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THE SALVE BEGAN TO work. Tali taught them all how to apply it and where. It seemed that the sores of the chakka-folk were extensive, but worse on exposed skin. And the quiet of their patient seemed to be resignation rather than any sign of deterioration. That was a relief at least. It seemed that the loud noises that they had become used to in the chakka-folk were reserved for confrontations only. Once he’d resigned himself to capture and decided he was to be treated fairly, his noises seemed to center around gentle hissing variations with the odd one or two teeth clicks here and there.
“I’m sure its language,” Dun said.
“Yeah, I think so too,” Tali said.
“Does it much matter?” Padg said.
“Yes, it matters. If we want to negotiate, it’ll make life a hell of a lot easier,” Myrch said.
“Suppose,” Padg said.
“But will we get a chance to learn it in time?” Dun said.
“Chakk, CHAKK.”
“Did you say that to us?” Tali said.
“CHAK.”
“I think we can take that as a yes,” Padg said.
“Chakk, CHAKK.”
“He’s either a really quick study or he already understands a common folk language,” Myrch said.
“Chakk, CHAKK.”
“Which?” Dun said.
“That makes a fantastic yes or no question, idiot,” Padg said. “Are you a quick study?”
“Sssssttthhh.”
“That could be no,” Tali said.
“CHAKK.”
“So you understand us clearly,” Dun said.
“CHAKK.”
“But you can’t speak like we do?” Tali said, warming to her line of questioning.
“Sssssth.”
“Is it because of how your mouths are?”
“CHAKK.”
“You can’t make the same noises we do?”
“Sssth.”
That sounded sad to Dun. They weren’t dealing with a terrifying group of fabled monsters here.
“The wounds you’ve got,” Tali said, “are they to do with where you live?”
“CHAKK.”
“Are they burns?”
“CHAKK.”
“From a chemical, is it a liquid that burns you?”
“Sssth.”
“A heat then? Like from a vent?”
“...chakk?”
“Is that a kind of?” Dun said.
“CHAKK.”
“So something burns you,” Tali said.
“CHAKK.”
“Where you live...”
“CHAKK.”
“It's like the heat from a vent, but not that? Correct?”
“CHAKK, CHAKK!”
“Good work, Tali,” Myrch said. “At least now we’ve got an idea what we’re getting ourselves into.”
“More importantly,” Tali said, “do you feel better? Is the pain less?”
“CHAKK, CHAKK, CHAKK, CHAKK!”
“Good, I’m glad,” she said. “The medicine seems to be working. We can teach you how to make it.”
“Do you have a leader?” Myrch said. “Someone we can talk to. Someone who speaks for all of you?”
“CHAKK.”
“Right then,” Myrch said, “let's go on a house call.”
***
IT WAS PARTICULARLY strange, following someone whose language you don’t really speak. Especially since, Chak as they’d decided to call him, insisted on hurrying on ahead then “chakking” impatiently. Strange and deeply worrying since they weren’t sure, even after Chak’s seeming successful course of treatment, how they’d be received. And in this weirdest of abandoned cavernous places, there was always danger. The route varied greatly in altitude and texture underfoot, seeming like the farther they got into Chakka-folk territory, the more they felt like there was no ground anymore. The disorientation wasn’t helped by one set of chakking coming from above and ahead of them.
It seemed the way to reach the home of these strange people was to climb and steeply too. Dun tallied this with the idea of the original ambush on them, coming from above. Why they couldn’t be hoisted up in the opposite way he wasn’t sure. He was pretty sure that a conversation like that was too complicated to get a sensible answer out of Chak playing the yes, no game. His thoughts were disrupted by the increasing trickiness of the climb. It seemed that the chakka people had treated the holds and ledges that made up the route, with something tacky and faintly resinous. That made gripping easier but didn’t lessen how hard work the vertical climb was. Padg, always the fitter of the two called up from below.
“You two doing okay?”
“Yeah,” Tali said.
“Uh-huh,” Dun panted.
“Not much farther now,” Myrch called down from above them.
Chak seemed to have reached as far up as he needed to go and was making impatient chakking back down to the climbers below. Dun heard a grunt as Myrch pulled himself up what must be the last stretch. Three more handholds and he was there himself, a right-angled ledge that would give them a new level to walk on. He heard Tali behind him pulling up the last reach, he felt stable enough underfoot to offer her a hand up.
“Thanks.”
“Chakk, chakk, CHAKK.”
“Okay, we’re coming!” Padg said. “So impatient these Chakka types.”
