Beyond The Gate - Book 2 of the Golden Queen Series

by David Farland

  And then a wingman swept over the clifftop and shrieked, a long wail of alarm. Tallea was not certain, but she could almost distinguish words in that scream. Out above the valley, all of the remaining wingmen veered toward them and flapped their wings, gaining speed. They knew that this would be their last chance.

  "Inside!" Gallen shouted, and several people ran for the door. But Gallen went to the edge of the road, his rifle in hand.

  Tallea rushed up beside him. "Take my sword," he yelled, and she drew the weapon from his sheath. She felt it quivering in her hand, as if it were alive, and it emitted a soft and eager humming.

  Tallea glanced back. Ceravanne and Maggie were already inside the iron door, but Orick was trying to squeeze his own bulk through the narrow passage, shoving mightily with his back feet, leaving claw marks in the stone.

  Gallen fired at the four wingmen who flew forward in a loose formation, and it seemed that the sun blazed from his weapon. A fierce wall of heat struck Tallea's face, and the light burst out over the canyon sky, catching the foremost of the wingmen so that he tumbled downward in flames.

  Two of them veered off, to avoid colliding with their dying kin, but the third came on.

  Gallen fired once more, and the wingman tried to drop beneath his shot. The flames surged past the creature, but they had come too close. Even in passing, the heat was so great that it left a huge black smoking blemish on the creature's back.

  The wingman screamed out in pain, diving toward the ribbon of blue river that shone in the forest far below.

  Tallea looked back to the door. Orick was still trying to push through. Gallen shouted, "Get in!"

  He raced to the door and charged into Orick, hitting him at full speed. Gallen bounced back, but Orick slid through the opening. Two more wingmen were sweeping from the ridge above, and Tallea ran to Gallen's side, leapt through the opening.

  A huge stone hit the door and shattered, then Gallen leapt through.

  The group sat inside the door for a moment, panting, looking at one another. Maggie's hand was bleeding, and Orick had lost a tuft of hair. Ceravanne may have suffered a sprained ankle, but Immortals healed so quickly that it would cause her no grief. A rock chip bad struck Gallen in the chin, and he was bleeding.

  Outside, the wingmen screamed in frustration, hurling rocks against the doors, but none dared land for the hunt.

  Gallen sat panting for a moment, and Ceravanne held aloft the light globe. "Welcome to the city of Indallian," she said, and her voice was tight with emotion. "It has been long since I've given such a greeting."

  Tallea looked up. The room flashed and reflected Ceravanne's light. They were in an incredibly large chamber, where gracefully carved stone rose high. In the distant past, the room had been painted cream or ivory, and stonework floral patterns had been painted in their own bright hues. High up, three magnificent silver chandeliers graced the ceiling, each with hundreds of sconces. Bright crystals at their base reflected back the light, throwing prismatic colors sparkling across the walls.

  Beneath each chandelier was a high, arching passage that led deeper into the mountain.

  The place smelled of dust and earth, and for once Tallea almost rejoiced at the cold, in spite of the tearing pain in her side, for at least they had escaped the wingmen. Yet there was more here than barren passages. Unlike the tunnels they had wandered before, this place still carried the faint scent of people, of ancient sweat and food, of tapestries moldering in distant halls.

  "Hey," Orick said. "Are you certain that no one lives here?"

  "Great is the lure of the city of Indallian," Ceravanne whispered. "I suppose that many people may live here yet. Miners may have ventured here in hopes of finding riches. . . . Other beings."

  "That lock was rusted," Orick said, "but the door hasn't been closed for hundreds of years. Thirty or fifty maybe."

  "Then whoever closed the city is surely dead and gone," Maggie said hopefully.

  "Do not be so certain," Ceravanne said. "Many peoples are fashioned to live long. Even a Derrit, with its thick hide, is likely to live three or four centuries."

  "But would a Derrit be smart enough to lock a door?" Maggie asked.

  "Don't be deceived," Ceravanne whispered. "Derrits are not dumb animals. They are foul, and live in their own filth, and they may eat you. But they are also clever and cunning. They were made to be workers on a brutal world, where conditions are harsh."

