This Battle Lord's Quest (16 page)

Chapter
Twenty

Lanta

The necklace continued to glow as Paas slipped it
over her neck, and they continued their downward climb on the narrow stairs. Sometimes
they would pass a particular formation, and Paas would point it out to show off
its beauty. Otherwise, they spoke little to each other in order to concentrate
on where they placed their feet.

When they reached another large, rail-encircled
ledge, Paas called for a halt and shared her dwindling supply of rations with
Aggee.

“I owe you big time,” Aggee commented.

“Just don’t kill me in my sleep. That’s all I ask,”
the warrior woman half-teased.

“How do you know I won’t?”

The woman froze. The smile left her lips, but she
didn’t appear alarmed.

“I don’t sense evil in you, and I think I’m a fair
judge of character.” She peered at her with slitted eyes. “You’re different
from anyone I’ve met. I don’t know how, but I’m going to find out. Maybe not
today, maybe not tomorrow, but I will. Eventually.”

“How do I know you won’t turn on me?”

“It’s against my personal code to fight you when
you’re less than at your best. Ask me again once you’re all better.” She added
a wink to her remark, and took a sip of water.

They spoke no more of the matter, and once they
were rested, pressed on. Every so often, they would come to an intersection
where another path meandered into the darkness. Paas knew the way well, and
never left the initial trail they were on, or at least it appeared they didn’t
stray. At one of the junctions, Aggee pointed it out.

“Where do all of those alternate routes go?”

“Some loop around back to here. Some lead to dead
ends. Many of them lead into alternate caves we have yet to fully explore.
There’s tales of people who’ve ventured off to map some of the lesser known
caverns, and never made it back.”

“I take it you use this trail often.”

“The cavern is too dangerous for those untrained.
Its use is prohibited to all but a select few of us, and even then we have to
be granted permission to come here,” Paas admitted.

“To go up top?”

The warrior woman glanced back at her. “I make the
trip to the fallen heavens two to three times a year, mostly to hunt for game.
And because I love the view from up there.”

“Bet these steps are a killer going up. Any idea
how many there are?”

Paas let out a bark of laughter. “One thousand
forty-seven, with six rest stops along the way.”

Which explained why it seemed as if the stairs
would never end, Aggee mused to herself. She continued to feel flashes of pain
in her broken arm, but her head gave her the worst trouble. As long as she was
careful not to make any sudden movements, the throbbing was manageable.

The same was true with trying to remember her past.
It was like a giant hand had reached inside her skull, grabbed a fistful of
thoughts and memories, and pulled them out by the roots, leaving behind open
and bleeding wounds in her brain. Every so often, a picture would flash behind
her closed eyelids, or a face. Or a sound would whisper in her ear, or a smell
would drift up her nose, when there was nothing around her to provoke any of
them. These moments came without warning and without reason, but they were more
prevalent when she was asleep. Some she remembered after she awoke, but many of
them retreated back into the black fog of her unconsciousness. All she had left
to let her know she’d been dreaming were their invisible ghosts floating in the
corners of her mind. Ghosts that never left, but continued to haunt her when
she wasn’t prepared for them to make an appearance.

At least the dizziness seemed to be lessening,
which was a blessing.

So deep was she in thought, she wasn’t aware the
floor had leveled out, and they were walking on a flat surface until Paas
spoke.

“See that light up ahead? That’s the cavern
opening.”

Aggee glanced up to see a pale white light in the
distance, streaming in like a solitary lantern. As they drew nearer, the light
became brighter until it took the form of an irregular hole in the rock face. A
wind blew over their bodies, and she shivered from its chill.

They stepped out into daylight, and Aggee came to a
halt. It was too much to take in all at once, and she squeezed her eyes shut
for a few seconds before slowly opening them.

“Welcome to Lanta, Aggee.”

As much as she could tell, the cavern was a fair
distance from the village. But between them and there, lay a view more
magnificent than the one she’d glimpsed from the top of the cliff. Although it
was in the middle of the harvest season, much of what she saw continued to be
lush and green.

“Come on. We need to keep moving. You can gawk
along the way,” Paas urged with a snicker, and took off. Aggee stumbled behind
her, but was unable to take her eyes off their surroundings.

“Is that a waterfall I hear?”

“Yeah,” the warrior woman responded, waving a hand
to their left. “It’s around the other side of the cavern opening. It’s not a
big one, but it empties into a neat little pool where a lot of us go to swim
and bathe.”

Although the forest didn’t come this far, the trees
that were present grew tall and wide. Even the mountains looming ahead of them
appeared larger. Aggee noticed their white caps, as well as the carpet of
foliage, much of it starting to turn color, covering the steep sides like a
quilt of gold, red, and orange. The countryside surrounding the village
consisted of knee-high grass, now dry and yellow under the autumn sun, that
extended all the way to the edge of the silvery lake glittering in the
distance.

The closer they got to the village, the more detail
she could make out about its construction. There were many smaller structures
made of wood and thatched roofs, but the majority of buildings were carved out
of stone, or consisted of stacked rocks. Inside some of them, huge trees had
sprouted within their interiors and literally grown through the ceilings.
Overall, the community was open and spacious.

And vulnerable to attack.

Aggee mentally shook her head. “Paas, did you say
at one time that you were at war?”

“Yeah. All the tribes are at war with each other.
Some more than others.”

“Except for the tribe in the mountain.”

“Right. The Kintuck tribe pretty much keeps to
itself.”

“Why are you at war with these other tribes?”

“For lots of reasons.” Paas looked at her. “Have
you ever been in battle with someone from another tribe?”

