This time Silk did gape. Then he burst out with a high laugh. Somewhere the gods were holding their stomachs in hilarity; they had done their job and completely and utterly destroyed the complacent, prideful, comfortable and recently getting fat Silk. He was frankly almost in awe of their thoroughness – right down to the poetic end.
He just laughed, and kept laughing, chuckling on and on and shaking his head, until the point when all those around him exchanged knowing looks and touched fingers to their temples in pity.
Chapter 21
What Orjin and his remaining troop were doing now could no longer be described as fighting. Fleeing was more like it. Whenever they encountered a column of Quon Talian soldiers they ran westward, and the enemy commander Renquill, no fool, was happy to drive them onwards towards the coast.
The word ‘remaining’ was the one Orjin adopted as his force dwindled before his eyes. Understandably so, as exhaustion and hunger became unbearable, and injuries worsened. Desertions increased as well, admittedly, as hopes faded.
Still, those remaining jogged onward, and Orjin constantly checked in with the hill-tribe guides, who would shake their heads, rather embarrassed. ‘Found it?’ he constantly asked, and they would look away, lowering their gazes.
‘It is a very narrow opening. Difficult to locate.’
‘Well … keep looking.’ And they would nod and run off to search anew.
That night, the western ocean in sight from the slope occupied by Orjin and his troops, word came of the sighting of the gorge entrance. He signed for everyone to move out.
Word also came that the rear elements were in running contact with Talian forces. Orjin and Orhan both jogged for the rear, but Prevost Jeral intercepted them, urging them forward and running ahead. Cursing, Orjin turned for the front.
He found the Wickan, Arkady, together with the guides guarding a slash in the steep slope less than two paces across – more of a hole than any sort of gorge.
‘This is it?’ he demanded of the hill youths, incredulous.
‘No one ventures here any more,’ one explained.
‘Fine! I’ll go.’ Orjin started forward.
But Arkady edged down ahead of him. ‘We will explore – wave down the troops.’
Orjin snarled his frustration, but complied, waving the men and women forward. Below, Arkady struck a torch and its light blossomed. Orjin urged the stragglers onward.
Arrows now came flying out of the darkness surrounding them, and he hunched. More and more of his remaining troops emerged from the dark and he pushed them on and down, clapping shoulders, pressing them forward.
Last of all came Prevost Jeral with a band of some twenty. ‘The Talians are hot on our heels,’ she announced, panting, her blade bared.
He gestured her down the crevasse. ‘Get going!’
‘After you.’
‘No. No rearguard. They won’t come chasing after us into this cave. They’ll think us cornered. Now go on!’
‘Fine.’ She waved her band down among the brush-choked rocks.
Torches now waved about them and Orjin caught the glint of starlight from blades and armour. He pushed Jeral down and followed, backwards, feeling his way.
Within, the ground continued downward in a slope of loose broken rock. He could hear it clattering and sloughing underfoot as the men and women descended. Torches shone below, showing a narrow stone throat.
After some stumbling and sliding on the loose debris, he reached the bottom to end up standing ankle-deep in frigid water along with everyone else. Arkady was waiting here, together with one of the hill-tribe lads.
‘This is an old underground riverbed,’ the lad explained. ‘We follow this for a time.’
Orjin nodded. ‘Fair enough. Let’s take the van.’ He turned to Jeral nearby. ‘Will you watch the rear now?’
She nodded – a touch sourly, as both knew the danger now resided ahead. Renquill would no doubt take his time above, calling for them to surrender, perhaps even tossing combustibles down.
Orjin now passed the long file of his surviving troops to the fore, where three of their guides waited together with the giant Orhan. He was uneasy to see these habitually sombre and guarded youths appearing nervous. He nodded a greeting, took a torch, and advanced up the narrow course of the waterway.
The bone-chilling water rose at times to their waists, while at other times the chute lowered or narrowed to the point where Orjin had to slide along sideways, or hunched double. Poor Orhan had to crawl nearly on his stomach through these choke-points. The way continued ever onwards, however, without any dead end or impassable barrier – so far.
Eventually, they did come to something of a dead end: a cliff where the waters cascaded over, arching downwards into misted darkness.
‘How far?’ Orjin asked over the roar of the falls.
The youths appeared uncertain. ‘We do not know. Beyond is the cavern of the … of it.’
Orjin looked to Orhan. ‘Throw a torch.’ The huge fellow tossed down his torch and everyone watched it tumble to land amid rocks. Some ten fathoms, Orjin reckoned it. ‘Do we have any rope?’ he asked of the troop at large. Heads turned, peering round, but no one spoke up. Wonderful, he thought. No one held on to any rope. ‘Fine. I’ll try climbing down.’ He handed Orhan his weapon and knelt at the edge, feeling down over the cliff.
At least it was solid rock and not rotten crumbling sandstone or shale. He found handholds and slowly, his way lit from above, he felt his way down the cliff face to piled fallen detritus, the talus slope. ‘Not too difficult!’ he shouted up. ‘Did you see that?’
‘Yes,’ Arkady answered. ‘We will follow. Do not move!’
Orjin remained where he stood – feeling rather foolish standing unarmed in the lair of some sort of reputed eldritch horror.
When perhaps half of his troops had descended, Orjin turned to the hill-tribe youths. ‘Thank you, but you needn’t go on from here. Just tell us the way.’
‘No one alive knows the way from this point onward,’ one said. ‘We will come.’
Orjin nodded his gratitude. He glanced to Orhan and Arkady. ‘Let’s take a look.’
They explored the cavern. At one point starlight streamed downwards from some hidden crack above. The bones of animals that had tumbled into the gap above lay broken amid the rocks here. Listening, Orjin thought he could almost hear the surf rolling against the rocky shore. The cavern narrowed here, the water rising to their knees.
He might have been fooling himself, but he thought he saw the glint of light just above the water level far ahead. ‘Is that an opening?’ he asked Arkady.
The Wickan did not answer. Glancing at him, Orjin saw the fellow staring aside, hand white on the grip of his curved long-knife.
What Orjin had taken for a pile of pale rocks off to one side now shifted, rising, climbing ever higher until he found himself staring upward at a great upright lizard standing at some four fathoms of bones and withered flesh. Yet it stood awkwardly, tilted, and he saw that the bones of one thick leg were broken.
The hill-tribe youths all gaped, frozen.
Yune came, pushing forward. ‘Not a dragon!’ he yelled. ‘Though I understand the confusion. A K’Chain Che’Malle warrior.’
Orhan had given back Orjin’s two-handed sword and now he drew it. ‘I don’t give a damn what it is – can it be killed?’
‘It appears preserved against rot somehow. Undying. Perhaps it fell from above ages ago,’ Yune told him. ‘It will have to be dismembered.’
‘Dismembered!’ Orjin snarled, appalled. ‘Fine. Orhan, you distract it and I’ll go for the other leg.’
Prevost Jeral had pushed forward. ‘No! All at once! Too many targets, yes?’
The creature struggled to advance upon them, dragging its shattered rear leg.
Orjin cursed again. ‘Right! All at once – we overpower it.’ He raised his sword overhead, bellowing, ‘All who would dare … draw your weapons and attack!’