The seeker slipped by her and went up to the obstruction, staring into the dark and sniffing. Irisis kept going. Ullii needed no light; in fact, she could employ her seeker’s talent better without it.
Irisis had been walking for some five minutes before realising that Ullii was not behind her. She held the lantern up. There was no sign of the seeker. No point yelling or cursing her, that would only make things worse. Irisis returned to the roof fall. Ullii was not there, though there was a small print in the clayey muck.
‘Ullii,’ she called, not too loudly.
Grit sifted down from a crack in the roof. Irisis felt afraid. Rotten wet rock was far more perilous than dry stuff. She squeezed through the gap, scraping breasts that were still tender from the previous night, and edged forward. A flat piece of granite detached itself from the roof, landing with a plop in front of her. Irisis shuddered and kept going.
The rotten rock continued as far as she could see, which was not far here. At a shallow bend, she peered around. Something crouched down the other end of the tunnel, but Irisis could not make out what it was. It might even have been a lyrinx.
At the thought, terror rose up within her and she almost screamed. Get a grip on yourself! A lyrinx would not even fit in this tunnel. She held up the lantern, the shapes shifted and became the seeker, crouching with her arms against the wall.
‘What are you doing?’ Irisis said crossly. ‘This place is too dangerous. We’ve got to go back.’
‘I can see something,’ said Ullii.
Irisis resisted the urge to run. ‘What?’ she whispered when she got there.
‘Crystal. Good crystal. Big crystal!’
‘Really? Are you sure?’
‘Biiiig crystal!’ Ullii turned around and around, as if searching for something she could not quite locate.
‘Where, Ullii? Which way?’
Her outstretched arm revolved, slanting down towards the floor. ‘There.’
‘Is it close?’ Ullii could never be precise about distances, although directions were usually accurate. To be so fuzzy was unusual.
‘Not … so close,’ said Ullii.
That meant down a fair way. The ninth level was also unsafe and partly flooded, the level rising and falling with the seasons. It had not been too bad last autumn: Tiaan had been able to escape that way. That could be different after a winter of heavy snowfalls that were rapidly melting. If the crystal was below the ninth level they might as well forget it, for the water would come into the excavation faster than their primitive pumps could extract it.
‘Let’s go, Ullii. We’ll come back in the morning.’
For once, Ullii seemed reluctant. She lingered by the wall, feeling it with her fingers. Her face was animated.
Irisis felt the sleepless night catching up with her. She caught Ullii by the arm. ‘Come on. It’s late.’
The seeker resisted. ‘Leave me alone!’
Irisis was so astounded that she took a step backwards. ‘What’s the matter?’
‘It’s talking to me!’
‘What is it saying?’
Ullii gave her a strange look, somewhere between pity and contempt. ‘You can’t understand.’
Irisis did not have the strength. She squatted against the wall and closed her eyes, but sprang up as the rock shook and a crash thundered along the tunnel. Air rushed past, carrying a wet, clayey smell. More of the roof had fallen.
Irisis looked back the way they had come but could see no further than the bend. She inspected the roof with her lantern. It was fractured all the way along.
‘Ullii?’
The seeker had not moved, nor did she answer. There was nothing to do but wait. Irisis settled down again. Her eyes drifted closed.
‘I’m ready now’. Ullii was shaking her shoulder.
‘What?’ Irisis said thickly, roused from deep slumber. She opened her eyes to utter darkness. ‘Where –’ She remembered. ‘What’s happened to the lantern?’
‘It went out ages ago.’
Irisis felt for it and gave it a shake – it was empty and cold. It had burned all its oil. How were they going to find the way back to the lift shaft? The eighth level was a maze of intersecting tunnels.
‘Ullii,’ she whispered. ‘I’m afraid. I don’t know the way back. What are we going to do?’
The seeker made a muffled sound in her throat, which Irisis took for a sob. Panic began to close her throat over.
A warm little hand found her cold fingers. ‘It’s all right,’ Ullii said soothingly, the way Irisis had often spoken to her. ‘I know the way.’
Being treated like a child was irritating, but Irisis tried not to show it. Maybe the seeker did know the way out. Perhaps she could see it in that lattice in her head.
Ullii pulled her gently along. ‘This is the wrong way,’ Irisis hissed, sure that she had gone to sleep against the right-hand wall, which meant that the way back was on her left side. They were going the other direction.
‘No, it’s not,’ Ullii said calmly.
Irisis did not argue. The seeker was at home in this environment and she was not. Maybe she had turned around in her sleep, or after she stood up. It was so easy to become disoriented down here.
The tunnel turned sharply, then back the other way, like the bends of an ‘S’. Irisis shivered.
‘It is the wrong way, Ullii. We definitely did not come around those bends.’
‘Shh.’ Ullii patted her hand. ‘I know where I’m going.’
Perhaps the fall had blocked the way they had come. After that, and turning into a different tunnel, and then another, Irisis kept her mouth shut. Hopelessly lost, she had no choice but to rely on the little seeker.
They had been walking for a long time when Ullii stopped suddenly. Irisis, so tired that she could not think straight, kept going. Ullii jerked hard on her hand.
‘What’s the matter?’ Irisis asked dazedly.
‘Hole in the floor. Shouldn’t be there.’
How could she possibly know that? ‘Does that mean we have to go back?’
‘Stay here.’ Ullii let go of her hand.
‘Ullii?’
‘Shhh!’
Irisis sat on the damp floor. This puts a whole new shade on being kept in the dark, she thought wryly. The silence settled around her. Absolute silence. It was broken by a faint echoing click.
What was the seeker doing? Was she trying to climb down the hole and up the other side? Irisis did not fancy that in the dark. She wanted to cry out, to hear the reassurance of the seeker’s voice. Now that was ironic.
What was taking her so long? Had she gone down and could not get up again? Irisis felt very alone. To pass the time she began counting, but after reaching a thousand gave up because she could no longer concentrate. Suddenly, out of nowhere, Ullii was beside her.
‘I smell clawers.’
It was her word for lyrinx. ‘Where?’ Irisis whispered.
‘Down. Ninth level.’
‘Did they make this hole?’
‘Think so.’
‘Does it go all the way down?’
‘Yes,’ said Ullii.
‘What do they want?’ Irisis said to herself, then answered it. ‘They want crystal and they’re also after the big one. Can we get past the hole?’
‘Think so.’
Getting information out of the seeker was like pulling teeth. ‘Come on!’ said Irisis. ‘We can’t let them trap us here. I don’t want to end up in the belly of a lyrinx.’
It was the wrong thing to say. Irisis heard the seeker’s muted squeal of panic, then nothing.
‘Ullii,’ she whispered.
There was no reply. Feeling around, she came upon the seeker, curled up like the armadillo that was her favourite animal. Irisis felt just as panicky. Now what was she supposed to do?
Leaving her there, she crawled to the hole. It was absolutely dark. Feeling around the ragged edge, Irisis smelt a familiar musty, meaty odour. The lyrinx were not far away.
It was unpleasant work in pitch blackness, knowing that if she overbalanced she would fall head-first and dash her brains out on the floor of the ninth level. Her hands met the wall, but leaning out as far as she dared Irisis did not find the other side. As she hesitated there, her heart clattering in her chest, something else struck her. If she could smell the lyrinx, they could probably smell her.