A creature came at her from out of nowhere. The
thing was naked, revealing ulcerous, oozing patches all over its skin. It
carried another man’s arm that it had ripped from the dead body, and tried to
club her with it.

Aggee blinked to clear her vision. “Yeah. I think I
have.”

“What did you fight over? Do you remember?”

“I think it was hungry.”

“It?” Paas raised an eyebrow.

“They wanted our food.”

“It’s the same here. They want our food, or our women
and children. Sometimes they attack for no other reason but to fight. The
Hassee are notorious raiders.”

“Where do the Hassee live?”

“Our scouts tell us they have a village on the
other side of the lake, at the foot of the Bleeding Mountains.”

Aggee looked at the formations. “Why do you call
them the Bleeding Mountains?”

“Wait until sunset. You’ll understand then.”

They encountered people coming and going,
performing their daily tasks. Like Paas, they all bore designs and details,
many painted in vivid colors, on their faces and skin. Several townsfolk
greeted Paas. Most of them stared silently at Aggee. Many of them gave her a
wide berth as she continued toward the village, but none of them approached
her. Soon, Paas led her from the grassland, directly into the village. Aggee
hesitated.

“What? What is it?” The warrior woman realized she
had ceased to be behind her, and went back to find out why.

Walls. Barriers. Tree trunks vertically aligned
side by side, and with one end buried deep in the earth, and the other
sharpened to a deadly point.

“Your village is wide open.”

“Yeah. So?”

“So what if another tribe tries to sneak in and
attack it?”

Paas answered by pointing overhead. “We have
sentries on duty. They can spot an intruder hundreds of yards away.”

Aggee glanced at the small structure built in the
crotch of one immense tree. The tiny enclosed kiosk had to be a good thirty
feet off the ground, and was so well hidden amid the branches, she probably
would have missed it had Paas not pointed it out.

“That may be fair and good in the daytime, but what
about after dark?”

“You seem to know an awful lot about defensive
measures. It’ll be interesting to hear what you recall when your memory starts
to return.”

Aggee realized the woman never answered her as they
continued to walk the convoluted streets between the buildings. Then again,
Aggee surmised, she hadn’t told Paas everything either, but that was because
what little she could recall came back to her in puzzling bits and pieces.
Nothing at this point made sense, and none of it seemed interconnected. If
anything, each revelation left her more confused and disoriented than she
already was.

There was a pattern here she couldn’t fathom. And
the buildings...

Paas noticed her scrutiny. “Once upon a time, this
used to be a city.”

“A city?”

“Yeah. A large village, where the buildings were
all made of stone or a type of rock called brick. The streets were very wide,
sometimes two and four lanes wide, so that things called cars could pass each
other as they traveled over them.”

Aggee nodded. “I’ve heard of cars. They were wagons
that ran on a fuel. So what happened to the city?”

“Most of it was destroyed when the moon burst, and
after that the forest reclaimed it. With the exception of a few remaining
structures, it’s mostly gone.”

“And you built your tribe around those ancient
buildings?”

“Yeah. Many of us do, including my family. They’re
still sturdy. And every now and then, we find an artifact that managed to
survive.”

They reached a widening in the path. It was an intersection
where several trails came together, and in the center stood a large, pitted
statue of a man. The sculpture was crudely made of what appeared to be
limestone. However, the writing on the wide base was easy to decipher. Aggee
walked over where she could read aloud the inscription.

“Stephen Webster Pierce. Savior. We owe you our
lives and our future.”

“When the moon burst, the oceans came inland and
swallowed up whole cities. Millions and millions of people died. Stephen knew
of the caves, and he took as many of us as he could find inside with him. We
exist today only because of his heroism and generosity in sharing his discovery
of the caverns.”

Aggee looked at the woman who stared reverently at
the stone figure. “Is that when your ancestors carved some of those steps into
the rock?”

Paas nodded. “Only after the waters receded did
they finally leave the caves and try to start over.” She smiled at Aggee. “What
about your people? Do you have stories that tell what they did to survive after
the...what did you call it?”

“The Great Concussion. No. At least, I don’t think
so.”

A strange woman appeared behind Paas. The scowl on
her painted face automatically put Aggee on the defensive. Instinctively, Aggee
started to reach for her dagger, when Paas saw her reaction and turned. The
scowl suddenly became a smile, and the warrior woman held out her arms. The two
embraced. Aggee waited and watched as they greeted one another with genuine
affection. After a moment, Paas turned and gestured at her.

“Dahyan, this is Aggee.” She gave a soft laugh.
“That is, we think her name is Aggee. I found her at the top of the fallen
heavens where she had just survived being attacked by a coon.”

“So you brought her here to be treated?”

“Yes.”

The woman named Dahyan came closer to where Aggee
could make out the details of the markings covering a face that appeared older
than Paas. Her waist-length black hair was untouched by gray, and her black
eyes reflected years of wisdom. Dahyan scrutinized Aggee at great length before
finally addressing her directly.

“Come with us to our abode. You are welcome as our
guest, She-Who-Thinks-Her-Name-Is-Aggee.”

“Thank you,” Aggee answered, giving the imposing
figure a slight bow of deference.

“As for you, young lady.” Dahyan turned to Paas.
“Who authorized your trip to the fallen heavens?
I
certainly didn’t! In
fact, I think you specifically requested the chance to go mining,
not
to
ascend the steps. Once your absence extended to three days, I realized you had
either gotten lost, or you had used the excuse to go up, and on your own, I
might add, which is strictly forbidden!”