Garth watched them with growing concern—what was going on?
The Manteceros continued mercilessly. “After some years, she became aware of a comforting presence that lingered in the back alleyway. It was a great shaggy dog, a stray, that someone had discarded. Gradually he became used to her, and accepted careful scraps from her fingers, licking them gratefully when he had finished. He was her only friend, and somehow she conceived the idea that the dog was her lover’s soul come back to aid her. The thought comforted her. One day the dog went a-roaming, as dogs are wont to do, and he caught a squirrel, wandering madly through the back streets of Ruen. As the dog caught the squirrel the rodent bit him, and the dog yelped in surprise and let the creature go. Two days later he felt a madness building in his mind.”
The tunnel was utterly silent now, and if Cavor and Maximilian had their heads bowed in indescribable grief, then all other eyes were on the Manteceros.
“The woman was relieved when she heard the dog scratching at the door, and she hurried to give it a pat and a hug. But as she leaned down the dog snarled and bit her hand, and she screamed and tore loose, and the brothers and their wives and their numerous children came a-running through the house and dragged her inside, slapping her for her foolishness, and stomped the dog to death.
“But it was too late. She grew feverish, her body wracked with convulsing agony. Her sisters-in-law tended her only enough to keep her alive, but they wished they had not bothered when the woman finally struggled up from her sickbed. The fever had crippled her back and twisted one leg shorter than the other. Even as a drudge, she was useless.”
Maximilian had sunk to his knees in the rock, only his grip on his sword keeping him upright. Cavor had turned to stare at the Manteceros.
“There is not much left to tell,” the creature said, and a strange light came into its eyes. “They threw her out to wander the streets, where she begged what food she could and slept in doorways when she was able. She accepted the abuse meted out by those who prey on the weak and helpless, and knew her time was short. Winter approached, and winter is never kind to those lacking both home and comfort.”
Now the Manteceros reared its head up to its full height. “So she curled up about her rags and sought the only answer to her pain. I ask you now,” it cried, its voice ringing with authority, “to venture the ordeal. What was her answer? What answer could she find to her pain and her sorrow?”
Cavor shifted, stumbling as he did so. “Death,” he whispered. “What answer could there be for her pain but death?”
The Manteceros stared at him. “You are wrong Cavor. Wrong,” it said, its voice now heavy with judgement, then shifted its eyes. “Maximilian?”
Maximilian slowly raised his head, and Ravenna almost cried out at the pain evident in his eyes. Did he somehow see his life mirrored in that of the poor woman cursed to a life of sorrow?
Then, unbelievably, Maximilian smiled his wondrous smile, and hope lit his features. “She laughed,” he said, then laughed himself, the sound ringing rich and vibrant through the tunnel. “She laughed. It was the only thing left for her to do.”
“Yes!” the Manteceros said, and Ravenna could feel its flesh leap beneath her fingers. She frowned. The creature felt almost hot, as if it were running a fever itself. “Yes!”
He turned back to Cavor. “You were wrong, Cavor, because you admitted hopelessness. A true-born king would never do that. You are a man of no hope and, hopeless, I cast you from the throne of Escator.”
“No!” Cavor shrieked, and raised his sword above his head in a huge arc meant to cut Maximilian down where he kneeled.
But rage turned to puzzlement an instant later as he felt his sword seized in tight hands.
His blade had cleaved straight into the gloam above him, and now there it hung, caught in the hanging wall. Cavor struggled with the weapon, his muscles bunching and straining, but he could not shift it.
For an instant everyone stared, then, just as Egalion moved to disarm Cavor completely, the Manteceros screamed.
Ravenna was flung back against the tunnel wall by a huge surge of power and heat. She cried out, and Maximilian scrambled forward on hands and knees, pulling her away from the ball of pulsing light that had enveloped the Manteceros.
Garth shouted and started forward as well, but before he could reach Maximilian and Ravenna, the blue light resolved itself into a tall, well-built man with a head of cobalt hair and eyes that sparked with blue fire. He was almost ethereal, and his fine features were very, very beautiful.
