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The Darkness Before the Dawn

Page 9

by Ryan Hughes


  "That settles it," Jedra said. "We're going."

  Kayan narrowed her eyes suspiciously. "I still don't like it. What's that city doing there, anyway? I've never heard of it before. And what's a thri-kreen doing roasting an erdlu in the middle of it? Where'd the erdlu come from? For that matter, where'd the thri-kreen come from? And where's everybody else? Something's not right here."

  Jedra dismantled their tent and put on his robe again. "I don't care," he said. "It's better than trying for Tyr." He slung his pack over his shoulders and picked up the spear. "You coming?"

  She blinked in surprise. "Jedra, what's gotten into you?"

  He shrugged. "I guess I'm just trying to be decisive."

  "What? You're rushing off into the unknown because I called you indecisive yesterday?"

  "No." He tried to explain, but it was hard to put words around his reasons. "This just feels right. I know this is where we should go."

  "It feels right. Oh, great." All the same, she apparently realized he was done arguing about it. She stood up and slowly drew on her pack. "If you're wrong..." She let the rest of the sentence hang.

  Jedra finished it for her. "If I'm wrong, we're dead. But I'm not wrong; I can feel it. This is the right thing to do."

  "I certainly hope so. All right, then, let's go."

  * * *

  The next day and a half passed much like the first, save that the terrain grew steadily rockier the farther they went. Once they had committed themselves to reaching the mystery city to the northeast there was no more argument about it, but Kayan obviously still doubted and resented the decision. There were no more goodnight Kisses; indeed, the rocks held the sun's heat well into the flight so they split the watch again and didn't even sleep together.

  Jedra's danger sense never even twinged the whole time, either while they were walking or while they rested. This rocky wasteland was truly empty.

  On the evening of the next day-their third since leaving the elves-they crested a shallow rise to find their goal laid out before them. It was indeed a city, and a vast one, too, but unfortunately Kayan's guess had been right: It was now a complete ruin. Stone buildings had collapsed into piles of rubble, and time had flattened the piles until the city was little more than a regular array of rocky hills. A few of the hardier structures- mostly toward the center of town-had fared better, some standing a few stories high, but most of the outlying buildings were mere fragments of their former selves.

  Kayan refrained from saying "I told you so." Jedra was glad of that; ridicule on top of the intense letdown he felt would have probably driven him over the edge. Their waterskins held only a swallow of water for each of them; if they didn't find more soon, they would die.

  "What about the thri-kreen?" Kayan asked. "Maybe he's real, at least."

  Jedra cast about with his watcher sense, and sure enough he felt a faint tingling of a presence toward the center of the city. "Something's alive in there," he said.

  "Can't you tell if it's the thri-kreen?"

  He shook his head. "Just something alive."

  "It could just as easily be something dangerous as something we want to meet," Kayan pointed out.

  "It doesn't feel dangerous," Jedra said, concentrating. He felt a sense of urgency more than anything. "In fact, it feels like it's in trouble."

  "What kind of trouble?"

  "I don't know. I don't sense any threat to us, though."

  Kayan looked at the piles of rubble they would have to navigate to reach whatever Jedra sensed, then with a sigh she said, "That's probably the only thing here in this slag heap; we might as well go see what it is."

  * * *

  It took them another hour of scrambling over boulders just to reach the city's center. They stayed to the middle of what had once been streets, finding that the debris wasn't as thick there, but the closer they got to the large buildings the deeper the rubble became simply because there had been more of it stacked up to begin with.

  It was hardly a street at all, now. The top half of what must have been a ten-story rectangular tower had fallen into it, scattering its massive stone blocks the way the wind scatters sand. Jedra picked his way among them, some of them nearly as tall as he was, searching for the source of the life he sensed. Now that they were close it seemed to be weaker.

  At last he thought to climb up on top of a particularly large stone and look around from there, and from that vantage he finally spotted a dusky yellow, chitinous leg sticking out from behind another block. "Over there," he said, pointing with the spear. He jumped down, and he and Kayan advanced cautiously. He didn't think they needed to fear this thri-kreen, but it never hurt to be ready for trouble.

