WITHIN THE GATE-HOUSE.
I could see still less now; and it was doubtless my very limitation of
vision which added to the sense of fear and awe that surged at me. An
abyss here, dark and soundless, the air was heavy, motionless, save
as it moved past us with our forward flight. Air that now was foul as
though heavy with the hot breath of the unseen monsters.
There was no visible ceiling, no walls. But, as though my pupils were
expanding in this greater darkness, I saw presently a black surface
beneath us; and in another moment saw that we were flying barely a
hundred feet above it.
A level spread of silent water. There may have been a black luminosity
to it; a phosphorescence, black, yet visible. I seemed, after another
interval, to be staring over a great distance.
A silent sea lay spread here under us. A vast area of water lying
here like a great black shroud. A scum seemed on its dead, unriffled
surface. A silent sea, yet it breathed with a slow rise and fall, as
though with labored breath it lay dying. A world apart.
I had thought our turgid ocean depths fearsome. But here was a new
quality--a dark foul sullenness--this silent sea aloof, remote here in
the bowels of our earth. I shuddered as I stared, for it seemed to me
suddenly that only the dead should gaze upon such a place as this.
And yet I knew that there were living things here. Creatures alive, but
only in that one thing akin to living humans. Monsters lurked here,
foul spawn of things unnameable, of form and manner and horror beyond
all conception of the human mind.
I looked away at last.
This soundless abyss! But presently I began to hear a murmur; a surge;
a roar. The water roaring at the flood-gates. And soon I saw that there
was no longer water beneath us; a naked black rock surface.
Entt whispered suddenly. “Look--out there!”
Far away I saw a dull-red point of light. No! It was not far; a few
hundred feet--a dull-red smoldering torch. It moved. A black shapeless
blur seemed with it. A living creature slithering away on the rock
surface? Formless, soundless: I was grateful for the concealing
darkness. There are things which it is not good for human eyes to
see--things that mark the mind with horror.
I did not want to see it, yet I stared. And with imagination beyond
curbing, I futilely tried to supply a head out there on the black
rocks, or a giant black body, or legs and a tail. They are all words
with meaning to our human mind. But this was none of those. My
imagination was blessedly futile!
For this thing, though perhaps it was partially visible, was beyond my
conception. The eye--was it an eye? Or a fiery breath, congealed in the
air? Or a heart--the essence of the thing’s being--nakedly visible?
The red glow mercifully vanished, with only a dim radiance remaining,
lingering like an infernal wraith of something which had been there and
now was gone.
We flew onward. The sound of the rushing water was monstrous ahead of
us.
Entt said: “We will land here. If there are Gians, they must not see us
coming.”
We left the aëro in a recess at the summit of a small rise. Invisible
again, we started forward on foot. What revulsion I had felt, flying in
the air and gazing down to where monsters might lurk in the darkness,
was intensified now. Here on the rocks, walking, seeing nothing,
hearing only that monstrous torrent ahead, I felt my flesh creeping
with horror. Why, any moment something unspeakable, lurking here, might
spring upon us.
* * * * *
“Keep hold of me, both of you,” Entt whispered.
Silent shadows, we walked swiftly. The ground was rough, broken now
into great crags among which we climbed, steadily ascending.
There was light ahead--a milk-white glow, faint as star-dust. And a
jagged black wall, clifflike, rising into the void beyond my vision.
A few minutes of climbing, and the roar grew. It beat upon me
deafeningly. It seemed for a moment to engulf all my senses. A titan
roaring--this torrent of water. An infuriated titan--yet still in
leash. The milk-white radiance broadened; beside us the rock wall now
was close.
Entt stopped us. We stood at the summit of the rise up which we had
come. Entt spoke, shouting at us now, for the blare of dashing water
tore at his words and flung them away.
“There is the gate-house. I think there are no Gians here.”
We followed his gestures with our gaze. I stood peering, holding my
weapon in my hand.
From here a path led down the rocks to the right. A hundred feet away
down there the cliff wall rose sheer, smooth and black. The path, from
where we were standing, went down the declivity and came to a small
door, a gateway in an artificial wall.
Beyond it, looking down upon the wall from this greater height, I could
see a small inner courtyard, with the wall inclosing it, and another
door. Beyond that, a narrow, precipitous flight of metal stairs, with
a wall around the bottom of them, led upward a hundred feet. Up there,
perched like some aerie against the cliff-face, was a small black
building, the gate-house. It hung there, with a dim oval of radiance
from within marking its window.
