by Ellis Knox
The spine fish was horrible. We could just choke down the pseudo-flounder, and for the most part we were able to keep it down. We were never poisoned, but a diet of nothing but fish stressed our digestion almost beyond endurance. It was fortunate the sea water was potable.
After two days at sea, we were well fed, on course, and thoroughly sick of each other. I shall not speak of the personal indignities suffered by the utter lack of privacy. We soon learned to look the other way and pretend not to hear. It is marvelous how quickly one adapts to circumstances. Modesty is, I firmly believe, a social luxury.
Sleep was more difficult. A stone boat is only slightly more comfortable than stony ground, but is considerably more crowded. Being so narrow, the boat permitted only two of us to lie down at the same time, so we had to sleep in shifts. This meant the others had to keep quiet, speaking in whispers. This, in turn, wrought havoc on our schedule of meals.
Two more days passed thus. The distant, ruddy glow became our pole star, the only means of navigation. Yet it seemed to draw no nearer, day by day. We were sailing, we were alive, but we wore on each other. Our nerves frayed. I began to loathe the look of my companions. I could hardly bear to hear one speak. My only refuge was sleep, and I came to despise whatever woke me. It may have been unreasonable of me, but I think I was losing my reason. Worse, I saw a similar incipient madness growing in the eyes of the others. I began to speculate on who would break first. We all demanded Bessarion do his prayers silently.
I was the one who spied the light first—a faint shape at the edge of sight, several points to starboard. I was sitting between Professor Queller and Bessarion. Cosmas was stretched out, asleep (he snored most violently). Trusting neither my eyes nor my voice, I tapped the dwarf on his shoulder and pointed. He reacted at once—his eyes are better than mine.
It was away to port from the red glow. It at once looked to be nearer, and the color was different, a shade of yellow so pale as to be the color of rich cream. More importantly, Beso and Cosmas both confirmed that they could just make out the shape of land.
“Land!” Beso cried.
“Where? Where?” This, even though Bessarion was pointing.
“I see it,” Nik said. “I’ll steer for it.” His voice rose with excitement. There was no discussion. We didn’t care for anything at that point except to make landfall.
To get out of that wretched boat.
Hunting
The land was quite unlike what we had seen in the other place, the land of the dead town. The lights from the interior could be seen to come from plants, some sort of phosphorescence that threw the nearer beaches into silhouette. We steered for the nearest point, there being no need to watch for shoals or breakers or rocks. We landed easily.
The ground itself told us we were in a new kind of place, for we landed upon a beach of black sand. It ran to left and right, curving away sharply into the darkness, its boundaries demarcated by the pale glow we had seen from a distance.
We all piled out of the boat. Nik and Cosmas ran it farther up the beach, above the high tide mark. Henrik bent to take up a handful of the sand.
“Perfectly ordinary silicate,” he said.
“It’s black,” I said. “Silica isn’t black.”
“Yes, it is,” he returned. I should have known better. “You no doubt have forgotten the black sands at Limassol or Santorini.”
I hadn’t forgotten; I didn’t know about them, but I nodded anyway.
“Especially fine, however,” he added, rubbing a few grains between finger and thumb.
“Trees,” Beso said, pointing inland. “No food here, but maybe in there.”
“Not may be,” Nik said, “but has to be. Something in there will be edible, if it doesn’t make us sick first. The boat is secure, and everything else we’ll bring with us.”
“What?” Henrik said, looking up from his inspection of the sand. “Ah. Yes. Quite. Lead on, Niki.”
We fell into our order of march again. My stomach seemed to crouch in eager anticipation within me. We hunted for food. I was armed with no finer a weapon that my Alpenstock, but I fancied my distant forebears had little better, and they’d survived. Some of them, anyway.
