James West - Crown of the Setting Sun

With a new path chosen, he climbed up and sideways, well over half the height of the cliff, then came to a ledge. Needing a rest, he tugged himself up, then settled his rump amid a scatter of twigs. Here, birds had attached even more mud nests to the rock.

Back the way he had come, the Alon’mahk’lar were much nearer. They did not blow their horns any longer, and Leitos thought sure they had noticed him climbing up the cliff. He grinned at the idea of their fury before wondering if they, too, could climb. Abruptly deciding he had rested enough, he resumed his ascent.

In short order, he made it to the top of the sheer spine of stone, and halted in the notch of a cleaved boulder. From far away, he heard a strange, monotonous rumble, but thought nothing of it, his attention fixed on the Alon’mahk’lar staring up at him from the base of the cliff.

There were at least two dozen, perhaps more-it was hard to separate one shadow from another. He should have run then, but instead he peered back, waiting. It struck him that he had never seen so many slavemasters gathered in one place. Why are there so many … and where did they come from? Since they seemed disinclined to crawl up after him, he also wondered what they intended to do.

“Come down, child,” one slavemaster invited, “before you fall.” It spoke as did all Alon’mahk’lar , in a voice that sounded like the grinding of stones and suppressed ferocity.

“Why should you care if I fall, if you mean to kill me anyway?” It took all his courage to keep his voice light, almost indifferent. He had never directly addressed one of the slavemasters.

“We wish you no harm,” the slavemaster said, snarling the words.

Leitos thought of mutilated slaves, and about what another Alon’mahk’lar had said, just before Adham drove his pick into the creature’s skull. “ Your blood will be a sweet wine upon my tongue… .”

Harm , Leitos concluded with growing anger, was all that these monstrous beings wanted for him, or any human.

The Alon’mahk’lar smiled up at him, a terrifying vision. “A place of comfort has been prepared for you. You will want for nothing.” Several of the demon’s fellows nodded in agreement, all smiling as nastily as the first.

Leitos’s eyes narrowed. “And a place has been prepared for you, Alon’mahk’lar ,” he said, speaking that forbidden name with as much disdain as he could muster. “ Geh’shinnom’atar is your true home, and Peropis is your master!”

He hoped to infuriate the creatures, and by their harsh growls he did. A handful of the slavemasters flung themselves at the cliff, snarling and snapping. To Leitos’s horror, one began scampering up the rock face with a mind-numbing grace, as if it were floating rather than climbing. Then one huge hand caught a lip of stone that broke away, sending the Alon’mahk’lar hurtling back. It bounced when it hit, scattering its companions. In the next instant, it was on its feet. A moment after that, the beast set to climbing again, cursing Leitos in its natural tongue.

The spell of watching the slavemasters come was broken by their terrible utterances, and Leitos clawed his way up and over the cleaved boulder. His desperate movements caused the massive stone to shift. By the time he had reached its crown, the boulder was moving downward in a sickening, sliding roll. He leaped with all his strength, not sure if he would fall into a bottomless crevasse, or land on solid ground. The boulder wobbled underfoot as he pushed off, then the sound of grinding stone filled the night. He landed in a sprawl on a flat sandstone surface. For the barest moment quiet held … then came a roar of crashing rock mingled with the slavemasters’ pained screams.

Leitos clambered to his feet and sprinted away. He did not look around. His legs flashed in the darkness, thrusting him along. Where before every step had been a struggle, now it seemed as if he were flying, light as a feather. Exhilaration filled him, for he knew at least some of his pursuers had died, crushed under falling rock. Crazed laughter erupted from his parched throat. Whether by accident or not, in some small way he had begun to exact the vengeance his grandfather had demanded of him. Galvanized, his feet flew. He felt as if he could run forever.

Even as his ears detected the rumbling sound he had dismissed earlier, he smelled wetness on the breath of the night. He passed through a strange veil of cooler air that pebbled his skin. Over another hundred feet, the strange rumbling grew into a throaty roar. He ran toward that sound, alarmed by its foreignness, but driven by the danger at his back.

Suddenly his feet were pedaling over nothingness, and he truly became buoyant as a feather-if a feather that fell through space, like a stone hurled into a chasm filled with darkness and unending thunder.

Arms flailing, Leitos fell, his cry buried under the fury of a thousand raging storms. After what seemed an age, he slammed into a chilling, turbulent froth and plunged down until his feet struck unyielding rock. Water, shockingly cold, gushed into his mouth, nose, and ears. He kicked off the bottom and rose through a speeding current. He bobbed to the surface once, then the raging waters dragged him back under. Leitos floundered, turned one way then the other, tumbling in the watery void.

Instinct kept him from drawing a deep breath. That same inborn knowledge guided his hands to churn before his chest in a clumsy paddling motion. A moment later, his head shot clear of the roiling water. He floated along, splashing and kicking, and the river became less turbulent. High cliffs swept by on either side. Above them, the stars shone with bland indifference.

Leitos’s initial panic faded, and he drank his fill from the river. He found that with minimal effort, he could keep his head above water. How long he drifted he could not have said, but he guessed at least an hour passed before he sensed a change in the currents. The river’s chuckling grumble grew angry again, the surface rising and falling in waves. Soon, he was hurtling along, a bit of flotsam caught on the undulating back of a serpent made of water.

All at once, a powerful current pulled him under. He kicked at the force, and though his calves plowed through the water, it held him firmly in its grip, dragging him down into the crushing dark. Pressure mounted and a painful popping noise sounded in his ears. His lungs burned for want of the last breath he had been denied, but there was none to be had. Slow fire rapidly spread from his chest into his arms and legs. The darkness before his eyes came alight with sparkling flares. The bright pinpoints faded soon after, devoured by creeping gray spiders … a few at first, then more and more. As the gray swarmed over his vision, it also sank into his mind, subduing his panic, replacing it with a resigned calm.

His mouth yawned wide, involuntarily preparing to draw a breath, and then the swirling current slammed him into a wide mass of moss-slicked rock. The last of his spent breath burst from his chest in a flurry of bubbles, but the same currents that had threatened to drown him, now carried him up, rolling him over slimy stone.

Thrashing feebly, Leitos cleared the surface, waterlogged and retching. The gray spiders of looming unconsciousness quickly retreated. He clawed his way onto a mass of rock until he lay half-in, half-out of the water. The river toyed with his legs, trying in vain to drag him back. Leitos pulled himself a little farther up onto dry ground, then collapsed.

He remained where he was for a long time, chest heaving. His wits and strength came back slowly, harried by vague thoughts of the hunting Alon’mahk’lar . But even that threat failed to rouse him completely. He had been on the run, fearing for his life at every turn, less than one full day and night, yet he was so exhausted that the thought of pushing any farther made him want to weep. He remained where he was, praying that no searching eyes would find him.