Well, they might have bound his mind, but they had not fettered his body this time. During his brief halt those roots above seemed longer. For some reason that awoke a dread in him. Being under the earth was difficult enough; he had to fight an ever-present fear of being shut in—encased in this evil-smelling pocket of soil. The light from the tuber continued to ebb. Farree faced around to look back, although all there was blind dark.
Not quite. He sighted a small spark of light—fiery orange-red, like a minute, awakening flame. Two—close together– another pair slightly behind the first. At the same time an effluvium, a stench strong enough to churn his empty stomach, puffed in his face. He gagged and fought to control the nausea that awoke in him.
At the same moment his mind was touched. He was in contact with one of the things which had run the dark ways underground back in the valley. What he could read was ravening hunger, and a picture of this foul thing hurrying to seize upon his flesh.
The odor grew stronger, and the lights which marked their eyes brighter and larger. Hunger drove them and he was the food.
Moving backward, Farree edged as close as his folded wings would allow him to the wall at his right. His hand groped for the knife and then he remembered his sheath was empty. He had no defense except his two hands. Still he backed and the creatures followed. Now and again he gave a hurried glance over his shoulder to make sure that there were no other eye lights showing ahead, that he was not being driven into a trap.
He expected them to charge, but it seemed that something kept them from making that last run which would bear him down. They were coming up on him to be sure, but not as swiftly as he expected. The tuber in his hand lost its light. But he could still see the eyes.
As Farree went he was careful to test each step with his heel, making sure that he was not about to lose his balance. Then he kicked something and there was the sound of metal striking stone. He dared to stoop and seek to feel what he had stumbled upon. His hand closed about a chain.
Part of it was loose and yielded easily to his jerk but the other end appeared to be fixed. He pulled again and was answered by a glow of light. Again where his fingers pulled he saw a glimmer. The hunters had paused– Raw hatred and purpose still filled them but there was now caution, he believed, in their halt, as if he had chanced upon something in which they foresaw trouble. At the same time the links gathered into his hand began to warm, to burn as had the globe; but he refused to drop his find. The fact that the very picking up of the thing had slowed the others' advance made him cling to it the tighter.
Light sped from the links in his hand out along the rest of its length. This was a far better light than the tuber had given. He gathered the metal linkage up in both hands now to give a strong pull.
There was no give. Only more of the chain was alight, so that his eyes, already accustomed to the dark, could follow it to a wall. There it had been fastened to a loop apparently deep set in one of the stone blocks. Farree followed it up to that anchorage. He had to divide his attention between what he was doing and those menacing eyes. But the latter had stopped their advance.
Farree's fingers found a loop set in the stone. From his touch there came a stab of agony as great as if he had put his hand into real flames. He drew back but he did not drop hold of the chain. Unlike the links he held the loop did not shine. Pull having achieved nothing, he tried twist, winding the chain as swiftly as he could to the left, its links clinging together and its length becoming less as he wound it into two strands together. Once more he jerked.
There was a clang and the link locking the chain to the loop gave way so quickly he stumbled back, his wings brushing painfully against the other wall. Now he held several arm's lengths of glowing chain free from its anchorage. Though it remained fully in his hand it did not sear his flesh as had the single stone-set loop. Winding a fair portion about his right hand he swung the rest back and forth as one would swing a lash. With a clank of metal against rock it met the pavement behind him. Only then did its light reveal something else—a skull, teeth a-grin, as it rested in the midst of a pile of bones. What manner of creature had been left to die here Farree could not tell, but to his eyes the skull looked as if it were humanoid in shape.
He took a stride across that mass of bones, striking the skull without intention with the toe of his boot. It rolled back along his trail, toward the waiting eyes. Farree shivered and began once more to edge along the right hand wall of this place, which changed quickly into a narrowed passage. The glow from the chain remained constant and he swung it back and forth now—not only as a warning to those who followed him, but as a method of seeing a little ahead on his own path.
The dim light picked up a heap of something and for the second time he viewed a pile of bones. But the method of securing this unfortunate prisoner to the wall had been different. The upward swing of the chain showed a small cage of metal secured to the stone about as high as a man such as Vorlund would stand. In that cage a second skull rested, with the bones piled below. Farree hurried on.
He passed two more chains looped to the wall but neither of these contained a prisoner held to his or her death. Then he came to the end of the way he followed to be faced by a flight of steps and a matching rise overhead to give that flight room.
It was at that moment that the hunters attacked. Farree must have been about to pass out of their territory and they would not allow that. He got up four of the worn steps and stood ready to face them, the chain dangling ready. They came and he lashed out. He struck solidly the one in advance of the other, then hit at the second with less chance to aim. For the first time the things gave voice—a shrilling so high and piercing that it hurt his ears. Twice more one leaped at him only to be caught by the lash. The first one he had struck lay struggling where the first blow had thrown it. Now its fellow joined it. One pair of eyes lost their light, and Farree thought that perhaps the creature was dead. Now it seemed that if not at that last state yet the second was badly injured, for it did not attack again, only lay near its fellow eyeing Farree with a hate near great enough to cancel out pain.
He watched it narrowly before at last turning away and beginning to climb. Farree still glanced back every step or two to see if he were again being followed. The heightened color of the chain dimmed to a light glow. He wound it about his forearm and held it out before him to light as much of the way ahead as it could.
Once started on that climb the upward path seemed endless. Twice he made his way through an opening overhead to come out upon another dark passageway. He was not tempted to explore, keeping rather to the stairs still reaching upward.
Used to the subdued radiance of the chain he was not aware at first of a faint light up ahead. At length the shape of a grey square drew his attention and he found by means of this some remnants of his decreasing strength to hurry on to the head of the stairs. This left him in a room of some size. There was a furnace at one end, and hanging on the walls at intervals were objects he had no desire to examine closer, for in this place there was such a residue of pain and fear as to make him shudder. Farree opened and flexed his wings—there was room here. At the far end of this chamber was another stair, while far above the reach of any one standing here, there was a row of barred windows, square cut along one wall. From them the mist-light of the grim place came.