  "But why would you make them that way?" Orick asked.

  "I cannot speak for their makers, for the Derrits were formed long before I was born," Ceravanne said. "But I believe that it was not the creator's intent to form such foul beings. Often, peoples who have been created fail as a species. Their love for one another is too fragile. Their passions too untameable. Such peoples usually die out. But while the Derrits are a failure as a species, either unwilling or unable to lift their own kind by sharing their culture, they are successful as individuals."

  "More than successful, I would say," Gallen put in. "For thousands of years, other peoples here in Babel have hunted them, trying to get rid of their kind. But it has proven damned near impossible to rid this world of them."

  "So they're forced to live here in these lonely mountains?" Maggie asked.

  "In the winter, when the snow comes on, they often move to lower valleys," Gallen said. "Where they sneak into barns and throttle sheep, or steal children from their beds."

  "Let us speak no more about them," Ceravanne whispered.

  "Yes," Gallen whispered. "They are unpleasant to think about."

  Ceravanne raised the light toward the middle hallway, and began limping toward it. "Are you all right?" Gallen asked, taking her arm tenderly.

  "Bloody, but unbowed," Ceravanne said, smiling. And Tallea followed them down into the darkness, holding her own aching gut. The pain was bad, but tolerable for a Caldurian.

  Long they journeyed into the heart of the ancient city of Indallian, until Tallea felt certain that darkness must have fallen outside, but Ceravanne led them on. Several times they found corridors that were blocked by falling rubble, and once the floor had caved in beneath them to a deep shaft where great caverns had been excavated.

  Ceravanne kept having to turn aside into new hallways, and once she stopped and threw her hands up, crying, "This isn't the way." They had been traveling down a well-made corridor, but suddenly it turned into a crude cave, chiseled by rough hands. Ceravanne walked back a hundred meters, found a side passage that none of them had noticed, for it was purposely concealed behind a large stone slab. It took them in a new direction, and Ceravanne seemed less and less certain of this new path with each footstep.

  Finally, she called a halt.

  Tallea put down her pack, and the group sat wearily. They began eating a small dinner of apples and jerky. Their provisions were failing. In two or three more days, Tallea figured they would be down to scraps.

  Ceravanne looked around the corridor worriedly, and Gallen whispered into her ear, "Perhaps we should scout ahead, while the others rest."

  Ceravanne bit her lower lip, looked ahead down the passage. "Perhaps we should."

  Maggie took two candles from her pack, lit them, and in moments Gallen and Ceravanne departed. Orick grumbled about the small dinner, and lay in a comer. Tallea went to him. "You can have my apple core," she offered.

  "Ah, I've plenty of winter fat to eat," he muttered, but when she put the apple core under his nose, he gingerly took it in his teeth, gulped it down.

  Tallea lay down beside him. She was falling asleep when Orick began muttering his nightly prayers. Cold from the stone seemed to be seeping into her wound, and Tallea lay wondering why the hosts of the Inhuman would remember this as a place of terror.

  Tallea's muscles had been strengthening daily, and she stretched her arms in spite of her fresh wound, hoping that she would soon be ready to begin exercise. She considered sparring with Gallen, wished that her ribs would stand for it, but she was still too weak. Pe
rhaps in a couple of days she would be ready.

  She listened long, and realized that in the distance she could hear a sound like wind rushing through trees. But it could only have been water cascading through some underground chasm. For a while she thought of searching for the source of the sound, so that she could refill the water bags. But instead she lay still, thinking to do it in the morning, and fell asleep to the gurgling of water.

  Hours later, when she wakened, Gallen and Ceravanne were just getting back. Ceravanne seemed greatly relieved, and when Tallea put her head up, Gallen explained. "We've been lost in a side corridor, but Ceravanne found the main road once again."

  Tallea lay back down, and Gallen went to sleep beside Maggie while Ceravanne lay beside Tallea.

  Tallea closed her eyes, and lay for a long while, but something felt wrong. She looked around, counted those sleeping nearby. Everyone was there, the candles were still flickering.

  She sniffed, but could feel no strange air currents. And she held her breath. Aside from the soft snoring of Orick, there was no sound.

