Celephaïs, the royal city of King Kuranes, features in the periphery of many of my stories, but as so many important people and things are found there it obviously deserves a book of its own. These stories help explain how some things work in the Dreamlands, flesh out the city and a few nearby places, and further extend the story arc developed in the Book of Jake.

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Districts, walls, and major ways

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City elevation

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Rivermarket areas

Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10

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Chapter 1

The alarm bells clanged her awake.

Fire!

Sergeant Jabari leapt to her feet, her hands pulling on her leather jacket and boots automatically.

She rushed out of the barracks, joining a dozen other women awakened by the alarm in the pre-dawn gloom.

Rasha called down from the tower: “It’s over near the Boreas Bath! It looks like just one building still!”

Good. If it was near the bath they’d have plenty of water.

“Rasha, hold the fort!” She turned to the others. “Double-time! Let’s go!”

They ran, each woman carrying buckets or poles.

The streets were largely deserted at this time of the morning, although as they passed the merchant area they could see a few early risers already preparing for the day’s work.

The public bath was just a short distance from there, and as they approached they could see flames shooting from a small, two-story building across the street from it.

“Larima, Georgina, douse the buildings on both sides and make sure it doesn’t spread,” she shouted. “Beth! Roust everyone and get them started with the buckets.”

Georgina, with a long orange braid hanging down her back, sprang into action. She got the bucket brigade up and running, her women rapidly joined by commandeered residents and shopkeepers gawking nearby, and the small pump they had brought shortly began to spray water on the flaming structure. With the fountain so near there was plenty of water available.

So far only the first floor was burning, but the building was made of wood, and the second story was already smoking dangerously. It was only a matter of time before it burst into flame, too.

Jabari tried to look inside to see if there was anyone still alive, but the fire was too intense.

If there was anyone in there, she thought, they’re dead by now. They’ll just have to wait a little longer.

The firefighters concentrated on dousing the adjacent buildings to prevent the fire from spreading—it had already jumped to one building, but fortunately was still small enough to be extinguished quickly.

The second floor suddenly exploded into fire, a puff of flame shooting out of the windows and shattering the few panes that remained. Glass shards rained down, but the heat was so intense the firefighters were safely distant. The fire shot up again with new energy, but that was its last gasp as the water sprays finally began to work. One wall of the building collapsed onto the wreckage, and with a cloud of glowing sparks, the fire was under control.

Embers and tiny flames remained, popping up here and there through the smoke and steam, but now it was just a matter of drenching the mess. By the time the sun rose the fire was dead, and adjacent buildings, though sooty and thoroughly soaked, were largely untouched.

Sipping a cup of cold tea provided by a local shopkeeper, Jabari sat on an upturned bucket, staring at the steaming ruin.

“Everyone says it was a saddlery, shop on the bottom and living upstairs,” said Larima. “No family, apparently—they say she lived alone.”

“It’s not so cold she’d need a fire this early in the morning,” said Jabari. “Brewing tea, perhaps?”

Larima shrugged.

“We’ll be able to look around in a bit. I don’t think there are any embers left now.”

Jabari wound a piece of cloth over her face and rose.

“Let’s go have a look now, shall we?”

Larima followed her into the wreckage.

Most of the second floor and roof had collapsed in the fire, and what wasn’t charred wood was covered with steaming ash. Puddles dotted the floor.

The woman’s body lay in the middle of what must have been the saddlery workshop.

She was dead, of course, and terribly burned, but the axe wedged in her skull made it very clear that it hadn’t been the fire that killed her.

What was even more interesting was the half-charred corpse of a man next to her.

* * *

“OK, so the woman’s body is Mistress de la Corda, just as everyone thought, but that doesn’t help us much,” said Jabari. “We still don’t know who the man was, or how he got into Skala Ereskou.”

“Or why he would want to kill de la Corda,” added Larima.

“Nothing’s turned up in the ashes yet?”

“Not yet. They’re clearing away the debris now.”

“I have to notify the captain, of course. A resident is dead, and somebody else. Almost surely an intruder,” mused Jabari. “He will not be happy with me.”

Larima grinned.

“This is one of the few times I’m happy you’re in charge, not me!”

“Bitch,” grinned Jabari right back. “In any case, though, ask around and find out more about her. And any men in her life.”

Larima nodded.

“Sarge, we’ve got another problem,” came a voice from outside the guardhouse.

It was Georgina. She’d rolled her long orange braid into a bun and pinned it to her head to get it out of the way. Her hands and tunic were dirty with soot.

“We got most of the wreckage cleared and didn’t find anything unusual. It looks like she and the man killed each other and the fire was started by accident; hard to tell for sure. Hard to tell much of anything, actually, but that’s our best guess based on the weapons and wounds. Doesn’t seem to have been any third weapon involved, at least.”

She paused and pulled a small leather pouch from her vest.

“We did find this, though, in the woman’s sash...”

She opened the pouch, and poured the contents out on the flat of her hand.

They looked almost like pearls, iridescent and almost glowing, but with a reddish glint no pearl could match.

“The Honey of the Goddess....” sighed Jabari. “Well, shit.”

She held out her hand.

Georgina rolled the “pearls” back into the bag and handed it over.

“Eight of them, Sarge. Offhand, that’s probably a year’s worth of all our salaries put together.”

“If you can sell them without getting caught, that is.”

Georgina nodded. “If you can sell them without getting caught.”

“So how many people know what’s in this pouch, Georgina?”

“Just the three of us, Sarge.”

“And there were really eight, right?”

“Hey, c’mon... we’ve been through it all together for over ten years. Yeah, Sarge, eight. Really.”

“Larima, how much is in that fund for the three of us now?”

“Not enough yet, Sarge. It’s a good start, but not enough to buy us out, or buy homesteads.”

“So how do the two of you feel about these honeydrops?” asked Jabari, carefully removing three of the “pearls” from the bag, and handing them over to Larima. “You agree we have to report these five honeydrops to the captain?”

“Yes, sir! It’s our duty, sergeant!” said Georgina, standing up straight as if on parade.

“Absolutely, sergeant!” agreed Larima, dropping the honeydrops into an inner pocket in her tunic.

“Constable Georgina, I comment your honesty in reporting this contraband, and hereby authorize a prize money payout of three gold coins.”

“Thank you, sergeant.”

“And I’m off to report this to the captain immediately. Larima, you’re in charge.”

“Sure thing, Sarge!”

Larima waved a casual salute and walked over to lounge in Jabari’s chair. She stretched her feet out.

“My regards to the captain!”

It being a beautiful morning Jabari decided to walk through the Cirque of the Moon, cutting straight through Celephaïs. She used the Aglaea Gate, nodding to the constables there, who were (luckily for them) alert and on duty when she passed.

It was still quite early, and the Cirque was still largely deserted. People were visiting the Estates, as they did every morning whether in respect or prayer, and there was the usual gathering of people around the Hippocrene Spring and the Necklace getting water for the day.

Clean water was available throughout the city, of course: the Slarr River, fed by the mountain springs of Mt. Aran, but many preferred the fresh spring to the flat taste of aqueduct water.

Given a choice she’d prefer fresh spring water, too, but as a Constable she rarely had a choice.

She walked closer to one of the Necklace ponds and scooped up a mouthful.

Cold and delicious, but no time to dawdle.

She continued on around the curving Cirque to the Street of Pillars, which she then followed toward the wharves, and the sea.

The main Constabulary barracks and the captain were located down near the cargo docks, surrounded by warehouses, cargo of all sorts being dragged or wheeled about, laborers shouting and cursing, and the smell of fish, fish, fish. Most of the fish were unloaded on the other side of the Street of Pillars, where the fish market was, but you could never escape the smell.

Jabari once again thanked her gods she was in Skala Eresou... she couldn’t imagine having to live and work in this odor every day. The captain said he was so used to it he never even noticed it anymore, but she found that difficult to believe, much as she trusted the captain.

And since the captain chose to actually live elsewhere—up in High City, in fact—she figured he wasn’t as used to it as he claimed.

“Captain Ragnarsson? Sergeant Jabari, sir, from Skala Eresou.”

The captain was seated in his office, staring at a map of the farmland north of the city.

“Come in, Jabari,” he said, motioning her in. “Apparently there’s a leak in one of the High City cisterns, and the artificers say they’ll need to hook up an alternate from the Slarr Aqueduct for a few weeks so they can fix it. Be a bit of a pain in the neck to run that pipe without damaging the Wall or blocking the outer Boreas Gate.”

He pushed the map to the side and looked up at her.

“And what’s your problem, Sergeant?”

“Murder, and an unknown man in Skala Eresou,” she said, pulling up a bench to sit across from him. She pulled the cloth bag out, and handed it over.

“And this.”

The captain gave her a quizzical look, and opened the bag, rolling a honeydrop out onto his palm.

“Oh, my. More honey. And in Skala Eresou this time!”

“This time?” asked Jabari. “Where else?”

“High City, of course, where the money is. A number of nobles have begun to show signs, and there have been a few, um, incidents.”

“And Skala Eresou abuts High City, through the Wall of Euphrosyne,” mused Jabari. “That’s the lowest side of High City, but still...”

“When did you check that wall last?”

“Twice a year, sir. The last one was about two months ago.”

“Nothing unusual?”

“Not really... a few smaller buildings built up against the wall, but nothing more than one story. The regs only forbid structures on the outside of the walls, not the inside, but I didn’t see anything especially unusual on that side, either. Just the usual gardens and sheds of the smaller estates.”

“Tunnels?”

“We checked both sides thoroughly and couldn’t find anything. The Wall goes down to the rock there, so digging a tunnel would be quite an undertaking to handle in secrecy.”

“Maybe it’s time for a surprise inspection.”

“Yessir, I’ll get on it immediately.”

“Report back to me at once if any new information surfaces. Who’s the man?”

“No idea yet, Captain. I’m looking into it.”

“Damn. Well, keep me informed if you discover anything related to this. Anything at all.”

“Yessir,” she said, rising.

“Oh, Jabari, how many honeydrops were there again?”

“Five, sir. It’s in the report.”

“Oh, so it is. Yes, thank you. Dismissed.”

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General outline of Skala Eresou

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Honey for Celephaïs: Chapter 2

Thibby bent over until his cheek touched the dirt, carefully checking the alignment of his thumb and the red marble. With his left hand he reached out and pushed a tiny fragment of something out of the way, then lifted his head again.

He straightened up, steadied himself with his left hand and both knees, and took the shot.

The yellowish marble flew out of his hand and clacked into the larger red, knocking it off at a tangent before to the ground and bouncing to a stop.

“Yes!” he shouted, both arms up in the air in celebration and all but one of the other children joined in. Odd man out was Ken, brows beetling, lips slightly pouting: he had just lost Big Red, his favorite marble.

Thibby picked up both marbles, the last two in the circle, and rattled them together in his hand for a moment, savoring his victory. This was his first win at their daily marbles competition in almost two weeks and he was loving every minute of it.

He opened his hand, picked up his yellowish shooter, and dropped it into his bag instead of adding it to the pile of marbles in front of him on the ground.

“Here’s Big Red back, Ken,” he said, holding out the other’s prize marble. “You’ll beat me again tomorrow like always.”

He pushed his pile of winnings into the circle.

“Thanks, guys, for the win. Take ’em all back.”

The other children—Ken and two other boys, and two girls—eagerly snatched back their own marbles, quickly settling one argument about who one common stone belonged to.

Mother Egret watched, quietly sitting in the shade of the giant oak. They met here almost every day, on the paving stones around the fountain when the weather was good, or under the broad branches of the oak when not. They’d played once in the public bath across the street, until they got chased out.

Mother Egret was always there, always with a gentle smile. She had a walking stick leaning against the rock she sat upon but nobody could recall her using it. In fact, as it occurred to them every so often, nobody had actually seen her walk at all.

They’d brought it up any number of times, determined to watch and see where she went, where she lived, who she really was, but every time they seemed to forget about it, only recalling their intentions after they were on the way home, or later that evening. It never seemed that important, after all.

Mother Egret never raised her voice, although when she told them stories her voice could reach the far reaches of the plaza easily. She enthralled her young audience with tales of kings and dragons, of buried treasure and cursed gems, of the heroes of the past and the future, almost every day after schola.

She could bring a smile to the saddest face, and kiss away the pain of a scraped knee.

Children began to leave, heading for home and their chores—most of them came from poorer families, and had to help with the family business, or even go to work for others.

He exchanged a few quips with his friends and turned to go home himself when he noticed Mother Egret beckoning him.

“Thibron, you were very kind to let everyone keep their own today.”

He smiled, white teeth bright though his sun-burnt complexion.

“Thank you, Mother Egret.”

She smiled back, nodding a few times, then reached out to touch him lightly on the head.

“Run along now, Thibron. I’ll see you soon.”

Thibby was smiling all the way home at his victory. He knew he could have kept all the marbles—some of the kids did that and got everyone all angry all the time—but he hated it when everyone got angry at him. Sometimes there were even fistfights when a kid couldn’t bear losing a precious marble in combat.

As he got closer to home, though, his smile slipped.

He slowed down, walking quietly and listening intently for his father.

No banging, no shouting, no crying… in fact, as he got closer, he could hear his mother humming.

The smile came back and he rushed inside the give her a hug from behind.

“Careful! You almost knocked the ladle out of my hand, you rascal,” she scolded with a smile, tousling his hair with her free hand.

“Run along and wash up now, and I’ll get you fed.”

“Yes, mama,” he said, and scampered off.

He ate alone, as always, although his mother sat across from him, watching with a slight smile as he devoured his soup and rice.

He scarfed down two bowls of rice and looked hopefully at the pot for a third, but his mother shook her head.

“I’m sorry, Thibron, that’s for your father.”

Crestfallen but not surprised, he picked up his bowl, cup and spoon and started to walk toward the open door, toward the running stream where he could wash them.

There was a bang at the front door as it was flung open, slamming into the wall.

Father was home!

“Quickly, Thibron, off with you! I’ll wash up later. Go!”

