“Who are you?” Garth repeated.
It was Ravenna who answered. She struggled to her knees, ignoring Maximilian by her side, then abased herself before the strange man. “Drava,” she whispered, “Lord of Dreams, I honour you.”
Garth started, stunned. This extraordinary creature was really the Lord of Dreams?
Drava leaned down and took Ravenna’s hand, helping her to her feet. Behind her Maximilian rose slowly as well, his expression wary. Above him, Cavor’s sword still hung from the hanging wall.
“You were friendlier,” Drava smiled at Ravenna, “when you thought me only a sad, blue creature.” He did not let go of her hand.
The wires had been laid in place days before, and now their ingenious, deadly design did not fail. The slight tug that Furst had given the wire by the cage door activated a lever deep within the bowels of the Veins, and that in turn activated yet another, and that in turn…and so in turn the deadly chain reaction pulsed towards the charges laid in their careful holes in the thin rock-face.
The rock-face had been abandoned several years ago once the workings scraped too close to the sea pounding restlessly five paces through the rock. The face had been shored up and left alone…left alone until recently when the struts and supports had been removed or weakened, and holes carefully drilled into the rock-face itself so that concentric rings rippled out from a central hole.
And then the charges were placed, and connected, and left in peace.
Now wires tugged and pulled, busy levers snapped closed or open, and flint artfully arranged sparked in sudden fury.
Starting from the outside circle, a series of split-second explosions worked their way through to the central charge. In a heartbeat the rock-face blew apart.
For a few minutes there was nothing but the dust clouds and the darkness, then a small trickle of green water crept through a tiny fissure, creeping almost apologetically about the chaotic jumble of rocks, then it was joined by another, then another, and then the rock-face was blown apart by another massive blast and this time there was no dust but screaming, triumphant water that filled the entire tunnel and then began to boil and foam its way upwards.
They felt rather than heard the blast and the subsequent rupture. Maximilian scrambled to his feet and laid his hand on the tunnel wall.
It was vibrating underneath his fingers.
Drava tilted his head to one side, curious. “Hark,” he said softly, “the sea has penetrated.”
Now all could not only feel it beneath their feet but hear it as well, a distant roar…and the sudden, horrifying scent of the salt water that chased away the stench of the gloam.
Garth wished they were still wrapped safely in the stench.
“It’s bad,” Maximilian whispered. “Very bad.” He paused, and when he resumed his voice was curiously toneless. “We’re dead. No-one is going to be able to escape this cataclysm.”
Drava tightened his hold on Ravenna’s hand. As Maximilian had spoken she’d moved closer to him, and he could feel her trembling. “Oh,” he smiled, “I don’t know about that.”
“Maximilian,” his tone turned brisk, and he clapped his other hand on the king’s shoulder, “are you prepared to dare the dream?”
Maximilian stared at the Lord of Dreams. “What do you mean?”
“Do you have the courage?” Drava’s voice had turned hard now, challenging.
Maximilian straightened his back and shoulders. “Yes, Drava. Yes I do.”
“Do you want to escape beyond the hanging wall?”
“Yes.” Maximilian hesitated. “Drava, there are other men here as well. Thousands. Guards and prisoners. Whatever their crimes, none deserve to die like this.”
Drava arched one blue eyebrow. “Criminals, Maximilian? You would rescue criminals?”
Maximilian did not lower his eyes. “I am responsible for them, Drava—and if there is to be hope for me, then it should encompass them as well.”
Drava nodded slowly. Maximilian was not only the true king, he would be a good king as well. “As you wish.” He turned away slightly as he smiled down at Ravenna. He shifted his grip on her hand so that their fingers interlaced. “Ravenna, will you help me?”
She returned his smile; Drava needed no-one”s help…but it was nice of him to ask. “Surely, Lord.”
“Then,” the Lord of Dreams whispered, and traces of green light flickered through his eyes, “let us dare the dream.”
Whatever light there had been in the tunnel abruptly died; Garth, who was standing close to Egalion, heard the man breathe deep in fear, and he could hear his own breath similarly rattle in his throat. The roar of the sea was now closer…much, much closer, so close the tunnel floor was shaking underneath his feet.
