The Exodus Page 8

  The crossbows started to click. The arrows’ swoosh was heard. From below, the wild roaring of wounded beasts followed.

  “The tar! Pour the tar, faster!” seemed like the command came from Birr. “Shoot the fire arrows!”

  The sound of the battle was getting louder. Nick heard the flamethrowers letting the fire out. A chain of guards was formed around the large cauldron in the square. The chain was transferring buckets of boiling tar to the flamethrowers. The horns on each watchtower howled in turns, alerting about the next attack.

  “The crawlers are on the northern wall!” Gorr’s low voice broke through the noise of the battle. “Save your arrows! Use your axes!”

  A group of guards immediately went to that side of the wall. Every one of them was armed with an axe that had a long handle and a curved broad blade. It reminded Nick of a medieval poleax. And then he heard blunt blows, as if someone was chopping thick logs.

  “Tree-crawlers are advancing! More tar to the western wall!”

  “Collarhorns are coming! Some beasts are riding them, aim at their backs!”

  “Fire! More fire!”

  The yells and shouts were now coming from all sides at the same time, everyone was confused and no one understood which side should be defended first.

  Whisperer pushed Nick, saying, “It’s time, let’s go.”

  *****

  The hunters rushed to the weapons room. No one paid attention to them. A fierce battle was taking place on the walls. Down, in the square, everyone was busy, but not in panic. People were doing what they were supposed to do.

  They walked quickly, but they had to watch all the time where they were stepping. The ground was marked with the gooey tar here and there. In the spot where the floud sank not so long ago, there was a huge, steaming jelly-like smudge. “They poured tar all over it,” Nick thought, “and these are, it seems, the floud’s pieces that landed all over the square.”

  “Don’t step on it!” Whisperer warned him, as if reading Nick’s thoughts.

  A surprise waited for them at the weapons room. The room was guarded. Of course, the young lad, intently and fearfully listening to the noise of the battle on top, could hardly be called a “guard.” However, Nick was at a loss nonetheless. In his mind, he was ready to break the lock, albeit illegally, to get the arms. But he didn’t know what to do with a legal representative of the authority. The lad was there to guard the weapons. His armor and the spear he was clinging to and leaning on were clear indicators he was on duty. Whisperer was the first one to come up with a solution.

  “Open the gate!” he ordered firmly. “Guards on the walls need more weapons!”

  “I have no authority. The order of D-d-deputy Commandant B-birr,” the guard reported back with a slight stutter, “is t-to open only on his p-personal c-command.”

  “He is somewhat busy right now,” Whisperer nodded toward the fortress wall, where they could see a dozen guards trying to push off the wall with their spears some huge beast that had crawled half-way through the broken loophole. “Will you be satisfied with a written order by Commandant Gorr?” with those words, Whisperer handed him a small scroll.

  The guard took it with a shaking hand, unrolled the scroll carefully and started to read it. It was obvious he was hardly literate. He read the content of the scroll several times, moving his lips. Then he breathed air into his lungs and started to read out loud, “Herewith I order to execute all direct commands of the present scroll holder, High-Born Rich of the Westgayer clan. C-c-commandant Gorr.”

  The guard had a hard time uttering the word “commandant.” He managed to do it only on the third try.

  “I hope you have seen Commandant Gorr’s personal seal?” Whisperer said condescendingly, taking the scroll back.

  “Yes, I have! Seen it!” the guard straightened up. “What are your orders, High-Born Rich of the Westgayer clan?”

  “What’s your name, warrior?” Whisperer looked him up and down.

  “Ross,” the guard was starting to acquire the air of a warrior, “High-Born Rich of the Westgayer clan!”

  “You are the bearer of a good name, warrior!” Whisperer said with pathos. “You are now under my command! Open the weapons room!”

  “Yes, sir! High-Born Rich of the Westgayer clan!”

  Ross rushed to execute the order and nearly dropped his own spear. The lad seemed happy to be useful at least in some way. Waiting for the forest creatures to come to him seemed to have damaged his morale. When his order was carried out, Whisperer came up to the guard, and looking into his eyes with a fatherly tender look, asked, “Warrior, do you want mothers of the Great City to name their children after you?”

