The Tower of Il Serrohe (48 page)

“
I understand. Take me to this tree.”

As they headed to the ravine, Netheraire came up out of her hole, and she and Nersite nervously sniffed noses. “She wants to come with us.”

“
Fine. No problem.”

The three continued down into the ravine, leaving the wary wolves behind at the top of the hill where they insisted on keeping watch.

seventy

“
We had escaped the tight place in the tunnel when I was telling you the story,” Nersite started.

“
Oh, God, yes. It nearly killed me to hear about you getting stuck there. Can you imagine how I felt?”

“
I do. But our own root homes aren’t—”

Don gave the Nohmin a look. “Don’t.” He lay down on the soft sand and curled his legs under him. “Go on.”

Nersite smiled. He loved telling stories, especially this one since it was his own, and not a traditional tale learned from Niddle-ai. Taking a deep breath, he resumed.

“
After a short rest, we headed out across the open Seared Meadow. The setting sun shot comets of orange and coral on our backs as we slowly made our way. Moving quickly yet silently across dunes and huddling behind tumbleweeds and sage brush would have made me extremely anxious. But the open sky above and flat land around felt like freedom after the ventilation shaft and place of the roots.

“
So, Don, I do know how you feel down in our homes and tunnels, though ours are pretty roomy—I understand. That’s why I tried to help you feel better—”

“
OK, OK. Don’t get all sappy on me. What did you do?”

Netheraire cuddled up against Nersite’s left side making a soft chirping sound.

“
A full moon threw silver sheets on the land, lighting our way to the foot of the Il Serrohe cliffs with the Tower above the cliffs’ valley face. It was a lost, lonely feeling to be so far from Nohwood.

“
We started climbing up, looking for the old tunnels Scarflue had mentioned. We had to find them.

“
The cliffs were the edge of the flow of old black rock from the Black Lava Mountains to the west.”

“
That’s called volcanic flow, Nersite.”

“
Oh. I don’t know what that is. Anyway, climbing the steep slope, we ran into huge black boulders, and a blanket of gravel that swallowed our feet and legs to the knees. There must be a path but we couldn’t afford to bump into Soreyes. And we were afraid we’d been seen by a lookout on the Tower.

“
We were about halfway up when Niddle-ai told us to stop.

“‘
Look, there to your right. That looks like a cave entrance. Maybe it leads to the tunnels Scarflue talked about.’

“
Netheraire and I went up to the small hole partly covered by weeds and sharp rocks. Sure enough, it was the entrance to a tunnel. Small even for a Nohmin, it was pretty big compared to the old tunnel we had just gone through.

“‘
You’re right, Niddle-ai,’ I said to him down below. ‘Your eyes are sharper than ours. We’ll wait for you, so we can work our way upwards through the tunnel.’

“‘
I can’t go on. You two go. I’ll watch from here. I can see the Seared Meadow and the Tower just fine.’ He poked around in his cheek pouches and brought out three pieces of hard chewings.”

“
What?” Don asked.

“
Stuff he chewed on like bark, weeds, seeds, and things. If you chew it, and leave it out in the sun, it gets hard. Then you can carry it around in your cheek pouches… oh, you probably don’t have them like us Nohmin.”

Don thought a moment. “Oh. You mean like incense. Don’t you remember the word? I thought you told me about how you prairie—uh, Nohmin carried it around in your pouches with some coals along with your Signascent.”

“
Signascent? I don’t remember that!”

“
Of course, you said that was your personal scent and—”

“
Well, yeah, but that’s part of our bodies’ natural scent. But chewings are different. Anyway, let me go on.”

Don thought,
So
now you peo—or animals can’t remember what you said to me. Maybe it’s because now I see you as more primitive. Maybe I just imagined their explanations and more sophisticated culture! Oh, forget it! Trying to figure this out is pointless.

Nersite continued, “We went down to him and Niddle-ai said, ‘Here, this is Sleep. Cover your nose and mouth, and throw this into a Soreye fire as you enter the Tower. They usually have fires everywhere. Any Soreyes hanging around will pass out.’

“‘
But Niddle-ai,’ I said. ‘Sleep only makes you drowsy, not passed out!’

“‘
Soreyes are unaccustomed to it. It might work faster on them.’

“‘
Might
,’ I said. That’s all I needed.

“‘
Anyway, I’ll be all right. Now, go on while I rest and my battle wounds settle down.’ Niddle-ai said.

“‘
You should put this on your wounds,’ Netheraire said, as she gave him a dried weed from her cheek.

“‘
Fine. Now go!’ Niddle-ai said.

“
So we did.

“
The moon rose higher and after winding our way through the long tunnel and up a short slope, we reached the top of the cliff. We were next to the Tower and behind it we could see the house where the priests lived just as Scarflue had said.

“
A guard was sleeping near a narrow door at the bottom of the Tower.

“
We dropped the Sleep onto a flat stone plate over a fire by the door. I waved my front feet over the rising smoke from the Sleep chewings. Netheraire and I ran around in circles trying to stir up the smoke. The sleepy guard woke up and saw us.

“‘
What? Nohmin? Hey, you can’t be…’ He sank to the ground as I waved the smoke from the plate in front of him.

“
Rolling him out of the way we entered the tall, round Tower. I left the plate with Sleep burning on it by the door, but I grabbed up a few pieces of Sleep ashes, blew on them to cool, and then stuck them in my cheeks—just in case. This was all too easy. Soreyes being stupid or a trap?

