“Save the rest for the big ones,” Einar advised.
His point was well made. The divine flame had reduced the ants to charcoal, a hammer swatting a flea. Also, it made the air stink of acid. Christopher coughed and wondered when war had become a marathon in armor. He really missed his horse.
Suddenly, Cannan looked around wildly. He was jogging with his sword on his shoulder, thus swinging his head like that threatened his ears, but that did not seem to be the source of his distress. The hallway they were in appeared no different to Christopher, save that it had leveled out from its constant downward slope, but Cannan clearly did not like what he saw.
“Run,” the red knight said, and put his words to effect.
Christopher, out of habit, glanced back at Einar for confirmation.
“Faster,” was the Ranger’s response.
Now the party pounded across the concrete-like ground. Christopher fancied he could hear a change in the timbre of the echoes of their footfalls. Then the roof fell in on his head.
6
A RISING TIDE
It was a false roof, the blocks of concrete plaster no more than a few inches thick. A dozen feet above the enclosed tunnel was a natural cave roof, complete with stalactites. As the walls tumbled down, Christopher could see the rest of the cavern, approximately eighty feet long and sixty or seventy wide. The ants had made a fake tunnel through a real cavern to lure them into the open where they could be surrounded and swarmed by the horde of black chitin rustling across the ground.
Ahead of them he could see more falling earth. Ants were closing the passage out. Lalania flashed the beam behind them, and he saw they were doing the same to the rear. Sealing him in a cavern with several hundred giant ants seemed like a pretty good trap.
Cannan and Istvar reached the collapsing exit too late. Half a dozen soldiers stood their ground briefly before being dismembered.
“Backs to the wall,” Istvar shouted. “Form a half-ring.” The ants would only be able to come at them on one level instead of two. They might be able to hold them off.
Cannan, surprisingly, did not obey. He clawed at the debris blocking the exit, throwing boulders to the side.
“That’s a lot of ants,” Gregor said, taking up his place in the ring. “They are not the threat,” Einar noted. “They are merely workers. The ants do not intend to defeat us by battle.”
It was true. The carpet of ants advanced slowly, and Christopher could see they were all the smaller workers. Presumably they could try to drown the humans under the weight of numbers, but it seemed like a bad plan given that it had already failed when tried with soldiers.
A sibilant, liquid gurgling crept into hearing range. Christopher looked down and realized he was standing in a puddle of water. When he looked up, he could see the reflection of Lalania’s lantern in the rising water.
Cannan kept digging at the blocked entrance with his bare hands.
“Should I use the lyre?” Lalania asked, clearly hoping the answer was yes.
“If you do, they will attack,” Einar answered. “Their only purpose is to prevent us from opening the way. The water will be our doom.”
“Theirs too,” Gregor objected.
“The queen is desperate. She spends her peasants and her magic freely.”
“Huh,” Christopher said. “This was going to be my plan.”
Cannan swore and stepped back. He had pulled a boulder out of the blockage, and now a stream of water shot out from the hole. The stream got bigger as the water wore away at the dirt.
“They have already flooded the other side,” Einar pointed out helpfully. “Did you think to prepare water breathing magic?”
“Did you think to suggest it?” Lalania snapped back.
Christopher ignored them both and pushed closer to the center of the room. The ants paused at his approach. Many of them were now struggling in the waist-deep water. He raised his sword and cast a spell, most likely the same spell the ants were using. Originally he had thought to use this spell to drown the hive, but its area was too limited. It would only affect a small area . . . such as this cavern.
What could be raised by magic could be lowered by it. The water began to sink. The ants clawed gratefully at the ground as it reappeared.
Lalania came to join him, away from the blocked exit. One by one, the other men did the same, eyeing her curiously.
“Wait,” Lalania suggested.
After a moment, several ants scurried to the exit and began tearing it open. When the party did not attack, a dozen more joined the effort. At the other end of the cavern, more ants swarmed the wreckage and soon began flowing out of the room.
The ants clearing their end made enough space to flee through. A couple dozen more joined them, but by then the rest had moved to the far side.
The way was now open.
“We are all men of rank,” Istvar said. “We could have held our breath longer than any peasant. You could have had a room full of treasure for the mere price of waiting a bit and lowering the water when it was ready to harvest.”
Einar seemed to agree with the Duke. “Do you think to extend mercy? Those workers are all doomed; they will die in agony and madness when their queen is slain.”
“And yet,” Gregor said, “for this moment, it was not necessary to slay them.”
“None can say what the future will hold,” Lalania said.
“Our death at the jaws of a thousand ants seems likely.” Einar shook his head. “Quite possibly at the mandibles of those you have just spared.”
Christopher shrugged. “At least we don’t have to dig our way out.”
Istvar laughed and pushed into the tunnel.
They moved more cautiously now. Christopher could feel the weight of the earth over his head. Hundreds of feet underground, the air was warm but not still. A steady breeze flowed through the tunnels. Einar used it in his navigation, following the breeze deeper into the lair.
