From the ranks of the Banibaleers, four men threw their daggers. The weapons wobbled uncertainly, not made for throwing. But two of them found their mark in Hankins' back.

  The writhing figures dropped on the snow, rolled against each other like some grotesque pair of unearthly lovers. The wires grew over them both, using their flesh to support extensions, whining, swaying, seeking

  In time, the machine was as dead as the men it had killed.

  14

  The windbreakers were taken down and packed away.

  A party was detailed to scoop out hollows in the snow, while a second party dropped twenty-four human corpses into the depressions and scooped loose snow over them. In time, they would be encased in ice, as fitting a grave for a mountaineer as any.

  The huddled, nightmare forms of Cartier, Zito and Hankins were left untouched.

  At Daborot's insistence, the men were fed, though no one had much of an appetite that morning. A bit of bread, some coffee, a little cheese, and a healthy dollop of brandy was the average lunch. No one, for some reason only partially understood, wished to partake of the salted beef jerky.

  Commander Richter pulled on the tough bread and looked down into the swirling mists and snow through which they must travel in the hours ahead of them.

  The Shaker said: Eternal fidelity cannot exist, of course.

  Richter said: Of course.

  The Shaker: No man is eternal.

  Richter: Sometimes, I feel that I am.

  The Shaker: And circumstances affect fidelity.

  Richter: Perhaps the knowledge of the Blank-perhaps it was not meant for us.

  The Shaker: For Jerry Matabain, then? You see, nothing matters more than knowledge.

  Richter: Love, family, children, freedom, peace.

  The Shaker: Ah, but all of them fall victim to the man with a little knowledge. With knowledge, he can take your woman from you. With knowledge, he can destroy your family and leave only ashes. With knowledge, your children can become his slaves, your freedom can become the product of his whim, and your peace will be shattered by his lust for war.

  Richter: You make me pessimistic.

  The Shaker: Not I. The world.

  And then they went down, hand-over-hand, piton-by-piton, foot-by-foot, into warmer climes where they spent a night without terror. And on the evening of the following day, they passed the frost line and changed into cooler clothes as the mysterious lands of the continent's heart opened to receive them

  BOOK TWO

  The East

  15

  Forty-two men and four dark-feathered Squealers constituted all the living creatures within the Darklands expeditionary force as Commander Richter brought them, at last, to the dense jungles which they had observed ever since they had come out of the mists on the eastern side of the Cloud Range. They crossed more than a mile of open, stony ground where rocks thrust up like fragments of broken urns and shattered bottles, and at last they reached the almost impenetrable, steamy richness of the rain forest. All of this was accomplished at double the average marching pace, for the commander feared that the Oragonians might be running patrols of the no-man's land between jungle and mountains in their aircraft. They might have a contingency plan in operation to cover the eventuality of their assassins-Cartier and Zito Tanisha-meeting with failure. Forty-two men and four birds would be easy targets in open country for men riding in aircraft.

  In the winding vines and ropy, exposed roots of the towering, interlocking trees, they huddled in the dense blue shadows and broke open the mess supplies for a meal of chocolate, dried beef and dried fruit, coffee and some brandy.

  It was two hours early for supper, but the commander had decided that appetites came second to the safety of his men. The way ahead looked rugged, and he wanted them to be full and energized for the next leg of the trek. Also, he hoped to make a good many miles before camp, even if it meant marching until darkness barred any further progress.

  And darkness came early here, in the shadow of the great mountains to the west.

  It was not that he was in such a hurry to find the place to the north-two hundred miles east of the Oragonia High Cut-where the enemy was mining the treasures of the Blank, though he certainly did wish to fulfill his mission. No, what plagued him more was the urgency to be gone from this open ground, to be secreted as deeply as possible in these thickly growing trees and ferns, these vines and flowers that barred their way but would part before them. If a patrol plane cruised over their exit point from the Cloud Range, found their path, trackers might be set upon their trail; the more jungle between the Oragonian hunters and themselves, the better their chances of survival.

  And now that he had lost more than half his men, now that his own and-figuratively-the General's son had died under his command, only the eventual success of his mission could redeem him. And even that would not erase the screams he had heard these last days. Even that would not erase from his memory the sight of the men falling from that rope across the chasm, the sight of slit throats and dead men whom he had known as friends and almost as sons. Those things would remain with him; he could only accept them and go on if he had eventual success with General Dark's plan.

  The world, as Shaker Sandow had said, had made him pessimistic. Maybe he could force it to give him his optimism back.

  Shaker Sandow sat down on the cool carpet of ferns before Richter, looked around at the verdant landscape. A geographic impossibility, wouldn't you say? he asked.

  Richter noticed how the old Shaker's fatigue seemed to have disappeared. Out of the mountains and the cold, finally in the east where knowledge waited, Sandow was almost young again. I hadn't noticed, he said.