  And then it hit her: no sound. She could not hear the rushing waters. Which meant that either the underground brook had subsided in a matter of hours, or else . . . someone had closed off a door, masking the sound.

  Tallea loosened her knife in its sheath, and lay for the rest of the long night with her eyes open, perfectly still. Once, she thought she heard a distant thud, as if someone had stubbed a foot on the floor, but there was nothing else.

  Still, when Gallen woke hours later, she whispered in his ear: "Take care. We may have visitors." And as they quietly slipped away from their resting place, Tallea listened down each side corridor for the sound of running water.

  For the next few hours they hurried along down passageways that were unimpeded, past storage rooms and old quarters where thousands of people had been housed. They were entering a section of Indallian that had been far more than the mere service tunnels or mining camps found at the east entrance. This was the full-fledged city, in its ancient glory, and often they passed through huge chambers where sunlight shone down through shafts in the ceiling upon vast reflecting pools, or where wooden bedposts still sat in the musty ground, petrified.

  In these areas, where ancient shafts and fire holes littered the ceiling, they had little need for Gallen's light, and Ceravanne nearly ran through the halls, filled with a new intensity. "This district was called Westfall," she said as they passed through one great chamber where an underground river rushed through a stone causeway, spilling out into the light. "Children used to bathe here, laughing under the icy water."

  And in the next chamber, vast brick ovens sat next to each other. "Here the bakers worked night and day, cooking loaves for the household."

  And in the next great chamber, the tallest and grandest of all, sunlight shone down through five holes in the roof, two at one end of the hall, and three at the far end. There were long reflecting pools under each light, and all along the great chamber were statues of ancient warriors lining the central hall—short, fat pikemen of the Poduni race; Tacian giants with great hammers; the tall Boonta men with long spears and their narrow shields, an army of warriors representing many nations.

  And at the end of the hallway were two thrones. "And here," Ceravanne said nervously, "is where I ruled, beside my brave Belorian."

  She stopped, and looked away shyly. Above each throne was a vast statue of marble that had once been overlaid with gold, but the images had been defaced by thieves, all of the gold chiseled away.

  Maggie gasped, and rushed forward to the statues, as did each of them. The statue on the right bore the image of Ceravanne, as one would imagine she would look in a few years. But the image on the left . . .

  "Gallen?" Maggie called, and she looked back at Gallen, horror and confusion on her face. Ceravanne strode forward, clenching Gallen's glow globe so that the light shone from it fiercely, and she held it up to the statue.

  The image was chipped and scarred. The hair had been cut shorter than Gallen's and the bearded face belonged to an older man. But there could be no mistake: the eyes, the chin, the nose, were all Gallen's.

  "Belorian?" Maggie asked, still confused.

  "When the Rodim slew him," Ceravanne said softly, "they destroyed his memories, so that he could never be reborn with those memories intact. But they did not obliterate his body. His genome was stored, so that his seed could be propagated, undefiled."

  Tallea heard Gallen gasp. "You mean I'm—But how?"

  "When the Dronon came, it was a dark time. Across the galaxy, the cry came out. 'We need more Lord Protectors.' And of all the Lord Protectors on our world, Belorian was judged the most worthy of cloning.

  "And so, the Lady Semarritte sent technicians to our world, and they took what they needed. Seeds for the future, as they also harvested seeds from other worlds. "

  Ceravanne looked up at Gallen, and there were tears in her eyes. "I do not know your circumstances, but I can guess: you were born on a backward world, much like ours. Your mother and father had no other children, and it was voiced abroad that they were desperate."

  "I never heard that," Gallen whispered.

  "I did," Maggie countered. "My mother told me of it, when I was small."

  "And so when you were born, no one worried that you did not look too much like your mother or father, for you were a gift from heaven. And you were a smart child, bright and resourceful, strong and fiercely independent," Ceravanne said. "That is the way it happens.

  "In a time of peace, you would have become a trader, perhaps—fiercely competitive. But you were born during uneasy times.

