempts. Almost we destroyed you."

Curiosity had saved him-one thing at least men and the aliens had in common. And telepathy explained how they first had agreed to cooperate. The talent must have proved a recessive gene and had died from the surface culture.

Dumarest said, "How is it that I can see?"

"A direct stimulation of the brain. We also adjusted that which was in it. Life persisted due to the radiation of the twin suns. Now it is dormant and will eventually be absorbed but, while it lasts, we can communicate. You want something but what do you offer?"

Another familiar trait or was he misunderstanding the meaning behind the words? How to understand an alien mind? Yet some things all life had in common; the need to feed, to expand, to breed, to find safety. As the Sungari had found it by burrowing deep into the planet using the rock and soil as a barrier against the energy of the suns. Which meant?

"We are not native to this world as you have guessed. Long, long ago a ship was wrecked beyond repair. We did what had to be done and achieved a balance. When those of your race came there was attrition but finally we struck a new balance. Now you come asking for help and offer what?"

"Trade."

"How?"

"Items can be left for you to collect. In return you provide minerals and other sub-surface products. Later, if mutually agreeable, a closer cooperation can be achieved."

A hope, but what else had he to offer? As the figure remained silent Dumarest took another step closer. The robe the monk wore seemed to move and, stepping even closer, he saw that it was not solid material but a mass of tiny creatures shifting, each hooked to the other, their bodies providing the illusion.

As others made up the face, the lips, the eyes, the body of the monk.

A hive-but could things so small have the mental power he had experienced? Or was the figure merely an extension of a greater intelligence?

"Is the part the whole?" said the monk. "If you shear your hair is the hair you or are you the hair? If you should lose a limb which part is you? The part with the intelligence and brain? But what if the brain itself is in many parts?" And then, as Dumarest remained silent, "Do not try to understand. We are the Sungari."

Creatures from a different existence to that he had known, perhaps bred on worlds men had yet to reach. Dumarest thought of an ant and its nest, a bee and its hive, a cell and the body to which it belonged. A brain commanding a host of appendages each able to convey information. A computer would be much the same and if its scanners were mobile and obedient-was the Sungari a giant organic computer?

More important-would it help?

"Come," said the monk. "You shall see."

And suddenly dissolved into a mass of glinting particles which rose and spread and spun a curtain before and around Dumarest so that he was enclosed in a sphere of shimmering brilliance which took shape and form and…

He looked down at a world.

It was Zakym, the terrain was obvious but the conviction was stronger than that. He knew and, knowing, ceased to question. Hills moved to one side and a building grew large in his sight. Castle Belamosk, almost he could discern the figures on the upper promenade then, as he dropped lower, or appeared to drop, they grew clear.

Lavinia, Roland, Gartok huge in his helmet and armor. Others stood tense and watchful, some armed, others with empty hands. One was speaking but there were no words. Only vision as if he looked through the eyes of a flying scanner which, Dumarest realized, was probably what he was doing. Some creature of the Sungari flying high, seeing, relaying back what it saw. Something in a familiar shape or with transparent wings and body so as to be invisible against the sky.

Against the wall of the castle a flower bloomed with a gush of red and orange, wreaths of grey smoke rising to vanish, to reveal the ragged crater the missile had left. Others lay behind it; raw pockmarks in the dirt, each signaling the path of a creeping barrage. Soon they would reach the wall and send the massive stones to fall in splintered rain.

A blur and he looked at another castle, smaller, less graceful, less fortunate. A turret had fallen and one wall showed an ugly breech. The missiles which reached for it widened the gap in warning of what would come unless the ultimatum was met.

Already the owner must be on his way to Belamosk with what men he could find and arm. Navalok would join him, Suchong, the others. Tomir had increased his force by a simple threat.

Tomir?

He sat in a somber room looking at his maps, a communicator at his side and, behind him, like a scarlet flame, stood the cyber Dumarest and known must be at the commander's service.

And, this time, there was sound; the rustle of papers, the sigh of breathing, the rustle as Tomir moved, the scrape of his chair.

"Report!" he snapped into the communicator. "Unit Two!"

"No change, sir." The man had a hard, rugged face. "Still no surrender."

"Advance barrage."

"More and we'll be on the walls."

"Obey!" Tomir slapped at a button. "Unit Five! Report!"

"Castle walls breeched and internal damage achieved. Alcorus asked for permission to fly to Belamosk and urge surrender. Permission granted."

"Hold your fire. Unit Four?" Tomir grunted as he heard a similar report. "Maintain surveillance. Unit Three?"

"No reaction as yet, sir."

"Increase destruction. Cease only when the owner asks for permission to visit Belamosk."

Ardoch said, as the communicator died, "My lord it would be best to cancel your orders to Unit Two. Belamosk must not be put at risk."

"This is my war, Cyber!"

"And you will win it, my lord. But we have a bargain."

"Dumarest. I know. But he is stubborn and I refuse to wait longer. Once he sees his woman in danger he'll show himself. Once she sees her precious castle begin to fall apart she'll surrender. Either way we win."

A crude prediction, too crude for any satisfaction and too dangerous for Ardoch's mission. One missile and luck could send stone to crush Dumarest's skull. There was no safety for anyone under fire. Even a near miss could ruin his mission and, as he well knew, the Cyclan had no patience with those who failed.

He stepped closer to Tomir, unaware of the things lurking in the crevasses of the walls, the eyes and ears which caught and relayed every word. Creatures of the Sungari living in the gloom of the underground chamber, adapted for a specific task and set to spy.

"My lord, you must cancel that order." His voice retained its even monotone but, even so, Tomir caught the hidden threat.

"Leave me, Ardoch!"

"The order, my lord. You will cancel it." The cyber's hand rose, a finger pointing at the young man's face. From beneath the nail something gleamed and, as the hand darted forward, pierced the skin of Tomir's cheek. "You will do it now."