  “Yes,” Ross’s eyes widened.

  “Do you want to earn the blessing to be named High-Born?”

  The young man was looking at Whisperer with admiration, devouring him with his eyes.

  “Today, you have been blessed with a chance to do a great favor to the Great City!” Whisperer said solemnly. “Don’t let me down, young man!”

  “What? Of course! Happy to serve!” Ross talked in a rapid fire. “What do I have to do? Just give me your orders!”

  “Keep the gate open. Soon, I will bring people here. You will need to give them all weapons quickly.”

  “May I ask High-Born Rich, how many of them will come?”

  “A thousand. Perhaps, two.”

  “Wow!” Ross said unwittingly. “I mean, of course. Then, with your permission, I will open the second gate as well. That will make things move faster.”

  “Great, do it!” Whisperer turned his back to the guard, as if having lost interest in him, and loudly ordered to his companions, “Follow me!”

  The hunters crossed the square and went through the low arches to the underground. On approach, Nick asked him, “Whisperer, why didn’t you tell me you’d reached an agreement with Gorr?

  “But I didn’t,” Whisperer’s face expressed nothing.

  “Then what did you show to the guard?” Nick was dumbfounded.

  “Our travel document, what else, Nick?”

  Nick tried to understand what he’d heard. He wanted to ask additional questions, but Whisperer already ducked under the low stone ceiling. Sith stopped, letting Nick go first, “Go ahead, Nick, I’ll follow you.”

  *****

  The large hall was dimly lit with smoke-free torches. They were installed into specially designed holders under the ceiling along the entire perimeter of the hall. When his eyes got used to the half-dark room, Nick noticed several wide staircases, going down sharply. Whisperer stopped for a second, as if hesitating, and then went to one of the staircases. They took one flight of stairs down and found themselves in front of a massive wooden gate. The gate was bolted with a huge roughly planed log that had been let through two large hinges. For extra assurance, the hinges were secured in a large chain with a heavy lock on it.

  “Oh, wow,” Whisperer stroked his beard. “Who thought of this? Sith, try to open it!”

  The boy let his spear through the chain links and tried to break it, using the weight of his body. Nothing.

  “Let me try,” Nick pushed Sith to the side, took the chain with his both hands. Then he grounded his feet, pressing them against the right half of the gate, and yanked the chain toward himself. The hinges croaked. Nick pulled harder, one of the chain links broke and the chain fell with a loud clank on the stone floor.

  “That’s better,” Whisperer muttered. “Let’s get this one out!”

  Together with Sith, they pushed the log out of the hinges.

  They were already expected behind the gate. Among the entire meeting party consisting of stern men, Nick only recognized Igo. But judging by how happy they were to see Whisperer, greeting him by putting their open hands on their chests, it was clear that they all knew each other. Igo stepped forward and said, “We are ready, Whisperer. Here, as you can see, the elders and whisperers from the Bony Mountain Chain and our two valleys, the Near Valley and the
Far Valley.”

  “I am glad to see you all in good health,” Whisperer greeted them. “Till the very last moment, I didn’t want to ask you to take up arms. But the situation is getting worse and worse. It is already clear that this is not a usual Exodus as we knew before. There are great many more beasts moving here. I am afraid that without your help the city guards will not be able to hold the walls.”

  “We can feel this as well,” a hunchbacked old man stepped forward, and, leaning on a gnarled stick, continued in a trembling voice, “Otherwise we wouldn’t have agreed to break the Guardians’ testament. Other whisperers and I,” he turned around and bowed to other old men, “called the Big Circle last night.”

  “Is that so?” Whisperer raised his bushy brows in surprise. “Did you receive an answer?”

  “Yes,” the old man turned around again, as if asking the others for permission. “To be honest, we do not all agree on how to interpret it correctly.”

  He fell silent, thinking and looking for the words carefully, and then continued, “But we all agree about the main thing.”