  Here we are but a short distance from the frost line of the Cloud Range, from a climate of snow and wind and ice. Less than half a day's travel, even by foot. And yet we find ourselves in a tropical world of palm trees and what appear to be orchids. I have only seen pictures in old books and stories about the flowers of the Salamanthe Islands, but I would say this is much like the land about the equator: humid, heavily grown, with its own breed of animals and insects. Geographically, such a closeness of opposite climes is impossible.

  Yet it's here, Richter pointed out.

  Aye, and I've been attempting to discover why.

  And what have you found?

  In the jungle, strange birds called in ululating lullabies to each other while others squealed atonally and rustled in the high branches.

  Sandow placed the palm of his hand against the earth after brushing away the ferns that obscured it. Richter followed suit, looked perplexed a moment. It feels warm. But should that be unusual in a warm place such as this?

  It is unusual, Sandow said, when you compare it to the earth only ten feet farther on-there where nothing grows but a few mutant ferns that haven't adapted.

  What is the difference? Richter asked.

  There, Sandow said, the earth is cool, almost chilly. I traced the temperature change and found a precise line where the warmth ceases altogether and where the cold begins. There is no melding space at all.

  And what do you make of that? the commander asked, genuinely interested.

  Almost too interested, Sandow thought, in such a minor mystery as this. To the Shaker, the old officer's motives were plainly obvious. In his desperation to forget the dead they had left behind them-the slit-throat boys buried in the snow and all the others back to Stanton's Inn where it had begun-Richter grasped at any diversion in order to remove the memories from the fore of his mind. It was a standard method of overcoming grief, of forgetting tragedy. If it should continue more than a day or two, however, it could swiftly become a psychosis that would endanger all the men in the expedition; Richter needed to be awake and alert with no regrets and no sorrows to dull the edge of his normally sharp mind.

  It seems to me, Sandow said, turning his thoughts again to the earth and the jungle, that there is a heat source of some kind beneath the ground here which supports the tropical plants and animals, even through the winter months-though the top-most branches of the trees probably get frostbitten, wilt and die.

  Artificial? Richter asked.

  Perhaps. Or maybe natural conditions. One mystery would be as great as the other.

  Do you think it would be of interest to us to attempt to unearth this heat source? Richter asked, brushing at the rich, black soil beneath the ferns.

  Even if it were possible, Sandow said, I doubt that it would be worth our time. It was just an incongruity which I thought would-

  At that moment, the Squealer keeper, Fremlin, approached them and interrupted the quiet conversation. He looked keyed-up, his eyes bright, and his slim but powerful hands busy in each other, his fingers locking and unlocking, pulling at one another with his overabundance of nervous energy.

  Yes, Fremlin? the commander asked.

  The Squealers, sir. I've already eaten, and I've had time to speak with them, to give them their orders. Do you think I could turn them loose now and set them about their work?

  I suppose they're anxious, eh?

  Aye, that they are, Commander. They're cursing at me with some of the words they've learned off the men, because they want to be gone.

  Very well, Richter said.

  Thank you, sir! Fremlin said, turning and walking off toward the cages where the four black mites waited, making strange, low chortling sounds among themselves.

  Wait there! Shaker Sandow called to the fair, well-muscled bird master. Could I come along to watch?

  Fremlin was glad for an audience and nodded approval as he continued on toward the birds.

  At the cages, the Squealer master knelt and cooed to his charges in soft, pleasant tones that reminded the Shaker of wind blowing against the open ends of bottles or of long, hollow pipes.

  How many will you send? he asked Fremlin.

  Just two, Fremlin replied. I never risk them all at once. Besides, two will do sufficiently.

  He opened the wicker cage to his left, and the two black creatures hopped out, scratched at the earth with their three-toed feet, fluffed their feathers and shook themselves, as if getting accustomed to the world outside the cage. At some unseen and unheard direction from their master, they leaped onto his arms, one perched on each wrist, and clung there as he turned to the jungle and issued some last word of advice. Then they were gone in a flapping, brilliant display of smooth aerodynamics, up, up and over the roof of the rain forest, away from the eyes of the men below.

  Fremlin watched even after there was nothing to see, then returned to the two birds in the other cage and spoke with them, consoling them for the necessity of sending only two and not all four.

  When he came to the Shaker, he said, They hate the cages. It worries my heart to keep them there. Yet they were safer there in the mountains than they would have been on their own in those turbulent high altitude air streams. And down here Well, who knows what sort of predator might lurk in those trees? Again, the cage is better. At home, beyond the Banibals in the Darklands, I let them fly loose by the cliffs, along the sea, and that makes them ever so much happier.

