The Carpet People

CHAPTER 9

The wights built Jeopard. They brought red wood and sparkling varnish from achairleg to pave its streets; from the Hearthlands they led great caravans of the rare jet, to be made into domes and cornices, and cinder and ash for bricks and mortar; at the distant High Gate Land of the Vortgorns they traded their varnish wares for beaten bronze, for doors and pillars; salt and sugar, in great white crystals, were dragged between the hairs by teams of sweating horses, for walls and roofs. And they brought different coloured hairs from all parts of the Carpet. Some became planks and rafters, but most they planted around the city.

Everywhere there were gardens. In the evening light it looked peaceful, but they had to lie low twice when moul cavalry went past on the road.

"In my city, too," said Brocando.

"You've got a plan, I hope," said Bane.

"There's another way into the city," said Brocando.

"I didn't know that."

"Didn't you?" said Brocando. "Amazing. All that trouble to build a secret passage and we forgot to tell the Emperor. Remind me to send him a note. Turn right into that little hidden track there."

"What track?"

Brocando grinned. "Good, isn't it," he said.

It looked like an animal path. It wound round and about the hairs. The dust bushes were much thicker here.

"Planted," said Brocando.

Eventually, when it was almost dark, they reached a small glade with another ruined temple in it.

"Temples don't last long around here, do they," said Snibril, looking around at the crowding hairs. Here and there were more statues, half covered in dust.

"This one was built to look ruined," said Brocando. "By the wights. For one of my ancestors. The one over there, with the bird's nest on his head and his arm raised-" He hesitated. "And you're a Dumii, and I've brought you to the secret place," he said. "I should have you blindfolded."

"No," said Bane. "You want me to fight for you, then I'm wearing no blindfold."

"But one day you might come back with an army."

"I'm sorry you think so," said Bane stonily.

"As me, I don't," said Brocando. "As a king, I have to think so."

"Ha!"

"This is stupid," said Snibril. "Why bother with a blindfold?"

"It's important," said Brocando, sulkily.

"You've got to trust one another sooner or later. Who are you going to trust instead? You're men of honour, aren't you?" said Snibril.

"It's not as simple as that," said Brocando.

"Then make it simple!"

He realized he had shouted. Even Glurk was surprised.

"Well, it's no time to argue," said Snibril, calming down a bit.

Brocando nodded. "Yes. Very well. Maybe. I'm sure he's an honourable man. Pull Broc's arm."

"What?" said Bane.

"Behind you. On the statue. Pull the arm," said Brocando.

Bane shrugged, and reached for the arm.

"First time a Dumii's ever shaken a Deftmene's hand," he said. "I wonder what it'll lead to-"

There was a grinding noise, somewhere under their feet. A slab in the temple floor slid aside, showing a flight of steps.

"It'll lead to the palace," said Brocando, grinning.

They stared into the square of darkness.

Finally Glurk said: "You don't mean ... into the Underlay?"

"Yes!"

"But ... but ... there's terrible things down there!"

"Just stories for children," said Brocando. "Nothing to be frightened of down there."

He trotted down the steps. Bane went to follow him, and then looked back at the Munrungs.

"What's the matter?" he said.

"Well ... " said Snibril. What shall I say? Creatures from ancient tales live down there: thunorgs, the horrible delvers, and shadows without number or names. Strange things gnawing at the roots of the Carpet. The souls of the dead. Everything bad. Everything you get ... frightened by, when you're small.

He looked around at the other tribesmen. They had moved closer together.

He thought: at times like this, we all have to forget old things.

"Nothing's the matter," he said, in what he hoped was a voice full of leadership. "Come on, lads. Last one in's a-"

"Never mind about the last one," muttered a voice somewhere towards the back of the group. "We want to see what happens to the first one."

Snibril tripped at the bottom of the stairs and landed on a pile of soft dust. Brocando was lighting a torch, taken from a rack of them on one wall of the little cave. One by one the band shuffled down. Brocando moved another lever and the statue trundled back over the hole, leaving them crowded shoulder to shoulder in the red-lit cave.

"All here?" said Brocando, and without waiting for a reply he ducked into a tiny crevice and was gone.

Nearly as bad as discovering all your worst fears are coming true, Snibril thought, is finding out that they're not.

The walls showed up brown in the torchlight, and were covered with tiny hairs that glittered as the light passed them. Sometimes they crossed the entrances to other tunnels. But there were no monsters, no sudden teeth ...

The path began to slope down and suddenly the light from Brocando's torch dimmed. Snibril started before he realized that they were entering a cavern under the Carpet, with walls so far away that the light was not reflected from them. They passed through many great caverns, the path narrowing and spiralling up around great columns of hair, so that they had to cling to stay on it. Sometimes the light sparkled on a distant wall. While they were edging along one place where the path narrowed almost to nothingness, and cold air rushed up from the depths below, Snibril slipped. Bane, who was next in line, reached out with great presence of mind and grabbed him by the hair just as he was about to totter into the darkness. But the torch slipped from his hands. They peered over the edge to watch it become a spark, then a speck and finally wink out. Something shifted in the dark depths of Underlay, and they heard it scuttle heavily away.

"What was that?" said Snibril.

"Probably a silverfish," said Brocando. "They've got teeth bigger than a man, you know. And dozens of legs."

"I thought you said there was nothing to be afraid of down here!" shouted Glurk.

"Well?", said Brocando, looking surprised. "Who's afraid of them?"

Anything else in the depths below would hardly have seen them, little specks inching along the roots of the hairs. Eventually Brocando called a halt on the edge of another abyss. There was a narrow bridge stretching across it, and Snibril could just make out a door on the far side.

The king held up the torch and said: "We are right underneath the rock now."

The roof of the cavern was gently curved towards its centre, bowed under the great weight above it.

"You are the only people apart from the kings of Jeopard to see this," Brocando went on. "After the secret passage was dug, Broc had all the workers personally put to death to stop the secret escaping."

"Oh? That's part of kinging, too, is it?" said Glurk.

"It used to be," said Brocando. "Not any more, of course."

"Hah!" said Bane.

When they had crossed the bridge Brocando pushed the little wooden door open, revealing a spiral staircase lit by green light filtering down from a tiny circle of light. It was a long climb up the winding staircase, which was so narrow that the boots of the ones in front tangled with the hands of the ones behind, and the torches made flickering shadows of giant warriors against the walls. Ghostly as it was, Snibril welcomed it. He hated the darkness under the Carpet.

Before it reached the circle of green light the stairway opened on to a little landing, just big enough to hold them all. There was another door in the wall.

"Where-" Glurk began.

Brocando shook his head and put his finger to his lips.

There were voices on the other side of the door.