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  “Sssst, click, pffft. That’s when we learned the other thing about Ember. It turns water to steam. Bill jumped up and started slapping at his pockets, steam billowing out of his clothes. He panicked I guess, took off running into the mineshaft. We took off after him but lost him. Didn’t have lanterns or even torches and the mines, they’re like a maze. We had to go slow or risk falling into a down shaft or pool. Like Bill had.

  “We heard his screams first, then the splashing. We ran as fast as we dared in the pitch black, but it wasn’t fast enough. Bill had fallen into one of the underground lakes. It was just a small pool, not even very deep from the look of it. My pick-man Sinclair jumped in after him to try and help. There was so much steam, too much commotion, too much screaming.

  “At first I just stood there. I didn’t know what to do. They were fighting on the water; Sinclair was trying to haul Bill out. I think Bill’s skin was being boiled from his bones and he didn’t know what he was doing. I’d worked with Bill for years. He was always levelheaded, calculating even. I never would have imagined he could act like that, so he must have been in some terrible pain. The rain swollen tunnels must have reached their capacity. Water crashed down the shaft in a torrent, carrying even more of the steaming rock. Bits from here and there that had been left unnoticed during normal mining I guess. It all gathered into that one little pool. The force of it washed me from my feet, the steam burning my skin and eyes as I slid toward the boiling pool.

  “My hand caught a hold of a rock and I clung there as the water rushed by. Then it stopped. It seemed so sudden. There was no sound of struggle, just dripping water echoing through the mines. I called out to them both, but nobody answered. Then I heard Bill laugh. It started like a giggle but then turned into a full-blown gut laugh.”

  Samrak looked off into the darkness like he was seeing something, or maybe hearing something. He looked sad.

  “Sssst, click, pffft. I think I meant to run for help, that’s what I try to tell myself. Maybe I was just afraid. I don’t know. I wonder every night.

  “I got to the shaft mouth and stopped, looking up at the path still awash with running water and sludge. I was afraid I would be swept off if I tried for the top. Indecision held me as sure as fear did. I think I had decided to go back for them because I had just started to turn when someone pushed me. Sinclair maybe? Bill? I don’t know, but I was falling. Spinning in the air trying to find something to grab, anything to save me. All I found was death. The only thing I saw was Death’s own face grinning at me as I tumbled off the edge.

  “Sssst, click, pffft. I woke up surrounded by piles of old mining equipment, my leg pinned under a piece of steal. Companies had been tossing old drilling rigs and equipment over for years and I landed on it. Some of it had landed on me.

  “My arm was shattered, and my head just flopped around. My neck was clearly broken, but somehow, I was alive. I later learned I had been there for weeks at least, maybe months, I am really not sure. Anyhow, She was there. I didn’t know Her yet, but She had been nourishing me, keeping my body alive.”

  He looked up as if surprised we all looked puzzled.

  “Mother,” he said as if that explained everything. Maybe it had to Ying, because she nodded her head slightly.

  “At first it was just the vines,” he continued. “They were growing over and through all of the debris and me as well.

  “It took me a long time to realize that some of them had grown into my skin. Burrowed into my organs and were pumping some kind of paste right into my guts and air into my lungs. Not understanding what was going on, I pulled at them and tried to stand, but my muscles wouldn't work. The vines must have known I was trying to move. She must have known. The vines wrapped me up and lifted my broken body.

  “At first, I was mesmerized. I thought that I must have been hallucinating. Then I felt the pain. It was incredible. A wave of the worst pain I had ever felt crashed over me and then I was falling again. When I next woke up I was in the dark. My neck had been fused with bits of metal. Other bits held my leg together and my arm was gone. The pain was still there but I was able to bear it. I stayed there, in that cave for many months, vines feeding directly into my gut, helping me heal, teaching me to move, changing me.

  “After months of recovery under the not-so-tender care of the plants and vines, I was able to feed myself. My body got strong, stronger than it had ever been. I went hunting, fishing, and eventually learned I was not alone in having been kept alive by Mother. Robinarl here found me, and we found others. We still didn’t know Her. It was just the vines, but they nursed and brought back those we found that could be saved.

