Serpent's Silver (16 page)

Ahead were wilds: trees and brush. He supposed he had run, crawled, or somehow moved through these parts. Yet he could hardly remember. The magic medicine Gerta had used on him had dimmed any memories of what otherwise might be coming back. It was plain that he had gotten here from the river, and he must have traveled this road. More he simply could not evoke.

They were stopping. The captain was talking to someone, and oh, how red his face appeared. Then the captain was falling, clutching at his throat. Horses neighed and danced. Swords leaped from scabbards. Shields were raised. In a moment a full-scale battle was on. It was like old times, thus abruptly: swords swishing and shields clanging and men crying out from wounds or giving their death rattles. Wild-looking men without uniforms were everywhere, attacking green uniforms.

A man screamed and fell from his horse, and another man and horse raced after a third. Dust billowed voluminously, like smoke. That was the thing about battles: they were never neat and choreographed; they were always messy and dusty and ugly in both sight and mind.

Briefly he glimpsed the face of a man not wearing a uniform: a young, now very grim face.
Kian!
he thought.
Kian! My son!

Kian must have followed him to this frame. But who were these men he was with? Who were these rough, ill-clad, undisciplined folk? They looked like bandits from the Sadlands. And was it really Kian, or did it just look like him? With similar-looking people turning up in this frame, it was hard to be sure. He had to find out!

He dug his heels into his horse’s sides and crouched low on the neck, trying to make a break. The horse leaped forward as it was supposed to do, and as he took off he shoved the soldiers on either side of him from their mounts—or tried to. His outflung arms did not accomplish much. Then he was past and there were other matters at hand.

The man he had thought to be Kian was in that battle ahead. John didn’t have a sword himself, or any kind of weapon. Still—

The blow took him from behind and sent him out of the saddle and down to the dust. He threw up his arms to protect his face. The ground came up very, very fast.

The next thing he knew, someone was pulling him up by his arms. Who had him, and why, he did not know. It was all he could do to hang on to his dwindling consciousness.

Chapter 16

Serpent's Hole

KIAN FELT HER STIFFEN and the gauntlet jerked. He knew she had been pierced by the gaze of a serpent or a flopear. At least he hoped that was it, rather than an arrow. He felt himself swing around, pulled by the left gauntlet, and the jarring thud as shield struck hard against a flopear's face. The flopear went down in a heap, his raised club flying from his hands.

Kian gave Lonny a quick slap and saw her eyes unglaze. He could hear more flopears coming in the distance, uttering hoarse shouts. The only flopear in sight was the one he had knocked unconscious.

They had to hide! There was no fighting these flopears. If they didn't get out of sight, they were going to be killed or captured.

A hole showed there in the rocks. A cave? A den? What did it matter? It was a hiding place.

He jerked Lonny the distance and pushed her ahead of him into the darkness of the hole. If they could just stay here until the flopears were past—until nightfall, perhaps.

Outside, the flopears were calling to one another in hoarse shouts. Yes, they'd have to stay hidden. They hadn't been seen or discovered yet. They had found the club-wielder and were trying to decide what had happened.

“Kian,” Lonny whispered, moving close. “Kian—”

“Not now, Lonny.” God, how he wanted her arms around him! But he didn't want her to feel his trembling. Heroes, after all, were supposed to be brave.

“Kian—I—I love you.”

That was what he had been afraid she would say. He was so attracted to her—and this in the wrong frame!

“Kian, there's something you should know.”

He was afraid he already knew it. That mergence in the serpent—that hadn't been just because they were both captive. It had been because they both wanted it. They both wanted it now, in their physical bodies, too.

His arms found her and held her. He could feel her heart beating under her light shirt. The trembling of his limbs now didn't seem to matter. In a moment, except for the danger, he might forget himself. Blessed be the peril, part of him thought.
Damn!
another part retorted.

But if they were in immediate danger of dying, why was he holding back? Why save himself for a woman of the other frame if there was to be no encounter with her? Wouldn't it be better simply to take advantage of that scant time remaining here?

“Kian, we're about to die.”

“M-maybe not,” he managed to say. Evidently her logic was paralleling his. She was such a precious armful, all sweet and soft and female. “I've still got my sword and my shield and the gauntlets. Even if they find us, they can't make eye contact in the dark. I can defend this cave for a long time.” But was that what he really wanted to do? How much easier to abandon thoughts of combat and simply lose himself in her!

“Kian, this isn't a cave. This is the tunnel a big serpent makes.”

He shuddered in spite of himself. A part of his mind had known where they were, but he had been suppressing it. Trust Lonny, troublesome as only a comely girl could be, to come out with it.