He set the utensils down and ran to the closet that was his bedroom. He pulled the sliding door shut, quietly of course, leaving it open just the merest crack so he could see into the larger room. It was the only room they had, the living, dining, kitchen, and master bedroom all in one, and often all at once.

Bare to the waist, belly bulging out over the filthy dhoti, his father looked even angrier than usual, his stubbled jowls pulled back to reveal yellowing teeth.

He paused for a moment to let his eyes adjust to the relative darkness of the apartment, then took a step toward the cushions spread out along the far wall.

“Ah! Ow! Gods dammit, what the..?”

He hopped up on one leg, then stepped back a bit to stand and reach down to pick something up.

His bag of marbles!

“Your damned boy leaving his damned toys about! Stupid bitch, can’t you keep things clean?”

He smashed the bag against the stone wall.

Thibron heard a marble shatter, maybe more than one.

He clenched his fists in anger and fear, one pushing against his teeth to stop himself from crying out.

“Denh, please… he’s just a little boy…” the woman pled, dropping to her knees.

He swung the bag of marbles with all his force, hitting her on the side of her face, toppling her to the floor. She screamed in pain and terror, barely catching herself with one hand, trying to scuttle backwards, her feet scrabbling uselessly on the stone.

“I’m sorry, Denh, I’m sorry, I’m sorry…”

What began as a whimper grew suddenly into a scream as he grabbed her by the hair, dragging her forward like a bad puppy, holding her head facing up and he struck her again and again with his fist.

“I’ll teach you to be sorry, you bitch!”

Thibron burst out of his closet, leaping across the room to grab hold of his father’s arm, pulling on it with all his strength.

“Papa, no, please! Please don’t hit her anymore! Papa!”

“Leggo, you brat!”

With a snarl his father snapped that arm up, sending Thibron flying to crunch into the wall.

He felt something in his arm snap, and then something hit him in the side and his world collapsed into pain and fire.

Dimly he heard his mother screaming, and the sound of something hard being pounded into flesh, then heavy breathing in silence, and darkness.

* * *

“Thibron.”

He heard the voice clearly, although it was faint.

“Mama?”

“It’s time to go, Thibron. Come to me, child; your mother is waiting.”

It was Mother Egret!

Mother Egret was here, in his home.

But it was so dark.

He couldn’t see Mother Egret at all. Or mama.

“Mama? Where are you?”

He stood, squinting into the black, searching.

“Over here, child,” came Mother Egret voice, and he turned to see her seated by a wood door dimly lit by some indistinct illumination.

“Mother Egret? Where is mama?”

He walked toward her, noticing that his body didn’t hurt anymore.

“You’ve been very brave, dear Thibron,” she said, leaning forward to give him a hug, squeezing him tight for a moment. “Your mother is right through that door; she’s waiting for you.”

The door wasn’t scary at all.

It was pretty, with little carvings of birds and flowers all over it, and perfectly child-sized; just high enough for him to walk through.

“Just push it open, Thibron, and you’ll see. Before you go, though, you won’t need this anymore,” she said, and reached out to pluck something from his chest.

He couldn’t see exactly what it was… something small, something glowing gold, like a marble.

Mother Egret gave him a gentle push on the shoulder.

He pressed on the door and it swung open easily.

Sunlight spilled into the darkness on a playful breeze, rich with the scents of flowers and children laughing.

He blinked.

There she was! Mama!

He leapt through the door, racing into the waiting arms of his mother, her face radiant and unlined with the beauty of a dream.

Mother Egret watched silently as the wood door swung shut slowly, silently, and sighed.

She looked down at the glowing gem in her hand.

“I’m sorry, dear Thibron. Would that it were him instead of you,” she whispered to herself as the soulstone turned to mist and faded away with the light, leaving only darkness behind.

END

Bortras wiped the sweat off his forehead with the back of his arm, the clean one. Over the years he’d learned how to keep one section of one forearm relatively dry and clean, especially for that purpose, even though the rest of him was usually wet and covered in filth.

He no longer bothered with the cloth mask around his mouth and nose anymore… he’d gotten used to the stench of the tunnels of Celephaïs years ago.

He took another step in the muck, his feet automatically seeking stable bottom, his arms automatically pulling the rake back and forth, cleaning detritus from the huge grating. Forged of steel bars, each as thick as two fingers, the whole was far too heavy for any man to move, let alone lift.

The noon sun didn’t penetrate far into the tunnel today, and while he wouldn’t have minded a little sunshine to lighten his mood, it would have meant he’d be a lot hotter while he worked. And a lot smellier as the muck warmed.

He didn’t have to clean this grate too often, but as the final barrier between the sewers of the city and the churning waves of the Cerenarian Sea below, it was critical to the whole sewerage network that underlay the city.

Seven years already, he thought. Seven years of working in the darkness, buried in the garbage and the excrement of the teeming city above. Only meagre lamps and torches to illuminate the labyrinth of tunnels and caverns, light that rarely penetrated far enough into the murky water to reveal what caused those ripples and splashes in the darkness.

He’d really wanted to work on the city’s defenses: the walls, the scorpions, the gates. He knew how to build all the machines of war, how to reinforce tunnels dug under the walls by sappers and how to defend against them, how to anchor a ballistae to withstand the stress of multiple shots.

And he’d been working in water and shit for seven long years.

The north end of the city, where the waters of the River Naraxa were first drawn in, was clean and pristine, pools and streams almost glowing under the lamps ensconced around the walls. The air was clean there, too, just the smells of water and rock and lamp oil.

There, the boats could travel freely through spacious tunnels, often with towpaths alongside broad enough for even horses. With a map, an artificer could traverse the city underground, whether into the farm markets, High City and its noble houses, even Skala Eresou itself, forbidden to most males.

He’d ventured to Skala Eresou once, just for the thrill, and found the grates there locked securely. No doubt Chief Artificer Marcus had the keys.

The water was flowing more freely now.

He raked one more time to pull out a long thin pole that had somehow managed to be washed down here, and checked once more to be sure he hadn’t missed anything.

Years ago he’d been so disgusted with the stench and the never-ending boredom and had abandoned his work before it was complete—and on that day, of all days, Artificer Krunogle had come to check.

He’d been dragged up in front of the Chief himself, and if Krunogle hadn’t said he was worth giving another chance, the Chief would have drummed him out on the spot. As it was he’d only gotten three strokes of the cane, and he was pretty sure Krunogle had held back.

His back had hurt for a few days after, and he had thought of just quitting, but he’d promised he’d see it through. Pa had made him promise to stick it out until he finished his apprenticeship, and swore it would be worth it if he could only reach journeyman.

As a boy Pa had told him endless stories about the work he’d done for the King, both here in Celephaïs and all over the eastern continent. He’d even worked on Serannian, the King’s flying palace!

He shook his head as he dumped the last load of brush and garbage into the scow. The mule twitched its tail once at the spray of droplets across its nose but otherwise just continued standing there, ignoring him as it always did.

He’d expected to be working on erecting castles, buildings, and machines of war, drafting exciting new designs to awe everyone with his talent. Not this, not raking muck all day.

As luck would have it, he was assigned to the underground network that supplied water to the city and swept away its waste, dumping it into the Cerenarian Sea. The outlets, including the grate he’d just finished cleaning, were situated to the north of the city seadocks, taking advantage of the current sweeping northward to carry it all away from the city, ever northward toward Inganok, or the Northern Marshes off Lomar.

His apprenticeship should be over soon, and as soon as he was a journeyman he’d be out of these tunnels and up in the clean, fresh air as soon as he could. He couldn’t wait to start working on real projects, not just shoveling shit.

He swatted the mule on the flank and it began to trudge back upstream, pulling the loaded scow slowly but steadily away from the gate. The landing was only a few dozen meters away, and when they reached it he moored the scow to one of the posts. A second tunnel, almost as big as the one he was in, joined his tunnel here, and there was a ladder down from the street above, one of the several entrances in the fish market. Somebody else would be along tomorrow to get rid of it all.

They had to be careful of the weather, since even a mild rain could cause these tunnels to turn into raging torrents, sweeping any incautious artificer to their death. The scow would have to be stowed way safely, too, until next time.

He didn’t plan on being here by then.

He hesitated.

If he had been alone he could climb up and go back through the fish market, now that the grate was clean. The stench of the fish market was, in a way, even worse than the stench down here, though… he’d grown accustomed to this smell, and while he certainly didn’t enjoy it he usually didn’t even notice it anymore. Rotting fish, on the other hand, he definitely hated.

He had to take care of the mule, too, and so they slowly walked back through one of the smaller tunnels that ran almost under the Wall of Euphrosyne, handling mostly water from the public baths and fountains. Unlike the loathsome inhabitants of the sewers, those tunnels were home to more innocuous denizens: frogs, fish, and the like. And the towpath was dry almost the entire distance, with torches at hand.

Much happier at the different smells in the smaller tunnel, the mule even took advantage of the improved water quality to snap up a few stalks of grass every so often as a snack.

They approached the north end of the city, where the waters of Naraxa entered the tunnel system. The mule lived in the stables there when it wasn’t working, along with its fellows, with plenty of fodder and fresh water. The artificers had their own bath there, too, with its own hot spring feeding it!

Many of the city’s artificers, and all of the apprentices, lived in the barracks aboveground, at the north end of the farm market, close to the Avenue of Boreas. Once he became a journeyman he’d be able to live elsewhere, if he wished, even marry, although he hadn’t really thought that far yet.

He’d been paying little attention as he walked, familiar with every bend and stone of the tunnel after years of use, but suddenly something caught his eye.

A light was moving down one of the unused tunnels.

That particular tunnel was, as he recalled, entirely unused. He’d never entered it, and his map showed it as a dead-end extending toward the adamant upthrust of the Pinnacle. Offhand he couldn’t recall if that was one of the tunnels that had a branch extending down, deeper into the water, but he thought it might have been. There were a number of such submerged tunnels scattered about under the city, leading deeper into the watery depths, but he’d never heard of anyone venturing into them.

He could see a light moving slowly, bobbing slightly as if a carried torch.

The mule could get home by itself, he thought. It knew the way better than he did, no doubt. He needed to see just what was happening down there, and raise the alarm if necessary. He’d been warned countless times that these tunnels were off-limits to everyone without the King’s permission—which they had—and if they spotted an intruder to report it at once.

He dropped the rope and hesitated for a moment as the mule continued to shamble away into the darkness, leaving the circle of light cast by his lamp.

Bortras adjusted the brightness of his lamp, twisting the thumbscrew to lower the wick until it was a dull glow, barely illuminating the towpath.

He retraced his footsteps back to the prior bridge—a row of simple wooden slats nailed to beams—and crossed over to the other side.

He walked slowly and quietly, holding the lamp low to check his footing and also make it harder for anyone to see him coming.

He reached the corner and peered around.

Yes, the lights—there were three of them now, it looked like—were still there, and still moving a little. He thought maybe one of them might be in a boat, judging from the way it seemed to bob up and down.

He moved a foot around the corner, and stopped when his boot touched something.

He could barely make it out in the dim lamp light.

A cloth bag.

He knelt down to look inside, and pulled it toward himself, only to discover that it was surprisingly heavy.

He opened the top and lifted his lamp up a bit to see better.

Gold. Dozens, maybe hundreds, of gold tiaras. More than he’d made in seven years of working these tunnels, more than enough to live well outside the city.

He blinked.

A fine house in the country, a wife, family… he could have it all.

The faint echo of voices from the tunnel brought him back, and he hurriedly pulled the drawstring closed.

He pulled the bag back around the corner, out of sight from the mysterious intruders, and turned to walk back toward the nearest ladder.

It was only a short distance, and now that he was safely out of sight he could turn his lamp back up. He raised the wick and quickened his pace.

The ladder was of wood, old but well maintained. There was a faint light seeping in from above, so he could extinguish the lamp and set it on the nearby shelf.

Holding the bag with one hand, he climbed with the other, and quickly reached the stone-walled room at the top. The door could only be opened from the inside, thanks to a complex mechanism. Someone could knock a hole in the wall, of course, but the idea was that it would make enough noise to attract the Watch.

The strategy had worked for centuries already, in spite of a few attempts.

Except maybe for tonight… who were they? What were they doing in the tunnels? And where did this money come from?

He opened the door and stepped out into the street.

He was standing across the street from a merchant selling vegetables of all sorts, with a carload of carrots being unloaded.

“Hey, Bortras! All done for the day?”

He spun around to see one of the older men he’d worked with, Artificer Framo of Cornwall. He looked to be shopping, with a basket of produce in one hand, munching on an apple.

“Ah… yeah, hi, Artificer Framo,” he stammered. “Finished with the bottom grate, all done. Got a few things to pick up myself.”

“Might want to wash some of that muck off first.”

Bortras laughed.

“Yeah, maybe I should’ve. Bit busy tonight, didn’t think I had the time.”

“Hot date?”

“Uh, yeah. Gotta get a few things ready, and then clean up,” he agreed.

“Good luck to you, Bortras!”

“Thanks. See ya tomorrow,” he answered and waved goodbye, turning into a convenient alley to escape the conversation as quickly as possible.

He trotted down the alley and turned the corner onto the Avenue of Boreas. The Gate of Calaïs was a stone’s throw away, offering a glimpse of the fields outside the city walls. It was open to the daily traffic, the constables perfunctorily checking carts and wagonloads.

He could be outside Celephaïs and on his way to years of ease in only minutes.

Bortras laughed, and turned away to enter an older, weather-worn building.

He shouted even before his eyes adjusted to the dimness of the interior.

“Intruders in the tunnels! At least three, I think, with a boat!”

“We know, Artificer Bortras, we know,” came a quiet voice.

Artificer Krunogle.

As his eyes began to make out shapes in the darkness, he saw dozens of men and women surrounding him, standing silently.

“They dropped a bag of gold on the towpath,” he explained, holding it out, then spun around in confusion. “Wha…? Why don’t you…?”

Krunogle stepped forward, placing his hand on his shoulder.

