by Terry Brooks
There was no more time for speculation. It reached for him, pincers extending at the end of flexible limbs, and he thrust out his arm in a warding motion and sent the Druid fire flying into it. The creeper was rocked backwards on its spindly legs and then toppled. It lay writhing, no longer able to rise, thrashing as it melted and burned. Walker raced past. It was constructed entirely of metal, just as he’d thought. He caught a glimpse of another, then two more, three, four; they were all around, coming toward him.
Metal dogs!
All of the components of Ryer Ord Star’s vision had come together—the maze, the ribbons of fire, and the metal dogs—pieces of a nightmare that would consume them if he couldn’t find a way to stop it. He sidestepped another fire lance, dashed across an opening between several shifting walls, and leapt onto the threshold of the doorway to the obelisk.
Behind him, there was chaos. He could hear shouts and screams, the rasp of metal on metal, the steady hiss of fire threads, and the boom of explosions. He could see the distinctive flash of Quentin Leah’s blade. He could smell the magic and taste the smoke. The entire company was under attack, and he was doing nothing to help them.
Quickly! Get into the tower!
He spied the slots for the keys in a raised metal surface to one side of the door. Swiftly he produced the keys from his robes and inserted them into the thin, flat openings. The keys slid into place easily, a bank of lights flashed in the black metal surface of the wall, and the door eased aside to give him entry. He stepped through quickly, the sounds of the pursuing creepers spurring him on, and the door closed behind him.
He stood blinded by the blackness for a moment and waited for his vision to return. He saw the lights first, some steady and unchanging, some blinking on and off, some green, some red, some yellow. There were hundreds of them, ahead somewhere, tiny beacons glowing in the dark. When he could make out the surfaces of floor and walls and ceiling sufficiently to find his way, he started toward them. The controls to the fire threads and the creepers would be there. This was a kingdom of machines, and the machines in this tower would control the machines in the maze. Shut down the one, and you shut down the others.
It was his last thought before the floor opened beneath him, and he tumbled away into space.
THIRTY-ONE
Rue Meridian woke when her head banged against the wall of the storeroom in the forward hold. She tried to roll away and found herself pinned to the floor by a heavy weight. The weight turned out to be Furl Hawken, who was still unconscious, his bulk sprawled across her torso. She could hear the wind howling like a scorched cat and feel the pitch and roll of the ship. A storm was in progress, and a bad one at that. With every fresh gust and new jolt she was thrown headfirst back toward the offending wall.
Squirming and wriggling, she worked herself free of Hawk and pushed herself into a sitting position, her back to the bulkhead. For a moment she couldn’t remember what had happened, then couldn’t figure out how. What was she doing down here, belowdecks? She had been working with another Rover on setting a fresh radian draw, tightening it down, when that wind had come up, soft and lulling, singing to her like her mother once had.
And put her to sleep, she thought ruefully, beginning to see exactly what had happened.
She climbed to her feet and staggered across the room through the lurching of the ship to the door. She tried the handle. Locked. No surprise there. She grimaced and exhaled sharply. The Rovers were all prisoners or dead, overpowered in all likelihood by the Ilse Witch. Somehow she had gotten to them when they weren’t expecting it, put them to sleep, and locked them below. Or worse, it wasn’t the Ilse Witch at all, but the thing that Walker had gone inland to find. Or was it worse, the one rather than the other? She rubbed her head where it had banged against the wall, wondering how many jolts it had taken to wake her. Too many, she decided, feeling an ache work its way through her skull and down into her neck.
She glanced around the room. It was empty except for Hawk and herself. The others were somewhere else. There were crates of supplies stacked against the walls, but they contained light sheaths, radian draws, parse tubes, ropes, and the like. No heavy clubs or axes. No sharp objects or keen blades to rely on. No weapons of any kind.
She looked down hopefully for her sword and throwing knives, even though she knew her weapons belt was gone. She reached into her boot. The dagger she hid there was gone, as well. Whoever put her here was smart enough to search her before locking her in. Hawk’s weapons would have been taken, too. Escaping confinement was not going to be easy.