The inland rose in a gradual slope. The beach gave way to tall underbrush dominated by plants we promptly named trident bushes, for each was comprised of wide, delicate fans of pale white, looking like nothing so much as lace fern, except for the color. From the center of each grew a darker stem that broke into three long points. They could scarcely be called anything other than trident bushes. They grew taller than Cosmas, so they obscured our view for a little while.
Nik found a trail through them almost at once. This was both good and bad. It kept us out of the undergrowth, whose nature we did not know but which could not be entirely harmless. But something had to have made the trail, which implied animal life, equally unknown to us. Danger on the trail; danger off. Perhaps the wildlife would be no more dangerous than rabbits.
The trail got us through the trident ferns, which grew only near the beach. Once beyond them, we saw the plants that had first caught our attention at sea.
These trees were somewhat like enormous palm trees. Tall, smooth trunks of cobalt blue were surmounted by an umbrella of fronds that spread in fans of twenty feet or more, giving off a soft, cream-colored light that fell in a hundred-foot circle beneath. A more pleasant street lamp could scarcely be conceived. The trees were plentiful and their light was bright enough we were able to douse our lamps. In place of the trident ferns, the undergrowth here was hardly more than a thick moss, leaving the space between the trees open.
“There are likely to be predators,” Nik said. “Everyone keep close.”
I hardly needed that advice.
“Predators?” Beso said. “I hope not!”
“On the contrary,” Queller said, “that would be an excellent find, for it would mean meat.”
My stomach growled at the word.
“Depends on the predators,” Nik said. “Some might have spears, or even guns.”
“I can’t believe any people are here,” I said.
“I don’t expect it, but better to be safe. Here we have life, so I’m going to plan for the worst.”
“Nik,” I said, scolding a bit, “we encounter the first living world since we left the Surface, the first possibility of food, and instead of enjoying it, you think of only the most awful possibilities.”
Nik started to reply, but I cut him off.
“I already know what you’ll say: you plan for catastrophe in order to enjoy the moment.”
“Something like that,” Nik grinned. “When in a new place, I check the room first. Then I can sit in the chair and relax.”
We moved through the cream-white light in a kind of daze. After so much darkness and so many crises, this interlude was hypnotic. We fell silent one by one, lest we disturb the reverie of the others. For the first time since emerging into the Second World, I began to like the place. Somewhat. The silence was eerie. Even in the great beech forests of my homeland, one will hear the occasional finch or the rattle of a woodpecker, but here there was nothing save the sound of our own footsteps. In its own way, the forest of lantern trees felt as empty as the dwarf city.
“Stop!” Professor Queller’s voice rang out in the stillness like a scream. We all halted. I thought he might have been injured.
“Look!” he commanded, pointing.
The lantern trees thinned here. Through a gap in the foliage, I at once saw what had made the professor cry out: a castle on a hill.
That was my first impression. A second look said manor house, and a third look said ruins. I couldn’t even be sure the buildings were made of stone.
No trees gathered around the structure to obscure our view. What looked very much like a curtain wall encircled a large building that ascended into several towers.
Queller was already plunging cross-country.
“Uncle,” Nik said sharply, “keep together.�
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“Niki,” Queller pleaded, but he did stop.
“We’ll go see, but let’s go carefully, yes? Stick to trails.”
“The way seems open enough,” Queller said, petulant as a child.
“How many landscapes are free of poisonous plants?” Nik asked. “We’re not walking the heaths.”
As ever, Nik’s cool head restored his uncle’s reason.
“You’re right,” Queller said, returning to the path. “Lead on, nephew, and keep us all safe.”
Nik soon found a side trail that ran across the mossy ground. Within a hundred yards, this gave way to shrubs that grew in unruly bunches, with long, woody branches almost like reeds. On each branch grew tiny bulbous shapes gathered so close together they gave the appearance of a kind of lumpy fur. The branches grew to a height of five or six feet. The branches held a faint glow, so we moved through a forest of sticks. The ground beneath was damp, spongy from untold centuries of undisturbed rot. It had the feel, and the smell, of a peat bog.