He stared at Maximilian, and spoke low but intensely, demanding.
“Who comes to Claim? Who dares the Dream, And, daring, ------”
Maximilian returned his stare steadily, accepting the challenge. “And, daring,…laughs”, he finished, completing the stanza that had puzzled Garth and Ravenna and centuries of historians for so long.
The cobalt-haired man nodded. “Yes. Laughs.” An extraordinary and utterly exquisite smile swept his face. “To laugh is to dare, because laughter dares fate and sorrow and the weight of all injustices. You are true-blooded indeed, Maximilian, and I name you rightful king of Escator. Welcome home.”
Cavor finally let go the sword and slowly lowered his arms, still staring about in utter amazement. Then, in an instant, his demeanour changed.
“Enjoy your triumph while you can,” he rasped flatly to Maximilian, the sword still hanging over his head, then turned and fled down the tunnel.
No-one paid him the least attention.
“Who are you?” Garth whispered. “Who?”
TWENTY SEVEN
BEYOND THE HANGING WALL
Cavor rushed along the tunnel, cursing each time he stumbled, shouting his frustration on the two occasions he actually fell to crawl on his hands and knees for a few blind paces.
But always he pushed himself up and onwards, shoving guards and prisoners out of the way whenever they threatened to impede his progress, striking one man in the face with his clenched fist when he didn’t move fast enough.
He’d never trusted that Manteceros, no he hadn’t. And wasn’t it like Maximilian to come up with a trick of his own? How had he known the answer to the Manteceros’ question? How? The two must have planned it earlier. Yes, that must be it.
It made what Cavor was about to do less of a treachery and more…well, more of a balancing justice…yes, that was it. A balancing justice.
Finally he ran into the cavern by the shaft. Furst was waiting, the cage door open, and inviting.
His mouth thinned in a cold smile. “And did you best him, sire?”
Cavor cursed foully and shoved Furst into the cage. “Is all ready?”
Furst inclined his head. “Of course, sire.”
“Then do it!” Cavor screamed, “And get us out of this nightmare!”
“If you think this is a nightmare,” Furst muttered under his breath, “be thankful you’re not still down that tunnel.” He leaned down by the cage door and twisted some wires that ran down the shaft.
“Will it work?” Cavor asked anxiously, his temper forgotten in his anxiety to escape into victory.
Furst did not answer for a moment. Then he leaned back, his face contented. “It is done, sire. And, yes, it will work. All we need do now is rise into the sunlight.”
And he slammed the cage door shut and threw the lever.
The cage rocketed towards the surface.
Beyond the hanging wall the sea seethed, waiting, wanting, hoping…probing, probing, probing.
“Who are you?” Garth repeated.
It was Ravenna who answered. She struggled to her knees, ignoring Maximilian by her side, then abased herself before the strange man. “Drava,” she whispered, “Lord of Dreams, I honour you.”
Garth started, stunned. This extraordinary creature was really the Lord of Dreams?
Drava leaned down and took Ravenna’s hand, helping her to her feet. Behind her Maximilian rose slowly as well, his expression wary. Above him,
Cavor’s sword still hung from the hanging wall.
“You were friendlier,” Drava smiled at Ravenna, “when you thought me only a sad, blue creature.” He did not let go of her hand.
The wires had been laid in place days before, and now their ingenious, deadly design did not fail. The slight tug that Furst had given the wire by the cage door activated a lever deep within the bowels of the Veins, and that in turn activated yet another, and that in turn…and so in turn the deadly chain reaction pulsed towards the charges laid in their careful holes in the thin rock-face.
The rock-face had been abandoned several years ago once the workings scraped too close to the sea pounding restlessly five paces through the rock. The face had been shored up and left alone…left alone until recently when the struts and supports had been removed or weakened, and holes carefully drilled into the rock-face itself so that concentric rings rippled out from a central hole.
And then the charges were placed, and connected, and left in peace.