But it would, of course, be possible.
Little Red never once stopped to think otherwise. It wasn’t in her nature to do so. She did not panic and she did not despair. She was a Rover, and she had been taught from a very early age that Rovers had to look out for themselves, that no one else was going to do it for them. She was locked in the hold of her own ship, and it was up to her to get free. She already knew she was going to do that. Someone had made a big mistake in assuming she wasn’t. Someone was going to pay for putting her here.
A sudden violent pitch of the airship sent her staggering to one side, and she was barely able to keep her feet while righting herself. Something bad was happening topside, and she had to get up there quickly to find out what it was. It didn’t feel as if the people who had locked her in had any idea what they were doing with the ship. If there was a storm in progress, it would take accomplished sailors to see the Jerle Shannara safely through. She thought briefly of the Squirm’s grinding pillars, of the sheer cliffs surrounding them, and of their proximity to both, and she felt a tug of concern deep in her stomach.
She worked her way over to Furl Hawken and began to shake him. “Wake up, Hawk!” She kept her voice low enough that anyone standing outside the door wouldn’t hear. Not that there was much chance with the storm howling all about them. “Hawk!” She slapped his face. “Wake up!”
His eyes fluttered and he grunted like a bull. Slowly he rolled onto his side, clasping his head, muttering to himself. Then he sat up, running his big hands through his tangled blond hair and beard. “What hit me? I can feel it all the way down to my teeth!”
The airship did a quick pitch and roll, causing him to brace himself hurriedly with his hands. “Shades!”
“Get up,” she ordered, pulling at him. “We’ve been drugged and locked up, and the ship’s in the hands of incompetents. Let’s do something about it.”
He lumbered to his feet, steadying himself by leaning on her shoulder as the ship shook with the force of the wind. “Where’s Big Red?”
“Can’t say for sure. He’s not here, anyway.” She hadn’t allowed herself to think what might have happened to her brother. Locked in another storeroom, probably aft of this one, she told herself. They’d probably been separated to render them more manageable. Alive, though. She wouldn’t consider the alternative.
She moved back over to the door and stood with her ear pressed against the wood, listening. All she could hear was the howl of the wind, the singing of the draws, and the rattle of something not properly tied down. She sat with her back to the wall and pulled off her boot. Inside the heel, tucked into the leather, was a metal hook.
“I see they didn’t get quite everything,” Hawk chuckled, coming over to stand next to her.
She pulled on her boot and stood up. “Did they miss anything you were carrying?” she asked.
He reached under his left arm, found a small opening in the seam of his stiff leather vest, and removed a long, slender blade. “Could be.” He grinned. “Enough to get us close to some real weapons, if we’re lucky.”
“We’re Rovers, Hawk,” she said, bending to the lock in the door. “We make our own luck.”
Kneeling with one leg braced against the door, she inserted the pick into the lock and began to work it around. The lock was new and its workings easily tapped. It gave in less than a minute, the latch snapping open as she pulled down on the handle, the door giving
way. She cracked it and looked out into the passageway. Shadows cast by oil lamps and ropes hung from pegs in the walls flickered and danced with the rolling of the ship. At the passageway’s forward end, a bulky form braced against the shipwalls and stared up the ladder at the hatchway.
Rue Meridian ducked back inside the storeroom and eased the door closed again. “One guard, a big guy. I can’t tell who or what he is. We have to get past him, though. Do you want to handle him or shall I?”
Furl Hawken tightened his grip on the knife. “I’ll deal with him, Little Red. You get to the others.”
They stared at each other in the dim light, breathing quickly, faces flushed and anxious. “Be careful, Hawk,” she told him.
They went out the door on cat’s paws, sliding silently into the shadowed hallway. Furl Hawken glanced back at her, then started toward the guard. The Jerle Shannara continued to shake and sway in the grip of the storm, the wind howling so fiercely that the guard seemed unable to think of anything else. A crash jarred the decking, something falling from a height, a loosened spar probably. The guard stared upward, frozen in place. Rue Meridian glanced at the doors of the storerooms closest, two only. The smaller held their water and ale in large casks. There was no extra room for prisoners in there. The other contained foodstuffs. That was a possibility, but the larger holds lay farther aft.
