Iome trusted Gaborn’s Earth Sight more than she did Averan’s memories.
“Where?” Averan asked.
“This way,” Gaborn shouted. “Follow me!”
He raced his mount a hundred yards, and then stopped, searching this way and that for a place to hide. “Up there!” he shouted. He pointed toward a narrow cleft between two stalactites near the roof.
“The horses will never fit through there!” Binnesman objected.
“Then we leave them,” Gaborn answered. He leapt off his mount and pulled out his dagger, then cut the girth straps to his saddle. In an instant the saddle and all of the packs were off.
Iome’s mount had its ears back, and its eyes were wild. It snorted in terror at the sound of the reavers’ trampling feet. Iome leapt off and removed her saddle, ropes, and pack. Her mount reared up, frantically pawing the air.
She could see no escape for the beast. There was no light here in the Underworld, and the horses would not be able to run in the dark.
As Iome wondered what to do, Binnesman dismounted, but left his saddle on the horse, cutting off only his packs and his coil of rope. Then he took his opal cape pin off and pinned it onto the saddle.
He laid a hand on the muzzle of the gray imperial warhorse, and said softly, “You have carried me as far as we can go, my friend. Now, seek greener fields.”
The stallion stared at him for a moment in curiosity, ears forward. Iome wondered if the animal understood the wizard, but this force horse had once been Raj Ahten’s personal mount. The runes on it showed that it had four endowments of wit. Seldom were so many forcibles used on a mere horse. This mount learned almost as fast as a man would. Hopefully, it understood.
“Go, my friend,” Binnesman urged. “I have provided light for the journey.”
Around Iome, the ground rumbled continuously. It was as if giant stones were rolling through the cavern. The sound seemed sourceless. She almost expected reavers to come charging up the cave at that instant, but somehow knew that they were far away. The noise wasn’t loud because they were close, it was loud because they were many.
The wizard turned away from his horse. Gaborn was already scrambling up the rocks, with the green woman in tow. Iome followed last.
The horses took off, went thundering down the tunnel, racing back the way that they had come.
“Here, now,” Binnesman said to Iome. “You first.” He hesitated as Iome stepped around him, between a pair of stalagmites that stood like grotesque guardians. There was no trail to their retreat. Iome had to look for handholds on her way up. The flowstone along the walls, though slick, offered many such opportunities.
She turned back to see what was keeping the wizard. He took some sprigs of parsley from his pocket and blessed them. He tossed them on the trail, then drew wards of protection on the ground with his staff.
Iome reached the sanctuary, squeezed in. Gaborn and the others were already inside. It was a small grotto, about forty feet long. Stalactites had dripped down over the ages, until at last they had joined with the stalagmites beneath, forming crude pillars. Several of these stood next to one another, becoming solid walls. The floor beneath showed that at times water had pooled in the small cavern, but now all was dry.
“The reavers will smell the horses,” Averan said. “They’ll come to investigate.”
“But they won’t smell us,” Binnesman assured her.
Iome had to wonder. Binnesman was the most powerful herbalist she had ever known. His spells could amplify the natural properties of plants, magnifying their effect. But could even the incomparable Binnesman hide the odor of half a dozen men and horses from the reavers?
Her heart pounded. She studied the narrow grotto. There was no exit. Sweat stood out on Gaborn’s brow; his tongue flicked out and whetted his lips.
What does it mean, she wondered, when even the Earth King is afraid?
The ground began shaking so hard that bits of stone flaked off the roof. Mingled with the distant rumble now came a hissing, the sound that reavers make as they draw breath. It sounded almost as if the tunnel were a windpipe, and the Earth itself were gasping.
Gaborn threw down his saddle and stripped his pack, ropes, and saddlebags off. He tossed them over his own shoulder, leaving the saddle. He stood up, and his eyes darted about nervously.
Iome and the others grabbed their own belongings.
“Get back,” Gaborn warned them. “Get to the back of the chamber.”
Averan was the first to go. Binnesman and the others followed. Gaborn held his reaver dart and stood at the mouth of the grotto, on guard.
Averan hung at the back of the cavern, listening. The rumbling grew. Tremors shook the floor, and dust rose all about. “They’re coming fast,” she said. “They’re coming too fast.”
“ ‘Too fast?’” Alarm coursed through Iome.
“This is it,” Averan said. “This is their entire horde, their army. This is the end of the world.”
“What do you mean, this is the horde?” Iome demanded.
“Now the real warriors are coming,” Averan said, “and all of them will come. They’ll bring their most powerful battle mages, and...and—” She threw up her arms, unable to explain.
Iome suspected that even Averan couldn’t guess what the reavers were capable of.
Three days. Gaborn had warned that there would be a great battle at Carris in three days. Iome calculated how fast the common reavers had run before, and realized that three days was about right. In three days the army that was marching from the Underworld would reach Carris.
Gaborn paced at the mouth of the grotto.
“What’s wrong?” Iome demanded.
“The Earth...” Gaborn said. “The Earth warns me to flee, but I see no escape.”
“Maybe we should go after the horses,” Averan suggested.
“No,” Gaborn said. “This is the right path. I just—I just don’t see the way out.”
Iome searched frantically. Everywhere, the white walls hung like dripping curtains of stone. Craters pocked the floor where pools had formed and then dried out ages ago. White ridges along each ledge showed where the waterline had been. Perfect blue-white cave pearls rested on the floor.
The water had to come from somewhere, Iome thought. She peered up. The roof above rose some twenty feet. Small stalactites hung overhead like spears. The ground rattled under her feet now, and Iome licked her lips, afraid that a stalactite would break loose and fall, along with the flakes of stone that had begun tumbling from the roof.
Then she spotted it—a tiny shaft so small that a badger could not have crawled through. It was near the roof, at the back of the cave.
“Up here!” she said.
Iome dropped her pack and ropes and climbed up the wall. Her fingers and toes found purchase in tiny crevices and indentations that no commoner could ever have used. The flowstone offered ample opportunity for support. With her endowments of brawn and grace, she felt almost as if she were a fly, climbing along the wall.
She reached the top. Her opal crown gleamed, and by its light she searched the hole. She couldn’t see far back. She reached in. The hole narrowed, and became no wider than her arm. She grasped a knob of calcite, a cave pearl that had fused to the floor of the small spring, and tried to wrench it free. With so many endowments of brawn she was able to break it off, but even as she did, her hand snapped up and hit the roof of the cave, banging it. Her knuckles bled profusely. It was no use. The calcite deposits were as hard as quartz. She’d never be able to dig fast enough to widen the opening.
“Here they come!” Gaborn shouted. “Everyone to the back!”
He herded the others to the rear of the grotto. Iome clung to the wall like a fly, afraid to move. The wall shook beneath her grasp.
Silently, she prayed to the Earth Powers, “Hide us. Let them not find us.”
Loud hissing rose outside the grotto.
“They’ve smelled us,” Averan said. “There’s no other reason why they’d be coming up this branch of the cave.”