  “Sssst, click, pffft. That was many years ago. Since then miners have fallen, people have jumped. Soon we learned of Her presence and that the vines were Her loving arms. Each time someone falls, Mother pieces them back together with bits of machinery. Using the metal castaways from the mines to repair the castaways of flesh. Bringing us all back into Her embrace. Over the years we have learned how to guide the process some. But it still doesn’t happen easy and it hurts in ways you cannot imagine.

  Mother does not tolerate those too weak to survive her love, but she did give us the resources to ease it some, to grow our numbers. One day Doc Parson fell to us. When he left Her embrace he said that She had told him a way to make the change easier so that more would survive. He created a drug to ease the pain of the transformation. It makes them more accepting of the change in body and mind. Many who were first brought from Her care were unable to cope with all they had endured. Many died before She granted us that boon.

  We send regular patrols looking for any who have fallen. We give them the drug right away if they are alive. Then the Mother puts them back together. That is why we took your friend. One of our patrols found him and thought him a Fallen, so they gave him the elixir and brought him here.

  “Sssst, click, pffft. It was not until you showed up that we realized the mistake.”

  “That is a hell of a tale yer tellin,” Wasco said. “Can’t imagine you making it up, so where does that leave us? He gonna be alright?”

  “He will be better in a matter of hours without another dose. The amount we use at first is small,” Samrak said.

  “Is he gonna turn green like you?” I asked.

  Wasco tensed, Ying sat up straighter, but Samrak just laughed. It looked weird coming from that tusked mouth with steam puffing out in little clouds. The others laughed too, and soon Wasco and Ying also chuckled.

  I didn’t see what was so damn funny.

  “No little one, he won’t. That is a result of whatever Mother does to us. Something She feeds us, so our bodies can accept the metal, Doc thinks. Unless we give him to Her, he will retain his pink skin.”

  “What the hell is this damn Mother you keep on about? You named the flowers that done this to ya?” Wasco asked.

  After I had asked about being green, I thought I might have said something wrong, but everyone laughed. Wasco’s question, they didn’t laugh at.

  Everything happened fast. Samrak jumped to his feet, I thought it was to attack Wasco, but I think it was to stop the other guy that came at a full charge hitting Wasco with a thunderous blow meant to take his head off. Wasco having reacted to Samrak standing took the blow on the meat of his shoulder instead, but it still knocked him back and over the table.

  The woman turned to grab at me, so I jumped under the table and crawled to the other end. The old-looking guy yelled something in protest and reached for a knife at his belt as he turned on Ying who was on her feet but didn’t seem to be watching him. I saw the hand pull the knife from the sheath from my spot under the table, tried to yell but there was too much commotion to be heard. Samrak was yelling for everyone to stop, but nobody seemed to be listening.

  I had left the Winchester where I had been sitting so I crawled back to get it after seeing the woman move away. I popped my head up and an arrow appeared in the table next to it. Well, not the table precisely, it had fir
st gone clean through the old guy’s hand. The knife clattered to the floor.

  Li dropped lightly onto the table from the darkness above, kicking out with his leg and knocking the old guy clean out before somersaulting off the table and over Samrak, catching him around the neck with his bow as he did. The momentum of his flip carried Samrak back and slammed him to the ground. Li had an arrow out and drawn in a blink, pointing right at Samrak’s chest.

  Wasco meanwhile had rolled to his feet and was trading heavy punches with the guy that had challenged him when we had arrived. The girl was now on the other end of the table, where I had been crawling to before I turned back for my gun, which I then pointed at her as I stood up.

  Ying’s voice echoed through the cavern, stopping everyone with its intensity. She was holding one of her vials near her mouth. There was a ripple of air over it, like the air above the hot sand.

  “You have broken the Tenet of Hospitality. Cease or be destroyed.”

  I had no idea what she was talking about, but it worked. Everyone stopped. Well almost. The guy fighting Wasco took that moment to pull a pistol from the strap at his belt and point it at Wasco, who like everyone, had turned at the echoing boom of Ying’s command.