  When they rounded the edge of the stone and saw the entire creature, they knew they had no reason to worry. Not about it attacking them, at any rate. The mantis warrior lay on its side, its six limbs sprawled out and its head resting flat on the ground. The only sign of life was a faint pulsing in its bulbous abdomen.

  There were no obvious wounds. "What's wrong with it?" Jedra asked Kayan.

  She leaned down and gingerly touched one of its clawed hands, then closed her eyes. "Dehydration," she said after a moment. "Wonderful. Thri-kreen can live for weeks without food or water. If this one is dying of thirst, there can't be any water around for a hundred miles."

  Chapter Four

  Jedra looked down at the insectile beast. It was the biggest thri-kreen he'd ever seen, easily ten feet long from the end of its abdomen to the top of its head, with its upper four appendages adapted for grasping and its lower legs long and double-jointed for running or leaping. Its neck was nearly two feet long. Only its head seemed small, and that only in comparison to the rest of its body. It was oblong, with jet-black compound eyes sticking out bulbously on either side and powerful mandibles in front.

  Something about its shape didn't seem quite right, though. Jedra hadn't paid much attention to thri-kreen when he'd lived in the city-it was best just to give them plenty of room-but this one seemed subtly different. A bigger cranial bulge behind the eyes, maybe, and a narrower face, if that glistening expanse of hard exoskeleton could be called a face.

  Strapped to the creature's back was a pack proportioned to the thri-kreen's large size. Jedra could have fit inside the bag, and there would have been room for Kayan on the wooden frame that extended below it. They would have had to empty it first, though; the pack bulged with unknown contents, and the frame was festooned with hardware. Cooking pots, the two multi-bladed heads of a gythka-without the usual long pole between them-some kind of curved throwing weapon with spikes sticking out of it, and more things that Jedra didn't recognize had all been tied to it. Jedra doubted if he could even lift the pack, much less carry it anywhere. Thri-kreen must be strong.

  And rich. Most of the stuff was made of metal.

  The creature became aware of their presence. It shuddered, trying to lift the arm that Kayan still touched, but it couldn't. The mandibles opened, clicked shut, then they opened again and a faint, croaking voice said, "Water."

  "Sorry," Kayan said, backing away. "We don't even have enough for ourselves."

  "Water," the creature croaked again. It tried again to move, this time managing to raise its head a few inches. Its multifaceted eyes seemed to fix on Kayan, then on Jedra. "I know... where is... water," it said. "You give me... yours... then I get more... for all of us."

  Jedra was still in shock over the complete wreckage of his expectations. He had come here expecting to find help, but now he found himself being asked for it instead. His beautiful city, with open fountains and food enough for weeks, had turned out to be the delirious ravings of a dying thri-kreen. He had doomed himself and Kayan to the same fate.

  Unless the thri-kreen was telling the truth. Could it know where to find water in this ancient city? "Tell us where it is," Jedra said, "and we'll go get it."

  The thri-kreen laid its head back on the ground. "Never reach it," it said. "Water is... underground. Must work... me
chanism."

  "I can use a pump," Jedra said. The thri-kreen shuddered the whole length of its body. "Not this one," it said. "Must know... principle. Suction head... not enough... need more differential... priming valve... air squeezer..." The words trailed off and it lay still.

  She shook her head. "It's delirious."

  "No." The thri-kreen lifted its head again, and even managed to prop itself up with an arm. "I am... rational. I can reach... more water... if you help me." Kayan stepped back out of the creature's hearing, pulling Jedra along by his sleeve. "It's desperate," she whispered to him. "It'll say anything to get our water."

  Jedra looked back at the enormous mantis, its black eyes reflecting no readable emotion as it watched them decide its fate. "Yes," he whispered to Kayan, "but that doesn't mean he's lying, does it?"

  "What, you believe it knows where there's a well? Why didn't it use it before?"

  Jedra noticed she was saying "it" rather than "he" in reference to the thri-kreen. Was she trying to keep from thinking of it-of him-as a fellow intelligent being? Jedra couldn't do that. He didn't want to do that. He said, "Maybe he collapsed before he could get there."

