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DUN AND THE OTHERS had not been waiting long before they sensed a creeping presence on all sides of them and the disturbing scent of more Chakka-folk drifted into them. Dun counted about twenty and filed the count under “outnumbered” and waited. The fainter scent of Tali’s balm ointment was there too, so Dun wasn’t too worried.
“Chakk, chakk!” At least Chak was still representing his people. The rest gathered round them and seemed to be prodding them with blunt sticks of some sort.
“I think we’re being encouraged to move on,” Dun said.
“I can’t help thinking of herd beasts,” Padg said. History had it that thousands upon thousands of cycles ago, the River-folk used to herd giant rat-like creatures and milk them, sometimes kill them to eat. Current River-folk always denied it. The example, Dun thought, was unnerving, but outnumbered as they were, he could find little choice but to follow.
Their shepherds prodded them from time to time to speed them or warn them around the gaping holes in the floor. They came to a steep-facing wall. Dun thought it was made from rusted metal, pitted surface. He could smell two more chakkas awaiting them in front of it. Guards maybe.
“Chakk!” Chak held out a hand to Dun’s chest again.
“I think he means wait here,” Dun said.
They heard a low hissing and chakking murmur between the guards and Chak as he presumably negotiated. It seemed like it had gone positively as the guards didn’t move and there seemed no flurry of activity that could be associated with apprehending intruders. They heard a huge noise of metal grating from the direction of the wall and felt the air move. It seemed like some kind of huge door was opening.
“Chakk!”
Wait again, thought Dun.
“I think he’ll be a while in there,” Dun said and hunkered down on his haunches ready for a wait. Tali sat next to him on the floor and stretched her legs out.
“Well, if we’re all sitting,” Padg said and sat himself.
Myrch paced.
They waited.
“If you could sit down now,” Padg said, “you’re making us all nervous.”
Myrch continued pacing.
He was disturbed by the sound of footsteps approaching from the door Chak had disappeared into. It wasn’t him coming back. All the folk approaching were doing so in step. Dun counted ten he thought, maybe more.
“Welcoming committee,” Myrch said. “Nice.”
The guard company coming out of the massive doorway seemed to split into two cohorts, the sound of one column flanking them on one side, the others down the opposite. Then they broke up into four small groups: behind, in front, left and right. Nowhere to run, then.
“CHAK!CHAK!” came the loud echo from all around them at once.
“CHAAAAAAAK!”
“Chak...chak...chak...chak.”
“Chak...chak...chak...chak.”
Foot stamps matched the beat of the clacking noise, it seemed they were to be marched inside, but whether as visitors or guests, it was hard to tell. They marched anyway.
It seemed their feet reverberated in huge booming sound then suddenly into a sharp, close staccato bark as they crossed the threshold into the Chakka-folks chambers. The guards fell into two lines left and right as it was only possible to move three abreast in this corridor. Dun knew they were the first people to visit this place, at least he hoped they’d be the first folk to visit and report back. Progressing down the corridor, it became hotter.
The corridor stretched on ahead of them and widened out into a largeish chamber. Once inside, there seemed to be a huge edifice in the middle of the room and the hissing noise of Chakka-folk all around them as if they were stacked on top of each other lining the walls, were there galleries around the room? The heat inside this sanctum was stifling. Dun wondered about it, as well as stifling, the heat was unlike any other he had ever felt. Unlike the vent’s heat that jetted on a cushion of air however hot, this heat was still, flat somehow, seemingly coming straight at them from the surfaces of the monolithic cube at the center of the chamber.
A voice came from the top of the cube. “I am sspeaker for the Chossen-folk.” The voice was odd, affected, but resonant nonetheless. “Who vissitss the womb of the ssacred energiess? And why?”
“Err, I am Tali! Speaker for the Bridge-folk. We have traveled many ways and pipes to meet you and we come with...”
“An offering?” Dun hissed.
“...an offering to your people, for, er...”
“Safe passage,” Myrch added.
“...in return for safe passage through your lands and territory.”
“We will think on thiss,” the voice said. “Who among the chosen would speak for you?”
There was silence while they all internally panicked.
“Wait! There is one among you who I hope would speak for us.” There was no point in calling him Chak in here. What then? “He was one, who... who...”
“Brought us here,” Dun said.
“Yes, the one who brought us here.”
“It iss well then. Come forth.” Then a word that seemed too much chakking and hissing to quick to make sense of. Was that Chak’s real name? There was a brief exchange of clacking and hissing and then silence.
“Come to us, speaker for the Bridge-folk. We would know of this strange comfort you bring to us.”