With a startling clatter Cavor’s sword fell from the hanging wall, followed an instant later by a shower of small rocks.
Without a word the group bunched closer together and Garth felt Maximilian place a hand on his shoulder and that of Egalion. “Courage,” the king whispered. “Believe in the dream.”
“Believe,” Drava echoed, and then everyone save the Lord of Dreams took great breaths of surprise, for the blackness had been replaced by a delicate green light.
Thousands of tiny emerald lines were spreading across the rock above and below them in delicate webs. As the startled onlookers watched, the lines spread up from the floor and down from the hanging wall until the tunnel was encased in tiny, wriggling emerald lines.
Cracks. Tens of thousands of them.
Garth remembered his dreams of the fracturing rock-face, and he could not help a shudder of horror.
“Courage,” Maximilian repeated, and Garth heard the confidence in the king’s voice, and let it relax him.
The emerald web surrounding them continued to thicken and spread until, within only a few minutes, the entire tunnel seemed to be made of frosted emerald glass. Garth, Maximilian’s hand still resting on his shoulder, jumped in surprise—beyond the opaque walls he could see the sea shadow and move.
“Welcome to the dream,” Drava said.
“Surely this is taking too long,” Cavor muttered, the fingers of one hand entwined in the wire of the cage for support. “Surely we fell faster than this?”
Furst glared at the low ceiling of the cage, as if that would help propel it to the surface. The cage appeared to be moving fast enough, and it grunted and screeched and rocked as if it was putting its best effort in. “Falling is always faster than rising, sire. Be patient.”
But Cavor could hear the doubt in Furst’s voice. “I want to get out of here, Furst.”
Furst grinned nastily. No doubt. No doubt at all.
Cavor’s mouth twisted in fury as he watched the expression on Furst’s face. “We are in this together…” he began, then puzzlement replaced his fury. “What?”
Furst spun about in the cage, only keeping his feet with difficulty as the cage rocked even more violently.
Faint emerald light trickled through the wire netting and iron framework of the cage.
The next moment Furst forgot all about the light as Cavor grunted in surprise and fell to the floor with an enormous thud. He tried to get up again, but it was almost as if the man’s right shoulder and arm were pinned to the floor.
“The mark,” Cavor gasped, pain carving deep lines into his face. “It’s so heavy…so heavy.” He grunted, trying to rise again, then screamed, his body twisting and writhing about the spot where his arm and shoulder were pinned. “Stone! The mark is turning to stone!”
The cage slowed.
Garth’s nervousness rapidly gave way to sheer wonder. Now the shapes of fish and frolicking whales cavorted beyond the rapidly clearing emerald walls. He slowly turned on the spot, not knowing which way to look first.
Maximilian smiled as he watched Garth, then caught Drava’s eyes. The Lord of Dreams nodded slightly, and Maximilian walked past him and further down the tunnel. Drava and Ravenna followed, still hand in hand, then Garth and Egalion, both utterly awe-struck by the sights they witnessed, scrambled after them.
The tunnel twisted and bent, as Garth remembered it had, and at about the third bend Maximilian came across the first gang of prisoners. Both prisoners and guards were huddled on the floor, their eyes glazed, not knowing if they were still alive or had, somehow, unknowingly passed into death.
In this fragile emerald tunnel their filth seemed even more degrading and dehumanising than it had by flickering torchlight.
Maximilian smiled reassuringly as he approached, then squatted down by the huddled group. The men stared at him, their eyes wide and terrified, but they did not move.
“Drava,” Maximilian said quietly, not lifting his eyes from the men before him, “will you aid me in this?”
“Assuredly,” Drava replied.
“Do you know me?” Maximilian asked the men.
Silence, and then one man spoke, his voice rasping with fear. “You are Maximilian, the lost prince.”
Maximilian smiled, wide and beautiful, and the men visibly relaxed. “Yes, I am Maximilian, the lost prince. I was lost beneath the hanging wall…did you know that?”