  "Hah. It seems pretty unlikely that it'd get this close and then give up. I think it's lying."

  The setting sun cast long shadows among the broken stones littering the courtyard. Jedra wondered how they would find their way back out of this maze with only one moon and the stars to guide them. And where would they go if they did?

  "So you want to just leave him to die?" he asked.

  She sighed. "What else can we do? I wasn't lying; we don't have enough water for ourselves."

  Jedra nodded. "Then why are we whispering? To spare his feelings?"

  Kayan clenched her fists. "I-" I don't care about- You 're a healer. You could no more watch him die than you could kill him yourself with this spear. Jedra hefted the b'rohg's weapon for emphasis. You 're trying to talk yourself into it, but it's not working.

  Don't go putting words in my mouth, Kayan said. I could let it die in an instant if I had, to. I'm just trying to decide if I have to.

  Jedra pulled off his pack and took his waterskin from it. There was only a swallow left, hardly enough to gurgle when he shook the skin. Kayan's waterskin held no more than his, he knew. I don't think it's really going to make much difference, he said. You said it yourself; we don't have enough water to do us any good anyway. But a thri-kreen doesn't need much water to survive. What toe have left could revive him, and he could help us find more. He talks like he knows this place; who knows, maybe there really is a well.

  Maybe. And maybe it just wants us to revive it so it can use us for food They eat elves, remember? I'll bet it wouldn't turn down half-elf, or even human in its present state. I don't sense any danger from him, Jedra said. Not even when I try to imagine him healthy again. He tried to think about it logically, though. Thri-kreen were carnivores, true enough. Is there any way to

  tell psionically if he's telling the truth? he asked.

  She nodded. Yes, if you know how to do it. Unfortunately, that's not one of my skills.

  Oh.

  Just one more reason why we need a master to train us. With our combined power we should be able to find out what he had for breakfast three years ago, but we don't know how.

  Jedra sloshed his waterskin. Then we'll have to do it without psionics.

  Kayan stared past his shoulder at the insectile creature. It stirred feebly, then quieted again. Finally she shook her head. I don't know how I let you talk me into these things, but all right, let's try it. We certainly don't have much to lose.

  When the thri-kreen saw them returning with their waterskins, it croaked, "Your generosity... will be returned... a thousandfold."

  "I'll settle for full packs and a guide out of the desert," Jedra said as he held the waterskin up to the thing's mandibles. It took him a moment to figure out how to pour the water without spilling any, but there was no hurry. He dribbled a few drops at a time into the creature's hard mouth and let them run down the back of its throat.

  When his waterskin was empty he took Kayan's and poured its contents into the thri-kreen's thirsty mouth as well, then handed the empty skin back to her. She held it up to catch the last drops on her tongue, then put it away in her pack.

  They didn't have to wait long for the water to take effect. The thri-kreen lay back for a couple of minutes while the pulsations in its abdomen grew stronger, then slowly, deliberately, it put its four hands down on the ground and pushed itself erect. Its backpack teetered precariously, but the creature used its upper two arms to steady the load while it came to its feet.

  He held the spear ready. Not quite pointed toward it-he didn't want the creature to think he was challenging it-but he made sure he could bring the stone point to bear quickly if he had to.

  Get ready to link, he sent to Kayan, then aloud he said, "You should know that we can stop you psionically as easily as we revived you, if that becomes necessary."

  The thri-kreen opened and closed its mandibles with a clicking sound. "Commendable," it said. Its voice was much richer now, deeper and with more volume. "One should always be prepared. However, I am not thri-kreen, as you have mistakenly assumed. I am tohr-kreen. Related, but more... civilized. We do not harm other intelligent creatures."

  I've heard of them, Kayan mindsent. They're like priests or something. Loners. They don't come into cities much, and they're not nearly as aggressive as regular thri-kreen.

  "Good," Jedra said aloud. He lowered the spear a few inches. "Do you have a name?"

  "Kitarak," the tohr-kreen said. The name was more clicks than anything, but it fit a human tongue well enough.