“Artificer Bortras, you have done well.”

He stepped back as another figure stepped forward to take his place.

Chief Artificer Marcus!

“Artificer Framo, how do you say?”

“He did not take any of the gold, and came here directly. He is worthy.”

“Artificer Krunogle, how do you say?”

“He has completed his tasks with skill and responsibility, as an Artificer of Celephaïs should,” said Krunogle. “He is worthy.”

“Does anyone have reason to doubt this man?”

There was silence from the assembled crowd.

“Artificer Bortras,” continued Marcus, “I hereby certify that you have completed your apprenticeship, and proven that you are a man to be trusted. You are now a journeyman, and, if you wish, free to leave the tunnels of Celephaïs behind.”

He could escape those damned tunnels! And work outside, in the clean air!

“I… I did it!” he gasped in shock, then shook himself. “Thank you, Artificer Marcus! Thank you!”

Marcus held out his hand, and Bortras reached to grasp it before stopping.

“My hand… it’s filthy.”

Marcus shook it anyway.

“You’re one of us now, Artificer Bortras.”

At that signal the whole crowd erupted into cheers and laughter, his friends pushing forward to clap him on the back or shake his hand. A key of ale appeared from somewhere and suddenly the oil lamps were lit and three people in aprons wheeled in an enormous haunch of roast buopoth, followed by a tableful of vegetables and fruit.

A panpipe started hooting in one corner of the room, almost drowned out by the noise.

“But what should I do with all this gold,” he asked Krunogle.

“Things you find in the tunnels are yours to keep.”

“There are no intruders down there?”

“No intruders. Just some of us testing you, and you passed with flying colors.”

He hefted the bag again.

“That’s a lot of gold…”

“Heh. Don’t worry, only the dozen or so on top are real… the rest is all skelfs; not enough to buy a meal with.”

Someone pushed a mug of ale into his hand.

So he couldn’t have lived happily ever after anyway. Whatever.

He was a journeyman now!

END

Klar always wanted to be a Dreamer.

Ever since he was a little boy he would focus on an ant, a leaf, a pebble, willing it to change into something else. At night before he slept he would stare into the darkness, willing a light to shine, or a sword.

Nothing ever came of it, except getting swatted on the head a few times for daydreaming, but he never lost that secret wish.

He thought of it once again as he rubbed his shoulder, that hand on the haft of his shovel as he caught his breath.

The sun was slipping westward, already close to the soaring minarets of Celephaïs, shadows creeping longer and longer.

It’d been a hard day—weren’t they all?—but the field was all done, plowed and seeded, and the packed dirt walls of the perimeter drainage ditch study enough to handle the coming rains.

The soil was good this year, a rich brown pungent with the scent of fresh life.

He could almost feel the seed corn wriggling with delight, bursting into explosive growth.

“It’ll be a bumper crop this year, Clyde,” he predicted, but the deino merely kept chewing its cud.

Clyde wasn’t the brightest deino he’d ever met, but he never complained and he kept that plow moving all day come rain or shine.

He patted the deino on the neck, receiving a head-butt in return, and unhitched it from the mouldboard plow. The plow was too heavy for him to lift by himself, but it was balanced so that the force of his arms would lift the pointed prow out of the soil and place most of the weight on the rear wheels.

It took practice, but practice he’d had: decades of it.

He looked over at Chek, his second son, and saw that he had already finished his plot and was scraping mud off the plow. Looked like Chek had finished a little before he had.

“Everything OK?”

“No problem, pa,” came the response. “Just cleaning it up a little… big patch of mud in the middle—damned heavy, too.”

Klar chuckled.

“Why do you think I offered to let you take the cooler plot, in all that nice shade?”

“Hey, apologize to Barrol, not me! He did all the heavy work.”

Barrol was their other deino, and now stood placidly chewing something, all four legs covered in drying mud. It wouldn’t bother him, of course, and that was hardly enough weight for him to even notice, but they’d just as soon not track all that mud into the barn if they could help it.

He whistled to Brute, their enormous wolfhound, who rose from where he’d been lazing in the shade to stretch and yawn. Brute snoozed most of the time, but Klar knew he always slept with one eye open, and woe to any fox that came after their chickens.

Brute’s mate, Boka, was back at the house with a boxful of puppies, one or two of which he’d be keeping for Brute to train… the dog was getting old.

The plows were stored safe in the shed a few minutes later, and they started the walk home. There was no worry about hurting the crop since they’d only plowed and seeded today, and it was far easier to just walk across the fields than take the balks. That’d change once the shoots popped up, of course.

The city was mostly in shadow now, black against the setting sun, but the orange light still illuminated the forest on the other side of his fields. The Tanarian Hills started here, just the first foothills, too hilly and rocky for cultivation but covered in verdant forest.

He’d cut these fields out of the wilderness himself, he and his family—his wife Myrn, and later his sons Brytos and Chek and daughter Kyrantha. It had been hard, those first years when he and Myrn were here alone, and later when the baby came… but they’d persevered.

He glanced at the trees once again. The sunlight was strange, somehow. The sunset looked normal, puffy clouds all lit up in orange, but the trees looked… different.

“Somethin’ funny with the light,” he commented offhand, but Chek just gave the trees a glance and shrugged.

“Doesn’t look strange to me,” he said. “The sunset, maybe?”

Klar grunted and kept walking until he could close the paddock gate behind the deinos. Clyde and Barrol stuck their heads deep into the water trough, slurping it up.

Myrn and Kyrantha would be putting the chickens back in the henhouse for the evening, or already inside making dinner.

It was just the four of them now that Brytos was in the Watch.

He was proud that the boy had become a constable. He was a strapping youth, and quick; he’d go far in the Watch, Klar thought. But he missed his son’s smile, his laugh, and, lately, his strong back.

They entered the mudroom and sat on the edge of the floor, built high off the ground, to pull their boots off. There were dozens of pairs there… those dusty ones at the back belonged to Brytos, he thought. He should really clean those up and put them away. Brytos might want them next time he came home.

He could hear Kyrantha and Myrn talking in the kitchen, a comforting sound.

The world shivered, the edges of his vision shimmering as through water for the briefest moment.

He blinked; it was gone.

The sunset was almost gone, too, the sun below the horizon and the orange glow faded to a somber maroon, the minarets of Celephaïs black in the dusk.

He blinked again and listened, but there was nothing but Brute’s breathing and the distant cry of crows heading home.

He and Chek washed up and changed into cleaner clothes, and by the time Klar was done, the food was already being served. Myrn was doing something over the stove, and Kyrantha was sitting at the table, pouring a rich stew over a heaping plateful of rice.

Klar pulled the salad closer and used the tongs to fill up four smaller plates, one for each of them. The salad came from their garden, of course: lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower, bell peppers, and few other bits and pieces to delight the palate.

“I think I’ll send a load of peppers and broccoli to the market tomorrow,” he said. “I’ll take the carrots and radishes in myself the next day.”

“On Garibon’s first wagon?” asked Chek. “You need help getting it ready in time?”

Klar chuckled. Garibon lived a few kilometers up the road, and some years ago had the bright idea of offering to carry people and goods into the city and back, for a price. He had three wagons running now, and a lot of people found it awfully convenient to be able to just pay him a couple skelf—or a few pence at the end of the month—instead of carrying a dozens of kilograms of produce on their backs all the way to Celephaïs.

“While you were playing in the mud I took a little break and picked half a dozen bushels. All ready to go.”

“I wondered where you’d gotten off to!” snorted Chek. “Figured you were just relieving yourself. Wish you’d told me, though… I wouldn’t have minded a little break from that mudpuddle.”

“Don’t worry, there’ll be plenty more mudpuddles. Maybe next time.”

“Gee, thanks, pa. And maybe next time you can plow the soggy one.”

“Nah. Mudpuddles are definitely for young boys, not proper men such as myself.”

“Proper!?” broke in Myrn. “You, proper!? Who are you and what have you done with my husband?”

They broke up laughing, and Kyrantha almost choked on her tea.

That night he awoke in the darkness, alone but for the warmth.

What had awakened him? Some noise?

He looked at the wolfhounds: they’d hear anything long before he did.

Brute and Boka were alert, standing with ears sharp, hunting for something unseen. It wasn’t a threat or they’d behave their haunches up and fangs exposed. Just something that made the uneasy.

Just like him.

Myrn?

He looked over at his wife, her long black hair clearly visible even in the dimness of the midnight stars. She was breathing slowly, her lower lip quivering slightly with each exhalation.

He sat up.

Something was off.

He reached for the blanket to get up and check the house, when the world shivered again, a spasm of reality that left him disoriented and dizzy.

Off balance as gravity shifted, he fell to the floor, sliding along the rough-hewn boards until he hit the wall that was somehow below him, bright in shades of yellow and blue.

Brute whimpered, ears flat, teeth bared, head searching back and forth and finding nothing. Behind him Boka stood over her pups, protecting them from anything that might come.

A thump, color vanished.

He slid back from the wall to the floor.

The Dance of the Oneiroi!

A dreamquake, a spasm in reality as a Dream was birthed.

Nobody really knew how common they were, save perhaps the King. When the reality of the Dreamlands itself changed, they changed with it, new memories of a new past replacing the old. Usually.

Sometimes somebody might recall some previous reality, or some object, some flotsam of the eddies of transformation, might remain to fascinate and awe. Or maybe it happened all the time, and they just never noticed.

He climbed back into bed, reassured by Myrn’s quiet breathing.

Nothing had changed… had it really been a dreamquake?

Or had he just fallen out of bed?

He glanced over at the dogs, but they were quiet once more, seemingly asleep.

He listened intently, and heard nothing but the wind and the insects. In time, he slept.

* * *

He always woke with the sun, but it looked like he’d overslept this morning.

Time to feed the deinos and get started on plowing the pair of fields farthest from the house, up close to the forest. They were the newest, too, which meant they still had plenty of rocks and old roots left. It’s be another day of hard work getting that ground plowed and seeded right.

He heard the rooster crowing away, and the heavy footsteps of Chek.

His head throbbed with pain, and his vision was blurry. He wondered if he’d caught something. He really didn’t feel like getting out of bed, but he did anyway. No sleep for the farmer.

He looked behind him—Myrn was already up and about.

He sat up, swinging his legs off the bed and onto the floor, and caught himself. His head pounded and he closed his eyes and hung his head for a moment at the sudden pain.

When he opened them again, head still hanging down, he saw his body for the first time… his belly ballooned out over his thighs, the hard muscles of a farmer gone.

He blinked, shook his head, reached out to feel his own stomach.

Fat.

He was fat.

And the arm he’d used to poke his own bulk was itself flabby, bags of soft, pale flesh hanging down from the arm that had only yesterday been tanned and muscular.

“Myrn!”

His voice came out in a squeaky rasp. He cleared his throat, tried again.

“Myrn! Could you come here for a moment?”

There was a bang in the kitchen as something was set down with considerable force, and then footsteps.

“What?”

She demanded an answer, hands on hips, lips tense with suppressed anger.

“Wha…? Why are you… so angry?”

“Get your lazy ass out of bed and get off to work! We’ve all been up for hours while you’ve been snoring away.”

Astonished, Klar could only gasp like a landed fish, unable to gather his wits before his wife has turned and stalked away again.

He followed her into the kitchen, expecting to see her making breakfast, or taking bread out of the oven. There was no food on the table, and she was sewing a linen dress, a basket of other clothes at her feet.

She didn’t even look up as he entered, merely grunted something indistinct.

Still wondering what he’d done to upset her so, he walked to the front door to scratch Brute and Boka on their heads. Boka was busy feeding the pups, lying on her side as they pushed and shoved over each other in search of morning milk.

He heard a gasp of surprises from behind him, and turned to see Myrn staring at him, eebrows raised, mouth open.

“He didn’t bite you!”

“He… wha…? Brute?” he sputtered. “Why would Brute bite me?”

Myrn, shaking her head and muttering to herself, returned to the kitchen without replying.

He gave the dog another scritch and sat down on the edge of the mudroom to pull on his boots, glancing outside to check the weather.

And froze in disbelief.

An expanse of dry dirt and dead trees met his eyes, stretching away for hundreds of meters to the distant line of trees farther up into the hills.

No cornfields. No freshly turned earth, no line of pumpkin plants, or cucumbers, or herbs.

No paddock. No deinos.

He rose on shaking legs to stumble outside.

The house was much the same, log and slat construction with mortar packed into the cracks, a turfed roof that slanted back into the earth on the north side.

The chicken coop.

A cow—not three cows and a barn, like it should have been, just one single cow.

He heard someone behind him, and spun around.

It was Myrn.

“We’re out of fish again, Klar. Buy some on the way home, if you can spare any from your drinking.”

She snorted in disgust as she spit it out.

“Way home? Drinking? I don’t…”

“Drunk again, and so early?” she sneered. “Go on, take it and off with you. Late again and they’ll fire you, and then where’ll we be?”

“Late? Who…?”

He shook his head in confusion, took a deep breath.

The dreamquake… it had to be the dreamquake.

“Myrn, love, please, sit.”

He sat down on the mudroom edge again, and grasped her by the arm to join him. She yanked her arm out of his grasp with a yelp and spat at him: “My love!? You haven’t called me that for two twelves of years. Got me confused with one of those nighthawks at the pub, have you?”

“Please, just sit, Myrn,” he asked again quietly, and patted the floor next to him. She did sit, grudgingly, her feet atop her sandals in the mudroom. She kept as much space between them as she could.

“Did you feel the dreamquake last night?”

“Dreamquake? Here? There was no dreamquake last night… everything’s the same as it’s always been. And we’ve all got work to do, no time to sit here jabbering away.

“Now off to the tannery.”

“Tannery!? I’m a farmer, not a tanner!”

“You? A farmer?” laughed Myrn. “You barely know which end the milk comes out of.

You said you would turn all dirt into fields and crops, and we needed to move out here to make our own farm, but you never did, no matter how much I pushed you.”

