"Which way do you think they went?" asked the priestess.
"Splintersteel squirmed when they hit him, and then the sounds ceased. I don't think it's likely they carried him past us. Lef s try checking out our back-trail."
They started along the corridor, walking as quietly as possible. Ariakas held his sword ready before him, while Lyrelee frequently whirled and scrutinized the shadows behind them. After a few minutes they came to the first branching corridor, and here they paused. Turning his face toward the floor, Ariakas brought the gem to bear on the blank stone. If there was any clue as to the direc shy;tion of their quarry, it was beyond their skills to find.
"I have an idea," Lyrelee said, indicating the main pas shy;sage. "Let's go a little farther."
Ariakas agreed and followed the priestess for another hundred paces. They came to a three-way branch, with corridors leading forward, to the right, and left. Once again there was no visible spoor to tell them which path to follow.
"Down there are the water warrens," Lyrelee announced, pointing left. "They're surplus overflow, mostly, for the temple's cisterns. But they go quite a long way, and both of us smelled something wet."
"I can't argue with your logic," replied the warrior. "We're reduced to guesswork any way you shake it!"
The passage proved to be more finished than many of the other tunnels in the catacomb network. Ariakas saw evidence of bricklaying to reinforce many walls, and soon they came to a well-chiseled flight of stairs, leading downward. As soon as they began the descent the war shy;rior noticed the air growing damp around him, and he felt the dank mustiness of the walls. His light spell cast illu shy;mination about two dozen steps down, and for a long time it seemed as though this stairway must descend into the very heart of the world. He lost count of the individ shy;ual stairs, though the number certainly passed a hundred.
Then, finally, the light reflected against a smooth, dark surface-liquid. Soon he saw the stairs end at a subter shy;ranean wharf. The stone pier, sprouting from a narrow landing, extended onto a surface of still water. The light spell swept over several tall posts placed, presumably, for the hitching of boats.
When they reached the bottom Ariakas saw that one long-hulled craft did in fact bob at a mooring, far out at the end of the pier.
"Is the boat usually here?" he asked.
"In the past there've always been two of them," Lyre-lee replied. "The priests use the boats for fishing, for patrols … but not very often."
Ariakas stalked onto the pier. The light reflected from dark and still waters stretching beyond-far beyond its illumination.
"Where does it lead?" he asked, gesturing to the placid lake.
"Well, nowhere in particular, I guess," the priestess replied tentatively. "I've only been this far-but Wryllish Parkane indicated that it's just a watery portion of the Sanctified Catacombs. I assume that some of the pas shy;sages go pretty far."
In the space between their words, the silence yawned around them, wider and darker than any quietude of the upper world. It was a silence that brought things like heartbeats into the audible range, made a gasp of breath seem like a shriek of alarm.
In this background of stillness, they heard a noise, a brief splashing of water. They waited breathlessly, but the sound was not repeated.
"That way." Ariakas pointed into the darkness to the left of the pier, utterly certain of his bearing across the black water.
Lyrelee untied the boat swiftly, and Ariakas stepped into the low hull. The seats were narrow, six of them lined across the beam at four-foot intervals from bow to stern. The craft bobbed slightly as the priestess also entered. She sat at a middle bench, hoisted the oars, and propelled them cleanly out across the lake. Ariakas stepped to the bow, allowed his glowing gem to sweep the water before him like a beacon.
And then he saw them: ripples, almost imperceptible, rolling toward the starboard bow in an arc so broad it was almost a straight line. Only the utter placidity of the water allowed him to discern the effect, and that just for an instant, before the ripples were cleanly split by the gentle bow-wave of the boat.
"Bear to my right," Ariakas hissed, and Lyrelee smoothly swung the bow through a gentle curve.
She rowed for several minutes, steady strokes of the oars propelling the sleek boat through the water. Then, with shocking suddenness, a solid surface jutted into the scope of the warrior's light.
"Stop!" he hissed, dropping to the seat just before the priestess dug the oars into the water. The lake swirled and churned, but Lyrelee slowed the boat to a gentle bump by the time they reached the barrier.
The wall seemed to be the shore of the lake. Since the lake was contained by a cavern, however, this shore rose in a vertical barrier of moisture-streaked stone, extend shy;ing upward and then, perhaps twice the height of Aria-kas's head, leaning above their heads to begin its vast dome over the water. Turning to each direction, Ariakas couldn't see any clue as to how someone or something could have left the lake.
"Bear right," he commanded again, guided by a name shy;less instinct.
Dipping the oars with silent power, Lyrelee started them slowly along the shore. She hadn't taken more than five strokes when his intuition was rewarded. Breaking the solid wall of the lake shore was a narrow crack. At first glance, Ariakas thought the opening too small to allow the passage of a boat.
Then his eyes fastened on an irregularity in the sur shy;face, just outside of the crack. He stared, and in a moment made an identification-it was an oar.
"There-into the crack," he ordered, and the priestess turned the prow toward the gap.
The boat slipped between two slick walls of rock. They found the route tight, but passable, and in another moment it opened around them.
"Here's a landing," announced Ariakas, satisfied to see a platform of rock that sloped right down to the water's edge. Beyond the platform a dark hole promised at least the beginning of a passageway. Even more signif shy;icant, drifting several feet away from the slab was a boat that was the twin of their own.
Lyrelee cast a look over her shoulder and glided the craft on a perfect course toward the landing. Ariakas looked around, and several facts confirmed his convic shy;tion. First, he saw streaks of water on the sloping stone floor, some of which still trickled back to the lake. What shy;ever had dripped onto the stone, he guessed, had done so not terribly long ago.
As the bow nudged the ramp, Ariakas stepped onto the shore, his sword held one-handed, pointed up the passageway beyond, the bowline grasped by his other hand. With a solid tug, he brought the first third of the boat up the ramp-enough, he felt certain, to prevent their transportation from drifting away.
Lyrelee stepped lightly beside him as they started up the passage. He winced inwardly at the thought of his bright light, which clearly revealed their position to any shy;one who lay in wait for them. Still, without it they would be handicapped even more.
Abruptly the priestess halted. "Let me walk behind you," she whispered, her voice barely audible.
He agreed with a nod, realizing that Lyrelee would at least be able to conceal herself from any observers in the shadows. Now Ariakas made a point of checking the ceiling, remembering the net that had swooped down, unobserved, costing him his prisoner. The warrior saw no threat above, nor did he see anything amiss in the shadows to the front. The passageway twisted and climbed, narrower and more roughly hewn than any of the catacombs Ariakas had seen before.