Tad shouted at my ear: “If those courtyard doors are open--Or we might
climb the walls.”
Those courtyard walls seemed no more than ten feet high. No Gians were
here, and the whole place appeared deserted.
“Wait a moment,” Entt cautioned. “If there is any one here, we’ll see
movement.”
The little metal house up there on its perch seemed unoccupied. Its
door was ajar, showing a slit of light, and the window on this side
was open. The room within was lighted. Was any one there? We waited,
closely watching, for any shadow of movement.
My attention wandered to the vaster scene spread before us. The
milk-white radiance illumined the distance. Beyond the path and the
small courtyards there was a sudden drop, a thousand feet perhaps--a
void here, all at that lower level. The cliff wall, to which the
gate-house clung, went down that thousand feet--and up out of sight
overhead. And stretched off in the milky distance. Smooth, black and
sheer.
But there were lines marking it into great rectangles; giant blocks
of metal out of which it was built. Not a cliff, but a titanic dam! I
could see only this end of it--twenty miles of it possibly. At about
the level of the gate-house, the water was surging through it, in a
tremendous horizontal gash. It stretched off and lost itself in the
blur of distance. And through the gash the wall of water was arching
out and falling a thousand feet.
Uncounted Niagaras! A million? I could fancy so. A million Niagaras,
piled one upon the other for a thousand feet of height; laid end to
end for hundreds of miles. An utterly inconceivable torrent, falling a
thousand feet into a white sea of foam down below--a boiling, lashing
sea hundreds of miles wide, leaping and tumbling away into other
cañons. White-lashed water, catching what little light was here,
reflecting it as a milky radiance.
There was wind here, its roar mingling with the greater roar unnoticed.
Wind whirling and plucking at us. Spray, even up here. Giant spirals
of upflung mist. The salt tang of the sea-spume whipped and sucked and
flung by the wind.
* * * * *
We stood only a moment. No Gians were here. Why would there be? This
water could not surge through that wall for very long without tearing
it away. Inconceivable torrent! But it was a mere slit in the wall--the
dribble of a child’s spillway on the shore of a sea. Our great oceans
were up there--pressing to get down. What Gian would stay here on
guard, with all his fellows escaping to safety?
We crept cautiously down the path. The wind whirled us; the spray,
suddenly leaping in some chance gust, drenched us. I clung to Tad. Entt
I could not see. I felt a sudden mild electric shock from Tad’s robe.
He cried out involuntarily; became visible so that I saw him beside me.
His hands tore at his hood; his startled white face appeared.
Then he grinned. “Ruined! It’s off, Jeff. You can see me, can’t you?”
The water had evidently short-circuited his robe. And in a moment mine
went the same.
Entt cut out his current. We flung back our hoods and took off our
gloves. The freedom of it was pleasant, but we were no longer invisible.
“What of it?” said Tad. “There isn’t any one here.”
We came to the low door in the first wall. It opened to our touch. The
courtyard was empty.
I clutched my weapon, with its lever adjusted to give the stabbing
flash. It seemed to aim readily, very much like an automatic. There was
a reassuring security in the feel of it. At a hundred feet I could
drill any one we might come upon.
There were inner doors to rooms in this courtyard wall. We crept upon
them one by one; flung them open, tense to meet what might be within.
All were empty. Small empty rooms, with evidence of the Gian garrison
here hastily departed.
We passed the inner wall door. No one here. We climbed the long metal
ladder up the cliff-face to the gate-house.
I led, with Tad next. “Easy, Jeff! Hang on--don’t get dizzy. By the
infernal, what a place!”
The ladder seemed to sway under us. In spite of all my flying
experience, I found myself clinging, with senses whirling for a moment.
It seemed that ladder was a spider web hanging over the chaos of water.
The white turmoil of spume engulfed us.
A slow, patient climb. We stood at last on a small metal grid, the
platform at the top of the ladder. The gate-house door was ajar.
Tad gripped me as we braced ourselves in the wind. “You’ve kept the
projector dry?”
“Yes.” I had shielded it with a fold of my robe.
He gestured. “I’ll shove the door, Jeff. We’ll rush in together. Get
back, Entt. Ready, Jeff?”
“No! Stoop here, on one side. I’ll kick it open. We’ll wait and see--”
With my foot I swung the door inward. We crouched to one side. Nothing
came out, nor was there any sign of movement in there. Weapon ready, I
advanced to where I could see all the room. A square metal apartment of
perhaps twenty feet, it seemed to occupy the entire little house. One
window was here beside the door, another window faced the maelstrom of
the dam. A bunk, a few pieces of furniture.