Dun walked along the ledge. It was wide enough to walk or stand on but not wide enough for two to pass. The high flat stretch of the wall was rougher on one side of them, the expansive dropped to the ground on the other side pressing on his awareness. He put it all to the back of his mind and tried to close down his air-sense before the vertigo made him sick.
“Chakk chakk” came the voice of their guide distantly from the front of the column.
It seemed Chak’s voice resonated from wherever he was ahead. As Dun neared he realized why. Once off the ledge, he let his air-sense expand again, whiskers twitching, and took in what was in front of him. A space in which everything was confusing. There was a roof just high enough for each of them to stand, but the space was massive in length and width. Metal walls and roof from the sound and bounce back from Dun’s air-sense, but some other substance for the floor, mineral based, but not quite rock. Smooth, but not quite flat either.
Dun slowly adjusted to the feel of the place as they very slowly banked and climbed on the odd smooth mock stone surface.
“Chakk, chakk.” STAMP.
“What’s up with him now?” Padg said.
“I think he’s trying to tell us something,” Dun said.
“Well done,” Padg said. “Perhaps he’s cross.”
Tali sighed. “Have you been paying any attention at all? That’s not cross. I don’t know what it is, but it’s new.”
“Meh,” Padg said, “linguistics was never my, aaaaaahhhhh.”
Dun heard a whoosh, a slap of flesh on flesh, and Padg disappeared from his air-sense.
“I think,” Myrch said, grunting, “that he was saying ‘Be careful of the holes in the floor.’” Dun rushed to the noise, Myrch had somehow caught Padg mid-fall by his hand and held him as he walked blithely into the hole and fell his full height. Gods, that must have hurt, thought Dun. He reached round Padg’s other side and grabbed him by his shoulder and pulled. They grunted and groaned Padg back up.
“Thanks,” Padg said, breathlessly.
“Take slightly more care, there’s a chap,” Myrch said.
“Is your arm okay?” Dun said.
“A bit bashed, but not broken. Thank you for asking.”
“Hold on,” Tali said. “I’ve got some bruise-wort in my pack,”
“No, thank you.”
“It’s no trouble for me to put on, easy in fact. Won’t take a...”
“No! Thank you.”
` “O...kay... just asking.”
“Shall we move on?” Padg said, feigning cheer.
“Not until we’re all a little more careful,” Myrch said.
When Dun concentrated and reached out carefully with his air-sense he felt something other than the odd surface of the floor. The whole floor expanse itself was pocked with holes leading down. He felt down by his feet at the hole they’d just extracted Padg from. It was rough-hewn, but the sides were worn with use. Slightly sloping inward, clearly a good way for someone not paying attention to fall foul of. Literally.
“Chakk, chakk, aaaahh.” Chak sounded, what? Cheerful? Proud? Pleased? He was quite close to Dun by the hole.
“Chakk, chakk, aaaahh.” This time the entreaty was accompanied by a heavy metallic chink-squeak sound overhead. The squeak echoed on for a while.
“Aahh?” again the chink-squeak.
What was the thing that Chak was telling Dun about? It was metal, attached to something else metal and swung freely. Chak touched Dun’s hand.
“What is it, Chak? What are you trying to tell me?”
Chakk held Dun’s hand gently and lifted it up overhead to the roof. There over the hole, Chakk led Dun by feel, to a metal ring, bolted into the ceiling, exactly over the hole.
“Aahh? Chakk, chakk, aahh?”
“The ring is something to do with the hole?” Dun said.
“Chakk.”
“Okay, and it’s important.”
“Chakk.”
“Why? Why is it important?”
“It’s how they get down,” Tali said, suddenly understanding. “You use ropes through the rings, Chak?”
“Chakk!”
“And you abseil down,” Myrch said.
“Chakk?”
“Slide down the rope? Yes, clever. And getting up?”
“Chakk, chakk, nnnnnhhhh! Chakk, chakk, nnnnnhhh!”
“Ah, more folk pull them up from up here?” Padg said.
“Chakk!” he said brightly.
“Clever,” Myrch said again. “Very clever,” he muttered walking on.
“Chakk, chakk!” Chak had held out his palm and Dun walked into it.
“What, Chak?”
“Chakk, chakk!” He held his palm firm against Dun’s chest.
“I think he wants us to wait here,” Dun said.
“Okay,” Tali said.
“And we trust him? Just like that?” Myrch said.
“Yes,” Tali said, “I think we do.”
“After all the stories of folk disappearing and never returning?” he pressed.
“Yes!” Tali said firmly. “I think he’s honorable and if he’s a reflection of his people, then we can expect them to be honest too.”
“And if not?”
“We’ll just have to wait. I trust him.”
“So we wait,” Myrch said, statement more than a question.
“We wait.”