They passed workers huddling in rooms off to the sides, but there were no more attacks. Then all at once, a swarm of workers rushed at them. Istvar and Cannan killed a dozen before they realized the creatures were simply trying to get past. Seized by intuition, Christopher and his companions chose to follow them. For a minute, the humans and ants fled together.
A deep rumbling roared up the tunnel they had just abandoned. The breeze reversed and pushed hard at their fleeing backs as dirt and stone collapsed. Once the workers began fleeing into side tunnels, Einar called a halt.
“We are safe now,” the Ranger explained. “There are at least a hundred yards of rubble between us and any possible entrance to the throne room. The queen yields whatever treasure you can claim from her subjects on this side of the barrier in the hopes that you will be satiated.”
“If we start killing ants, they’ll start fighting back,” Christopher said.
“Surely you don’t expect her to murder them for you and serve their heads on a silver platter?”
That imagery reminded him of the goblins and a series of mistakes he was determined not to repeat.
“Can we still make it to the queen?”
Einar considered. “There are yet surprises; we have not faced the queen’s champion. How much spell-craft do you still command?”
“About . . . half.”
Einar’s eyebrows went up.
“I know the feeling,” Istvar said to the Ranger. “For myself, I am depleted. I have spent everything healing Ser Cannan. Although the royal sword makes him deadly, it does not provide the durability of rank.” There was an implicit condemnation in his tone.
Lalania, despite being covered in sweat, bug juice, and dirt, rose to Christopher’s defense. “In the service of a healer, rank can be replaced. As you yourself have demonstrated.”
Einar ignored the argument. “What little magic I possess is sufficient to find our way out again but no more. Thus, I conclude that we can choose to press on with middling risk.”
“We could retreat and return
tomorrow?” Gregor suggested, although he didn’t seem to think much of the idea.
“No,” Christopher said. Never mind that he never wanted to walk into a subway tunnel again after this. “That will just give her a chance to recharge, too.”
“A wise choice,” Einar agreed. “If we retreat now they will take that as a sign of weakness and fight even more fiercely to prevent our egress. I conclude that retreating also carries middling risk.”
Gregor frowned. “I’m pretty sure if we press on they’ll also fight more fiercely out of desperation.”
“True,” Einar said. “Hence, the risk.”
“Lala, if you please,” Christopher said. He finally realized they had been waiting for him to give the order.
She shook out her hair, as if her appearance would affect the quality of her performance, and handed the lantern to Einar. “Once I start, I cannot stop, lest the magic end. So if you have any questions of me, ask them now.”
It felt like a challenge. Had Christopher really dragged her down here merely as a torchbearer? Was she just another magic item in his pocket?
“What questions should I be asking you?” he said.
“Many,” she replied with a snort at his attempted sophistry. “But not that one.” She finished unwrapping the lyre from its leather covering, drew in a breath, and struck the first note.
White mist rose up from the ground and streamed to the blockage. Soon the party was standing uncomfortably in the center of the tunnel while dirt and rocks flowed by on conveyer belts of mist. The ants launched an attack from the still open end, trying to silence the lyre. A dozen soldiers and a score of workers died on Istvar and Cannan’s blades. Christopher got to watch this battle more closely because they were not running for their lives. Both men focused on killing the ants as quickly as possible so they could not be overrun. The ant chitin, which seemed so hard and durable under his feet, parted like cheese under the men’s blades, especially Cannan’s. The ants also fought without regard to defense, lunging suicidally to inflict a single bite against an arm or a leg. They traded their lives to deplete the men’s tael. When Christopher reached out and replenished Cannan with a minor spell, the swarm lost heart and melted away. The battle was over as quickly as it had begun.
Cannan strode among the still bodies, stabbing. Christopher thought he might be administering mercy until the red knight stabbed an ant head that had already been fully severed.
The red knight returned to his side. “You should know,” he said, and held the haft of his sword up. Christopher could see that the large aquamarine gemstone set in the pommel was glowing with an inner light of purplish hue. The blade had collected the tael of its victims.
“I always wanted a sword like that,” Istvar said wistfully. “It lends a certain dignity to the necessary aftermath of a battle.”
Einar disapproved. “It covers an ugly truth with a pretty lie. Battlefields should be grotesque, lest they become too comfortable.”
“Being surrounded by grotesquery dulls the senses,” Istvar argued. “Men must retain the capacity to be disgusted.”
Christopher was surprised at the sophistication of the argument. He was also slightly worried that this was not the place to have an essentially theological discussion.
Gregor ended the argument in his own special way. “Imagine if we could make a cannon do that,” he said. “The best and worst of both.” Cannan grunted and pointed down the tunnel. Lalania had opened the way. The party walked through the restored rubble while Lalania stroked the lyre, making the white mist polish the stones to a dull gleam. Busy work for the spirit laborers to keep them bound to the calling for as long as possible. Christopher wondered whether they resented it.
They passed two other major tunnel entrances. The third one they came to was blocked with piled boulders slathered in still-drying concrete.
“This is our final choice,” Einar announced. “The queen lies behind that hastily assembled wall.”
Gregor fumbled at his backpack and produced a silvered whiskey flask. “Friea gave me this for emergencies. I think we should top up before we go through that door.” He took a swig and passed it around. The rest of the men took varying lengths of drink depending on how badly their vitality had been depleted.