She was getting angry now, nostrils flaring and lips thin.

“You took the little we had saved and spent it on drink. No matter where you work you get fired, because you drink. Every time. Chek and Kyrantha and I work our hands to the bone, even Brytos, thank the Gods he escaped, sends half his pay, and you drink it all up!”

He blinked, hearing every work and unable to process it.

He rarely drank; perhaps a cup with dinner once in a while, or at the Festival of the Horned God. But to drink away his family, his farmland, his crops—his dreams—he couldn’t conceive of it.

He stood, and then fell to his knees in the dirt in front of her, grasping her hands and holding them tight even as she tried to pull away.

“Myrn, I swear to you by Nath-Horthath that I am not the man you speak of. I am not a drunkard, or a tanner, but a farmer, and by the Gods I shall prove it to you to you all!”

He stood, still holding onto one of her hands, and looked out over the barren scene.

“Have we a plow, and hoes, and axes?”

She looked up at him, this time her mouth gaping open in surprise and wonder.

“A plow? Yes, old, perhaps, but serviceable. All the tools we brought with us years ago, to build a farm…”

“Do I still have time to catch Garibon’s wagon into the city?”

“Garibon?” asked Myrn, cocking her head and frowning. “Who?”

“Garibon! The wagons into Celephaïs every day? Our carrots and radishes?”

She pulled her hand back out of his.

“Never heard of no Garibon, and Gods know we have no carrots to sell! Would that we did.”

Klar looked out over the barren land before him.

He’d tamed this land once, and by the Gods he’d do it again.

He was older, and fat, for Gods’ sake, but he had Chek to help him, and Kyrantha.

“Do we have enough to buy a deino? Twelve laurels, no more than twelve and six.”

Myrn gave a bitter bark of laughter.

“Twelve laurels? I’d be thrilled if we have twelve pence to spare!”

Klar emptied his wallet into his hand.

Three pence.

He handed them to Myrn silently and bent to lace up his boots, ignoring the expressions on the faces of his wife and their two children, as they stared at this man who no longer acted like the father they knew.

If this were a dream, thought Klar, then he would Dream it properly.

* * *

His first step was seeing what he had to work with.

He found the plow easily enough, in a dark corner of the ramshackle barn. It was the first plow he’d had, years and years ago, designed to be pulled by a deino or a horse. He had neither.

He did have hoe and axe and pickaxe, though, and by that evening he’d cleared the scrub and rocks from a broad rectangle of ground.

“This will be for vegetables,” he explained to Myrn, who had brought him a cup of cool tea in the afternoon. “Lettuce and broccoli here, and over that way will be spinach, pepper, beets…”

“The stream is a long ways from here, Klar,” she warned. “Who’s going to carry all that water every day?”

“Trust me, Myrn. There is water,” he smiled. “See that bent pine over there? I’ll make a well right near it, you’ll see. Enough water to turn all this green.”

“I can’t tell if you’re really a different man, or just plumb crazy,” she said, shaking her head. “You sure sound like the man I married, but… Maybe there really was a dreamquake after all.”

“There was, I’m sure of it.”

“Brute seems to think you’re a different man. Yesterday he’d snarl every time you got close to him or Boka. You kick him all the time.”

“Me? Kick Brute?” He was flabbergasted. “I would never kick Brute!”

He eyebrows shot up and she pursed her lips.

“Maybe you wouldn’t, now, but you sure used to. Used to hit us all, too.”

“Hit you!?” He almost dropped the tea in astonishment. “Hit you? I have never… I would never…”

“You did,” she said quietly. “Especially when you’re drunk. Which is—was—often.”

He fell silent.

“Looks like I’ve got some hard work ahead of me,” he sighed. “And not just here in the field.”

She took the empty cup from his hand and glanced at his blistered, bleeding palms.

“Let me get you some salve and cloth to wrap your hands in. Your hands aren’t used to honest work.”

“Yet,” he added.

“Yet,” she agreed.

That evening she helped him wash and bind his hands, and when they sat down for dinner he noticed a jug of ale on the table. It was far enough that it wasn’t obviously his, but close enough he could easily reach it.

He reached out for it, and watched Myrn out of the corner of his eye. Her fork had come to a stop and was slowly descending again, forgotten, as she followed his hand and the jug.

“Anyone want some ale? If not I’ll stopper it up.”

Dead silence for a moment, then Chek cleared his throat.

“You don’t want any?”

“Just tea for me, I think… good cooking’s always better with tea, don’t you think?”

He pressed the cork in and set the jug down on the floor where it would be out of the way.

Myrn let her breath out and suddenly noticed the forkful of food she was still holding in the air.

Conversation started, hesitantly, as painful as his unused muscles.

After, he left Myrn speechless by thanking her for making dinner, though it had been a sad affair of little more than some greens and rabbit stew.

He picked up the jug of ale, and as his wife and children watched, expecting him to swig it down and collapse in a drunken stupor, instead walked the family altar, and poured a cup for their household god. He knelt, and set the ale on the altar as an offering, head bowed in silent prayer.

* * *

Several days later Myrn didn’t shy away when he gave her a kiss.

He and Chek dug deep near the pine, where the well had been, and it was as he had remembered. They had water now, all the water their gardens and fields would need.

He was sure it had been a dreamquake, and Myrn and the children were beginning to believe him. Finding buried water in this barren waste had almost convinced them. Quitting drink had convinced them even more.

He needed seed now. The tiny amounts they had wouldn’t even be enough to feel themselves, let alone produce enough to sell at market.

Klar suggested asking one of the nearby farmers to loan them seed, but Myrn shook her head.

“They’ll never loan to a drunkard, Klar. And they’ll not believe you’ve changed, either.”

He needed a deino to plow the fields. It wasn’t impossible to do it by hand, of course, but it was backbreaking toil, and his hands were bleeding raw already.

Once the ground was plowed, he’d need seeds. To buy seeds he needed money.

They were broke, though, relying on what they could trap or hunt in the woods, and the pittance Brytos brought each month.

That night he woke again in the pre-dawn darkness, but this time there was no dreamquake. He knew how to do it.

“I’m going up to see Master Garibon,” he announced at breakfast. “He lives up near the bend in the river, just below the ford.”

“Garibon? Near the ford?” Myrn shook her head. “Never heard of him.”

“Chek, would you come with me? It’s a short walk; if I’m wrong we’ll be back soon enough.”

“And if you’re right?”

“Then I think everything will work out wonderfully.”

Chek was unconvinced, but half an hour later they were walking up the road, deeper into the Tanarian Hills. The river, still young and fierce as it came out of the hills, ran close to the road, and Klar recalled it had flooded several times over the years.

Garibon’s house stood near the river, on an embankment that kept it out any floodwaters.

“Master Garibon!”

There was a muffled shout from the far side of the house, and a moment later a stout man came toward them. He stopped short when he saw who it was, then started walking toward them once again more slowly.

“Master Klar. And Master Chek.”

“Master Garibon, sorry to call unannounced. Have you a few moments we can talk?”

Garibon scowled. “About what?”

“About a business proposition that I believe will profit us both, and handsomely.”

“You asking me for money, is that it?”

“No, please. No money. And no ale, either,” pleaded Klar. “Ask Chek; I’ve changed.”

Garibon looked at Chek, who nodded.

“Well, I’ve never known Master Chek to lie, and you do look a lot healthier than I’ve ever seen you,” admitted Garibon. “From the look of those hands and your sunburned face, you’ve been doing honest work, too.

“I’ll listen to what you have to say.”

An hour later they had a deal.

It took two full days to get their wagon wheels fixed and the axles greased, and another day to get the benches installed and the harnesses and traces repaired, but finally it was done.

Klar already knew who his best customers would be, and what the market would bear, and the following morning they launched the new venture.

Drawn by two of Garibon’s horses, the wagon travelled from Garibon’s homestead at the base of the falls to the city walls, picking up people carrying their loads to market, or (thanks to Garibon’s well-known trustworthiness) transporting their produce for them. They made one round-trip in the morning, and a second in the evening, and by the next morning everyone knew.

For many of the farmers in the region it was well worth two or three skelf for a ride to the markets of Celephaïs and back again. Once Chek had proven trustworthy more and more of them began entrusting their goods, and receiving payment for them when the wagon returned once more.

Word began to spread that it had not been Chek, but actually Klar the Drunkard, a drunkard no more, who was behind it all.

Two months later there were three wagons running the route, and they’d had to hire a few people to help keep things moving smoothly. Garibon was scouting a possible new route from Celephaïs down toward Cornwall, where a whole new town was coming into existence around the new madrasah erected there by the King. He was delighted with the handsome return he was getting on his share of the business.

* * *

“Thank you, Treana,” Klar said, smiling as he held out his cup for a refill.

His six-year-old granddaughter beamed, carefully holding the heavy teapot in both hands as she poured.

Klar tasted the tea and smacked his lips in appreciation, earning a giggle for his trouble.

Sitting on the porch bench, he looked out over the fields: the green vegetable fields closest to the house, bursting with vitality, with tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers and more hanging ripe. Beyond stretched a towering forest of corn, countless stalks waving gently in the breeze, tassels glinting in the late summer sun.

Treana’s mother was there, picking fresh greens for dinner, three-year-old Conal staying close but more engrossed with the progress of a huge caterpillar. Instead of holding onto Kyrantha’s skirt he had one hand on Marpo’s back. He was beginning to spend more time with the young wolfhound than his mother.

Klar felt a hand on his shoulder and looked up into Myrn’s face as he covered her hand with his own.

Had the dreamquake itself been a dream, a nightmare that knocked sense into him?

Perhaps he was a Dreamer after all, and as he looked out over his Dream made real, he was content.

END

– 1 –

“My usual, please, Master van der Kerk.”

“Mistress Chuli, good to see you again,” replied the man behind the counter. “That’d be a block of Gouda and a block of my own Ambroli, right?”

Chuli smiled, white teeth bright against dark brown skin.

“Yes. I love your Ambroli... can’t find it anywhere else!”

The man stopped with a look of mock horror on his face.

“Mistress Chuli! Surely you haven’t been to a different shop!?”

“On, no, of course not! Of course not,” she laughed. “I’ve been coming here for years and have no intention of ever going anywhere else.

“No, my husband and I visited Lhosk the other day, and I tried to find something good to eat there... most of them knew it, but none had any to offer.”

“It doesn’t ship very well, I’m afraid,” said Lujan van der Kerk, wrapping up a block of tan-colored cheese in a large leaf and placing it on the counter. “Something about the sea air. Too salty.”

“Oh, that’s too bad. I’m sure they’d fall in love with it, too.”

“I have more than enough happy customers here in Celephaïs, Mistress.”

He finished wrapping up the Gouda and handed her both packages.

“Thank you so much, Master van der Kerk,” she smiled, and dropped a few coins into his waiting hand “Until next time, then.”

“Have a pleasant day, Mistress. Best to the Poietes.”

She blew him a kiss as she stepped outside and vanished into the crowd of the marketplace.

Lujan van der Kerk, once of Imaut, pulled a long, thin knife out of the rack.

He carefully shaved off a thin, almost transparent slice of orange Yann Sharp, folded it over twice, and popped it into his mouth.

He closed his eyes in momentary delight at the tangy flavor, then dutifully wiped the knife clean and returned it to the rack. It was almost time for closing anyway, he thought as he checked the position of the sun against the silhouette of the Wall of Euphrosyne. His shop would be in shadow in minutes, and that meant he could expect only a very few customers.

Lujan lit the oil lamp on the counter, then closed the wood shutters over the window and drove the iron bolts home to lock them in place. The door was locked and bolted, of course. The stairs to the living quarters on the second floor danced in the flickering lamplight, and the massive door to the storeroom looked heavier than ever.

Instead of heading upstairs, he opened the storeroom door and stepped inside, closing the door again behind him.

The walls were lined with shelves, packed with wheels of cheeses of all sorts, but he walked past them all without a glance, straight to the second door at the back of the room.

He pulled the ornate key out of his pocket and unlocked the door. It was too dark to see inside, but he didn’t hesitate: he knew every inch.

Lujan snuffed the oil lamp out and set it on a nearby shelf, closing the door as he waited for his eyes to adjust to the faint bluish light.

In the center of the room a large iron grate was set into the floor. Coolness flowed up from below, making the tiny brilliant motes dance in the air.

Spores.

They glowed blue, their dim light revealing dozens of wheels of Ambroli. He checked each one carefully, looking for the slightest imperfection or discoloration, until he reached the end, and stood in front of the altar. It was covered in fungi of all shapes, all blue in the light of the spores.

He knelt to kiss the low stone pedestal.

“Mycelia Spore-Mother, I offer my flesh and blood to you freely. I beseech your blessing for myself and my house.”

He held a small knife to his palm and sliced it open, grunting in pain as blood spurted out onto the pedestal. He gritted his teeth and set his bloody palm flat onto the pedestal, and waited, head bowed, chanting the prayer to his goddess under his breath.

The pedestal slowly turned darker, stained with blood shining black in the dim lighting.

The prayer ended, and he lifted his head to gaze upon the misshapen form of his goddess above the altar. Was that the faintest hint of a smile on that rough-hewn face? Were her swollen limbs, her pendulous breasts, more shapely, more human, than before?

He thought so, but he’d thought that every day for dozens of years. Perhaps she would never come to him here. Perhaps.

He lifted his blood-stained hand from the pedestal and stared at it in awe.

Her blessing!

The wound was gone, healed to leave only a smear of blood and one more scar to join the dozens upon dozens that already crisscrossed his palm.

A few shining motes danced across his palm, or in it.

Lujan van der Kerk, Godsworn of Mycelia and purveyor of fine cheeses to the people of Celephaïs, kissed the pedestal once again and turned to go upstairs to family and supper.

– 2 –

“What is it, Gobbler? Is daddy back?”

Wiping her hands on her apron, Glaire stuck her head out and looked into the street. Gobbler, their pet raptor, was pushing at the bars across the lower half of the doorway, eager to get outside.

