A Call to Darkness - Michael Jan Friedman [55]
The sky above the structure was dirty, the terrain around it dull and colorless. Altogether, not a cheerful picture.
He hadn’t seen the figures on the wall for quite some time-not since their path had twisted down and then up again in their approach to the place. From the drivers’ present perspective, someone would have had to poke their head over the edge of the barrier to be seen.
But the last glimpse he’d gotten of them had been curious indeed. For they had been dressed in hard, bulky garb-not at all like the plain homespun the drivers wore. And their faces were obscured by some sort of half-masked headgear.
Why? What for? Not against the weather, certainly; the drivers weren’t freezing even in their simple tunics and cloaks. For protection, then? Against what?
Picard considered those questions in the light of last night’s discussion with Ralak’kai. After most of the drivers had gone to sleep, huddled against their wagons or whatever better shelter they could find, he and the goldeneyed one had stirred the fire’s embers and talked.
“But why, Picard? Why would anyone live in so isolated a place? There are no rivers to nurture it, no fertile fields, no forests full of game. It is as desolate a location as one can imagine. So I ask you again: why?”
Picard had shrugged. “Perhaps whoever lives there has been isolated for a reason. Perhaps they are… diseased. Or deranged. Or in some other way dangerous to a larger population.” He’d grunted. “Not a happy prospect for us, eh?”
“No. Not a happy prospect at all.” Ralak’kai had paused then, peering in the direction of their destination-though one couldn’t see much under the overcast sky. “And yet, my friend, I don’t think it’s here for any of those reasons. I have a feeling that there’s another purpose to it entirely.”
“Such as?”
“You saw those figures on the wall, didn’t you? They seemed to be guarding something, did they not?”
“Yes. They did.”
“They were looking outward-not inward. As if they were more concerned about someone coming in than someone going out.”
“I noticed that-but I believed it was us they were looking for. In anticipation of the supplies we’re carrying. Or just for the sake of something to do.”
At the time, Ralak’kai had nodded and said no more. That explanation had appeared to make sense.
Now, Picard wasn’t so sure.
He was less than a hundred meters from the gates, and still they remained closed. If there had been a sense of anticipation about the supply train’s arrival, wouldn’t someone have come out by now to hail them? At the very least, would the gates not have swung aside to give them access?
Unless Ralak’kai had been correct, and that which the sentinels were guarding against was outside the walls. Suddenly uneasy, Picard took a quick took around. But there was nothing dangerous to be found. No wild animals, no weather aberrations.
There weren’t even any marshals in the vicinity.
Turning his attention to the edifice again, he noticed something else. The stones immediately around the gates were scarred-as if someone had struck them repeatedly with something hard and sharp and heavy. In fact, as he got closer, he saw that the gates themselves were marked with any number of dents and more than a couple of sizable depressions. Without question, someone had been trying to get into this place.
That would make it a fortress-wouldn’t it? An installation designed to defend against hostile forces.
The more Picard thought about it, the more that sounded right. After all, there could hardly be a site easier to safeguard against an enemy. Nothing but sheer slopes and precipices all about, and the only approach a narrow one-much to the drivers’ chagrin.
But if all this were true, what was the fortress guarding? Surely, not territory. This was the far end of the valley, a cul-de-sac.
Something inside, then? A treasure of sorts, which could not be guarded as well in the midst of