“No. We should leave him here and hope he never returns to the surface.”
“What? That is a terrible thing to say, Roe. Did you hit your head when you fell?”
“He tried to kill me, Scarlett and will do the same to you. We didn't come upon him by accident. His name isn't Shelny. It's Rinan and he is the youngest son of Gremian. I wasn't sure where I had seen him before, but when he climbed the side of that building I remembered his face from the pits.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, he's been at nearly every match of mine and probably all the others as well. He might be young, Scarlett, but he's clever and he's cruel and he's very much his father's son. He's probably watching us right now.”
“He must have crept through the door ahead of us while we were distracted by his brother. How did he get himself onto that stalactite? I saw no way to climb to it.”
“This pup is uncannily nimble. I don't know how he did it but it was nothing compared to what he is capable of. A rumour spread throughout the burrow a couple years ago that he had pounced from the highest palace window onto another fox who had annoyed him that was walking across the rotunda below.”
Scarlett looked at him in disbelief considering the height must be near to thirty tail-lengths.
“That's nothing, because after he crushed the other fox's skull, he jumped back to the window from where he had landed, as if he was walking up a step.”
She looked toward the broad skyline of buildings, the number of windows too numerous to count, and imagined that his little head could be spying at them from any one of them.
“We have no choice but to go forward and you need not worry about losing him,” Roe spoke, while looking at the terminus of the canal. “He'll keep up, and when he's ready, he'll make his move.”
“Well,” Scarlett said, trying to focus on the task at hand, “the canal continues here but only via that narrow ledge.”
“This wavy line on the key ends with a faint circle which I believe is this pair of dancing foxes. The library is close and is most likely through that tunnel.”
Roe hopped down to the ledge and started trotting, expecting to hear Scarlett following behind. When she didn't he turned to find her staring back at the silent and expectant city spread before them.
“Do you think we will come back this way?” she asked Roe looking away from him.
“Some day, Scarlett. If not today, then some day you can bring your mother here and Samson and the whole burrow if you want.”
“Okay,” she said longing to explore the endless ingenuity of her ancestors sitting enticingly before her. “You wait for me here, City Burrow of London, and don't go caving in on me”
She took a quick gulp of water, and spat it onto the fire with a sputter, quickly allowing the darkness to consume the small camp. She hopped next to Roe and together they passed under the circling foxes whose great black eyes had long been holding vigil over the city.
*
“How far do you think this tunnel goes?” Roe asked, beginning to doubt they had gone the right direction.
“Judging by the boats we saw, I imagine this tunnel leads to another burrow so it may not end at all. Do you think we should head back?”
“I don't know,” he said, looking through the candlelight at the monotonous hole in front of him. “Perhaps it would be a good....”
The rest of the sentence was pummelled back into his mouth, as he painfully walked into a perfectly transparent wall of glass.
“Ouch...what is this?” he said, as his voice echoed loudly back down the tunnel.
“It is some sort of barrier,” Scarlett said, squinting through the glass at the continuing darkness beyond.
“Why would anyone put it here?” Roe asked. “There is nothing on the other side but the continuation of the tunnel.”
“Perhaps, Roe. Or perhaps there is more to this glass than meets the eye. Look. There is a small etching at the centre. It's the same symbol which leads into what remains of the library at the Palace. A sword with the words, 'Pro captu lectoris habent sua fata libelli' carved onto the blade hangs above the main entrance. This is it. I'm sure of it.”
“I don't see how we are going to get through. This glass looks to be at least a whisker-length thick.”
“I don't think we'll need to blow it up. My mother told me a story once about these types of gates. She called them the 'Broken Eye' because they make you see what is not really there.”
“Where did your mother come across one of these before?”
“She didn't. Audley told her about it after one of his expeditions into the quarantined burrows. He had spent years passing a similar glass which he thought lead to nowhere, until by chance he stopped and built a fire in front of it. He had been lucky enough to catch a few rodents to roast. The fire was hardly bright enough but gave him a wavering glimpse at an alternate view behind the glass. He said it showed a long spiral staircase set within the dark centre of the tunnel. Here, we have one flare. It should be considerably brighter than a fire.”
Scarlett took her candle and propped it up in the centre of a small pile of dust. Unwrapping a thin waxy paper from the end of the red cylinder, she put the revealed fuse to the flame. It caught instantly and after a few sparks a fountain of light shimmered from one end, blinding both of them.
“Look away for a moment!” Scarlett said, pushing Roe into the wall and dropping the flare onto the ledge, letting it burn. “If we blind ourselves we won't see anything.”
She continued to hold his head away from the flare, even after Roe complied, and the two were huddled closely together while their eyes gradually became used to the light. Without thinking, she allowed her head to rest on his shoulder and she unconsciously found herself enjoying the feel of her fur on his.
“Okay, look back slowly,” she said, letting him go.