  What will those two do now that you've released them? Sandow asked.

  The commander wants to know how far the jungle extends to the north, how long it will offer cover to our march. They'll fly over the top of the trees, unless it seems to be too long a stretch. If they do not see some sort of end to it in short order, they'll fly high enough to look down and make an estimate of its size. Higher than we were when we came out of the mists on the Cloud Range.

  May I stay to hear them speak of it when they return? The Shaker had spent some time with Fremlin and the birds on the first leg of the trek, hoping the creatures would get to know him and trust him.

  I think so, Fremlin said. But we'll see for certain when they come back. I cannot always tell when they are ready to give their confidence to a stranger.

  The two dark mites returned in short order, not fifteen minutes after their release. Which means, Fremlin said as they soared in toward him, that they could have been back in five minutes. After being cooped as they were, they surely took an extra ten minutes of flight just for the joy of it. They settled on his arms with the grace and gentleness of two tufts of cotton, pecked at their shiny feathers with their red and orange beaks, their crimson face swaths seeming to ripple as some hidden muscles did some unknown work beneath.

  Will you speak before the Shaker? he asked them.

  Both birds cocked their heads toward Sandow, examined him with small, coal-dust eyes.

  I am a friend, Sandow said.

  Weeewill, weeewill, the Squealers affirmed in a whining imitation of English. Heees good freeend of feethered peepoleee

  Tell me then, Fremlin said, nuzzling them with his face, like another man might nuzzle his lover's breasts.

  The creatures began a warbling, high-pitched conversation, sometimes speaking at once, sometimes one at a time. Their language was composed of trills and ripples, ascensions of the musical scale that stung the ear with their abruptness, descents of the same scale that sounded like the dying cries of animals.

  Sandow could see why they had come to be known as Squealers. If one did not listen closely to the fantastic intricacy of the sounds they made, one might only hear a high-pitched squeal that sometimes rose and fell but was no more than the dumb sonorous cry of an animal. But it was not dumb. The intricacy, the complex arrangements of sounds, gave indication of a language every bit as complicated as the one the Shaker spoke or the one the Salamanthe Island people spoke. Perhaps even more complicated, since the combinations of the sounds were not the only things which gave meaning to what was said. As Fremlin had told him, the musical key in which a word was spoken by the Squealers was indication of an altogether different meaning for that word, so that they had a grammar not only of syllables, but of tones.

  In time, the birds ceased their discourse and returned to pecking at themselves and to cooing quietly to each other and to the other pair of flyers which had been restrained all this while in their cage.

  Quite a strange report, Fremlin said, his brow furrowed.

  How so?

  They say the jungle is a perfect circle, Fremlin said.

  Perfect? Have they any conception of that word's meaning in our language?

  Yes, Shaker. Of course, they speak in generalizations when they use it now. But what they mean is that this jungle before us is, to the eye, as perfect a circle as you or I could imagine. Their sight is far more critical than ours.

  Sandow's heart beat a little faster, and his spine was swept its length with a shivering sense of expectancy. Ahead lay the unknown and the keys to unlock all these secret places. It fits with what I said to the commander just before you came to us a while ago. This jungle, I am convinced, is artificially contained. For what purpose and by whom, I cannot guess. But this report from your feathered charges goes a long way toward proving my suppositions.

  There's more yet, Fremlin said.

  The birds chortled.

  They speak of a part of the jungle which is crystalized. They speak of trees with leaves like lacy sugar works, with boles like compacted diamonds. They speak of plants the color and the texture of crushed rubies and emeralds. They say the jungle has a diameter of five miles and that the northern mile and a half is all constructed of the most marvelous gems we might wish to see.

  They do not lie? Sandow asked.

  Fremlin looked hurt.

  Forgive, please, Sandow said. I am foolish. Of course they do not lie. What would they have to gain from it? But we must get this information to the commander. And we must get moving. I want to see this marvel by this day's light and not by tomorrow's sun!

  16

  They progressed in an odd and ungainly manner, though none of the trouble they put themselves to was wasted. Rather than use their two machetes immediately and hack their way into the dark heart of the rain forest, they split into five groups and paralleled each other with six feet between the lines. They climbed over the snaking boles that wound across the fertile earth, wriggled through patches of dense ferns and snatching, semi-sentient vines whose green tendrils more than once ensnared a man beyond the point where he could struggle free on his own. They helped one another, moved some thousand feet from the jungle's edge only with a great deal of effort. There, Richter called them together into one group, where they formed a single line and began using the machetes, clearing a path before them. But when they had gone only another thousand feet, the old officer ordered the original five lines formed again, and again they moved out without leaving much if any trail behind them. Even if trackers picked up their path a thousand feet into the forest, they would not be able to follow it and swiftly overtake the Darklands unit.