Christopher raised his hand to cast and then stopped.
“It’s too dangerous. We have to vote on it.”
“Why?” Einar asked. “Only your vote counts. We cannot do it without you, nor will we abandon you.”
Lalania’s mist began dissembling the wall.
“What if I make the wrong choice?” Christopher asked.
“Then we all die,” Cannan said. “The next words out of your mouth best be a spell.”
Christopher cast the aura detection spell. Lalania had been coaching him on how to interpret its results, which was just as well because she was currently occupied with the lyre. In this case, the results were obvious. The entranceway was covered in a blinding yellow glow of menace. He was developing a healthy fear of doorways. So many creatures seemed to enjoy layering them in deadly magic.
His dissolution spell worked; the glow winked out of existence. The wall fell in a final jumble of stones. Beyond he could see a large chamber opening off to the left, its importance revealed by a ceiling twenty feet high. A single worker ant stood in the revealed portion of the room, staring at them like a meerkat on lookout duty. Istvar and Cannan inhaled deeply and charged into the room. Christopher had no choice but to follow.
When he turned left, he caught his breath. A carpet of black stretched many yards to the back of the room. At the front of the carpet was an ant the size of a small elephant. To either side was a line of carsized warrior ants, like the ones that Joaden had reanimated. Behind them the carpet sloped down to merely ordinary cow-sized soldier ants. At the far end of the room, dimly visible in the furthest reach of the lantern’s light, was the queen, the size of a city bus, her ovipositor even now releasing a white-sheathed egg. She stared out at Christopher through glinting insectoid eyes with unmistakable intelligence. In his mind, the carpet transformed into a royal cape laid before the feet of a noble ruler, its hem of giant warriors like gems to show off her status.
Then the carpet crawled forth to claim him.
The room was checker-boarded in golden auras, although none as intense as the one that had lain across the entrance. The ants moved through the auras without concern. Gregor and Einar stepped forward to shield him and Lalania. The woman was playing the lyre in earnest now, but Christopher had no time to wonder why. The front line of ants was covered in a flickering aura only he could see, and the huge champion was wearing several layers of light.
As it charged, he cast the dissolution spell again. The coat of light went out, depriving the monster of the queen’s aid, although it did not seem to care. It rushed forward and snatched Istvar up in its huge mandibles, squeezing with incredible force. Any ordinary human would have been instantly sliced in half. Istvar was, as he had noted, somewhat more durable. Nonetheless, his tael would not hold out long. A pair of soldier ants crawled on top of the champion, reaching out to bite at him.
Istvar struck back at his captor, severing its left-handed antenna. This seemed like a weak blow until Cannan stepped forward into its blind spot and severed the champion’s mandibles with a great stroke of the royal sword. Istvar fell to the ground like an armor-plated ball.
The champion kicked out with its front legs, knocking Cannan and Istvar back, where they rolled up against Gregor and Einar. For a brief moment, the giant creature was not standing on top of his allies. Christopher called down the tower of flame.
The warriors and soldiers trapped in the column popped like corn kernels. The champion crawled forward, slightly on fire and smoking like a chimney. Istvar and Cannan scrambled to their feet and fell back. The remaining warriors rushed forward, filling the gap, protecting the champion while it recovered. Pushing his luck, Christopher stepped back and cast the spell again, narrowly a
voiding including Istvar in the blaze. When the flames cleared, they left behind only ash.
If only he could do this forever. “One left,” he told his companions. Twelfth rank had its limits.
“Save it for the queen,” Cannan said, and leapt forward to intercept the swarm of soldiers.
Two slender ants appeared above the carpet, hovering on rapidly beating wings. Christopher had not seen these before, but Lalania had when they had attacked the circle of fire yesterday. She stepped in front of him, sheltering him. Before he could react to this unchivalrous deed, a stream of golden darts flowed out from the ants, curved around Lalania, and slammed into his chest like bullets. They hurt but not as much as watching his tael leak away like a stabbed waterskin.
Around him his men were suffering from dozens of wounds. Cannan in particular seemed to be fighting on pure adrenaline. Christopher cast a high-level spell, one of the ones gained by his new rank. Healing poured into him, the excess streaming out to replenish the men.
Forty feet away, the army of soldiers formed a ladder. Soldiers flowed up to the ceiling. Now they came at Christopher’s party on two levels again. The swordsmen could not keep up. Christopher reached out to his patron for help. In response, a ring of flashing blades of light surrounded the human party at a distance of thirty feet. Every ant that tried to pass through it was diced like fruit in a blender.
Again the golden darts streamed forward. They passed through the ring of blades, swerved around Istvar’s upraised shield, which was looking the worse for wear, and struck Christopher. This was getting troubling, but he wasn’t entirely certain how to stop it. Gregor, given a reprieve from sword fighting, unlimbered his carbine and started firing. One of the fliers fell.
Christopher knew it was coming before it happened, although there was nothing he could do about it. Flames roared down from the ceiling, engulfing his party.
World of Prime 05: Black Harvest Page 5