  “Don’t drag it out, Shorr,” Nick felt that Whisperer was really concerned, “Tell me.”

  “The Forest decided this land belongs to it.”

  “Belongs to it,” Whisperer repeated the words as if tasting them. “All of it?”

  “This is where we couldn’t agree,” Shorr turned around and bowed to the other old men. “Some believe all of it. Others think that only the land along the Rapid Waters.”

  “Both versions are really bad. Really bad,” Whisperer gave all of them a long concerned look. “The Tower stands very near to the Rapid Waters.”

  “If the Forest decided to take this land, we cannot just sit and wait it out underground.” It was obvious that Shorr had repeated these words many times before. “There is no other way but to fight. The Departed help us. Then the Exodus will subside and we will be able to return home.”

  “Are the people ready?”

  “Yes, waiting for the signal.”

  “Then go ahead! Lead them to the weapons room. Everyone will get his weapons back,” saying nothing more, Whisperer turned around and went upstairs. Nick and Sith followed him.

  *****

  The fight was already on the walls. The guards, having dropped the useless bows and crossbows, were fighting with swords and double-edged axes with short handles. Nick tried to see what kinds of beasts they were dealing with, but it was difficult to discern anything from beneath. He could only see long shadows of dark bodies and contours of the guards chopping them at full force. He could hear peoples’ screams, the crackling of bones and clanking of swords, and the roaring of wounded animals. The shooters at the watchman towers were shooting from crossbows, helping those who were fighting on the walls.

  From the underground to the open gate of the weapons room, there was a long line of hunters. They were silently waiting for their turn to receive the weapons that they had given up the day before. The people threw alarmed looks at the walls. Sith, Whisperer and several elders were helping Ross to hand out the weapons. The hunters, who received their spears and knives, stepped aside right away to give way to the others.

  At that moment Nick heard cursing followed by loud verbal fighting. Whisperer waved at Nick to follow him. With great difficulty they got through the dense crowd of hunters who were standing around the weapons room. “Oh, as if we needed this right now!” the old man muttered.

  In the center of the square, there were two carts pulled by sloths. Several guards were sitting in the carts, dangling their feet and toying with the charged crossbows. Next to the carts, there were three more guards, who did not dare to leave it. One seemed familiar to Nick. He was shouting at the top of his lungs, using all sorts of foul language, “Make way, stinky foresters! Who allowed you to crawl back out? Guards! Come here!”

  Whisperer quickly ran up to him. It was obvious that the crowd of hunters was hardly containing itself from attacking the soldiers.

  “Why are you yelling, dear?” Whisperer wanted to come closer, but the guard put his spear forward.

  “Don’t come closer, old man!” he stepped back, yelling. “I will give the order to shoot!”

  “You, young man, seem to have gone mad with fear.” Whisperer tried to speak calmly. “The commandant ordered to give weapons to all Near Forest residents. Look, they are already fighting on the walls!”

  “This is unheard of!” Nick heard the troublemaker and recognized him. It was Root, the husky guard who created a fuss on the ferry. “To give foresters the weapons! And where? In the Tower!”

  “And why did you bring the carts in here?”

  “To take the weapons, of course! Rekk’s order. We have run out of all arrows. In a little while, the beasts will break through to the pier. The fire cannot contain them any more. They are coming and coming…”

  “You see,” Whisperer tried to ease the situation. “And if they break through here, then your end is near as well. They’ll kill everyone!”

  They suddenly felt the ground under their feet shaking. Nick looked around, puzzled. “Earthquake?” he thought quickly. A crowd of hunters started to back up. Whisperer froze, listening to something attentively. The ground shook again. From the center of the square, black cracks in the ground started to run in different directions.

  “Back away! Everyone, back away!” the alarmed screams were heard from everywhere. “It’s a ground-digger! Back away!”

  The ground in the center of the square quickly bulked up into a large hump and then broke into two parts with a loud cracking sound. A moment later, something that resembled either the tentacles of an enormous octopus or tangled roots of a giant tree started to emerge from inside the crack.