Now wires tugged and pulled, busy levers snapped closed or open, and flint artfully arranged sparked in sudden fury.
Starting from the outside circle, a series of split-second explosions worked their way through to the central charge. In a heartbeat the rock-face blew apart.
For a few minutes there was nothing but the dust clouds and the darkness, then a small trickle of green water crept through a tiny fissure, creeping almost apologetically about the chaotic jumble of rocks, then it was joined by another, then another, and then the rock-face was blown apart by another massive blast and this time there was no dust but screaming, triumphant water that filled the entire tunnel and then began to boil and foam its way upwards.
They felt rather than heard the blast and the subsequent rupture. Maximilian scrambled to his feet and laid his hand on the tunnel wall.
It was vibrating underneath his fingers.
Drava tilted his head to one side, curious. “Hark,” he said softly, “the sea has penetrated.”
Now all could not only feel it beneath their feet but hear it as well, a distant roar…and the sudden, horrifying scent of the salt water that chased away the stench of the gloam.
Garth wished they were still wrapped safely in the stench.
“It’s bad,” Maximilian whispered. “Very bad.” He paused, and when he resumed his voice was curiously toneless. “We’re dead. No-one is going to be able to escape this cataclysm.”
Drava tightened his hold on Ravenna’s hand. As Maximilian had spoken she’d moved closer to him, and he could feel her trembling. “Oh,” he smiled, “I don’t know about that.”
“Maximilian,” his tone turned brisk, and he clapped his other hand on the king’s shoulder, “are you prepared to dare the dream?”
Maximilian stared at the Lord of Dreams. “What do you mean?”
“Do you have the courage?” Drava’s voice had turned hard now, challenging.
Maximilian straightened his back and shoulders. “Yes, Drava. Yes I do.”
“Do you want to escape beyond the hanging wall?”
“Yes.” Maximilian hesitated. “Drava, there are other men here as well. Thousands. Guards and prisoners. Whatever their crimes, none deserve to die like this.”
Drava arched one blue eyebrow. “Criminals, Maximilian? You would rescue criminals?”
Maximilian did not lower his eyes. “I am responsible for them, Drava—and if there is to be hope for me, then it should encompass them as well.”
Drava nodded slowly. Maximilian was not only the true king, he would be a good king as well. “As you wish.” He turned away slightly as he smiled down at Ravenna. He shifted his grip on her hand so that their fingers interlaced. “Ravenna, will you help me?”
She returned his smile; Drava needed no-one”s help…but it was nice of him to ask. “Surely, Lord.”
“Then,” the Lord of Dreams whispered, and traces of green light flickered through his eyes, “let us dare the dream.”
Whatever light there had been in the tunnel abruptly died; Garth, who was standing close to Egalion, heard the man breathe deep in fear, and he could hear his own breath similarly rattle in his throat. The roar of the sea was now closer…much, much closer, so close the tunnel floor was shaking underneath his feet.
With a startling clatter Cavor’s sword fell from the hanging wall, followed an instant later by a shower of small rocks.
Without a word the group bunched closer together and Garth felt Maximilian place a hand on his shoulder and that of Egalion. “Courage,” the king whispered. “Believe in the dream.”
“Believe,” Drava echoed, and then everyone save the Lord of Dreams took great breaths of surprise, for the blackness had been replaced by a delicate green light.
Thousands of tiny emerald lines were spreading across the rock above and below them in delicate webs. As the startled onlookers watched, the lines spread up from the floor and down from the hanging wall until the tunnel was encased in tiny, wriggling emerald lines.
Cracks. Tens of thousands of them.
Garth remembered his dreams of the fracturing rock-face, and he could not help a shudder of horror.
“Courage,” Maximilian repeated, and Garth heard the confidence in the king’s voice, and let it relax him.
The emerald web surrounding them continued to thicken and spread until, within only a few minutes, the entire tunnel seemed to be made of frosted emerald glass. Garth, Maximilian’s hand still resting on his shoulder, jumped in surprise—beyond the opaque walls he could see the sea shadow and move.
