‘Where are we?’
‘This is a most clever and useful thing,’ said Nakor. They stood on a platform and Pug could feel a vibration through his feet and heard a deep and distant thrumming noise. ‘Soon a thing like a wagon is going to come by and we are going to get on it. Move quickly because it doesn’t slow down.’
‘What—?’ began Magnus, just as the device Nakor had described appeared.
It was like a wagon, in so far as it had a flat bed and what would have been a driver’s bench, except there were no animals drawing it. And rather than a cargo bed in the back, there were more benches. ‘Jump!’ Nakor shouted.
They did, and all three arrived within one bench of one another.
‘It takes some practice, I guess,’ said Nakor.
‘What is it?’
‘I don’t know what they call it here, but I think of it as a really big tram.’
‘Tram?’ asked Magnus.
‘Miners use them,’ said his father. ‘Dolgan the dwarf king in the Grey Towers told me about them. We were travelling through an ancient mine and I saw an abandoned tram off in a side tunnel.’
Nakor said, ‘I’ve seen them down in Kesh, in the copper and tin mines. They have big wheels so they can be pulled by mules. They load them up with ore and haul it out of the mine. They use little ones they push by hand to fill the big ones. Sometimes they lay roadways of wood.’
‘How does this thing work?’
‘There’s some massive contrivance, an engine of some sort, perhaps water-driven or by some other means, that moves along on a giant tether in a big loop. If you ride it long enough, you end up back where you got on.’ He paused. ‘Hang on, there’s a place ahead where we—’ Before he could finish there was a hard jolt and suddenly the tram picked up speed. ‘I think there’s a device that moves it from a slow tether to a fast one. There’s another jolt when we slow down at the other end.’
‘Who built it?’ The Dasati?’ asked Magnus. Pug understood his son’s question. The constructions on this world and Kosridi were massive, beyond the abilities of people on Midkemia or Kelewan who had built some impressive structures by human standards. But the scale of the building and engineering in this world required such things as they had observed: massive doors beyond any known means of moving; arching bridges that spanned miles and defied the imagination. Nothing they had seen of the Dasati indicated that this was a significant population with the talents and abilities to build such things, nor was there a hint of any new construction or projects. To all appearances, it was a society stagnant to the point of necrosis.
‘Where does this take us?’ asked Pug.
‘Into the heart of madness,’ replied Nakor as the tram sped along into a vast tunnel leading to the darkness.
The tunnel seemed endless. Pug lost track of time, though he was certain they had been moving for less than half an hour. Still, at the rate of speed they were travelling, they must be at least ten or more miles from where they boarded. ‘How much longer?’
‘We’re about half way. That’s why I said we had to hurry. And we cannot linger at our destination. Or at least I can’t. You and Magnus can decide what to do when I show you what you need to see. I have to get back before they rouse the recruits lest Bek does something… well, something that Bek might do.’
Pug noticed that since coming to the second realm, Nakor’s usually cheery spirits were all but absent. He was subdued, and Pug could understand why: not only were the Dasati a grim and bloody people by human standards, but their concept of humour was almost exclusively limited to pain and suffering. There was more. Over the last few weeks, there had been a growing sense of despair and fear, and the attitudes and habits of the population in the city had been changing. Fewer ventured out after dark, and markets that had been thronging when Pug had first arrived on Omadrabar were all but deserted. Groups of Lessers scurried in the shadows and cringed visibly as Deathknights rode past. Deathpriests and Hierophants were all but absent from public view, being locked away in the black heart of the Dark One’s temple, involved in preparations for the Dark One’s next horror.
Martuch and Hirea were even more stoic than usual, barely speaking unless asked direction questions. Pug was left with the impression that there was usually a sense of relief after a Great Culling, a sense of survival and relative calm. But this time something was different. Rumours abounded in the city, but no one really knew what was coming next, for nothing like this had ever occurred before. The loss of two of the TeKarana’s legions was a sacrifice unprecedented in Dasati history.
The tram jerked and slowed and Nakor said, ‘We get off in a moment.’