Kingdoms of the Night (The Far Kingdoms) (35 page)

Not that I looked for long because my eyes were taken and held by a true marvel.

Sorcery is normally a construct or a spell and most of us do not think in terms of magic being connected to engines. But it can be done by very skilled Evocators working with the most handy mechanics. I suspect the model of Vacaan that occupied the center of King Gayyath’s palace was such a device; and my sister Rali had destroyed the doom-machine built by the Last Archon that was intended to destroy Orissa and make him into a god. Those were indeed marvelous, but in some ways this was a greater feat, even though it showed a debt more to cleverness than wizardry.

A huge wheel rose out of the water before us, a cogged wheel that a huge endless chain ran on, a chain with links almost the size of that seachain that had once closed off Lycanth’s harbor. The chain ran below the water in one direction, I guessed and just at water level in the other.

As we approached the roaring became louder and with a screech the wheel began turning, the links of the chain clanking up from underwater, over the gears and away into the distance, very slowly. I was certain sorcery worked these engines because in spite of their age neither the iron wheel nor the chain showed the slightest rust but were as new as when they’d been hammered out in some unimaginably huge foundry.

I saw a sailor drop to his knees and begin praying and be jerked up and backhanded back to his duties by a mate.

Janela leaned close, shouting in my ear, “The magic of the Old Ones still senses us. This I wager will take us to the top.”

I didn’t know how and so peered ahead.

The chain rose a bit as it traveled and then I could see it followed a huge trough that went upward, wide enough for the biggest merchantman in my fleet, and vanished into the distance. The trough was set at almost a ten degree angle and water ran down it, but not in the torrent it should’ve. Again, watermagic at work.

Janela went to Kele and pointed and spoke but Kele was already nodding, as if she knew what was to be done. She bustled about the deck, grabbing men and shoving them into motion, shouting inaudible commands into their ears. I could hear nothing but saw them obey, unshackling the anchor chain from the anchor, laying it on deck, then, from the chain locker below, breaking out the spare chain and laying that out as well. Other seamen took down the forecastle rails as if we were entering harbor. Still others ran haillards from the foremast’s yard to the ends of the chains, set to and lifted the chains until they dangled clear of the deck, just overside.

Kele must’ve seen my puzzlement because she darted to my side. “Just like a toy L’ur bought me as a wee one, my Lord.”

I still hadn’t a clue but she had no time for me. Three of the
Ibis
’s best seamen were detailed and Kele ordered the sweeps to bring us close alongside that chain. At least
someone
knew what she was doing. Waiting for their moment the seaman went overside, until they were standing on that huge chain as it clanked along. Our own anchor chains were lowered and made fast, first with rope, then with cables and we were secure to that chain and carried on, toward that enormous flume.

Just then I got it, about the time both Janela and Kele noted my puzzlement and decided to explain. This enormous apparatus was no more than an endless bucket such as farmers use to water their fields or a funicular, like one an Orissan speculator had rigged once with cables and boxes to carry those too lazy, old or infirm to the peak of Mount Aephens, which had lasted one entire summer and then the winter winds ripped it away. But by Te-Date, the magnificence of this magic and machine! This was yet another device the Old Ones had to guard their heartland well.

There would be no need to fight an enemy trying to come against them upriver. All that would be necessary would be to cancel the spell working the gears and shut the engine down or lay a simple vision-blocking conjuration so the slight gap in the waterfall wouldn’t be seen. Into my mind flashed something Janos had once said — “The greatest warrior I’ve known was one who fought never a battle but won all his country’s wars by subtlety and subterfuge.”

No doubt the spell would sense a ship going downstream above and the gears automatically reverse and send the chain the other way, working as a brake, although we’d have to design some sort of chain-rigging if we returned by this route, no doubt. I grinned — was I becoming so self-confident I actually believed any of us would survive this? A day ago I’d been locked in gloom and fear, and now, with something that appeared to be going to design, was suddenly as bubbling and happy-go-lucky as bumpkin who has finally been allowed to win a toss of the dice.

Kele was on the quarterdeck, hand-signaling, Janela beside her, working with those tiny signaling flags and then we were in the channel, being taken up toward the land above.

I saw working parties scurrying on the decks of the
Firefly
and
Glowworm
, so knew Towra and Beran had understood what was needed.

The chain lifted us slowly up and up, into another pool, where another toothed wheel and chain went up a second flume, just exactly like stairs. We had more than enough time to free ourselves from the chain before it went underwater and back down. There were two more channels and again we journeyed upward hour after hour and then came out of a high-arched tunnel into the clear sunlight and we were back out on the river as it flowed across the plateau. We unshackled the chains for the last time and rejoiced as our other two ships came out of the darkness.

Downstream we heard the roar of the waterfalls that fell into the gorge we’d left some hours earlier.

I swore that now I could
smell
the real Far Kingdoms.

* * * *

We sailed on, the land around us as barren and sere as it had been when we climbed the stairs at the trader’s shelter far behind us. There was nothing to see, nothing to do but the few duties required to hold our course, since the wind blew steadily in the direction we wanted, and lie on the deck panting like hounds and sweating. We rigged awnings but the wind came hot and dry, bringing sand from the desert across our decks and into our food.

But we were all cheerful, knowing we’d finished another stage of our journey. Perhaps there’d be another gorge or another swamp around the bend but we would deal with that, just as we dealt with the others and would in time deal with Cligus and Modin if we were unlucky and they caught up to us.

Such is man, always reeling from elation to despair. But then, if those of us who were out here, far beyond the known world, had wanted it any other way we could have snuggled down in that warm sty of contentment and boredom that was civilization.

