David Farland - The Lair of Bones

“Gaborn,” Iome asked, “is there danger ahead? Do you sense reavers?”

“Yes,” Gaborn said trying not to sound too ominous, “I sense danger, but not for many miles.”

He wondered at that. If the reavers were planning to set an ambush, what better place could they have to spring an attack than here in this dank fog?

Gaborn asked Averan, “You warned me yesterday about the dangers here. What are we likely to find ahead?”

Averan shook her head, as if clearing her thoughts. “Mainly there are reavers,” Averan said. “Lots of them. But there are other dangers—deep canyons that reavers could climb, but maybe men could not. And there are other animals down here....”

“With our endowments,” Gaborn said, “I don’t think we need to worry about animals.”

Averan seemed to think for a moment, and then let out an exasperated sigh. “This...isn’t what I remember. A week ago, the roof of this tunnel was choked with vines, and the floors were thick with vermin. That’s what the Waymaker remembered. But now the reavers have cleared the trail and smoothed the way. So I don’t know exactly what we’ll find on the road. And I’m not sure what roads we might have to follow. There are lots of tunnels near the Unbounded Warren, and there are paths that even the reavers fear to tread. If we’re to get past the reavers, we’ll need to take some of the less-used tunnels, the dangerous ones. I think we’ll have to sneak in.”

“You say we’ll meet reavers,” Gaborn asked. “Will there be guards?”

Averan thought for a moment. “I told you: the reavers you fought, they weren’t warriors. They were farmers and tunnelers, butchers and...just common reavers. Few of them knew how to fight. Sure, they carried knight gigs and blades, but they didn’t know how to use them. If there are guards ahead,” Averan continued, “I can tell you what to watch for. Reavers like to burrow underground when they hunt. They’ll be on the road, with dirt covering them, hidden so well that you won’t even notice a bump. Nothing may show except for one or two philia, lying above the surface.”

“I’ve always wondered,” Binnesman said, “can they see us when they’re underground?”

“No,” Averan said. “Like I told you, they don’t see like we do. They only sense shapes from their life-glow, from the lightning in their bodies.”

“The force electric,” Binnesman said.

“Whatever you call it,” Averan said. “So they can’t see through dirt any better than you could. But so long as a philium or two is lying above the ground, they can smell you coming, and they can feel vibrations from your movement. When you’re on top of them, that’s when they like to rise up, throwing you to the ground to disorient you. They want to kill you before you have time to move.”

“So I’ve heard,” Gaborn said bitterly. Averan didn’t know it, but Gaborn had gone into the Dunnwood to hunt reavers only a day after he’d wed Iome. He’d hunted in an ancient cave where some reavers had holed up. Even though Gaborn was an Earth King, and even though he’d had his senses to warn his men of danger, few of his companions had survived that expedition. Nearly four dozen knights had died in an ambush like the one Averan described.

“There is danger ahead,” Gaborn said. “Reavers, most likely. But it’s not for—oh, ninety or a hundred miles.”

“I just remembered something,” Averan said, “something I learned from the Waymaker. There is an old warren ahead. I don’t know how to convert distances in reaver to human terms...but I think maybe a hundred miles. The reavers stayed there for days before they came to the surface.”

“It was a staging area?” Gaborn asked.

“There could be more reavers there, I think,” Averan said. “An army—a big one. I remember seeing it in the mind of the fell mage. She needed to get her warriors out, to make room for the others that were coming.”

Gaborn’s heart went out of him. Seventy thousand reavers had attacked Carris. If there was a horde that size ahead, how could they hope to sneak past it?

“Is there a way around the staging area?” Gaborn asked, “a side tunnel that we can take?”

Averan gazed up at Gaborn’s face. “Maybe we should go find another way into the Underworld.”

“There isn’t time,” Gaborn said.

“We might be able to sneak past them,” Binnesman said. “Or, if their guard is light, we may be able to fight past them, and hope to avoid pursuit.”

The fog felt to Gaborn as if it were closing in. He was beginning to worry about Averan. She had learned much from the reavers, but she didn’t know nearly enough to guide them. Or perhaps, more precisely, her head was so full of minutiae that she hadn’t had time to put it all together.

“What about this fog?” Iome asked. “Can reavers see through fog?”

“Yes,” Averan said. “They hardly notice it.”

Almost as soon as Iome had spoken, Gaborn found the fog beginning to clear. Indeed, in a matter of a few paces, it was gone altogether. The tunnel branched, and warmer air seemed to be coming from the left fork, like a summer breeze, except that it smelled of minerals and dank places. The right fork led up at a steeper angle.

“Turn left,” Averan said. “The trail almost always leads down, toward warmer air.”

Now the tunnel began to show signs of life. The ice here had all melted, and with the confluence of heat and moisture, patches of wormgrass began to grow all along the floor and walls. Wormgrass was so named because the urchinlike shrub had soft spicules the width and length of earthworms. Cave kelp hung from the ceiling, and blotches of colorful fungi adorned the rock.

Most of the vegetation along the floor and walls had been devastated, so that now only ragged patches of flora could be seen.

Here and there blind-crabs roamed about, searching for food. These were nothing like the crabs that inhabited the coast or some rivers. They were more closely akin to reavers, and to Gaborn’s mind looked more like giant ticks than crabs. They had six legs, each of which was long and thin.

The group mounted up, and began to ride their horses hard now. The road was clear before them.

Most of the young blind-crabs were absolutely colorless. Their shells were like flawed crystal, giving a clear view of their guts and muscles. Gaborn could see their hearts palpitating wildly in fear as the horses approached, and could make out the color of their latest meals. Most of the crabs were small, only a few inches across the back.

A few lost gree shot through the cave with the speed of an arrow, searching for reavers that served as hosts for the insects and parasitic worms upon which the gree fed. As they flew, their black wings wriggled and squeaked as if in pain. One landed on Iome’s shoulder, mindless with hunger. Its head was spade shaped, like a reaver’s, with tiny philia that ran along the ridge of its brow and down its jawline. It immediately hooked its clawed feet into Iome’s cloak and began scrabbling about, searching for insects. Iome shrieked and grabbed it, then flung it against the wall.

Soon after that, the party came upon their first great-worm of the journey—gray like a slug, nearly nine feet long and as broad as a man’s hand, leaving a slime trail as it fed on a colony of mold.

Gaborn was fascinated. He’d heard few tales of the Underworld, and many animals and plants, like this giant worm, had no names that he’d ever learned.

Now that they had passed through the fog, for hours they rode down into the very belly of the world. Often they reached branches in the tunnel, and more and more, the cross trails showed signs of heavy use by reavers.

At each juncture Averan would sniff the trail for the Waymaker’s scent. Yet in spite of all the memories that the Waymaker had shared, even Averan found a few surprises.