Jopale nodded. “All right. I see.”
“Good Mountain,” said the caretaker. “That’s where we’re stopping.”
A dozen faces looked up.
Realizing that he had been noticed, Brace straightened his back and took a deep breath. Then without hesitation, he said, “Everyone will disembark. The feeding will be done as fast as possible. And from this point, everyone rides on top of the worm. Up where the mockmen are sitting now.”
The old woman bristled. “But where will my mockmen ride?”
“They will not, madam.” With squared shoulders, the caretaker faced the spoiled creature, explaining to her and to everyone, “This is an emergency situation, if ever there was. And I’m using the powers of my office, madam. Do not try to stop me.”
The woman shrank a little bit.
But her companion, smelling his duty, climbed to his feet. “We can’t just leave these creatures behind,” he argued.
Brace smiled. Then he laughed, quietly and with considerable relish. And he opened his arms while gesturing at the surrounding stomach, admitting, “Oh, I don’t intend to leave them. Not at all.”
There was no station at Good Mountain, abandoned or otherwise. There wasn’t even an auxiliary trail for a worm to pull to one side. But the foundations for homes were visible, plus markings lain out to define a network of streets. The only signs of recent habitation were the promised locker—an underground facility little bigger than a worm’s stomach—and standing to the north, a beacon tower built of wood and capped with an enormous bone-lined bowl. A reservoir of fats and cured sap was burning slowly, yellow flames swirling with the wind. In other times, this would have been the brightest light for a hundred kilometers—a navigation point to help any lost souls. But the firestorm to the east made the fire seem quite weak. Against that rushing, sizzling wall of scorching fire and vaporized wood, everything about the world seemed small and feeble.
The wind was blowing harder now, and with it came a chill from the west, causing Jopale to shiver.
Caretakers worked frantically, breaking open the locker, rolling barrel after barrel onto the trail directly in front of the worm. And other caretakers ordered the mockmen off the worm’s back, gathering them together on the dusty, dry ground, loud voices warning them not to take another step.
Jopale thought he could hear the firestorm, even though it was still ten or twenty kilometers behind them.
It sounded like water, oddly enough. Like a strong current flowing over a brink, then falling fast.
Do-ane appeared suddenly, almost close enough to touch him. Her boots were buttoned. Her book was cradled under one arm. She studied his face for a moment. Then she regarded the firestorm with the same speculative intensity. And finally, she said to Jopale, “Come with me.”
He wasn’t surprised. For a long while now, he had imagined this invitation and his response. But what startled him was his own reaction, feeling decidedly unsure about what to do.
“My colleagues are there now,” she continued, pointing at the still-distant tower. “Behind the beacon is a little hut, and there’s a shaft and elevator that will drop us all the way to the starship—”
“What about me?” Rit interrupted.
Do-ane gave him a moment’s glance. She seemed unprepared for his entirely natural question.
“Your starship is huge,” Rit reminded her. “Huge and empty. Don’t you think your friends would welcome me, too?”
She tried to speak.
Then the old wealthy woman stepped forward. “There isn’t much time, miss. Where’s this sanctuary of yours—?”
“Beyond that tower,” Rit offered.
“Thank you.” Then to her companion, she said, “Help me, will you dear? I’m not sure I can manage such a long walk.”
Her young man was holding their essential bags, a faint smile showing as he stared off to the north. With an agreeable tone, he said, “I’m sure you’ll do fine.” Then he winked, adding, “Start right away. As fast as you can.” And with the strength of youth, he ran off into the ruddy gloom, dropping his bags and hers in his wake.
Other passengers began to follow him.
“Well,” the old woman muttered. Then with a shuffling gait, she tried to keep up.
Rit glared at Do-ane. Appalled by the circumstances, he asked, “So just how big is this elevator? And how fast? And will it take all of us at once?”
She tried to answer, but her voice kept failing her.
Rit looked back at the worm, then focused on the tower.
“Where are you going?” Master Brace hollered. He was still up near the worm’s mouth, but moving toward them as fast as he could manage. “What are you people doing? What in the hell are you thinking?”
Do-ane saw him coming. Then she threw down everything but her precious book, and glancing at Jopale one last time, she turned and sprinted across the empty plain.
Rit considered Jopale, plainly doubting his good sense and sanity. Then he was gone too, his long stride letting him catch up to Do-ane, then the old woman, leaving both of them behind.
“Sir,” said Brace, staggering up next to Jopale.
He would say his good-byes; then he would run too. Jopale had made up his mind, or so he believed.
“Don’t,” was the caretaker’s advice.
“Don’t what?” Jopale asked.
Brace took him by the shoulder. Panting from his run, he said, “I like you, sir. And I honestly meant to warn you before now.”
“Warn me?”
“And then… then I saw the girl talking to everybody, and I didn’t think… I couldn’t imagine… that all of you would actually believe her—”
“What is this?” Jopale cried out.
“She’s ridden my worm in the past, sir.” Brace looked across the plain. The fire to the east was tall enough and bright enough to illuminate each of the fleeing passengers. Tiny now. Frantic little shapes soon to be lost against that great expanse of dead dry wood.
“I know she’s ridden this way,” Jopale said. “Of course she has. She comes here to study the secret mountain.”
Brace shook his head. “No, sir,” he said.
Then he looked Jopale in the eye, saying, “She does this. She has that book of hers, and she befriends a man… usually an older man… convincing him that everything she says is real. Then she steps off at this place and invites him to join her adventure, and of course any man would happily walk off with a pretty young thing like that. But she is insane, sir. I am sure.
“On my worm, she has ridden west at least five times now. And three times, she has set off a flare to make us stop here and pick her up on our eastbound leg.” He gulped the cool air. “That’s what people do in this country when there is no station, sir.” Offering a grim smile, he added, “But sometimes we haven’t brought her, and it’s her men who set off the flares. We’ve rescued several gentlemen of your age and bearing, and they’re always angry. ‘She showed me this big book,’ they’ll say. They’ll say, ‘I was going to explore an ancient starship and look at the bones of gods.’ ”
Jopale wrapped his arms around his chest, moaning softly.
“That girl is quite crazy, sir. And that’s all she is.” Brace placed a comforting hand upon Jopale’s shoulder. “She takes her men walking in the darkness. She keeps telling them that their destination is just a little farther now. But there’s nothing to find out there. Even the most foolish man figures that out. And do you know what she does? At some point, she’ll turn and tell him, ‘You are the problem. You don’t believe, so of course we can’t find it.’
“Then those fellows return here and continue their journey west. And she wanders for a little while, then comes and waits here for the next eastbound worm. Somehow she always has money. Her life is spent riding worms and reading her book, and when she forgets that nothing on those pages is real, she comes back this way again. And that’s all that she does in her life, from what I can tell.”