He moved his back up against the wall of the tunnel. He resheathed his sword and put his gauntleted palm against it. A thought screamed at his consciousness:
If we move back, back, back, maybe they won't come in here after us. Maybe they'll never find us!

Lonny moved still closer to him, scaring him almost more than the darkness, in quite a different manner. He took her hand firmly in his and whispered low so as not to be overheard by any sharp-eared flopear. “If we retreat far enough back—”

“But, Kian, we can't know what's here! There might be a—a—”

“And there might not. Not all the holes are occupied.” He hoped. “Come—”

He led her stumbling and cringing through the blackness, his gauntlet scraping the side of the tunnel. The gauntlets wouldn't lead him into unnecessary danger, would they? In any other place he would have found it easier to believe that.

There was no indication, but he felt that the tunnel was old. If it hadn't been used for a long time, just maybe they might follow it to a spot where the original tunneler had resurfaced. It was a possibility, though remote. After all, the one they had been in had eaten silver, then come to the surface. They did like to sun themselves after a meal.

“Kian, is that a glow?”

He paused. He had thought it wishful thinking, but yes, there was a lightness. Outdoors! They'd survive after all!

But no, he felt no breeze, no hint of fresh air. His nose, in fact, seemed clogged with dust. So if that wasn't daylight, what was it? There were no alternatives but to go on, or stay where they were, or return to the entrance. Even now the flopears could be tracking them down, entering the tunnel; the flopears had no fear of serpents.

His gauntlets were tugging at him, forcing him to move away from the wall and follow their lead, lest he be drawn off balance.

It could be daylight!
He thought without any proper conviction.
It could be daylight!
he kept telling his doubting self. But his self knew it was a lie. The light was greenish, and that meant—

At home it would have meant moss of the luminous variety that had enabled him to row out on the underground river and travel through the rock walls to Mouvar's concealed chamber. Here—

Here it meant luminous moss on rock walls. There was a blaze of green light and then he stopped, grabbing Lonny's arm. They were right in the exiting mouth of a serpent tunnel that led from a wide, natural chamber. The chamber's walls were coated with the luminous lichen. Other serpent tunnels, not of this size, also entered it at irregular intervals.

Kian took a great breath. “Maybe we
can
find a way out. By taking another tunnel.”

“Yes, Kian! Oh, yes!”

She was so quick, so positive. He liked that, knowing he had no business to react to it. He had aroused her hope, he thought, and now he would have to deliver. The gauntlets, he feared, really did not know more than he did which serpent tunnel might lead them to a reasonably safe exit. How
could
they know? They were not of this frame.

Holding Lonny's hand in his, feeling awed by the size of the chamber, he led her into it. There were outcroppings of rock and stalactites of great size above them, stalagmites rising up like raised spears from the floor. In the green radiance all was clear for a surprising distance. It was as though they had entered some mammoth building. There was little dust, and fresh air was coming in through serpent holes far overhead.

Lonny's face held the same awe Kian felt. The place they were in stretched as far as they could see, and there seemed no end to the radiance. Even if one of the serpent tunnels presented an immediate exit, the impulse to explore was overwhelming.

They walked hand in hand, admiring the beauty. Fear diminished; fear could not flourish in loveliness like this. There were crystal outcroppings, natural shelves and stairs and doorways. There were beads in some outcroppings that seemed bluish and yellowish and even reddish in the light. With some difficulty Kian realized that the beads were actual gems of a size that in his home frame would have been unheard of. Silver ore outcroppings here and there, like rivers and streams of shining mineral flowing frozenly through the rock. A crystal waterfall, greenish and sparkling, as high as any waterfall Kian had ever seen.

“Oh, Kian! Oh!” Lonny exclaimed.

Inadequate, but accurate, he thought. It was almost worth the danger to see this place, to know of its existence.

“It's as pretty as the flopears' silverwork,” she continued.

He had to agree. The people of this region drew the beauty of their images from it, along with the horror of their serpent companions. Yet, after being inside a serpent, he realized that horror was mainly how a person saw it. There was beauty within the serpents, too.

They walked between the stalagmites and found themselves in a narrow chamber. Here there were luminous mushrooms such as flopears used for lighting, and beyond the mushrooms was an area that descended as if by means of man-made stairs to a lower level.

Kian took a deep breath, thankful again for the good air here—who would have thought he would appreciate serpent holes like this!—and led Lonny on. There seemed no end of wonder to this place; no physical end in sight.

Ahead, silver. Lots of silver! He stopped, staring. The silver was in long, thin belts and made of overlapping scales. The silver was discarded serpentskins, many of them from giants.