The man was already dead, the drug injected into his flesh robbing him of all volition. He would obey as if a marionette and then, like a puppet with broken strings, he would fall.

But, as he turned to the communicator, his hand slipped and hit the destruct button incorporated into the military unit.

The unexpected. The unknown factor which could ruin any prediction. The element which could render useless any plan. Ardoch looked at his hand, the dead body, his mind already assessing probabilities. The orders had been given, even now the missiles would be closing the gap to the walls. Orders could stop them but would they obey his commands? Louchon was the the next in line, he could stop the barrage, but first he had to be convinced.

Dumarest watched as the cyber left the chamber.

"Now! If you are going to help do it now!"

A wordless cry from the mind to those who had shown him a little of the power they possessed. The Sungari who alone could do what needed to be done.

And he was looking at a group of men standing around a launcher.

They were efficient, glad the waiting was over, eager for what spoils victory would bring. Their officer lifted an arm and waited for a moment. He wore the visor of his helmet raised and few of his men wore body armor. There was no need when fighting at so far a distance. The sky was clear of rafts, no enemy could touch them, and confident in their safety they were careless.

"Now!"

Before the missile could be fired, the load it carried delivered to the castle, the fury of the warhead tearing at stone and flesh and bone and turning graceful men and women into crawling things of horror.

"Now! For God's sake stop them if you can!"

The air blurred.

It shook to the quiver of wings, the passage of bodies spined and with serrated fins, creatures of chitin and bone. Living darts, pointed, barbed, coming from nowhere and striking without warning.

The officer screamed and fell, holes where his eyes had been, blood gushing to stream down his face and join the fountain pulsing at his throat.

His men spun, some running, others beating at the air with hands too slow to hit the living missiles. They died, falling with blood marking their bodies, clothing ripped, flesh torn from bone, bone shattered by the bullet-like impact.

A shift and other men, more death, more destruction of the invading force. And more. And more. Until, finally, it was over.

From the raft the ground was a mottled patchwork of rocks and boulders lined with crevasses and dotted with patches of scrub. A hard place to find anything still less the relatively small figure of a man. Sighing Gartok lowered his binoculars and palmed his aching eyes.

For two days now he had been searching without success but stubbornly refused to give up. Dumarest was alive, he was sure of it, and if he was alive, then somehow, he would return to the surface.

The Sungari would help him.

"Sir?" The driver of the raft was young and proud at having being chosen by the tough mercenary to handle the vehicle. "Shall I continue in this direction?"

One way was as good as another but ahead reared the bulk of the Iron Mountains with the attendant dangers of turbulence and varying densities of air. Even an experienced driver could lose a raft in such conditions.

"No." Gartok made his decision. "Swing to the left and follow the foothills. Ride low and keep even."

Again he lifted the binoculars. They were fitted with an infrared detector and could reveal the presence of any living thing by its own body-heat, but the lenses remained clear.

"To the right," ordered Gartok. "Hold it!"

Something was over there and he tightened his hands at the hint of movement. A trace augmented by the sudden flicker of the detector. A living creature-Dumarest?

Gartok swore as a foal suddenly sprang from behind a rock to race down a crevass then, as the detector flickered again, yelled to the driver.

"Down! Down and to the right a little. Hurry, damn you! That's Earl!"

He was sitting on a boulder, his head resting in his hands, a thin coating of some kind of slime dried on his clothing so that he seemed to have been dusted with a frost-like powder. As Gartok approached he looked up.

"God!" The mercenary came to a halt. "Earl, your face!"

It was tense, drawn, the eyes sunken, the hair also coated with the lace-like patina. More rested on his cheeks, paling his lips, webbed on his eyebrows. It gave him the appearance of having aged a century; an illusion broken only when he spoke.

"Kars."

"Here!" Gartok had come prepared. He lifted a bottle and jerked out the cork. "Drink some of this." He restrained his impatience as Dumarest obeyed. "You found them, didn't you?"

"The Sungari? Yes."

"It had to be you. I told those weak bastards who came demanding that you should be handed over that. Told them and ordered them from Belamosk. By God, I'd have killed them had they lingered. Then I came looking for you." He added, simply, "I've been looking for a long time."

With others, scouring the skies with rafts, searching, always searching. But he, at least, had found.

"Earl?"

"It's over, isn't it? The war?"

"Over. Every last mercenary is dead. Tomir too, they found him in a cellar."

"I know."

"You know?" Gartok frowned, then changed the subject. "What are they like, Earl? Did they feed you? Give you water? How did you manage to persuade them?"

Questions followed by more and all stemming from a natural curiosity. Some impossible to answer while others could only be guessed at. The extent of the underground domain. The means by which access was gained to the surface. The method of breeding the selective strains which formed the extensions of the main intelligence-or had there only been one.

Was Zakym the home of a tremendous, alien brain?

One thing was certain, the Sungari owned this world despite what men may have thought. They, it, were the masters. Men were tolerated as a harmless insect would have been tolerated by a magnanimous gardener. But should that insect bite it would be crushed as men would be exterminated should they grow too fast and become too greedy.

Plague could do it. The destruction of all surface life, the crops and herds, would force them to withdraw. And there could be other ways based on the mind. Terrors which he could only imagine. Horrors without a name.

Dumarest rose and drank more of the brandy and felt the warmth of it spread from his stomach and restore some of his humanity. He had wandered too long in the dark, relied on the alien life-form too greatly, had suffered its probing too long. He needed to face those of his own kind, to hear voices, to take a long, hot bath and feel clean and wholesome again.

He needed to hold Lavinia in his arms and feel the soft comfort of her, the assurance of her need. But when they returned to Belamosk she was gone.