Chapter 19
Dead undergrowth snapped beneath Jayce’s boots as they continued through the forest. Needles fell from the branches and a chill nipped at his ears and nose.
“It me, or is it getting cold out here?” Jayce asked.
“Does feel like winter.” Sarai shivered and zipped up the front of her jacket.
“The song, can you both still hear it?” Maru asked.
Jayce turned away from the group and cocked an ear up. He hummed the first few stanzas, then pointed at an angle to the left of the way they’d been walking. He turned around and found Sarai pointing the same way.
“It isn’t any weaker or stronger,” she said. “What does that mean?”
“I’m not sure.” Maru stroked his chin. “Sodality records of this particular apparition are contradictory.”
“We spread them out and basic land-navigation techniques can tell us how far the tower is,” Dastin said. “We only have a direction now. Two different vectors to the same point and some trigonometry will—”
“If we were anywhere but the Veil that would be an excellent idea,” Maru said. “But the Veil has a way of changing the rules. Look.”
He pointed his glaive staff toward the direction Sarai and Dastin had given. Ruins made of white, chalky bricks were just visible through the fog.
Eabani growled and readied his crossbow. His goatee flapped from side to side, and he spit toward the buildings.
“Where’d those come from?” he asked. “Wasn’t there a second ago.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Maru said. “That is the way we need to go.”
“Principals fall back to center, close on them.” Dastin and Maru led the Attuned pair into the ruins. Eabani kept watch behind them.
Jayce fiddled with his hilt as they crossed the threshold between the ruins and the forest. The buildings were mostly single storied with no roofs. The brickwork changed from building to building, the orientation and size of the bricks different, as well as the height of the doorways.
“Who built all this?” Jayce whispered.
“We did.” Maru did a combat peek around a corner, then waved the rest of them across a street with deep ruts from countless carts that had rolled down the street. He bounded across the street and took his place in the lead. “At least, these are buildings from our home reality that have been imbued with Veil flecks. Shrines. Houses of healing. These structures are a reflection of what is there . . . and are also here.”
“But why are they all here?” Jayce rubbed knuckles on one wall and it flaked off into clumps of chalky dust.
“Because the Veil wants them here,” Maru said.
Dastin held up a fist and the party froze. He made quick hand gestures and ducked as he went to a low wall. Eabani clicked the safety switch off his crossbow. Sarai tapped Jayce on the shoulder twice, then pointed one finger up and then at a mound of rubble behind them.
Jayce raised his hands in confusion.
Sarai rolled her eyes and then leaned closer to his ear.
“Dastin saw hostiles. Take cover while Maru scouts a way around. We get separated, that pile of crap back there is our rally point.” She pushed him toward a half-crumbled wall. Jayce dropped his pack as quietly as he could against the wall.
Jayce took a sip from a hose connected to a water bladder on his back. Dastin took a crossbow bolt from the bandolier across his chest and tapped the arrowhead against the wall, then pointed at Jayce, then to a hole in the wall.
Jayce got the hint and crawled to the hole and looked through.
They were on a steep hillside. Below was a dead city with a hodgepodge of quarters, none with the same architectural style. A crumbling dome rose over the distant fog, an enormous crack riven through the top. Roads connected through each quarter but didn’t run from one to the other.
A river ran through the city; bridges made of crude wood and rope connected to suspended segments. Other bridges were floating slabs of masonry that led halfway across and became elegant arches to the other bank.
“It’s a bloody labyrinth down there,” he whispered.
“Shh!” Dastin snapped. He tapped the arrowhead again and then angled it down. Jayce looked down the slope and his breath caught in his throat. There was a temple of sorts at the lower level. The roof was gone, but an altar with ivory statues around it was visible. In the center of the altar was a Veil stone.
It glowed with a magnificence that was still there when he closed his eyes and turned his face away. He touched the stone in his harness and felt that it was a pale reflection of the power and potential of what was on the altar.
“I think that’s a ship stone.” Sarai peeked over his shoulder. “Oh, it’s beautiful, isn’t it?”
“Sure is.” Jayce licked his lips, suddenly thirsty. “How would . . . how does someone claim it? Synch with it?”
Sarai mimed reaching out and grabbing it, then pressed her hand to her chest.
“That’s all,” she said. “You should go get it. Then break your anchor and go go go back to the Aperture. We’ll meet you there in no time flat.”
“Maru needs us to synch with the stones at the Pinnacle,” Jayce said. “We can only do it once, right?”
“Right,” Neff whispered in Jayce’s ear. Jayce seized up out of shock and the Docent slapped a furry paw over Jayce’s mouth. “I see the stone fever fever in your eyes. Always like this, so close to the prize you’ve wanted for so long and you want to take the first one you can get your dirty hands on. Can’t you tell?”
“Tell what?” Sarai asked.
Jayce tried to talk, but his words died against Neff’s paw.
“Someone’s already watching it,” Neff said. “Someone has designs for it. I feel the greed. Long snout. Claws. Predator intelligence.”
“It’s a trap,” Maru said. Jayce did a double take at the Paragon, who appeared seemingly out of nowhere. “Powerful stones must be found, they don’t give themselves away.”
“Then what’s that one doing there?” Jayce asked.