It was Finh, alright, walking beside the enormous deino pulling the wagon. It slogged along, one heavy clump at a time, oblivious to angry objections of passers-by who had to step out of the way to let it pass, and also seemingly oblivious to the ton of wet clay in the wagon.

“I’m home!” came her husband’s voice in confirmation. “Let me get this wagon out of the way, and take the deino back. Everything OK here?”

“Sure, everything’s fine. I was just having a cup with Nessie. The kids are still at schola, should be back soon. You want some tea?”

“I need something cold more than some tea, Glaire. Be a bit yet, though… later.”

He prodded, whacked, and cajoled the deino until the heavy wagon was safely in the workroom, then unhitched it and walked it back toward the Street of Pillars where he’d rented it earlier that day. He could afford to buy his own deino, of course—he could get a perfectly good deino for six or seven tiaras—but finding a place to keep it in the city was more difficult, especially when you considered how narrow these alleyways were. Not to mention how much food they ate!

He only needed one when he went off to his quarry in the Tanarian Hills to fetch more clay, once a year or so.

He returned the deino and collected his surety. They’d dealt with each other so long he probably didn’t even need to put up a surety anymore, but he’d never asked.

He took a small detour and picked up a half-dozen cinnamon honey cakes shaped like butterflies.

By the time he got home Kahlia and Finjul were waiting, and delighted to see his present.

“Thank you, papa,” said Kahlia as she accepted a cake politely, and gave a small bow in thanks. Only ten, she was already acting like the beautiful lady she would no doubt grow to be.

Finjul, two years younger and far more energetic, was less polite, snatching up one cake in each hand and managing to get a muffled thanks out in spite of cramming them into his mouth at once.

He sat down at the table with his wife and Mistress Nessie from across the street and wiped his face with the moist towel Glaire handed him.

“Hot day to be dragging all that clay around, Master Finh,” said Mistress Nessie.

“Poor deino did the draggin’,” he explained. “I just told it where to go.”

“Uh-huh,” nodded Glaire. “And who loaded all that clay onto the wagon?”

“I told that clay to get in the wagon, and it jumped right up there by itself! Magic!”

“Here, Oh Great Sorcerer—some cool ale may help the cake go down.”

He accepted the jack of ale gratefully and down half of it in a single gulp. He visibly relaxed and set the jack down on the table.

“Getting pretty old to be carting around tons of clay anymore,” he sighed.

“Can I have the last one?”

Glaire reached out slapped the boy’s hand away from the last cake.

“You already had two, you pig! That’s your father’s, and say thank you properly, young man!”

“Thank you, father,” he parroted at once. “But if you don’t want it…”

“No such luck, Finjul,” laughed Finh and popped the cake into his mouth.

He turned back to the two women.

“Forgive me, I must smell like deino… Let me go wash up. I won’t be able to get that clay all cleaned up until tomorrow; might get some throwing done in the afternoon, though.”

“Fin! Kahlia! I’m going to the baths. You want to come?”

“No thank you, papa,” came the girl’s voice. “I’ve got to finish my sums before it gets dark.”

“Good girl!” he nodded. “And you, Finjul? No homework for you?”

“I’ll do it later, papa, promise!”

“A man keeps his promises, Finjul,” broke in Claire. “And I’ll hold you to it, later.”

“You and Kahlia’ll go later? Or tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow, I think,” replied his wife.

“I’ll pay for you, too, then. Be back in a bit,” said Finh, draining the jack and standing from the table. “C’mon, lad, let’s go see who’s at the baths today.”

* * *

Finjul, riding a sugar high from the cakes he’d wolfed down, stayed reasonably close to his father as they walked down the alley. He’d learned that much, at least, and Finh kept an eye on him to be sure he didn’t break anything or get trampled by a passing horse.

Most of the shop owners merely watched the boy pass: a few scowled, perhaps at some unfortunate recollection, one handed Finjul a piece of apple and sent him on his way.

The sun was beginning to dip toward the horizon and the baths would be getting busier as people finished their work for the day.

They headed toward the public baths. Finh had left his wallet at home, carrying only two iron skelfs, the smallest coin. The public bath was only a skelf, cheap enough that even the lowest-paid laborers could afford it.

The entrance to the bath was crowded with people coming and going. There was the usual assortment of soldiers, merchants, dock workers, housewives, children of all ages, even a Godsworn or two. Many public baths in the Dreamlands were mixed bathing, but this particular one had separate baths for men and women to prevent undue problems. In theory it was to keep the noisy children away from the men’s bath, but nobody had any illusions about what sort of problems they were trying to prevent.

The Lofts and its vast array of entertainment were quite some distance away, but the fish market and the cargo seadocks were a short walk. Not everyone in Celephaïs was gentle and restrained, regardless of what King Kuranes might think.

Finh coughed.

It was a small cough, the sort of cough anyone might make.

He coughed again, and felt a searing pain in his chest.

He clutched his side, over the lower part of his right lung, and stopped, bent at an angle to the right by the pain.

His face contorted in pain, he slowly collapsed onto his knees, catching himself from toppling facedown with his other hand.

“Papa…?”

“Finjul… I can’t…”

“Papa? Papa!”

His hand failed and he fell the rest of the way.

The boy knelt at his father’s side, pulling helplessly on his tunic as a thread of spittle dribbled from his mouth to the cobblestones.

Before the blackness claimed him, he heard a woman’s voice shouting for Healer Pontil.

– 3 –

Lujan frowned and held his breath for a moment.

There it was again… a tiny movement.

The boards of the wood floor creaked faintly, one rising the merest fraction of a millimeter as he watched.

Something had stirred them up, he thought.

“Crija? Could you take over for a few minutes?”

“Be right down!” shouted his wife from upstairs. She joined him shortly, wiping her hands on her apron. “What’s up?”

“Just need to check on something in the storeroom,” he said. “Shouldn’t be long.”

He hurried through the storeroom with its wheels of cheese and unlocked the door to the second room at the very back. He had brought no oil lamp with him this time, but long years had etched every step into his memory, and by the time he’d raised the heavy iron grate from the floor to reveal the yawning pit beneath, his eyes had adjusted to the point he could see perfectly well in the dim blue light emitted by the tiny motes drifting in the air.

He pulled his sandals off, setting them neatly next to the yawning pit, and without any hesitation swung his legs in and climbed down into the darkness.

There were no motes here to illuminate his way, but the walls and ceiling were covered with splotches of something that looked like lichen, giving off a dull red light. It was enough to make out the walls of the rough-hewn tunnel and the enormous mushrooms growing from every surface except the narrow, twisting path leading into the gloom from the ladder.

As he walked deeper into the tunnel, following the trickle of water that ran down the center of the path, he picked off a few convenient mushrooms to nibble on, enjoying their pungent flavor and chewy texture. He’d always wanted to sell mushrooms, too, but all the truly delicious ones dried out so quickly in the outside world…

He could hear them twitching and sliding before he could see them.

The tunnel opened up on one side into a fairly broad space, filled with thin stalks waving back and forth like wheat in the autumn breeze: a multitude of mushrooms. In the reddish light they all looked black but he knew they were really a yellowish white, the shade of old ivory, the tiny cap at the top of each stalk a brilliant, electric blue.

“What is it, my lovelies? What do you hear?”

There was no response, of course, and Lujan wriggled his toes in the damp soil, digging his feet slightly into the earth. He closed his eyes, relaxing his body as his breathing and heartbeat slowed and his senses sharpened until he could feel the fungoid life around him.

The tall, thin mushrooms waved as if in an unseen wind, uneasy, afraid… the gardeners, dozen-centimeter long slugs, had pulled in their eyestalks and were huddled in place, afraid to venture forth even into the safety of this hidden garden.

This was the third time he’d seen this, although he didn’t realize what was happening the first time until much later. Fatally later.

Something dark had come to Celephaïs, something evil.

– 4 –

“Healer Theros?”

“Yes, what is it?” she answered, putting down the hairbrush and stroking the long-haired cat one last time.

“It’s happened again, Healer, this time in the Cirque of the Jade Bull just south of the Avenue of Amphitrite. Healer Pontil says he’s tried everything and nothing works.”

“The same thing?”

“It seems to be,” said the young Godsworn, nervously pushing his long black hair back up atop his ear with one hand. “Acute pain and coughing, weakness, bluish vision with ‘flies’, a growth of whitish-gray tissue around the mouth, eyes, and elsewhere. Fainting. The first case was just reported yesterday, and so far there are no reports of anyone reaching the final stages.”

“Eaten alive from the inside by those creatures… a horrible way to die…”

The cat, ignored, plopped off her lap to the floor, and leisurely stalked out of the room.

“I hoped we’d seen the last of that horror years ago…”

“As did I. But it’s back, and Healer Pontil asks for your urgent assistance. A family of four: the husband and two children are sick but the wife is not.”

“At once, of course, but I fear I can do little,” said Theros, standing and adjusting her simple sky-blue robe. She picked up her serpent-entwined staff, sign of her calling and her goddess, and strode out of the room with the vitality of a young woman in spite of her salt-and-pepper hair.

“Find Godsworn Cressida and tell her everything you have just told me. It is of the utmost urgency,” she commanded as she left, and he bowed as she passed.

“To the altar,” she said to the two women waiting outside her room. They were young, only admitted to the order a few years ago, and although they were still studying and mastering the techniques of healing, today they would serve as her assistants.

They would certainly remember the lessons learned today, she thought to herself.

Her quarters were only a short distance from the central altar of the temple, and as the four of them entered the main hall she noted half a dozen people who had come to be healed. Other Healers were already talking to them, helping them as needed.

She smiled to herself as she recognized Pharad, a rotund pubkeeper in his forties who came every week without fail, complaining of new aches and pains. She’d looked at him herself, and agreed with the opinion of the other Healers who had seen him in the past: he was merely a hypochondriac. Still, he was a wealthy hypochondriac, and if he felt better after a Healer laid hands on him and proclaimed him cured, then it was a just fee for a service rendered.

She knew of several Healers who visited his pub to give him a “quick checkup” which somehow always seemed to involve a drink or two on the house.

The altar was immaculate, as always, the light shining in through the high windows reflecting off the polished bluish marble surface. In the center of the altar was a wide, shallow bowl of golden orichalc, half-filled with fine white sand and scattered piles of powdery white ash. Two sticks of resiny incense still smoldered, standing upright in the sand and giving off wisps of pungent smoke. A smaller plate to the side held ruddy embers.

It was flanked by coiled snakes, captured with the energy of life in silver, the one to the left coiled tightly at rest, tongue flicking out to test the supplicant, the one to the right with head up, poised and ready to strike. Rumor said that the right-hand snake would come to life to bite and kill any who failed the test.

Theros knew the truth of the matter, of course, but wisely made no comment.

She pulled back the sleeve of her robe and picked up a small stick coated with yellowish resin, praying to Panakeia, Goddess of Healing, in ancient Greek. She waved her hand to flare the glowing ember to life, and touched the incense stick to it until it caught, then carefully stood it in the sand. She inclined her head in respect, still chanting, and repeated the process two more times before she was done.

She stood and adjusted her robe once again, then turned to face the others.

“And now to work,” she announced, and they trailed her as she strode from the temple. North along the Wall of Aglaea, and across the Avenue of the Lad in Green, then the broad Street of Pillars. The buildings were fairly clean here, merchants and craftsmen showing their wares or working in their shops; shoppers, hawkers, children, even tourists, were common here, but shortly they reached the Healer blocking the entrance to an alleyway.

“Healer Theros! Thank goodness you’ve come,” he said, stepping back to open the way.

“May we pass, Healer?”

He bowed and waved them on.

“Of course, my apologies! Healer Pontil is with them now.”

“Thank you,” she replied, nodding briefly as she led her party past.

There was another Healer standing at the doorway to an older, two-story building. Like many of the homes in this area, the structure consisted of two homes, each with its own entrance and in this case each housing a family.

“Healer Pontil!”

A youngish, balding head popped out of a nearby window.

“Healer! Thank Panakeia you’re here! Come in, come in, please!”

The rooms smelled faintly of pine and lavender, additives used to provide a gentle, cleansing scent to the medicinal incense healers used. She noted that every doorway and window had been properly “sealed” with a stick of slow-burn incense to contain whatever was loose in these poor people.

A middle-aged woman knelt in the atrium, beseeching her aid.

Theros squatted in front of her, placing her hand on the woman’s shoulder.

“I am Healer Theros of Panakeia, Mistress. Lift your head and come, sit with me.”

The woman looked up into Theros’ face for a moment, then wiped the tears off her cheeks with her sleeve. Theros sat, patting the bench next to her until the woman joined her.

“What is your name, Mistress?”

“Glaire, Healer. Glaire of Ophir.”

“Ophir is a beautiful city, Mistress Glaire. I love the beauty of its iridescent domes in the fires of the setting sun.”

“You’ve been there?”

“Oh, many times, Mistress Glaire, many times. Tell me, when did you come to Celephaïs?”

“My father promised me to Master Finh a little more than a twelve of years ago, and I have lived here with him since.”

“A potter, I see, and judging from that vase over there, a very good one.”

“My husband is an artist; many of his works can be found in High City.”

“A talented man indeed,” soothed Theros. “Tell me about him.”

The conversation proceeded, Theros gradually relaxing the woman, taking her mind off the sickness affecting her family while probing for more information. Theros knew that Healer Pontil had already examined the sick, and for now she wanted to know why Glaire’s husband and two children had fallen sick while Glaire had not.

She discovered that the potter, Finh, had gone into the Tanarian Hills east of the city to gather more clay. He had a secret source deep in the Hills, Glaire explained, that yielded high-quality clay. He’d returned only a few days earlier, with a wagonload of clay.

Yes, Glaire nodded, he’d been doing the exact same thing, and bringing home the exact same clay, ever since they’d wed eleven years earlier.

He hadn’t taken the children, ten-year old Kahlia and eight-year old Finjul, with him.