So Tali edged forward, prodded gently by the guards. Each step took her closer to the cube and so hotter in turn. How could they stand to be so close to whatever the hells it was? She guessed you got used to anything with enough time. She nearly reached the face of the cube, but her face bumped a wooden structure with flat, spaced horizontal edges. The guards poked her again. She had no idea what they wanted of her.
“Ascend,” the voice of the speaker said from above. Slowly, feeling for the wooden bars in front of her, she climbed.
The heat on Tali’s face was almost unbearable, she focused on putting one foot in front of the other and tried not to think about anything else. When she got to the top, two hands reached down to her and pulled her up. Dusting herself down, she oriented herself. There was a great flat expanse on top of the cube and some kind of a raised area in the middle where the speaker sat.
“Come to uss.”
Tali walked forward.
“What iss it you offer?” the Speaker said.
“I have a treatment that can help you, has helped one of you, I hope.”
“Do we need help?”
“Your skin, it has burns. I think I can help heal them and make the painless.”
“But we live with the pain, it iss part of who we are.”
“It doesn’t need to be. Speak to Cha... our friend and find if he feels its helped him.”
“And how would you make all of this medicine of yourss?”
“I could teach you how to make it, or your shamans or wise-men.”
“And in return?”
“You grant us safe passage through your territory.”
“I will conssider.”
“One more thing, we believe you have our guide Jarn. He must be returned.”
“We will provide you with a guide.”
“No, that’s not what I mean. He is our friend we would like him returned.”
“That is not possible.”
“Err... why?”
“CHAKK, CHAKK, CHAKK, CHAKK.”
“Chakk, chakk, chakk, chakk...”
“SILENCE! I will answer her, we are not barbarians. She has a need to know what has happened to her friend.”
Tali waited, the hissing of the Chakka-folk subsiding.
“He is to become the new speaker for the Chosen-folk.”
“Okay. Does he want to?” Tali said.
“That is immaterial. There must be a new speaker, he is the one.”
“But aren’t you the speaker?”
“I was chosen, as he is chosen, but my time is brief. Each speaker must speak while he can until the spirit of the chosen overwhelms him and he can speak no more.”
“I don’t understand. Why is your time brief? You sound only young.”
“So I am.” The speaker sounded amused. “But the fires of the spirit of the chosen burn bright, so I will teach the new speaker as I was taught, then I will join the ranks of the chosen.”
“You’ll die?”
“No.” Again the amused tone. “But I will speak no more.”
“Hmm.” Tali felt the heat rising up through the soles of her feet.
“You understand?” the Speaker said, kinder now.
“I think I might be starting to,” she said. “The fires-of-the-spirit-of-the-chosen; they are what we can feel all around us here? The heat?”
“Yes,” the speaker said. “What else would they be?”
“And the fires, consume the speaker, in the end,” she said. Knowing more now than asking.
“Yes.”
“Literally? It affects your face, so you can’t speak?”
“Yes.”
“You were captured, sorry, chosen, yourself?”
“Yes.”
“How long does it take? Until you can’t speak anymore?”
“I am privileged to be the speaker for a little while yet.” Again the amusement.
“But how long?”
“Five hundred spanss maybe. A little more. It takes one hundred spans to teach a new speaker. Less if they have a sharp ear.”
“Gods,” Tali said.
“It is the gods who chose uss. It is a privilege. Now as a speaker for your people, it is your time to choose. Do you leave with a blessing and a guide, or do you stay?”
“What about Jarn?” Tali asked.
“That is not a choice.”
“I must consult with my friends.”
“But you are the speaker for your people?”
“That is not how we do things.”
“Here it is how we do things. You must decide, they must abide by the decision.”
Tali had not been expecting that. It seemed like she must sanction abandoning Jarn to the Chosen-folk, at least to get them out of there and on their way. It was not something that she was happy about at all. In fact, there was very little about the whole situation that she was happy about like the mysterious source of heat that they stood on, that seemed to have permanently damaging effects on the Chosen, or the fact that their hosts seemed to kidnap folk entering their territory to become the next leader in who knew what kind of ritual. She was pleased that she’d created a salve that dealt with the pain, and without too much time to test it thoroughly, she thought a reasonable chance of improving healing and preventing infection to boot. And that was all she could settle for to comfort her. They had to go and leave Jarn to his chances.
Tali sighed. “We’ll go. I’ll show some of your people how to make the salve and where to find the ingredients. They’re pretty common.”
“Good luck, Tali of the Bridge-folk. May the gods follow your progress.”
“Prolonged exposure to darkness is a funny thing. First it made me frightened, then annoyed. For the longest time, I didn’t feel anything. Now I feel everything.”
Excerpts from <Distress Beacon SN-1853001>. Found by E.S.V. Vixen Terradate: 26102225.
