The farther they walked, the danker the air in the tunnel became, until Fhremus had beads of water dripping from his helm and eyebrows. His skin was clammy with more than trepidation; moisture beaded on his oiled jerkin and ran down off the front of it, splashing in thin rivulets on his boots. “This place was at one time the sewer of Jierna’sid,” Talquist said. His voice, muffled by the scarf and the mist, echoed against the distant walls and was swallowed in much the same way as the light had been. “Then the dynasty of the Dark Earth, Leitha and her forbears, built the great aqueduct system, abandoning this place.” Fhremus remained silent, his eyes futilely scanning for the walls that had receded into the dark. Then, in the distance, he began to hear a strange sound, like the harsh whistling of wind over the desert, punctuated a moment later by a deep hum that fluctuated below it. The noise was constant^ growing in volume as they grew closer. Though he did not recognize the sound, it chilled him deep within, even as it scratched mercilessly at his eardrums. “We are almost to the giant cistern,” Talquist said, his voice suddenly soft. “Follow closely, Fhremus, and do not lose your footing. ’Twould be tragic.”
Fhremus glanced over his shoulder. He thought he could make out the dimmest shadow of the titan’s outline, but when he looked again he saw nothing but darkness. Nervously he turned back again. Talquist had come to a stop at the edge of what appeared to be a massive circular canyon, a hole of vast proportions that had once contained all the runoff of the mountains, a water volume similar to that of a river in flood. Fhremus stopped behind him, fighting nausea from the stench that had become acidic, stripping the lining from the inside of his nose and resonating up into his sinuses. Below the canyon’s rim the noise had grown to a deafening pitch, a screaming whine below which a growing bass note was rising, thudding like war drums. Talquist held the light over the rim, then beckoned him closer. “Come,” he said softly, a tone of reverence in his voice. “Look.”
Fhremus swallowed silently and approached the edge. As he did, something small and hard grazed his face; instinctively he brushed it away, like a fly, and peered down into the darkness. For a moment it seemed as if he was standing above the funnel of a tornado at night. In the inky blackness below, air seemed to swirl with the ferocity of a whirlwind, screaming as it passed. The movement was as vast as the greatest desert dust storm Fhremus had ever seen, towering walls of sand that had torn up and buried entire villages. But unlike a storm, the motion was chaotic, sporadic, with millions of flashes that had no course, just speed and sound.
The regent emperor was watching his face closely. His smile widened, and he held the lantern up over the swirling chasm of stench, screeching, and sickening motion. In just the faintest ray of light, Fhremus could see what was spiraling in the cistern. “Dear All-God,” he whispered, feeling bile rise in the back of his throat and burn. “Are those—?”
“Plague locusts.” Talquist finished the question for him. “This is a young swarm, nymphs, hoppers mostly. No fledglings yet—the vast majority of the eggs won’t even hatch until the first week of spring. They haven’t grown wings—yet.”
The dank, putrid air of the place churned in Fhremus’s lungs. The first two words the regent had just spoken were considered a profanity in this realm of endless sun and little water, where crops were scratched from the unforgiving earth in the southern temperate region of the country but almost nonexistent in the northern mountains and steppes. The dryness of the land had been both bane and blessing; while the soil yielded little in the way of foodstuffs, the pestilence of unstoppable swarms had been minimal, because the vermin needed water in which to breed.
Like the swill at the bottom of the abandoned sewer.
Even so, despite the swarms’ not having been seen in this region in Fhremus’s lifetime, the history of locust plagues was devastating enough to have left long scars on the memories of the population. The misery and starvation that the hordes of ravenous insects left in their wake was so terrifying to the Sorbolds, as well as the people of the Middle Continent, that the appearance of a single grasshopper could cause widespread panic that led to many fields being unnecessarily burned.
Fhremus bent down and retrieved the carcass of the one that had struck him in flight. How anyone could mistake a simple grasshopper for one of these creatures was beyond him—the angular head, the saw-toothed mandibles, the sharp, knifelike wings, were the hallmarks of a creature that harbored evil in its midst.
He swallowed his rising gorge. “I don’t understand, m’lord.”
Talquist had been watching him closely, and nodded.
“Come then, Fhremus, and I will show you more.” He turned and walked away into the darkness. The imperial commander tossed the carcass into the black pit and followed him quickly, casting a last look over his shoulder as if to confirm that he was awake. The air in the tunnel around him grew even heavier with rotten moisture the farther they traveled. The stone giant followed them, moving as silently as death, or at least it appeared so, as the screaming hum of the cistern had been replaced by a deep, clicking thrum, pounding and pulsing in Fhremus’s ears and echoing the rough corridor walls around them. They passed what appeared to be old feeder tunnels of the sewer system, many of them occluded or entirely blocked with the rubble of centuries, until finally they came to a foul-smelling pond of sorts, the water foisted with green waste, possibly plant life, though Fhremus could not believe it possible that anything natural could grow in such a place. The regent emperor strode confidently into the water, wading slowly but purposefully out until the slime covered his boots halfway up the leg. Then he turned and gestured to Fhremus to follow him. The soldier complied, coming alongside Talquist when he finally stopped, gazing into the gloom ahead of him. The titan remained at the water’s edge, motionless. Talquist’s eyes were burning bright in the radiance of the cold lantern. He pointed into the darkness ahead. “There, Fhremus, see the answer the All-God has provided to our need for protection against those who would threaten our land.”
He held the lantern aloft. Fhremus squinted to see past the light. Ahead of them in the muck lay the massive body of what appeared to be a serpent, a dragon or horned snake, perhaps; it was impossible to tell, as it had been largely devoured, consumed in thousands of tiny bites. As he stared harder, he could see that the carcass was comprised of what appeared to be striated stone, like the titan waiting on the bank behind them, its glassy eyes smooth except for the gouges that had been dug in them. A tail, missing large sections, coiled behind it, while broken remains of wings could be seen, stripped to the stone cartilage. The statue of the beast appeared to be sprouting grass or grain of some sort, like an earthen sculpture left in a field to go fallow.
And all above and around it hovered screaming locusts, most the size of his hand or bigger, feeding avariciously on the grain, and on the carcass itself. But, unlike the nymphs and hoppers in the cistern swarm, they seemed to be actually flying. Talquist turned to the giant. “Faron, if you please, bring us one.”
The titan looked down at the green ooze for a moment, then waded into the water. Fhremus involuntarily held his breath as the giant walked by him, causing a wake to rise up the sides of bis boots in its passing. It continued, undeterred by the onslaught of swarming creatures until it came to the feeding ground, where it reached out with an almost sickening speed and grasped one of the insects. A sickening crack echoed through the cavern; Fhremus winced in spite of himself. Then the titan waded back to where the merchant emperor stood. “Put out your hand, Fhremus,” said Talquist softly.