The down-clad waif laughed delicately. "We are not sure.
We have always worked on the Building. We always will
work on the Building. What else is there to -life but the
Building?"
"You say you call it 'Heart-of-the-World.'" Jon-Tom stud-
ied the radiant walls and glistening spires. At first he thought
it had been made of real gold, then stone covered with gilt
paint. Now he wasn't sure. It might be metal of another kind,
or plastic, or ceramic, or some unimaginable material he
knew nothing of.
"Perhaps it is the very heart of the world itself," the little
lady offered in suggestion. She smiled joyfully, showing
perfect minuscule teeth. "We do not know. It beats with light
as a heart does. If our work were to be stopped, perhaps the
light would go out of the world."
Jon-Tom considered saying more but found reason and
reality at odds with one another, mixed up like a dog and a
cat chasing each other around a pole, getting nowhere. He
looked helplessly to Clothahump for an explanation. So did
his companions.
"Who can say?" The wizard shrugged. "If it is truly the
architecture of the heart of the world, then at least we can tell
others that the world is well and truly fashioned."
129
»,'
•&,
Alan Dean Foster
"Thank you, sir." The sprite leaped nimbly to another rock
further upstream to keep pace with them. "We do our best.
We have become very adept at adding to and maintaining the
Building."
"Make sure," Jon-Tom called to her, "that its glow never
goes out!" They were passing into a, narrower section of the
river cavern, leaving the unnamed little folk and their enig-
matic, immense construct behind.
"Who knows," he said quietly to Flor, "if it is the heart of
the world, then they'd better not be disturbed in their work.
That's a hell of a responsibility. And if it's not, if it's only a
building, an obsession, it's too beautiful to let die anyway."
"I never thought the heart of the world would be a
building," she said.
"Aren't we all structures?" With the Massawrath and
Helldrink safely far behind he was feeling alive and expan-
sive. He'd always been that way: high ups and abyssal
downs. Right now he was up.
"Each of us develops piece by piece. We're full of careful-
ly built rooms and halls, audience chambers and windows,
and we're populated with changing individualistic thoughts. I
never imagined the heart of the world would be a building,
though." He stared back down the tunnel. It was growing
dark, the radiant growths vanishing as they were prone to at
unexpected intervals.
"In fact, I never thought of the world as having a heart."
The last rich light from the distant chamber was lost to
sight as they rounded a slight bend in the river. Bribbens was
lighting the first lamp.
"That's a nice thought, Jon-Tom. If only having a heart
meant you would be happy."
"I suppose it often means the opposite." But when the
import of her last comment finally penetrated, she had left
him to chat with their stolid steersman.
130
THE HOUR OF THE GATE
Jon-Tom hesitated, thought about pursuing it further by
rejoining her to say, "Flor, are you trying to tell me some-
thing?" But he was as afraid of showing ignorance if he was
interpreting her wrongly as he was of failure.
So he sat himself down in the nickering light and began to
clean and tune his duar. As he tightened or loosened the
strings, a gneechee or two would appear behind him, peering
over his shoulder. He knew they were there and did his best
to ignore them.
They were compelled to run on lamplight. Gradually the
immense cave formations, the helictites and flowstone and
such, began to grow smaller. In the narrowing confines of the
river channel the rush and roar reverberated louder from the
walls. The continuing absence of the familiar fluorescent
fungi and their cousins was becoming unsettling.
No one liked the darkness. It reminded them too much of
sleep, and that reminded them of the now distant but never to
be forgotten sight of the Massawrath. More importantly, their
lamp oil was running out. Bribbens had prepared well, but he
hadn't expected to journey for long in total darkness. The
now sorely missed bioluminescents were all that had kept
them from traveling in black. Soon it appeared they might
have to do so, relying on Pog's abilities to guide them, unless
the light-producing vegetation reappeared.
A hand was shaking him. It was too small to be part of the
Massawrath, too solid to be one of its children. Nevertheless
he had an instant of terror before coming awake.
"Get up, Jon-Tom. Move your ass!" It was the urgent
voice of Talea.
"What?" But before he could say anything more she'd
moved on to the next sleeping form. He heard her banging on
an echoing surface.
"Wake up, wizard. You lazy old wizard, wake up!" She
sounded worried.
131
Alan Dean Foster
"I still admit to 'old' but not the other." A grumbling
Clothahump clambered to his feet.
Jon-Tom blinked, fought to dig sleep from his eyes. It was
hard to see anything in the reduced light from the lamps.
Bribbens was trying to conserve their dwindling supply of oil.
Then he saw the cause of her anxiety. In the blackness
ahead was a writhing sheet of flame, completely blocking the
river. It hung in the air there, a dull, thick orange-silver that
did not move. The others awoke and moved to the bow to
examine it. All agreed it was a most peculiar kind of fire.
As they cruised closer no rise in temperature or indeed any
heat at all could be felt. The orange-silver hue did not
change.
"Can it be another structure like the Heart-of-the-Wbrld
building of the little folk?" Flor licked her lower lip and
stared anxiously forward.
"No, no. The color is all wrong, supple shadow, and there
is no sign of separation; levels, floors, or windows." Caz
faced the wizard. "What is your opinion of it, sir?"
"Just a moment, will you?" Clothahump sounded irritable.
"I'm not fully awake yet. Do you children think I have your
physical resiliency simply because my brain is so much more
active? Now then, this surely cannot be dangerous." He
called back to Bribbens. "Steady ahead, my good boatman."
"Don't have much choice." The frog snapped off his reply
as he tightened his grip on the steering sweep. "Tunnel's
become too narrow for us to turn 'round in. Some of the
rocks hereabouts look sharp. I don't want to chance 'em, so
it's steady ahead unless it turns desperate."
The boatman was forced to raise his voice to a near shout
to make himself understood. The rush of air in the pipe of a
cave argued noisily with the increased force of me current.
They watched silently while mat cold flame came nearer.
Then there was another, dimmer light haloing it, and the
132
THE HOUR Of THE GATE
orange-silver no longer blocked their progress. The new light
came from tiny shining points that flickered unevenly, but not
like gneechees. These were both visible and motionless.
"Well, shit." Mudge put hands on hips and sounded
thoroughly disgusted with himself. " 'Tis a prize pack o'
idiots we be, mates."
Jon-Tom didn't understand immediately, but it didn't take
long until he knew the reason for the otter's embarrassment.
When he did so he felt equally ashamed of his own fear.
The orange-silvery color was familiar enough. Then they
emerged from the cavern. The great rising orb of moon no