“You’ve been to a Shrine, what did you see around the altar?” Maru asked.
“Symbols without any repetition. The—Look!” Jayce pressed his face against the hole in the wall. Below, at the altar, ghostly figures appeared. All bowed and prayed toward the altar.
“They’re summoning a stone from our reality,” Maru said. “Interesting. They appear to be from the Star Cult from the Occarian sector, by their robes at least. I’ve found a way down. Leave them to their business and follow me.”
“Wrong souls. There’s others down there.” Neff hopped to Maru’s shoulder.
“Then we best avoid them,” Maru said. The party came to a spiral staircase that ran perpendicular to a sheer cliff. The staircase ended in broken blocks a few feet over the top of the cliff, but there was no connection to the hilltop or even handrails.
“Nope.” Eabani tried to back away. Dastin grabbed him by the collar and kept him from moving farther. “No no no, I don’t do heights.”
“You’re gonna have to.” Dastin shook Eabani. “There’s a faster way down, but you’re not going to like the sudden stop at the bottom.”
“Just knock me out.” Eabani nodded quickly. “Toss me across the gap and carry me down. Much better way.”
“Wouldn’t we all just love to be carried everywhere and wake up after a good nap to a nice stretch and tea?” Dastin’s voice grew slightly louder. “Are you going to leave our little miss behind because you’re a chicken shit?”
“I am not a prey avian!” Eabani shouted, then hunched his shoulders as he heard his words echo off the forest.
“Help? Help!” came from the fog.
Dastin let Eabani go, then held up a knife hand cocked next to his face.
“Toss me the gear.” Eabani dropped his pack, then got a running start and jumped across the gap. He hit the central pillar and fell back. His claws scratched long gouges against the flaky bricks and stopped himself before he could fall.
A sharp whistle went over Jayce’s head. At the edge of the fog, dark figures emerged, all with bows in hand. One took aim at the party and let loose. Maru knocked the arrow away with his glaive.
“I don’t think they want help,” Jayce said.
“You’re figuring this out real quick, aren’t you?” Dastin smacked him on the shoulder. “Toss your gear to ’Bani—hurry!”
Jayce heard the crack of more arrows against Maru’s blade and chucked his pack to Eabani. It almost fell short and Eabani caught it with his arms extended. The counterbalance almost tipped him over the edge of the stairs.
Eabani let out a roar that sent more fear through Jayce than the raiders firing arrows.
“Here goes!” Sarai jumped off the cliff and into Eabani’s arms.
“Your turn.” Dastin prodded Jayce on his back.
“I don’t think he’ll catch me,” Jayce said to him.
“You either jump in the next two seconds or we’ll see if I can kick your ass across the gap!” Dastin shouldered his crossbow and fired at the bowmen. One went down with a cry, grasping his thigh.
“Sure wish I could do that shunt thing.” Jayce ran toward the stairwell. He planted his last step to propel himself forward . . . and lost his footing to a loose pebble. Jayce got some momentum to clear the gap, but not enough.
His heels went over his head, and he spun his arms as he got a very clear look at the chasm leading all the way down to a river white with rapids.
Eabani caught him by the ankle and swung him to the level below him on the circular stairway. Jayce thumped against the central pillar and fell against the stairs.
“Move it!” Dastin yelled down at him. The gunnery sergeant hesitated for a heartbeat when he looked all the way down, then jumped the gap. Maru landed next to Jayce and helped him up.
“I miss my boats and all the water monsters,” Jayce said as Sarai came around the stairs and motioned at him to get moving. Eabani had all the packs either on his back or had their straps in hand.
“It spirals down, keep going,” Maru said to him.
Jayce concentrated on the steps and put one foot in front of the other as fast as he could. He didn’t know what the species that made the staircase had against handrails, but he hoped he never had to visit their planet.
There was a hoot from the cliff side and a sharp pain against his shin. An arrow sprang off the steps and went tumbling through the air. A bloody gash flapped from his pants a few inches over his ankle.
“Ah, damn it!” Jayce leaned against the central pillar.
“He’s got a hilt! I claim it!” came from the cliff.
Jayce looked up as a wild-eyed young man with dark skin hopped off the hill and locked a metal brace on his arm against the rock to slow his fall. The bandit braced both feet against the cliff and leapt at Jayce, one hand reaching for the hilt on Jayce’s belt.
Jayce turned aside and the bandit got one foot on the staircase, then went flailing over the edge. His screams trailed off to nothing quickly.
“I’ll handle this.” Eabani raced up the stairs three at a time and came around the bend and bumped into a rather surprised marauder. Eabani gave him a quick shove and launched the man into the air. He caught the bow before it could fall and swung the bent end around the center column. The point struck the next marauder in the sternum with a crack of bone.
Eabani grabbed the stunned man by the shoulder and bashed him against the column and let him stumble into gravity’s embrace. He seized the final marauder under the arms and snarled in the man’s face, then lifted him up and crushed his head against the stairway. He flung the body off the stairs and went down the stairs.
Jayce and Sarai clutched their packs as Eabani shouldered his load. Both stared at him in shock.
“What?” Eabani asked.
“It was raining people.” Jayce pointed toward the city.
“Better them than us,” Eabani said. “Get moving, I’m not carrying your crap if I don’t have to.”