After a time, the ground began to rise. The bog became more solid, and the reed bushes became fewer, then gave out altogether, to be replaced by a carpet of vines supporting a net of tendrils, dark blue-green in color. Something in them caught the light from the lantern trees high above, which made the ground appear covered in dew. The effect made me stoop to touch one, but the plants were perfectly dry.
“That wasn’t smart,” Nik said roughly.
“Maybe not,” I said, “but we are explorers, aren’t we? We can’t go through all of the Second World—sorry, Urland—as if we walked in a bubble.”
“She’s right, Niki. We must learn about this world, if we are to survive it.”
“I’m being overly protective, I know,” Nik said, “but I feel responsible. Too responsible. In future expeditions, I’m going to bring only hired hands; no relatives or friends. No offense.”
“I take no offense,” I said. I offered a quick smile, but inside the smile lasted longer. He had called me friend, if only indirectly. I had been trying earnestly to be considered an equal member of the expedition. Somehow along the way, we had become friends. That felt invaluable.
These crystalline lights had one other effect: anything moving among or beneath them could be tracked by the jostling of the lights. The plants themselves were only about knee-high on me. Around the base of a tree, they gathered and rose several feet in a mass, then thinned to tendrils that climbed right to the top, where they were lost among the fronds.
“Upside down plants,” Professor Queller said, as if someone had asked. “Fascinating. Do make a note, Miss Lauten, when we’re back at camp.”
“They don’t look upside down to me, professor,” I said.
He kicked at a plant next to the path, tossing the vines back readily and exposing bare ground beneath.
“You see? No roots.”
“You mean to say the roots are up there in the trees?”
“After a fashion. Were we to do a careful analysis, I’m certain we would find these plants require phlogiston to live. They draw the substance, in some mixed form, from the trees. We might find a few ground roots here and there. The more I inspect, the more I draw an astonishing but inescapable conclusion.”
He started walking again. I knew his ways well enough by now. The pause was to draw a response.
“And what is that?” I obliged.
“In Urland, the processing of phlogiston takes the place of photosynthesis. And thus do I reply to one of the key weaknesses of the Queller Theory.”
He’d evidently given his ideas a title. “And what is that weakness?”
“Why no plants accompanied the Urlandic creatures to the Surface. It has puzzled me for years. As so often happens, what appears mysterious in theoretical form becomes evident once direct observations can be made. I have no doubt that if we were to transfer one of these plants—any of the flora of Urland—to the Surface, it would perish. It could not bear sunlight. Even as a rose or a turnip planted here would wither and die, for lack of the ability to use phlogiston.”
I could find no fault in his reasoning, but found little comfort there, either. For it only emphasized how different were our two worlds—not merely different, but inimical. We were the strangers here. We were the transplants, though I felt rather more like a turnip than a rose. I could only hope we were not doomed to wither and die.
Our conversation about the glitter vines—we were all naming things now, almost with every step we took—and my gloomy thoughts that followed, had brought us onto the flanks of the hill. Here, the plant life thinned still more until, at the summit, there was only stony ground and a cluster of ruined buildings. Nik promptly named the place Bald Mountain. This only put me in mind of the witch of the Harz. Somehow, having discovered life in the Second World, I was becoming even bleaker in my attitude.
The buildings garnered all our attention. What I thought was a curtain wall turned out to be a line of lesser buildings standing below the larger structure. The large structure consisted of a central hall as big as any castle great hall or palace ballroom. Chambers flanked either side. All the buildings were roofless, and the walls had crumbled. Dressed stones, two and even three feet thick, lay everywhere. All were mottled with some kind of lichen substance. The lantern trees being absent here, we were forced to use our Ruhmkorff lamps. Amid the broken walls and fragments, we were like five ghosts moving through the castle ruins of some ancient laird.
“Well,” Nik said from where he had bent to inspect a stone, “this is not dwarf work.”
