He felt that some deep, subconscious sense guided him. Despite his lightning bolts, Zeus did not believe he could make it into the depths of the tangle alone-not fighting the sfuz. The creatures were too numerous. No, to make it to the cisterns, Zeus needed Gallen’s help. Perhaps that’s why I left him alive. In my heart, I knew I’d need him. His help could be worth more than the mantle. And looking back, Zeus realized that he could not have held Gallen’s trust if he’d killed the Qualeewoohs. The deed would have lessened Zeus in Gallen’s eyes.
Zeus realized, if Gallen takes me to the Waters, fighting beside me, all I have to do is drink. Then I will gain such power that I won’t need his mantle any longer. But Zeus recognized that if the Waters of Strength flowed in some cistern deep inside the cliffs of Teeawah, Zeus could not afford to let the others drink. The Waters would make Zeus a power without equal.
Then Gallen’s mantle would mean nothing, and Zeus could kill them all. Indeed, he would be forced to kill them all.
Chapter 32
After all his dealings with the dronon, Gallen was surprised that the dronon hadn’t begun searching the tangle before he left his ship.
He’d turned off the engines when he first landed, ceased all radio transmissions, and manually dismantled the ship’s transponder. Gallen feared the dronon would commandeer the starport facilities at Felph’s palace and use the computers there to demand that each ship send its code. The ship’s Al couldn’t ignore such a request; it violated the ship’s programming, and once a ship sent its code, it automatically broadcast its exact latitude, longitude, and altitude.
After Gallen had verified that his ship wasn’t emitting any gravity, radio, or heat waves he felt somewhat secure. The dronon wouldn’t be able to find him using the passive sensors that detected such emissions.
This meant that they would have to begin using active sensors-directing energy and particle streams in an effort to search the planet for large metallic objects. It would take time to scour the surface of an entire planet, but the dronon had plenty of ships capable of helping in the search. It wouldn’t take much time.
Gallen’s greatest hope was that the dronon’s sensors wouldn’t penetrate here, so far beneath the tangle.
Yet he still felt afraid. The dronon had a tool he couldn’t defeat so easily. The Seekers. The dronon could still track by scent. But he hadn’t left any scent within two thousand kilometers, and here in the tangle, air currents moved sluggishly. Their scent might not reach the surface for days maybe weeks.
But if by chance the dronon found that scent, they would be able to follow it easily.
While the others rested, Gallen packed enough food for five days, wondered if it was too much. He hoped to find Teeawah sooner, but in all honesty, it could take months. He had no idea how to reach his destination except through an interlaced network of caves that might be impassable. Quite possibly, he might find that he was in a section of the tangle that didn’t connect to the caves.
And if he didn’t find the city soon, he’d die. He was a lone Lord Protector, leading his friends into an enemy fortress. Part of him wanted to deny that anything bad would happen, but he’d seen some of the prowess of the sfuz. They were so fast. He wouldn’t be able to protect his friends in a pitched battle. Gallen wouldn’t even be able to protect himself against so many enemies.
In all probability he was leading them all to their deaths.
Gallen clenched his fists and cursed his fate. If only he hadn’t beaten the Lords of the Sixth Swarm. Only an odd combination of determination, skill, and luck had put him here. Yet if he’d walked away, if he’d simply refused to fight that first battle so many months ago … the dronon would still rule the worlds of man in tyranny.
No, Gallen could not truthfully regret his fate. The dronon war had cost millions of lives each day. Gallen had won a temporary peace for mankind. A few months of reprieve, a few months of joy on ten thousand worlds. Some fifty quadrillion people lived on the Unified Worlds. Gallen had won something for them, and even if he and his friends died in these lightless depths, their lives would not have been wasted.
But in spite of the facade he tried to erect for his friends, Gallen didn’t believe that he would survive this trip. The tangle seemed too thick, too dangerous. His destination too uncertain. The dronon too likely to attack.
Even if he did find the Waters of Strength, who knew if they would have any effect on him?
Gallen had too many foes to combat, too little to hope for.
He felt overwhelmed. I am but one man, Gallen thought. Too much depended on him. Not just Maggie and Orick and the few friends around him-it was Arachne and Athena and the gray people that Felph held in such low esteem. And beyond that was the wider universe. Everynne fretting somewhere back on her Omni-mind, his Mother living in her quaint home on Tihrgias, Ceravanne trying desperately to find her own peace under the tutelage of the peaceful treelike Bock.
Gallen wanted to collapse, to turn aside and run. He’d never faced a task so daunting. The prospect of failure terrified him. If I die, he thought, Lord Felph could resurrect me. But Maggie, Orick, and Tallea would be dead. He couldn’t face that. To live on without them would be damnable. He’d never forgive himself.
So he had to beat the dronon. He had to go on fighting, drag himself forward no matter what the consequence.
Regardless of the outcome, he had to go on, keep fighting, because … because he loved them all, loved them so profoundly that for a moment he stood in awe of the simple power of his emotions, just considering, remembering the faces of friends that were beginning to be lost in the haze of time.
He closed his eyes, tried to recall the woods outside his home on Tihrglas, the call of the kiss-me-quicks hopping in the bushes, the towering green pines, the way the maples on the hillside north of town reflected the reds of the sunset in the autumn till they shone like coals.
Gallen’s mantle recognized his desire, sent him recorded images of home-sights, sounds, smells-so that suddenly Gallen found himself standing inside the common room at Mahoney’s Inn, the first night he’d met Everynne.
There were John Mahoney and Father Heany smoking by the fireplace, just after teasing Gallen about how he fancied young Maggie Flynn. And over in the comer sat Sean Mullen, a terribly thin man who’d once given Gallen’s mother a cow. Gallen hadn’t thought about him in months. Beside him sat Ian O’Bannon, an old fisherman who’d taught Maggie to dance-another friend Gallen had forgotten. The fellow had once told Maggie that she should stay away from Gallen, saying, “You’ll have naught but misery from that one-always out playing the hero, trying to impress folks.” Gallen could smell the beer in the air, the sweet tobacco smoke, the scent of wool and sweat. He could feel the heat of the fire warming his hands.
Yet this memory belonged to Veriasse, not to Gallen, so that he saw himself and Maggie as they had been that night, two shy teenagers sitting off in a dark corner, trying to hide their affection for one another from everyone in the room.
Gallen laughed at the image. Both he and Maggie had looked so skinny, so young, so innocent-just six months before.
Is that how I was? Gallen wondered to himself. A child. A barbarian. A wild animal. Despite all the dark times since, despite his loss of innocence, Gallen looked at the young man he’d been a few short months before, and decided he would not trade places.
Not even if he died today because of it. He thought about the warning Ian O’Bannon had given Maggie. He’d believed Gallen wanted to impress folks. He’d never understood, never understood what Gallen dared tell no one that he did what he did because he loved people, loved them so deeply that something inside him just had to give and give until he had nothing left to give.