Another few steps, Rue Meridian was thinking, watching Hawk’s cautious progress, when the hatchway opened, and a rain-drenched figure started down the stairs.
He caught sight of the Rovers immediately, screamed a warning to the guard with his back turned, and bolted up the ladder. The guard wheeled at once toward Furl Hawken, a wicked-looking short sword in one clawed hand. Hawk closed with him at once, and Rue Meridian could hear the impact of their collision. She caught a glimpse of the guard’s reptilian face, scaled and glistening with rain that had washed down the hatch. A Mwellret! The other man, by the look of his uniform, was a Federation soldier. She felt a cold sinking in the pit of her stomach. She and Hawk were no match for Mwellrets. She had to stop the fleeing soldier from giving warning to whatever others there were.
Impulsively, she went after him, leaping past Hawk and the Mwellret. Bounding up the ladder through the hatchway, she charged onto the open deck into the teeth of the storm, the wind whipping so wildly that it threatened to tear her clothes from her body, the rain drenching her in seconds. The ship wheeled and twisted in the storm’s grip, its light sheaths down, its draws gathered in, stripped bare as she should be in this weather, but for some reason drifting in powerless confusion. Rue Meridian took in everything in a heartbeat as she raced after the soldier. She caught up with him amidships, just below the pilot box, where a second soldier struggled with the airship’s steering, and she threw herself on his back. Locked together, they rolled across the deck and into the foremast. The soldier was so desperate to escape, he didn’t even think to draw his weapons. She did so for him, yanking loose the long knife he wore at his belt and plunging it into his chest as he thrashed beneath her.
Leaving him sprawled out and dying on the deck, she sprang back to her feet. The Federation soldier in the pilot box was screaming for help, but there was nothing she could do about that. If she killed him, the ship would be completely out of control. The wind was obscuring his cries, so perhaps no one would hear. She started aft. Without a safety line to tether her, she was forced to creep ahead, bent low to the deck, taking handholds wherever she could find them, slipping and sliding on the rain-soaked wood. Through clouds of mist and sheets of rain, she glimpsed the rugged gray walls of the channel’s cliffs, rising through the mist. Somewhere not too distant, she could hear the pillars of the Squirm clash hungrily.
She came upon another of the Mwellrets almost immediately. It emerged from the gloom of the aft mast carrying a coil of rope. It was staggering and stumbling with the movements of the airship, but it threw down the rope, drew out a long knife, and came for her at once. She dodged away from it. The Mwellret was much stronger than she was; if it got hold of her, she would not get free unless she killed it, and she had no reason to expect she could manage that. But there was nowhere for her to go. She scrambled for the starboard railing, then turned to face it. It charged after her recklessly, and she waited for its momentum to carry it close, dropped into a crouch, and whipped her legs into its heavy boots, causing it to lose its balance. It staggered past her, fighting to stay upright against the pitch and roll of the ship, slammed into the railing, toppled over the side, and was gone.
That was easy, she thought giddily, suppressing a ridiculous urge to laugh. Bring on another!
She had just regained her feet when her wish was granted. Two more of the creatures appeared through the aft hatchway and started toward her.
Shades! She stood her ground in the swirl of wind and rain, trying desperately to think what to do. She had only her long knife, a poor weapon to keep two Mwellrets at bay under any circumstances. She edged along the railing, trying to gain some time, to think of a way to get past them and down the hatchway to where she believed Big Red and the others were imprisoned. But the Mwellrets had already guessed her intention and were spreading out to cut off any attempt she might make to get past them.