“Dwarves,” Bessarion said with a sniff, “do not build walls that fall down.”
The discovery of the building was our first proof that at least one other people besides dwarves, a civilized people, had once lived in the Second World. This would overturn a century of research and speculation across a whole array of sciences. Darwin would have to revisit his On the Origin of Folk. A whole generation of scholars would find themselves facing new and unexpected questions.
“It is a temple,” Professor Queller declared. He sat upon a stone, looking as happy as a boy with ice cream.
“It might be a fort, Uncle,” Nik offered, “or some kind of armory.”
“Nonsense,” Queller snorted. “No one builds an armory unless it is near a city.”
He slapped his thigh; the sound made us all jump.
“A city!” he cried. He stood and snatched up his lantern. “Temple or fort, there must a town nearby, and I must find it!”
“Don’t go running off,” Nik warned.
“But don’t you see? This will be revolutionary. Positively revolutionary!”
“We stick together,” Nik said, his voice hardening. “You can’t make a revolution if you’re dead.”
The professor puffed out his cheeks. “Then come along. For once, I shall lead.”
“No, you won’t.” Nik moved to block his way.
Queller puffed himself even more. “Discovery is the first priority of this expedition,” he declared. “A fact you appear to have forgotten, Mr Thesiger.”
The anger did not surprise me, but the formal address did.
“You’re wrong, Henk.” Nik’s casual familiarity came like a counterpunch. For a moment I worried they might exchange more than angry words. If our two leaders fell out, we were all lost. Nik rescued the situation.
“Our first priority is to keep alive, and for that we have to eat. Then we can explore.”
This was so sensible and obvious, even the good Doktor Professor could not argue against it. The tension went from his shoulders. He even chuckled quietly.
“Quite right, Niki. You see why I had to bring you along. I suffer from an excess of enthusiasm, perhaps to a fault.”
Enthusiasm was, in my opinion, too kind a word.
“I’m going to have a look around,” Nik said. “Beso will help. You three can poke around in the ruins, but do not go beyond them. I don’t want to have to go looking for you.”
He sai
d this last directly to his uncle. Queller nodded meekly, promising to confine himself to the ruins.
Rather than investigate, I chose to take this opportunity to record. I had seen so much in so short a time, I had to get it down on paper. Cosmas fetched out my notebook and a pencil. I sat on the ground and made my notes. My handwriting had shrunk over the weeks until it was hardly more than tiny scratches, filled with a whole library of abbreviations on a par with any medieval scribe. Despite our situation, I allowed a slight gleam of hope to reach my heart. There was life in the Second World, enough so that I had some reasonable belief we would not starve, though poisoning was still a firm possibility. My chief question now was whether the builders of this place yet lived.
I was in the midst of writing about our fishing exploits when a sharp cry made me jump.
“Eeyah! Ha ha ho! See!”
Each scarcely articulate statement was separated by a cackling laughter that identified the professor. He did not sound as if he were in danger. I looked at Cosmas, who shrugged with shoulders and hands.
“He has found something,” the ogre said.
“Come, come at once!”
“I suppose we must,” I said. “Sometimes he’s like taking a child to the zoo, running from one display to the next.”
“Huh. Huh. Huh.”
Nik came hurrying back at the sound of the cries. Beso trailed behind, without hurrying.
“What the devil?” Nik said, though he did not wait for a reply.
We found Henrik well inside the ruins, where tumbles of stone indicated this had once been a tower, or at least a room. Vines snaked everywhere, and rust-colored lichen grew wherever the surface was flat. The professor was pointing at one jumble of stone, proudly, as if he were a hound that had run down a fox.
“What?” Nik asked, without actually saying that this had better be good.
Henrik reiterated his pointing. He grinned broadly.
“Alive or dead, Herr Doktor Professor?” Cosmas asked. His stance showed he was ready for either.
“You really must be more explicit, Henrik,” I added.