“
Inside, it was dark, though the moon shone directly down through the open top high above.

“
I spotted a round wood floor in the center of the top of the Tower, but it didn’t touch the walls by a space my size.”

Don looked at Nersite doing a mental measurement.
In the Valle, about eighteen inches, not the “normal” eight inches of a Rio Grande prairie dog.

Nersite continued, “A large tree-sized post, buried in the ground, held up the top floor. Against the inside wall of the Tower were smaller, tree-sized posts like this,” Nersite stuck his little fingers out showing how upright posts were distributed around the inside of the Tower against the cylindrical wall, preventing the Tower’s collapse.

“
Around the big post in the center were a bunch of twisted wooden planks, going up step-by-step.”

“
Those are called stairs, Nersite.”

“
OK, so we started going up the ‘stairs.’

“
As we climbed, step-by-step, I saw a wide plank near the wall by a window. It was like looking through smoke, which was not surprising with my eyesight. However, Netheraire said that it was the Seared Meadow, and it didn’t look clear to her either.

“
Both of us were scared because as we looked out, it was as if we were floating way up in the air with nothing under us. I looked straight down, but all I could see was the ground below, farther than I expected. That must be how it looks to the Sianox when they’re flying in the sky.

“
Afraid to look down, too, Netheraire looked out instead. ‘The sun is shining on the Seared Meadow, but it is not barren,’ she said. It is covered with strange plants, green and looking like feathers!’

“‘
How can that be, Netheraire?’ I said. ‘We just crossed it, and it was as it’s always been. There are no plants except for tumbleweeds and a thorn bush or two.’

“
But she went on saying more of what she saw as if I hadn’t said anything. ‘And the Nohwood has hardly any trees.”

“
We climbed to another window which faced the rising sun and mountains. It was still like there was nothing under us. But we could see a little way around to the Seared Meadow. Again, it looked dusty or foggy. Looking toward the mountains, Netheraire said, ‘The Piralltah Steeples aren’t there.’

“
I looked, and even with my poor eyesight, I could see they weren’t there.

“
As we went higher up the… stairs, we peered out another window, and the Meadow was greener. But still no Steeples.

“
We went up some more and looked: it was suddenly bare. No plants, weeds, trees, nothing! And behind, I saw humps in the distance toward the mountains. It was so odd because through some windows it was night time and others it was day, but different times of the day.”

“
We went higher to another window and the humps became hills.

“
Then small mountains.

“
Out the other way we saw tall cliffs. The Piralltah Steeples.

“
Finally the Nohwood began to look right, although it was still unclear, and the Meadow had a few skinny plants and bushes.

“
Closer to the top, that fog or dust cleared up, and we saw the Seared Meadow almost like it is now—”

“
What in the hell are you talking about?” Don asked, so agitated he couldn’t keep silent any longer. “Were you looking in the same direction? To the south?”

“
Well, yes, whatever you mean by south. Although at times, we were looking different ways because the Tower is round. Like I said, sometimes toward the rising sun.” Nersite paused, thinking.

“
There was only one window to the plains where, if you looked around far enough, you could face in the direction of the setting sun. It was near the top, and when we looked, we still felt like we were floating in the sky, not standing on a hill or a ridge looking down on the valley. And there was no window facing the Great Snow Mountains. I guess there wasn’t anything that way the Soreyes wanted to see.”

“
So why in the hell was it looking different out each window?” Don said, actually expecting Nersite to explain.

“
As you say, ‘how the hell would I know?’”

“
Smart ass.”

Changing terrain, changing fauna, changing time of day, humps growing to hills, then mountains, and so on. My God!

“
You had mentioned Scarflue, the Soreye you captured, and what he told you to expect. Did he say anything about these weird things you saw as you went up the Tower?”

“
He did, but we didn’t understand it.”

“
Tell me what he said. Do you remember?”

“
A little. He said the Soreyes had stuck Time in a mud brick—”

“
An adobe.”

“
Yes. And they baked the adobes in the fire so it was hard and the Time could not escape.”

“
Is this Time like your incense—uh, ‘chewings’?”

“
No. We told him about our Timeless chewings. He laughed and made fun of us. Like you do, sometimes. He said it was Time itself. Niddle-ai and I didn’t understand. Scarflue couldn’t explain it.”

Don blew out air and pursed his lips. “What the hell? Try to remember what else he said.”

“
Just that Time was held in the adobes like this…” Nersite made a tiny fist. “Held tight in there. If you pile the adobes on top of each other, you could see different times…”

Don tried to get his head around this. He spoke aloud as he thought. “All right, so you capture Time. Then, you stack up adobes to make a wall, to make a Tower, ‘round and ‘round… of course! If the adobes could hold Time, and you could tap into that by looking out standing on a wall of them, you could see the past, present, and… future?”

“
What in the hell, asshole?” Nersite blurted.

Don chuckled. “You’ve been around me too much. You gotta clean up your language, son.” He struck Nersite smartly on the back with the side of his face since doing it with his hoof would be awkward and painful.

“
Don’t hit me!” Nersite cried out.

“
It was a friendly slap. Like between friends or… brothers. Anyway, that’s
it
. The Soreyes can look out from their Tower and see the past, then the present, and on top to—the future. As far into the future as they can build that Tower without it collapsing! That’s how they knew what you were going to do before you did it.”