“Welcome to the dream,” Drava said.
“Surely this is taking too long,” Cavor muttered, the fingers of one hand entwined in the wire of the cage for support. “Surely we fell faster than this?”
Furst glared at the low ceiling of the cage, as if that would help propel it to the surface. The cage appeared to be moving fast enough, and it grunted and screeched and rocked as if it was putting its best effort in. “Falling is always faster than rising, sire. Be patient.”
But Cavor could hear the doubt in Furst’s voice. “I want to get out of here, Furst.”
Furst grinned nastily. No doubt. No doubt at all.
Cavor’s mouth twisted in fury as he watched the expression on Furst’s face. “We are in this together…” he began, then puzzlement replaced his fury. “What?”
Furst spun about in the cage, only keeping his feet with difficulty as the cage rocked even more violently.
Faint emerald light trickled through the wire netting and iron framework of the cage.
The next moment Furst forgot all about the light as Cavor grunted in surprise and fell to the floor with an enormous thud. He tried to get up again, but it was almost as if the man’s right shoulder and arm were pinned to the floor.
“The mark,” Cavor gasped, pain carving deep lines into his face. “It’s so heavy…so heavy.” He grunted, trying to rise again, then screamed, his body twisting and writhing about the spot where his arm and shoulder were pinned. “Stone! The mark is turning to stone!”
The cage slowed.
Garth’s nervousness rapidly gave way to sheer wonder. Now the shapes of fish and frolicking whales cavorted beyond the rapidly clearing emerald walls. He slowly turned on the spot, not knowing which way to look first.
Maximilian smiled as he watched Garth, then caught Drava’s eyes. The Lord of Dreams nodded slightly, and Maximilian walked past him and further down the tunnel. Drava and Ravenna followed, still hand in hand, then Garth and Egalion, both utterly awe-struck by the sights they witnessed, scrambled after them.
The tunnel twisted and bent, as Garth remembered it had, and at about the third bend Maximilian came across the first gang of prisoners. Both prisoners and guards were huddled on the floor, their eyes glazed, not knowing if they were still alive or had, somehow, unknowingly passed into death.
In this fragile emerald tunnel their filth seemed even more degrading and dehumanising than it had by flickering torchlight.
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Maximilian smiled reassuringly as he approached, then squatted down by the huddled group. The men stared at him, their eyes wide and terrified, but they did not move.
“Drava,” Maximilian said quietly, not lifting his eyes from the men before him, “will you aid me in this?”
“Assuredly,” Drava replied.
“Do you know me?” Maximilian asked the men.
Silence, and then one man spoke, his voice rasping with fear. “You are Maximilian, the lost prince.”
Maximilian smiled, wide and beautiful, and the men visibly relaxed. “Yes, I am Maximilian, the lost prince. I was lost beneath the hanging wall…did you know that?”
Now one of the guards answered, his voice slow. “I…we had heard rumours.”
“I was lost beneath the hanging wall, but I escaped, and so can you. Tell me, would you like to escape beyond the hanging wall?”
“And what is there for us?” one man cried, his voice harsh. “We are condemned men. Outcasts.”
Maximilian was quiet for a long moment. “Well,” he eventually said, very quietly, “it seems I am now king, and I would condemn you to the same fate I am condemned to.” A small smile playing about his lips took the harshness out of his words. “I condemn you to service to the realm. I have need of an honour guard. Someone to stand at my back, to carry my personal standard. Will you agree to form part of this guard? Swear your allegiance to me, and to me only?”
“You would take such as us?” one man asked.
“You forget that I was once one of you,” Maximilian replied, his voice hoarse with emotion, “and I would be proud to take such as you. Come, will you swear allegiance to me?”
Their hesitation dissipated. “Yes!” one man cried, then another, and then all raised their voices.
“With a harsh clatter, their chains fell away.
“Thank you, Drava,” Maximilian said under his breath, then he extended his hand so that all the men, former guards and prisoners alike, could kiss it and pledge their allegiance.