She stiffened. «Why do you choose to start with me? Is it because I am blind?»
Kermadec reached out with his huge hand and placed it gently on her shoulder. «No, girl. I start with you because you have less of a stake in all this than the others do. It would be easiest for you to walk away.»
«Once, that was so.» She shook her head slowly. «Not anymore. My decision is made. I am going.»
Kermadec looked at the other three. «Pen, you haven't any choice, so there's no reason to ask you. And Tagwen will go because he doesn't trust me to get the job done alone. What of you, Khyber Elessedil?»
She gave him a fierce look. «I will go because my uncle would have gone if he had lived. I stand now in his shoes.»
Kermadec nodded his approval. «Then we're a company.» He wheeled away. «Come with me.»
He led them back down the corridor they had come through earlier, toward the shouting of fighters and the thunder of siege weapons. Pen felt his temperature rise and his hands begin to sweat as the sounds of battle reverberated through the mountain catacombs. He remembered how it had felt to be chased through the streets of the village, dodging arrows and sling stones, trying to stay safe. He did not care to experience that again, and yet it seemed as if that was exactly what was going to happen. He wished they had an airship and could simply fly away. He wanted to be back in the skies, where he felt safe.
The main chamber of the redoubt was filled with Trolls charging in all directions. The men stood at the walls where the cliffs opened to the village below, crouching behind their fortifications as boulders smashed into the rock and arrows whizzed past their heads. The women and children were making their way in small groups toward the back part of the cavern, then filing down a series of tunnels into the torchlit dark. The women, distinctive by their smoother skin and slender bodies, herded the tiny children like puppies, urging them along, carrying those too small to walk. They seemed calm on the face of things, moving deliberately and with purpose, evidencing none of the panic that Pen felt. Their self–control impressed the boy, and he tightened his own resolve.
With Kermadec leading the way, they hurried after the women and children. Dust was falling from the cavern ceiling as the pounding of the catapult missiles against the rock walls grew more insistent, the resulting reverberations deep and threatening. It felt as if the mountain might come down about them, broken in two by the constant hammering. Pen ducked his head instinctively and reached over to take Cinnaminson's hand. He did so as much for himself as for her, and was grateful when she squeezed his fingers reassuringly.
They were mingling with the women and children now, the latter staring up at him with curious, anxious eyes. He tried not to read accusation in those stares, — the children wouldn't know that their upheaval was his fault. He smiled at them as he hurried past. He didn't know how else to tell them that he wanted them to think better of him than he thought of himself.
«Stay together!» Kermadec called back.
Silt rained down on Pen in a sudden shower, and he tripped over one of the children. Releasing Cinnaminson's hand, he paused to pick the child up, brushing off its tiny head, handing it back to the closest of the women. The woman took the child and smiled at him, her strange black eyes and smooth features drawing him in. Something in the look she gave him reminded him of his mother, and suddenly he missed her so that it made him ache. The shock was like a physical blow, and it left him stunned and momentarily disoriented. His world compressed to a tightness about his heart, where the things he needed most felt the farthest away.
Still struggling with his feelings, he hurried after the others.
Sixteen
I hey fled through the tunnels, away from Taupo Rough and deep into the mountain rock. At first they followed the women and children, a part of their steady flow down the boltholes, and then they broke away to follow a different set of tunnels and did not see them again. Pen and the rest of their small group moved swiftly and purposefully, sliding through the darkness with torches to light the way and a sense of urgency to keep them focused. The din of the battle they had escaped was audible for a time, then dimmed and faded, and they were left with the soft scrape and rustle of their own movements in the ensuing silence.
No one spoke. All of their efforts were concentrated on moving through the tunnels, on getting clear of the pursuit that was sure to follow. It might be that the Druids and their Gnome Hunters couldn't track them through the rock corridors, but Pen knew that Kermadec and his Trolls would not rely on that. He held Cinnaminson's hand as they went, drawing on the strength he found there, reassuring himself that she was with him. He didn't even try to tell himself that the contact was for her, — he knew that she was better able to navigate the dark than he was. It was to keep his despair and loneliness at bay, for he was afraid that otherwise, without the feel of her, he would give way to the dark emotions that threatened to overwhelm his failing sense of purpose and leave him drained of strength.
The eyes of those women and children haunted him, burned into I his memory, became ghosts in his mind. That wouldn't have happened had he felt less guilt over their fate. But he could not absolve himself of the responsibility he felt, no matter what Kermadec might say. Too much of what had transpired already on the journey was directly attributable to him. Fortunes altered, plans shattered, and lives given up—that was pretty much the story for everyone with whom he had come in contact since leaving Patch Run. It might not be his fault and his involvement might not matter anyway in the long run, but he could only see what was, not what might be. His presence was the catalyst for everything that had happened. So much depended on him, and the weight of it was terrifying.
«Keep right,' Kermadec called over his shoulder, motioning toward Pen and his companions. «Don't look down.»
They entered a cavern that dropped away on the left into a black hole so vast that it looked as if it could swallow whole villages. The trail became a narrow ledge that hugged the wall of the cavern, and the company pressed close to that wall as they edged forward. They were strung out in single file, torches spaced along the ledge. Pen could see for the first time the other Trolls who had joined them somewhere along the way, a line of burly, dark shadows in the flicker of the firelight. They wore no armor, only leather tunics and pants, closed–toe sandals, and heavy cloaks. All carried weapons strapped across their backs, along with packs of supplies. They moved ponderously, but with no visible effort or strain. They had the look of massive rocks into which faces had been carved.
On the far side of the cavern, a tunnel opened into the rock wall, and soon they were burrowing downward once more. They had been descending steadily since they had set out, and if Pen was judging right, they were below the level of the village of Taupo Rough by several hundred feet. He wanted to know where they were going, wanted to reach a place where he could ask, and wanted most of all to get out in the open air again, where he could breathe. The mountain and its darkness pressed down against him with suffocating force. He was a flier, born to the air, and he hated being closed away.
But the tunnels wound on, deep and dark passageways thick with stale air and tar smoke, dead feeling and tomblike. Pen closed his mind to them after a while, a defense against his distaste and the hint of fear that lay behind it. He whispered now and again to Cin–naminson, just so that he could hear her voice. Each time, she squeezed his hand, as if sensing his need to make contact.
When they finally emerged from the tunnels, it was late afternoon and the sun had disappeared behind the peaks west, the light gone gray and misty. A narrow wedge of sky was visible overhead, distant and thick with clouds. They were deep in a valley where the shadows were so heavily layered that the trees carpeting the slopes surrounding them seemed already given over to night. Mountains rose all about them in sheer cliffs and jagged edges. Pen stood with the others, breathing the fresh, cold air and thinking that he had somehow tunneled down to the bottom of the world and must now climb back out again before he lost his way forever.
Kermadec was speaking in his deep, calm voice with one of the Trolls at the front of the line, but the conversation was being conducted in his own tongue so that Pen could not understand it. When they were finished, the other Troll disappeared into the trees, and Kermadec walked over to the boy and his companions.
«Barek will scout ahead to make sure the way is safe. We will follow in a few minutes.» He gestured toward the dense line of peaks that lay east. «These are the Klu. Part of the Charnals, but their own range, as well. To the extent that it's possible to do so, we'll travel at night from here on.» He paused. «Is everyone all right?»
They nodded, all of them, but with nothing that approached enthusiasm. Pen was somewhat relieved to find
