Lord Marbon was on his feet, striding back toward the foaming river he had unloosed, Dwed close behind him. Even Uta crouched near the rim of the channel, peering down at the rushing waters.
That flood did not go far, Brixia saw as she joined the rest of the party. The rise in the slope of the valley might well have sent the draining water back towards the lake. Instead the new stream disappeared not far away. Lord Marbon had moved to that point, was looking down at the swirling, foam topped whirl pond.
“Underground,” he murmured—“a river underground.”
However, he spared but little attention to that. Rather he hurried back to the lake itself.
The water poured away in a steady, rushing outflow. Already a pinnacle arose out of the lake. The top of a dome showed, then another.
“An-Yak, the long-hidden—” Lord Marbon’s loud cry of triumph arose above the rushing of the water. “Three and one—we have come to find what has long been lost and vainly sought!”
Still the water drained. Walls rose clear and dripping. Brixia could see that what stood here was unlike any other structure she had ever seen. Those walls now coming into view enclosed spaces for which there was no indication roofs had ever existed. There were two domes at the heart of that maze of walls, between them a slender tower, standing not very tall—perhaps less than the height of a manor watchtower. As the waters fell to disclose more and more, Brixia blinked and rubbed her eyes.
There was something very curious about what Lord Marbon named An-Yak. The sprawling structures were small—they might have been viewing it from a distance so perspective reduced the normal size. She could not explain this strangeness—only she herself felt large—too large—a giant near buildings devised for a much shorter race.
The toad people had been small—and a statue of their kind had guarded the way to An-Yak. Was this some ancient dwelling of theirs—a temple perhaps? Brixia half expected to see one of those warty, tendril haired heads break above the surface of the rapidly dwindling water.
Matching the color of flood itself, the hues of those buildings were both green and blue. Nor were those colors constant in shade. Rather, across the wet surfaces those rippled, light and dark, dark and light.
Wide bands of metal of a deep green encircled the domes. Those were set with what might be gem stones; for, catching the sun’s full light, they flashed with fire. It would seem that long immersion had in no way either eroded or encrusted what had been built here.
The flood dwindled at long last. There was still a cupping of water in the middle of the lake, washing about the foundations of the walls, but no more fed on into the channel.
“An-Yak’s heart—!!” Marbon leaped from the rim of the lake. As he moved purposefully forward water washed about his ankles, then arose half way to his knees.
Brixia cried out. Claws struck her shoulders, pierced her shirt, to catch in her flesh. She put up her hands to grasp Uta, settling the cat into her arms. Dwed was already splashing after his lord and it seemed that Uta urged her to follow, perhaps looking to Brixia to provide a way for the cat to reach the once drowned building dry footed.
Her feeling that the proportions of the building before them (for she had decided that it was indeed joined together to form a single structure) were wrong continued. Its small size seemed to be normal, her own in relation to it, too large and clumsy. Water washed lazily around her feet and—
A small wavelet, set up by the passing of the two ahead, broke against her own legs. In it—Settling Uta more securely in the crook of her left arm, Brixia stooped. She was right! Her fingers closed upon the tight bud which had swept over the lake to reveal what lay under its surface. To hold the enfolded blossom once more was comforting. Under the sun it was tightly shut as if it had never opened. Nor did it feel any more as if it pulsed with some life of its own. Brixia tucked it into her shirt, glad of its cool wetness against her skin.
There appeared to be no gate or other opening to lead through the cluster of walls about the two domes. The three splashed their way completely around the outer edge to discover none such. The road they had seen from the bank came to a dead end against one wall. Those partitions arose in a height slightly above Lord Marbon’s head, well above Dwed’s. Brixia thought she might just be able herself to reach a hand to the top of one while standing on tiptoe.
Marbon was not to be baffled. He had made the complete circlet, now he turned to face the nearest stretch of wall. Reaching, he hooked his hands over the top and pulled himself up. He had not spoken since they had come down into the basin of the lake, nor had he shown any sign of realizing he was not alone.
Though the vacancy in his face had gone, his new expression of deep concentration walled them away as completely, he saw only what lay before him—continued with urgency in every movement.
Up and over he went, to drop from sight.
“Lord—!” Dwed must know the futility of such a call as he voiced it. The boy sprang in turn. His first leap fell short so his crooked fingers only drew lines down the still wet surface of the barrier. Before Brixia came up, he jumped again, and this time caught and held, scrambling to the top by a determined effort.
The girl loosened Uta’s claw grip on her shoulder and held the cat up. Like it or not Uta would have to take to her own feet now, Brixia could not climb one-handed. And it would seem Uta was willing enough to do just that.
She joined cat and boy on the top of the wall. From here the odd architecture of the building was even more clear. The walls enclosed spaces which jutted out from the double domed center like—like the petals of a flower. They tapered somewhat inward, the space each guarded roughly oval, narrower at the dome end. There was nothing within these enclosures save more water, washing higher here since it had been retained by the walls.
Marbon, water waist high about him, had nearly reached the narrowed end of the space into which he had swung. Now Dwed dropped, heading doggedly after his lord. Brixia hesitated.
Curiosity alone, or so she had thought, had brought her this far. Now, as she crouched on the wall top, she was in two minds about continuing. All the old distrust of sorcery and ancient Powers moved in her. Dwed was drawn by his fierce loyalty to his lord—no such tie moved her. While the alien feeling of the place made her more and more uneasy.
Uta ran lightly along the top of the wall. The cat had already caught level with Marbon, now passed him, heading for the double-domes. Brixia shook her head. This venture was none of hers. She remained perched where she was, unwilling to go on, yet somehow also unable to go back.
The water washing about on the section below was dim, murky. Anything might swim below its surface. Marbon and Dwed went with their feet and legs covered, she had no such protection. Go back—
But still Brixia could not bring herself to do that. Rather she arose, to balance carefully on the wall top, following Uta’s example. The wet surface of the stone was slippery and she advanced slowly, having no desire to slide over.
Lord Marbon reached the far end of the walled enclosure and climbed the wall there. She could see him standing before the nearest of the domes. Uta sprang—not for Marbon’s shoulders, but up and out, landing gracefully on the highest point of the dome itself. She leaned over to voice a loud mew as if addressing the man beneath her perch demandingly.
Brixia swayed, fought for her balance. That sound that the cat had made! Her hands flew up to cover her ears. Pain shot through her head like a knife sliding into her flesh. No—!
She could not hear that piercing cry now, she could only feel. While the pain stabs followed near every breath she drew.