being drawn along by powerful currents, and no longer the hum of the clockwork engine. For a while she set the engine to full power, heard it clonking, gears stepping, straining against the pull. Then she realised it was futile; whatever pulled the brass barge seemed almost sentient, and she would simply burn out the engine if she continued.
Anu cut the power, and sat in eerie silence made more deafening by the stillness of the barge. She realised, then, she had grown used to the sound of the clockwork engine; it had been a comfort, like mother’s heartbeat in the womb.
Now, only the wind sang her to sleep.
Minutes passed into hours passed into days, and Anu lost all concept of time. She slept when she was tired, and ate what meagre rations remained in the hold of the barge, mainly hard bread, salted fish and a little dried pork. Or at least, animal flesh of some kind.
Eventually, veins of crystal ran through the black rock over Anu’s head; faintly at first, no more than occasional threads, strands of orange and green to break up the monotony of the terminal black. Then the threads grew more proliferous and thicker in banding, and it provided an eerie, underground light of sorts. Anu could make out the backs of her hands, and a vague outline of the barge. That was all.
The noise came after…she did not know. It could have been two days, could have been five. It was a blur, a blur of time, of memory, of identity. The noise began as a tiny crackling sound, which had Anu scampering down to the engine to see if there was a fault. But the clockwork engine was dead; killed by her own pretty, vachine-clawed hands.
Then, after hours, the noise increased and Anu realised it was the sound of gushing water, like that of a waterfall, or fast rapids over rocks. It echoed through the tunnels, strange acoustics summoned and distributed by the very nature of the environment.
More hours passed, and Anu grew increasingly agitated as she realised the source of the increasingly raging noise. It was the Vrekken, a natural whirlpool talked about with reverence in adventurer circles, around camp fires in the middle of the night, by hushed bards in rush-strewn taverns; and by the Blacklippers, who were said to have some unholy alliance with the great whirlpool. Nowhere, however, had Anu ever heard tales that the Vrekken was beneath the Black Pike Mountains-effectively entombed.
She shivered, now, and was drawn along in the darkness.
She realised that forces beyond her controlled her fate.
And she accepted this fate with a great, heartfelt sigh.
It was said her father, Kradek-ka, was down there, in the mythical land of Nonterrazake, down through the Vrekken, down through the mingled salt and fresh waters of the curious rivers which joined and flowed between savage towers of rock. Either that, or a simple death awaited.
The noise grew with every passing minute, and Anu realised the brass barge was moving subtly faster. The noise increased until it was no longer a noise, but a roar, a roar of anger and bestial hatred, a roar to be feared, a roar to instil pure hot terror. Anu grabbed the barge rail, knuckles white, as it began to rock and she wished, for a fleeting moment, that she had stayed with Alloria, travelled the high mountain passes, faced the threat of the hunting Harvesters. But then her jaw muscles tightened, her eyes narrowed, and she conjured a single word.
No.
She would not fear death. She would search out her father. Or she would die in the process.
The roaring grew and grew until it was so loud Anu could have screamed at full pitch and not heard herself. The river was dangerously agitated, rocking the barge from left to right, and slapping it abusively against rock walls.
And then…
A world opened before Anu, at once incredibly beautiful, and awesomely dangerous. It was stunning like a shark up close is stunning, dazzling like black-magick fire, and it held her gaze and she knew, if she survived this ordeal, nothing, ever, would compare to this moment…
The Vrekken was nearly half a league across, and filling a cavern of such incredible scale she never would have believed it could fit inside a mountain. The arena was lit by wrist-thick skeins of mineral deposits in rock walls, swirling, twining bands of orange and green that put Anu in mind of a carnival or festival; only here, there was very little to celebrate. Unless one wanted to celebrate death.
The Vrekken roared, a mammoth circular portal, a frothing juggernaut of churning river water all spiralling down, down, down into huge sweeping circles and further, into a savage cone depth. Anu’s eyes were fixed. Her mouth so dry she could not eject her tongue to moisten lips. The Engineer’s Barge was tugged, then flung into the Vrekken and caught like the tiniest of toys, powering along on surges of current, nose in the air leaving a wide wake through circular waters and Anu spun down, and down, and round and down and she realised the mighty whirlpool consisted of layers and she passed down, through layer after layer of this oceanic macrocosm, of whirling dark energy, of raw power and screaming detonation and mighty primordial compression, and she thought…
There is no fabled Nonterrazake.
I am going to die, here.
I am going to die.
And the Vrekken roared in terrible appreciation.
FIFTEEN
Endgame
The cankers charged, howling, and the brave soldiers of Falanor marched in armoured squares to meet the attack head on. In ranks, they advanced across the plain, shields locked, a full division of 4800 men arranged in twelve battalions of four hundred, with six in the centre two battalions deep, and three battalion squares to either side of the main square, like horns, the intention being to sweep round and enclose the enemy on three sides.
As the two forces closed, so the soldiers let out war cries and increased their pace, and the cankers accelerated to crash into shields with terrifying force, snarling and biting and clawing, a thousand feral clockwork twisted deviants slamming the battalions with rage…for a moment there was deadlock, then the Falanor soldiers were forced back, their swords hammering out, hacking at heads and claws, at shoulders and bellies, but the cankers were resilient, awesomely tough, incredibly powerful, and their claws raked shields bending steel. With screams of metal, they leapt, fastening on heads and ripping them free of bodies and the armoured shield wall broke within only a few short minutes, panic sweeping through Falanor ranks like rampant wildfire…
Kell crouched beside Nienna, whose face was ashen, watching the carnage below. Terrakon and Lazaluth had rushed away to command their troops, now only Leanoric remained, eyes fixed on the battle, face ashen, nausea pounding him.
“Find a horse,” said Kell, softly, forcing Nienna to tear her gaze from the battle. He took her chin in his hand, made her look at him. “Steal one if you have to. Ride for Saark. You understand?”
“No, I can’t leave you…what will you do?”
“I must help Leanoric.”
“No, Kell! You’ll die!”
He smiled, a grim smile. “I have my Legend to uphold!” he said, and pushed Nienna away. “Now go! You hear me?” She shook her head. “Go!” he roared, and saw Myriam there beside her, and Myriam locked eyes with Kell and a silent exchange, an understanding, passed between them. Myriam placed a hand on Nienna’s shoulder, and nodded. Then they took off through the camp, towards the towering, fractured walls of Old Skulkra, and tethered horses beyond.
Kell strode to Leanoric. “Sire. It’s time we went into battle.” He lifted his axe and began to loosen his shoulder. He turned, and saw the main block of infantry being forced back yet again. The battalion horns had swung around to enclose the cankers, on Terrakon and Lazaluth’s command, and cankers were falling under sword blows…but they were slaughtering the soldiers of Falanor in their hundreds.
Below came the snarl and thud of canker carnage. Claws through flesh. Swords through muscle. Kell mounted his horse, and clicked his tongue. In silence, Leanoric followed and the two men rode down from the camp and onto