An instant later, a wild-eyed Furl Hawken emerged from the forward hatch, covered in blood and shouting like a madman. With a Mwellret’s short sword in one hand and his dagger in the other, he charged bowlegged and crouched at Little Red’s attackers. They turned instinctively to defend themselves, but they were too slow and too unsteady. The burly Rover slammed into the closest and sent it sprawling, then catapulted into the second, plunging his dagger into the cloaked body over and over while the Mwellret roared.
Rue Meridian broke at once for the hatchway. Hawk had bought her the precious seconds she needed. Leaping heedlessly across debris and through slicks, she gained the aft hatch—only to have yet another of the Mwellrets heave through the opening to greet her.
This time, she had no chance to escape. It was on top of her almost instantly, its broad sword swinging at her head. She slipped trying to avoid the blow and went down, flailing helplessly. But a sudden lurch of the airship saved her, and the Mwellret’s blow went wide, the blade burying itself in the wood of the deck. She rolled to her feet as the Mwellret struggled to free its weapon, and slammed her long knife into its side. The Mwellret jerked away with a hiss, released its grip on the sword, and fastened its clawed hands about her neck. Down they went in a heap, and Rue Meridian could feel her head begin to swim. She tried to yank free the knife for another blow, but it was caught in the Mwellret’s leather clothing. She kicked and struggled against the tightening hands, hammered at the muscular body with her fists, and fought like a trapped moor cat. Nothing worked to free her. Spots danced before her eyes, and her strength began to ebb. She could feel the Mwellret’s breath on her face and smell its stench.
Groping desperately for a weapon, she found the pick she had stuck in her pocket after she’d left the storeroom. Yanking it out, she jammed it into her attacker’s hooded eye.
The Mwellret reared back in pain and surprise, releasing its grip on her throat. She twisted clear instantly, scrambling away as her adversary thrashed about on the decking, its hands clawing at its bloodied eye. Using both hands and what remained of her fading strength, she worked free the Mwellret’s embedded sword and jammed it all the way through the writhing body.
Drenched in blood and rain, tangled knots of her long red hair plastered against her face, she dropped to her knees, gasping for air. Rain beat down ferociously, the wind howled and gusted, and the airship twisted and lurched as if alive. Little Red felt the decking shudder and creak beneath her, as if everything was coming apart.
A booming crash brought her head up with a jerk. The lower aft spar had broken loose and fallen on top of the pilot box. The Federation soldier who had been struggling with the steering lay crushed and dying in a mass of splintered wood and bent metal. The Jerle Shannara was
flying out of control.
Then she saw Furl Hawken. Almost buried by broken parts and debris, he lay atop one Mwellret and close beside another, bleeding from a dozen wounds, his face a mask of blood. A long knife was buried in his back and a dagger in his side. His short sword was still clutched in one hand. He was staring right at her, blue eyes open and fixed. He seemed to be looking past her to something she could not see.
She choked back a sob as tears filled her eyes and her throat tightened in a knot. Hawk! No! She pushed herself to her feet and started toward him, already knowing she was too late, but refusing to believe it. Staggering against the force of the wind and the lurching of the airship, she shook her head and began to cry, unable to help herself, unable to stop.
Then the Mwellret that lay next to the dead man turned slowly to face her. Blood streaked its reptilian face and cloaked body, and its eyes were dazed and furious. Lurching to its feet, it yanked the long knife from Hawk’s back and started toward her.
She retreated slowly, realizing she had no weapon with which to defend herself. When she stumbled over the Mwellret she had killed, her hand brushed against the sword that jutted from its body. Turning, she pulled the blade free and faced her opponent.
“Come get me, ret!” she taunted through anger and tears and a terrible sadness.
The Mwellret said nothing, approaching cautiously, warily through the haze. Rue Meridian dropped into a crouch, working to keep her balance, to steady herself against the rolling of the airship. She found herself wishing she had her throwing knives. Perhaps she could have killed the Mwellret before it reached her if she did. But the sword would have to do. Both hands gripped the pommel as she held the blade stretched out before her. There was no time to find the others and no one else to turn to for help. There was only her. If she died, they were all lost. Given the condition of the ship, they might all be lost anyway.