Sandy brown bricks, tightly mortared, were charred black and reflected back into the mirror-like water. The glass cut through the canal seamlessly and the tunnel did indeed continue on the other side but, under the sputtering light of the flare, they could now see an ornate bridge made from the same glass and under the water beneath it, mosaicked into the base of the canal, were the same sword and the same words only these were set within the confines of an anatomical heart.
Their view to the other side was brief, and as the light faded they frantically looked for a means to shift the glass.
“We don't want to blow our way through. It may destroy that bridge.”
“Roe, quick look before the light dies completely.”
He followed her gaze to the side of the glass running along the wall. There, planted at regular intervals, were shallow, slightly frosty, fox prints meandering across the entire arch to the ledge on the opposite side of the canal.
As the light disappeared, so did their view of the prints, and Roe quickly placed his own paw on the first of them. Instantly, he felt a sharp pain, followed by a click, coming from inside the wall. Out of a nearly hidden gap running next to the glass, a metal arm swung out and clamped around his leg. He felt something in the manacle pierce his skin and a small trickle of blood flow to his paw and onto the glass below it.
“It looks like I've got to walk the glass,” he said over his shoulder to Scarlett.
“Are you sure?” Scarlett asked, concerned. “You're bleeding. Maybe if we blasted just a portion on the side it would be far enough away to save the bridge.”
“Scarlett, I don't think I have much choice at this point,” he said as he gave a few tugs against the metal. “Besides, if I struggle I think I will only do more damage to myself. Here goes.”
As delicately as he could, he placed a second paw on the print still visible on the glass. Another metal arm clicked into place, and another small stream of blood flowed to meet the other. A low rumble came from the glass wall, and it spun, revealing another set of prints below him. Without hesitating he placed one and then the other hind paw onto the glass and winced as each band
of metal drew more blood.
As soon as the fourth paw had been bound, the first was freed revealing another print further along and each piercing step let the blood flow more freely from his legs. The metal grip was so strong from the swing arms, he found that he could walk sideways along the wall without much trouble. He left a trail of bloody paw prints behind him, a detail he thought would have been lovely if not for the pain in the painting of it.
Reaching the top of the arch he began to feel weak and staggered towards gravity, as much as the metal would let him.
“Roe! Are you all right?” Scarlett asked from below, feeling powerless to help.
“I'm okay,” he responded after a moment. “I just need to catch my breath. Every step I take shifts the metal and tears my ankle in a different place. It appears this device wants my blood. . Audley didn't tell your mother about this, did he?”
“No, he never actually found a way to shift the glass and decided it was best to leave the mystery alone. I don't think he was a fox made of the same stuff as you, Roe. He was an academic at heart and by choice but an adventurer only by necessity.”
“Well I'm not there yet,” Roe answered, taking another step and growling with the pain of it.”
“You are doing really well,” she tried to say , but was taken aback by the large amount of blood that was now running along the glass below him, defying gravity and collecting in the centre of the disc.
Three-quarters of the way around he came to a halt again. Scarlett called to him a few times, but he did not respond from his slumped position, dangling at a dead angle from the glass. He was unconscious.
*
Again the sky was clear and infinite. Below him the grass extended and merged into a pastel horizon. The single old fox sat below looking up at him and smiling. None of the regalia which he had worn before was to be seen. Now he wore only four gold anklets which glinted and flashed towards Roe in the bright light.
A sound came from the old fox. At first a melody, then a whine, and finally a stuttering language.
“Do...do...do...you have...the...the..the...Art of Destruction?” He rasped across the air.
“Yes,” Roe responded and opened his jaws releasing a silent bark.
Suddenly, Roe burst into flames, the pain of his melting flesh so intense, that it shocked him out of the sky and he found himself standing sideways, the canal waters flowing silently beneath him.
*
“Roe!” Scarlett screamed with relief when she finally saw him move. “I thought I'd lost you again.”
“No, still here, barely. I'd better get this done,” he responded and took another determined step, then another, until he found himself snout to ledge with no further to go. He breathed the thick dust and mould in heavily, but didn't care, and hardly had the energy to cough.
All four of the metal clamps released him at once, tumbling him into an exhausted pile, his body tilting precariously over the ledge towards the canal. The last streaks of blood flowed horizontally, as if some secret energy gave them life, and when the last drop reached the centre of the glass, finally filling the etched sword, the glass gave a great groan and a shimmering iridescent light streaked through it.
The paths of the light cut into the glass in swirls and waves, until there was no portion they hadn't reached. As quickly as the light came, it ended, returning the tunnel to darkness.
“Roe? Are you all right? I'll need to to swim across to reach you. Nothing has changed after all that.”
“No. It has, Scarlett. Bark.”
“What?”
“Bark at the glass, Scarlett. I do not have the energy.”
Pulling her gaze from the shape of Roe opposite, she looked back at the glass wall and instantly understood.
“I hope my bark is strong enough,” she said haltingly.
Taking a large gulp of air, she at first growled then let out the strongest bark she was capable of.