  "I'm Jedra," Jedra said, "and this is Kayan."

  "Charmed," Kitarak said. "Or not, as the case may be. You are psionicists, rather than mages."

  Jedra wasn't sure if that was supposed to be a joke. "Uh, right," he said. "So if you're civilized, you'll stick to your bargain. We gave you the last of our water; it's time you showed us this well of yours."

  The tohr-kreen clacked his mandibles again. "Ah yes, the well," he said. "A deep subject. Come." He turned to the right and began walking through the rubble with a quick, darting stride.

  For someone who had only minutes before been dying of dehydration, Kitarak could move fast. It was all Jedra and Kayan could do to keep up. Occasionally they lost sight of him behind a large boulder or the remnant of a building, but fortunately his enormous pack squeaked with every step he took, so they could home in on the noise even when they couldn't see him. At last the noise stopped, however, and they came cautiously around a corner to see him lowering his pack to the ground and bending over a pile of stones at the base of a relatively well-preserved building. It still had two walls, at any rate, and part of a third.

  The other buildings around them were in even better shape. They were much larger, too; some of them rose five or six stories. Jedra looked around at their placement, and realized they were standing in the same spot where the courtyard fountain had been in their psionic vision.

  The tohr-kreen began removing the piled-up stones. With his four arms, that didn't take long; by the time Jedra and Kayan had arrived and removed their own packs, he had exposed a piece of machinery of some sort, Jedra recognized a pump handle and spout, but that was about the only thing he recognized. Three more levers stuck out of a flat plate on the ground, and a set of toothed gears connected a two-handed crank to a vertical shaft that also went into the ground beside the levers.

  Finding machinery amid such ruins was surprise enough, but Jedra was even more astonished when he realized that everything but the pump handle was made of metal. If he could carry even one of those levers or gears back to Urik, he could name his price from any weaponsmith in town.

  "How did this manage to survive the scavengers?" he asked.

  Kitarak twisted his long neck so first one eye, then the other, looked toward Jedra. With their multiple facets, it was impossible t
o tell just what he was looking at. "It is worth more as a pump," he said. "Those of us who know how to use it are careful to hide it from those who don't." He worked the pump handle up and down a few times, bringing forth a squeak of rusty metal but no water, then he pulled one of the levers beside it toward himself and bent over to spin the crank with his lower set of arms. The gears squeaked, too, but the shaft turned, and deep underground something vibrated.

  "The water is too deep to pump directly," Kitarak said while he worked the crank. "Atmospheric pressure will only raise water thirty-five feet at this elevation. So we must pressurize the containment vessel to provide more lift."

  "Right," Jedra said. He hadn't understood a word of what Kitarak had said. He looked over to Kayan, but she merely shrugged her shoulders as well.

  Kitarak went on without pause. "Unfortunately the cistern leaks after ail these many centuries, so I must pump fast to keep it pressurized. In another century or two, I fear someone will have to descend into the tank itself to replace the seals."

  "In another century?" Jedra asked incredulously. "You seriously think this thing will last that long?"

  "Why not?" Kitarak replied. "It has lasted until now. I and other travelers have had to repair the handles, and once a valve stuck on the lifting piston, but other than that-"

  Kitarak bent down farther and switched from his lower arms to his upper ones on the crank. "It is tinkercraft," he said. "An ancient discipline, lost to time for all but we few scholars who struggle to keep it alive."

  Kayan had been watching silently the whole time. Now she spoke up. "I've heard of it. It's the opposite of magic. Or of psionics for that matter. Using mechanisms to replace sentient beings. Some say it helped bring on the destruction of Athas."

  Kitarak stopped cranking for a second. The below-ground vibration stopped as well, and now they could hear a faint hissing from around the base of the levers. Then Kitarak resumed cranking. "Not so," he said. "Not so to all your points, except possibly the first. Magic is a lazy attempt to duplicate tinkercraft without the hardware. What magicians don't understand is that every action has an opposite and equal reaction. Every act of creation is an act of destruction. Each spell they employ uses life-force, which is then gone forever. It is magic that destroyed Athas. Not tinkercraft."

 

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