He had fallen unconscious suddenly on the way to the public bath, and had been falling in and out of consciousness since. The children—the boy first, then later the girl—had started coughing several hours later and were now unconscious as well... infested with ravenous creatures that would eat them from the inside out before bursting free to escape back into the wild.

She had seen all this before and felt as helpless now as she did then—unable to do anything to help, unable to even discern the track of the evil as she could so many other injuries or diseases. It was invisible to her, and even physicians could find nothing to treat but the symptoms.

And thus far these symptoms always meant death.

Was it something in the clay?

She questioned the woman in depth. Had she ever touched the clay? Had her children?

Glaire herself never touched slimy clay, she said, and she was busy with housework and the children besides. The children might have, she admitted; they were always getting into things they shouldn’t.

But Finh had used this clay countless times before, she wailed.

She comforted the woman as best she could, then stood.

“Let me tend to Finh, and to your children, Mistress Glaire. Rest for now.”

Finh was awake, lying face-up on the bed. Only his eyes were moving, seemingly following insects about the room. She knew bluish spots were dancing in his eyes, making him think there were tiny insects circling him, but there was nothing there. The tiny specks he saw were actually inside his eyeballs, not mere hallucinations, but the Healers would keep that unpleasant fact to themselves.

A flaky, whitish material was caked around his mouth and nostrils, thinner in the corners of his eyes. From experience she knew it couldn’t be washed off, and if scrubbed or picked off would leave the flesh bleeding and raw.

“They are just dots in your eyes, Master Finh. They can’t hurt you at all.”

“Who…?”

“I am Healer Theros, Master Finh. I bring the blessing of Panakeia for you and your children,” she said, even as she wondered if her Goddess’ blessing could succor him.

With the help of Healer Pontil and her two assistants she set up the portable altar, and measured out the ingredients for the incense herself. She ground them slowly and precisely in a ceramic mortar until they were a fine dust, then added the tarry oil to the mixture, kneading it with her fingers until it reached the desired consistency.

Silently, she worked it into a small pyramid, perhaps a centimeter on a side, and placed the finished piece on a small bronze dish. She sat down cross-legged next to Finh and accepted a piece of lit punk from Pontil, using it to light the pyramid.

She handed it back as the pyramidal incense began emitting a light green cloud of smoke that smelled vaguely of wet dog. With her two assistants mimicking her every move, she began to chant once again in ancient Greek

She closed her eyes and used the gift of the Goddess to look into his body, searching for the tracks of disease. There was an insect bite, easily cured. A bit of tooth decay that might become painful in a year or two, impossible for her to fix but she could at least slow it down. Nothing in the heart, the lungs, the brain, the spine… she dug deeper, inspecting individual organs one at a time, probing, searching for any trace of the invader.

His lungs were seeping blood, slowly, through damaged tissue. She helped his body begin to repair the damage, but try as she might she could detect no sign of any possible cause. And even as she worked to stop the flow and heal Finh’s lungs, blood began to seep through in new places, undoing all the gains she had made.

A sense of hopelessness washed over her… even with the help of the Goddess, she could see nothing. No track of illness, no injury, no sign of the hungry worm she knew lurked within.

She thought furiously, searching for anything that might help, and her concentration flagged. Her sense of Finh’s body spread, became indistinct.

Something was off.

She couldn’t identify it at first, but once she figured it out she couldn’t understand how she’d missed it. How they’d all missed it.

“It’s not what we can see,” she whispered, “It’s what we can’t.”

Where there should be a pulsing tapestry of blood vessels, nerves, muscle, the architecture of a man in his prime, there was a blank, a splotch of emptiness, in one lung. She couldn’t see what it was, she could only see where the natural tissue of Finh’s body ended, vanishing into a blob of nothingness that was impossible to bring into focus.

“Look at his left lung, Pontil. At the bottom. And you too,” she added to her assistants. “There’s something there, something I cannot track at all.”

There was a moment of silence, and then a gasp from Pontil both

“But what is it? Why can’t we see its track?”

“And how did we miss it until now?” asked Theros. “If the Goddess cannot show us its track it must be Other… something from Outside.”

“The stones of Mnar, in the Temple!”

“Yes, the starstones of Mnar may help. We must bring one here at once.”

Theros spun around to face her assistants.

“Ban Thua, return to the Temple at once, and bring one of the starstones.”

The woman nodded, stood, and hurried out of the room on her mission.

“Treyd, summon the city Watch. I need the whole block cordoned off, nobody in or out until I can check them. Godsworn Cressida, Master Chuang, and probably others will be coming; guide them to me immediately. you are also to the temple.”

“Yes, Healer,” said the young Godsworn, and fled.

“Healer Pontil, assist me. We must check the children as well, and also Mistress Glaire.”

“And perhaps even the clay, Healer,” suggested Pontil.

“Yes, good. But first the children.”

They turned to their work.

– 5 –

It’s still early, he thought. If I’m lucky I can find it—or them—before it’s too late.

He’d dealt with a wide variety of visitors, some inimical, some not, over the years, and had a matching variety of scars and aches that spoke to his years of service. The King and Chuang always did what they could, of course, but his injuries were rarely of this world. Or even of Wakeworld.

The wounds of Outside lingered for far too long.

He walked through a rough-hewn doorway to another chamber. The flood ended right in front of the doorway, with a narrow path leading to the right, into a deeper darkness. In front of him dark, oily liquid rippled, glinting a sullen red into the dim radiance of the mold adorning the walls and ceiling.

He knelt next to the pool, leaning forward to peer into its depths.

It was too dark to see anything, of course, but he only needed to discern a fine, hairlike mass floating on the surface. He picked up the simple bamboo rake lying there and swept it across the surface of the pool, hoping to capture one of the writhing organisms.

Once, twice… on the third sweep he felt something touch the stick, and slowly pulled it toward himself. Something that looked like a tangled ball of yarn hung suspended, soggy filaments lying limp on the surface, those submerged twitching and wriggling as they continued to blindly hunt their microscopic sustenance.

This’ll do nicely, he thought, and picked it up.

Holding it carefully cupped in one hand he reached out and picked up a wood bowl, scooping up a bowlful of water and then gently sliding the blob in. It floated, quiescent, on the surface, seemingly a bit of pond scum you might find in any pond.

He retraced his steps back through the darkness, holding the bowl as still as possible while watching the dim reflections in the water that revealed the profile of the floating creature. There was no motion that he could see.

He breathed a sigh of relief… there were no spores from Outside down here at least. He set the bowl down. He transferred the contents of the bowl to a deep glass jar that would be easier to carry without spilling. Outside in the light a glass jar would be ideal.

If he could locate the spores before they’d fully taken root, he’d need the potion, too. He snapped off a fist-sized chunk of fungus from one of the many niches lining the walls, then picked a clump of delicate pink toadstools and dropped them into a pocket. He picked up another, larger bowl and pressed it flush against the wall under a huge gray mass of fungus hanging from the ceiling. Carefully, taking care to avoid getting splattered, he used his knife to cut a hole and let the clear, pungent liquid drip out.

Even he, accustomed as he was to the stench, pressed his nose again the inside of his elbow, breathing through his tunic sleeve held tight over his mouth.

He had enough in a few minutes and thankfully retreated toward the ladder up leading up out of the darkness. He could make the rest of his preparations upstairs in the light.

“Crija, I’m afraid I have an errand to run,” he said as he stepped out of the storeroom and into the shop. His wife was just wrapping a block of flaky whitish Ylourgne for the dumpy matron at the counter.

“Give my regards to Lord Atridoon, Mistress, and have a pleasant day.”

The customer nodded fractionally as she accepted the cheese and stumped out without a word.

“What’s happened?”

“Something is loose in the city.”

“You don’t mean…!”

“Yes, I’m afraid so. Something from Outside,” he explained. “I’m going to mix up the potion now, and then see if I can find it.”

“Dogs again?”

“They just scented it, so it can’t be very big yet… rabbits should be fine if I can find it quickly enough.”

“Let me grind it for you,” said Crija, holding out her hand.

He dropped the chunk of shelf fungus into her waiting palm and turned to the workbench. He set the bowl of foul-smelling liquid on the bench, then pulled the pink toadstools from his pocket.

He hooked his foot under a nearby stool, dragging it over to sit so he could see wat he was working on more easily. He gently separated the individual toadstools, and then pulled the caps off, scraping out all of the stem material. He washed the tiny caps, only a few millimeters in diameter, in running water, and set them to dry on a linen cloth. He thought four would be enough, and he’d have difficulty carrying more than four rabbits in any case. Just to be sure, though, he decided to prepare a dozen in case he needed them later.

If he needed more than four right now, or if the rabbits were too small, even a dozen extras might not be enough…

“Moggy! I need you to run an errand for me!”

“Yes, father,” came the muffled response from upstairs, and he was shortly joined by his eldest, Mogucent, a slim boy of twelve years.

“Take this to the King’s Guard at the main gate of the Pinnacle. He’ll know what it is,” he ordered, handing the boy a small ceramic tile with an enameled picture of yellow butterfly on it. He could send the red or purple signs later if necessary, but for now he had to let Chuang know.

Moggy dashed out of the door and Lujan turned back to his toadstools. They were probably dry now, he thought, and inspected them closely to make sure.

He added six drops of ammonia and the quicksilver to the clear liquid he’d tapped from the fungus, and Crija measured out the powdered fungus. When the mixture was ready he gently immersed the toadstool caps. They waited for them to change color, watching as they gradually darkened from soft pink to a harsher, more fiery red before finally reaching the deep, dark red of ripe cherries.

He fished them out with a broad, flat net, and set them out to dry on the linen once again.

“What should I do with the leftover?” asked Crija.

“I’ll clean it up later; just leave it in the back room for now. It’ll be fine as long as nobody gets near it.”

“How much do you need for the rabbits, you think?”

“Haven’t bought one recently,” he replied, grimacing. “Four rabbits… uh, I think the warrener sells two for a penny. Let me have two pence for now. Bokash knows me; he won’t mind the rest later if it’s more than that.”

“You sure rabbits are big enough?”

“They should be enough. If I get there in time.”

She nodded and took a small sack of coins out from somewhere under her tunic. She pulled open the drawstring and poured out a handful of coins, picking up two iron pence and handing them to Lujan.

“Send a messenger as soon as you have an idea, and I’ll tell Master Chuang.”

“Right,” he replied curtly and opened the door. “Be right back with the rabbits.”

It was a short walk to the Street of Pillars, and the warrener was only a half dozen meters beyond, on an alley off the main street. His warren—where he raised his rabbits—was outside the city walls, but since rabbits were small and easy to handle, he kept a big stock here instead of at the livestock market.

Bokash had told him once that the spells to keep meat cold at the market cost him almost as much as the meat itself, and Lujan helped him out with a few minor concoctions that would retard mold and such. Nothing he could do about insects and bacteria, but mold, at least, was not a problem.

“Master Bokash, you have a minute?”

“Master van der Kerk! Come in, come in,” warbled the short fat proprietor. “Always have time for an old friend. Even better if you have time for a drink or two.”

“Not today, I’m sorry,” declined Lujan, setting his bamboo cage down on the floor. “I need four rabbits. It’s urgent.”

“Some special event?”

“Just an unexpected surprise, I’m afraid,” said Lujan, keeping the details to himself. “Maybe I can take you up on that drink tomorrow?”

“Look forward to it, Master Lujan,” replied the warrener. “Big and fat? And do you want a doe or a buck?”

“Actually, no… Small is best. Healthy, but nice and light. Doe, buck, it doesn’t matter.”

The butcher cocked his head in curiosity, then shrugged. “Demta! Demta, where are you, boy?”

A boy, perhaps ten years old or so, stuck his head out from the back room.

“Fetch four young rabbits for Master van der Kerk, boy. Bucks.”

“Yes, father.”

The face vanished, replaced by the sound of padding feet, and then rattling cages.

He was back very quickly, four rabbits—not fully grown yet—held by the scruffs of their necks.

“In the cage, Demta, don’t just stand there.”

Demta dropped the rabbits into the bamboo cage and stood there waiting for the next order, but the warrener had already turned back to Lujan.

“Three pence?”

“Pretty expensive rabbits, seeing as how they’re not even grown yet. How about a penny for the bunch?”

“A man’s gotta make enough to live on, Master Lujan! Two for the lot?”

“Deal.”

Lujan handed over the coins and picked up the cages, one in each hand.

“Thank you, Master Bokash. Save some of that brandy for me!”

He pushed the door open with one foot and hurried back to his own shop.

As he entered his own shop, cage in hand, he noticed another customer.

“Ah, Master Kuloni’e, a good day to you! I trust the Factor is well?”

“Master van der Kerk, yes, well, thank you. I was just arranging to have a wheel of Ylourgne delivered.”

“Excellent choice, Master Kuloni’e. I know the Factor will be delighted.”

“He always is! As am I, since he is kind enough to share.”

“Crija, give Master Kuloni’e some Ambroli as well,” he directed. “A way of thanking you—and the Factor, of course—for your patronage.”

“Oh, really, I shouldn’t…” said the customer, protesting weakly as he held his hand out and accepted the gift from Crija. They always had a number of wrapped slabs of Ambroli ready at hand to give to customers, and Lujan doubted the Factor would ever hear about it.

“Excuse me, Master Kuloni’e… I must take care of these rabbits. My regards to your wife,” he said, bowing slightly as he backed into the storeroom, cage in hand.

He shut the storeroom door and set the rabbits down on the table, the smile slipping from his face. Leaving them there for the time being, he walked to the kitchen and picked up a stalk of celery, which he cut into several handy pieces.

He made a small incision and inserted one of the red toadstool caps in each piece.

He pulled one rabbit out of the cage and dropped it into a second, topless cage on the floor. He offered it one of the pieces of celery, which it happily accepted and began munching away on. It took only a few minutes for the celery to disappear, toadstool and all, and the rabbit to fall asleep.

The process was repeated for the remaining rabbits, and a short time later the four were returned to their carrying cage, slumbering away.