  The gun hit the rock, the draw having been interrupted by the arrow that had grown from his eye. Red and gold feathers quivered in the silence that followed before the body remembered it was dead and crumpled to the ground.

  “Holy shit,” I said.

  Samrak got to his feet as Li stepped back and they locked eyes. Samrak looked like a storm trying to contain a twister. His eyes were hard, his muscles were tight, and steam was a constant angry hiss from his nostrils.

  At first nobody moved. Besides the occasional click and clang of the green things, the cave was quiet.

  Ying turned to Samrak and said, “We are here under the Tenet of Hospitality to which your leader agreed, and the Mother understands. It was broken through no action of ours. The life lost is your responsibility, not our own.”

  “You insulted her!” the woman I was pointing the Winchester at yelled.

  “No. We did not. It was simply a misunderstanding of vernacular,” Ying said.

  “A what?” I asked.

  “It is the way Mr. Wasco talks,” Ying said. “A misunderstanding of the way he speaks and one that was easily clarified had he not been attacked.” She looked at Samrak. “Do you disagree?”

  Samrak was silent for a while then said, “I do not, but I will go to Mother and ask. If she does not honor your words, then you will not leave here.”

  He turned to the rest of the monster men and told them to leave. That’s when I saw a side of Samrak that I had not known existed.

  Some of his people refused to let it go. One stepped up to Samrak and snarled. Samrak laid him out with one blow to the side of his head. Another said something I could not hear and Samrak charged him and slammed him into the rock wall and growled. His face was so close to the others that the steam from Samrak’s mouth actually went up the nose of the other one.

  Seconds passed before the other one looked away and Samrak let him go and turned his back to him. No one else said anything.

  He turned to Li and said, “This one was not a part of our Hospitality, he dies.”

  Two hulking green things stepped up to grab Li.

  I screamed, “Samrak no!”

  I was a kid; it was all I could think of.

  Ying on the other hand, said in her calm quiet voice, “You are incorrect Samrak. I accepted your offer on behalf of all who entered this cave with us. This is Li; he is my servant and entered with us. It is not our fault that you failed to see him.”

  Samrak growled. “You play games with words little woman!”

  “Do I?” she said with a pleasant smile on her wrinkled face. “And did I win this game of words?”

  Samrak huffed a cloud of steam, turned, and walked away.

  “Bring them,” he said.

  A gang of green muscle and metal bits surrounded us, and we were herded off into the darkness. I looked back to where Jacob was. He was still sitting in the same place, eyes staring into the darkness. Wasco hesitated and looked as if he might try and take on the lot of them, but a touch on his arm and smile from Ying and he handed over his rifle. He did not look happy about it as he stalked after Samrak. Li handed over his bow and sword and a large green hand took my Winchester from me.

  We followed Samrak into the darkness. As the light from the camp faded I noticed a green light in front of us. A pinpoint at first, that grew into a rectangle as we got closer. When we stopped, Samrak was waiting at a large metal door. The green light was leaking from the seams. He had lost the hard look, but his eyes didn’t smile like they had before.

  “Sssst, click, pffft. I will go and speak with Her. Watch them closely,” he said to our guards. “If Mother tells me that they are false, they will be killed immediately. If they are true, She will tell me what to do next.”

  He looked at Wasco who had tensed and looked as if he was ready to throw himself at Samrak. Ying stepped in front of Wasco with another light touch to his arm.

  “We will abide the judgment of your Mother,” she said.

  “The hell we wuuuurrrgh…” Wasco started to say before his voice just kind of stopped.

  He looked perplexed then spun on Li who had reached up and tapped the side of Wasco’s throat with one finger twice. Wasco tried again to say something, but no sound came out.

  Ying said, “Yes, Mr. Wasco. We will. When something needs to be shot or beaten to a pulp, we will defer to you, but in this, you must defer to me. Your voice will return in a moment, now be still please.”

  Samrak stared hard at Ying for long seconds then turned and pulled hard on the heavy iron door which gave way with a creak.

