“Eh.” She waved a hand dismissively. “I’m used to it.”
“So now what?”
“Keep heading down.” Kit picked her way around the edge of the crater and scooped up her pack. “And hope that—”
She stopped, and Gyre nearly cannoned into her.
“Hope that what?” he said.
“How many more of those bombs have you got?” Kit said. “Just for information’s sake.”
“None,” Gyre said. “That was all Lynnia had on hand. I’ve got some smaller crackers, but—”
“Then,” Kit interrupted, “I think it’s time to run.”
Gyre looked down. His numbed ears couldn’t hear much, but he felt a buzz through the soles of his feet. On the floor, tiny pebbles rattled and jumped to the echoing tread of many oncoming footsteps.
*
They ran, down into the dark.
To this point, Gyre had been doing his best to keep track of the route in his mind, so that they could backtrack at least a little ways if they ran into a dead end. Now any hope of that was abandoned. He sprinted down one curving corridor after another, Kit just behind him. When he came to a branching, he chose whichever tunnel wasn’t already thick with the rumbling tread of constructs.
“They’re herding us,” Kit gasped out between breaths.
Gyre nodded, too winded to speak. Not that there’s anything we can do about it.
A stitch stabbed in his side like a dagger, and his pack dragged at his shoulders. Light-patches blinked on ahead of them and went out once they’d passed, corridor after corridor, the endless web of tunnels stretching down and down. His knees screamed with every step.
They came to a four-way junction, a pool of light with darkness all around. Ahead and to the right, distant shapes moved, and footsteps were still closing in from behind.
Left it is, then. Gyre ran down another curving corridor and skidded to a halt in a small circular room. A light-patch on the ceiling flickered on, revealing no other exits. Except—
There was an opening on the rear wall. Not a passageway, just a hole in the rock, barely big enough for Gyre to crawl through. It was lined, not with stone, but with something soft and wet that glistened in the faint light. It looked distressingly alive, and as he watched, the edges of the aperture contracted in a fit of peristaltic motion, the wave running down the narrow chute and out of sight.
“Yuck,” Kit said.
“No idea what that is?” Gyre said. They approached the strange opening, the pounding of footsteps behind getting louder.
“Nothing I saw the last time I was here,” Kit said. “On the other hand, I was unconscious when they brought me into the city.”
“You think this might be an entrance?” Gyre said. “It looks like …” Words failed him.
“It looks like the inside of someone’s throat, after you cut their head off,” Kit said.
“Thank you for that image,” Gyre muttered. “So what are the odds it leads to a stomach?”
Two constructs appeared in the doorway. They looked more dangerous than the one Gyre had destroyed, their carapaces spiked and gleaming with sharp metal tines.
“Does it really matter?” Kit said. She took a deep breath.
“You’re not seriously—” Gyre began.
But she was. She hurled herself forward, arms outstretched. In an instant she was gone, carried down the slimy passage on a wave of muscular contraction. Gyre could have sworn he heard her shouting excitedly, like a child on a slide.
“So many bad ideas today,” Gyre muttered, and followed.
Chapter 18
They let Maya sleep in her own room, which she hadn’t expected.
She wasn’t free, by any means. She didn’t have her haken back, and two Legionaries waited just outside the door. But challenging the centarchate apparently afforded her a bit of formal status, at least until the challenge was resolved.
Practically the moment she’d left the Council chamber, she’d felt the adrenaline draining out of her, replaced with wobbly-legged fatigue. By the time she got to her own chamber, it was all she could do to collapse into bed. But sleep eluded her for some time, as the day’s events replayed themselves in her mind. Eventually, she must have passed out, because when she sat bolt upright, heart pounding, the gradual dimming of the Forge’s sunlamps told her it was early evening.
Maya put her hand on the Thing and made herself breathe, feeling the muscles in her chest work, the blood rushing through her veins. Jaedia had tried to teach her to clear her mind, to focus on the rhythms of her body as a way of maintaining her calm. It was not something Maya had ever been very good at.
Jaedia. I’m coming. She felt better now that her feet were planted on a new path. It might be treacherous, but it was a way forward. All I have to do is keep moving.
Here and now, that meant beating Tanax in the dueling ring.
When her pulse no longer roared in her ears, she got up and went to the door. Two blank-masked Legionaries waited outside, and Maya asked if she could have some dinner. One of them nodded and went to summon a servant. The food, when it arrived, was plentiful, roast chicken and thick soup and some of the doughy dumplings Marn liked so much.
Marn! A stab of guilt went through her. I never even asked what happened to Marn. As far as she knew, he’d gone with Jaedia on her mission. Which still doesn’t make sense. Had he made it home, or … Jaedia couldn’t have killed him. Not her own agathios. She shook her head, swallowing hard. Chosen defend, none of this makes any sense. I hope he’s all right.
There was a soft knock at the door. “Yes?” Maya said.
“It’s Beq.”
“Beq!” She pushed her tray aside and scrambled across the room. She’d been ready to throw her arms around the arcanist, but Beq stood awkwardly between the two flanking Legionaries, and Maya paused. “Is it all right if she comes in?”
One of the soldiers nodded. Maya gestured Beq inside and closed the door behind her. Then she hugged her, as Beq exhaled and relaxed.
“You—” Beq said, as Maya pulled away. She paused, started again. “I heard what happened with the Council.”
“You think I’m crazy,” Maya said.
“No one challenges to get their cognomen, not anymore.” Beq shook her head. “I didn’t even know you still could.”
“It’s in the rules,” Maya said. “Never been changed. That used to be the only way to become a centarch. Back then there were more candidates than haken, so—” She trailed off. “Sorry. I did a lot of reading in my cell.”
“I gathered.” Beq smiled. “Usually it’s me getting excited about ancient history.”
Maya laughed out loud. She offered Beq the chair and sat down on the bed, unable to stop herself from fidgeting with the covers.
“Have you seen Varo?” Maya said. “They haven’t accused him of anything, have they?” She felt a stab of guilt for not asking earlier.
“Not officially,” Beq said. “But the Council was quick to send him on another assignment. He’s somewhere in the south now, I think.”
Maya nodded, then took a deep breath.
“And have you … made any progress?” she said. “On what you … found.”