It wasn’t at all what Eanrin had expected. But as long as the badger-man hastened in the direction Asha was indicating, he supposed they couldn’t get into too much trouble, at least, no worse than they were already in. He hastened after his rival, watching how the lantern lit the Path one step ahead of Glomar’s scurrying feet. Only a single step, but it was enough.
Eanrin wondered how long he had been so guided without knowing it.
“How did you end up here, cat?” Glomar asked after they had progressed some moments. “Did you fall for the vision too?”
“What vision, Glomar?”
The captain growled. “Nothing. Nothing at all.” He was silent several paces. Then, “Seriously, though, how did you end up in this tomb?”
“Tomb?”
“Yes, tomb. Don’t tell me you didn’t know.”
“Didn’t know what?”
“Gah! I should never expect a straight answer from you, should I?”
“Lumé’s crown, Glomar,” Eanrin cried, tempted to kick the captain’s heels, “I wish I had some idea what you were going on about! By the Flowing Gold itself, I know of no tomb, nor visions. I fell into a pit, a nasty, dark, and stinking pit. And what with one thing and another”—there was little use, he decided, in trying to explain the Dark Water or, still less, the Hound—“I ended up here. With you, more’s the pity. But I know nothing of any tomb.”
“Must be the city playing its tricks again,” Glomar said with a shrug and continued along his stumping way. “It’s getting stronger, I shouldn’t wonder, the longer Hri Sora is awake. They’re feeding off each other. I can smell it. Here in the dark places I sense what I couldn’t up there under the red sky. Hri Sora is getting stronger.”
Eanrin frowned, surprised at the captain’s words. He had felt no such sensations himself. But then, his adventure had obviously led him an entirely different route than Glomar’s, and his senses had been distracted.
“What tomb are we in?” he asked the badger-man.
“Hers,” Glomar said, his voice sinking to a low growl. “Or at least, hers before she became her. Before she took the fire. This is the tomb for the last Queen of Etalpalli, and her name has been melted away from above the door.”
Eanrin shuddered. “Hri Sora is the last Queen of Etalpalli,” he said.
“Hri Sora is its mistress,” said Glomar. “But she is not queen.”
Were they, then, still in the tomb as Glomar believed? Eanrin wondered. Or were they both now in the Netherworld, still near the Dark Water? If Glomar had died in the tomb, and Eanrin in the fall, then there could be no doubt the Netherworld was their fate. Terrible thoughts for an immortal to consider, and Eanrin found his mind rejecting the notion. He focused once more upon Asha.
“Light,” said Glomar.
“What?” Eanrin looked up, wondering if the captain had suddenly perceived the lantern after all. But no. He saw beyond the glow of Asha another, more distant source. A pinprick of daylight.
The tunnel had an end. But what end? Eanrin wondered.
It didn’t matter. He and Glomar were instantly running, Asha swinging lightly in Eanrin’s hand, still guiding, though neither looked to it for guidance. The daylight seemed forever away, but they were immortal and lived without thought of Time, so forever mattered less than the need to somehow get there. How long they ran in the dark could not be measured in minutes or hours. But run they did, neither speaking, both hoping beyond hope for an end at last to this blackness.
Suddenly the pinprick was a window, then the window was a door. The two men of Rudiobus burst through from darkness to light, momentarily blinded. They cried out, whether in joy or pain, neither could guess. It was impossible to emerge from that tunnel, like a newborn bursting into the world for the first time, and not make a cry. And they fell upon the ground and lay for some while.
At last Eanrin raised his head and looked about.
Then he gasped and sat up. “Glomar!”
His companion lay beside him, still groaning, feet splayed out behind him. Eanrin grabbed him by the hair atop his head and gave a little shake. “Glomar, look around you, man! A fine mess this is.”
Glomar huffed and spluttered what might have been curses had they been coherent and pushed himself up onto his elbows. “Lumé smite me,” he growled, shaking his head. “We’re in the dragon-eaten Between.”
So they were. They lay on the banks of the River, beneath the shadows of the Wood, and both could hear the roar of Cozamaloti’s not-too-distant falls.
Eanrin leapt to his feet, then realized his hands were empty. He cast about like a lunatic, searching the banks, even stepping down close to the water. The River snarled at him, and he backed up quickly, his eyes wide and his hair bristling. The River was not one to soon forget an offense. Eanrin scrambled over slippery rocks onto a higher tuft of ground, searching.
It was no use. Asha was gone. Perhaps it had never been. Eanrin ground his teeth. Curse that Hound! Curse that Light! He was back where he’d started from and he’d . . .