  The door was only opened for a moment, but it was enough. Green light flooded the cave, but it was not as intense as I think I had imagined it. Or maybe it just seemed brighter in the deep darkness of the cave. It was a soft, smooth, comforting light. It made me want to go to it. I think I actually took a step towards it, but Ying stepped in front of me which broke the trance. Just before the door closed I saw a room filled with vines that looked a lot like the Drinker root we used for our spitshots, except they were bright green. They were pulsating like Drinker roots too, pumping something into giant leafy pods. The last image I had is the silhouette of a twisted human figure inside one of those pods while one of the pulsating vines moved a large metal hinge into it, where the leaves then continued the pulsing push.

  It should have been horrifying. I should have had nightmares about it, but it wasn’t – and I didn’t.

  I didn’t think anyone said or did anything while Samrak was gone. But I couldn’t say for sure. I just remember the door opening and him coming out.

  “The Mother says they are not false; they are to be allowed to go free,” he said, then looked at one of the guards. “Go and get the other one and their weapons. I want them out of this cave immediately.”

  “What about Jacob,” I said. “Will he wake up?”

  “He will wake up, young Topher,” Samrak said.

  No one said anything until the guard retuned with Jacob walking numbly along with him. All our weapons and belongings that had been taken were pooled in his arms as he walked. I ran over to him and started taking everyone’s belongings from him after giving the guard a dirty look and sticking my tongue out when he turned his back on me.

  The others came and got theirs as well.

  Samrak said, “Go,” as he and his guards turned and walked away.

  CHAPTER EIGHT – SNAKEFACE

  W e made good time getting away from the caves, mostly riding in silence. Wasco led us to a stream that was running from the mountains rather than the runoff from the mine. Since we were close to the cliffside it hadn’t gone far enough to be contaminated by whatever turned everything black in that place.

  “Don't drink it,” Wasco had told us.” It's safe to wash
up in but keep it outta yer mouth.”

  I spent some time cleaning my clothes and washed up a bit as did the others. Each of us got some time while the others sat with their backs turned. My pants had been splattered with blood from the fight with the coyotes, and probably some urine if I’m honest. I washed them and set them out to dry then put on my other pair. We ate and mostly sat in silence until we were ready to move again. Jacob woke and seemed fine, not even a scratch really, but he was quiet, and we let him be.

  “How we gonna sleep out here again? I ain't seen no rocks anywhere,” I asked.

  The thought of another night in the open turned my guts to water.

  “Should be alright,” Wasco pointed out into the distance. “Over there it starts getting hilly. Looks like dunes from here but it ain't. Rocks and hills. There should be Movers in there too. Only a few hours from here, let's get a move on.”

  He was right. Within a couple of hours, I realized we were going up when my back started aching from leaning forward. An hour after that and it was rocky ground. Black and sharp hard rock, but it did seem a little less imposing nonetheless.

  We stopped early in a semi-circle of rocks and Movers, and Wasco had a fire going in minutes. We cooked stew and even softened some of the hard bread in the coals. Overall, it was comfortable. You wouldn't know we were in the middle of the Blacklands and had almost been eaten by black-toothed, goo-drooling coyotes, or turned into green monsters by whatever those other things were. I kept hoping one of the Movers would snuggle near me like the one had done, but none did. They would shuffle a little here and there, but that was all.

  “Ying, what did you mean in Samrak’s cave about Tenets of Hospitality? Why’d that make everyone stop fighting?” I asked through a mouthful of bread.

  She set her bowl down, wiped her mouth and said, “You have seen the things I do when I talk to spirits. They have rules Topher. The thing that Samrak and his clan called The Mother was a spirit. I felt it as soon as we entered the cave. I could not talk to it as I do the elemental spirits, but I could hear it talking to them. Somehow that spirit has found a way to connect itself to Samrak’s people. It is a spirit of nature, of plants I believe, but there is something more. It is angry. Filled with a rage that is hardly contained. I cannot begin to tell you the source of its anger, but it was there.”