A table near the farther window held a square metal tablet, no larger
than my chest. The dim interior light shone on it; switches and wires;
dials; a glowing bowl of radiance, like the fluorescence of an atomic
tube. The gate mechanism!
My heart pounded as I gazed at it. This little thing--diabolical! But
Entt knew how to operate it. A minute now and we would start it closing
the great gates.
We advanced into the room, cautiously, then with a rush. I whirled with
my weapon ready. Tad stood alert, tense, his eyes roving every corner.
Entt dashed for the mechanism, and hastily seated himself at the table.
* * * * *
There was a movement behind me! In the outer doorway stood Rhana! She
flung off a long, wet cloak. “So? You did come?” She advanced a step
and then leaped for Entt.
A panther’s leap! I met it with the stabbing light of my weapon;
caught the sheathlike shield of her body; struck her full. There was a
flare--a wave of vibration came surging back at me.
She was unharmed. A glow was around her; it streamed like a mantle
down from her headdress. Her leap carried her to Entt. He rose up, was
caught half turning. And then he crumpled, slumped and fell at her feet.
Tad and I rushed at her. And I saw that Tad had staggered back; he
fell, but he was alive, shouting: “Jeff! Look out--run!”
Rhana whirled at me. I fired again. The flash was reflected upward; the
room ceiling reddened for an instant where it struck.
“Run, Jeff!”
Tad was on his knees. I leaped forward--and struck the radiance
surrounding Rhana as though it were a solid wall. A wall of vibration.
The flesh of my arm burned; my robe shriveled about me. I was dashed
back and fell; my weapon clattered to the floor.
Rhana had ignored my attack. An instant only she stooped over the
table, then she turned from the instruments. I caught a glimpse of her
face. Her lips were parted in a mocking smile. She went past Tad and
me before we could rise; she caught up her cloak, went through the
doorway. The metal door closed upon us.
Failure! It pounded at my heart--failure now at the last!
I was striving to get up.
“Jeff--you all right?”
Tad got to his feet, wavering, almost falling again. I stood with him
in a moment, stood shaking. My left arm hung limp and my legs were
almost unable to hold me. The smell of burned flesh, noisome, was heavy
about us. My arm was burned; Tad was scorched. Both our robes were
shriveled and charred about us.
We lurched to where Entt lay huddled on the floor, then I pulled Tad
away.
“Dead?” he asked.
I gasped. “Yes--don’t look, Tad. His face--burned where she struck
him--it’s--too badly burned.”
Thank God he was dead!
Failure! It pounded at us, beyond thought of Entt, or ourselves. These
gates, this torrent!
The mechanism lay inert where Rhana had demolished it. But more than
that--
“Jeff, listen! Good God!”
Monstrous roar and surge of the water. But there were other sounds in
it now--a muffled rumbling, far away, a vague blended rumble, crashing,
tearing, as of great mountains of rock split and torn and moved away.
It was growing into a tumult--sweeping nearer, louder.
“Jeff!”
The window by the broken mechanism was closed; but its heavy pane
was transparent. We could see the dam through it. A mile away, as we
stared, a great segment of metal moved outward, broke and fell into the
torrent. The dam was crumbling!
A snapping violet light, huge as a rainbow, was out there, darting
along the wall as far as we could see into the distance--a powder train
of light, laid by the Gians, which now Rhana had released. It ate and
tore and ripped at the wall. Another segment crumbled and fell--a
mountain of metal rock, instantly engulfed by the greater surge of
water from behind it; engulfed and flung down and lost as though it
were a pebble.
The seething white abyss was visibly higher now. In ten minutes more it
would be up here to the gate-house level, its backed-up water surging
into the dark realm of the monsters, surging everywhere.
“Tad--it’s breaking!” Was that my voice, so calm in the midst of a
cataclysm like this? “Breaking, Tad. We can’t do anything about it.
Just get out of here--”
His eyes were big, luminous as torches; his white face expressionless
with the shock of it.
Failure!
“Yes, Jeff. We’d better get away.”
The window near the broken mechanism was closed by its heavy thick
pane. We found now that the other window was closed! And the door!
We pulled at them. With all our shattered strength we tore at them.
Futile! We were trapped. A metal cage, now, this little house clinging
to the rocks, with the mounting torrent already risen almost to engulf
it!