Now to find those damned spores, he thought to himself. Guess I’ll take the pushcart this time... I’m really getting too old for this.

He set the rabbit cage on the cart’s bed along with the glass jar and its slowly writhing inhabitant, and lifted the two shafts up off the floor before he stopped in thought for a moment, then set them down again.

Best take a few bits of cheese with me… never hurts to advertise.

“Crija? Give me a few of those Ambroli samples, would ya?”

She brought half a dozen of the small cheese blocks, glancing at the unconscious rabbits as she handed them over.

“I hope you don’t need them all… the kids’d love another rabbit for a while.”

“I hope so, too, but… We’ll see.”

“Good luck.”

He picked up the shafts again and pushed the cart into the alley, the little bell jangling quietly.

“Take care of the kids,” he said, and started down the alley toward the larger street, pushing it ahead of himself and exchanging greetings with shop-owners and passers-by.

As he walked he kept on eye on the thing floating in the jar. It hung, mostly submerged, limp tendrils hanging down, twitching gently every so often. He would walk up and down the alleys of the area until he got close enough for it to detect the invaders.

He walked in rough circles around his shop, gradually working farther and farther away. He knew it couldn’t be too far because his gardener slugs had cowered in fear, but there were still far too many streets and alleys to cover quickly with his pushcart.

Half an hour later, after he’d given away a few of his free samples of cheese and worked his way toward the Avenue of Amphitrite, the hanging tendrils began to twitch. He continued a bit in that direction, confirming he was getting closer, and when he raised his eyes to look at the homes and shops lining the alley he immediately spotted a young constable, blocking an alleyway and looking quite bored.

There was another constable up ahead, he noticed… they had obviously cordoned off a section of the block.

“Robbers?” he asked as he trundled his pushcart closer.

The constable spat and grimaced.

“Just some sickness. Pulled off our regular patrol and have us standing around all day instead.”

“Sickness!? My goodness!”

He pulled back a bit, feigning surprise.

“Thank you for protecting us, constable,” he said, and reached into his cart. “Here, let me give you a little of my Ambroli in appreciation.”

“Ambroli? The cheese? That’s pretty pricey stuff!”

“I just have a few samples with me, but please, enjoy it.”

The constable accepted the little block of cheese and immediately bit off a chunk.

“Mmm. Good stuff! Now if I only had a little ale to go with it…”

Lujan laughed.

“Sorry, can’t help you there, I’m afraid. Perhaps one of the shops here…?”

“Nah, can’t leave my post or the sarge’ll crucify me. Thanks for the cheese, though.”

“Where could I find your sergeant? I’d like to thank him, too, if I may.”

“Sarge? Down there at the crossroads,” mumbled the constable around his mouthful, pointing at the next intersection.

Lujan could see a few horses tethered at the corner, and another constable.

“Thanks.”

He began to push his cart in that direction, keeping an eye on his jar. The twitching was getting weaker. Definitely down that alley behind the constable, then.

“Godsworn van der Kerk!”

– 6 –

He spun around at the man’s voice to see Chuang striding toward him, robes clutched up out of the way for speed.

“Master Chuang! How did you find me?”

“Godsworn Cressida contacted me, too. She’s on her way, I think… might already be inside.”

“Down there, I gather? How bad is it?”

“I heard three people, just started yesterday afternoon,” said Chuang. “Come on with me.”

Lujan turned his pushcart around and walked briskly with Chuang to the alley, no longer worrying about jostling the glass jar.

“I can’t let anyone—” began the constable, but Chuang just glared at him and kept walking.

“Run and tell your sergeant that Chuang Tsu is here.”

“Chuan… Master Chuang!”

The constable was mortified and began blathering an apology but Chuang waved him off.

“Your sergeant, lad, now.”

The constable ran down toward the intersection with relief, and the two men walked into the alley.

“I prepared four rabbits,” explained Lujan. “Hopefully that enough, and we got here in time.”

“It didn’t work very well last time.”

“We caught it in less than a day this time,” countered Lujan, “and I’ve made a few changes. I think it’ll work better.”

“If it gets out of hand we’ll have to torch this whole area,” grimaced Chuang. “…so much death and destruction. We have to avoid that at all costs.”

“We’ll not have a repeat of last time.”

Healer Pontil met them at the door.

“Master Chuang, come in, please,” he urged, waving Chuang through. “I’m sorry, are you with Master Chuang?”

“Well, yes, I suppose I am,” smiled Lujan, and was about to give a more useful response to allay the poor man’s confusion when Chuang broke in.

“This is Godsworn Lujan van der Kerk of Mycelia.”

“Ah! Godsworn! My apologies, I didn’t recog…”

“Get out of his way and bring that cage of rabbits inside.”

“Of course!” said Pontil, chastened by Chuang’s brusque order.

Theros was kneeling next to Finh, who was lying on a futon on the floor, holding up an eyelid to peer into one of his eyes. On the other side of the Godsworn lay the two children, ten-year-old Kahlia and eight-year-old Finjul, their mother wiping their faces with a damp cloth.

They all looked terrible, especially the older Finh. There was a whitish, flaky buildup around his eyes, nostrils, and mouth. A starstone of Mnar lay on his chest.

The children had only a few traces of white around their mouths, and while Finh was apparently unconscious the children drifting in and out of consciousness, breaths rasping in their chests and their eyes darting around the room in pursuit of something no-one else could see.

“It won’t come on,” whimpered Glaire, rubbing the towel over the girl’s face again and again. Tears were dribbling down Kahlia’s cheeks, and wiped off cleanly on the towel although the white growth around her mouth stubbornly remained. In one place it had come off, tearing off a patch of skin from her chin to leave the pale red of a shallow wound, plasma welling.

“Mistress, stop, please… it won’t come off,” advised Theros, no doubt for the fiftieth time. “Master Chuang is here from the King, and Godsworn van der Kerk. They are here to help.”

She looked up and noticed them for the first time.

“Please! Please help them!”

Chuang knelt down next to her and placed his hand atop hers.

“Let us help, Mistress. Give us room to work.”

She straightened her back, took a despairing look at her husband and children lying on the futon, and folded up even further, hiding her face between her clutched knees, sobbing.

“Healer Pontil, perhaps the Mistress would feel better if she had some tea,” suggested Chuang gently. “In the kitchen.”

Pontil understood, and helped the woman rise to her feet. He led her out of the room and into the kitchen, and nodded to Chuang as he went. He’d keep her out of the way.

Chuang laid his hand on Finh’s chest and closed his eyes.

“At the base of the left lung,” said Theros. “That empty space.”

“I see it… or rather, I don’t see anything,” said Chuang. “That’s why we had so much trouble last time. We were looking for something and we should have been looking for the lack of it.”

There was a bustle at the door and another blue-robed woman strode in.

“Godsworn Cressida. We’ve just started,” explained Lujan. “Join us.”

“I heard your conversation just now… The sergeant is here with me.”

“It would be best to get the sergeant started rounding up the people nearby,” said Chuang. “We’ll have to check them all, now and later. Oh, and we’ll need a constable to stop anyone from bothering us in here, too.”

“I’ll assign Pontil here to keep an eye on things for another week or so. And you two with him,” said Cressida with a glance at the young Godsworn, Ban Thua and Treyd. “For now you two just watch and learn. Oh, wait—Treyd, fetch Pontil. He needs to see this, too.”

She turned back to Finh.

“Now let me see…”

She knelt and laid her hand alongside Chuang’s. After a moment she opened her eyes.

“There’s another strand of emptiness leading from the lung down into the intestines… it’s spreading fast, but I think we still have a chance.

“Where are the dogs?”

“I brought rabbits this time. It’s yet young. If it’s big enough to need a dog there’s no hope for him.”

“The starstone has had no effect?”

“None yet.”

“No time left,” snapped Chuang. “What do we need to do?”

“The rabbits are drugged, and I’ve adjusted their blood to attract the larvae. The next step is to lower their body temperature as far as you can and get them to move to the rabbits.”

“Last time, with the dogs, you didn’t do prepare them, did you?”

“Just a sleeping drug,” said Lujan. “Rabbits are generally a degree of two warmer than dogs, and these poor bucks are running a fever to make them even hotter.”

“Are you sure the wife is still clean?”

“I’ve been checking her regularly, Godsworn Cressida,” said Theros. “If she is infected it’s just started, and we can deal with her later. These three need us right now.”

“Theros, you take the boy. Master Chuang, will you handle the girl? Or would you prefer the man?”

“You are the Healer,” smiled Chuang, and turned to Lujan. “We are in your hands, Godsworn.”

“It’s impossible to tell what will happen even if the things do move to the rabbits,” he warned. “They won’t care what happens to their current hosts, and I think you’ll need to act quickly to save the man if it’s beginning to root into his body.

“He might not live even if it does move.”

Healer Pontil entered the room. Cressida directed him to work with Chuang, Treyd with Theros, and Ban Thua with herself.

The six bent to their tasks, silently summoning the power needed to lower the body temperatures of the three victims. Cressida and Theros were mumbling prayers under their breaths while Chuang just sat motionless, both hands on Kahlia’s abdomen.

Lujan pulled a rabbit out of the cage and carefully made a shallow cut into its foreleg with his dagger. The blood seeped out, staining its fur bright red as he laid it down next to the sleeping face of Finh. He repeated the process for the each of the children.

“Now we just wait.”

He rocked back on his heels, watching the rabbits closely and listening to the congested breathing of the three.

Kahlia, the ten-year-old girl, was the first to react, her body arching up off the futon, head tilted back with open eyes and mouth in silent scream.

She was thankfully unconscious, and stayed that way as something gray, a writhing, amorphous blob of slime and blood, oozed out of her rictus of a mouth and flowed toward the rabbit. In seconds it had forced itself into the rabbit’s mouth and vanished.

The rabbit’s belly bulged and moved as it settled in.

Chuang’s hands moved about over the girl, and beads of sweat appeared on his forehead. Kahlia spasmed, coughing up something thick, and Chuang used a finger to scoop it out of her mouth, deftly flipping her over his knees and massaging her back. She coughed a few more times, burped, and collapsed, the rigor seeping out of her body as her breathing quieted.

“She’s fine,” whispered Chuang. “It hadn’t attached itself yet.”

The other two showed no change.

Lujan picked the rabbit up and dropped into a huge pottery jar he’d had on his pushcart.

Chuang and Pontil concentrated on the girl for a few moments, and finally Chuang pronounced her clean.

“It’ll take a while to fully recover, but she’s safe now. Healer Pontil, would you take her to her mother?”

Pontil nodded and scooped up the young girl. He carried her out of the room, and the sounds of a vastly relieved mother could be heard.

Chuang shifted to work with Cressida on the man, and when Pontil rejoined them shortly he knelt down next to Theros and Treyd, working on the boy.

He was already showing signs of reaction, his spasms getting more energetic, saliva and mucous running dripping from mouth and nose.

He made a horrible sound, a cross between a burp and a death cry, and curled up into a fetal ball, knees up under his chin and arms wrapped tight around them. His face, instead of being buried into his clutched legs, stared out straight ahead with wide-open but unseeing eyes, his mouth stretched wider than should have been possible for an eight-year old boy.

A long, thin pseudopod of pale grey flesh crept out of his mouth, inching toward the bleeding rabbit, tasting the fresh blood and probing the invitingly open mouth. It slowly crept inside, and shortly it thickened, pulsing like a snake that had swallowed dinner as it transferred itself from the boy to the rabbit.

The boy was immobile, even his breathing stopped until the thing had moved into its new home. Again, Lujan picked up the infested rabbit and dropped it into the pottery jar with the first one.

“He’s not breathing,” whispered Theros, ear pressed to the boy’s chest. “And his heart’s stopped… can any of you…?”

Pontil laid his own hands on the boy and closed his eyes, tilting his head up to stare at the ceiling with closed eyes. They sat motionless for a moment until Theros slumped in defeat.

“Nothing… No reaction at all. Pontil?”

“Me neither. He’s just not responding… I think he’s gone.”

Treyd, the youngest Healer there, spoke up quietly.

“Healer Theros… I was one of the Healers selected to attend classes at the King’s new medical madrasah in Cornwall. Classes start in a few months—they’re still building it—but Physician Nolan gave us some special advance training.”

“This is not the time nor place—” started Pontil, but Theros held up his hand to quiet him.

“What, Treyd?”

“He showed us something called CPR. It’s a way to get the heart beating again.”

“You can do it?”

“I think so… it’s not that difficult…”

Finh, lying down next to them, suddenly started thrashing, arms waving and legs kicking. Cressida narrowly avoided being hit in the face, and grabbed the arm with one hand, leaving the other on his chest.

Ban Thua, a thin Asian girl, wasn’t so lucky, catching a kick in her abdomen, but instantly latching on, wrapping her arms around it and holding it down with the full weight of her own body

“Try! It’s his only chance!” pleaded Theros, yielding his position to Treyd and turning his attention to the writhing man instead.

Treyd stretched the boy out and began thumping the boy’s chest.

“Please tilt his head to one side and clean out as much of that gunk as possible, so he can breathe,” he asked. Pontil reached for the boy’s head.

As soon as the airway was clear Treyd gave the boy his first breath, pushing his own air into the boy’s lungs mouth-to-mouth, and then back to pressing the chest.

“How long does it take?”

“Physician Nolan said to continue until it starts beating, or the patient is dead.”

Another breath.

Pontil, his hand on the boys wrist, suddenly lifted his head.

“His pulse is back! It worked!”

Treyd stopped for a moment to let Pontil lay his hand on the boy’s chest and check.

“It’s beating. And look,” he said, “he’s breathing now, too. You saved him!”

Treyd say back on his heels and took a deep breath.

“It really did work, didn’t it…” he said, almost to himself. “Physician Nolan said it worked… and it worked.”

“Chuang, can’t you still his arms and legs?” snapped Cressida, narrowly dodging another whack.

“I’m trying, but they’re not entirely his anymore!” answered Chuang through clenched teeth, his attention obviously elsewhere.