“Gods, Lonny,” he said, “there's a fortune! They must have been coming here for ages!” His eyes swept along the shining carpet. It stretched for as far as he could see and then was closed off by a bend in the cavern.

“If only Jac and his men could get down here. They'd never have to steal silver from the flopears again. They'd be rich as any king! They could go out and buy themselves an army or a kingdom!”

“Kian?” Lonny whispered. Her face was very pale; what was the matter with her, reacting so to such wealth?

“It's all right,” he said.

“Kian,” she gasped, “remember where we are!”

Yes, she would remind him, he thought. Remind him that they would in all probability never get back to Jac and his bandits. Still it was something, just knowing this was here. If an army needed to be raised, the means of raising it was here.

Listening, he heard a great, dry rustling. It grew louder and louder, and then silver appeared in one of the serpent tunnels. They stood frozen as a great serpent snout—larger even than the one they had been in—protruded from one of the holes. That could be why the tunnel they had entered was empty: it was too small for a serpent this size. It did not see them, and Kian pulled Lonny away, back into a natural alcove.

Other rustlings, other sounds. It was as though the cavern walls had come alive. Serpents of great and simply large size, serpents the size of ordinary snakes, and serpents the size of worms, squirming out of open tunnels and tunneling themselves out of rock. Bits of rock dust fell here and there as serpents broke free of the honeycombed rock. The slithering grew louder and louder and was accompanied by hisses as the serpents broke into the cavern.

“Oh, Kian, Kian, hold me! Hold me before it's too late!”

He did, trembling and shaking. Any moment a head might emerge at their backs. Any moment a serpent might set its freezing eyes on them. Once discovered, they would be gone. There was nothing to prevent their being snapped up, chewed, swallowed, digested, and made physically a part of these monsters. Magic gauntlets, sword, and shield were as little protection as their clothing. There was nothing to do but stay hidden and wait.

Plop! Plop! Plop! The sound of serpent bodies sliding, gliding, falling onto rock. This huge cavern that had seemed so much like salvation from pursuit had turned out to be the most dangerous place of all.

He held her tight, no longer daring to speak any word. It was amazing that the serpents didn't smell them, but perhaps the odor was too diffuse to alert them. But any sound now—

After a time he found her face turned to his. Silently, he kissed her, and it was very sweet. Perhaps they would soon be horribly dead, but at the moment they were wonderfully alive.

*

Herzig came as fast as his short legs could carry him. The flopear motioned to the body on the ground, and he pulled up by it and looked down. Danzar, he thought, staring into the wide features of the unconscious man. His club lay near his hand, but there was a bruise on his forehead.

“Herzig, do you think they have a way of deflecting the serpent eye?” Kaszar asked. Kaszar was bending over Danzar, his stubby fingers lifting his eyelids to reveal the whites.

Herzig snorted. “With a bruise like that? No, if they could resist the eye, they would have taken him with them. Look here in the dirt; tracks of two mortals.”

“Then Danzar got careless?”

“Yes. Never underestimate a mortal. They are stupid, but some are less stupid than others.”

“Like Rowforth?”

“Rowforth, their king of Hud, is too cruel to be entirely stupid. Not stupid but not wise, and not what mortals call good.”

Danzar groaned and looked out again through his eyes. “Ohhh,” he said, his hand going to his bruise. “Two mortals. A man and a woman. I thought to club the woman dead, but he threw a stone to distract me and then swung without looking at me.”

“He swung without looking?” This was very interesting. Suggestive of a power, if not actual magic.

“Yes, his shield. He swung around fast and the shield caught me so fast I didn't see it. And my knee—he grabbed my knee, so that I fell. I never expected such coordination when I thought him done for.”

Herzig nodded. He didn't really like fighting mortals. They were so frail, for the most part, and few were worthy of joining in the cycle. It had been an act of kindness to put those two into the ancestor, just as it had been pity for a wretched creature that had driven Gerzah, Gerta's mother, to mate with one and bear it a child. But mortals by and large were untrustworthy, as that one had proved to be. Poor Gerzah had joined an ancestor early, and her daughter, Gerta, was without mate or child. That was what came ultimately of kindness to mortals. Still, as it had turned out, Gerta's mortal heritage enabled her to understand mortals better, and so she was good at helping them recover. That had been most useful in the case of the mortal John Knight.

Kaszar pointed to an opening in the rocks. It was an old ancestor tunnel rather than a natural opening. A pair of footprints were clearly in the dust in the tunnel's opening.

Herzig delivered himself of a long, painful sigh. Such stupidity just wasn't possible! But there it was—they had entered the domain of the ancestors. Deep in the ground the ancestors would find them and devour them, and then, just as food eventually became flesh, they would become part of the cycle.