One night we sighted a glow on the horizon. We became nervous, remembering that city of ghosts behind us. But it was still there when the sun rose and as we closed on it, hour after hour, became a vertical pillar of fire, rising out of the bare desert.

“Magic,” one of the sailors said.

“Not necessarily,” Janela replied. “Haven’t you ever seen when the earth bleeds sticky oil or where tar covers a swamp? If that could be lighted I’d wager it’d look like what we’re seeing.”

As we came up on it we saw a scatter of huts along the riverbank, no more than a league from the column of fire. We saw people standing near them, watching us.

We chanced drawing close but kept our weapons at hand, ready to fire back and return to midstream if we encountered hostility, but there was none.

There was a rude dock and we moored not far from it and lowered a boat. Janela, Quatervals, Pip and I went ashore, more to stretch our legs than in the hopes of getting information or finding anything.

It was well we had no expectations because the people were a poor lot. Unsurprisingly they called themselves the People of the Flame in their own tongue and claimed they were the last of a once-mighty people, who’d ruled this wasteland with sword and fire. But their mounts had been taken from them by the gods.

Gods? we asked.

Those who live up there and they pointed on, up the river.

Who are they? What did they look like? How far away were they? Had anyone of this generation or the one before
seen
these gods?

No to all questions. What had happened to them had happened in their grandfather’s grandfather’s grandfather’s and so forth time.

They had little to trade except water from a sweet well, but more out of pity than anything else we filled our barrels and left these miserable folks with some play-pretties and candies.

I gave a sugar-stick to one boy who would have been about seven. He was quite naked and it was evident from his and the others’ smells they didn’t feel swimming a worthwhile avocation. I noted he had a pet, a lizard about the length of my arm on a string. I asked him if it had a name and he shook his head, no.

He said it would be bad to name it since it was a great one, descended from those steeds the gods had taken away. I blinked at that and reached down to examine the little creature.

It opened tiny fanged jaws and spat at me and its spittle smoked and burnt like fire. I jerked my hand back and swore.

The boy nodded. “Does that to me, too.”

He sucked hard on his sugarstick and his expression grew dreamy, finding tastes he’d most likely never known.

I looked at the lizard, wondered a bit, but knew I’d never know more.

We reboarded and sailed onward.

* * * *

On the sixth day after that we saw a shimmer on the land ahead of us, crossing from horizon to horizon.

Hardly daring to hope or even to pray we sailed closer and closer and then a vast, fabulous lake opened before us.

Just beyond rose the mountains.

All river folk have a fascination for where a thing might begin or end. We sit by the banks of our river and watch the endless coming and going, dreaming of what it would be like to join such grand processions. Some of us are so afflicted we become wanderers, always seeking the source of all things; praying, even, that we might be the first to see such wonders. It’s a glorious, if childish, feeling that allows you to briefly imagine that instead of a puny mortal looking up at a mountain you are that haughty ageless range looking down.

I’ve enjoyed such fleeting moments many times in my life. But never so much that the pleasure grew stale. And so when we came into the great lake where the river was born, one part of me was wary, sniffing the heavy air for new dangers, while the other was drunk with the heady wine of discovery; for while the Old Ones might have reigned here a millennium or more ago, it was a place no one from my world had ever seen.

The lake seemed nearly as broad as a sea. Janela’s map showed we needed to sail for its most distant shore out of sight to the east. Plumes of mist ribboned up from the lake’s cool surface and the air shimmered under a bright sun, giving the view the cast of a magical mirror. The water was low that time of year and near the shore trees grew right up from the bottom — singly or clotted together like a small woodlot.

Lily pads the size of serving platters at a palace table floated their blossoms across the shallows, filling the air with fragrance. Fabulous dragonflies with dazzling wings darted here and there in search of mates, while emerald-feathered birds half as tall as a man stalked the water on stilted legs, necks as graceful as swans, scarlet beaks long slender poniards prodding among the lilies for dinner.

There was a faint breeze carrying the cool, damp scent of the feathery ferns that fanned out under trees that grew amazingly tall and straight toward the sky. Fat-fisted clouds knuckled under that vaulted course, giving everything an ethereal, peaceful look — as if we were at the entrance of a realm where all was clean and kind and good.

From this lake the river flowed, bringing life to those who dwelled below. After the Months Of Cold, when the snows from the mountains melted, wondrous falls would thunder from craggy cliffs and countless streams would burst their narrow banks, filling the lake to the brim until it spilled out and made the river a glorious beast, rushing along all those weary miles we had traversed until it met the sea.

In happier eras villages and towns would have held festivals to thank the gods for such bounty; there would be music and love-struck couples and clucking grannies shaking their heads at such goings on.

I smiled, chuckling to myself in memory of those lusty years when my own loins were as bursting as a reborn river and there had been many a maid to dally with and fuel the gossip of those finger-wagging grannies.

“What amuses you so, Amalric?” Janela asked.

When I told her she smiled and asked, “Are you certain those years are lost to you?”

I felt my cheeks flush, which made her smile wider and her eyes dance in humor at my discomfort. There was no denying I’d changed greatly since she’d first set eyes on me in my villa. I’d grown stronger, sleeker — limbs heavy with new muscle, waist narrow, chest no longer sagging with age. My old man’s stoop was gone and I stood tall and straight again; easy in my boots, confident in my stride. I didn’t need a mirror to know the marks of age had been erased from my features as well or that my white locks had been replaced by a shock of red hair that shone like hearth fire. I only had to see the occasional looks of wonder from my companions to realize that I appeared a man in his fourth decade rather than a fellow weighted down by almost twice those years.