Finh’s left hand slashed through the air, raking across Chuang face and leaving three ragged, bleeding wounds down his cheek.

“Almost… almost there…” grunted Chuang, yanking his head back a bit but not removing his hands from Finh’s body. “Just a little more…”

The man spasmed with all his strength, throwing Cressida off entirely and knocking the others off-balance. They wrestled him down flat again and the first blob of slimy gray matter oozed from his mouth.

There was a terrible sucking sound, like a boot pulled from deep mud, and the man collapsed.

More blood-streaked tendrils came from his mouth, then his nose, gradually thickening as the thing moved into its new home in the unconscious rabbit.

The rabbit began to bulge, swelling gradually to twice the size of its fellow.

The last tendril slowed, thinned, and finally withdrew into the rabbit entirely. The transfer was complete

Lujan snatched it up and dropped it into the jar with the other two, replacing the lid promptly.

Finh was splayed out like a discarded ragdoll, a pool of dark blood slowly spreading from his nose and mouth, skin ashen. There was a weak movement of air bubbles around his mouth suggesting he might still be alive.

“That lung is in bad shape,” said Cressida, eyes closed. “That thing ate a lot of his lung, and he’s dying. We must stop the bleeding quickly.”

“Turn him on his side so that lung is on the bottom,” said Chuang. “Healer Cressida, Healer Theros, we have to work as one or this man dies.”

“And me,” said Healer Pontil, joining them from the boy.

Cressida shifted to give him room, and they all laid hands on Finh’s body.

“Healer Pontil, get all that fluid out of his lungs and airway. The rest of us will stop the bleeding. If we can.”

They fell silent, their attention turned inward, and knelt for a few minutes until Cressida slumped and opened her eyes.

“That’s enough for now. It’s stopped, thank the Goddess.”

“Thank our combined skill, I think… I saw no Goddess in this room,” said Chuang, sitting back and taking a deep breath.

“You don’t have to see her to feel her presence,” said Cressida, her nose and eyebrows lifting up in scorn. “It is clear that the Goddess Panakeia lent us her power to help save this man.”

“Perhaps, but I rather suspect we saved him, together with Godsworn van der Kerk and Physician Nolan’s CPR.”

“Mere accessories, mere accessories,” she replied, waving her hand in dismissal.

“Mama?”

They all turned to look at the boy. Finjul was sitting up, half-supported by Treyd, and calling for his mother.

“Constable!” called Chuang. “Let the Mistress in now!”

There was a bustle at the door and Glaire came running in, embracing and soothing the boy before turning to her husband. Her daughter, Kahlia, was right behind her, hanging onto her skirt tightly.

“Is he…?”

“He’s very weak,” explained Cressida, “Healer Pontil will stay here with you for another week or two and help him heal. His lungs will never fully recover, I’m afraid, but with time he will be recover much strength.”

Glaire bobbed her head in thanks, one hand around her son’s shoulders and the other stroking Finh’s cheek. Kahlia snuggled up next to her mother, and Glaire adjusted her arm to wrap around both of them.

“Healer Pontil, Master Finh will need constant monitoring to ensure that the seminaria morbi doesn’t cause a problem,” continued Cressida. “I will send another Healer to assist you, of course, along with the teas and incenses you’ll need. And I’ll have the check-ups continued in the area to be sure only these three were infected.”

“What is seminaria morbi?” asked Glaire.

“The seeds of disease, like grains of rice but so small you cannot see them,” explained Theros. “They caused your papa to get sick, and we have to be sure we destroy them all.”

“But if you can’t see them…” said Glaire, doubtful.

“The Goddess can see them, Mistress, and destroy them all,” stated Cressida firmly, ending that conversation sharply.

“Well, I think we’re done for now,” said Chuang as he slowly got up from the floor. “It’s time for my nap.”

“And I think I had better see to my friends in the jar here, too,” said Lujan.

“The fire?”

“The big one, certainly, and one of the others, but I think I’ll keep one of the small ones… We need to know more about these things.”

“By Panakeia, burn them all!” cried Cressida. “They’re hideous!”

“They aren’t from Wakeworld or any Dreamlands I’m familiar with,” said Lujan, “Whatever they are, they’re from outside the realm of Mycelia Spore-Mother; we think they’re from Yuggoth. In any case, the very idea of a mobile fungus is worth investigating. I’ll be careful.”

“This time,” added Chuang dryly.

“Um, yes, this time. I know what they can do now, and it won’t happen again,” agreed Lujan.

He picked up the pottery jar and carried it outside to his pushcart.

“Before I go, anyone want some Ambroli?”

END

“I’m sorry and I fully realize that you have traveled for many weeks to reach Celephaïs, but the King is not receiving any visitors at this time.”

Most people would have wilted under the furious visage of King Babacar of Thalarion, but Chamberlain Mikhail of Celephaïs remained unmoved. In fact, in addition to responding to the increasingly energetic complaints in the same quiet, measured tone, he also remained physically unmoved from the center of the doorway, blocking the entrance to the Palace of the Seventy Delights.

The two muscular guards standing on either side of the door were relaxed, one casually resting her double-bladed axe on the ground as the other merely watched with one hand on the hilt of his sheathed sword. They were watching King Babacar and his retinue while simultaneously keeping an eye on the road leading to the massive rose-crystal doors that stood half-open. Apparently carved from single slabs of the semiprecious gemstone, every inch was covered with carvings of heroes and monsters cavorting across their polished faces.

“You have the audacity to stand in the way of the King of Thalarion!?” sputtered the plump, sweating man standing in front of the Chamberlain. “Move out of the way at once!”

He reached out as if to push the Chamberlain to the side but suddenly jerked back, whipping his hand away. The double-bladed axe that had been resting quietly on the ground was suddenly in front of him, blocking his way. If he had been a bit slower he probably would have lost his hand at the wrist.

“I am sure King Babacar is tired from his long journey. Allow us to offer the King the services of the Wisteria Villa to rest. Of course, every service that Celephaïs can offer will be at your disposal.

“After you have rested and recovered from your arduous voyage I believe King Kuranes will be able to welcome you as your noble station deserves.”

The plump courtier sniffed.

“The Wisteria Villa? Hardly fit for King Babacar!”

The Chamberlain merely nodded, his face impassive although he chuckled to himself. He knew full well that the Wisteria Villa, insignificant as it was compared to the Palace of the Seventy Delights, was still far more elegant and beautiful than King Babacar’s own palace in far Thalarion.

“My most sincere apologies for the inconvenience. I will have one of the servants guide you,” he continued, and gestured to someone inside the Palace.

A young man of about twenty, but still a page, stepped into the sunlight and stood silently.

“Teros, guide them to the Wisteria Villa, and ensure they their needs are met.”

The Chamberlain bowed once more and returned into the shadows of the Palace, leaving the page to lead the way back down the paved road. The Wisteria Villa was also located on the Pinnacle, but of course below the Palace itself.

The rose-crystal doors swung shut once again behind Chamberlain Mikhail. He sighed, shaking his head as he approached Chuang.

“These kinglets and petty nobles… they drive me crazy!”

Chuang chuckled.

“The smaller they are the larger they puff up, don’t they?”

Mikhail nodded.

“I could ask you where the King is, I suppose…”

“Yes, you certainly could,” agreed Chuang, “but I suspect you probably will not. Chances are I would refuse to tell you, as I have for the last dozen or so times.”

“Yes, I think you’re probably right. But at least you’ve admitted that you know where he is, as opposed to merely avoiding any answer at all.

“Can you tell me if he’s still in the Palace?”

“I do not see why not,” mused Chuang. “Not.”

“But he certainly didn’t leave by this gate, and no airships have called all day… hmm. There are a number of other exits from the Palace, of course, but that would suggest he felt he had to sneak out, which seems unlikely.”

“King Kuranes rarely sneaks, and I think I can say with certitude that he did not sneak today. In fact, I watched him leave, and he was quite animated, conversing in a perfectly normal manner with Commander Britomartis.”

“Ah, so he is with Britomartis!”

“I never said that,” denied Chuang. “In fact, I doubt she is with him now. As Commander of the King’s Guard, though, I am confident she is watching over him.”

He was correct in both statements.

 

* * *

 

She was standing in the doorway, looking down the stone stairs leading to the floor of the red-lit cavern. Wisps of steam floated in the hot air, partially obscuring her view of the King, who was just then gingerly making his way across the floor of the cavern.

He walked very slowly and carefully, moving one foot at a time and testing each step before he shifted his weight forward. He hardly looked a king at all, she thought, dressed as he was in a simple farmer’s tunic but with heavy warboots. His head was bare of crown, and the tunic sodden with sweat in the heat and humidity.

A section of the cavern floor, perhaps a meter by two in size, suddenly tilted up with a hiss to emit a sudden spurt of steam, fortunately away from the King. He ducked down at the sound, and by the time he’d turned to look at it, the floor had dropped back again, looking as permanent and immobile as ever.

To his left a small pool of lava bubbled quietly, spitting gobbets of fire every so often.

Forbidden from joining him, Britomartis watched his every move, her hand gripping her sword tightly, lifting it up a few centimeters from its sheath and then slamming it back again, over and over and over.

The King Kuranes finally reached the flat, hexagonal stone in the center, and stepped up onto it with a sigh of relief. He was safe, for now.

He knelt facing the sphere of rock standing solitaire in the center of the hexagon, and drew his knife. He drew it across the palm of his left hand, then pressed his bloody hand against the sphere. He grunted with the pain, and Britomartis was sure she heard his flesh sizzle from the heat.

The sphere slowly reddened, as if absorbing the King’s blood, and as it grew redder the cavern slowly darkened until she could only see the black silhouette of the King against the darkly pulsing blood-red sphere.

“Now, Britomartis. You may join me.”

She leapt to the cavern’s floor and raced to the King’s side, dropping to her knees next to him.

“My King! Let me help you.”

“Later, Commander,” he said, climbing to his feet with her assistance. “The basket.”

She handed him one of the baskets and together they began to search the cavern floor, torches held high.

Britomartis saw a glint and bent over for a closer look. Yes, there was the slug, torpid now that the cavern was cooler, its smooth, cylindrical body blotchy in shades of red and gray. It had no eyes, of course; eyes were of no use to it as it bored through the bones of the earth itself. Behind it stretched its trail. As a garden slug left behind it a trail of slime, these chthonian slugs instead left trails of gold, brought up from the unknown depths below.

She used her knife to pry it loose, and dropped it in her basket.

Within minutes the two of them had collected several kilograms of gold.

She glanced at the central sphere. It was still pulsing, but much slower than before.

“Only another few minutes, my King.”

“I know,” he grunted. “Come help me… there’s nice clutch here.”

She found him kneeling in front of a small pile of what looked like a cluster of grapes at first glance. They were almost round, in various sizes up to about three centimeters in diameter.

It looked like there were a few dozen of them.

The King was using his knife, trying to pry the cluster off the floor. It didn’t budge.

She joined him, jamming her sword into a gap and using it as a powerful lever.

With a crack the cluster broke free, and split into two chunks.

They quickly lifted the chunks—surprisingly heavy—and put them in their baskets with the gold they’d collected.

“Time to go,” said the King. He glanced at the central sphere: it was almost black, just a few dull strands of red yet swirling on its surface.

They hurried back to the stairs and up out of the cavern.

A huge belch of escaping steam and sulfurous gas hurried their feet.

They walked down the tunnel a few meters to a wood bench, and the King collapsed onto it.

Britomartis pulled out a vial and scooped up a dollop of the paste with her fingers. Reaching out, she grasped the King’s cut and burned hand, using her balm-coated fingers to pry his open, and spread the healing salve all over.

His breathing steadied and as she watched his hand sloughed off the blackened flesh to be replaced by healthy pink skin. She didn’t know what was in Master Chuang’s secret salve, but it was literally a life saver.

She handed his the canteen and he took a long drink.

With a sigh of relief, he finally pulled the canteen from his lips and held it out to Britomartis.

“Thank you, Mistress. That was one of the most delicious wines I’ve ever had.”

She giggled.

“It’s the table wine, my Lord. I filled it in the kitchen just before we came down.”

He smiled and shook his head.

“Well, I’m glad that’s over. Let’s see what we got, shall we?”

He pulled his basket closer and picked up the cluster of balls.

“A good-sized egg mass, isn’t it? And yours is even a bit larger I think…”

She nodded, and twisted one of the balls off the mass. With her knife she scraped the covering shell off, revealing a brilliant ruby.

“That’s a beauty!” she smiled, holding it up to the light. “I wonder what the rest are.”

The King picked up one of his own.

“Usually rubies and emeralds go together, but every so often…”

“We haven’t gotten a firestone for some time,” she said. “I wonder if they all hatch into those slugs, or different gems birth different creatures.”

“I’ve never tried to find out,” he replied. “I’m more concerned with whether any of the larger chthonians might come looking for those who steal their eggs!”

“Must it always be you?”

“Well, when I dreamed Celephaïs I knew that I’d have inexhaustible wealth: gold and gemstones. But I never actually thought about just how I’d get all that wealth… I’ve tried to find a different way to do it, and so far it has proven impossible to dream a different method. I only caused some dreamquakes, fortunately not serious in their effect.”

“Not even with Master Chuang’s aid?”

He shook his head.

“We tried. It’s beyond our abilities. Or just immutable.”

“There are things beyond even your capabilities!”

He laughed.

“Oh, my dear Britomartis. There are dreams within dreams within dreams, and nobody knows what reality may be, if it exists at all. Perhaps I merely dream that I cannot do it, and I could if only I could look at it from the outside.”

“The outside?”

“Outside the dream, of course.”

“You mean Wakeworld?”

“No, no. Not Wakeworld, or the Dreamlands, or any of the countless bubbles of reality. Outside.”

They fell silent for a time, until the King rose to his feet.

“Come, it is time to climb back up to the Palace of the Seventy Delights, where I must once again play the part of a King, and you a Commander.”

They lifted their baskets and trudged toward the endless stairs the led back up into the Pinnacle, and daylight.