  "Gallen, it is no accident that you are a Lord Protector. Maggie told me how Veriasse found you only a few weeks ago, that he 'chanced' upon you in an inn. But though it is our good fortune that he found you, I suspect that little chance was involved. I suspect that he knew a seed had been planted in the town of Clere, so he sought for you in the town of your birth.

  "And I am grateful that the Lady Everynne—when she learned the truth-sent you back to us, in the hour of our greatest need."

  "I am a clone?" Gallen asked, and there was still disbelief in his blue eyes.

  "Ah," Orick grunted, studying Gallen. "Now I see. The Bock never would tell us that Gallen was human!" "He's not—quite," Ceravanne said. "Belorian was from a race of people called the Denars."

  "The Denars?" Gallen asked.

  "A race designed to be Lord Protectors," Ceravanne said. "The first race designed to be so. It is not by chance that your hands are quick or your mind is nimble. You were born with great gifts, and a desire to use them in the service of your fellow man. "

  Gallen folded his arms and looked up at the statue for a long minute. Then he spoke to Ceravanne, and his voice was husky with resentment and accusation. "You know these corridors. You brought me here on purpose, when you could have bypassed this chamber."

  "All these past few days," Ceravanne said softly, "the memories the Inhuman gave you have been telling you what it wants you to become. I thought it best that you find out what you are."

  "I think, rather, you are showing me what you want me to become." Gallen grunted as if it did not matter to him at all, and nodded. "Let's go, then."

  And Ceravanne led them from the great hall, down some long corridors. They were near the borders of the city, and now they rushed for the east gate, but a few kilometers away.

  Gallen looked back once, and his eyes were full of tears, and Tallea pitied him for being a pawn in such a large game. He seemed to be running blindly, so she ran ahead of him, taking the lead in case there was danger.

  They were jogging down a corridor, and entered a broad room when she smelled it—the garlicky scent of Derrits, thick as smoke.

  She halted and turned, and there in the shadows, the great beasts were lying: three of them rose up on their knuckles and growled, each of them more than twice the height of a man.

  "Run!" Gallen shouted, and he drew
his sword. Tallea would have stood to fight beside him, but her sword was gone, and she had only a knife and her dueling trident—no weapons to pierce Derrit hide.

  She rushed down the nearest passage, leading the way, with Ceravanne behind her. The Derrits lunged, their shadows dancing against the far wall. They had huge yellow eyes, and bones tied in their stringy gray hair clattered when they moved. The largest was an enormous male with dirty yellow skin and testicles as large as a stallion's. He wore a mail shirt, woven from bits of chain mail taken from a dozen human warriors, and he grabbed a massive door to use as a shield. In his other hand, he took an ancient halberd. He roared and charged, and Orick stood beside Gallen and rose on his hind legs. The two of them looked like children, hoping to withstand the monster.

  And Tallea stopped and rushed to Gallen's side. Her Caldurian blood called her, and she could not leave friends in need.

  Ceravanne and Maggie needed no urging to run, yet they did not go far—merely crossed the room, then stopped and turned. Ceravanne crushed the glow globe in her hand, squeezing it tighter and tighter, so that its light shone fiercely. Tallea admired the woman's bravery, for the Tharrin had no protection, and she held the light up only to aid the warriors.

  The Derrits howled in pain, and raised their hands to shield their eyes, their pointed yellow teeth flashing. The huge male raised his shield, protecting his eyes. They were a shifting mass, acting as if they would charge, and Tallea dared not tum her back on them. She pulled her dagger and dueling trident, held one in each hand. They were small weapons, hardly hig enough to do much damage, but she'd honed them as sharp as steel can be.

  The male Derrit roared and surged forward, using his shield to slap Orick aside. The bear went flying like a doll, yelping in pain, and tumbled past Tallea. The male raised his halberd to strike, as if it were a hatchet, and Gallen danced in, struck the giant under the rib cage, and rolled away, his sword dripping blood.

  The Derrit swung wide, slamming the halberd into the stone floor so hard that the weapon shattered. The Derrit raised his head and howled at the roof, never taking his amber eyes from Gallen, and swung his shield at Tallea. She ducked under its blow, felt the huge door whistle over her head, and knew that if she'd been hit, the blow would have shattered every bone in her body.