  “It broke through!” Nick heard someone in the crowd screaming, “It broke through!”

  Nick mesmerized, froze, unable to tear his eyes away from the surreal picture. He was watching more and more tentacles emerge from the black mouth of a gap in the ground, moving their countless branches of various lengths and shapes that reminded him of a mighty root system of a tree uprooted by a tornado. The tentacles, moving their circles out, were crawling farther and farther, trying to reach the people who had frozen in awe and fear.

  Then everything got scrambled. Nick noticed Root jumping onto the cart. The guards started to whip the sloths, trying to get away from the underground monster as fast as possible. Whisperer grabbed Nick by the hand and dragged him to the side. Right in time as one of the tentacles, arching into a huge ring, slapped the ground a second later, and like a swatter, managed to squash the second cart with the guards in it.

  Nick and Whisperer ran to the farthest wall of the weapons room and caught their breath. “What do we do now, Whisperer?” Nick yelled on top of all the noise around. “How do we fight this beast?”

  Many hunters snapped out of their initial shock and put their spears forward. Nick saw about a dozen of men attacking the nearest wriggling tentacle, fiercely piercing it with the spears. This seemed to have some effect: The beast was clearly in pain. Trying to avoid the hunters’ attack, the tentacle quickly recoiled back into the gap. One of the hunters did not manage to jump over it, stumbled, and fell on the ground. His leg was tangled in one of the tentacle’s outgrowths, and he was being dragged into the gap. The hunter was desperately fighting back, until he disappeared inside the crack.

  “Tar, Nick,” Whisperer said in broken voice.

  Nick followed the old man’s index finger and realized what Whisperer meant. About sixty yards away from the gap, there was a tripod with a huge cauldron of boiling tar. The guards who had been keeping up the fire underneath it had left their post a long time ago and now were fighting the beasts on the fortress walls.

  “The tar needs to be poured right into the ground-digger’s mouth,” Whisperer grabbed Nick by the hand again, “Did you hear me, Nick? Right into its mouth!”

  “Got it, Whisperer,” Nick looked at the tentacles feeling out the g
round right next to the cauldron. Then he looked at Sith. He thought that it would be probably better if he did everything by himself this time. No need to risk the young boy.

  “No time for a staring contest!” Sith was trying to look brave. “If we need to pour it, we will pour it. Right, Whisperer?”

  Without waiting for Nick’s answer, the boy started to move carefully. Nick followed him. He heard Whisperer gathering the hunters around himself, but decided not to get distracted and concentrated on the path to the tripod. They needed to make only about a hundred steps, which is nothing in essence. During the sprinting contests on Earth, Nick could easily do a hundred meters in eight seconds. But now his path was covered with dozens of tentacles, contracting in waves. Nick wished his always cool-headed friends, Ron and big Valu, were there. “I wonder, how they are doing now?”

  Nick breathed out slowly, blocking out everything that could distract him. “One, two, three, one and…” Nick started to count, trying to figure out the patterns in the ground-digger movements, “two, pause, three. Let’s go!”

  Leap! He jumped over the tentacle that just reached the ground. One, two, three. Stop! Nick waited for the next ring to curl and rolled over his shoulder through the arch it formed. The way he advanced to his goal resembled the children’s computer game, a quest where the player had to overcome various obstacles one by one. The only difference was that in the simulator one could make an indefinite number of attempts, while here Nick had only one. Jumping over the next tentacle-like root (upon closer inspection, Nick could swear it was no animal), he found Sith with his eyes. The boy was swerving and swirling, quickly advancing. While Nick tried to avoid even touching these disgusting pale-pink, covered in brown clay roots, Sith, on the contrary, bravely climbed them over, grabbing the outgrowths to pull himself and keep his balance.

  They reached the tripod at the same time, and even though Sith was all covered in mud, his eyes were sparkling with joy. “Obviously,” Nick thought unwittingly, “we played different games in childhood.” They hardly caught their breath when the shouts and yells of the hunters became louder.