It was more than enough, and as the sound of her voice echoed down the tunnel, the glass wall shattered sending bits of glass in all directions. The chunks were square, and didn't cut as they sprayed over her fur and face. Instead, they quickly started to melt, as if they were made of ice and a great heat was forcing them to loose their cohesion. Within moments nothing remained of the glass wall, and the way was open before them.
Not lingering to marvel over what had just happened, she quickly ran towards the bridge and crossed its smooth surface, seeming to float over the water below. She reached Roe just as he was attempting to get to his paws.
“Thank you, Scarlett,” he said as she offered him her shoulder. “We couldn't have gotten through that unless we did it together.”
“Here, have a drink,” she said, as she helped to dip his head into the canal.
After a few draughts, a wave of strength returned to him, and he managed to sit up.
“Let's bandage up those wounds,” she said, digging around in Mercia's pack. “It is amazing how much that vixen managed to fit in this little bag.”
“Mercia is a lot to handle at times, but so are all those who are most capable.” Roe responded, considering Scarlett as she gently picked up his ankle and started to wrap it in a thick tan bandage.
She didn't say anything further until she had finished his remaining ankles and he was standing again testing out his legs.
“Do you think you can walk?” she asked, supporting him on one side.
“Of course, what I would like to do is sleep for a week, but I don't think that is very likely at the moment. Let me have a few bits of dried rat from Mercia's magic bag,” he said, indicating with his head.
Scarlett retrieved several pieces, dipping them in the water before giving them to him, making them moist and easier to chew.
The meal returned some of his usual vitality, and he started across the bridge, Scarlett giving him a bit of a push to realize the steep slope.
At the apex of the bridge was a flat dais, with the shape of a key clearly set within it.
“Well, that is a relief,” Roe said. “I was afraid the bridge was going to want whatever blood I had remaining.”
“We've gotten a lot of use out of this key,” Scarlett said retrieving it from the pack. Roe gave a nod that he was ready for whatever was coming, and she placed it in the matching hollow with a neat CLINK.
Without hesitation, the bridge shattered and melted into the water below, as did the mosaic seal, and with a tremendous rush Roe and Scarlett were flushed into a swirling vortex of water, small tiles and melting glass.
Once they had disappeared, a small shadowy form emerged from the dark, and before the water had emptied completely, Rinan dove in and was flushed away after them.
*
Scarlett tried to keep hold of Roe as they were flung through the passage and twisted with the pipe. At some point, as she began to weaken from the minimal gasps of air she could manage, he whirled away from her when the tunnel forked.
She lost consciousness, but was brought back when she hit a wall hard and was dragged down a waterfall. Her legs were weak but she managed to crawl away from the cascade and collapse behind the wall of water. Another form landed and rolled beside her.
“Well, that wasn't so bad,” Roe said, shaking the water from his fur. “Actually, it was just the rejuvenation I needed.”
Scarlett scowled at him, still coughing and spitting out the canal water.
“I think your ride was a little easier than mine,” she yelled over the roar of the water.
The cave behind the falls extended in front of them, revealing a set of roughly carved stone steps leading to a hole which looked to have been blasted rather than built.
“Let's get away from the water,” Roe yelled back, helping her to her feet and up the steps.
As soon as they passed through the hole the roar of the water became a constant calming muffle of static in the background.
“The candle is still in one piece,” Scarlett said, pulling it out of its leather holster.
After several attempts, the lighter gave birth to a flame and they peered into the cavern before them.
Books were scattered everywhere. In piles and in stacks, on hastily erected shelves in alcoves, and in terraces, the remains of the once great Palace Library were spread before them. To Scarlett they seemed to be breathing with the knowledge they contained.
Supporting each other in the centre of it all, they started to laugh and their laughter echoed back at them as if the librarians of the dead were laughing with them.
“Scarlett, my dear,” Roe began, after they had managed to settle down for a moment, “I'm afraid you can't take it with you today.”
“No, but there is nothing that is going to keep me from coming back.”
“I'm sure there isn't.”
She bounded away and pulled the first book she could find out of a pile of others. It crumbled into a muddy mess from her jaws. Panicked she looked around her hoping that not all of the books had moulded to such an extent.
“These books on the ground are likely to be irretrievable. The air is drier above us. I think we need to look around a bit in the hope that there is some clue as to what we are looking for.”
Roe smiled at her.
“Take a moment to see what is salvageable. We have space to take a few back with us.”
She bounded off, climbing up a wall to an alcove above, her bruised body forgotten amongst the swell of pages.
“The alcove up here is dry and dusty and the books are neatly arranged on shelves.”
She picked one up and found the binding and boards still tight and solid. Opening it the pages stuck slightly but separated with a flick of encouragement.
“What is it called?” Roe asked watching her from a musty pile below.
“Um, Medicinal Moulds!” she yelled back, excited even by such a mundane subject. “Their cultivation, harvesting and preparation; a treatise by Summarian the Younger.”
“How exciting,” Roe yelled back.
The Progeny of Able (The Burrow of London Series Book 1) Page 31